WHEN Phillip Schofield announced on morning television that he was gay, everyone rallied round and said how brave he’d been.
But when it turned out that he’d actually done gay stuff, he was sacked, cancelled, eviscerated and swept into the bucket of history marked “disgraced ageing TV stars”.
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I was actually quite cross about this, so even though I don’t know him at all well, I called him up and we had a long chat.
It was like talking to a completely broken man because he could see no way back.
I was therefore delighted to hear this week that he’s managed it.
He’s been on a small island with nothing but a camera for company, and he’s made some kind of soul-searching documentary which will be aired by Channel 5 next week.
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My delight then turned to horror because I learned the small island was off Madagascar in the Indian Ocean.
And when I visited a small island off Madagascar a few years ago, it was rammed full of German paedos and the reception desk at my hotel was littered with signs telling guests they couldn’t take children back to their rooms.
I thought that Channel 5 had screwed him.
Happily, however, they haven’t.
He was on a different island. A deserted island.
And looking at the pictures, I couldn’t help thinking: Hmmm. Couldn’t we all do with a break like that?
Forgive the change in direction here but right now, the world feels very unstable.
Ukraine shows no signs of getting better and the Israeli thing looks like it might actually get worse.
Pretty much the whole of North Africa is a no-go area, America is descending into madness and, without wishing to sound like Enoch Powell, I do see some serious immigration issues coming Europe’s way in the near future.
So it’s all very gloomy on the world stage and things aren’t much cop at home because our new government is definitely going to wreck our economy in the coming years.
Doubtless, then, many of you will be thinking that maybe you too would like to put your head in the sand on a faraway island until the dust settles and things (hopefully) return to normal.
I’m not sure that Phillip Schofield’s would work, though.
While it might be far enough away to escape any unpleasantness from a nuclear holocaust, it’s too hot and too full of mosquitoes.
For that same reason, all the tropical Robinson Crusoe islands are out.
Svalbard, way up there next door to the North Pole, looks better.
But actually, it’s too cold and there are too many polar bears.
I’d like to recommend Tristan Da Cunha.
‘MOST REMOTE PLACE ON EARTH’
Situated in the Atlantic about halfway between Africa and South America, it’s the most remote inhabited place on earth.
And when I say remote, the islanders didn’t even know the First World War had started until a year after it finished.
And when I say inhabited, it has a population of just 250.
There’s one shop. One pub. And one policeman.
Can you move there? Well, even though it’s a British overseas territory and has a British postcode, it’s not easy.
But it is possible.
They always need a teacher and a doctor, for instance. And you can get a temporary visa which would last “until Starmer buggers off”.
Normally, if I suggested buggering off to a rock in the South Atlantic for the next few years, you’d say “no thanks”.
But after the Labour Party Conference this week, I bet some of you will now be calling Channel 5 and saying, “How do I sign up?”
KEEP A STRICT LIMIT
OH dear.
We learned this week that the viewing figures for Strictly Come Dancing are in freefall.
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They fell from a high of 10.2million in 2020 to just 6.7million last week, as Toyah Willcox and Neil Jones took to the floor.
And now everyone at the BBC is running around, waving their arms in the air and wondering what to do.
Well, here’s one idea.
Every single time I turn on the BBC (which isn’t that often, I must admit), it’s running a chat show where the guest is urging viewers to watch their new drama on Netflix or Amazon or Apple.
You don’t get that in a normal business.
Staff behind the counter at McDonald’s, for example, never say that next week you should get a curry or a pizza instead.
A SIGHT UNSEEN
IN his column in The Sun this week, Piers Morgan said that he and I had been at a party in an Oxfordshire pub last weekend.
He went on to say that everyone else in the pub garden observed our presence with a mixture or fascination and excitement.
And in some cases, revulsion.
Well, I don’t want to sound like the Queen here, but recollections may vary.
Because what I noticed is that no one else in the pub even noticed we were there.
THINK YOU COULD MAKE ART? PARK THAT IDEA
IT’S that time of year when people with hairy armpits and verbal diarrhoea come together to talk nonsense about art.
And this, one of the hot favourites for the fabled Turner Prize, is a Ford Escort covered in a giant doily.
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Many will say, of course: “I could have done that”.
True enough. But you didn’t.
In the same way that you never pickled a shark.
Or submitted your unmade bed. You were too busy working for a living.
PUBLIC SWEAR BY MAX
AFTER using the “F” word during an official press conference at last week’s Singapore Grand Prix, championship leader Max Verstappen has been ordered by officials to do, and I quote, “work of a public interest”.
On the face of it, this sounds like he’s got to spend a day collecting litter or giving a talk to hard-working families in the community.
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But think about it.
We are the public, so what would we really be interested in seeing him do?
I’d quite like to see if he could ride a pig. Or eat a hundred baked beans in a minute.
Or do a wing walk while dressed as Batman.
If I know Max, and I don’t, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find he goes along with this, and next week he does his punishment by drinking a bottle of vodka while standing on his head.
TOTALLY STUCK? YOU BET
BACK in 2022, I pootled into town on the day of the Grand National to place my bet, only to find the local bookies had closed down.
So I came home and after just an hour of swearing and trying to read that smudged number on the back of my debit card, I managed to deposit some funds and set up an online account.
Great. Well done, me.
But the following year, when I tried to place a bet, I could not for the life of me remember which online bookies I’d used.
I went on to all the sites, stabbed away at various possible passwords, and eventually, I missed the boat.
The National began without me.
I tried in the subsequent months to find out who had my money but it was only this week that I heard from Betfred that it was them, and that if I didn’t spend the money soon, or remove it, they would confiscate it.
Anyone know my password? Anyone?
I have 24 days left . . .