I’ve not wrrtten a blog post in ages but there’s a good reason for the absence.

It’s all Alan Partridge’s fault.

If you’re not in the UK then you may not have encounted Alan before. If you haven’t, hopefully youtube can help you out. In short, he’s what the British called a ‘veteran broadcaster’, someone who used to be all over our TVs a while back but got left behind by changing televisual fashions. I’m a big fan of Alan’s. I’ve read two of his books - can’t seem to get a copy of Bouncing Back - and enjoyed all his various TV shows. Now he’s back on our screens again and I’m very happy.

Problem is, Alan is haunting me. You see, he has a very idiosyncratic way of speaking, particularly when it comes to delivering truths or commenting on and analysing situations as he sees them. Agree with him or not, you can’t deny that Alan speaks in his own voice. A voice that won’t let me be.

Every time I sit down to write a blog post, I can’t help but read it as Alan - or my clumsy version of Alan - and that has a way of undermining it. If you ever want to knowif something your reading deserves to be taken seriously, then imagine it being read to you by Alan Partridge. If it still works, then what you’re reading is worth pursuing. If it sounds like trite, simplistic, shallow nonsense, well, that’s the power of Alan.

So, that’s why there haven’t been any blog posts. Every thing I write just sounds like Alan Partridge and that’s no way to butter your blogging parsnips.

If anyone has any ideas about how to rid myelf of this affliction, I’d love to hear them.

This Time with Alan Partridge