My friend was working at the Olivier awards the other night and said Hannah waddingham stepped in to defend a young staff member that some guests were being rude to. She told them to never treat anyone like that and then checked that the girl was okay, before offering to shout at anyone that bothered her again 😂 just a super lovely thing to do, especially when she was hosting the awards and probably had a million other things on her mind.

Oh god this disastrous first date I went on. Just the order the conversation devolved was unparalleled:

1. He randomly drops that he has a kid. Ok not a big deal.

2. Kid is 13 years old. This guy is 28 years old. So some crazy math to start.

3. The last time he saw his kid was when the kid was 9 years old.

4. He has no plans to see his kid until the son is 18 years old.

5. He will just tell his son that his baby momma is insane and is trying to trap him into marriage. He truly believed this.

6. His baby momma was, at the time of the date, engaged. And had been dating said man since right before she gave birth.

7. Baby dad’s (the guy I’m on a date with) mom does free nannying over most weekends unsupervised (no baby momma). Baby dad doesn’t want to go see his kid then.

I was in literal awe. He was talking like it was the most normal conversation. Right before the end of the date he actually was worried I was going to judge him because he was anti-vax. Sir we were long past that worry.

Got a heavy hitter for this one.


Managed to find myself sat in the front carriage for a 60mph train crash. Which is about as fun as it sounds.

After derailing, we came to rest on our side in a tunnel, can't see a thing, dizzy, ears ringing. You check your limbs are still in the right places, and start trying to grasp what just happened, but you realise smoke has started filling the carriage. Doors obviously didn't open, couldn't kick the windows out. Cue panic like you can't imagine, grown men losing their s**t, hysteria, absolute bedlam. Half the passengers were strewn around the carriage, half were climbing over eachother trying to get out.

Figured that was me done, once I realised our goose was cooked I called the Mrs to say the train had crashed, there was a fire, I don't think I'm getting out and that I love her.

The fire never really caught, we just stood huddled in the wreck trying to keep eachother talking until rescue came.

Wound up with a severe PTSD diagnosis, stopped going outside, could never feel safe, couldn't sleep for more than a couple of hours at a time, so just completely stopped functioning for a year, and then another year of gradually improving. Was self employed at the time so nearly lost everything in the process.

It's been a handful of years now and it still f***s with my head on a daily basis (albiet in largely managable ways).

Life is good now, and somehow nobody died, so no dramas. Hell of a night, though.