Thursday 7 February 2008

Introducing Dennis

It will come as no surprise to many of you to learn that I'm not always me. Sometimes I'm Dennis.

Dennis is my P.A., or, as he likes to describe himself, my Personal 'Attendant'. He attends to all the jobs I have neither the time nor the patience to do myself. Sometimes it's Dennis who types up my posts and publishes them when I'm busy with the show. You might say, therefore, that Dennis is my extra set of legs. He's also my third arm, but, I hasten to add, he's not my fourth. Dennis has only one arm. In fact, he's one of the few one-armed P.A.s in the country, which makes him half a P.A., or an 'A' as he likes to joke.

Dennis has a unique sense of humour about his disability, which is the way he says you have to be. Not many men have had a limb bitten off by a basking shark off the coast of Cornwall and I doubt if there's another man who can laugh about it as much as Dennis. It's what makes me feel so certain that you'll like him. However, a word to the wise: Dennis' involvement in my blog explains why there are often so many spelling mistakes and typos in my posts. You may think you're correcting my poor spelling but you're really making a one armed man feel bad about his disability.

I've decided to introduce you to Dennis because tomorrow I'll be going to meet the team who will be working with me on 'Eye of the Storm 2'. There's already talk of 'Eye of the Storm 3' and 'Eye of the Storm 4', so this job will be consuming two days of my week from now on. Should I disappear for 48 hours, I'm hoping that Dennis will help keep this blog going. Being a one armed man, he will probably be writing posts that are considerably shorter than my usual pieces. I hope that Dennis will become to this blog what Nige is to Bryan over at Thought Experiments. Or that's how I explained it to my little one-armed helper this morning.

'Dennis, would you relish the opportunity of doing some extra typing each week?' I asked him as he began to clear up after the first production meeting of the day.

He looked at me from under his heavy brow and grunted.

'Is that a good grunt or a bad grunt?' I asked.

He put his one, lonely, solitary hand in his pocket and adopted the look of a suitably unimpressed one-armed man.

'I take it that you don't want to hear what I want you to do?'

'I'm not writing your blog, if that's what you're asking,' he said, forgetting for the moment which handsome Channel 4 type pays his wages.

'You've done it before,' I said. 'There are many times you've transcribed pieces from my Dictaphone.'

'But you get all the credit.'

'As it should be, Dennis. As it should be. You can't honestly believe that people should credit you for transcribing the words of a man with the full compliment of limbs?' I rubbed my face, which was aching at the cheek of it all. I could see that I would have to compromise if I wanted my plan to go ahead. 'So, would you do it if I told people of your existence? Perhaps I could give you a regular column in which you'd get to talk about life from a one-armed point of view.'

He shrugged but his face couldn't conceal a fleeting look of excitement.

'That's better,' I said, 'but if you're going to have a more visible presence on my blog, we have to make some ground rules. Take a note, Dennis. Head the list: Things That I, Dennis, Should and Should Not Do When Writing on Richard's Blog.'

'Fair enough,' he said, his hand coming out of his pocket and taking a pad and pencil from his desk.

The list took half the morning to compile but I present it to you as a way of filling the blog while I now go and practise my documentary voice.

Dennis's List of Things He Should and Should Not Do When Writing on Richard's Blog

1. Don't annoy the punters. Americans don't like too many references to Stephen Fry or obesity.
2. Don't provoke the visitors to any online forums dedicated to 'The House'. They will hunt you down, Dennis. The last time, I was lucky to get away with only three crank phone calls and a jiffy bag full of rabbit excrement.
3. Try to promote Jerry Caesar's blog whenever you can. I'm tired of being the only person to leave comments over there.
4. No posts about disability rights.
5. No posts about Esther Rantzen. I don't care how wonderful you think she is, Dennis.
6. Don't flirt with Selena Dreamy. If you had three arms you still wouldn't have enough.
7. Don't mention Finland to Ax unless you speak the language.
8. Don't provoke Mutleythedog. He is not a dog and probably isn't called Mutley.
9. Do not disillusion Bertas. She still thinks that Norwich is a good holiday destination.
10. Remind The Twitch to keep taking his mood medicine.
11. No name dropping. People cannot stand it when a blogger casually drops the names of famous people they have met into their blogs. Stephen Fry doesn't do it so neither should we.
12. News about Stephen Fry takes precedence over any other. Then it's Bill Oddie followed by That Man Clarkson. News about Jeremy Paxman can be posted if there's nothing better to do.
13. Respect Judy at all times. Remember: she pays our wages.
14. No jokes about one-armed bandits or any other kind of bandit.
15. No pictures of naked one-armed women.
16. Remember that people are here to read about me. I, Richard Madeley, should appear in every one of your blog posts. As should a completely superfluous link to Stephen Fry's blog.
17. Never mention your stump. People aren't interested.

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's ridiculous. Nobody thinks Norwich is a good holiday destination (Sorry Bertas!)

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

You and I might think that, LMRT, but Dennis isn't allowed to be so honest. To him, Norwich is the jewel of the South East and home to the UK's second best talk show host, Alan Partridge.

Anonymous said...

Quite right. I think such opinions should be held for bloggers with their own domain - this is not an excuse for Dennis to branch out on his own!

Anonymous said...

Boys, after Birmingham ANYTHING is a good holiday destination... besides you dont know where I have been... :) Have you ever been inside of an atomic shelter or wandering the streets of Belfast in the middle of the night? Not to mention I lived in a war zone (and no it wasnt Birmingham) Trust me Norwich is good :)
Now we have sorted that out, Richard while I understand your need for ahem an administrative professional (that is the PC word btw), you do realize you are asking for trouble dont you?
Any minute now your House American friends will settle here like flies dismissing it as one of your multiple personalities and/or saying it is time for you to be hospitalized... dont worry if you need a place to hide, I have a spare room... you will have to share with the animals though :)

Anonymous said...

Oh and how rude of me... hello Dennis :)

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

[Whispers] Please don't mention that House forum. I'm really scared of looking...

I accept that if you've seen Birmingham then Norwich is good. One of the worst days of my life was spent in Birmingham looking for New Street Station.

Dennis says 'hello'. In fact, he is waving to you with his one, lonely, solitary hand.

Anonymous said...

Oh Lord... you should have seen New Street Station on Sunday mornings when all the Birmingham city supporters would go to the game... and if you are blond and a girl, well it isnt pretty...I shudder at the thought...

(whispering) I love House, but they do scare me a bit too... :)

Anonymous said...

Hello Dennis ..if you ever need a hand...i'm here to help....just ask.

Anonymous said...

As a disabled, obese American who loves Stephen Fry and doesn't watch House I'm not sure about some of your rules - I think you should move Jeremy Clarkson up in the name dropping order and The Twitch is more interesting off his meds. That is all, carry on.
(Hi Dennis)

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

Bertas, I remember standing with my nearest and dearest, who had consistently doubted my ability to find my way from a coach station to the railway station. In the end, I dumped out bags in the middle of the pavement, pointed at a building, and screamed at the top of my voice, 'New Street ****ing Station'. I can't help but always think of it in those terms.

Twitch, I'm sure Dennis is reassured that there's somebody as sensitive to his needs reading this blog.

Okbye, and you wonder why you drop by? This blog is written with you obese Americans in mind. And I'm sure Dennis will do a good enough job tomorrow when I'm out. He can a unsavory in his personal habits and it may take him an eternity to type his post, but he's got good qualities too. I can't at the moment think of any but I'm sure you'll spot them eventually.

AxmxZ said...

*tenses all over like a borzoi*

Who said 'Finland'?

I disagree about mentioning Fry. Mainly because I like reading about him. :)

AxmxZ said...

Oh, and hi Dennis!

Uncle Dick Madeley said...

Ax, this thing about Finland does worry me. You don't know that they have the highest suicide rate among herring fishermen than any other country in the world? Can't I persuade you to take an interest in Norway or Denmark instead?

And Dennis says 'hi'.

Dennis Plumb said...

Testing testing. Hello world.

Anonymous said...

Dennis I read from your blogofile that you have been working for Dick the past five tears....is this how you lost your hand?

Anonymous said...

Now that I think about Dennis should be a little more concerned with his missing head than his missing arm.

Dennis Plumb said...

dear okbye

i know that he will say that he's trying to protect my identity but i know it's because it's the only picture that mr. madeley has of me.

sorry about the lower case. i can't be bothered to keep pressing in the caps lock key.

dennis.

AxmxZ said...

Oh, I know all about the suicides. Part of the reason why I find them so fascinating. According to my preliminary research, Finns manage to combine being utterly boring with being batshit insane. I'm impressed almost despite myself.

I think Hugh Laurie was meant to be Finnish, but something played out wrong.

Anonymous said...

Hey hey hey! Finland! *points to herself with two different hand fingers*

Lola said...

Everyone else is saying hello so I thought I'd join in. Hello Dennis, hello Richard, hello everybody. Now let's get on with writing proper blog entries, this isn't a chat room. Ooh, aren't I stern?

AxmxZ said...

Oh come now, hope-athelet. You know it's all true. You melanin-deprived, tango-dancing, air-guitar-playing, knife-fighting, Conan-O'Brien-watching, ever-drunk weirdoes... :)

(kidding. I'm fennophiliac like whoa.)