h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

American comedian Rich Hall came to our own little backwater as part of his latest tour of the British Isles. The night we were due to see him, I poured myself into a pair of buttock-hugging trousers and a very tight top, and I let my hair swing loose from my cowboy hat to my waist in freshly-washed waves.

"Do you think he'll like me?" I asked Gothly.

"He'll love you," said Gothly, refusing to bite. "Don't forget to put on some of that posh perfume. That should make him hot for you."

So I put on my perfume and pocketed my autograph book and ran through a few possible chat-up lines in case I met Him. When I say "a few," I mean one. I could only think of one: "that's a hell of an itinerary you've got there." (Well, it's been a long time.)

The theatre was crowded, and very warm. Gothly and I found a table in the bar and observed our fellow audience members till it was time to go in. As some of you will know, one of our local reservoirs has been contaminated, resulting in a small epidemic of cryptosporidiosis; so we entertained ourselves by spotting the convalescents. They could be identified by their anxious, stiff-legged scuttle and their proximity to the theatre toilets, which were already developing queues. (Comedians being thin on the ground in Wales, we've learned to take our laughs where we can get them.)

Our seats were right at the back of the auditorium, too far for me to make out the performers' facial expressions with my useless spectacles (shouldn't've gone to Specsavers). I guess Rich Hall has a similar problem with his eyesight, because he didn't seem to notice my tight top and my glorious head of hair, and he didn't display any signs of having fallen madly in love with me the moment he clapped eyes on me. In fact, he didn't seem to notice me at all.

To my left sat a boy-racer-looking guy, about twice my height and half my width, which worked out nicely in terms of sharing the arm rest, because I was able to tuck my elbow comfortably behind his, without even touching arms. Gothly wasn't so lucky, being stuck between me and a guy who was half Gothly's height but three times as wide, and who took up the whole arm rest and part of Gothly's lap.

Rich Hall's supporting act was an Irishman called David O'Doherty, whom Gothly likes; I'd never heard of the guy, but he was pretty damn funny. I actually guffawed. I've never guffawed in a public place before. (Except for one very stoned evening at the all-night garage, but the less said about that incident, the better.) David O'Doherty, having warmed up the audience with a ridiculous musical interlude on a children's synthesiser, proceeded to tell us all about his technophobic mother, who had recently acquired a mobile phone and taken up text messaging: "...and you know, she has taken to text messaging like a duck to text messaging."

His mastery of timing is something I wish I could do justice to, because I think it was this, more than the words he spoke, which made him so very funny. His vitriolic attack on lads who play loud bass music from their souped-up second-hand cars with blue lights fixed to the undercarriages had the tall boy racer next to me weeping with laughter.

Trying to draw the audience in, he mentioned the signs he kept seeing all over the place, telling him NOT TO DRINK THE WATER! "What do you *have* in your water round here?" he asked.

"Cryptosporidiosis!" we shouted, but we were not in unison and it came out as, "crypripocspirosdictoridispordiosdisosisosis!"

He looked blankly at us, which was enough to make us fall about, and then he asked, "what are the symptoms?"

There was a long pause. Nobody wanted to be the first one to shout "diarrhoea" at the top of our lungs, in case we ended up being the only one, so we all waited for somebody else to shout, "d...!" so that we could then yell, "iarrhoea!" Only, nobody did.

"You don't know, do you!" O'Doherty taunted. This was too much for one guy down near the front: "the screaming shits!" he bawled, with real feeling. We all laughed at him, relieved that it hadn't been us. O'Doherty decided that shits that can scream must be really scary.

His only duff joke was this one: "who are the coolest people in a hospital? The ULTRA SOUND specialists!"

"And by tomorrow," he added, "that's the only joke any of you will remember. And you'll ALL pass it on to your mates."

Since we had to leave as soon as the show was over, I went hunting for Rich Hall during the interval. I got as far as the ice cream vendor. She told me she didn't think Mr Hall would want to be disturbed while he was preparing for a show, and that I'd be better off buying an ice cream. An acceptable alternative, the ice cream was tasty and felt good on my tongue.

Listening to Rich Hall talking onstage was like being tickled in the ribs, mercilessly, for a good hour. I could hardly catch my breath from laughing so hard. The shrieks and gargles I was uttering were more than embarrassing, but I couldn't stop. I took comfort in the fact that the people sitting around me were in a similar state.

He picked out a couple in the front row, who didn't seem to know whether they were an item or not, and he spent most of his act being an unofficial marriage guidance counsellor for them, between his other jokes. Having interrogated the man on his name and career, he sat at a grand piano and ad-libbed a song about how the man heroically saves the day and wins the love of the woman; unfortunately, the guy had a name that's unpronouncable outside of Wales, and his job was retinal photography. Not a lot of things rhyme with 'retinal photographer', as Rich discovered; but he ploughed on, digging himself into an ever deeper and more surreal hole as, in his song, escapee retinal photographs began to take over North Wales, with the refrain, "no-one wants to look that deeply into someone else's eyes."

Somehow, he made the song work and be very funny, but it was a close call. The man's a genius.

Welsh pronunciation came back to haunt him in a pun he made about the name of the local town. He didn't understand why it didn't raise a laugh, and spent about five minutes hilariously explaining, justifying and defending the joke; but we hadn't laughed because we simply hadn't got the pun. The town's name is not pronounced the way he thought it was.

The highlight of my evening was probably Rich's love song about a mad bag lady. Those of you who follow my journal will appreciate why such a song would warm my cockles. I began to think maybe he *had* noticed me and fallen in love with me after all, and this was his oblique way of showing me.

Towards the end of his session, the fatigue of travelling all over Britain in the dead of winter to do daily shows began to show through the cracks. He launched into a monologue about London's preparations for the Olympic Games, then suddenly said, "I forgot. This is Wales. You guys don't give a shit about London, do you."

There was a pause, one which didn't seem staged. My heart went out to him. He looked exhausted. He looked as though what he really needed was to lay his head on the soft, yielding thighs of a beautiful woman in tight, buttock-hugging trousers, and have gentle fingers run repeatedly through his curls. He pulled himself together and asked the audience if we had any questions.



We shuffled our feet and glanced at each other: nobody had told us we'd have to be *spontaneous*. Had somebody *told* us, we could have *prepared*. But suddenly, I realised that this was my chance to dazzle and woo the great Rich Hall. This was my moment to speak to him, and I had to do it *now*. What the hell was that chat-up line? Ah, yes: the itinerary. But Rich had already covered the hellishness of his itinerary in his routine. That was all my ideas used up, and some guy in front of me stole my thunder by asking him where he'd bought his shirt. Nebraska, if you're wondering.

Rich got on a roll again, and tickled our ribs with jokes and songs till it was time to go home. Now I'm left with a Rich-shaped hole (I won't say where) and a powerful urge to listen to music by Tom Waits.

The lack of any sign of jealousy on Gothly's part regarding Rich Hall's obvious infatuation with me is yet another sign, if one is needed, that I'm living with an alien doppelganger!

But maybe Gothly organised for Rich Hall to be snuggled up nicely under your on Christmas morning.....better make sure your Christmas stockings are in fit shape!

zdt

I'm beginning to see why Rich Hall always has that drawn, anxious expression! Greeted by womanly thighs everywhere he goes!!!

J

Hmm... I don't know who Rich Hall is (other than apparently a comedian) or what he looks like and I'm not sure I can be bothered to find out. This thread looks as though it's going to be like the Vin Diesel one all over again ...

Perhaps I'll acquire some enthusiasm for googling later.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/r/gallery/richhallsfishingshow_999031109_3.shtml

It's not really about his looks, it's about his factor. It's his cynicism, his gravelly singing, and the fact that he's very, very, very, very, very, very funny.

Perhaps this thread will be about what tickles people's funny-bones, eh?

Ah, unlike that other chap, I do think I've at least seen this one before - though I don't think much of his choice of fishing friend. If I've remembered the right one, then he's one of those who does sarcasm and acting surprised or outraged and I'm relatively neutral about his brand of humour.

>>though I don't think much of his choice of fishing friend<<

Sarcasm in action! Perfect!

J

"I don't think much of his choice of fishing friend."

That picture's from a series he did in which he took celebrities we love to hate on fishing trips; it was a version of the chat show format, in which the celebrities had free rein to be their most annoying selves, Rich Hall had free rein to be prickly and sarcastic, and when he'd had enough, he'd row them into a reed bed, shoot them, pitch them overboard, and row home alone.

"he's one of those who does sarcasm and acting surprised or outraged"

He also veers towards the surreal and farcical. I'd group him with comedians like Alan Davies (http://www.bbcamerica.com/genre/drama_mysteries/jonathan_creek/jonathan_creek_davies.jsp) and Bill Bailey (http://www.chortle.co.uk/comics/tours/2001/billbailey.html ), but then, I think they all know each other, so it's probably not surprising that their humour's a bit similar.

Jabberwock's first journal entry also had me in stitches: F2606954?thread=1310633.

I prefer those other two.

Do you watch QI?

Sometimes. I don't always remember/bother and it's offensive when they (the programme makers rather than the contestants!) get stuff wrong.

I'd only noticed one thing they got wrong - or rather, they were stretching meanings of words rather far. Do you mean to say they do this a lot?

I told Jabberwock's chip shop joke to friend last night: it cracked him up as well.

Aw gee......

J

SEF, Gothly's curious as to what things the QI people have got wrong. Can you recall any examples?

I don't take notes. I only notice them in passing. After that I have what is more genuinely Random Access Memory than any misnamed RAM is - ie there tends to be no knowing when/whether something will resurface or what I'll get if I try to recall a specific thing.

I thought that might be the case, especially since you're not a regular viewer. Gothly wanted to know what type of 'wrong' you meant. I'll get clarification on what that's supposed to mean, but not right now.

I remembered an example this morning - and then forgot where the thread was! I think the QI makers were among those guilty of copying the creationists in getting the derivation of a chinese character wrong. Other wrongnesses were in areas of science but at the moment those haven't come back to mind. Though I might be able to find the example which someone else spotted in a QI show which they had seen (that would require sufficient enthusiasm to attempt the search in the first place of course).

I thought of one today, but it's gone now. Oh well.

I do hope it's true that, genetically speaking, we're two-thirds geranium. I liked that one.