Pointless

Today was one of those days where you can look at your long list of 'Things to do Before you Die', and tick another box. Today was an experience that was enjoyable, but would I do it again? I'm not so sure...

You see, I was invited, (at an impossible hour of the morning), by CC, to a recording of the popular BBC gameshow, 'Pointless', the show where the contestants have to correctly guess what 100 members of the public were not thinking of. Basically, the aim of the game is to get as little points as possible, to get a chance of going through to the final, and the chance to win a pointlessly small jackpot, (compared to say, 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire'), that, for legal reasons, is a show that happens on another channel..

Anyway. The journey there was smooth enough and after a little hunt for the audience entrance, we found ourselves being directed by a 'BBC Executive' into a rather impressive and cosy studio to enjoy 2 episodes of this famous gameshow being filmed. The host, Alexander Armstrong, and his co-host Richard Someone-or-other, came on to rapturous applause and despite some rather embarrassing answers from a pair of wierdly named students, (I think they were called something along the lines of Banoffee and Meringue), the whole thing seemed to go quite swimmingly. It was quite interesting to watch how these programmes are made, even if sometimes it did feel like we were simply watching a slowed down version of the finished product.. We had fun though, and it was good to play along, when the real contestants were struggling!

However... there was one element of the whole experience I certainly did not enjoy. Other than the weird pain you feel after sitting down for too long, we had to endure the most infuriating, un-funny, camp, stupid stand-up comedian the planet has to offer. His name is Joel Dommett, and after doing a bit of research since I've been home, I have found out he has a spot at the Edinburgh Festival and works on BBC shows such as this one, and Russell Howard's Good News. The question I want to ask is, how?! I was in that studio for 4 hours and probably at least 40 minutes of that was spent listening to this idiot attempting to do stand-up comedy. The major problem was, no one had come to see stand-up comedy. No one had come to get involved in the banter and joshing that comes with stand-up comedy, and no one was prepared to listen to a man, not much older than I was, waffle his way through pretty much the same material whilst waiting for what they had really come to see. I didn't envy his job at all, and he made pretty hard work of it. I did feel a bit sorry for him at the time, but since finding out he is, somehow, halfway to stardom, I now think he's an idiot. To even attempt to matchmake 2 members of the audience, who were sat on opposite sides and have the audacity to try Madeleine McCann and Fritzl jokes, to an audience mostly comprised of bus-pass users, is just suicidal. I mean, really...

It just about didn't ruin the experience though. No one won any money, but I did get a good look at the cleverly amusing Alexander Armstrong and stood next to Fiona Bruce at the pelican crossing outside the BBC earlier in the day. Apparently Russell Kane was in the audience aswell, but he probably walked out at having to witness the hideous stand-up he has so masterfully made his own in recent years.

The journey home was rather long and tiresome, mainly due to the outrageous Friday evening London traffic jams, but I made it home in one-piece before embarking on my taxi mission to pick up Master Kettle, of which I have just returned! A good day then, but hopefully an even better weekend of cricket coming up!