There’s about to be a change on The Blank Page. Don’t worry, it’s nothing major. I’m not about to start blogging only in Wingdings or turn this whole thing into a either raging diatribe on why I should run the world or why old Thomas the Tank Engine will always be superior to its modern incarnation. Although, for the record, I think I’d make a pretty good world leader. But don’t we all, right?
Read MoreAs I got older, my comedy compass shifted. Sometimes through the influence of friends, sometimes through late night TV surfing. I got into the uncomfortable pleasure of watching Alan Partridge fail and fail again. I saw Chris Morris skewer the world around him whilst he kept a sharp, straight face. Seinfeld and Sanders showed me how America was warping the formula its past masters had perfected. Whilst here Father Ted, Darkplace and Spaced were all merrily making up their own rules, breaking ground for an incoming flood of new comedy.
Read MoreOkay, I want to talk about something in particular this week. Only, in order to do that, I need to make confession before we go any further. Are you ready? This isn’t going to be easy for me.
Here goes nothing…
There really is no surface quite as slippery as the blank page. Which is not great when you consider we’re completely surrounded by them at this time of year. There are blank calendars wherever we look, showing all those unwritten days we’re going to fill, whether we like it or not. I hate any new calendar or diary for that. They always seem to offer undiscovered territory. Yours to claim. They’re a map of potential, in that moment you open them, at least. Of course, once you finally start using them, all you really mark down are trips to the dentist and occasional family gatherings.
Read MoreThings are getting hectic, they always do at this time of year. It’s like being trapped on a merry go round that refuses to slow down. Every time we ask someone to apply the brakes, it only accelerates. Sure, there are festive lights and catchy tunes circling around us, but this close to the event horizon of Christmas Day it all starts to get out of hand. The music deafens us. The motion makes us feel ill. The horses under us start to leer and grin as it all lurches past our control.
There are cards to write, presents to deliver. There’s food to hunt and gather, sometimes against shoppers who are racing against the exact same clock as us to the exact same shelf for the exact same final box of stuffing. The season of goodwill can get pretty nasty down a supermarket aisle.
It won’t be a long one this week. It can’t be. It’s been a long week. It’s been a tough week. Last Saturday, after spending a thoroughly brilliant day at a wedding, Sam and I got back to our hotel and logged online to find out one of our closest friends had died.
Read MoreI don’t know about you, but I think there are two kinds of people in the world when it comes to music. Never mind which genre you chose to set up your base camp. Never mind what you’re currently listening to or what you truly detest. The way I see it, you either grew up listening to the same music as your parents or you immediately turned your nose up at it. In some cases, you might keep the same taste as your parents. In other cases, you might rebel against it as soon as your friends snigger at the music they find lying around in your bedroom.
Read MoreI only book a stay at The Overlook Hotel occasionally. Every visit always leaves me with a different souvenir. I go in with pieces of the mystery set firmly in my head, ready to help me decrypt what I’m seeing. The native American mythology. The reference to The Donner Party. The many, many other theories the truly mind-bending documentary Room 237 has implanted into my thinking. Regardless of those intentions, by the time I get to the end I’m always too unnerved to think past the overwhelming sense of escape.
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