I really am a mentalist

Woo, check out the memory champion, back in training! Results of a good day's work - half-hour binary 3550, hour cards 24 packs (attempting 30), speed numbers 256 (best of two attempts). So obviously I can do significantly better in all three, but if I got those scores at a world championship there wouldn't be many who'd beat me. And more importantly, this is the first time in a very, very long time that I've done so much memorising in one day. If I can do the same kind of thing tomorrow (hour numbers, spoken numbers and speed cards), I will be deliriously happy with myself. I haven't done a full weekend practice session for ages and ages, and there was a time, many years ago, when I was doing them nearly every weekend. Wonder if I can get back into that kind of mood?

It's all the talking about memory I've done lately. So keep talking memory competitions with me, people, whenever you see me! And speaking of memory competitions, let me just put in another plug for the Online Memory Challenge, now that I know I have blog-readers who are training in memory but who I don't necessarily talk to. The next OMC is on Saturday 20th January, at 10am GMT - very early morning if you're in America, but we have to give the Australians a chance to take part in these things too. The OMC really is an ideal way to add some variety to your practice, to meet other competitors of all ability ranges, to test yourself and not have to mark your own papers, and to have some fun! Come along and join in!

Mentalists follow-up

Thanks for all the comments, one and all! Since practically everyone who commented on last night's entry included a question, here are the answers:

Lewis: Yep, I'm the only person mad enough to have one image for each pair of cards. I'm pretty sure it's the way of the future, though, and a few other people are experimenting with it right now. Incidentally, do I know you? I'm not aware that I know anyone called Lewis, except the Derby County players Lewis Price and Eddie Lewis, and I don't actually know them, I just memorised their names this morning.

Ian: I'm next on the telly on January 29th, co-starring with those loveable memory monkeys. And you can rest assured that I'm going to train hard and beat Gunther this year! Definitely!

Mike: I just don't like pain au chocolat. I'm very much in favour of chocolate and don't have any particular objection to bread, but put them together and serve it to me for a French breakfast and the thought makes me ill. Give me a bread and butter pudding made with stale white bread any day of the week. Incidentally, I have three regular blog-commenters called Mike - I can usually deduce which one is commenting by what they say (subtle clues such as the fact that only one of the Mikes I know cohabits with an Emma), perhaps you guys could give me more of a clue? Mike D, Mike C and other Mike C, for example?

Ace: I just don't like pain au chocolat. But Ashley can certainly have an autograph, if I can give him a cuddle.

Mike C: I've known you longer than the other Mike C, so you're "Mike C" instead of "other Mike C". No, there isn't a website about me, and I'm not going to make one either. Why would I want one? To tell the world I'm great? The world already knows that!

Katy: Thanks! Here's a summary of things people have said to me about the documentary - "I especially loved Zoomy's grandma, she's so sweet", "your gran is cool", "your gran came across as a lovely wee wifie". I don't know why they bothered to put me, Ed and Gunther in the film at all...

Sam: Was I one of the pillocks on there?

Well, I was on Radio Derby this morning, they invited me on as a sort of follow-up to last night's TV. Much to my satisfaction, they didn't ask me to memorise cards for once, but instead gave me a load of Derby County statistics instead - all the current squad with their numbers, all their results this season, and Robbie Savage's disciplinary record. And even more to my satisfaction, I memorised them all perfectly! Even the names! I'm very happy with myself!

And what's more, this weekend, there will be Training, with a capital T! I've been doing well this week, I've done a half-hour cards, half-hour numbers and half-hour binary, plus a whole lot of speed cards, over the last five days. I think I might be able to try some hour numbers and cards without my mind wandering. If I can do a real pile of practice this weekend, I'll know I'm back on song.

"Bet he's got no problems remembering where he left the car keys"

Bless her, that's what the continuity announcer on Channel 5 has just said about me. Gosh, I've never heard that before. And if I had car keys, believe me, I would lose them. "The Mentalists" is on after the break and I thought I'd write my blog while I watch it, or at least until I can't stand to see and hear myself acting like an eejit any more and turn it off...

"There's a small group of people across the world whose brains harbour an amazing ability..." Not a great start. I was hoping for a "this is something anyone can do" approach. Heehee, ooh, fun footage, though! Gunther's house!

Ooh, my house! Tumby house, that is! Ooh, me in the used-to-be-the-dining-room-and-is-now-the-kitchen! Heehee, me with the straw hat! Ugh, I'm ugly. And my voice is horrible. Argh, I always sound so pretentious when I'm talking to the camera! I don't normally sound like that in real life, do I? Also, I'm fat.

Fantastic that we get to see the house, anyway, I can show this to my brother. Hee! They spelt "Highley" wrong! That'll upset the people at the leisure centre! Hmm, artful camera angles to disguise the fact that only five people turned up for the UK championship... Yay, my Zoom-Zoom T-shirt!

Ooh, clever, they matched me telling my spoken number story to a shot of the answer paper - and correctly synchronised the images I'm saying with the numbers as the camera pans across! Nice one, Nick!

"Booyeah!"

Heehee, James Kemp looking impressed in the background. Wow, first advert break already? This is a lot more fun than I expected it to be. I wish I hadn't scuppered the ending by losing the world championship now.

I bet Alan Hansen doesn't really shop at Morrisons. He's just lying because they give him money. Big fibber. Although I suppose he must do his shopping somewhere, so there's a chance he really does. Unless he's rich enough to have someone do his shopping for him, of course.

I'm recording this for my brother (who's out doing something more exciting tonight) but also for any foreigners who want to see it and can arrange to get a copy from me. They'll get to see all these British adverts and experience a whole different culture.

Come on, put The Mentalists back on! Ah, that's better. Who the heck is this reciting poetry? Oh, Ed, of course. Heehee. Ooh, is that the field where we got lost on the way to his party? Yep, there's stately Cooke Manor. God, Ed, people are going to take you seriously when you say things like this. The quality of the terrain, indeed...

Yay, Ed's dad gets an interview too! "We thought he might have finished with the world memory and get a job or something..."

Ooh, is this going to be Grandma's moment of glory? Oh, thanks, Nick, let's say "Ben's parents separated when he was nine..." that's important information for everyone to know. Yay, Grandma looks great on TV! She's watching it right now with all her friends. Heehee, thanks, Grandma, "He doesn't tend to brag about his achievements." Oh, fantastic, Dad's photo too! Hope that's the end of the Pridmore family soap opera.

Oh god, Tony Buzan with a kendo sword. He wanted this documentary to be called "Warriors Of The Mind". "Some people call me a guru, you know..." Good old Tony.

His 92 books on the brain... Actually, I thought the 92 included his books of poetry, don't they? Say what you like about Tony, he's one heck of a snappy dresser. I've always loved his clothes.

Ahh, I remember that taxi ride to Central Tonight in the pouring rain. Happy days.

Hey, you know, I'm really enjoying this. Excellent - "Useless is what would describe what I do..."

Ahh, German championships! Whoa, wait a second. "He's certainly beatable, although he hasn't shown much sign of it over the last few years." I said that about Clemens and they edited it to make it seem like I was talking about Gunther!

Heehee, me getting stressed after dropping the pack of cards at the end. Classic.

Ooh, Gunther's house is nice. Is that his giant chess set? And I'm sorry, I refuse to believe that Gunther and Michaela practice like that, in English yet, when there aren't any cameras around...

Eww, yuck, prawns. "Cutting onions with ze big knife..." Heehee, this is funny stuff.

Ahh, more adverts. Woo, we're half way through and it hasn't made me look particularly stupid yet. Possibly I was worried about nothing.

All that M&S posh food looks horrible. Pain au chocolat bread and butter pudding? Yuck! Now, my dad used to make a great bread and butter pudding.

Too many adverts on telly these days. You know, it occurs to me that you'll need to be watching the documentary while you're reading this blog, or it won't make any sense. Ah well, who cares?

Here we go, Ed and Lukas high-altitude training! You've already told us Ed is the world number 17, people, you only get 45 minutes, don't duplicate information! "Every year we come to the mountains where Lukas lives as a goatherd and train ourselves for the competition..." Heehee. Bet they follow this up with me doing karaoke and getting drunk. Hope they do, anyway.

Wow, nice scenery. Nice camerawork, too! Kudos to Nick, if he did that bit himself. Wow, Ed looks like the real guru, up on top of a mountain. And chopping wood!

Heehee, Gunther's got a lot more trophies than me. And he keeps them in a cabinet.

Yay, "Ben has his own approach to last-minute training" and us getting drunk and karaokeing. Wait, we have me talking about the upcoming German championship made to look like I'm talking about the worlds? More trickery!

Oooooooh, Bahrain. Such a cool place. I hope we get to go there again. Heehee, me with the hankie on my head, foolishly going out in the midday sun. "I'm sweating like whatever the halal equivalent of a pig is..." Hope nobody finds that offensive.

Team China! We really, really need matching T-shirts next year for Britain.

Dr Yip and his Oxford English Dictionary. There should have been more of him there.

Ah, the drama of the abstract images. Ooh, the excitement of the competition! This is actually put together very nicely. "Gunther's mind games pay off" is a bit misleading, but never mind.

That footage wasn't of me starting to memorise binary digits. That was hour numbers. Fakery.

Did I mishear that? Did I say "The Blue Beetle"? Why would I have said that? He's not one of my images? And no, Gunther hasn't been shaken by my performance, he was expecting me to get that kind of score.

Oh, excellent, I was hoping Boris would get a cameo. Nice speed-stacking!

Aargh, hour cards. What a horrible disaster that was. Do we have to see this? Can't we pretend that I got a big score and won the world championship?

Still fun to watch, though. Those aren't my cards, despite what the narrator said. They're German cards.

Heh, "Ben, ludicrously stupidly, tried to do 36 packs of cards..." Nice one, Ed! Actually, it wasn't because I was going for so many that I went wrong. My brain just wasn't in the right place, that afternoon, and I could tell from the start that it wasn't sinking in.

More adverts. Nearly finished. Do you think I'm going to win the world championship? I bet I am. Hey, wasn't that Lynne Slater from EastEnders on that Take A Break advert?

I was hoping there'd be an appropriate advert that was connected in some way to me or to memory, but they're all for things I'm not interested in at all, like Jamie Oliver.

Hmm, answer that message from Crispy or keep blogging? Keep blogging. Gunther and Michaela are training in their hotel room. "Do you ever relax?" "Sometimes, but very rarely."

Ed is actually good at explaining what's going on for establishing shots. I didn't really do any of that. Oh god, he's sounding serious again.

Ah, speed cards. Turn away now if you don't want to see me make a fool of myself...

Sigh. I suck.

My beard doesn't look as grey on TV as it does in real life, though. That's a good thing.

God, I can't believe I messed up the speed cards. It's so embarrassing. Heehee, me and Phil look like siamese twins there.

Well, Gunther deserved it, anyway. Next year it'll be a different story. Oh, I basically said that on the interview, too.

Wow, this has been a great documentary. Oh, the narrator was Richard Vranch. Should have recognised the name. He's a great pianist too, you know.

Well, that's that. I liked it! I hope it was entertaining for the people watching it who'd never heard of me or memory.

It could be you

Yesterday I found two Thunderball lottery tickets for tonight's draw, lying on the floor in the shopping centre in Derby. I was looking forward to a moral dilemma when one of them won the jackpot and I had to decide between keeping all the money to myself or finding the person who bought and lost them. However, they didn't win a penny. I feel doubly disappointed.

It'll make a good sequence

I'm in two minds. Should I watch 'The Mentalists' on Thursday night so I know what people are talking about when they jeer at me on the street the following day, or should I miss it and avoid the horror of hearing my horrible voice, seeing my horrible face and witnessing a documentary making me out to be some kind of weirdo entirely different from the kind of weirdo that I really am? I'm pretty sure that you can't sum up my life in 45 minutes, so I don't think I'm going to like it, however well-made and flattering it might be...

On the other hand, I do miss being followed around by a cameraman urging me to do things that I would never normally do, on the grounds that "it'll make a good sequence". Maybe I'll see if I can persuade someone else to make a documentary about me, this time about accountants, or othello players, or people with unusually long toes. I don't think there's ever been a documentary about any of those sub-groups of society, and let's face it, if Channel 5 will show a documentary about memorisers, they'll show a documentary about anything.

Hey, maybe I could become a director, and follow someone else around with a camera all day! It looks like a fun thing to do, when you're not dealing with a stroppy weirdo who doesn't want to be in a documentary in the first place.

Sissons Scissor Sharpening

"I don't like to have to say this to you, lads," Mr Sissons said to the three women who worked for him at his scissor-sharpening stall on Bolton market, "but you've probably noticed that business has been a little slack recently. We live in an age when people just don't seem to need their scissors sharpened as much as they used to. I don't know why, I think it's something to do with the internet. And it doesn't help that those other two scissor-sharpening stalls opened up on either side of ours and started charging less than a quarter of what we charge for the same service. But the long and short of it is that we've only had one customer in the last eight years, and she only came here to ask if we'd seen her lost dog."

"What are you getting at, Mr Sissons?" asked Valerie.

"Well, I'm afraid that I simply can't afford to employ three full-time staff any more. Unless you can think of a better alternative, I shall have to sell the lot of you into slavery in order to pay the rent on the stall for another week."

Roberta, who had an NVQ in business administration, suggested "Perhaps we could diversify the business? Start selling scissors as well as sharpening them?"

"No, no, that wouldn't work at all," Mr Sissons said with a shake of the head. "I have a terrible fear of scissors, and while I can just about tolerate having them in close proximity to me for as long as it takes to sharpen them, I couldn't bear to have a stock of them on this market stall. It would drive me out of my mind!" He shuddered at the very thought.

"Maybe you could admit to that woman that you stole her dog, and you've still got it at your house now?" Dolores said. "She might pay a reward, and to be honest I've always been a little concerned about your habit of stealing people's pets. I think it might be illegal."

"Nonsense," said Mr Sissons with an impatient wave of the hand. "If people can't protect their pets from thieves, they don't deserve to own them. Likewise with televisions and jewellery. No, there's nothing else for it, the slave trader will be here in five minutes, put these manacles on and try to look like hard workers."

Just then, a man came up to the counter and asked "I say, do you sharpen scissors, by any chance? I have a rare pair of diamond-encrusted gold scissors which, being made of gold and thus hugely inferior to ordinary steel ones, need frequent sharpening. I'll pay a thousand pounds a week for you to keep them sharp."

"Eh? What? Scissors? No, we don't sharpen scissors," Mr Sissons said, distractedly. "No, wait! Yes, we do sharpen scissors! I got confused there for a moment..."

But the man had already left, with a disappointed look on his face. "Blast," Mr Sissons said. "I just don't understand why my business isn't more successful. It's the internet, I'm sure of it."

Remember!

Ah, there's nothing like sitting around talking memory for a couple of hours to get the old motivation running again! Did a half-hour cards this afternoon with nearly no mind-wandering, and I think I got a perfect 18 packs (although I haven't checked them yet). And this is despite having a pint of Foster's at lunchtime!

Hmm, maybe it wasn't the morning's discussion with the Jameses, maybe it was the beer. Perhaps getting drunk is the secret to a good memory? I'll have to experiment further. But I'm pretty sure it was the conversation. I was actually in the mood to follow it up with a late-night half-hour-numbers session, but then I got chatting on the internet for, well, two or three hours. But the point is, I'm still in the mood to memorise, and tomorrow, when there will be fewer distractions, I think I'm gonna do some more! Woohoo!

Black tongue

I do love black jacks. The aniseed chews, not the playing cards. I haven't had them for ages, but I bought a pack yesterday and now I'm hopelessly addicted to the things. It's no wonder I'm so big and fat, is it?

Anyway, James and James are coming round tomorrow to run through our amazing memory presentation for the unis. What we're doing, and I don't think I've really explained in this blog before, is putting on a performance demonstrating feats of memory, explaining something about techniques, in conjunction with sending out a 'memory manual' to all these eager young students, then organising university memory competitions. It should be a lot of fun, and if you're a student and you're reading this, go and ask your university whether we're coming or whether they didn't reply to us (it was the psychology department who got the emails/letters).

I should point out that it's James Paterson who had the idea and who has done the enormous amount of work on this whole project, ably assisted by James Paterson. I'm basically just tagging along in the hope of impressing some impressionable young minds with my collection of trophies and accolades and thus helping the Jameses recruit new competitors to the exciting world of 'memory sports'.

Neville Neville

One of the central gimmicks of "How To Be Clever" is that it has a piece of useless trivia at the bottom of each page. So I've been scouring the dark recesses of my memory and bookcase for interesting little-known facts, preferably ones that can't be found on the internet (which is increasingly hard these days, but I'd like to be able to claim that my book contains not just information that's actually true, but that can't be found on Wikipedia!)

But then tonight while idly reading up on football I come across the hugely interesting fact that the father of footballers Gary and Phil Neville is called Neville Neville. And this is, naturally enough, extremely well-known to everyone except me. So I can't put it in the book, but it's nice to know that while I'm working on sharing my fascinating obscure knowledge with the world and deriding the internet, the internet is sharing its fascinating knowledge back with me. Heehee, Neville Neville. What a great name.

Ask me what I've been doing all day

What have I been doing all day, you say? Working on "How To Be Clever", of course! I feel all industrious and successful. Even though I've only got as far as getting three chapters and most of a fourth up to absolute-finished-polished-first-draft stage. Heck, at this rate I might even be in a position to let someone look at it some time soon.

I'm currently also playing in an othello tournament on kurnik, and I just had a 31-31 draw. I don't think that's ever happened to me before.

He's the one who knows the Mysterons' game

Gerry Anderson night on BBC4, and I'm watching the first episode of Captain Scarlet. Featuring those wonderful Spectrum Pursuit Vehicles in which the driver faces backwards and sees the road ahead on a computer screen. I've always been impressed by how sensationally pointless this innovation is.

Anyway, my road to fame and glory continues apace - the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation want to include me in a memory documentary. I had resolved to do more actual memory championships and training and less documentaries, but I figure it'll be okay if I don't actually have people following me around at competitions and pestering me in the couple of months beforehand. And Canada is a place I've always vaguely wanted to go, so this will make the people there like me in case I ever get round to visiting.

Best thing since sliced bread

With my usual impressive grasp of advance planning, I realised this morning that I didn't have any food in the house, and unless some shops were open, I wasn't going to be able to eat anything until tomorrow. Luckily, though, Sainsbury's was open (poor Sainsbury's staff, don't even get New Year's Day off work), so the danger of starving to death was averted. However, they didn't have any sliced bread, unless you count a few loaves of unpleasant-looking, rather dated wholemeal stuff, so I bought an unsliced loaf from the still-warm, fresh-from-the-bakery section.

I disapprove of unsliced bread. What is this, the dark ages? Really, I'm old-fashioned enough just buying sliced bread - the trendy young people these days don't make their own sandwiches, they buy them ready-made from overpriced coffee shops and things. Also, I didn't think to buy a breadknife while I was in the supermarket, so cutting it is going to be fun (haven't tried it yet, but I'll need to for breakfast tomorrow).

Apart from that, I've done stuff today. All related to the first of our university memory demonstrations, which is coming up soon, in Plymouth. Which should be fun, and really merits its own blog entry, not a footnote to a bread-based rant. Maybe tomorrow.

They're gonna put me in the movies

Woo! This is the first time one of my occasional TV appearances has merited a namecheck in the Radio Times! I really must be famous! Although I don't get to be in the picture at the top of the column. And Kate Moss's documentary is five minutes longer than mine. And I'm not one of the 'choice' selections for the day in RT. I'm offended. I'll complain to my agent and manager and drug dealer. Well, actually, I'll just sit here complaining to my blog and enjoying a sherbet fountain.

Anyway, 2008 beckons! Tomorrow is the dawn of a new productive era of Zoomy! There'll be writing and memorising and achieving and weight loss! Sherbet fountains are low fat, right?

Cross my palm with golden oldies

A train of thought today led me to think "I'm pretty sure I own a pack of tarot cards, somewhere. Perhaps I should find them and read my fortune for the year ahead, and write about the results in my blog. And even if I don't find them, I'm sure to find something blogworthy while I'm looking through all my old stuff..."

Well, I never realised I own such a lot of rubbish. Really, I need to throw some things away. The most entertaining things I turned up in the box of junk that sits next to my bed were a couple of old music cassettes - Kid Jensen's Favourite Chart Breakers and The California Raisins Sing The Hit Songs. There was a time, when I first got a walkman back in the late eighties, when the California Raisins tape formed the entirety of my music collection. I can't remember where it came from, presumably it was a present since I can't imagine going into a shop and thinking "Wow, I really must buy a California Raisins tape!" But you never know. I was a very strange child.

Kid Jensen's Chart Breakers, on the other hand, definitely came free with a Rubik's Magic puzzle (or possibly the puzzle came free with the tape - the pair of them together cost around 50p, anyway), bought in the Wise Owl drug store (and general junk shop) in Boston, at some point after spring 1987, which is when the eight hits in question were breaking the charts. Since I know you won't be able to live without knowing what Kid Jensen's particular favourites were at this point, here's the running order:

Pepsi & Shirlie - "Heartache" (entered chart Jan. 1987, highest chart position 2)
Johnny Hates Jazz - "Shattered Dreams" (entered chart Apr. 1987, highest chart position 5)
Fine Young Cannibals - "Ever Fallen In Love" (entered chart Mar. 1987, highest chart position 9)
Boy George - "Everything I Own" (entered chart Mar. 1987, highest chart position 1)
Five Star - "The Slightest Touch" (entered chart Apr. 1987, highest chart position 4)
Blow Monkeys - "It Doesn't Have To Be This Way" (entered chart Jan. 1987, highest chart position 5)
Living In A Box - "Living In A Box" (entered chart Mar. 1987, highest chart position 5)
Mel & Kim - "Respectable" (entered chart Feb. 1987, highest chart position 1)

Those descriptions are all you get on the inlay, there's no commentary from the Kid explaining why they're his favourite chart breakers, or anything like that. All eight songs, in fact, are rather good ones. I was thinking I could have a laugh about some song being considered anybody's favourite, but they're all quite nice, you can listen and sing along to them. So I thought I'd look up the singers on the internet and see what they're doing now.

According to this Wham fan site, which is the first one you get when you type 'Pepsi and Shirlie' into Google but hasn't been updated since 2001, Pepsi sings backing vocals for Geri Halliwell, and Shirlie is married to Martin Kemp out of Spandau Ballet and "London's smash soap opera The Eastenders". And apparently Pepsi and Shirlie's dancing was a crucial part of Wham's success. If you say so.

According to this Johnny Hates Jazz site, "there is no current news regarding the groups activities or any solo-projects that I am aware of." Good to know.

This VH1 website says that Fine Young Cannibals Dave Cox and David Steele continue to work together under various names, without adding any more detail, "while Roland Gift's hoped-for film career never quite took off."

Boy George is still vaguely in the public eye, I think - the ultimate homepage dedicated to him says that he'll be in Genoa Italy for the new year's eve. Whether he's performing there or just holidaying isn't clear.

The first result on Google for 'Five Star' is Five Star Professional Ranges, which is far more entertaining to me than knowing what they're doing now. However, I remembered that one of them was called Delroy, looked him up and it seems he's got an IMDb page. All the cool people have them nowadays.

The Blow Monkeys have apparently reformed recently, although a cursory internet search reveals absolutely nothing about them except websites mentioning their couple of singles in the eighties. I'm sorry, people, but if the first page of a google search for your name doesn't give me a fan site with news updates, you're not going to hold my attention. Their lead singer was called Doctor Robert, though, which is a very cool name.

The lead singer of Living In A Box, Richard Darbyshire has his own website that says he's giving one-to-one songwriting lessons in West London "in a bid to help younger artists to reach their goals". How nice of him. Marcus Vere, wonderfully, writes songs for the "Here comes a..." series of children's DVDs. Drummer Anthony Critchlow might be a sculptural lighting designer, or an associate in the litigation department of Bell, Rosenborg & Hughes LLP, or else he hasn't done anything in the last twenty years worthy of a mention on the internet.

Mel & Kim, whose hit "Respectable" was my favourite of Kid Jensen's favourites, I can probably write about without looking them up. One of them died young and I think the other was on Big Brother or something. Let's see... Kim Appleby's clearly still alive, so it must have been her. She has a website that says she's released a new song but doesn't mention Big Brother, so perhaps she wasn't on it after all. I still loved "Respectable", though.

David "Kid" Jensen is still a DJ on some obscure radio station, I think.

Puppet show

Something I could have blogged about yesterday if I hadn't decided to be all me me me with the resolutions is the Weakest Link puppet special that was on last night. I'd actually heard about this during my Blue Peter adventure, chatting with someone who had worked on it and was telling me all about the technical difficulties of making a Weakest Link show with puppets (the walk of shame is obviously tricky to arrange). And no, I can't remember her name.

Soo was obviously going to win, though - she's always had more brains than all the other puppets on children's TV put together (except Sooty, of course, but Soo has the advantage of being able to talk. Although Sooty answering questions by whispering in Anne Robinson's ear would have been good.) Actually, I always had something of a crush on Soo. She's got a really nice voice, don't you think?

Jelly and Jackson had the funniest ad-libs, though. I'm going to have to watch The Story Makers now - I really admire puppeteers who can get into their characters like those guys obviously can.

Come the resolution, you'll be the first against the wall

It's the time of year when people resolve to do things and then don't do them. So I thought I should join in the fun, since there are rather a lot of things I need to do. So, because I'm twelve times better than most people, I'm going to make New Month Resolutions that I want to achieve before January is out. And I'm publicly posting them a few days early in case any of my loyal readers want to suggest further resolutions or refinements to existing ones. So here we go:

1) Get the amazing memory feats prepared for those uni demonstrations we're going to do. This way we'll avoid any Blue Peter-style fiascos.

2) Get a job. Unfortunate but unavoidable - if I'm not gainfully employed by around the end of March, I will be destitute.

3) Get that machine in Woolworth's to tell me I weigh less than 11 stone 10.2 pounds with a B.M.I. value of less than 24.9. By fair means or reprogramming.

4) Get that damn book of mine written. Seriously.

5) Develop magical powers of some kind. Not related to memory.

Commercial break

There's a thing on the BBC News website saying that that advert with the drumming gorilla was the highlight of the advertising world in 2007. Really? I mean, it was okay, but it wasn't anything special. And until I read the article I didn't have the faintest idea that it was an advert for Cadbury's, so it's really not achieved its basic aim, anyway.

The coolest adverts of the year have been those home-made-looking ones for some phone company, no idea which one, or that one with squillions of musical instruments all in a line playing a catchy tune. Which could be advertising toilet paper as far as I know. If I ever end up in charge of arranging an advert for whatever company I'm working for, I'll insist that it uses the brand name in a catchy, memorable slogan that's the core of the advert. And no drumming gorillas.

I'm an actor, a mentalist and a psychological specimen!

Wow, I haven't googled myself for ages, but I didn't expect to come up with so many wonderful discoveries in one session!

Okay, number one - I've got my own IMDb page courtesy of my appearance on The Panel! This is the grooviest thing ever! I've always thought it would be good to get myself an Equity card and have a small speaking part on The Bill or something along those lines. You know, just for the experience. And if you're on IMDb, that practically makes you a real actor, doesn't it?

Number two - not that anybody at Channel 5 or Special Edition has mentioned it to me, but it seems the documentary "The Mentalists" is on Channel 5 on Thursday January 10, at 8:00pm. "Documentary following accountant Ben Pridmore in his bid to become the World Memory Champion. The film follows Pridmore on a journey from the UK to Germany and Bahrain to compete against 'warriors of the mind' from three continents. Along the way, he encounters an array of eccentric characters, including a blue-blooded Austrian Count, 'mind guru' Tony Buzan, and a latter-day Renaissance man who lists 'inventing a new colour' as one of his works.". I confidently expect it to make me look like some kind of freak, and I urge everyone reading this not to watch it.

Number three - I don't know exactly what an A.P. Psychology course is, but they see fit to publish their homework schedules online, and check out what they were doing a couple of weeks ago! On Thursday December 13, brilliantly as part of the day themed around both memory and forgetting, students are instructed to spend five minutes watching "the amazing memory of Ben Pridmore" (aka my Central Tonight appearance). I'm on a syllabus! My god, it doesn't get cooler than this!

Ho ho ho, merry Christmas!

What could be more appropriate for the festive season than six consecutive episodes of Father Ted (not including the Christmas special) on More4 tonight? Well, quite a lot of things could, but I don't care. It's funny. Happy Christmas, everyone! Have a great day!

Once you pop, you can't stop!

Much as I love my grandma, she labours under the mistaken impression that I don't eat enough. So whenever I come round, she plies me with cakes and goodies non-stop until I'm fit to burst. She also routinely tells me I've lost weight, even though I've got documented proof that I haven't from that machine in Woolworth's.

She also gave me a big tube of Pringles (35% extra free, party size!) and a pack of jaffa cakes to take home, just to keep me going until my next visit because I can't be trusted to eat anything in the meantime, and I just have no moderation when it comes to Pringles. Once I've eaten one, I'll finish the whole tube, especially if they're sour cream and onion flavour like these. So now I feel unwell from overeating, and it's not even Christmas Eve yet!