Top 10 Jobs at a Radio Station—in My Very Biased Opinion
Top 10 Pivotal Moments in My Career
Top 10 Things that Make a Successful Radio Show (the type of shows I do, that is)
Top 10 Seminal Items of Technology that Had the World Aghast
Top 10 Things to Take to a Meeting if You Think You are Going to get Shafted
Top 10 Memories of The Big Breakfast
Top 10 Things to Consider When You Split Up with Someone
Top 10 Songs Regularly Murdered at Karaoke
Top 10 Great Questions to be Asked
Top 10 Reasons to Stay Friends with Your Ex
Top 10 Bands on Radio 1 During Our Watch
Top 10 Things that are True about Showbiz
Top 10 Signs You Are Losing the Plot
Top 10 Things a Celeb Should Never Do
Top 10 Things I Think About—Other than My Wife and Family
Top 10 Most Useless States of Mind
Top 10 Things that Help Get a Deal Done
Top 10 Reasons Why I Presume Capital Never Took Us Seriously
Top 10 Human Responses I Experienced Leading up to the Deal
Top 10 Houses I Have Found Myself In For One Reason Or Another
Appendix it is what you think…notes from the cast
Top 10 Tabloid Newspaper Descriptions of Me
10 GENIUS
9 WHIZZ KID
8 MOGUL
7 MOTORMOUTH
6 UGLY
5 MEGLOMANIAC
4 DRUNKARD
3 TYRANT
2 LIAR
1 TOSSER
As you can see there have been countless occasions when I have done myself few favours in the public eye. After some deep thought and consideration on the road back to the real world, I can only conclude that this was because I reached the top of a mountain I never even expected to climb. Once there it’s obvious to me now that I didn’t have the first clue what to do next—so I jumped off.
‘Far more fun than merely walking back down and having a rest before setting off in search of the next one,’ I thought.
Wrong!
As a thirteen-year-old paperboy I never for a second imagined the tabloids I was then delivering would one day take me into their beloved bosom and splash me on their front covers with such regularity and for such varying reasons. Some good, some bad, some true, some fittingly published, but that’s all part of the deal. Anyone that complains about it—famous people that is—have to realise they can’t have their cake and eat it. The fatal mistake is to moan—if you don’t like the bright lights and everything that comes with them, get off the stage.
For years, as the song went, I did it my way; for years I thought I was bomb-proof; for years I was just plain lucky when I thought I was being a wise guy. Of course I got things wrong from time to time, but I put that down to being part of life’s rich tapestry—after all, few of us set out to get things wrong on purpose.
In the first half of my life—at least I hope it’s only been the first half of my life—I achieved everything I ever aspired to. I performed a job that I loved, I punched way above my weight when it came to dating the opposite sex, I worked with and met some of the most talented and exciting people on the planet, I bought cars and houses that were to die for and at one time I was co-owner of a company that was worth over a billion pounds. Yet here I am, sat back in front of the keyboard with a cup of tea, wondering just how on earth any of this happened.
Was there a plan? Not that I’m aware of, but then again I suppose there must have been—surely a story like this couldn’t occur by chance? Or maybe that’s what life is: just one big accident from start to finish and what comes round the corner to hit us depends on which road we’re on at the time.
Ultimately I look back and see a minefield of huge risks and high stakes in all aspects of my life, some of which went my way, some of which did not, but most of which I didn’t have to take in the first place, yet I still felt compelled to do so. Barring physical, mental and social disadvantages, I think this is the single most common theme that links people who might be more likely to exceed their so-called ‘expectations’ as opposed to those who don’t.
I am constantly intrigued by this existence of ours and why we are here at all in the first place and therefore, as a result, I am fascinated as to just how far we can take things before we are asked to leave. I also don’t want to leave; I love being alive and here and breathing