Sunday, February 08, 2009

25 Things You Never Knew About Nick Clegg

Somewhat bizarrely, LibDem Voice refuses to publish Nick Clegg's 25 RANDOM THINGS ABOUT ME meme. So let me save them the bother. It's HERE, and very entertaining it is too.

And Atticus in the Sunday Times writes suggests a duel between me and Draper. I'll leave you to make your own jokes.

UPDATE: Apparently you can only view the list of Facebook if you are a Facebook friend of his. LibDem Voice still refuses to put up the full list, so I'll do it for them...

1. The weirdest thing I’ve ever eaten is fried bees in China.
2. My favourite way to get to work is on my electric moped.
3. I once wrote a novel. It was terrible.
4. I used to work in Uzbekistan organising aid projects for the EU.
5. I think I was the worst ski instructor on record: after two weeks I had an accident and ended up on crutches for three months.
6. Of the five languages I speak, I like German the best.
7. But I speak it the worst.
8. The last film I saw was a preview of Bolt, with my sons. It was great, but I think I enjoyed it more than they did.
9. I love walking with my family in the Peak District.
10. I did daily transcendental meditation for a while in my early twenties.
11. When I was on a road trip across America I hit a road runner bird and killed it, which puts me one up on Wile E. Coyote, but I felt terrible about it.
12. My office in Sheffield is in a plumber’s yard.
13. My sons usually beat me at the boxing on our Wii.
14. I can’t get to sleep unless I’ve read a few pages of a novel first.
15. I have a biscuit tin and a fruit bowl in my office, and I always eat the biscuits first.
16. The last thing I bought online was a Lego castle for my son.
17. My great-great aunt dated HG Wells, Bruce Lansbury and Maxim Gorky.
18. I worked as a fact checker for Christopher Hitchens.
19. I helped teach political philosophy to students at the University of Minnesota.
20. The book I’ve read the most is The Gruffalo.
21. I have porridge for breakfast every morning.
22. I love eating mangoes.
23. My dream holiday would be taking my sons camping in Montana.
24. My sister is the funniest person I know.
25. I’ve performed in a Christmas panto in Sheffield three times, the last time as a health and safety inspector complaining about the beanstalk in Jack and the Beanstalk.

21 comments:

Chucklenuts said...

I thought there were already 30 that we didn't particularly want to know.

Jim Baxter said...

Carol Thatcher is a sex kitten.

Anonymous said...

I clicked on your link but just saw my facebook profile??

Anyway, good on Clegg for making Cameron and Brown squirm. I hope Clegg can HANG out with them quite a bit in the future.

:)

Anonymous said...

clams linguine> Carol Thatcher is a silly moo. Nothing more and nothing less.

Salmondnet said...

Oh dear Canvas. You used an offensive sexist term and as a newly minted feminist I am profoundly offended. You must be denied any gainful employment in future.

rob's uncle said...

I also just went to my Facebook profile; please clarify.

DespairingLiberal said...

I wonder why they don't want to publish it? Nothing very awful there.

Simon Gardner said...

“LibDem Voice still refuses to put up the full list...”

Maybe after the ‘more than 30 sexual partners’ thing the Lib Dems are a bit wary. But good journalistic service Iain.

“6. Of the five languages I speak...”

Hmm. That ‘five languages’ thing makes him suspect to the man on the Clapham Omnibus already. Remember Chirac pretending not to speak English despite being fluent?

“10. I did daily transcendental meditation for a while in my early twenties.”

Weirdo alert.

“14. I can’t get to sleep unless I’ve read a few pages of a novel first.”

So the sexual athlete thing is over, then? How sad for the wife.

“18. I worked as a fact checker for Christopher Hitchens.”

Leftie credentials. Hmm. As if anyone is fooled.

“21. I have porridge for breakfast every morning.”

How terribly fashionable.

Unknown said...

Nick Clegg is a very likable guy

Anonymous said...

Come off it Iain, don't be a Dolly.

LDV didn't "refuse to publish it" - they just decided to post it in the morning.

Iain Dale said...

James, well, from the Twitter exchange last night between James Graham and LibDem Voice they clearly did. But then they agreed to publish a bit of it. Still very strange.

Unknown said...

@Iain Dale

Is it really that strange? James Graham and LDV are both very militantly anti-Clegg, so i'm not remotely surprised that they wanted to ignore this.

Pogo said...

4. I used to work in Uzbekistan organising aid projects for the EU.

18. I worked as a fact checker for Christopher Hitchens.

19. I helped teach political philosophy to students at the University of Minnesota.


So, another "top politician" who's probably never done a proper job of work then.

DespairingLiberal said...

And what pray tell is your totally real and completely genuine job, Pogo?

jon dee said...

Surely missed one.

"I fell in love with myself at Primary school."

Nich Starling said...

Odd hypocrisy Iain after all that you said about Draper and stalking people on the internet.

you seem to think it wrong for Draper to use Twitter to track people BUT you use Facebook to get information on Nick Clegg, only available at that time on Facebook and publish it here on your blog.

Explain the difference ?

Simon Gardner said...

Norfolk Blogger said... “...you use Facebook to get information on Nick Clegg, only available at that time on Facebook and publish it here on your blog...”

Absolutely legitimate (even heroic) journalistic enterprise. Nothing wrong with it.

And a scoop too.

Anonymous said...

I wonder if Clegg likes to stuff the Turkey at Xmas or drissle it with cranberry juice?

I notice that Clegg's favourite song is not on the list "Joel le Taxi" no doubt!

Iain Dale said...

Norfolk Blogger, I think you must have been having a bad day...
How can it be wrong to reprint a list on a publicly avaiable webpage? I actually did it because I thought it was an interesting list and couldn't work out why LibDem Voice were being so coy about republishing it. No conspiracy. I just thought it was odd.

Are you saying Facebook is a private website? How very strange. Not sure how you can equate this with Draper spamming my Twitter followers.

I like Nick Clegg. I published it because I thought it was a good thing for him to have done. Presumably he did it because he wanted people to read it. Which was why I found LibDem Voice's attitude rather odd.

rob's uncle said...

2024 hrs: LDV have now published the full list.

Stephen Tall said...

Yep, that's right, LDV did publish the list - having first made sure we had permission from the author before copying 'n' pasting. It's kinda politer that way, y'know.