Once upon a time, this might have been the sound of freedom. Atom Heart Mother by Pink Floyd is not one of my favourite albums of all time, but it's one I like to listen to occasionally. I don't like listening to it on my computer desktop version of iTunes, since that rather neat link "Play Album", as shown in the picture, might be better marked as "try to play album, and then wait for about 20 seconds as your computer ignores you, and then wonder if it's actually playing since the Pink Floyd albums often start almost imperceptibly quietly".

It's times like this I wish that mp3 players provided the sort of hiss and crackle that vinyl used to provide so at least you knew if this piece of shit software from Apple (the most smug organisation in the world) was doing anything. Note: just because Apple happens to make some of the most desirable technology doesn't stop them from being dicks. Google aren't dicks.

On an unrelated point, why do I have to press play on my iPod twice when it's been sleeping for a bit? Pointless. Just fuckin' play!


Anyway, the album in question was once the sound of freedom to me. June 23rd, 2002. I was driving home for the first time at the start of a new life. The me that was driving home had probably written my first ever song (not very good) but hadn't been a proper comedian, hadn't even thought of writing a musical, was fairly lost, but was extremely optimistic about all the things that were now possible. The album, which had been delivered as part of a job lot of fun things, was being played for the first time and became associated with the joint optimism and fear for the future I felt on the road from Darlington railway station (for that's where I'd parked) back to Newcastle where I lived.

My blog of the time doesn't reveal very much about what was going on. I didn't write much back then. Oh how that's changed.

Ten years is a long time to look back over. Some differences in my life between then and now.

• I have moved to the other end of the country, living in Gloucestershire, rather than Tyne and Wear
• I still have many of the same friends, though I seem them at different times
• I became a comedian, which has largely defined my life for the last 10 years
• The forlorn end-of-a-relationship guy from 10 years ago has now become the happily married man - I've known my wife for just under 4 years
• The small pile of DVDs became many shelves full, which then became a hard drive
• The big shelf-full of CDs went crazy and then got reduced to an iPod
• I'm on my 3rd privately-owned laptop and I have a tablet PC
• I share my home with two cats
• I play instruments a lot more than I ever did
• I've been involved in writing a book, and have also been published in national magazines and even the Mail on Sunday
• All the weight I was losing 10 years ago came back, in different places