The World of Karl Pilkington

by Pilkington, Karl

  Steve: So your solution is that seventy-eight-year-old women have little babies inside them and as they slip away into death, the little babies are born?

  Ricky: And who looks after the baby, because it is a pretty good system having a baby while you are young enough to look after that baby and make sure it lives to reproductive age itself.

  Steve: I mean that system has been working for years. But wait a minute Nature, put that on hold, ’cos Karl Pilkington’s got an idea.

  Karl: That’s what it was. Just an idea.

  Steve: Yeah, it was nonsense, but thank you for it.

  Ricky: It was the ramblings of someone you’d find by themselves, in a hospital, eating flies.

  Steve: Yeah, this is the sort of thing you’d find in the diary of a psychopath who went on a rampage and then turned the gun on themselves. They’d go through his possessions and find he’s drawn weird drawings, women with knives in their face, and written this kind of gobbledegook.

  Ricky: I saw a similar sort of theory written out on a wall, but it was written in shit.

  Karl: No, all I’m saying is, when people die normally, everyone’s fed up about it, aren’t they, and a bit down, but if when you pass away, you go, ‘Oh we’re going to miss Gladys’ or whatever, but then there’s this new life brought in. It’s almost like a bad news/good news.

  Ricky: But you’re talking about it like someone could pick this idea up and run with it; like you’ve given them enough information to do it. How is this possible? Where does she get the baby from? How does it grow? Why grow it in Gladys’s belly? Why not have it in a drawer? Just add water.

  Steve: Who looks after ‘Son of Gladys’?

  Ricky: There is no theory here. It’s the ramblings of a madman.

  Karl: What I’m saying is the body is always changing innit – from caveman to now, or whatever, and they’re always finding out more and more. Like d’you know how they say people have six senses?

  Ricky: Yes.

  Karl: Well there’s loads more than that.

  Ricky and Steve laugh.

  Ricky: Okay, show me that you’ve got just one.

  Karl: No, right, there’s this one that’s knocking about and what it is – say if I’m in a pub, right, and I’m just doing a crossword or whatever …

  Steve: … Unlikely, but go on …

  Karl: And there’s some woman who’s walked in, right, and she’s staring at me. I know she’s looking at me and I look up and she’s looking at me. They’re saying that’s a new sense that they’ve found out from doing tests and what have you.

  Ricky: Yeah, it’s rubbish.

  Karl: And they are saying that’s been around since like man and dinosaurs was knocking about.

  Ricky: But it could be peripheral vision.

  Karl: No they’ve explained it.

  Steve: I think it’s safe to assume that, with your perfectly round head, people are always stopping and looking at you.

  Karl: No, but they explained it. They said it’s from the time when caveman was wandering about and he would go, ‘Hang on a minute’ and he would look round and there’s a dinosaur there or whatever, and he’d leg it.

  Ricky: Right, this is nonsense. ‘When caveman was wandering round’. Cavemen and dinosaurs, oh they used to live together, yeah sure. Oh that’s the same era. What have you been watching, Raquel Welch in One Million Years BC?

  Karl: What d’you mean?

  Ricky: What do you mean, ‘caveman wandering about, knocking around with a dinosaur?’

  Steve: You do know The Flintstones is only partly based on fact?

  Ricky laughs.

  Steve: Dinosaurs and man did not co-exist. Dinosaurs had long gone before man arrived. Extinct, kaput.

  Karl: Hmm.

  Steve: What, you don’t believe us because you saw that film where they took pictures of lizards and magnified them and put them next to men so they looked like they were fighting each other?

  Karl: No but why couldn’t that have happened? Why wasn’t there dinosaurs back then? Just like we have dogs now.

  Ricky: He has been watching The Flintstones. You know cavemen didn’t mix concrete in a pelican?

  Karl: I just think that there must have been a crossover point.

  Ricky Why do you think there must have been a crossover point?

  Karl: Because if nothing was knocking about at any point, how did anything carry on?

  Ricky: I know, exactly. Why didn’t Hitler meet Nero? It’s weird, there must have been a crossover, they must have met at a party somewhere. I mean are you telling me that Ken Dodd has never met Genghis Khan? They must have bumped into each other, I can’t believe it!

  Karl: Oh forget it.

  ‘D’you know what, I’m sure

  summit’s died in here.’

  Karl: D’you know how you don’t believe in scary stuff, like ghosts?

  Ricky: I believe in scary stuff. I don’t believe in anything totally illogical.

  Karl: Vampires?

  Ricky: No. Anything made up by man.

  Karl: Well there was summit in the paper the other day about a vampire, how they found one. They dug summit up, found a body in a coffin with a bit of wood through its heart and a knife in its mouth.

  Ricky: It was a vampire pirate?

  Steve: That’s definitely proof of a vampire, of course, and not just some grotesque murder. That’s definitely proof of a vampire. As far as I’m aware when you’ve put the stake through the heart they just turn into dust.

  Ricky: And all their victims get their lives back.

  Karl: Right and there was a second bit. Somebody had dug it up, got the heart, blended it, burnt it, popped it in some water, drank it and they’re in prison now. Now if it wasn’t dodgy stuff why are they in prison?

  Ricky: Because they’re mental. Because they dug up a body, liquidised its heart, burnt it and drank it.

  Both: That’s why they’re in prison!

  Karl: But anyway I met Derek Acorah the other week, right.

  Steve: Is he a medium that can contact the dead? Is that right?

  Karl: Yeah, he just chats to ’em and that. Passes messages on.

  Steve: Nice of him.

  Karl: So I said, ‘Tell us summit a bit weird and that.’ So he said, ‘What do you want to know?’ and I said, ‘Just summit weird.’ So he goes, ‘Alright then, here’s one for you. There’s this pub out in the country and there’s this mug.’ You know them old mugs that they have, where they used to leave their own cup knocking about, a tankard thing. So there was one of them mugs in there right, and everybody …

  Steve: Tankard, let’s call it a tankard.

  Karl: Tankard, yeah.

  Ricky: ’Cos you’re the only mug in this story.

  Karl: So this tankard’s knocking about, right, and everyone who’s running the pub keeps going, ‘Oh I wish they’d stop leaving this tankard about’ right and they pick it up …

  Steve: It must be a pain, having a small tankard in a pub – that must be a real grind.

  Karl: So they picked it up and they said, ‘We’ll have to wash that’ and they popped it on a different sideboard. Next thing you know, that person who’s touched it died.

  Steve: Sure.

  Karl: So they kept getting new staff and they thought ‘What’s the connection here?’, right.

  Steve and Ricky laugh.

  Karl: So someone notices, and they go, ‘Yeah, it’s a bit weird. It’s that cup, right.’

  Steve: Tankard.

  Karl: ‘It’s that tankard’ and that. So they get a vicar in and they go, ‘Look, there’s a lot of weird stuff going on here. This tankard – every time someone touches it, they die.’ So he said, ‘Leave it with me.’ He gets his special water out, he comes round, does a little prayer, sprinkles it. He goes, ‘Right, not a problem, don’t worry about it.’ And he picks it up and chucks it in the bin. Guess what …

  Ricky: What?

  Karl: He dies in a crash on the way home. Because he
/>
  picked it up.

  Ricky: But Karl, you’re telling me this like it’s fact.

  Karl: Derek Acorah, he told me.

  Ricky: But Karl, I have no opinion of that story, other than I am pretty sure there was absolutely no connection between touching the tankard and him dying. That’s all I am sure of. I’m not gonna even contest the chain of events. All I’m saying is: there is no connection possible because I believe in logic and the laws of the universe. So when you’re telling me about miracles and strange things you may as well be telling me about the tooth fairy and the Easter bunny. It’s absolutely ludicrous.

  Karl: So what would it take, though, for you to go, ‘Oh I’m actually a believer now?’

  Ricky: I can’t answer that question because I would have to base my beliefs on some of your premises, which I can’t do. It’s like you saying, ‘But what if you found out that two and two equalled five?’ I can’t. It’s a necessary truth. I would have to go back and fundamentally disagree with what I think ‘two-ism’ and ‘five-ness’ is.

  Karl: You’ve never been in a situation where you’ve gone, ‘This room feels a bit weird?’ I mean like if you’ve been to Cornwall on holiday, and stayed somewhere and you’ve gone, ‘D’you know what, I’m sure summit’s died in here.’

  Ricky: I’m sure something has died everywhere.

  Karl: I’ve got a mate, right, who is staying in this big stately home, right, and I mean it’s bigger than Buckingham Palace this place, right. I went down there and from outside you go ‘Oh this is brilliant’. It’s like summit out of To the Manor Born. But then when you get in, it’s a wreck. No one’s doing any vaccing-up or anything, and there’s like rat poison everywhere, windows are smashed. Doors kicked in. I think they’re going to have it done up, but it’s going to cost like £80 million. I have got a little torch and we’re wandering around looking in all these different rooms, right, and I’m asking him ‘How’s it got in this state?’ And he was saying how it was a mental home at one point. And a place for drug addicts. Have you ever been in a hospital when it’s been shut down or a school when there’s no kids in it and it’s got that sort of bad atmosphere of weirdness?

  Steve: Yes, for the sake of argument.

  Karl: So we’re wandering about and I say, ‘What’s in this room?’ And we go in and all the floors are a wreck and rotten and stuff. And I looked at the wall and there was a little piece of paper stuck on the wall right, and I said, ‘What’s this here?’ And so I wandered over, right, got right up close to it and someone had wroted …

  Steve: Somebody had ‘wroted’?

  Karl: So there is a little sign there and it says ‘Flies’, with an arrow. I thought, ‘That’s a bit weird.’ So I follow the arrow, which goes to this corner, where there’s a shelf with about three thousand dead flies on it. And a condom stuck on the top! That’s weird innit?

  Ricky: That is weird.

  Karl: Then I see there’s loads of bits of paper on the floor. I picked up this bit of paper right, and it had written on it, ‘Need nappies, dummy, blankets’ – and I turned it over, right, and it said, ‘None of this now needed – baby dead’. Now that’s weird innit? That’s what I’m talking about when you get a bad vibe.

  Steve: I don’t actually understand what point you’re trying to make, Karl. Didn’t you just tell us that it was once occupied by ‘drug addicts and mentals’, so haven’t you put two and two together and thought that was probably who wrote it? That doesn’t mean it’s paranormal. You walk into a building, it’s a big, terrifying empty house. It’s terrifying in as much as it’s cold, and dark and draughty. It doesn’t mean that you’ve got some paranormal sense. ‘I’m Karl Pilkington and just like Derek Acorah, I have sensed something strange and evil in this room. Wait a minute, there’s some flies and a condom. I was right all along.’

  Ricky: Flies and a condom was weird, but the note … I just think of his face when he saw that. By torchlight … You must have been terrified.

  Karl: It’s a bit odd, innit?

  ‘I don’t know the detail on

  that bit but ...’

  Karl: This is one of the first Monkey News that I did and I think it’s worth hearing again, just in case you forgot about it, ’cos it’s sort of classic Monkey News. It’s about this monkey that was knocking about called Ollie. It was called Oliver, and it was in this zoo, and it was the only monkey in there, right.

  Ricky: Oh, this is the one they think was the missing link. They thought it was half human, half ape because it had a bald head and looked like you, which doesn’t mean it’s half anything.

  Karl: What happened is, it was in the zoo and stuff and it was getting a bit lonely ’cos it was sharing its time with an elephant and a giraffe and they didn’t really get on that well.

  Ricky: No, no, no, no, no. Wait. They do not put chimpanzees in with the other animals.

  Karl: But let me tell you …

  Ricky: Well it’s not true.

  Steve: Gervais, it was obviously some kind of flat share. They put an advert in the Students’ Union. ‘We’ve got two rooms to let …’

  Ricky: ‘African mammal wanted.’

  Karl: What I’m saying is, there was other elephants for elephants to knock about with and that. The monkey, it was the only one there. So what happened is, the zookeeper felt a bit sorry for him. He was like, ‘Oh look, he’s looking all fed up and that.’ And like you say, I think he went a bit bald because he was bored and all that. So the zookeeper started to get pally with him and so at lunch time, when the zookeeper was sat on the wall having his ham butties or whatever, he would sort of go, ‘You alright, yeah?’ And Ollie used to come over, closer and closer, right. Anyway, within a month, he was sat on the wall having his lunch with him, right.

  Ricky: What wall?

  Karl: Just a little wall in the zoo.

  Ricky: So he let the monkey out? The monkey could just wander about? He had his own door key?

  Steve: These blinking latch-key monkeys.

  Karl: You’re picking up on little things that aren’t important. It doesn’t matter. So anyway, zookeeper’s sat there, and as time goes on he’s sort of sat with him most of the day. Monkey’s walking round with him, helping him feed the other animals and that.

  Ricky: This is rubbish.

  Karl: But then what happened is the zookeeper, at the end of the night when he’s locking up and stuff, he’d feel bad because he’d be leaving the zoo and Ollie’s sat there and he’s like, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow’ and the monkey’s like, ‘Yeah, alright, see you later.’ Ollie is looking all fed up because the zoo keeper has got a home to go to and Ollie’s still stuck in his – well, where he is basically working every day. He’s never going home, right. So anyway the zookeeper goes home, says to his wife, ‘Look Ollie’s having a bit of a time at the moment.’ She says, ‘Oh yeah, what’s going on?’ He said, ‘Well he’s looking a bit fed up. You know, he’s sick of it.’ She said, ‘Bring him home.’ He said, ‘Well I did want to ask, but I didn’t want to force it …’

  Ricky: This conversation didn’t happen.

  Karl: So anyway …

  Steve: Such detail!

  Ricky: No it didn’t happen. This is in your head.

  Karl: So anyway, she said, ‘Yeah, bring it home tonight.’ So anyway, the zookeeper is looking forward to going into work and that. He sees Ollie. He doesn’t tell him straightaway.

  Ricky: Like it’s a surprise. Oh God!

  Karl: So they go through the day, you know usual stuff, feeding the elephants and all that. It gets to the end of the day and Ollie’s there. He’s looking at the zookeeper as if to say, ‘Well there you go, another busy day over, see you tomorrow and stuff …’

  Steve: Sure. Little does he know …

  Karl: Anyway the zookeeper is like, ‘Get your coat …’

  Ricky: Coat? What do you mean, ‘Get your coat?’

  Karl: Whatever the equivalent is, whatever you say to a monkey. It was kind of like, ‘
You’re coming with me.’ So Ollie’s going ‘Oh brilliant.’

  Ricky: No he’s not.

  Steve: So Ollie gets his hat and coat …

  Karl: He can’t believe his luck right. He goes back to the zookeeper’s house. Everything’s going well for about a week and a half, right.

  Steve: Has he got his own room?

  Karl: He still goes to work and stuff …

  Steve: To the zoo, yeah.

  Karl: To the zoo.

  Ricky: He doesn’t work there!

  Karl: And then he comes back with the zookeeper at night. Anyway, what ended up happening is … he’s back at the house and it’s going well for about a week and a half, he’s sat there, you know he’s having a brandy at night before he goes to bed. The zookeeper noticed that when he took it back to work it was kind of getting flashbacks of not having a good time in the zoo, right. So, it was like, ‘this isn’t helping him out. He’s happy when he’s at home with the brandy and the fags and that, but when he comes back here, he’s starting to look a bit fed up.’ So he said to his wife, ‘Look, you’re at home all day right. I’m going to work. I’ll leave him with you.’ So Ollie stays at home. Anyway as time goes on there’s a little bit of trouble. Whilst the fella’s busy at work, grafting, paying the bills for Ollie at home, Ollie starts getting a little bit cheeky – tries it on with the missus.