Happy to see that the New Theatre Royal, Portsmouth, has reopened with a new studio dedicated to my brother, Anthony.
Pompey has a special place in our hearts, for myriad reasons, so it is great that Anthony is remembered and celebrated here.
Yes, Gogglebox Scarlett totally dissed the Labour film I made with Martin Freeman and the heroes who are Silverfish Media…
… but she did it so hilariously. Totally love her.
Click the image for 15 more Scarlett one-liners via @buzzfeed
The danger with blogging, at least the way I do it, is that the blog can become a place to be unhappy. To bemoan the state of the political nation. Or to mark mournful anniversaries. We forget to celebrate what we have, to cherish the small moments. One thing I love is walking my boy Giorgie to school. So here I am, celebrating and cherishing, in what may become a School Run series.
How’re things going at school? I gather you’ve had a tricky couple of days? Some ‘red flags’ and –
How do you know you’re not just a brain in a jar?
I need to ask you how things are going at school.
We could be just brains, being controlled by a scientist or a programmer.
And what about tonight – will you remember to be polite, please? – who’re you having tea with after school?
George.
Which George?
George Osborne.
Right.
You know him. The second most important man in the country.
Is George’s surname really Osborne?
No. None of this could be real. Like SIMS.
It would have to be a very complicated program, or a very brilliant scientist, to give us such detailed and consistent experiences – this bed, this kitchen, this house, this street, these signs, these cars, these faces, these smells, these sounds….
It could be a very complicated program. It could have been running for thousands of years, so of course it would be consistent and have lots of detail.
We have agency. We aren’t just inert passengers in a scripted world. We can change our world. I could walk into that traffic and stop the cars.
You can do that in an RPG game. You can shoot people.
Why would anyone bother to go to such lengths to create this fictional world? Why wouldn’t such a clever alien just come round for a cup of tea, instead of spending so much time fooling us into thinking we were leading real lives?
Maybe they just want to. We do things like that. We create virtual worlds, like the SIMS.
Right. But will you remember to be polite with George’s Mum? Knife and fork and please and thank you?
I don’t know. It depends what happens.
The danger with blogging, at least the way I do it, is that the blog can become a place to be unhappy. To bemoan the state of the political nation. Or to mark mournful anniversaries. We forget to celebrate what we have, to cherish the small moments. One thing I love is walking my boy Giorgie to school. So here I am, celebrating and cherishing, in what may become a School Run series.
Breakfast laughs provided today by a brilliant birthday present from my sister Gioia: a book of Van Morrison lyrics.
I had wondered how the book would cope with the endless repetition in some of my favourite songs, like Summertime in England. And the answer is: with endless repetition. Line after slavish line of “It ain’t why, why, why, why, why, why, why….”
If all of our music were lost in some nuclear holocaust, we agreed, and Martians, or future archaeologists, found only this text, they would be baffled. What are its hidden meanings? Why this many “whys” on this line, and that many “whys” on that line? Why!? Why!? Why!?
So the school run today consisted mostly in setting our walk to the tune of Coney Island, a spoken song so apparently slight as to be almost about nothing. Just going along. Just like us.
And who knew? With my remarkably authentic Northern Irish accent, our little journey could be surprisingly poetic.
Coming down from Carson
Opposite the parade
Slipping left into the estate
And the no cops was good.
Turning right at Heron Court
In the grey Dulwich morning
Coat buttoned against the cold
Because the zip’s no good.
On and on through the bird-named blocks
Falcon and Dunnock
Twisting through parked cars
My boy’s shining face
Heading for school.
When I thought of Van’s last line of Coney Island – Wouldn’t it be great if it could be like this all the time? – I thought, yes. This would do. This would be enough. Me and Giorge. This urban walk of cars and cut-throughs and grey, susceptible, with a little assistance from Van Morrison, to poetry. To meaning. To eternity.
I felt Giorgie squeeze my hand, as if he too, wanted all moments to be like this.
Dad, you will never develop that Northern Irish accent.
I’ll never develop it?
Never.
Why? Because it’s already so good?
Er, no Dad.
Why? Why? Why?