When did you ever hear of a child not in need? 'Oh that's enough jam tart for me, I'll just go now and clean the toilets.'

My drive to put myself on the line comes from boredom. From that feeling when you go to bed and think, 'What did I do today?' It doesn't have to be something monumental, just a feeling that you really tried to look at something, or look into something.

I fear we might be losing the basic human facility to be alone - and with that you throw out independent decision-making, what to trust, what not to trust; key stuff - a perilous loss.

I don't go around thinking of myself as a great anything.

The terror of failure can make you feel like a failure. So a bunch of people think you're not very good at your thing. How much do you invest in what they say? How much do you care? Failure is not putting yourself on the line.

I have no qualifications to do anything else and there weren't any formal application forms you had to fill in for stand-up, so I thought I'd give that a twist.

I'm Irish, yeah, but I don't need to get up on a soapbox about it.