Dave\’s blog

It’s only TV but do I like it?

Posted by dave - 23/02/09 at 01:02:20 pm

All in all it’s been a strange few days. Thursday started off normal enough, some bits of writing in the morning, then down the allotment in the afternoon to prepare for spring. I started digging out a fallow piece of land that the previous owner had his shed on. The more I dug, the more I crap I found, tin cans, corrugated iron, broken glass, plastic bottles and bags etc, etc –so, what was supposed to be a job for an afternoon I had to abandon to finish another day.

I came home tired and aching and thought I’d treat myself to a nice relaxing bath, I felt like I deserved a long hot soak. Half way through my watery meditation the phone rang, I didn’t move a muscle knowing that if it were important they would leave a message or call back.

An unknown number flashed on the screen, must be work I thought to myself.

‘Hi this is Astra from the BBC, we wondered if you wanted to come and talk about allotments on News 24 tonight?’

My heart started racing, ‘tonight!’, I thought to myself now panicking a little.

I called back and she informed me that I was to have a car turn up in 2 hours to take me up to BBC Bristol in Clifton.

I spent the next couple of hours nervously wandering about, swatting up on allotments. At one point I had to go to the local shop just to get some of the nervous energy out of my system.
Up to that point I’d been on – BBC Breakfast, ITV Weather, BBC Inside Out West, Radio 4’s Today Programme and Working Lunch not to mention countless local radio appearances. So this was to be my fourth live television appearance and yet I was still shitting it.

I was dropped off at BBC Clifton at about 8pm. The lights were off and the whole place looked closed for the night, I began to think the whole thing was a hoax and reached for my mobile phone. Thankfully, all was made clear after a couple of phone calls. I was told to head for the vehicle entrance and wait in the security office for a bloke called Peter. Forty minutes of shivering next to an open door in a semi-dark room Peter turned up with obligatory clipboard in hand. I think the only information on these clipboards is the guest’s name as the usual action, and Peter was no exception, is to nod and point to a page on the clipboard before uttering, ‘Dave Hamilton?’

Peter ushered me to the newsroom, which was empty save for one bloke working a few rows away. He sat me on a high stool and put a microphone on my collar and earpiece in my ear. I faced the camera checking my hair in the monitor; it looked like it always looks, messy despite brushing it before leaving the house. With no cameraman there was nothing human to engage with, just a remote controlled eye staring at me.

The time came for my piece and I felt myself freeze up for a second or two. Like the first dump after a couple of days of painful constipation the words suddenly began to flow (I’m sure other analogies could be better there!)

I looked in the monitor to see who was asking these idiotic questions but what showed on the screen bore no resemblance to the inane chatter in my ear.

‘My wife goes up the allotment for hours and never seems to return with anything!’

My interrogator utters.

My first thought was to joke that she was more likely having an affair than digging for carrots but I think better of this and return the chatter with something equally nonsensical. The next thing I know I’m telling the country to grow more potatoes and then I’m off air.

I pull out the air-piece feeling like I’ve just been in a car-crash and Peter directs my bewildered self out into the open air.

I wait for 20-30 minutes in the cold night air on my own for the car to take me home before realising it isn’t coming. I debate walking or getting the bus but it’s getting late now so I head into the security office again to see what’s happened to my car.

After leaving messages with Peter and Astra it becomes clear that their phones are off for the night and I have to call a taxi home.

A few years ago I used to work for an employment agency in Oxford called ‘Driver Hire’, I wasn’t a driver for hire but I did work for them as a drivers mate. I would be picked up outside the agency then dropped off in whatever logistics, delivery or removal company needed a drivers mate that day. It was a one-way deal however and regardless if the company was in Cowley, Didcot or a village in the middle of no-where I would have to find my own way home.

I never thought a television appearance would echo this but I guess that’s the glamorous life of a TV pundit!

The next day I went to do a volunteer day at Eastside Roots, a community garden scheme set up on an abandoned piece of land at Stapleton Road Station in Bristol. The co-ordinator, Nick Ward, asked how I’d been so I mentioned I’d been on TV the night before to which he replied, ‘oh I was on TV on Monday, what were you on?’

He’d been short listed as one of the RHS’s Peoples Gardener and had appeared on the Alan Titchmarsh show the Monday before. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for him as we could do with any extra support for the project we can get!

The following day it’s quite sunny so I head to the allotment again to finish digging out my mini landfill site. I arrive to find the plot below me teaming with people. That particular plot has been more or less empty since I got mine three years before so it came as quite a shock to see it swarming like this. Rather strangely it turns out that I know the allotment holder and I chat to her briefly as she heads home to get tea for her personal garden army.

I mention that I’ve been on TV to which she replies, ‘Oh me too, and I’m going to be on Gardener’s World Soon!’

I can’t believe it, is everyone on TV these days!!??

She’s part of an organization called Gro Fun and the plot is a community project to get people interested in gardening. Just like Nick it’s a worthy cause and I really can’t get jealous of her TV exposure!

This kind of puts things in perspective for me, my plot is for my own enjoyment rather than a community project. The closest I get to community work there is when I call up my video-making friend to free him from his editing suite or when my girlfriend pops by to do some weeding.

I finish the day feeling like an allotment holder rather than a minor-celebrity and whilst I pull out a vintage Old English Ginger Beer can from the soil I remind myself that I’m not doing this for the fame (and yes I do see the irony of writing that in a public blog!)