Its The...Ben Fan Happiness Bang!

Terry and Bakey - End Of An Era

Series Two, Episode Six - “The Last Laugh Before Bang Saturday” [10′17, 80kb] Its all collapsing in on itself at the Dirty Video Cassette as the strain of making a ten minute podcast every three weeks has finally taken its toll on Ben Baker. But how will it all end? Will Terry jump the shark? Will Gwendil die on the way back to his home planet? Or will there just be an explosion and some tiresome shouting like all Baker’s other tawdry programmes. There’s only one way to find out…

NB: This is the last ever Dirty Video Cassette. But dont worry, there’ll be more new podcast nonsense soon I swear. Just as soon as I can stop listening to this new Magnetic Fields album…

A Very TL:DR Christmas

Hello friends and associated overly-interested wellwishers!

So, you may be wondering what has happened in my fast tilt, full paced life since we last hung out, swapped phone numbers and fingered each other under the giant pile of coats in Simon’s room. Well a lot and yet ultimately little. As I type this, I am full of cold and have been since Friday, which is the main reason this here tumblette hasnt been filled with my tiresome woes for some time.

So, in my best Casey Kasem voice, pretend you care and lets take a quick look at what I’ve been doing in the last two weeks:

24TH DECEMBER - The start of the chaos. The first four hours of which were spent hurriedly recording and editing the Dirty Video Cassette christmas special. Exactly the same as last Christmas Eve in fact. Hopefully you found it worth the effort. Its here if you managed to miss it and want to feel misguidedly festive.

Literally minutes after editing was complete (I listened to the edit in the taxi on the way), I was rushing out of the door and out to do my Santa act (dropping off presents that is, not supporting bloomin’ Nestle baby death with Mel Smith’s voice). Then after some familial teas, it was off for a small six-hour sherry with some of my dear friends. Also: Wiggers. Lovely work all round.

25TH DECEMBER - I thoroughly suggest starting any Christmas Day with a showing of “Olive The Other Reindeer“ then Kylie prancing around in various states of undress on Channel 4. Especially when you know you’ve got to spend the day with your entire family and your Dad has only had 3 hours sleep due to stressing about cooking for everybody (and you wonder where I get it from….).

Still, due to a combination of Wii Sports bowling, my grandma amusingly once again giving my nephew and niece the wrong gifts and general family comeraderie made it go “relatively” smoothly. Although I still havent seen “Harry Hill’s Christmas TV Burp” yet. Bastards…

26TH DECEMBER - Ah, the normal boring day..sorry, “Boxing day” slowness, right? Yeah, well when its your Mum’s birthday and your Dad is doing a disco at a local boozer, its remarkably less slow. Cue an obscene amount to drink from 2pm til 2am and touching Kay’s bosoms on more than one occasion. (Twelve occasions) It was all done in the best possible taste of course…

27TH DECEMBER - A relaxed day now? Nope. The house needed cleaning from top to bottom in advance of Fran coming to visit for a few days. I think all the running about and Betty’s mad dashing ultimately had a terrible after-effect as around 8pm I suddenly became very dizzy and sick, which lead to…

28TH DECEMBER - …being spent either in bed or on the sofa feeling like total crap. Luckily, Russ decided to come up a few days later and Fran went out to visit family and friends for the entire day so I was given ample chance to recuperate with Nurse Wiggers bringing me hot pizza and a spoon as and when required.

29TH DECEMBER - My pre-birthday trip to Leeds for shopping, drinking and loving which I was thankfully much better for it. Unfortunately Kay wasnt, which lead to her being very snipey all night (nothing to do with aforementioned boob-touching) and Fran suffering from tinnitus which flared up in the excellent Fab Cafe. Still, I had fun so thats all that matters.

30TH DECEMBER - My actual birthday. Thanks to all the people who sent me lovely messages and those who appeared in real person to celebrate it with me. It was genuinely the best adult birthday I have ever spent.

31ST DECEMBER - And almost my favourite New Years Eve too thanks to Darrell, Fran, Russ and Wiggers being round for some relaxed lovely behaviour, almost ruined by Chesh turning up, getting very drunk within about 2 hours and becoming shouty and annoying (something he’ll no doubt call me a wanker for saying but screaming at the top of your voice at 2am in a residential area then getting arsey when rebuked in never an acceptable thing). If you’re reading this pal, you’ve a ridiculous chip on your shoulder. Oh, and Happy New Year.

1ST JANUARY - The rest of New Years was great though and the 1st was the best it could ever be, as I managed to get out of the usual family buffet at my Grandma’s as I had a house full of guests. Although I did pop down to tell her this and got back £55 in collected birthday monies as a result. Whee! Then it was back to ours for Lee Mack Live (superb, essential purchase), Futurama: Bender’s Big Score (similarly excellent) and some caterwauling with keyboards which may or may not appear in a future podcast in 2008.

2ND JANUARY - Fran and Russ leave, Darrell of course does not. The first slow and relaxed day in over a week, ruined by the immediate arrival of…

3RD JANUARY - …my pal Phil Catterall. Not ruined of course, but enhanced. To DEATH. We have a lovely day watching CITV continuity from the 90’s on YouTube, Homestar Runner DVDs (my gift from him) and then drinking our weight in…um, drink.

4TH JANUARY - I wake up very hungover, only to realise as the day goes on that its not a hangover and I am fucking ill again. As the day goes, Phil leaves coughing and Darrell realises he’s starting with a cold too. By the end of the day, we are both completely fucked.

And thats basically it. Darrell went home ill, I am still ill and you poor bastards have just had to read all that. To make up for it, this is probably my last Tumblr post incidentally. Its become incredibly rubbish to use and to be honest, no-one reads it. Still there’s plans afoot for new stuff and 2008 should be a very exciting year for people who enjoy the nonsense I write.

Just as soon as I can get rid of this bloody cold…

A Christmas Announcement...

…just one day later than promised (blame Virgin rotten Media and their jack-in-a-box web service) but here’s what I was barking on about earlier anyway…

Yes, its my first book!!! Of sorts! A collection of my favourite sketches from the last three years, including gallons of unseen Bean (sketches, songs, scribbles and notes), a hundredweight of new material and thanks to Darrell Jones being actually proficient with publishing software, its a thumping 136 page read which I am insanely proud of.

Im getting it privately published (Yeah, strangely Penguin weren’t knocking down my door..) and if any of you fancy one, they’re available to pre-order from January 1st. They’ll take a few weeks to get to me so Im hoping they can be sent out by the end of the month. The idea was to have it ready for Christmas but we missed the deadline by a day.

So, thats my christmas gift to you. £9.99 with P&P please. WHAT?!? These guys seemed pretty happy with it…

         Merry Christmas! From Ben and “The Two Bladdy Ronnies” x