Drug of the nation

This is a time when I should be knuckling down and creating comics, but I’ve found myself distracted by the TV this week. On Monday there was a documentary on Five (which now has the best documentaries of any channel) about a man whose limbs resemble tree branches because they’re covered in warty growths. Here he is:

 
Next time you get a spot, remember that it could be worse.  I started off feeling sorry for him, but then a skin specialist flew in from the States (tree man lives in a remote part of Indonesia) to diagnose the problem and come up with a solution. We were told that tree man was desperate for a cure. After a great deal of hard work, a course of treatment was decided. Hooray! But then tree man changed his mind because it would ruin his career as a travelling circus freak. Boo! Surely having hands and feet would be preferable? Honestly.

Then last night I watched Child Genius on Channel 4, which raised the thorny issue of whether the parents of gifted offspring should help them realise their potential as soon as possible or just let them be kids. I think I’d be in favour of the latter. Being super-intelligent tends to create more problems than it solves, I think. Not that I would know. All these kids seemed isolated though. I’m grateful that I was raised by parents who just let me be, with no pressure whatsoever to take a certain path. Okay, I’ve ended up as a geek who stays in every night drawing comics (and watching more TV than I should) but I’m happy with that. I am!

Biggest TV disappointment of the week was Dom Joly’s Complainers, also on Five. I only got half way through it. The ‘highlight’ was supposed to be when they applied a wheel clamp to a clamper’s van. Ho ho! A taste of his own medicine! Surely he’ll be spitting mad and we can all laugh at him! Well, no. He just shrugged and called his boss. Rubbish.