Walking The Dog with Emily Dean - David Baddiel (Part One)

Episode Date: July 2, 2024

Join Emily and Ray to take a walk on Hampstead Heath with the legendary comedian and friend of the podcast, David Baddiel.David is a huge cat lover - he’s had over 20 cats in his life. However, we popped down the road to see Frank Skinner who kindly lent us his dog Poppy for our walk. Frank seemed very relaxed with the idea of us taking Poppy out - but David wasn’t so sure...We chat about David’s childhood dog Dingle, his origin story with cats in the Baddiel household, his mum’s affair with a golf memorabilia salesman and David's unconventional birthday party invitation.David’s new memoir My Family is out on Thursday 4th July. You can buy your copy here!A Muslim & A Jew Go There - hosted by David Baddiel and Sayeeda Warsi - is available on all podcast platforms. Listen to Emily and Ray's last walk with David from January 2018 here!Follow Emily: Instagram - @emilyrebeccadeanX - @divine_miss_emThis episode of Walking The Dog was produced by Faye Lawrence and Sarah BishopMusic: Rich Jarman Artwork: Alice LudlamPhotography: Karla Gowlett  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Two of my cats clearly prefer more Wenner, who is my wife, to me. We've worked out that if she sings, only you, Pip, in particular, will just come immediately to her and start purring. And I sometimes want Pip to come to me, so I recorded it on voice memo, and I occasionally use it to make Pip come to her when she's not there. But then Pip looks furious. This week on Walking the Dog, Ray and I took a stroll with comedian, author and much-love pal of ours, David Badele. David has always been firmly team cat, but he does happen to have a neighbour who owns a dog.

And that neighbour happens to be Frank Skinner. So we began the podcast by popping in to see Frank so David could borrow Frank's beautiful cabapoo, Poppy. I'm not saying Frank was nervous about entrusting his dog to David, but he did say something along the lines of goodbye, Poppy, I do hope I see you again. As it turned out, David and I had the loveliest walk ever. because even though David often says he doesn't really see the point of walking, he is an endlessly fascinating, hilarious and entertaining person to go for a walk with. And we had an incredibly in-depth conversation about his pretty unconventional family on this walk because he's just written an absolutely unput-downable memoir called My Family,

inspired by his hugely successful West End show. And it's a painfully honest but stomach-clutchingly funny insight into the comically surreal goingsau. in the Badiel household. It's one of those books you just can't stop talking about, thinking about and laughing about after reading. So I strongly urge you to order your copy now. I really hope you enjoy my chat with David. I'm going to stop talking now so you can hear from the fabulous man himself. Here's David and Poppy, kind courtesy of Frank Skinner, and Ray Ray. Hello, welcome to my house. Let me explain what just happened. I mean a few things just happened. So I thought it was you.

but it was a lady who I don't know telling me that my cat Pip and my other cat, her son Tiger, I've got four cats, were being attacked and at first I thought Ray can't be possible, can't be possible Ray's the nicest guy, he wouldn't attack them but no it's Halley

and there's a constant at the moment with my cats. I know this is a dog podcast but I think I always talk about cats on it which is a cat called Halley and his American owner I don't know her but she sends me emails says hey I'm really sorry about Hallie He just loves other cats.

He really loves... I know he's coming around to a few people in the neighbourhood. This is on the local website, the local email thread. So don't worry about him. And he comes around and it's carnage. It's total carnage. Basically, my slightly elderly cat, Pip, who's got a heart problem, just immediately goes crazy and attacks him.

And he's about five times her size. And what is also pathetic is that my various other cats, who are big enough to take him on, just run away. But Pip, the mother, who's like 90 in... in human years and has got a hot murmur and we're all worried about it and it's awful. And also, I'll tell you another thing, Hallie is really fucking hard because I now go out and try to deal with Hallie and he's not bothered. He stands his ground.

I had to throw a ball at him the other day. And even then he was like, yeah, I'll head it. Welcome to Walking the Dog with David Bidiel. And then I had a problem because I had to put a belt on before we go for a walk so that my trailer don't fall down. I did notice that. Yeah, this particular belt, the buckle falls off all. the time. Don't show me. Okay, I have to show you. I'll put some shoes on, shall I?

And then we'll go. We're doing an exciting thing, listeners, dog-wise, which is down the road from here, lives Frank Skinner of Fantasy Football and Benilla Skinner, unplanned fame. I don't know if you need to do that caveat. And, of course, the show that you were on, sorry to mention it. I know it's recently been taken off the air, but the radio show that he used to do with him. Yeah. Anyway, he lives down the road. And yesterday, He came round, I don't know when this goes out, but we've watched the terrible England performance against Denmark. He came around to watch that. At the end of it, he said, oh, you're doing Emily's podcast, you can borrow my dog.

That's so nice of him. Yeah, it is nice. And Ray has previous with Poppy. Can they get on? And they get on. I mean, as far as... I'm going to put clips on, is that really... What's clips?

So it's a sunny day and I have clips, like the sunglasses. clips and I don't look because my dad used to have these. I've never seen anyone with real life. In the wild. I've only seen in the back of those magazines you've got in the back of a newspaper, those supplements. Yeah, yeah and I think no one wears them at all anymore but I'm intrigued to see what they look like. I think they work pretty well. What do you think? Let's see. Slightly ridiculous. It's really not that terrible. Yeah, I think it's okay and the point is these are my glasses so I'm now seeing properly. Okay, shall we go? Okay, shall we go?

I love Dave. Let's go. I called you Dave. The only other person to call you Dave is? Frank Skinner. Well, actually, some of my old, old friends do as well. But basically it's Frank Skinner. One other thing, before we get the dog, get Poppy,

is that Frank said, oh, you can have Poppy. And I said, OK, that'd be lovely. And then he said, and I think the people will like that, because he said, I think people like to know that we're still mates. And then he said, I think people think we're not. Which I don't know. When I get in taxis sometimes and, you know, have to deal with whether or not it's coming home. Yeah.

Then later on, they will say, do you see anything of Frank Skinner? And I say he lives in my road. And that does seem to, you know, gee people up. They seem to be pleased about that. I would describe you as unusual in some ways, unusually close for people that have worked together so intensely so long. Yeah. Well, we haven't worked together for quite long time. so that might be a key to it.

No, but... We haven't, we haven't actually worked together. I mean, Kate, we've done the odd interview together and the odd appearance together, but in terms of actually working on a show together. But how many doors away from each other do you live? Well, I'm sure I mentioned this last time. I'll mention it again, because it is quite unusual. So we used to live together in a flat around here, the same very, very near here.

I bought a flat and Frank was homeless, basically, so we'd be chucked out of his house. house in Birmingham by his wife and was just at the point at that point in time a comedian on the cabaret circuit so he gave him a room right Ray can you call Ray David Ray Ray what's Ray doing does he not really I think he's doing a poo oh I guess that's part of the whole thing I can't see a poo David okay this is my road so I will probably get blamed if there's dog poo on the road uncleared. Oh it dropped out of his bomb after the fact. Is that it? Why is it there? So for people, I'll paint a little word picture. He stopped at a tree with a lot of great areas

to shit in with bushes and all that. Then these poo was actually halfway down the pavement. No one understands how that happens. Like a magic tree. He's got his own mind. Oh, now he's doing some weird kind of shaking things. Is that part of the magic trick? Sort of Paul Daniel's flourish. Come on Ray. Oh, there's a child there. The child's going to love Ray. Children love Ray. The child doesn't get struck by poo that's rolling down the hill because he just puts it anywhere. But anyway, he, uh, so we lived together in a flat for like six years, uh, during which time I was already famous, but Frank then became famous and I never put his rent up. I think I always mentioned that. Uh, and then I moved out and bought a house, uh, in Belsize Park.

And it was number one, it was number one on that road. I might as well say now, so I don't live at England's Lane. And then Frank bought number five England's Lane. And now I've moved somewhere else and he's brought a house about ten doors down. It's like a very expensive form of stalking. Did he ever discuss it with you? No. He just buys houses to me and me.

I love it. Well, it is a sign of your lovely friendship, I think. Right, come on, Ray. I think we're at Frank's. He knows Frank's house. because he comes here often. Yeah. So he will get excited.

Come on, Ray. Oh, Poppy's already excited. Oh, can you hear poppy? Yeah, poppies already. Listen to that. Come on. Hi. Hi.

Hello. This is Kath, Frank's partner. Oh, Cass, you're being recorded. So don't say any. Cass to show me a Jewish thing to make me feel better at myself. I'm so sorry. Well, I'm going to shut up. Hi, Cass.

Right. Frank can tell you. Takeover. Hi, look who it is. Well, it's Frank Skinner. I should warn you you're being recorded. Okay. I said this is a rare appearance of Badiel and Skinner.

Frank, I really want to hug you, but I'm clutching a poo. David. Oh, okay. Yeah, well, don't call me that. Do you want some poo bags? Since the radio show stopped, I've been struggling a bit, so it would help if you could donate. This is so lovely of you to let us borrow Poppy. What a brilliant idea. It's good for her to do the walk.

do the war. Thank you. You bring you out. Do you don't know you know? No, feel free to let her off the lead. Okay. Is there anything we need to know? She's got her chip so if she disappears. Not really. I would know. I tried but there's so much blood and that I just couldn't face it. Are you sure it's okay to let her off the lead? Yeah, well I let her off the lead. She comes back eventually. But she knows you. Yeah but she knows. She knows. Emily. Are you confident with David? I think she recognises our dog like status. What, even after many years? Not as she was born when we were properly on the telly.

No, no, certainly not. No. Are you confident with David as a dog handler? Yeah, I mean he's very catish, as a course. Yes, we know this. I like the idea of having Poppy and having this, this good, this whole lead thing, because when you have a cat, they just go wherever they like. So the idea you can control it a bit, I quite like that. The dog lead, a light review.

They used to clever, aren't they? Yeah, you know, stop by running away, to kick that on. Yeah, that's true. Thanks for telling me that. So, Poppy and Ray will be fine. Yeah. They'll be fine.

She's a lovely, calm dog. What she does, which might be able, if you pass groups of dogs that look menacing, look menacing walking away that she can use you as a human shield I am slightly worried no no don't be worried it's very very Poppy that's good see the cut she knows who she is yeah okay nice to see you all nice to see you we'll see you later when we return pop-love you we'll see you soon which way are we going this way oh actually this way's quicker to the heath

if we're going to heath this way's quick it's nice to see you guys I know so will you be in about an hour yeah yeah all right see you later have fun Come on, Poppy. I find your friendship very wholesome. It is wholesome. Look, thanks looking out as Poppy leaves. Do you think he's worried? It doesn't seem to be.

I'm more worried than he is. He seems to be fine about it, but I instantly felt a certain sense of, oh my God, because, you know, it is a wholesome friendship, but I think you'll know that Frank doesn't take kindly to things going, you know, that he feels wrong, and losing his dog will definitely be in the Vendai. of wrong. Do you know what I mean? I can't see him being okay about that. Yeah, I'm not sure that's a peculiar fank thing. I think those people...

I'm toning it down for the listeners, but you know what I mean. Is she okay? Are you okay, Poppy? Because Poppy will be thinking who is this bloke a bit. I've met Poppy a few times, obviously, but I don't feel we really know each other. She knows me though. Not like me and Ray. You and Ray. Yeah, me and Ray have been, you know, on holiday together basically. Cheltenham. We have had it also. Ray has been on stage with me in Cheltenham with you. That was an amazing thing. I don't know whether, I can't know. I think we hadn't talked about this last time or we did the podcast before this. Is that Emily interviewed me at the Cheltenham Literary Festival,

now recently divested from Bailey Gifford, of course, and nothing to do with this, and chose to have Ray on stage, because it was like a big sofa, sofa and he sat on the arm of the sofa incredibly calmly in front of about a thousand people for the whole thing it's amazing it's almost like I trained him but I really like find that amazing do you is that unusual well as you know I work mainly with cats yeah work with them I live mainly with cats and they won't do anything actually talking about literary festivals I was at at the Hay literary

Festival recently divested from Bailey Gifford and Are you going to say that every time you mention any sort of arts event? I think so, just topical. And the actor, Julian Reintat, who's a very nice chap, don't really know him, he came and sat down next to me and he said, oh, I was listening to you talk on the radio once. I don't know what radio show it was. And you said this thing, which is true, and I did it again last night,

which is basically two of my cats, the female cats, we have four cats, clearly prefer more Wenner, who is my wife, to me. There's a kind of female solidarity thing. And she is very lovely. And they've realised that. And so sometimes with, basically they want to come to Walwena. And Molyna, we've worked out that if she sings, only you by Yazoo, Pip, in particular, the matriot cat with the bad heart,

will just come immediately to her and start purring. And I sometimes want Pip to come to me. So I recorded it on voice memo. And I occasionally use it to make Pip come to me when she's, not there but then Pip looks furious. So go on. Yes, so we had three cats for a long time. Pip, Ron and Tiger. Pip is the mum. Ron and Tiger are her two sons and they get on pretty harmoniously having lived all their lives together. Another cat, Zelda, this is an interesting by the way that she's called Zelda because I had a cat called Zelda when I used to live in

Kilburn with Frank and my ex-girlfriend Janine and my mum. much as, and we'll get onto this, she took the name Golfiana from David White, just took the name Zelda for the I'd already established as my cat's name for her cat when we gave her Zelda, who is one of Pip's children. And then they both died and then we had to have Zelda back and Zelda, we thought, well, we'd better have her back because we've got her family. But of course it was just carnage. It was like absolutely not like surprise surprise or long lost families. It was just like, shouting and hissing and chasing people under cupboards. It never happens with Davina McCall.

And so, so Zelda now lives upstairs a lot of the time to keep him away from the other. Not all the time, but a lot of the time. Oh, like Rochester's wine. A bit like that. And what's happened is that Zelda, particularly from Moorwena, has become a sort of extraordinary, because Moeller likes cats, but not like I like cats.

She's not obsessed with cats, whereas I am, but now she really loves Zelda. But Moena is presently filled with cats. but Morewena is presently filming in Bristol. So Zelda is not coming and sitting on the bed in the way that she does when Molyan's there. And then there was this extraordinary moment last night where I thought, I know, I'll play a voice memo

of Moorwellyn's singing. It's pathetic, I know. By the way, the reason Julia Ryan Tut is in this is that he brought this up, that he knows about the voice memo and he said he thought it was pathetic, but so charming. So that's why he said it.

Anyway, I played at the voice memo for singing, only you. Just goes, la la la la, by the way, shouldn't sing the lyrics. And Zelda just got few. I'm curious. Zelda just looked at me and started going, we're going,

meaning what the fuck are you doing? Don't play these kind of tricks with me because I know she's not here. That's the impression I got. Zelda knew. Yeah, Zelda's very clever, but also quite angry. Do you know why she's angry?

Why? Because you had to live with my dad for 10 years. We'll get onto him. Yeah. I think they did another poo. Hang on. The whole pooing thing is very discreet, isn't it? It's very like you'd hardly notice I've done it.

as I've done it. But that's not helpful really because it seems polite to Ray to not make a big deal of it, but it's more difficult for you in terms of knowing it's done and what your social obligation is. Yeah, but you know what? That's a tax I'm willing to pay because he's such a gent. He is such a gent. I love that about Ray. It's the kind of the way he poos you're right is very sort of like euphemism is that one of those elderly ladies would say, like, I'm just going to spend a penny. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Let's not make a fuss of that. it you know come on let's go this way it's very charming but it's not helpful when you because those old ladies generally no one has to clean it

up until things go really bad you say that until later on yeah you say come on Ray I want to pick him up for this bit because he'll slow us down really is he so not a dog that he can't handle this terrain oh like Donald Trump but honestly it's we're not walking across a brown field in Ukraine at the moment, but it's his hamster teeth. There's no minds, is what I'm saying. How are you giving on with Poppy? Good. I don't know when I should let her off the lead. I'm slightly frightened of letting her off the lead. Let's wait until we get to a grassy knoll. Yes, a grassy gnar. Um, that's a very good idea. How are things in general, am I able to,

I mean, we should go on to me, but how are things now that you're not doing the show? Are you coping? I am coping. I do really do really do. I miss it. Yeah. I miss it in terms of... I miss it. Do you? Yeah, I listened as you know. I was a big listener. And occasionally a guest, although Frank said, I'm not going to thank any of the guests. Who cares about the guests? And obviously I took a ginn at least five times. But hey, but no, I, yeah, as a fan. Come on Ray. He is quite slow, David. Have you noticed? Ray, yes. I knew that because he's got little legs. I should say also we're on hamster teeth, which is your manor. Yeah. And as if I need to mention at this point that I'm with David Bedeal. By the way.

People are wondering who is this bloke. They seem quite close. They seem to know each other quite well. Yeah. And I'm thrilled you've come on again to my podcast. You've done it. This is your second time. Yeah.

And I think it was just me, you and Ray last time. Did we borrow a dog? Oh, actually, maybe we did. But not Poppy, I can't remember if it was. Well, I wanted to remind you of this. Okay. We borrowed a rescue dog. Right.

I think it was from the dog's trust. Yeah. And he was called Jimmy. Yes. And he was a Whippet, I believe. Yeah, it's all coming back to me. Jimmy the Greyhound, actually. Okay.

We borrowed a dog called Jimmy the Greyhound. And do you remember the first thing you said to him, David? No. Well, Jimmy was quite wary, because I think he'd had a troubled life. Right. So... We've all had that. And you said, look, it's Jimmy anti-Semitic?

Of course I did, yeah. I was going to say, was it about Jews? Was it about Jews, stroke Nazis? And indeed it was. You were lovely with him, but I don't get the sense you really bonded, whereas when you've met Ray before, I think you have bonded with Ray. Definitely, no. So here's my...

I may have said this on the previous podcast, but my backstory with dogs is that I... Actually, we did actually have a dog. I don't even mention this in the memoir, because I don't remember him. We did have a dog called Dingle, I believe, who was with us when I was like three. But then after that, it was solidly cats, and that's why I'm so obsessed with cats. And I love dogs. I do really like them, but I've never had one because I've always had cats,

and I've always thought the cats won't like it. It's slightly cliched of me. You know, it might be, you know, I should maybe think out the box more with that, but I've always assumed they won't like it. it and the other reason is that I like dogs but I when dogs start to turn I am a bit frightened of them and that is partly because it's to do with like one thing I talk about quite a lot of the book in my memoir is the incredible Olympian levels of neglect of my parents and one of the ways in which they were neglectful is that I

started walking across the incredibly rough park that I used to live there when I was quite young when I was like eight or nine to go to my really weird piano teacher for lessons, for piano lessons. He is definitely not an entirely undodgy fellow. And I was going there when I was like nine without my parents thinking, perhaps we should run a check on this bloke. But also that involved me going over the iron bridge at the end of my road, which in the 70s always had stray,

well I would consider it be pack dogs on them who would just be barking and showing their teeth at me. And as a nine-year-old, I was terrified of that. And I think that instilled in me a slight fear of dogs, which I don't feel with Poppy or Ray, particularly not with Ray. Ray is at the other end of the dog spectrum. I've gone for a sort of Walter the Softy dog. Yeah. I've been actually on that note, does Ray, like that side of dogs, i.e. the guard dog, the side that will protect and go crazy when the doorbell rings.

A bit like my dad used to. Ray, does Ray do any of that? What do you think, David? I just think it would be funny if he did. I think it'd be funny if Ray squared up to an intruder. But I go for another strategy, which is make the psychopath your friend. You've done that your whole life. Humanised your own life.

I want to say handily, a lot of the time on this podcast, we obviously go into your past a bit. And you very handily timed this with writing an absolutely. brilliant memoir. Thank you. Honestly, it's so good, David. And even as someone who knows you well, it gave me so much insight into you, and it's hilarious, of course it is.

Thank you. People seem to think that mainly. It's interesting, because, you know, I think it's an exercise in trying to turn what some people might consider to be bleak dysfunction into comedy. The whole premise of the book is, book is. Yeah. My mum had a massive affair that she was, my mum had a massive affair that she was

very public about, my dad was very angry, he got made redundant, you know, there's all sorts of things that went wrong, we had no money, there was an incredible amount of what might be called, not sexual transgression of a really terrible sense, but of a sort of domestic sense, there was too much pornography, there was too much like loud sexual noises, blah, blah, and then there was this mad thing to do with golf. actually that's the point is that in the middle of that my mum is having an affair with a golfing memorabilia salesman

and decides to turn our lives over to golf and golfing memorabilia and my feeling is that's where you can't make it anything else but a comedy because you could try your best to say this is really broken me and damaged me or whatever but when you get to the point about golfing memorabilia the psychoanalyst will laugh or have to stifle at laugh

I think that's the point. I go on about this a lot in the book is that, you know, this is not a misery memoir, it's not about abuse. There are bits in it that come quite close to actual abuse, psychological abuse, at least. But for me, it's all part of the great tapestry, the rich and strangeness of my early life. And as you know, Emily, about me, is that I am extremely me, you know, like wearily. annoyingly me. And so what I always think is that whatever else it did in my early life, it did make me very happy in my own skin. Like you can't be as resolutely yourself as I feel the need to be in a slightly incontinent way without constantly telling the truth. Those two things go together, right? It's something that I know more when are your partner. Does she spend

a lot of her time with her sort of cringing a bit in, as it's in public situation? So actually I was about, I think we began this bit, we tried to take the lead of Poppy. I brought the dog thing back, is it? I'm not such a pro. And I'm finding that difficult. And there's a bit in the book where I talk about being asked to do Taskmaster and how, well, Wenner said, well, you'll be so terrible.

And then she was quite pleased about it because she's got a sense that this will show the world of how I have to deal with this bloke who is the least practical person in the world. and I think I said that when I sometimes says as well have you ever thought about saying the second thing that comes into your head and that's the thing is that I am a thinking person but I think very quickly without any kind of filter and then tend to say what I'm thinking

and do what I'm thinking and also can't work out small practical things to get me through life so I say at one point so I the point is that I am an idiot in some respects and yes the book has quite a lot of these stories I mean, to mark my parents, but there are digressions, and one of the digressions is the way that I fucked up with famous people, often people I'm very, very admiring of.

Peter Gabriel turns up in the book quite a lot, as someone who I continually fuck up in front of. It's kind of weird, because he was probably my hero when I was sort of 13 and became obsessed with Genesis at completely the wrong time in popular culture in 1976 when they were hated by everyone. I became obsessed with Genesis and then met Peter Gabriel a few times. The first time I met him, I don't think I say this in the book because I'm worried about checking my privilege. But anyway, it was Angus Dieton's 50th, so that's a while ago. Angus, who is a Genesis fan, very kindly, had seated me at this big event he was having opposite Peter Gabriel. I was so excited.

Couldn't hear a fucking word he was saying for the entire time. And the only thing I can remember telling him is that I don't really like world music. And this is the bloke who invented WOMAT. I vaguely remember his face falling. The story is that I was with Peter Gabriel on another occasion and he asked me about Moorna. What was she was doing and I said, oh, she's in, since a while ago, she's in the new Harry Enfield show, which was called Harry and Paul. It hadn't come out at that point. And he said, oh, Harry Enfield, what happened to him?

And I said, oh, he did a few things recently, and, you know, he went off to do a show on Sky. And then I said, oh, and he did a show on BBC 2 called Celeb. And then I said, which was about a faded rock star, in fact. And I could see his face again full. And I thought, why have I said in fact? It's the words in fact that which are supposed to me just like this maybe will be something you'll find funny. But it sounds like I'm saying, like you. Like, yeah, that's like you, isn't it?

So you'll be interested in this show. about a silly, clapped out rock dinosaur, won't you, Peter? That's you. And the bit I miss out on stage, because I think, oh, I don't want to seem like too much of a big shot, is we were on a skiing holiday together, and we were actually on a ski lift when I said that, and we had to rumble on for six minutes in silence on this mountain.

But there's a... It goes to that story, which is a few years later, I was in Skins, which was a Channel 4 drama, that Moorwena was a regular in, and Molyna was in a family in that show, was a sort of teen soap opera with Harry Enfield played her husband and I was coming back from the two episodes I was doing that show from Bristol with Harry Enfield on a train and remarkably really I mean this seems ludicrous to me Peter Gabriel got on the train

Peter Gabriel got on the same train right this feels like at that point the world is just conspiring against me to make my life absurd anyway he sat with us for a bit and then he got off early and then I thought, oh, I must tell Harry this funny story, the one I've just told you. So I tell him the story about being with Peter Gabriel, about saying, talking about celebrity, saying in fact, all that. And he doesn't laugh at all. He just looks really pissed off. And then I realised, yes, all he's thinking about is the fact that Peter Gabriel said,

whatever happened to Harry Enfield. So I fucked it now with another person I admire. So yes, there's quite a lot of this. But it is, I mean, there's a few more, but the point I'm trying to make, apart from just like having bits in a memoir that I feel the audience might want to hear a bit about my life in shows. Is that I think I was brought up in a way that was boundaryless and weird. And thus I haven't really acquired the ability to know what not to say. I tend to just say what's in my head all the time.

And I think that's not useful if you want to avoid, you know, pissing people off. And also I think I say, you know, that people say don't meet your heroes because you're bound to be disappointed. My feeling is I shouldn't meet my heroes because they're about to be disappointed. Because your heroes will be crushed. They'll be crushed and upset by things that I've said that I don't quite realise before I've said them, that they will sound sort of injurious to them. Just to give people an insight, I hope you're comfortable with me mentioning this. We'll soon find out.

But David had a birthday recently. Yeah, I find it was interesting that. And prior to the event, lovely invitation, and then he followed up. The invitation. A few weeks later, saying, I'm paraphrasing here, but he essentially said, it had the tone of, look, I'm getting a bit worried because it's getting a bit oversubscribed. So please don't worry if you can't come. You're not paraphrasing, that's basically exactly what I said. Yeah, okay.

And then at the end you said, hopefully you won't all be crushed to death. Yeah. But what actually happened was, this is again typical, is, I'm very, I'm quite a thinking person, you would agree with that, but I have something which is unusual for a thinking person, which is I do stuff immediately and without really thinking about them, right? I think fast, but I don't then double think much, I don't think back on it. And I couldn't be bothered to spend ages finding a venue for my 60th birthday party. So, it's 60, so I just chose a very nice place, which is quite near here, quite near where I live, without asking what the limit was for people. And then I just started inviting people and then I found out the limit was about a hundred people and I'd gone well over that already.

So I panicked a bit and sent to the email saying and I thought some people won't want to come but they might feel a little bit embarrassed about saying at this stage that they don't want to come. I'll let them off that hook and I know just I know this is wrong. And so I said like if you don't want to come can't make it don't worry just tell because we're already a bit over the limit and I don't want to have a party where people get crushed to death. You ended the email crushed to death, David. It was quite upsetting. You're missing something quite key, which is I then, and this is how more wena exists with me. I then sent it, and after I'd sent it, she said, what are you doing? And I said, I read out the email to her. She said, what the fuck?

You're such an idiot. You can't do that. You can't send it in, a thing out to people saying don't come. Like, it's a bit, like, there'll be too many people, please don't come to a party. So then I had to send another one saying, I'm not saying don't come, which she was absolutely right, by the way, because within the space of time, it was about four minutes, I'd got a text from Nick Hancock saying, oh, I can not come if it's easier for you. I really want to come, but if it's easier, I won't come. But even in that email, even in the explaining email, you gave away too much. You started it saying, Mawena says, I did, yeah. I should send this email because she was a bit upset. When it says it's gauche and rubbish, for me to send an email telling everyone.

If I was when, I'd have thought, why have you told them that? Well, because for me, you see, that's so interesting because I think you're right, Moena would have thought exactly that. Yeah. I think my basic default position is tell, say everything that's happening all the time. That's my basic default position. Say everything that's happening. That's a beautiful animal.

Oh, he's lovely, isn't it? That's a great visual game. It's coming home. Thank you. It's not, is it, by the way? Right, David. Yeah. What do you want?

A coffee and a glass of water, I think. It's a bit hotter than I thought it was going to be. Yes, me too. We can go and find a shady bench. That might be nice. Up there. Poppy, you're not allowed in there. Poppy, Poppy. Puppie. Why is Poppy going in there?

Oh no. What's happening? David? Poppy's gone inside the cafe. Yes. Poppy, come back. Come back. Poppy.

I mean, Poppy's got inside the cafe because that's where the food is. I assume that's why Poppy did that. Don't tell Frank she's gone inside the cafe. So this is an interesting dog moment. So again, you don't have to worry about the cats. I give my cats water, but in my house. Whereas I was thinking when you said we'll give them water, my instant thought was, will they have a bowl in the cat's?

in the cafe. And what you've done is they're just in plastic cups. Yeah. And, well, Ray doesn't need to understand that because you're basically putting water on your finger and giving it. I have to do this because he's used to very small. Does he not realise he can drink directly from the cup?

There you go, darling. Ray. Have your water? Good boy. No, he just doesn't want water. Let's walk to a nice bench, Rhett's carton. Do you want some of this before you go? I'm sort of on a keto diet at the moment. Oh.

I think I was last time. You know, it was on some sort of weird diet. Well, I'm generally on some form of low-carb diet. And it never works, and it never makes any difference to my... It does. Not really... Well, actually, I think you... Was it when you were doing a podcast?

I very remember being with you, I think I remember it was after I'd done the radio show once. And you going on about my thinness, which I remember the last time anyone's gone out of my thinness, this was maybe 10 years ago. And then I was on the 5-2. Yeah. But I was for briefly thin. or not thin, but certainly thin out of now, but generally I can't

handle, to do the same thing. It's because I'm very, like, immediate and in a way it's to do with the meanness, right? Like, it feels to me a lie to me to pretend that I don't want food. Do you know, I love how authentic you're being to yourself eating whenever you want.

Yeah, but that's true. I love your authenticity, David. It feels that that is true. Why am I pretending that I don't want food? That feels to be like that's what a diet is. Do you not have that 99 would be? completely inauthentic and I'm not someone I don't want to live a lie. That's right though the more you're talking to the piss the more I'm just thinking

yes that's absolutely right so I find diet's quite difficult and the only diet I can do as a result is a low carb one because a low carb one involves eating quite a lot of food meat you know cheese this morning actually I had fried eggs beads and then I was gonna have bacon but then Ezra had eaten all the bacon so I had herring I had smoked herring, which I bought quite a lot of recently. So you know, you were saying about how you feel the need also to always give all the detail. So you've just told me, I was going, you told me what you were going to have, and then why you didn't have it, because Ezra had eaten the baker.

As I say in the book, it's a kind of incontinence. At least when I write, it services me when I write. Because when I write, it floods out of me and then I can shape it. But when I'm talking, it's like this. this. But detail is funny. Yeah, yeah, detail is funny. Detail is where the light gets in. Well, that is true. I mean, I use that quote. The crack is when the light gets in, but it's the same thing. It's a really good point. I really hope you love part one of this week's Walking the Dog. If you want to hear the second part of our chat, it'll be out on Thursday, so whatever you do,

don't miss it. And remember to subscribe so you can join us on our walks every week.