Meeting Gordon Burns

Life Today I got to shake the hand of The Krypton Factor's Gordon Burns.

For two days I'm enjoying a short course, 'Insight into Broadcasting and Journalism' which tells the story of getting a job in the media. Various speakers are covering different aspects of the process and Gordon was there representing presenting (he currently introduces the BBC's Northwest Tonight). There a buzz beforehand. Everyone said, 'Gordon Burns' in that faraway dreamy way that people do when they know they're about to meet legend.

When I was at school, on the first day of a year, a teacher was going around the class looking for things to say to the kids. When his eyes rested on me, he said:
"Stuart Burns. Do you know who your famous namesake is?"
"Gordon Burns." I said.
"Who?"
"From the Krypton Factor."
"Oh. Have you not heard of Robert Burns. The poet?"
The pattern of my life can be traced back to that moment. I was always a telly rather than a book kid. But here I was getting the chance to see a childhood hero.

After an excellent explanation of what newsrooms expect from volunteers and an anecdote about how he stumbled into the media business, he invited people who were interested in having something like his job to visit the front of the lecture theatre in which we were gathered to try their hand at speaking for a minute into a camera.

A girl stepped down and said she'd talk about the NHS and she manages a skillful agitprop about politics and funding. Then Gordon surprised her by replaying her performance on the giant display screen. She was very engaging - she has eye contact and that special important y factor. Smiles all around. Then Gordon asked for more volunteers.

Silence.

He picked on a girl who had previously put her hand up, but now, realizing the ordeal she'd be going through, she declined saying that she was thinking about a different career plan.

"Anyone else?" prodded Gordon. "You. Let's have a chap."

To my horror I realise he's looking at me. To my terror I realise that my hand is straight up in the air. I know because I'd put it there hoping to look eager but not wanting to be picked on. Well, not really. Well, alright I wanted to shake hands with the man and for these brief, few, desperate seconds it seemed like the only way. He might run off at the end of the session and I'd miss my chance. Even though I'd fallen into the trap of volunteering for something.

I stumble down to the front.

"What are you going to talk on?" He asks.
"Erm?" I hadn't actually thought this far ahead. Film review. I could do a film review. I could talk about Unknown White Male. That was fresh in my mind. "Weblogs."

Gordon is puzzled. The room is puzzled. I'm puzzled.

I sit down. I look into the lense and Gordon counts me in. As I speak I realise how long a minute actually is if you don't really know what you're going to say. Lord knows how Paul Merton copes on Just A Minute (I know it's because he's Paul Merton).

I introduce the concept of weblogs and that I have one and the kinds of subjects it covers. I head off into community weblogs and then on to the BBC and Nick Robinson's work and then mention The Guardian's new Comment is Free site. Then for some reason I say that this weblog is five years old this year and I'm still trying to decide how I'm going to mark the event.

And I was rubbish. So bad. I dried about half way through and lost the ability to remember words and put them into sentences. I used phrases like 'a gentleman by the name of' and indeed 'mark the event' which you'd never use in regular conversation. In the later autopsy, the crowd/group/audience would notice that I didn't make eye contact with the camera much, which I didn't because I was distractedly talking up to the crowd/group/audience instead.

Gordon said that he thought I had a thick skin so he felt he could tell me that much of what I said was boring, 'all weblog this, weblog that' and I would have been hurt of he hadn't been right. I should have just picked one aspect or a topic which people might have been interested in. Turns out weblogs - not as interesting as the NHS. Part of your brain might think you can be an evangelist for the medium but you're really talking about the 'innnernet' to people who don't really care. Looking up at that picture now projected back at me, with my black dot eyes, pasty unshaven face, unkept hair and chin which seemed to have grown to be the size of an asteroid I knew that I was right to have selected Print media for my workshop the next day.

At the end, as I stood up I made eye contact with Gordon. He put out his hand. I took it. I shook it. I smiled. He smiled. And he thanked me. And my short flirt with television presenting was worth it.