An Unlikely Sequence of Events

Here is episode 103 of Gather Around Me, the podcast in which my associate Cam "the thinking woman's Nick Littlemore" and myself discuss matters of import and solve burning social issues of the day and yesteryear.

Why should you listen to this podcast?

Well just consider the ludicrous series of coincidences that led up to this episode:

1. I was born. Think about that. One precise sperm and one precise egg meeting each other at the precise time which would produce me, and not anyone else. Slightly different cells, at a slightly different moment, could have resulted in a completely different person being born. I might have even been...A GIRL! Ew, right? Vaginas and stuff.

2. I didn't die. Yes, I escaped SIDS, meningitis, measles, mumps, wayward drivers, carelessly-placed pillows, falling pianos, acid rainfalls, masked banditos, and dingo maulings, and survived.

3. I grew up. This means I was not only lucky enough to get bigger, and intelligent enough to complete a moderate education, but I gained the maturity to deal with other people in a calm and reasonable way without spitting at them. Hardly anyone does this - purest chance. What's more, as I grew up I was exposed to that unique combination of social isolation and sporadic bullying well-calculated to instil a desire to be a comedian and the concomitant sense of self-loathing.

4. I moved to Melbourne. Without moving to Melbourne I would never have become a GAMer. And I never would have moved to Melbourne if it weren't for my wife. And I never would have met my wife if she hadn't named herself Ausgirl_18 on Yahoo Chat, thus making me think, "Hello, she's in my country, here's a window of opportunity!" And I never would have been on Yahoo Chat if I hadn't become restless in my usual MSN chatroom, what with the guy who sent women wav. files of John Farnham claiming it was him singing and everything.

5. I met Cam Smith. I am not at liberty to divulge all the details, but suffice to say it involved poverty and desperation and hunger and sleep deprivation and multi-million dollar mergers and a wall of autographed cricket bats.

6. Cam didn't hate me to the point of physical violence. I don't need to elaborate how necessary/unlikely this was.

7. I began recording a podcast with Cam.

8. I kept recording a podcast with Cam.

9. Neither Cam nor I at any point during the podcast recording screamed "I CAN'T DO THIS ANYMORE YOU ARE SMOTHERING ME I NEED SOME SPACE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD" and rushed out sobbing into the night.

10. We kept this up for 102 episodes.

11. Neither of us fell onto train tracks before recording the 103rd.

12. We recorded the 103rd.


An amazing sequence, no? And now you realise how infinitesimally unlikely it is that we have reached this point, now you see the incredible nature of random chance and how it leads us to outcomes unexpected and delightful, now that you have been humbled by the tininess of all we cogs in the great cosmic machine...

Don't you think maybe you should listen?