Walking The Dog with Emily Dean - Jonathan Ross

Episode Date: August 3, 2017

Emily goes out for a stroll on Hampstead Heath with Jonathan Ross and his French bulldog Professor Snowball. The pair discuss the joys and pitfalls of being dog owners, what it's like growing up in a large family, the realities of fame, and accepting compliments. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You'd go, open the door to go to school in the morning, and there'd be seven dogs sitting outside panting. And she would desperately try and get out there because she wanted to fulfil her biological imperative. Of course. They wanted to get their end the way. A lady's got needs. I'm a schoolboy caught in the middle.

Wearing hand-me-down trousers that don't stretch to my ankles. Hi, welcome to Walking the Dog with Emily Dean. I'm loving getting all your feedback and thoughts. So please, if you get a minute, do rate and review. And if you want to hear more, subscribe on iTunes. This week, I went out with Jonathan Ross, and his French bulldog Snowball. To give him his full name, it's Professor Snowball.

I'm not sure what he got his PhD in. Landposts in the North London area maybe. I mean, I'm sure he's a very respected academic in his field. It's just that his field happens to be a ditch in Hampstead Heath. Come on there, Snowball. So where are we going to go? We'll go over here onto what is called the Heath Extension. It's the extension of Hampstead Heath because we are lucky enough to live right near it.

and it's favoured by local dog walkers, many of whom take that slightly superior tone and pretend to know more about dogs than anyone else. So they're actually, collectively I find dog owners both charming and intensely annoying. I should say, by the way, I'm with Jonathan Ross, as if you didn't know already. This is Walking the Dog. I'm Emily Dean and we're with Jonathan Ross and we're also with Snowball. Well, hold on, give him his full name. Oh, it's his full name?

Professor Snowball. Is he a professor? Yes, he's a professor. Jonathan, I'm really sorry, I didn't know that. Well, you know, it's very typical of you, typical white privilege. Your dogs always tend to have a sub-prefix, don't they? No, not all of them, many of them do. I mean, there was, you see, Yoda, who we had for many years, who sadly died last year.

He was put down. He was very old, and he was, the last few weeks of his life, he got quite ill. It was very sad. But in a way, it was kind of, you know, very interesting experience and very useful experience. Because, of course, he was, he was just, you know, ready to die. But he was often referred to. as you know as Professor Podomovsky. I invented a story for the children when he was young

that we bumped into him while he was touring, lecturing on dog behaviour and he took to us and needed a place to stay. But it wasn't really his full name and we always knew it was a kind of, it's the kind of doctorate that gets given to someone like, you know, Paul McKenna or Phil Collins, you know, it's like, you know, they should really have the self-respect not to accept it.

So we've got so, we should describe some. Snowball. He's a very handsome chap. He's a beautiful French bulldog. He's probably six years old now, six and a half years old. He has had a sort of like a difficult life because he was actually bought for me by Jane on my 50th birthday. Yeah. It's very easy to remember his age because I'm 56 going on 57 now. You look great. I look amazing, but not as amazing as he does. And he has been through far more than me remarkably because I didn't know a number of ops, didn't he? Yeah, well I didn't realize that French bulldog, a lot of breed dogs, but this kind of breed in particular, are prone to a lot of genetic disorders anyway. Fairly early on, he had, we detected a heart murmur, so he was on pills for that. Then he got very ill, and one time I was meant to be going out, oddly, I was meant to be going out to dinner with David Williams as a celebration of Barbara Windsor, and I'd promised to go, more because I love Barbara Winds, and I wanted to show my respect to her and my friendship to her.

But I am actually, I mean, I'm not a recluse, but certainly I'm not keen on socialising, and so I know how did I pass the test? No, no, just luck. But I decided I would make the effort. But I'm always worried because people know I don't like doing those things. When you cancel, you suspect their eyes are rolling back and they're thinking, obviously, it's canceling. But as I was about to leave, I was feeding all the dogs and random up, I couldn't find Snowball anywhere. And I searched for him, and we haven't got a huge back garden.

I mean, it's big, but it's not in all. I searched him for an hour in the back garden, couldn't find it. Began to panic. And in the end, I found that he'd crawled into a tiny little space away from everyone to be on his own. And that's always a sign that a dog, is not well. Yeah. You know, normally they go away from the pack when they're about to die. So I cancelled the Walliams Windsor evening and rushed him to, and it was after vet hours, and we took him to a sort of local animal hospital. And then they diagnosed him with,

the heart was still bad. He also had an ear infection that had got worse, which we treated for him in the past. They also said his spleen needed work. There was loads of stuff. So in the end, he had a heart operation, and they fixed the heart completely. But sometimes these dogs were born with only one aorta going into the heart. It's had a two. It's had a two. It's a It's really crazy, messed up. So poor little fellow, you had heart operation, ear operation, then another ear operation, nose operation, soft palate operation, spleen removed, something was wrong with his leg, and he went for all this in about a year and a half.

And of course, he was one of the dogs in the house that's not covered by pet insurance. I could be walking an Italian car now. Yeah, he's an expensive chap, isn't he? It's worth every penny. It's like having a trophy wife, isn't it? I think he feels that way about me. I hope. He's a good boy looking at.

So you've got Jonathan, you've got Snowball, who's adorable, and then you've got the pugs. They're just known as the pugs. I never know their name. Everybody calls them the pugs. Impe and piglet. However, because they're brothers, we've now forgotten which is which. Now, the only way we can tell him apart is one of them had to have a front leg surgery. He had a fracture. He's got a plate in his leg.

So if you feel the leg, you can feel the metal plate in there. I don't like doing it because that freaks me out. So I just refer to them as the pugs more often than that. But they're very... They're very close, shall we say, in a way that dogs don't seem to be as troubled by societal norms when it comes to expressing their sexuality. So even though they're brothers,

there are moments that none of us are particularly comfortable watching. Well, I've been at your house sometimes, and you do get an impromptu live sex show. You do, it's like being in the box. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So we've also got, as well as the two pugs, the over-sexualized pugs. Oh, who's this coming up?

I'm no idea. He looks sweet though, didn't he? Look at that. Hello, Snowball, who's that? Snowball can be occasionally aggressive on first meeting. Hello. Snowball, he doesn't want to play like that, thank you, come on. He's gone off, that was a one-night stand for Snowball. He's a nice elderly chap with his dogs.

This is me in about two years time. Wow, this is... What breed is this? This is a beautiful animal. German Spitzers. Wow, what a beauty. Snowball, come on. Do friends, look. Look, I'm friends. You can be friends.

Yeah, they get really hot in their coats, don't they? And that's a collie, yeah? Yeah. And who's this little fellow here? I don't know. I've just picked him up. Oh, you've just found a dog. You're not dog napping, are you?

Yeah, I've just about. He's done his business over there, good boy. He's a, I love the grey one. Maybe we've discovered a whole new breed. Yeah. What, the dog you found on the street? It looks a bit like one of my Sony robotic dogs. Hello.

Nice to meet you, sir. Enjoy the rest of your day. Nice to meet you, bye-bye. What lovely animals. Really lovely. We've got the two pugs and then we've got princess. We've got princess who is a faded rose. She's the oldest dog that we have left.

She's 11 or 12 thereabouts. She's on her way out to be honest with you a bit worried about this weekend. So we give her lots of little treats and lots of little strokes and make sure she feels kind of loved. But she won't, you know, I don't think she'll see Christmas certainly. And she's a chihuahua isn't she? She's a chihuahua and she had puppies in the house with Jane's dog. She was our daughter honey's dog. Yoda was harvey's dog.

Betty had Captain Jack, who died also last year, and he was put down, and I was holding him and stroking while he's put down, poor old thing. And there's a very sweet story about that, which if you have time, I'll happily share with you. And then we have Princess who had puppies with Sweeney, who's Jane's Brussels Griffin. What you're up to? You can go to the toilet? Brussels Griffin, which was an alarming thing to witness. And I don't know if you've ever seen a pregnant chihuahua, but they're small animals. And when they're stretched to bursting point with four puppies,

it doesn't look like it was intended to happen that way. Really they should lay eggs or something because she was not comfortable. But she's very, very sweet. But that's what's happened really is the children all had one dog each. Of course. And Jane and I had a dog. We had five.

So when we walk the dogs, one person per dog, that's easy to walk. As the children gradually moved away to university or just to get on with their life, the dog stayed. And then my dog, Mr. Pickle died accidentally, which was awful. I'm really upset me. So that's when I bought the pug boys. Really sad about that. really sad. And then Jane bought me snowball. So we had this kind of growing and then

the kids kept dumping their pets on us. Like we've got Wigel, who's Betty, who's doing her PhD in biology down in Brighton. He's your eldest. Yeah, because the studies are quite intense, she's dumped her dog on us. And he's a bad influence. He's a bad influence. That's going to be children one day, isn't it? Well, I think children are much easier to handle annoying dogs because children, you're forced to pay attention to you. I mean, I think we all forget that we have a relationship with our dogs. It's easier to forget. And you need to give them as much time really as you can. Yeah.

And if you don't, they do get a bit pack mentality and they do get a bit crazed. And so, I mean, I do make sure that I spend time and interact with them as much as possible. Because otherwise, I think that's when their worst natures come out. Or that's when they're kind of, you know, their animal traits develop more. Yeah. And you wind up with dogs that just go to toilet wherever they want and they snap at each other and they try and... Well, that's what I've got. That's awkward. So, Jonathan, when you were growing up, did you have pets when you were growing up then?

We did have pets. We did have pets. We did have pets. We didn't have pets in the way that we have pets. I mean, they weren't sort of purchased breed animals that were, you know, looked after and fussed over... Part of the family? I mean, they were sort of part of the family, but they were... Well, it's odd actually.

When I come to think of it, see, I was kind of like that as well. I mean, my parents went on some sort of fierce breeding program, and there were six of us. Oh, with human beings, not dogs. There were six of us. And really, you know, my feeling is a family of six is fine if people have the time to deal with them. But my parents didn't have the time to deal with them, because my dad was making. making ends me as much as possible and my mum wasn't working she was looking off the family so really i mean i was largely neglected which is fine i'm not you know bothered about it but it's

the truth is you don't have the time to give six children if you're hello hello that's a quite a handful you've got there but all beautifully behaved just like my boy um so we had we had first of all we had when you said quite handful you've got there i'm really hope she knows you meant the dogs like a carry-on moment so sorry we're talking about your childhood we had uh we had uh yeah no it's very typical of you. We had, so we first we had a dog, and I've no idea how we acquired her, but she was a Mongol, so she was some sort of like,

you know, a dozen breeds rolled into one. Quite unattractive, frankly. I mean, a very unattractive animal. No one ever looked at her and thought, wow, that's a nice looking dog. I mean, she, and her name was trog, T-R-O-D. T-R-O-D. T-R-G.

And I named her, bizarrely, and it's odd that I named you this way because she was sort of named because apparently when she was a puppy and I was too young, so this would have been about 64, 65, And this is it, is it Leightonstone? Late Stone, East London, where I was brought up.

I used to watch a TV show, a black and white puppet show for children called Pogles Wood, which is very sweet. I think it was one of the Oliver Postgate programs back before he enjoyed a bigger success. And they had a pet squirrel in it called Tog. They had like West Country Access. They'd go, Tog. Where's Tog? And I interpret that as Krog.

Now, obviously, the irony is I inserted an R into a word when so much of my life has been defined by my inability. to successfully wrangle the letter R. But so Trug was her name, which was an odd name, spent a lot of time explaining that name to people. And Trug was with this one. Trug was a bitch, so she was, but she was never sort of like snipped. So she was always going into heat.

I don't know why my parents didn't think it would be a good idea to get that dealt with. Because our lines were kind of dominated by that. Once a month or thereabouts when she would go on heat and she would give off whatever smell it is that attracts all the neighbourhood dogs. And bear in mind Eastland in the 60s, a lot of just stray dogs.

you know, it really was, it was kind of, it is like a whole other world. And open the door to go to school in the morning, and there'd be seven dogs sitting outside panting. And she would desperately try and get out there because she wanted to fulfill her biological imperative. Of course. They wanted to get their end of the way. A lady's got needs.

I'm a schoolboy caught in the middle, wearing hand-me-down trousers that don't stretch to my ankles. You know, it was a pathetic sight. So often she would get out, and I don't know whether you've seen dogs post-coitus. Right. They stick together. Oh, I see.

They're hard to separate. Yeah. Something happens to the member. It's like foxes, yeah. It gets stuck in. I think it's kind of to give them a better chance to get pregnant. But often they seem to be sort of asked to ask. Physically, I've never quite understood how,

I guess the dog's penis has more kind of a hinge capability than the human penis. Hello. Hello, good morning. Perhaps you could help us on this. Good morning. There's a little dog. Go ahead. I can't talk about this in front of their dog.

He's too polite and middle class. That's like Margot and Joey from the good life. It really is. What a charming elderly couple. Very lovely. So, and they used to get stuck together, and often we get people knocking and doing on saying, your dogs are stuck together. Once it was in the middle of a local football match, and I had to walk out with a bucket of cold water, with a bucket of cold water in front of a jeering crowd of football fans, as a boy, I'm a boy.

I don't even really know what's going on. I had to throw this water over the dogs and that would often separate them. So I guess the shock would make whatever was going on with the man. That's quite traumatic, having to do that. Deeply, but I feel I'm making progress. You are. that childhood then? Did you share a room with all your brothers? There were five in one room? There were five boys in one room, two bunk beds and one bed on its own and people have this

kind of thing though, don't they about? You know, we didn't have much but we had each other and we all, do you think that's? Well, we didn't have much and we didn't have each other. I mean, we were kind of we were close only in terms of geography, really. I mean, I'm very fond of all my brothers, but I don't interact with them much. They're very nice men. They're all nice men. They're all kind of very different people. My sister's nice. I don't interact with her much. My parents are nice. I don't really interact with them much. You know, they're all fond of all of them, but it feels like it's more of a biological connection than anything else. And I suspect that's because there were so many of us growing up. So, you know, and I was, bizarrely, I know people might find this

surprising, but I'm actually essentially an introvert. I was going to say you, I always get the impression from what you said about you being quite an introverted chart like growing up. So how did that manifest itself then? Were you not, did you not have loads of friends or Did you spend a lot of time in your room? I didn't really have many friends. No, I would spend a lot of time in the room. Yeah. We didn't call it, and no one called it my room.

It was in the bedroom or the room. Because I would draw a lot of read comics, so I would just spend all day on my own drawing. My mum once came out to me and said, I'm worried about you and here all day on your own, and I think I said, don't be. That was probably as long as the conversation went on for. That was it.

You know, I found things to amuse myself, and I found things to amuse myself. And this, of course, I mean, if you do have any younger people, listening and I suspect with me on the show you probably won't this week it was such a different world then I don't think people realise you know this was before not only was it before the internet of course but it was before VCRs I mean actually we're talking about before colour television yeah you know so so before anyone had VCRs you were a slave to what was being shown on

the only three available channels and one of them was essentially open university for hours then a couple of sort of like soft art programs and then it was good night so there was not much on to engage young people. And when you looked at telly then, did you think, oh, that's something I'd like to do one day? Or did it not even occur to you that that would be an option? I quite liked it. I think I had a desire to be noticed to say,

I think that's what tragically this all comes down to. And that comes from my being the middle child in a family of six. And actually, it's slightly more isolated than that even because my two oldest brothers, there was one year apart with them being born. Then there was a two-year gap for me. I think my parents tried for another one,

and it didn't quite work. Then there was me. And then there's another two-year gap. and there's my younger brothers who have one year gap each. So they kind of formed little units. So the two oldest were close and the two younger ones were close. My sister was sort of off on and treated somewhat differently by my parents, obviously. So I felt very much on the way on the middle of it,

and I didn't share the interest they did. They either genuinely liked or pretended to like sports. I didn't like sports and couldn't be bothered to pretend to like sports. So I think my father didn't really understand me. Not that he was sporty crazy, but I think he was. He found me more than any of the others perplexing and difficult to like, really. So, yeah. So it was, I was kind of deliberately on my own. I'm quite happy in it, really. I don't think of my child as being unhappy childhood, but I don't think my childhood as being,

there's nothing about my childhood I miss apart from the things I did on my own. Yeah. There is no family memories I have, which I've got none. You know, I've very few memories. And then you've really created that now, haven't you? The fact that you've, you know, I would describe you as someone now, and I'm lucky enough I get to spend time with you and your family. Well, that's very, very, I think, polite of you to say.

I don't know whether I believe you really believe that, but I mean, it's nice of you to say that. I know. For the sake of societal needs. Yeah, exactly. But now I think you're someone, that's kind of an important thing to you now, isn't it? I know. It's very important.

I adore my family, I love my family, and the time we spend together I value, I mean, much more than even the time I get to spend on my own, which I also value tremendously. But, you know, I feel I've got, I like the balance in my life because of the things. So, you know, as you get older, you kind of make peace with who you are and what you are and you try to enjoy, you know, you try not to do things that you don't want to do too much. And if there are things that you feel obliged to do, you try and find pleasure in them. So I very much enjoy hanging out with kids. I'm hanging out with them in a different way to Jane. Yeah. I like it to be, I'm slightly more transactional.

So I like there to be, I like to know there's a reason for me being there. Oh, that's interesting. I'm helping you with this. Yeah. I'm doing this. Is that a male thing maybe? I don't think so. I mean, it might be partially.

I don't know. I know I see it in men, but I see it in some women as well. I think it's, you know, a personality type. You're good at acts of service. Catherine Ryan introduced me to that concept, which is that she said, when I interviewed her for this podcast, she said, that's how you can kind of show up in relationships. That's a really good thing to do. do so you do acts of service for someone. Yeah. And I think you're quite good at that. You're very,

let me get your coffee, let me do this. The problem is I'm so not good or not comfortable with the other side of it. That's the problem. I mean, that's where the lack of it. The other side is being pleased to be with people just because the time you spend together regardless of what you're doing somehow nourishes you or you somehow enjoy it. You know, and I don't, I have to force myself to stay in the room with people once the job is done. I mean, that's what I don't mind going. I mean, that's why I don't mind going for dinner with people because you know roughly how long it's going to be. Yeah. You know that you can then quite happily go, no, I have to go now.

Thank you for that. Thank you for human contact, which, by the way, I still don't get, but I'm off. I'm going home. And now I'm going to play. What's the thing you always play? Titan full, too. That's your favourite game? Well, yeah, although I'm terrible at it.

I mean, I'm terrible. I've been playing it. It's tragic because this is on the Xbox. I think it's on other platforms now, but it started on the Xbox. and it's that they've got this huge server about the size of South Korea so people can play against each other online and I've been playing this game I mean they released version 2 a little while ago but I've been playing that fairly solidly for a year I mean probably every day for you you can look at your stats and it says something like to a 50,000 hours play and still when I log

into the game there's no consistencies whether I'd be one of the best players in that match or more often than not on the bottom two and it's someone like Nutty Dave Manx 1, who clearly is 7 or 8, because you sometimes hear their voices come out. He's just killing everyone. So the 10,000 hours principle doesn't apply to a tight move. No. So when you were growing up, Jonathan, did you know, I mean, were you quite academic? Because you went to university, so presumably you were one of the first people in your family.

No, well, my two oldest brothers, I don't quite know what happened. I'm not really interested enough to find out. But the two oldest went to university, and I went to university, I went to university. I think the brother who's younger than me was quite severely dyslexic. And in those days they didn't diagnose dyslexia as such. They just thought you were a bit slow or inattentive or just not academic. And he excelled in sports and I think that's quite common in people who have that kind of challenge in their life.

They're keen to do stuff and they find out that which they can do successfully because it must be a terrible thing. If you have severe dyslexia, especially if it isn't diagnosed, what a terrible sort of thing to have to fight through it. must have been horrible for him at school. But the first three of us were, did well enough at school, state school, obviously.

But it's interesting because my mum and dad weren't particularly well-educated people, certainly not formally. I mean, they both left school at, I think, 15 and 16. My dad was raised partially in care. He was his mother, was a single parent. Imagine that in the 40s. He was very different. And she was trying to work.

And so she had him in, like, he was in children homes being cared for. So she was part of his life. And so I think they were very keen, Both my mum and dad, my mum comes also from a broken background, maritaly. So they were keen to start their own family. So they got together when they were, I think, both 16. Wow.

And they had their first child, my oldest brother, when they were 18. It was my father's 18th birthday. He had his first son, which today sounds kind of almost medieval. Yeah. But it was fairly common back then, that people started families so young. And it's still more common in kind of genuine working-class families than it is elsewhere. And so they had one when they're 18, one when they were 19. I came along when they were 21.

they had another one when they were 23 another one they were 24 imagine that so by the age they were 24 they had five kids 24 and then another one after that so when they're 25 they've got six children and then they split up when you guys had left home basically didn't yeah my I think my dad always I think my dad was unhappy I don't really know yeah for sure and then but I think he felt very very much a strong sense of duty to stay with us until we were hi-ha I've been going in circles. Do you know where Kenwood House is? Kenwood House, yes. You are heading roughly in the right direction. I mean it's kind of over that way and I think you can do it by staying on the heath.

But if you can't, if you go up up here and keep to the right and hit the pavement, go around until you hit the main road, go up to a roundabout and do a left and Kenwood House is on the right. So it's basically that direction where I'm pointing now, which I would say is what? This direction, okay. Sort of north, northwest. But if you head up through the head up through the head. teeth in to as far as you can go. My suggestion really though would be to walk up as far as you can. No, to walk up as far as you can go here and staying to this side of the thing and then when you get to the top, hit the road, go up to the roundabout and then do a left. Do you know the name of the road? That is North End Road. Okay, great. Thank you. Good luck. That was great Jonathan. Yes, superior local knowledge. That was like you were sending someone off on some massive quest. That was like Lord of the Rings.

See that's the kind of transaction I understand. So this is really incredible that you're having to talk about things. I don't mind talking about things. Okay, good. But it's only because you're so desperately needy that you find this strange. I mean, we're both, let's face it, both severely damage human beings from different sides of the compass. And that's fine, isn't it? We're a good fit.

Do you know anyone who isn't damaged? No. No, I don't think anyone's not. Do you think there's more damaged people? I mean, damages perhaps a kind of weighty, word to use here. But certainly I think everyone has, will find upon examination themselves as they get older, that there are issues perhaps, which, well, things about themselves, they didn't understand when younger that now makes some sort of sense of them. And hopefully, they arrive at

some degree of comfort with that and realize that it's okay, you know, it's okay to interact with people how you feel comfortable. Yeah. And as long as you're clear and as long as you're, you know. But you're quite an honest person, I think, aren't you? You've always been really honest. Yeah, I am very honest. And that's why I tend not to give interviews. I don't mind giving interviews, but more often than not, as we know, and this isn't me winging. But the newspapers, even the ones which are not tabloid, will, and often the journalists will blame whoever is involved, the editor who pulls one line out and gives it headline prominence out of context. And suddenly, what you said actually isn't what you said.

It's close to what you've said, but it's given undue importance or it's focused upon in a way which makes it seem different. And it's just tedious, really, to have to deal with that for no real reason, because, you know, They try and get you to talk to newspapers and people for when you're promoting TV shows. It doesn't make any difference. It really doesn't. I mean, I've been on the cover of most magazines in the UK, and the week you're on the cover of a magazine, it has absolutely no impact on how many people watch that show. I mean, genuinely, you know, it really doesn't.

But sometimes they're nice people, and sometimes it's quite fun to have a photograph taken, but it's not something which I overly enjoy. When you were growing up, so you left university and I know you became like, you were a researcher, weren't you, a TV researcher? Yeah. And so did you have any sense then of going into the world that you're in now? No, not really. I mean, I know I didn't want to work in a conventional job. When I was growing up, when I was little, we used to walk to school every morning.

It was a long walk. It was probably about a mile and a half, two miles to school each way. And we used to walk sometimes. There was a family around the corner called the Hills. There was Mr Hill, whose name was Edward. There was Mrs Hill, whose name was Cath. Yeah. And they had three boys or four boys, one of whom was called Matthew. Matthew was that was the first time I ever saw a dead body because when he just turned 18 and he was a bit of a larry very lovable but larry sort of rogue He was always hiding out in our house because he was one of the first people I ever met who understood credit cards and he got a credit card when he first started working and ran up a huge bill then got another and then another one so often back in those old says well men would turn up in suits Yeah, carrying briefcases from Barclay cards. You know where Matthew Hill lives and he'd be hiding in the kitchen and he had a kind of trials bike and he used to waste around it. He loved his drugs, right? Yeah, and he got in some sort of order cases.

another drive and it went badly and he got knocked off his bike. We never really found out what happened. And unfortunately it was a taxi going behind him and he got crushed under the taxi. He was 18 who was crushed to death. And I remember going up to the, because I really liked Matthew. He wasn't particularly my friend. He was more my younger brother's friend. He was that age.

But I liked him a lot as well. We all did. So I went to see the body. You know, I thought I should. It was the first time I'd ever seen a dead body. But see someone that young dead was quite... That's pretty traumatic, isn't it? So I must have been about 19 then or maybe he was 17.

Yeah. So the reason why I told you that while I grew some stories, I used to walk to school and we used to dread it because to get to school, about the halfway mark, you'd go down the underground tunnel that went down to the underground station and up the other side. It was a cut through, or there was a kind of busy road nearby. And Mr Hill used to go to his job every day. He'd walk to, and he was.

It was like someone out of almost like, you know, the 40s. He wore a bowler hat. I used to walk to school often with a neighbor's father wearing a bowler hat. And I was too polite to not walk with him, but of course you don't want to be making conversation. When you're 10, you don't want to spend, I certainly don't spend like half an hour every day talking to a man in these late 50s. You know, and he was very sweet. He was very nice. But here's the point.

He would have been the last of the bowler hat wearers generation, wouldn't he? But I remember walking into school and it was his last day at the office. And I remember him saying, well, this is it, it's my last day there. And as luck would have it, as we went home from school, he must have been going to be. we bumped into him again and he was a broken man and they'd given him a carriage clock. I mean this is literally what they used to do about him. So he'd worked for the same firm for someone like 35 years and they gave him a piece of shit carriage clock and said thanks very much and that was it.

I don't know what sort of pension he had, but you could see that a lot of his reason for living had gone and I remember even the time thinking, okay, well this whole thing is a lie. This whole thing about work hard and be good and stay in one place. that's why I remember when the good life started on TV I felt very cheating because I was so excited because all the newspaper said young couple find out the way to opt out of the rat race and already when I was about 12 that was my big concern

so I remember thinking okay man I'm watching this I'm taking notes yeah this is a way to survive and to live happily without having to be Mr Hill and I watched it and when I found out that essentially it was a sitcom it wasn't a life guide it was a sitcom and you still needed a house with a garden to get by well that's not easy you wanted to really opt out well i wanted to arrive i wanted already to be living with barbara in the house yeah built growing potatoes having the marvellous passive-aggressive

love square i suppose it was with margot and joey next door my eye's like i was scared of i was scared of being i mean i've never liked being told what i'm morning but um i didn't want to be in a position where i had no control of myself or indeed was doing something that was rewarding. Yeah. And someone else had the power just to say, okay, you're going to stop now, boy, we don't need you anymore. So then you were definitely, you were an outlier then, because that's quite an unusual way to think, because the majority people do think. I think it was unusual in Laintonstone in the mid-60s, certainly for a young person. Yeah. But I didn't, I didn't, I didn't live there in a way, in a way I lived in America in my imagination,

because all I did was read comics. Yeah. I watched TV and film shows. So I dreamt, and I kind of never thought I would ever get to visit America. Because it wasn't open to people like me back, I mean people didn't you know cheap flights didn't really kick in until who was that guy Edward later? Now it's closed to the end to so many people yeah well it's not so much though I mean it's different reasons but back then financially yeah it was just not on the cards yeah you could go to America I mean we never had a holiday out the country I never went out the country with my family so then when you started doing the last resort which I remember and it is kind of

it was really for me I remember thinking oh there's no one else like that who's like me who's young and doesn't look like everyone seemed old on television people doing chat shows and it was pretty groundbreaking wasn't it that show i think was was probably you know attention worthy at the time this is what people responded to it was that i deliberately didn't want to do a youth tv show and i wouldn't let them cast me as a young person doing a show and i wasn't that i mean i was 26 when it started right so i'm not really a young person i was perhaps young in terms of the landscape of TV then, but only in terms of the landscape of like evening TV and being given your own show. And it was, you know, it's a real troublem. This boy's getting a bit tired now.

Where is it? Where is we should start heading back with him. Okay. Maybe. You're getting tired. He's a good boy. Do you want a restaurant in a minute? Sweetheart. But I deliberately, that's why I wore my, that's why I wore suits. Because suits weren't really in fashion with young men back then, particularly. Some started wearing. This is kind of late 80s. Yeah, I mean, I always loved clothes, partly perhaps because I never had any nice clothes when I was. young and so I always was very, very troubled by my appearance. So as soon as I got my now started being interested fashion and I was the right age for punk and punk was so much fun and so kind of like you could experiment and be crazy with clothes and make stuff. And then there was

like new romantics and there was kind of you could wear a zoot suit, which I never had a proper suit suit much to my chagrin but I had an approximation of it that I formed from items in the local Oxfram shop. So I always like suits and suiting generally and then kind of mid-age's Jean-Paul Gaudier started making slightly odd-shaped suits for men. I remember thinking, oh, this is amazing, because these are clearly not business suits, but they have that, a nod towards the formality of the suit, and a nod towards a male uniform. And also, when you're wearing a suit, it's actually very easy if you're not particularly good stylishly.

I mean, you know, I like the way I dress. Most people are somewhat confused by it. And so I would see a suit. There's a big part of your life, isn't it? It's your sort of self-expression. Yeah, I mean, not, for me, it isn't. For me, they're clothes. Well, I like them, but to be honest, to be on.

with you, I can spend four days in sort of soft lounge pyjamas if I'm indoors and I don't think I want to go out and put something nice on. Yeah. And I'll wander out in those clothes. It's not like I'm particularly interested in effect how it lands with others. But I do, you know, I like design generally right across the ball. And so I'm just part of that. And the interesting about these suits was like most suits is when you put them on, you're dressed. The great thing about a suit is it's hard to mess up a suit. You can. But providing the shoes aren't ridiculous and providing the shirt isn't ridiculous, you're good to go. Yeah.

Because it all matches, you know, and it's acceptable. I mean, for women, it's a bit more nightmares. For women, and of course, Eddie Isard, who's never quite got it right, that pink beret was a huge sartorial misstep, Eddie, if you don't mind the same. Someone tried to steal the pink beret. Well, they were doing him a favour. I wish you'd let him get away with it. I suspect that's why Labour lost votes that year.

It was Eddie's beret. But did you, so after the last resort, Jonathan, that was when you became famous, wasn't it? That's when you must have thought. Yes. Do you remember thinking, oh, okay, I'm famous? I remember the moment when I thought, oh, oh, yeah, this is having some sort of impact on people is when I was walking down South Moulton Street, probably looking in, there was a shop down there, and there was a shop called Bazaar, which was a great shop.

I remember Bizarre, yeah. And I lusted up. They had a Jean-Cool-Gaulted bowler hat with a spike sticking out the top. So you wanted a bowler hat like Mr. Hill? No, it wasn't like Mr. Hill. He had a spike out of the top. It was the antithesis of Hills hat. So I remember I was probably wondering around their window shopping. I didn't have a lot of money.

I mean, the suit, well, bizarrely, in the first show, wasn't Goetheet, it was Armani. Right. I was a suit that I later wore for our wedding when I got married to Jane, which was the next year. But I remember being down there and someone coming up to me and asking for my autograph, and it was such a weird thing because, first of all, I mean, I didn't particularly like people approaching me who I didn't know. And then when they asked a autograph, and I remember thinking, oh, God, I haven't really figured out how to sign this. So I wasn't one of those kids who practices their autographs on their school book. And in fact, when I used to dabble in drawing comic books, when I was young guy, I used to sign myself Darcy Sarto.

So if you have asked me to say that, that was a song. was a name taken from an episode of Hancock, which I also liked when I was a kid, even though I didn't see it when it first went out, but I had the scripts. There's an episode where he can't find the final page of a detective thriller. The single page turner. And the book was called Lady Don't Fall Backwards. And the author is Darcy Sarto. So I acquired that as a pen name. So I'd never mastered my own signature particularly well. And even today my handwriting is pretty deplorable and my signature's not good or consistent.

But that was a moment where I thought, oh, I see. So they are, people are watching. But to be honest, I mean, I didn't particularly enjoy it because that whole period, I was just in a state of near constant panic. Were you? Because the show, the first three or four weeks it was not live. We recorded at about 730 and it went out at 1230. And then because it was getting attention, Channel 4 wanted to move it earlier and go live. They were kind of obsessed with live TV back there, which is fun.

So we were doing a live show. I bear on I have no real performance background or experience. and sort of lucked into this job and was also asked to do it but it was a strange position I mean I wanted to do it I thought I wanted to do it and suddenly I'm going out live

doing a live show which is quite a challenge and it's very difficult as well because we didn't necessarily have the best guests always that had its fun it had its own identity I mean I remember

it was a funny quote I think it'd smash it from one of the members of AHA who said they said what's your favourite show on TV and he said the last resort on a good night and what's your least favourite show on TV

he said the last resort on a bad night And I had to agree with him. But I like that you got slammed by Morton. Oh, it wasn't Morton. No, no. No, no. Morton's always been there for me. It was one of the lesser band members. It was Pedd or something.

Hague. Yeah, ped. Someone who should actually be a shelving unit. But that was really life-changing. And you've met Jane, who I should say, that reasons of full disclosure, which is how I've got this access. Well, it's how we became friends. We're friends as well.

I've known you now for about 18 years or something like this. Yeah, longer. 23? Certainly feels longer, but I think it is about, it feels about 40. You're horrible, but actually, you're not really. You're someone who is really generous. Like, you're the most generous person I know, I think. And, but you're also someone who cannot bear to take compliments.

Why do you think that is? I'm sorry, I wasn't really listening. What was that you just said? You're very, very generous person. It's true, though, isn't it? Why can't you take compliments? I don't really feel comfortable with them, I suppose. I don't particularly value them.

I think I have a fairly strong sense of myself. And also, often I've heard people, in my line of work, you get complimented a lot and sometimes falsely. Yeah, that's true. It is healthy to have a degree of scepticism about them and not to value them too much. Yeah. But on the individual edge, yeah,

I think kind of, to some extent, that level of emotional exchange is not welcome, you know. I mean, I'm, I mean, we used to joke Jane and I that she was my human credentials. Which I now think we meant. She was someone who understood the interaction would occasionally steer me to the right thing to say and do with friends. Yeah. You know, whereas I kind of... But that's quite healthy, isn't it? Well, yes and no.

value honesty as well and sometimes I think an honest relationship which is rare yeah could be more fruitful but just supply different things you know I mean there are times when various of my friends most of whom not exclusively but many of whom work in the creative field and sometimes they'll produce something which isn't really the standard any of us would wish yeah and apparently you have to still say it was great which I find odd I mean I don't you find that difficult Would you rather say what they think of my work? I have a clear idea of it. And if an audience is finding it and liking it,

we will get recommissioned. If they're not, we won't. Yes. But ultimately... Sorry, Johnty, should we go up here? Hold on, where are we? So where are we now? I don't know, we're lost.

No, we're not. We've come a long way. I know. In so many different ways you can interpret that set of. We've come a long way. Is it up this way? It's up there and there's white. We're white on the back end.

See, that lady I gave directions to them. Yeah. She did follow. my directions hopefully she'll be here she'll be here she needs to be over there so whether or not have you ever seen the film called the swimmer oh yes i have seen that at lancaster yeah we go through people's back gardens maybe she would have been the jogger and she ran through lots of back gardens so i know you don't like compliments jonathan but no it's not they don't like them they're fine i just don't really respond to them okay you don't respond to them in the way i mean

i'd rather than not be coming my way but given the alternative they're preferable okay well i think You've done an incredible job with your kids. Ah, you don't know them. See, that is me undercutting a compliment. But yeah, they're really nice young human beings. I think so. Yeah. I like to think the world is a better place for them in it.

I think it is, definitely. Which is all you can really hope for. Yeah. Come on, I might have to carry you. So your chat show is coming back this autumn. Late August? Yeah. And do you still love interviewing people?

Do you enjoy doing it? It's a job. I mean, I don't say I've ever loved it particularly. I mean, I like it. There are very few things I love. But I like doing it a lot. On the night when you're on form and the guests are in the right mood to be played for. I mean, it's a peculiar kind of show we do. These are like entertainment talk shows. They're not revelatory emotional talk shows. I mean, we touch sometimes on real issues. And I like to think I'm reasonably adept at mixing the two together because that's quite a difficult task. But it's as much to do with creating a mood. Yeah. For the viewer and in the studio and letting the, I'm going to pick him up. So he will now be panting. No, no, no. Don't go over there.

Come this way. Here. Daddy get you. Oh, you are a heavy old lump. Okay, here we go. Oh, Snow. It's a good boy. Let's give you a break.

Oh, Snowball. Because you're a bit tired, don't you? This is how I feel doing the show some weeks. Sometimes it's all you doing the lifting. But no, I like doing it a lot. Yeah. You know, it's also fun. As you get old as well, you don't want to be retired, really.

I mean, I've enjoyed. this first after the year, I see we were spending the money they would have put on my show trying new things like the nightly show, which I'm full to say wasn't a success. Yes. And so I was like, and also I thought we'd be out the country because of James work anyway. So it suited both of us, but in the end I've been around. Yeah. I've really enjoyed not having a routine particularly.

And I've got a bit of routine. I do a weekly show on Radio 2. Yeah. So once a week you go out and you interact with people and do some business and then go home again. quite nice and radio I find comes quite naturally to me so people say and you know I agree that people always say you're one of the best radio show I mean that's you're brilliant it's so who are these people well they didn't want to be named I don't blame them they're in the witness protection the wireless protection hey oh but your life's nice right now isn't it because the kids

no my life has always been nice yeah even when I've had stress and concern I've always yeah look I am someone who tends to focus even in a midst of adversity on the positive. I mean the other day this is going to sound silly to you perhaps. The other day I remember feeling really happy. Oh look at squirrel. Oh yeah. Hey boy. Hello. It's got a nut. It's like a squirrel posing for a picture already. I know. Instagram squirrel. Hey squirrel. I remember getting two things made me feel very happy last week. One was my hands. I was holding several things in my hands and I'm thinking, man, these are well designed. This weird, so lucky to have these things. Look at this and I was

experiment in my hands. Now I'm 56, still my hands surprise and delight me every day. Yeah. So I'm happy, so that made me really happy. That gave me a good spring in my step for the first half of the day. Yeah. Easily. And every now and then I'd look down, they're still there, still working. But you know, we take that sort of ship for granted. They're magnificent. Your hands are a magnificent creation. Even, missionary speaking, I mean, imagine if you didn't have an opposable thumb. It would be a nightmare. So that's number one. The other thing was, It was modern plumbing. I was going to the toilet, which I do more often these days on the eastern. I remember thinking, oh, can you matter of fact of walking like half a mile out of the village

and dump into a stream and then come, and there's no paper. I mean, I was playing tennis with David Bidil once and I desperately needed to go and I went behind a bush. I don't know if you've wiped your backside or leaves recently, but they lack absorbency. You did go to the bathroom in the woods, didn't you? Well, it was behind a bush, yeah. And I tell you that was... But there were your own woods. Well, it sounds like you've got your own woods.

That was a big pile I left there. About a week later I had to blame, I said, oh, maybe we've got a family of foxes living down there because it was still present. So, but anyway, modern plumbing. So, well, and I genuinely, I'm not saying this to be cute. Generally, I remember thinking, this is amazing. We live at this time now. Thank God. I'm so grateful to be alive right now, as opposed to 100 years ago, which would have been fun, I'm sure.

Oh, it wouldn't have been. It would have been really tough. But you wouldn't have had the future to compare it to him. Exactly. So, you know. I don't think you would. Should we cut? Should we cut through here?

Be cut through. I'm just thinking of snowboard. We can't get a taxi by here, oh there's a taxi. We can't... Are you okay? Should we get them? Let's stand here for a minute. I'm just worried about him being too tired.

Where should we sit? Let's sit on these stumps. He's also, he's got a lecture to give this afternoon. So he's got a... Oh, Professor Snowball's busy. Yeah. Hey Snow, Snow, come sit down here. Snobs, come and sit here.

Oh, is he all right, Dante. Hear that noise I'm sitting down. That was a man's noise making noise. That was a full on. Snowball! How about that? He's also weighing. I couldn't find the normal lead.

He has a harnessing. He's sweating. his thick neck dog so he's wearing his winter harness which is sort of a fetching teal-coloured tweed and uh is that teal he looks really stylish yeah it's teal i called it prison brakes it's a bit denim i was saying earlier that i think you're you're really generous and i think you like say that again because now i would have heard that over that you're really generous but you like doing that you like taking people out and you like buying dinner and you like no you know i don't know though i like it but i prefer it's the alternative there's no

Which is what? Well, if I've got, there's a great quote, if I'm going to give you, from the great Telly Savalas. Go on. An actor whom I admire, Greek, not of great range, but he was wonderfully Cojac. He's also, there's a Mario Bar of a horror film called Lisa and the Devil, which is amazing, which was a couple of years before Cojacke, and he looks the same and he sucks a lollipop in it. So I can't help but think he was already trying out that particular, not the deepest character trait, a love of lollipop, but it was memorable.

And I used to have a picture of Telly Savalus, which I kept on my computer occasions, and screenshep of Telly, looking magnificent. Huge Greek-American man. Unashamedly thick in every area, right? Where oiled up, sunbathing oiled up, where he looked like a giant savelet, wearing the tiniest pair of orange speedos. It's an amazing look, right?

And he said sometimes, he was giving an interview when Kojak was in its prime, and very, very generous man. I mean, genuinely, you know, like overtipping everyone. And someone said, you're kind of very generous, perhaps foolishly so. He went, you know, if telly's holding, everybody's holding.

And I really like that phrase. You know, you should share your good fortune. I really like that. If I'm out with someone... I'm going to start saying that, J.R's holding. No, don't say it about me. I don't want to get around. And also, he said it about himself, which was amazing.

Yes, I love that he said it about himself. No, but that's, again, that's acts of service. I prefer the clinical phrase, transactional. Okay, transactional. But you're good, like, when you buy presents, you're very thoughtful as well. I'm quite thoughtful. You are, Jane's last birthday. I was quite impressed.

I was bowled over. Just the thoughtful... No, but they were pretty impressive. Well, you know, because I do love Jane and I wanted to have nice gifts, but I've learned to be better. In actual fact, over the years, there's a difference between generosity and thoughtfulness.

And often I used to buy stuff because it caught my eye. Yeah. And I thought it seemed fun. And I gave very little time to think about whether the person it was intended for would share that feeling. Yeah.

And so more often than not, people would get gifts that I was excited as he opened. And they were a nice gift, but they weren't tailored to them. And I learned in recent years that in actual fact, what's fine is such a straightforward thing, it sounds almost stupid a point. But if you listen to people during the course of the year,

when they express a desire, for example, for a brighter light near where they put makeup on, that would make a good gift. As opposed to what I would have brought her, which was a portable multi-charger unit, which you can power a flat-screen TV off of if you're in a field, which is an amazing thing. And I would buy that as a gift for anyone

and think that's a great gift, realise now that she doesn't have a need for that, but she did have a lead for a bright light over by that side of the bed. So that was seen as a more thoughtful gift. Consequently, I reasoned it was a better purchase and indeed it was. Although I'm not going to tell you in advance, but this birthday, don't buy yourself a portable power block before you turn 50 next year. I don't turn 50 next year. I'm not, please don't say that. I'm not 50 next year. That's such a root one joke. I apologize. I'm not going to say how old I am.

I remember, which is a bit, it's a bit heavy this, but it's fine. It's my show. I can say what I want. When my sister was really sick. And I can remember you were the person that was kind of, you and Jane were very practical. And you said, right, do you need, you weren't just saying, oh, it's really sad. This is terrible. You were like, right, what about a car to take you to the hospital or something?

Which was just like really useful because people, you know, people are great. And they say, oh, this is a terrible thing that's happened. But you actually want someone just thinking of those practical things. I think sometimes often being. offering some sort of practical support is a really nice gift for people even though it's not glamorous yeah but then sometimes it is just thoughtfulness then I remember a friend of mine his father was dying of cancer and I didn't know his father particularly well I've met him once twice this is someone who's famous yeah I won't name him and I

said I'm you know so sorry about your days I said is there anything I can get him or different because he'd met me and he quite liked me and I think he liked my work on the film show which I did for years on the BBC yeah he said what he really loves those 60 spy films he used to love it when you interviewed those eyes and that So I got together. So I just, it's very easy to do, really. I'm lucky enough I have something of a disposable income. So I bought like 20 spy films on DVD from that period,

some obscure, some of the year, and wrapped up in the box for a DVD and made sure you had a DVD to watch them on and then send them over. And I know that he liked that. And I think he probably liked the thought that went into it as much as the films, probably. I suspect sometimes when you're feeling down,

the fact that someone's brought you something, but they haven't sent you over flowers. They haven't seen you over flowers or chocolates, some of that. They thought, what does this person like? what does this person want, what would make this person up. The fact that you put that level of thought into who they are often means more than the actual physical thing that you're sending over. So I've learned to be slightly more.

Well, I think I was always fairly thoughtful, but I've learned to value that more. Do you think you've changed a lot then? Like in the lot, I mean, everyone changes, so it's a kind of a bit of stupid question in that sense. But I mean, do you think you've changed dramatically? I think fundamentally, no, because deep down inside, I think there is a kernel of a person, my belief, is it's formed when you're pretty young,

and that person's always there. I think you do change and you can work on yourself in the way you interact with others. Yeah. And what you receive from them and what you give to them. And I've certainly changed that. And also politically you can change in terms of you become, I mean, I never, I was, I genuinely, I don't believe I was ever an arrogant person. But sometimes in my own work, you have to give off a certain breezy confidence, which is very easily mistaken for arrogance. And when performing in that kind of while, and really on screen, you know, always you're performing.

Even if you don't think you are, you're always offering a. an edited version of yourself or an exaggerated version of yourself. And I think sometimes, certainly in my earlier career, I felt very keenly that I should present this sort of image that you were on top of it, that you could have the final say, that you were smart enough to come back with a one-liner, boom, boom, boom. And that's not always particularly attractive to watch or comfortable to be in the presence of.

And when that would bleed into my own life, I think that was, it wasn't comfortable for those around me. So I think learning to just cherry pick the aspects your personality that you share with others, the awareness that you can do that. And there's nothing wrong with doing that. It's actually a decent thing to do so that you don't always say what you're thinking. And I am, as I said earlier, I'm somebody with values honesty. So I have to sometimes stop from saying what I'm thinking because it's the truth, as it feels to me.

I mean, there's not necessarily any objective truth. But certainly this is my reaction to a certain circumstance. And I realize, no, that's not. You can't say that. It's not okay to say it. Your book is terrible. I mean, I've read Friends books sometimes, which I thought weren't great, and they've been fishing for compliments,

and I've learned how to say, yes, it was good. Do you say, do you use the classic, wow, you pulled it off? You've done it again is not one. You've done it again is good. I tell you what, I mean, occasionally, some films as well. Occasionally you'll find something to focus on within the work that wasn't as awful as the rest of it. Or indeed, if it's something like, I mean, if it's professionally on screen,

when I was doing the film show I had to be honest and I was always I never said I liked something I didn't like and I often said I quite like things which I knew other people would hate and I would try and find something especially towards the end of that tenure

because I had a growing realisation of just how hard it is to make a film so I would try and be a bit gentler but if I'm doing it on the talk show where you're not being paid to give an opinion so you can therefore avoid it without it feeling like you're betraying

you know the purpose of your job or the people are paying you so or the audience so uh i will then often if it's a terrible terrible movie and the guest has already booked for it i will just pretend i haven't seen it really yeah which is fine because really they're there to talk about the movie partially you're there to create a fun thing which has an element of that in it there's no reason why you can't say so tell me about the film you know why do you want to do it working with this guy was good working with this one was great this director this moment boom boom boom well good luck with it that's not compromise because that's still fulfilling the fun of the show, but it's a

managed to avoid you the awkwardness of saying, yeah, I mean occasionally if I know someone really well, I know that and take it, I might, and I know, often you know the people themselves don't like the film, but they're in an awkward position as well. They've got to promote it, haven't they? Yeah, because, congratulations, they're obliged for a wee. He's had a little rest.

Good boy, though. This is the best walk of his life. Well, look, I want to say, no, the best walk of his life, I think, was, and you all appreciate it. It was a couple of years back, it snowed and I wanted him to experience the snow. Yeah. And partly also, I wanted to, I wanted a, I wanted a cut a dash with him because he's a handsome boy he looks great I bet in the snow and I've got a long

coat that I bought about 30 years ago by design I'm not sure they're called matsuda are they still going they're not in that way when people were buying yoji and kenzo yeah yeah a lot of Japanese designers picked up over here we've now fallen by the way so it's a mat suda it's an amazing coat it's like a kind of thin fabric great coat it goes down almost to my ankles and i'm six two so that's a long coat and it's got big black satin collars yeah so i was excited at a chance to have that way now So I put that on and someone had given me a top hat recently. So I put some big Rick Owens boots on my matthewed a coat. Did you wear the top hat?

Did David Badil give his top hat? He gave me a white top hat. So I went out wearing, took him for, what a, can you imagine what a figure we got? He had a black lead. He's as white as a snow, a black lead. It probably looked like I was just walking on my own holding a string. Snow everywhere. I'm stomping through it.

Top hat. Oh, I like to think it cheered everyone like that day. But the other snow story, this is a sweet story. You know I mentioned earlier on Betty's first dog, Captain Jack. Oh yeah. He was an adorable shih Tzu. He was lovely. Well that was partly what inspired me to get shih Tzu.

Well, temperamentally, you couldn't have a sweeter dog and just very pleasant company, just a joy to be with. And when he got ill, he had a lump grew up around his neck, some sort of cancerous, but fairly benign cancerous growth. But once they had he was breathing, we had it removed, and then it started growing back. But then he started being in pain about something. We had him diagnosed he had a thing called a nerve sheathed tumor, so it's a tumor growing around the nerve veins up the top of the shoulder.

And they said, look, we can manage the pain, but he might not have long. He might only have a week. He might only have a month, maximum week and three months. And I said, well, we'd like him home with us. If he's not in pain and he's got some quality of life, let's keep him alive. So we took him home. Fast forward, almost a year later, he's still doing fine. Okay?

I mean, we have to give him pills every day, twice a day, but he's doing fine. And then, I think it was February. It's fairly late in the year. I woke up and I went and gave him his food. He wouldn't touch his food. And he started complaining. He was growling, didn't want his mares, didn't want his food. and I thought, okay, this, I think we probably come to the end.

So I called the vet to make him visit. And I'm stroking him. I could see he was very out of sorts, and it obviously was getting worse. He was yowling. And refusing everything, didn't even want to drink, and I thought, this is not good. And bear in mind, he's already had nine months more than we said the best chance we would have with him. And then, interesting, he was a dog who'd always loved the snow. When it snowed, he'd always loved the snow. He would go out and be in the garden for hours in the snow.

He'd love walking snow. While I'm waiting for a vetter, it started snowing in the garden. And the snow, it was cold, and the snow started settling. and I took him out in the garden and you could see it cheered him up I'm actually going to cry but it was such a beautiful thing and even though I'm not prone

to that kind of nonsense of thinking about things meaning anything when they are just you know it's just geography and oh no I think that's really lovely but he went and he just had the loveliest time in the garden and you could see it light and then we got back his own

and he was miserable again and the vet came out and said no they never tell you you you should do it they say i think you should consider it and uh so we did we put them to sleep that morning and he was on my lap being stroked where i went to sleep that's that's the is the sad thing about dog is that that you know you've had to endure multiple deaths but it's sad and it isn't sad i mean that's the sad thing about life isn't it and and is it sad it's the nature of life i know it is but it's the fact that it happens with quite a lot of regularity and

you only get a small period you get what are you falling yourself when you buy one you think it's going to last for 50 it's like well no but i might yeah i'll get 12 years, I know I'm going... I almost put me in the bin last time I saw him. Seriously. That was because you went to the bathroom in your office. I called the cat had coughed something up. I was going to flush it away.

In your office with all your toys. So how many toys have you got to you think? I have no idea. I've got way too many toys. I've got no idea. I don't know how many comics I've got. They're prodigious collections of both and I very much enjoy them. And do you think, is that, do you like buying them?

Do you sort of consciously think, right, I'm going to treat myself now because I can? Well, no, I think it's partly, there's a brilliant comic book writer called Chris Ware, who won a prize film book, which is Jimmy Corrigan, and he's a remarkable talent. Yeah, he's amazing. And he sometimes used to these fake adverts, which echoed the adverts that you would find in children's comics. And they were actually intended for adults back in the 40s as well, but there were a lot for GIs coming back who had a low level of literacy, would read Superman and Batman and detective stuff. And that's why they were popular. They were as expensive back in the 40s as Time magazine. But because they stayed in that slot, they became suing as just for kids.

over the years. But they had fairly detailed, heavily texted, advertisements of the back, and he did one, a spoof of one, in which he talked about collectors. And I felt this kind of cringe, I shuddered and blushed with embarrassment when I realized how much he skewed me, because he talked about collectors, get these obscure robots from the 1960s, especially desired by TV personalities, low-level media stars, and everyone who have a desperate sense of entitlement that was not fulfilled in childhood.

It was something along those lines. I thought, man, that's me. I mean, it really is. He's nails you there. When I was a kid, we didn't have any money and we didn't have much in the way of goods. We had a bike one year, and I think my parents got them all on a catalogue

and were paying them off for the next year. Did they? And did you have to share everything, presumably, with their boys as well? Many of the toys I got were secondhand. Yeah. Well, it wasn't much sharing. We just we didn't have a lot. And I possibly compensating for, you know,

the lack of emotional connection in my life, I was happy to enjoy the company of things. I don't know. But certainly I wanted things. Now it's different. Now I am slightly into it, partly because I enjoy collecting and I enjoy interacting with my other collectors.

You share stories about them and where we find and we trade and you offer them, you'll move stuff around. I mean, all collections really, you're just looking after it for the next generation if it's nice stuff. And so it's beholden on you to look after it well and to keep it in good condition, and to be generous with it when you're gone and make sure that other people get to enjoy it.

But there's a quote, I'll give you a quote here, you're like this from Tom Waits' masterpiece of Foreign Affair. Okay. Where he's actually talking about wonderlust and travel. It's a brilliantly written song. But he says, he says, the obsessions in the chasing and not the apprehending, the pursuit you see and never the arrest. Oh, I like that. And there is something in there, which is it's a way of filling time and having something fun to do. And there is a certain psyche that enjoys.

ticking off a list. Well, like train spotting is essentially... Well, it's the quest to get the things. Collecting something, but you don't have it afterwards. So in a way, it's a much more sensible way of living. But I collect them and I like... And I do like... I like working on the display and change the display

and sharing photographs and making model kits based on them. I enjoy that. It's quite meditative. Yeah, I think that's true. That's your mindfulness practice. You're there, but you're not there. Yeah. And it takes you outside of it.

And you can immerse yourself in something like that. More so than you... you can if you're reading even or watching a film because then you know you're responding something outside yourself and in a way you respond something outside yourself and in a way when you're working in solitary on something which you enjoy you're sort of inside yourself

I think you're quite a calm person but you're one of those people though but you are Jonathan for someone who I would describe as an alpha male oh god you are do you not like being an alpha male no I don't mind it I don't

I don't know how useful those kind of phrases really are in the real world but certainly I'm certainly a confident privileged white man we came a long walk didn't we we really did so well you're going to be home soon

and you're going to have some water this will be edited for your listening consumption but we've walked for seven hours now we're very nearly home he's going to sleep this afternoon come on we walk slowly I think if we walk a bit slower he can do it

we're going to have to let him set the pace of it There you go. Snowball, that's it. We're probably walking too quickly, weren't we? We're so close Snowball I can see your house. Look. The other dogs are going to be furious that they didn't get a mini walkie. Do you think so? You have to take them out later? I'm very rarely take one out on its own. I'll only take two or three at once. Yeah. You can go back in and do the other two or three.

By Snowball? How excited are you? Look where we are Snowball. We're back at the house now. That was a good exercise. Come on. We're off. Thank you so much, Snowball. And thank you, Jonathan. Coming into the call, we'll unleash snowball, and you can have to all have a water. Yeah, we'll take him in now.

Get in, boys. Yeah, we're back. We're back. I really hope you enjoyed listening today, and I would just like to say that this podcast is in memory of Princess Ross, the sweetest, most lovely chihuahua that I ever met. We miss you and we love you, Princess. That's all for now, and I'll just leave you with this doggy tip. If you want the ball so much, human being, maybe don't throw it.