mostly david ephgrave

If you asked me what my favourite picture of a British Prime Minister pulling a face like they’re making a high-pitched fart noise was, after much consideration, I’d go with this: It was hard to whittle it down to just one choice, if I’m honest. It was up against some pretty stiff competition. But if I had to pick my gaseously political photographic front-runner, I’d reluctantly - yet assuredly - point you in the direction of the photo above; the only instance in my life in which a Tory gets my vote.   I have to admire his commitment to his pose. He's striking it with the presence and poise of an experienced world leader – but when you’re standing at a lectern in front of a Union Jack, you can’t pussyfoot about. It’s not a time to show weakness. That's why he threw in a ‘pull my finger’. (The sound he making, incidentally, is this .) Say what you like about David Cameron (and I'd like to offer up the phrase “Five-headed toff”), at least he’s got th...

The other day I saw a man wearing a t-shirt with ‘Awesome Dad Since 2007’ written on it. I hope his kids are eight. If they’re older, then he clearly has a brazen attitude to his poor parenting up to that date. What happened in 2007 to bring about a change to his paternal approach? He must have had a road to Damascus moment. Either that, or he just needed a new top. Maybe his children bought the t-shirt to acknowledge his improvement. It could act as a reminder of both how bad things were and how much better they’ve become. While he may still disappoint from time to time, at least his standards aren’t as low as they were at the turn of the century. You should have seen what was written on his t-shirt back then; the adjective wasn’t ‘awesome’, I can tell you. What if he has more than one family? If so, do they each have corresponding shirts? Timing laundry to line up with custody would be a nightmare. Whatever the motive behind the t-shirt may be, I suppose it could hav...

I mentioned a few days ago, after using a blog-post as an excuse to collate my many tweets on the subject of buses, that I’d eventually do the same with the ones about trains. This was originally meant to be a joke, but the bus blog was so popular - forty-one views and counting - that I couldn’t ignore the interest.     So, here it is. If you like concise commentary about public transport, you’ve come to the right place. I derive far too much pleasure and satisfaction from being the first person off the train and through the ticket barrier. The man sat next to me on the train who sucked his fingers after finishing his crisps made me feel like I was party to it. Got to the station earlier than I needed to, so have taken the slow train as a 'treat'. Woman on the train, complaining that she "Hasn't had no time to wrap anything". I need graph paper to work out the double-negatives. The train driver j...

It was a clear measure of my self-control that I left Pets at Home today without a guinea pig. It wouldn’t have been the first time I'd come out with an impromptu pet. My flat has previously acted as an ark to a pair of zebra finches and Russian dwarf hamsters, and is currently home to two budgies and a cat. I also live with my wife, but she doesn’t count as livestock, except for when we go through passport control. It's the cheapest way for her to leave the country. I love having animals around me. They’re good for the soul. I may not take my beast appreciation as far as Brian Blessed (who lives with two thousand of them; two thousand ! ), but I’ll always have a pet or two around the house. They don’t ask for much, save food and attention, and they’re almost always pleased to see you. Except for cats, who often look at you with disdain, but I like to think I can see through it. Guinea pigs are the next four-legged creature on my se...

There was a man on the bus today whose sneeze sounded exactly like a police radio. Now that I’ve piqued your interest, I thought I’d share some of the things I’ve tweeted about buses in the past (because this transition was obvious). You’re in for a riveting ride, but feel free to press the buzzer if you want to get off. Someone on the back of the bus just made a noise like they were dying. I like a bus with a stop bell that perforates your eardrum. This isn't a bus, it's a kiln. Hot Topic on the Bus: "Do you like Murray Mints?" Sat on a bus passing another bus on a very tight corner. "That's poor timetabling", I muttered to myself. #DullestThingEverSaid Boy on the bus, drinking from a family-sized bottle of Coke. Bye bye teeth. Clean up cat sick. Run for the bus. My life is non-stop glamour. I'm waiting for a bus. See: I'm just like you. Hoping to fit on a bus while surrounde...

Jim Bowen was only forty-four when he started presenting Bullseye. Bowen, Series One. Yes, you heard me right: forty-four. That’s just ten years older than me. While I’m a fan of Bowen and see him as an institution, that doesn’t mean I’d want to look like him a decade from now. If I do, my degradation rate will be similar to Walter Donovan's after drinking from the wrong grail at the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. (Classic reference.) Jim, Circa 1981 To hammer the point home, I’ve compiled a list of famous people who are the same age now as Jim Bowen was then . It’s right at the time of going to press and is pretty comprehensive. Strap in… David Tennant, Matt Damon, Ewan McGregor, Gary Barlow, Susanna Reid, Lisa Snowdon, Tamzin Outhwaite, David Walliams, Pete Sampras, Ethan Hawke, Jamie Theakston, Tess Daly, David Coulthard, Melinda Messenger, Mary J Bl...

For some reason, my cat is fascinated by my left knee. Whenever she climbs onto my lap, she gives it a sniff – and not just a passing one, but a thorough going-over. She never does it with my right knee, which clearly has no allure; only my left one. It’s a little disconcerting. What is it about the left knee that draws her tiny nostrils in? This is by no means an isolated incident. She’s sat on me twice since I started writing this, and both times she’s smelt it. I don’t know whether to be flattered or offended. My port-side patella’s scent is either pleasing or pungent. It’s hard for me to judge which, as (1) in thirty-four years I’ve never been more than a few feet away from it (as in ‘unit of measurement’, and not ‘hoof’), and (2) I’m not flexible enough to get close to it. Whatever it smells of, she seems to like it. Am I part catnip? Perhaps I spilt something tasty on it once that she’s still picking up, but if that’s the case I’d be surprised, as I wash my jeans...

Yesterday, I had my first casting for a few weeks.   Unfortunately, it didn’t go as well as I would have liked. This was due to a combination of not being on form (I have a rotten cold) and the job not being quite right for me. What pleased me most was I didn’t take this to heart. When you’re an actor, you don’t get a lot of outside affirmation. You have to keep yourself on an even keel when things don’t go well and keep your own standards in check. A director seldom tells you when you get something right, but will give you a raft of notes when you get it wrong. Or maybe that’s just me. The psychological scales are often tipped toward the negative. (Is that a clear analogy?) When I left the casting suite yesterday, I didn’t ruminate about the audition (other than keeping it in mind to write this). I knew I hadn’t got the job, but I didn’t let it get to me. It helped that I somewhere to be. Not only that, I came out to an answerphone message from my agent about anot...

This morning, I was faced with the awkward situation of my favourite taxi driver going all Daily Mail on my ass.  We were minutes into our trip to the station when the conversation turned to current affairs, including the recent suspected attempted terrorist attack in France and the destruction of the ancient temple of Baalshamin in Syria by IS. It was then that the driver (who I always liken to Tommy Saxondale) stated, "Say what you like, but most terrorists are Muslim".  It was at this point that I felt I couldn't say what I liked, despite the fact he'd just told me I could. While I disagreed completely, and knew that he’d made a massively sweeping statement that presented a hugely blinkered view, I was also aware of the fact that he was providing me a service - and it's hard to lay into someone for being narrow-minded and then ask for a receipt. I hate this assumption of collusion by default, particularly in a one-o...

This was the second most popular story on the BBC News website today. Tomorrow they’ll teach us how to suck eggs. To be fair, that’s actually a screen-grab of the foot of the article, which was a piece on how the UK's wet summer is causing giant house spiders to head indoors. It read like a plot from a B-movie, only more ‘arachnoristic’ (a term I invented myself, meaning ‘containing a greater spider-to-Jeff-Daniels ratio’). Arachnophobes around the country were probably slamming their windows, bolting their doors and brandishing their slippers with intent, after browsing the website. It’s a call to arms against the many-legged beast. You could argue the warning was a wise move on the part of the BBC: last year, I ejected a spider from my bathroom that was so big, I was afraid to use the back door the following day for fear of reprisals. It was large enough to be included on the electoral roll. He looked like the one at the end of the TV movi...

I’ve noticed lately, with some sadness, that my local Caffè Nero is not what it was. It’s nothing to do with the coffee, the premises, or the way that it’s run. What’s changed is the staff. Literally. Most of the people who worked there when I used to sit in to write have moved on to pastures new. The friendly faces who would ask me how I was and what I was up to have nearly all gone. They’ve been replaced by equally amiable faces (on different bodies: they’re not the same people), but however pleasant they may be, the magic has gone. There’s no connection. What was once a refuge for a frustrated out-of-work actor and comic is now a place to pop in and out of quickly. It’s no longer my Caffè Nero; it’s just another Caffè Nero. I’ve lost my Cheers, my Moe’s, my Queen Vic. I’m like Frasier boycotting Café Nervosa, due to Elvis Costello – except my Costello is the Costello of the past . What I’m saying is: I miss it. In many ways, it’s a positive. The staff I used to cha...

I adopted a similar dialing technique when making an appointment today that I used to use when phoning 'Going Live!' in the late 1980s. Back then, the redial button was your invaluable companion. No sooner had you heard the stuttered beep of the engaged tone than you’d pressed one finger on the hook to hang up and another on redial to call again. This saved valuable handset-in-the-cradle / number-punching time and upped your chances of being connected. You were a step ahead of any kids whose houses still had rotary-dial phones. With one of those, you had no hope: you may as well have sent a letter to TVC. (...though I wasn’t aware of this abbreviation back then.) It’s only on looking back that I realise how much of my childhood was spent knelt next to the telephone table by the stairs. It’s probably why I have bad knees as an adult; I may sue Sarah Greene for personal injury. With the rise of mobile phones today, it’s so much easier. To paraphrase the ex-Tory PM ...

I’ve already discussed my love of overhearing snippets of conversation on this blog. I don’t seek them out in a voyeuristic, Chuck Berry video-camera-hidden-in-a-public-toilet type way (Google it); they just tend to follow me about. I’m always catching something that sounds bizarre, amusing or mundane out of context, and then tweeting it to remember it. It occurred to me today that, while I’ve documented some of my favourite unintentionally eavesdropped classics here before, I did it nearly two years ago. Bearing this in mind, see below for some of the best utterances I’ve accidentally monitored - and then less accidentally catalogued on Twitter - since October 2013; that’s very specific. "No amount of money would make me work on a Sunday. Unless you offered me five hundred quid." CHILD: "Can we see a clown?" MUM: "No. Sorry. There are no clowns about at the moment." "We're going t...