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I am going to let my daughter live her own life and she can be whoever she wants to be, as long as she becomes the most successful comedian in the world and wins all the celebrity versions of TV quiz shows. Not for her own sake, but to make up for my failure in both arenas. And once she’s done that she’s free to be a vet or a princess or whatever daft shit she thinks is a useful way to spend her limited time on this dying planet.
In preparation for this I have set up a rigorous training process. The morning and lunchtime is taken up with me teaching her how to blow raspberries and pull funny faces and other simplistic jokes, such as repeating something ad nauseum as if that alone is amusing and enough to sustain a career. She has come up with jokes of her own. When we give her one of her little baby-wotsit crisps, she likes to hold these up to whoever is giving them to her, as if she is going to let them have a bite, and then at the last minute pull it away and eat it herself. This is a brilliant joke and she finds it hilarious (and laughing at your own jokes is the first step in becoming a top comedian) and I am proud of her for coming up with that without any assistance. She showed she is going to be a comedian with hidden depths, capable of putting together a 60 minute show full of laughs, but then being touching and poignant today. She held up the wotsit to me and then when I went to bite it she let me do that. On one hand this looked like a wonderful moment of love, where she had learned to share and didn’t want to pull the crisp away from her brilliant dad, which was very moving. But on the other hand, it had been in her mouth already and I was expecting her to pull it away, but instead ended up with a mouthful of bland baby crisp and sticky baby dribble. She’s working this thing on a lot of levels.
In the afternoon when I should be playing with her and educating her, I sit her down to watch as many TV quiz shows as possible. That can sometimes start as early as 1000 Heartbeats, a new quiz hosted by Vernon Kay in which you have to answer as many questions as possible within 1000 beats of your own heart, thus punishing the nervous and stupid at the same time. Today a policeman was totally unable to work out the correct time on a mirror image of a clock. It was disturbing to think that he might have put some people in prison based on his observation and logic skills.
Then comes Tipping Point, which I have mocked a bit in RHLSTP but which is becoming required viewing for me now. It’s great to add a random element of gravity into a quiz to give thick people a chance of winning, which they often do. Especially as the machine tends to pay out more later in a round after the clever people have answered all the questions they’re allowed. But maybe that proves the thick people are cleverer after all, because if the clever people were so clever they would wait until the end, the comparatively intelligent idiots.The awkward bit where they all have to commentate on what they think might happen in a random event and pretend to be delighted by the ridiculous fortune of the people they’re competing with, takes on a Beckett-like quality over a dozen or so episodes. I think Ben Shepherd might be better than Shakespeare.
At the moment Phoebe mainly enjoys waving at the contestants and clapping when the audience clap, but quiz show tactics and answers must be seeping in by osmosis.
Today we got in Pointless as well, which is justly her favourite and it proved to be pretty much the perfect show for me - if only I could have got this run of questions when I was on. Even one of the subjects on the final board was Monty Python (though I was surprised that seemingly I’d never learned the cheese shop sketch off by heart, because I struggled to recall any of them (but did recall the pointless Danish Blue). I will never have a coveted Pointless trophy, but as long as Osman and Armstrong can keep this going for another 16 or so years, I am sure my daughter will.
We didn’t watch Eggheads though. We’re not fucking idiots.
If you want to be in with a chance of winning the very golden plastic crown that I wore in the Lord of the Dance Settee photoshoot, plus definitely receive a DVD of the show, plus 134 minutes of video extras and nearly 9 hours of audio, then simply order a copy here before the end of Friday and you have a roughly 300 to one chance of getting it. There are also free Lord of the Dance stickers for the first load of people who buy the discs (whilst stocks last, but there’s quite a few of them) and if you want the programme for the show you will also be making a donation to SCOPE, so do that (cos the programme is really good too). Or if you don’t want to give any money to SCOPE, hang out at my house on bin day and you’ll be able to pick up about 300 free copies a week in the recycling.
Do check out all of the gofasterstripe stuff, especially the sale items. Some great gifts for comedy nerds or for people who think all the best comedians are on TV and need to be reeducated.
