Tuesday 19th September 2006

I was speaking with my Mum the other day about the various small irons I have in the fire, the different projects and what have you, and she commented that she’s always been impressed by ‘eternal optimism’. I’ve never really thought of myself as particularly optimistic, indeed I am a pessimist and curmudgeon, but I suppose it’s true that I do always hold out hope for projects, watch them come to nothing, and then hold out an equal amount of hope for the next one. I don’t think its optimism though, I think it’s a case of not having much choice. It’s this or working in an abattoir.

This is why I like Lovejoy so much. He was always perpetually broke, but his love for antiques was such that he could never really do anything else, and so each day brought a fresh set of challenges. What I’ve done there is confuse a fictional antiques dealer written for television with my actual life, but he’s still a good role model.

I suppose one reason I stay positive is that I know I’m going to have to make it big from an idea of my own and not be employed by anyone else, and therefore there is a very strong need to keep putting my energies into idea 578 even when the previous 577 have disappeared without trace. The law of averages suggests one will come off. I hope its Global Hangover – that just needs the start up cash. I hope it’s Tolerance, but that’s a long long long shot in the world of TV. I dunno… there are so many avenues and options. One more presented itself today.

A while ago I was sat having a drink with my friend Wade when we got to talking about mobile phones. The conversation turned to how it would be strange if mobile phone technology was so basic that we all communicated by yoghurt pots attached to a piece of string, as we tried to do in the playground as kids.

In this strange, yoghurt pot phone world we envisaged, all these millions of pieces of string went down into holes where there were big string caverns in the earth and telephone exchanges where operators were busy putting different bits of string into different holes to connect people, whilst wearing a headset with a piece of string coming out of it themselves.

There would be chaos on the streets as people got caught up in other pieces of string leading from different people’s yoghurt pots (therefore getting caught up in people’s conversations) and how messy and confusing everything would look. Could you get broadband string? Then we suggested that instead of someone showing off their new Nokia handset, people would be showing off their new Muller yoghurt pot.

This struck us as rather a splendid idea for a Muller TV commercial. So anyway, today I was thinking about this and decided to act upon it. I rung Muller and asked who handles their advertising. Turns out it’s a company called TBWA. I rung them and asked to be put through to the person in charge of the Muller account.

Do you ever have those days where you take a look at yourself and think ‘what are you doing? Stop before you embarrass yourself’? I had this feeling when I was being put through to one of the people responsible for the Muller account at TBWA. What was I doing?

I explained to them that I wasn’t in the industry, I was a writer and comic, but had a great idea for a Muller ad campaign. Not just one ad, but lots. “A whole concept.�

“Okay. What is it?�

“Well obviously I can’t tell you. I want to meet with you.�

So I’m going to meet them in London next week. Ye Gads, that’s going to be interesting. What I need is some solid stuff to go in there with and so tonight I treated myself to a garlic free Italian meal in Bar Italia on Castle Street and started to write down how the ad would go. Then I sketched it out on storyboard paper. It’s not too shabby! Really! It’s funny and I think it would look good.

Oh God… Imagine if I could sell this to TBWA and use the cash to start up Global Hangover? That would be the best scenario possible. I must try and make this happen. I can sell stuff, surely? I’m a comic. That’s all we do, sell ideas. True, the ideas I ‘sell’ on stage don’t make any sense, but it’s the same thing. I can put a suit on and give a presentation in an office can’t I?

Hope so. I’ll stay positive, Mum.

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