I got serenaded at the gas station today. For realsies.

I pumped gas.


He pumped gas.


I smiled.


He smiled.


He broke out into a rousing rendition of, “When a Man Loves a Woman.”


I pumped gas.

He finished singing.


I went home.

All in all, a strange day.

Writing comedy is hard.

For me it’s hard, at least. Probably for people like JonnyB it’s brilliantly easy. I bet that joke ideas come to JonnyB as if by magic. I think that fairies probably bring them down to him in little joke-sized cases, complete with glitter and sparkles and the sound of bells.

But for me it’s hard.

There are no fairies with joke-sized cases in my comedy-writing life. No glitter, no sparkles, no sound of bells.

Instead, I have a notebook. A Blue Notebook. And anybody that thinks that a Blue Notebook is a fair trade for glitter and bells should be punched in the head and forced to drink hair tonic.

And in this Blue Notebook, I write joke ideas. Things that, for the 37 seconds it takes to write them down, seem like PURE GENIUS.

These joke ideas are not PURE GENIUS. For, you see, once I get through my 37-second delusional period, the vast majority of these ideas will never, ever seem funny again. They shall never make it into my comedy routine and the Blue Notebook shall be their home for life.

Tonight, my friends (or JonnyB’s friends, to be more exact,) I give you bits and pieces of comedy that didn’t make the cut. Joke out-takes per se.

These are actual sentences pulled directly from the Blue Notebook:

On catch and release fishing:
“Oh, never mind the giant hook you stuck in my neck. I’m just glad you’re havin’ a good time.”

On why we eat beef:
“Cows? They have six stomachs, for the love of God. If you met a woman with six stomachs, you’d kill and eat her too.”

On commercials that irritate me:
“Raisin Bran needs to stop bragging about how many raisins they have in their cereal. They’re called Raisin Bran; we expect them to have raisins. Now if they advertised, ‘Raisin Bran, now with two scoops of cocaine,’ that would be a commercial worth airing.”

On video games:
“Some murderers have recently claimed that constantly playing violent video games motivated them to kill people. I, on the other hand, have watched the Food Network for hours on end and have never once been motivated to cook anything other than Top Ramen and Pop Tarts. I guess some people are more easily motivated than others.”

On cannibalism
“If I was a cannibal, I’d definitely eat Roseanne Barr before I’d eat Rudy from the Cosby Show. That’s just the way it is.”

Since I write about ten Nearly-Jokes for every Real-Life-Joke, I have rather a full Blue Notebook. Doesn’t seem like the most efficient way of writing, really. But, I can’t really think of a better way.

Well, until the fairies come.

If blogsitting is anything like babysitting, then I’m a little fearful that I’ll be the kind of irresponsible sitter who has a drunken party in the house while the parents are away.

A drunken party where someone will, assuredly, urinate off the balcony and vomit in the fishbowl.

And the parents will come back after a long, hard night of having cocktails with their friends and laughing about how their once-hot friend Lois got really fat and all the botox in the world won’t cover it up.

These, the very parents who diligently checked my references and made sure that I was not a crack-user or a prostitute or a unicyclist or anything weird like that.

And they will see their house in shambles. They will see urine on the balcony. They will see vomit in the fishbowl. They will see an EXTREMELY unhappy fish. And they will say to themselves, “Why did we ever let HER babysit?”

This is what I fear.

Hi, I’m Jill. I’ll be your blogsitter for the week. Thank you to JonnyB for the kind introduction. Please try not to throw up in the fishbowl. Thank you.

If blogsitting is anything like babysitting, then I’m a little fearful that I’ll be the kind of irresponsible sitter who has a drunken party in the house while the parents are away.

A drunken party where someone will, assuredly, urinate off the balcony and vomit in the fishbowl.

And the parents will come back after a long, hard night of having cocktails with their friends and laughing about how their once-hot friend Lois got really fat and all the botox in the world won’t cover it up.

These, the very parents who diligently checked my references and made sure that I was not a crack-user or a prostitute or a unicyclist or anything weird like that.

And they will see their house in shambles. They will see urine on the balcony. They will see vomit in the fishbowl. They will see an EXTREMELY unhappy fish. And they will say to themselves, “Why did we ever let HER babysit?”

This is what I fear.

Hi, I’m Jill. I’ll be your blogsitter for the week. Thank you to JonnyB for the kind introduction. Please try not to throw up in the fishbowl. Thank you.

I pack my suitcase!!!

I am off to attend an Important Scientific Conference overseas!!!

Well actually it is the LTLP who is going to the conference, but I will be accompanying her to the functions in the evening, including the Gala Dinner. This is reassuring for her. It is a bit like when the Queen goes away abroad, she has the rock solid support of the Duke of Edinburgh beside her, always knowing the appropriate thing to say etc.

Already I am a bit intimidated as I have had to pack a shirt and tie for the dinner, as I do not possess a white lab coat. But I am interested in hearing what the scientists’ latest ideas and theories are, especially on whether we can expect any good to come out of the new series of Dr. Who.

I will also get some time on my own to potter around the city. I have been to Rome before, and what I remember is not to bother to go out on Sunday, as the whole city is shut for religious reasons. Fortunately, there is nothing at all likely to happen in Rome over the next few days that would cause shops, tourist attractions etc to close their doors and the city not to be a fun place.

Looking after the blog in my absence will be very funny American comedian Jill Twiss.

She is a writer and stand-up, and well worth catching live if you can. You can get a flight from Heathrow to New York really cheap these days, and the places she performs are just a cab ride from the airport there, so you could be back in the UK before you get shot or catch obesity.

Plus the BBC is now banned from bidding for expensive foreign imports, so I got her on the cheap.

See you in a week or so.

Friday brought the official opening ceremony of the pub next door.

(I should recap for new readers – my next-door neighbour, Short Tony, has converted his dining room into a pub).

(I should elaborate on that. It’s not really a pub as such. It’s a dining room with a couple of pub-like trappings, like a dartboard and some ‘toilets’ and ‘opening hours’ notices. As a pub, it’s a bit like when you’re a kid and get a Batman costume – it makes you look like a kid dressed up as Batman rather than literally turning you into Adam West, the caped crusader. But it’s fun, and you can play at being Batman, especially if your dad’s got a black car.)

Big A turned up with a sign he’d got made up. ‘The Short Man – Free House’ it read. The image showed a ‘Usual Suspects’ style lineup image, with our heads superimposed on the three male models that had posed for the original picture he’d nicked it from.

My head had been done too large in proportion to the body. I was cross about this as it spoilt the sign completely, but I didn’t like to ask him to redo it or to point out that it made him look foolish as actually I have quite a normal-sized head.

It is very handy having a pub next door, but I felt a pang of guilt as I popped in to the real Village Pub for a pint. I haven’t been in there for ages, mainly due to illness, and they have definitely missed me, as they have moved my usual stool.

I made a resolution to go in there more often, for the sake of the community. I must use it or lose it.

Even though the Short Man offers me free drink, darts and bags of peanuts that when you pull them off the rack gradually reveal a scantily clad lady.

“You have got your keys, haven’t you?”

“Oh yes.”

“I mean, you have definitely, definitely, honestly, totally got your keys?”

“Yes.”

“Show me your keys?”

[rattle rattle, search search] – “Here.”

I don’t know what sixth sense tells me that the LTLP will have a problem with her keys. In truth, I am a bit cross. If I am to go home to bed early (midnight) because I don’t feel well, it would seem reasonable for everybody else to stop enjoying themselves as well.

In Victorian times she would legally have had to follow me home, as she would have been my property. Then I could beat her with a big stick (not bigger than the width of my thumb, that would have been illegal and cruel). But no more. Truly my rights and liberties of hundreds of years have been steadily eroded away.

“Another whisky?” I hear drunk Short Tony offer as I leave the house. In Victorian times I would have been able to slap him round the face with a black glove and challenge him to a duel with muskets for staying up with my LTLP whilst I had a bad cold.

But I don’t pursue the matter, and stomp home to bed.

It is 2.30am when the constant doorbell ringing wakes me up. I go to the door in my pants and slippers, very cross indeed.

The LTLP staggers in, like a character Hogarth would have airbrushed out for being too likely to frighten the children.

I stand at the door shivering, the snow blowing in on me. “Come out,” I order.

Short Tony appears from behind the coal bunker, looking furtive. He clearly is thinking hard about what to say. Then he comes out with it – a phrase that haunts me in its indecipherable mysteriousness.

“Angus Deayton!!!” he cries in anguish. “ANGUS DEAYTON!!!”.

And he runs off into the night.

I boggle at him as he disappears into the snow. In Victorian times I would have been able to get him LOCKED UP in a FUCKING LOONY BIN for this. I am always very careful in my secret diary to be respectful and nice to the people who I share the village with. But he is barking mad and a mentalist.

I sigh, and fetch the LTLP a bucket.