Now I Can

As someone with a very big mouth, I’m rarely stuck for words. I usually have some rubbish joke handy whenever I get embarrassed and then make a quick exit, rarely with grace.

But Simon May, the charming man who wrote the theme tune to Eastenders and produced the world wide hit Knock On Wood for Amii Stewart, said something to me this week that I found myself floundering with.

I had no reply when we met, shook hands, and he said with a big smile, “I read your blog”.

People tell me that writing here each week is pointless unless people actually read the stuff, but I suppose I’ve always thought of my blog as my diary and that I’ll look back on all the instalments in later life and remember, while shuddering. Many people have told me privately that they follow my bad typing here, but this is the first time it’s been said in front of other people and, if I’m honest, I was more than a bit embarrassed. Writing a blog is a bit like passing wind or picking our nose in so far as many of us do it but we don’t tell others. I felt I had a dirty secret that had suddenly been exposed.

So I think I’m going to have to give up this blog lark now that I know for definite that people actually read it. I mean, aren’t I supposed to keep some mystique? Do you guys now know all my secrets? I think you probably do, apart from the big one about......well, let’s leave that for another day.

You certainly know that this is the end of my first week after having my eyes lasered. I had thought about doing this for years and had finally overcome my handicap of fear and taken the plunge, laid down on the surgery table, and watched lights go off in my head like a bad acid trip. I hasten to add that I’ve never actually done acid but I imagine it’s like having a barcode scanner run across your eyes while fireworks go off. It’s brilliant.

I can now see.

I can finally tell that the scary giant my kids told me about who stands at the bottom of our garden is just an oak tree, that the very large mark on my bathroom mirror when I shave is actually my nose, and that those cute chubby cheeks I kiss every night as I say goodnight to my wife is actually...... well..... I’ve just found out she started sleeping with her head at the bottom of the bed six months ago.

Reading is still blurry but I’m told that takes a few weeks to settle. So I am very happy indeed not to have to read any newspapers for a while, and the kids have said they’ll start bringing their report cards home now.

This week I leave Smooth Radio London after two years, and it’s been a blast. They say you should leave when things are no longer fun but I’ve had friendship, support, emails, texts and calls that have made me very proud. I’ve also interviewed innumerable stars who have submitted with good grace, and I've been to many great theatre nights and brilliant gigs. I have been very lucky.

It will leave me with more freedom, much more money from better paid work, and more interesting foreign travel, but I can’t believe it will leave me with more fun. But things move on and I’ll have more time to write.

So I guess I’ll keep the blog going. Just so long as Simon May doesn’t tell anyone.

I Can't See Clearly Now

With TV now going high definition, and with 3D the new big thing, I thought it best to upgrade my eyesight – I mean what use is spending money on the best quality TV picture to see Scotland losing at football, or gasping at the gore in True Blood, with eyes like mine?

I sit there squinting and wondering whether I’m watching Big Brother or a wild life programme, and I can’t tell if Britain’s Next Top Model is a guy or a girl, and that’s only if I happen, by chance, to be facing the right way and I’m looking at the set instead of the door.

Sometimes I’ve found myself wondering why London’s Burning or Towering Inferno is going on a tad long before I’m told I’m actually looking at the fireplace. I’ve never had great eyesight but now it has deteriorated so much even Mister Magoo would be embarrassed.

So, after years of talking about it, I’m actually getting my eyes lasered. I don’t expect too much, just twenty twenty sight and the power of X Ray vision.

I’ve been thinking about this for years and I’ve bored the pants off every optometrist and optician at every party. When they see me coming now they change their job description to jet pilot and, as I can’t see their faces properly, I never know if we’ve met before.

At least they can get away with saying they’re jet pilots. With my sight I wouldn’t be allowed to pilot an elevator, and I’m also colour blind which means I can’t even qualify to fly Easyjet . It also explains my taste in clothes.

Am I scared? Well put it this way. If scared were fat, I’d be Eamonn Holmes in a fat suit listening to the Fatback Band. But you have to suffer for beauty, right?

So, on Friday morning, after I finish doing the Breakfast show, I’m going to the Laser Vision surgery and putting myself in the hands of David Allamby. He seems a nice bloke and his hands don’t shake too much so what have I got to lose?

Next week I’ll report on how I get on. That’s if I can see the computer keyboard. If the blog reads something like “Caf*jd thh%ruu$ 8hgnaplw’’ then you’ll know I might need some further work. And if you see me with my shades on indoors I’m not being cool. Just careful.

Best stay off the roads for a while.