Karl Pilkington - More Moaning: The Enlightened One Returns

ALSO BY KARL PILKINGTON

THE WORLD OF KARL PILKINGTON

HAPPYSLAPPED BY A JELLYFISH

KARLOLOGY

AN IDIOT ABROAD

THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF AN IDIOT ABROAD

THE MOANING OF LIFE

FIRST PUBLISHED IN GREAT BRITAIN IN 2016

BY CANONGATE BOOKS LTD, 14 HIGH STREET, EDINBURGH EH1 1TE

WWW.CANONGATE.TV

THIS DIGITAL EDITION FIRST PUBLISHED IN 2016 BY CANONGATE BOOKS

COPYRIGHT KARL PILKINGTON, 2016

THE MORAL RIGHT OF THE AUTHOR HAS BEEN ASSERTED

PHOTOGRAPHY COPYRIGHT AJ BUTTERWORTH, JODIE KRSTIC, MUS

MUSTAFA, SIMON SMITH AND ME & YOU PRODUCTIONS LTD

ILLUSTRATIONS COPYRIGHT ANDY SMITH

PHOTOGRAPH P.106 MUSEUM VICTORIA CC BY. PTERONURA

BRASILIENSIS, GIANT OTTER, MOUNT. REGISTRATION NO. C 30005.

PHOTOGRAPHER: JON AUGIER

BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING-IN DATA
A CATALOGUE RECORD FOR THIS BOOK IS AVAILABLE
ON REQUEST FROM THE BRITISH LIBRARY

ISBN: 978 1 78211 731 5
eISBN: 978 1 78211 732 2

EXPORT ISBN: 978 1 78211 734 6

CONTENTS

IF YOU GO to a fancy restaurant these days you normally get given something that is called an amuse-bouche thats French for amuse mouth which is basically an appetiser that they serve before the food you have actually ordered turns up. The whole point of it is to whet your appetite. More often than not it looks like stuff theyve just brushed up from behind the cooker and stuck on a broken Jacobs cream cracker. I tend to eat it just cos its there but I very rarely enjoy it and it isnt a part of the meal I remember when looking back. To me, an amuse-bouche is like an introduction to a book, in that you could easily do without it.

I thought Id finished writing this book. I had handed in the six chapters to the publishers and was all pleased with myself that after almost nine months of sitting in front of my computer, it was finally complete. Except it wasnt. Jenny at the publishers said she wanted some more. Jenny is never happy. If God had handed her his Ten Commandments for approval she would have suggested he write another three. Why do I need to do an introduction? I asked. She explained that an introduction should inform the reader of why I travelled around the world looking at the topics Ive written about. I said that I had written over 120,000 words and all this information was already in each chapter, but she insisted that an introduction was still required. So I am sat here feeling like a marathon runner whos been asked to do a lap of honour. I know the saying is that you should never judge a book by its cover but Im asking you not to judge this one by the introduction. I dont know what to say that I havent already covered, and would prefer it if you just went straight to the start of chapter one now. But for the benefit of keeping Jenny happy Ill keep going with this introduction even though I dont believe in them.

I think if a book has been well written you shouldnt need any explanation at the start. I only got round to watching Star Wars for the first time last year and thought it was odd that it had all that scrolling text about in a galaxy far far away at the start of the film explaining the background to the story. I thought Id downloaded the bloody Kindle version of it due to the amount of text there was to read. I wonder if Jenny was involved in Star Wars and demanded it had that intro added on afterwards.

Ive just remembered an introduction to a programme I watched years ago that was so daft it made me laugh even though it wasnt supposed to. It was a travel documentary presented by Neil Morrissey (the fella off the TV show Men Behaving Badly) called Neil Morrisseys Excellent Adventure in Jordan. Now, just like Jenny at the publishers, TV execs also like the start of a programme to cover what the show is all about and why Neil Morrissey has been picked to present it. This is always a tricky sell for any programme as its most likely that he just did the show cos it was a paying job and didnt have much else on at the time. But being honest doesnt always work for TV. If I was in charge Id have just called the show Amman Behaving Badly (Amman is Jordans capital city). This would immediately make Neil the perfect presenter for the show, no more questions asked. But they didnt think of this, so to justify his involvement the opening line to the series was Im Neil Morrissey and Ive always been fascinated by the desert. It makes me laugh just writing it. He said it with such seriousness, which made it even funnier. Now, Ive never met Neil, Im sure hes a lovely fella, but I dont believe for one second that he has always been fascinated by the desert. I would bet 100 that he was forced to say that line by some TV exec so any viewers wondering why Neil had been chosen to host the show now knew it was because hes fascinated by deserts.

And now, like Neil Im being forced to explain and justify why I filmed The Moaning of Life 2 series. Well, first of all I needed to earn some money to pay off the mortgage. The second reason was that if I was going to be away from home yet again I wanted to look at topics in life that interest me. The first Moaning of Life series looked at issues that most people face through their lives like marriage and having kids, but looking back on it, the problem with those subjects was that I went into them with my mind already made up, as I already knew that marriage and having kids wasnt for me. So in some ways it was all a bit pointless. With this last series I wanted to look at themes that did play a big part in my life even though I didnt realise how big. The original list of topics I was going to look into were:

About two weeks before going away to film the Intelligence episode I lost interest when an ape that I was planning to visit and challenge to a game of Pac-Man in Japan pulled out due to its carer not being happy with the fee. So that episode changed to Art. I also didnt bother with the Food episode in the end either as I thought there were already too many cooking programmes on the TV. Which is a shame really as I could have opened the episode with Im Karl Pilkington, and Ive always been fascinated by desserts.

I think thats all you need to know for now. I hope you enjoy the book.

AS I WRITE this Im twirling a stainless steel teaspoon up my nostril. I have my reasons for this, which Ill explain in a minute. Hopefully that will keep you hooked enough to get you through the introduction to this next topic, which is art. If youre like me, you might struggle to read about art. I know its really important and is a big part of everyday life I mean you cant even buy a cappuccino these days without it coming with some sort of doodle in your froth but its boring to hear someone go on about it at great length. Its as dull as someone telling you about their dreams. They say that in reality, dreams only last two to five seconds, so why is it when someone tells you about one theyve had, it lasts longer than the Harry Potter series? Ive switched nostril now. It would be a lot easier if I had one of them two-pronged forks so I could do both nostrils at once.