I AM just returned from another trip to London, where I took part in a presentation of a new telly show to ITV executives.
Oh, yes, my dears, I do have another career of sorts, as an opinionated gob***** on the telly.
Because, you see, while my vocation as a journalist has so far been less than a rip-roaring success (the highest positions I soared to were Chief Reporter of the Methodist Recorder and TV Previews Writer for the Daily Star) I can claim a sustained if somewhat bizarre presence on national TV.

Over the past few weeks, for instance, I've been popping up as a pontificating pundit on a C4 programme called, I think, Top 100 Search Engine Hits of 2005.
Haven't seen it myself, but some nine months ago I recorded my comments, on subjects as diverse as Manchester United (booh, hiss!) Pope John Paul II (hurrah!) and the Barbie doll (Britain's Sindy doll was so much more characterful, though a bit of a slag).
This show originally aired as part of C4's "educational" output but then it was chopped into segments and used as a day-time and late-night schedule filler on that channel until quite recently.
People keep coming up to me in Hell's Waiting Room saying: "Ooh, I saw you on the telly last night."
It is the sort of pub that has regulars who habitually watch C4 at 5am in the morning, so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised...
In the past I've also been on national TV as a talking head on The James Whale Show (in my capacity as Sam Brady the bad-tempered TV critic of ORACLE and Teletext services).
In a later show I was seen I ripping into Alan Titchmarsh and other mediocre celebs as a pundit on C4's 100 Worse Britons and later still on another list show about the 100 Worst Pop Performances or summat.
And once, while I was being treated to lunch in a Soho restaurant in London by satellite telly PRs, the BBC's George Aligiah came in with a TV news crew.
George was doing an item on a new bill before Parliament about tipping and service charges in restaurants.
Well, I had drunk such a lot of wine by then (it was free, after all) that I held forth forcefully and critically, and ended up on the (then) Nine O'Clock News.
Even me mum in Wigan saw that one, and I was wearing a very garish earring at the time, and an excessively flowery shirt.
Never mind. I was young and daft at the time.
Talking of which, and old friend from London, Dazza, has been in touch to remind me to mention my two experiences as a stand-up comedian on the old L!ve TV cable station.
I wore a very spangly jacket for that, and talked a lot about my fictional wife, Myra.
I remember telling the audience me and Myra had reached an accommodation in our relationship: One night every week, I went out for the night with the lads; on the other six nights she did the same.
The thing is I went down to London the other day on one of Virgin's appallingly hot and unpleasant trains out of Liverpool, to do this new telly show called Win My Wage.
The show is being pitched as an ITV daytime programme by my friend Simon Broadley of Hotbed Media in Brum.
It is a game show idea whereby little clues are given out about some nine or so people in a line-up.
The contestant then has to match the people in the line-up with a big list of their earnings, ranging from nothing for a stay-at-home dad, to £40,000 for the top-earner on this occasion, a marketing lady.
The contestant has to make a guess about what each person does for a living in order to get an idea of their salary. Among those in the line-up with me were a professional clown called Conk, a choreographer and a woman prison warder.
In each round the contestant has to eliminate whoever they think is the lowest remaining earners.
By the end of the show, the contestant is supposed to have sussed the highest earner and then they win that person's salary, tax-free.
Of course, it doesn't always work out that way, and there is always the small chance that the contestant will walk away with nothing.
But I think Win My Wage is better than most TV game shows because there are elements of deduction and intrigue in it.
And we all want to know what someone does for a living and how much they earn.
During the practice run of the show I was, to my horror, eliminated in the first round. That is to say the contestant thought I earned nothing.
When asked why she had chosen to boot me out straight away she said she thought I might be RETIRED and "therefore probably earning nothing or very little".
What a cheek! I am only 49 (only 39, according to some versions of my CV).
I put her mistake down to the fact that I was wearing my spare glasses at the time. They are similar to the the ones Harry Cross wore in Brookside so they must be what made me look like a shabby old git.
I know... Me?! Mr Charisma... New Brighton's leading stud muffin etc ...
Anyway, my pride and self-image was restored during the live presentation of the show to ITV bosses because then I wasn't eliminated until near the end.
That means the second contestant thought I was a dynamic, high-earner.
Ain't life grand?... in my dreams.

AT LAST I qualify as proper New Brightonian - because now I've been to the Old Tavern, the nightclub tucked away in a residential sidestreet.
For once, I am using the real name of a drinking establishment in New Brighton, instead of making up a moniker for it. Well, I can't see the point of being subtle in reference to the Tavern. It just isn't a subtle place.
It's said you simply can't fail to pull if you are out looking for lurvvee in this joint.
Needless to say, I failed to pull the other night, not that I was really trying...I'm afraid I'd consumed rather too much lager, bitter, Red Bull and vodka, cider and Southern Comfort by the time I got to the Tavern.
I was in no state to initiate or even respond to any, erm, romantic impulses that might occur.
Let alone get up to any actual hanky-panky.
My general impression is that the club is more upmarket than I'd been led to believe, though in atmosphere it's really like an old-fashioned youth club, except it's for grown-ups, and in many cases for grandparents.
(It reminds me of the youth club featured in The Style Council's video for Shout To the Top!) Or is that the Solid Bond vid I'm thinking of?
Anyway, I was driven there after a Saturday outing to the trendy bars of Hoylake with friends from Hell's Waiting Room, Lofty the gob-iron and banjo player, and Slutty Hardman.
Together we tried to wow the bodacious babes of Hoylake with our rough-edged New Brighton ghetto chic.
Again I'll dispense with my usual habit of giving false comedy names to real bars. Because the real names of the designer bars of Hoylake are glorious self-parodies anyway.
We drank in La Bodega, Eskimo and Jack Rabbit Slims, at the railway end of this posh (but not as posh as it thinks it is) little town.
And despite the silly names given to the bars, they were all stylishly decorated and full of prosperous, well-dressed people.
Though I must say Hoylake people wear their designer labels rather too self-consciously ever to be considered authentically cool.
And I must add that the women of Hoylake, for all their class and money, torture their hair just as mercilessly as the rest of the women of Merseyside, and also have the same tanning salon orange skin that's so characteristic of this region's females.
Anyway, I ventured to chat to one of the young ladies in the Eskimo bar - and she and her friend gave me the sort of look that says "no chance, you sad old tramp" before scurrying away to another velveteen booth as far away from me and Lofty and Slutty as possible.
Slutty was quick to blame myself and Lofty for "scaring away the talent". He claimed we had started an "unsuitable" conversation about domestic violence (in this instance, about husbands being battered by the hefty women of Hull, which is a most serious problem for Humberside Police).
I don't know why the women moved away from us. It's their loss anyway. I'm quite a catch, I am.
Maybe those Hoylake girls didn't like the look of my shapeless Prince of Wales check sports jacket, bought in a charity shop in Rhyl.
Maybe they thought they'd have a style heart attack if they remained seated in close proximity to it.
Well, tough. I can't even afford to aspire to 'the Hoylake look', not even if I shopped for 'bargains' at that poncy Met Quarter in Liverpool.

• Post to:
•  del.icio.us
•  Digg
•  Newsvine
•  Nowpublic
•  Reddit