What the fuck? Another day off. I almost felt like a human being by the end of it. And on Wednesday I am in
Tring which is in the same county that I now live in. So this is going to be very close to feeling like a week at home.
My latest
Metro column came out today. I seem to be getting mainly positive feedback on these, though a Jeremy Clarkson fan and a Tory Councillor on Twitter opined that I wasn't funny. Which is as close as receiving an offical stamp saying that I am doing something right. The Clarkson fan told me that I had never made him laugh, whilst Clarkson always did (though to be fair I had only said I didn't want to fraternise with Jeremy, which might have been down to the fact that I was intimidated by the way he showed me up as a comedian), so I replied "Sorry that I insulted your boyfriend." I thought that the complainant would like that, as it's the kind of joke they do on Top Gear - there is nothing funnier than insinuating that someone is a homosexual, whilst confirming that you're definitely not homosexual yourself (isn't that essentially what Top Gear is all about and I would argue any interest in cars beyond them as functional machines probably demonstrates repression of some kind). Indeed he replied "Ha fucking Ha". I made him laugh twice. And also swear. I have learned from the master.
I enjoy it when people feel the need to tell me personally that they don't find me funny, as if they are assuming that I think everyone thinks I am brilliant. I don't. So individuals informing me of their ambivalence or antipathy are wasting their time. If you want me to stop being a comedian then all I will accept is a legal document signed by every human being on the planet telling me I am not amusing and should stop trying. Whilst just one person is laughing at my stuff (aside from myself - I think I am a hoot) I will continue. As I think the snooker podcasts clearly show. Talking of which,
Frame 13 is now up at the British Comedy Guide and on iTunes. This might be the last for a while as I now have no accessible snooker table, but we might find some way around that.
By the way I will also give up being a comedian if you can organise a legal document signed by everyone in the world saying that I am the funniest person they have ever seen. I am only doing this job to annoy and upset people. If you really want to piss me off you have to praise me, whilst revealing that you are the kind of fucking idiot who would become a Tory Councillor or thinks that Top Gear is the height of wit or doesn't think a man playing himself at snooker constitutes entertainment or who likes Stewart Lee (he's just the left wing Clarkson). Like an alien invasion I can only be destroyed by love.... or the common cold... or a computer virus combined with a nuclear bomb. Those are my three Achilles heels. That and having three heels. Those are my four Achilles heels. It's a bugger trying to buy Achilles shoes.
I was back in London town today and picked up our wedding rings (now engraved with our initials and a date that is not too far in the future). So that's really happening then! I was meant to look at the engraving inside the ring through a little magnifying glass thing, but to be honest I couldn't really see much. Afterwards I realised that I was probably meant to hold the lens up to my eye, like jewellers do in films, but I just waved it around a bit. The lady in the shop didn't say anything. It's probably considered bad form to call their customers fucking idiots, even if you've already got their money. My main worry was that I would lose the rings at some point during the rest of the day, because my life is a sitcom written by an unimaginative and lazy writer and that's just the obvious thing to do. I would then either have to cover up by buying another pair of rings or more likely try to substitute some cheap rings out of a machine dispensing toys and try and convince my fiancee that these were the ones we bought.
Luckily I managed to get the rings back to Harpenden safe and sound, but there's still a month for something to go wrong (and for full comedic impact the rings should be lost on our wedding day) and even afterwards that ring is something I have to look after for the rest of my life, so there is a million opportunities for it to get lost of damaged (my mum lost her wedding ring in a swimming pool in France, so the slapstick sitcom Herring family have form - though I seem to remember that that wasn't a very funny occurrence, so my writer was on usual misjudged and shit form).
These rings you have when you get married are quite unusual possessions, as the chances are (as long as they and your love remain not lost) they will be passed down to future generations once you're gone, perhaps becoming the possessions of people who don't even exist yet. They might get thrown into the sea as a symbolic gesture of the failure of the marriage and they might get buried with you, I suppose, but they might get bequeathed to our sexcrement or sold on to a stranger. Mine will doubtless end up in the Richard Herring Museum where my life and achievements will be honoured by generations of grateful future humans. But it's pretty sure that these rings will outlive the fleshy fingers that they will encircle and one day be around fingers that don't yet exist.
My mum's one is probably being worn by some French person right now, or stuck in the overflow pipe of a swimming pool. You can't guess where the future will take them. Which makes them the best symbol of marriage yet.
