Monday, March 24, 2008

Dickie and Davey.

I wonder if Dickie and Davey Attenborough have a bit of a sibling rivalry thing going?

They probably do - I mean Dickie never actually became a national treasure did he? He got the knighthood and proved his talent but perhaps he's a bit too much of a luvvie.

I heard that Davey has decided not to venture forth into the great unknown any more. Very sensible - he's at least 90 by now.

But I can't help wishing he'd made the decision before that 'Life in Cold Blood' series.

Why?

As I've mentioned, I suffer from Batrachophobia (fear of amphibians) especially those four letter F words that jump.
Whatever you say about Dickie he gave us 3 hours of amphibian free entertainment in Ghandi.

Now, thanks to Davey, everyone's fallen in love with slimy cold blooded life forms and is dashing into the garden to create tadpole friendly environments.

Charlie Brooker is an arachnophobe who describes his phobia as being 'hardwired into the brain'. He despises friends who state the obvious such as 'It's more scared of you that you are of it'.

YES - we know that - thank you VERY MUCH.

Have you got a phobia?
KAZ

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48 Comments:

Blogger CyberPete said...

Of course, in fact I've got plenty

One of them you mentioned, arachnophobia. Also insanely scared of snakes. That's probably my main phobia.

What's that called anyway, being scared of snakes?

10:26 am  
Blogger CyberPete said...

YAY FIRST!

(and second)

10:27 am  
Blogger Betty said...

Moths. The big, furry ones that make a thrumming noise and fly into your face and crash against ceilings and walls dementedly. They're okay outdoors and away from me. Same with bats.

10:38 am  
Blogger Rog said...

"everyone's fallen in love with slimy cold blooded life forms"??

Try telling that to Sir Paul, Kaz.

I'm quite partial to a small 4-legged Frog, but she's a French Bassett. It takes allsorts.

Drew is not comfortable with rats, but luckily rats have a terrible oz-naphobia.

I'd better get my coat now....

10:49 am  
Blogger stitchwort said...

Yukkk - frogs, toads, newts. Yukk, YUKK!
Not so good with lizards either.

11:23 am  
Blogger stitchwort said...

and cyberpete, it's ophidiophobia.

Oafidiophobia is something else.

11:26 am  
Blogger tony said...

Phobias? Is Fear of Heights a "phobia"? or must it be a an object/3D thing?
I have a cure for your phobia! Buy a Froggy-Hotwater bottle (such a thing must exist.)It will be warm&soothing & in the morning you will wake up phobia-free!!!!

11:30 am  
Blogger Geoff said...

Terrified of snakes but love lizards, even ones that look like snakes with legs. So not really logical, is it? Frogs are beautiful but Andrew Lloyd Webber and the journalist Antony someone or other both scare me shitless.

11:34 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Pete:
Extensive research tells me it's called 'Snakephobia'. Honest!
Do you get many snakes in Denmark?

Yay!!

Betty:
Furry things are usually nice.
Well I suppose that wouldn't include grisly bears.
Bats are just too weird and creepy.

Murph:
By all accounts that Lily is a Smartie. I hope she's a Murphophile.
I bet Drew didn't like the end of 1984 ..oh and you've already got your coat.

Stitch:
It's an awful affliction for gardeners like you and birders like me.
No one appreciates how very brave we are to venture outside.

11:41 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Tony:
Nice thought - but a froggy hot water bottle would not be slimy and would not jump.
I think fear of heights is a very rational thing.

Geoff:
I don't mind those tiny lizards that dart about on walls - but I couldn't eat a whole one.

I know who you mean by that Antony bloke. He has a face designed for radio - I just hope he never decides to jump.

11:48 am  
Blogger liits said...

Not so much a phobia, more an abject terror; Benin, one of our delightful live in staff, has bought himself a corn snake. It's only a pup, or whatever yong snakes are called, and is about the size of a pencil. They grow to about four feet long. Currently, the damn thing lives in a small fish tank like thing. I've waned him that he is not to bring it down into the pub and that if it escapes, he's in deep poo! I have visions of me hunting around the saff accom with a stick and the coal shovel.

11:58 am  
Blogger Geoff said...

Anthony Howard! I remembered!

Also just found out that Tony Wilson was Anthony Howard Wilson.

Won't forget those two in a hurry.

12:26 pm  
Blogger The Mistress said...

I can't touch a wooden spoon. Nor put one in my mouth.

I have to take my own lacquered chopsticks to Asian restaurants so I don't have to use the wooden ones.

12:42 pm  
Blogger Rob Windstrel Watson said...

I had agoraphobia which made me panicky in open spaces (probably caused by working from home online for years plus then my mother died)

I fixed it with something called CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy). It involves exposing yourself to the thing you fear little by little and breathing techniques to help control the fear while you are doing this.

It works for all phobias but of course you must be motivated sufficiently to be rid of the phobia.

Problem with phobias is that giving into them can feed them and make them worse. For example, fear of high places can lead to fear of going to strange streets, then to going outside, then going out of your bedroom.

Really, the only solution is to wean yourself back to 'normality' but it can take a long time and must be done gently :-)

12:56 pm  
Blogger SL said...

You're a great read, Kaz. Always enjoy it.

Phobias - just heights. Mildly. I guess I'm lucky.

2:28 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

Why can't my phobia have a difficult name

I am also scared of any animal/insect that's airborn

Are you afraid of Kermit too KAZ?
He is so lovely.

3:16 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Geoff:
True - but for different reasons.

mj:
That wooden wood does have a funny feel.
I can't touch cotton wool.

Hi Rob:
Agoraphobia sounds awful and you must be brave to expose yourself to the thing you fear the most.

sl:
Thanks.
I knew someone who was not frightened of heights - and she fell off ...really!

Pete:
Oh - but did you read Stitch's second comment (thanks Stitch I've only just spotted it)?
You suffer from 'ophidiophobia'.
Congratulations.

Kermit is fab - and so non reptilian

3:52 pm  
Blogger The Mistress said...

ewww cotton wool! I have the same reaction. In fact, the dentist has made a note in my file not to use it in my mouth as I freak out on him.

As for the wooden spoons, I have a pair of wooden spoons with rubber handles to solve the baking/cooking problem.

Being MJ is not as easy as you would think.

CyberPete, are you afraid of flying monkeys?

4:39 pm  
Blogger The Mistress said...

Does refusing to enter a public pool or hot tub count as a phobia?

I'm convinced they're hotbeds of bacteria.

4:41 pm  
Blogger Zig said...

I don't like macaroni cheese and spiders much, I do like frogs though and snakes.

(I'm fascinated by MJ having a wooden spoon aversion, just off to lick one to see if it has any adverse effects . . .)

5:21 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

I'm afraid of you MJ - are you a flying monkey?

Kool, I have a fancy sounding phobia too

I wonder what Kermit phobia is called

5:45 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

mj:
Cotton wool is intolerable - I wonder why - because cotton is so nice.

I think you are very good at being mj - no one could do it better.

mj:
No that's common sense - they are also 'hotbeds' of people you wouldn't want to be with under any circumstances.

Ziggi:
I don't think you are phobic.
it's the phrase 'don't like ... much' that gives you away.

Pete:
Kermit phobia comes under the heading of Muppetophobia.
Flying Muppets anyone?

6:02 pm  
Blogger CyberPete said...

*snort*

6:08 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Anonymous:
I deleted your comment because I didn't like it much and the ref to Darwen Scuggs blog might not have been the real you.

Pete:
I'll take that as a No.

Lilts:
So sorry I missed you.
It was probably because I was trying not to think about that horrendous snake.
I blame Dickie.

6:33 pm  
Blogger Roses said...

Not so much a phobia as a huge dislike - fair ground rides. Hate 'em. I like being both feet on the ground and not hurled around until I do.

Don't mind snakes, frogs, lizards or spiders smaller than a 50p - any bigger and we have to have a talk with a jar or broom.

I'm not keen on heights (again I like my two feet on the ground) and therefore throwing oneself off a bridge, out of an airplane or off a cliff is just plain stupid to me.

7:01 pm  
Blogger Tom said...

Arachnophobia.. run a mile and scream like a baby.. Jane has to move them for me... never have liked spider. When I worked the doors I'd stand there trying to look dead tough... ha! if someone had come up with spider I run have ran off screaming like a baby. My friends and family find it really funny.

9:12 pm  
Blogger Carmenzta said...

Bizarrely, I'm not afraid of snakes, lizards or frogs. Small spiders don't bother me at all, but I'll throw a shoe at anything bigger than a dime.
However, roaches are my phobia. Even their name gives me goosebumps. And if you saw the ones we have here in sunny South Florida you would understand. Some VW and Fiat models are smaller than these, sometimes referred to as Palmetto bugs. UGH.

9:59 pm  
Blogger Romeo Morningwood said...

Thanatophobia: the abnormal and excessive fear of death..
especially from lethal wounds to the head or genitals suststained from being attacked by large multicellular organisms with razor sharp teeth like Sharks, Bears, Lions, Komodo Dragons, T Rex, and about 10,000 other creatures.

Other than that I'm good.

5:00 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Roses:
And I bet everyone thinks you're a right miserable bugger don't they? Just because you can get your kicks on the ground.

Those bigger than 50p spiders must be in Trinidad as I've not seen a British one.

Wom:
Isn't it amazing - you've described my response to frogs exactly.
If my students had found out - I dread to think what might have happened.

Hello Carmentza:
Of course it's 'cockroaches' over here and we had plently around our old house when I was a kid...but small compared to the US version - isn't eveything?

My friend is like you - she will not let anyone even say the word - and she means it.

Donn:
Thankyou for giving me such lovely serene thoughts to wake up to.
I trust you are still with us.

9:12 am  
Blogger Dave said...

Aliens. Those ones that burst out of your chest and kill you dead.

Don't like them.

10:51 am  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I fucking hate Kermit the frog.

In fact, I detest ALL of the muppets.

My phobia? Earwigs.

1:28 pm  
Blogger Dave said...

On reflection, a phobia is probably an irrational fear. Being frightened of aliens that burst out of your chest is, of course, completely rational.

So I withdraw my comment.

Sorry for troubling you.

2:31 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Dave:
Aliens don't go to Norfolk.

Piggy:
What - even Miss Piggy??
You knew I'd say that didn't you?

Earwigs - I'd forgotten them - They don't really bury into your brain you know.

Dave:
Mine is an irrational fear - yours is a fear of the irrational.

5:23 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Kaz (and Dave) - No-one goes to Norfolk, do they?

*shudders*

10:14 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Piggy:
No - one actually goes there - but it does have the highest known concentration of bloggers in the Universe.

8:11 am  
Blogger Malcolm Cinnamond said...

Hens (yes, really).

. . . and my first wife.

10:05 pm  
Blogger Gareth said...

As a child I had a big fear of tomato ketchup bottles

10:52 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Malc:
Hens!!??
But you love and nurture the beasts don't you?

Gareth:
That must be the most irrational phobia of the lot.
Were you O.K. about the brown sauce?

7:12 am  
Blogger The Poet Laura-eate said...

Fish. They give me the heeby-geebies! Can't even look at them, let alone eat them.

Or perhaps I'm a surrealist gone wrong...

10:37 am  
Blogger KAZ said...

Laura:
I've met fish phobes - one was on the check out at ASDA. She freaked out when she had to pick up my trout wrapped in polythene.

Was she in the right job?

10:43 am  
Blogger The Poet Laura-eate said...

A housemate once left one in the microwave by accident while she sorted out the fridge/unpacked her shopping. I leapt a mile when I opened the microwave door later and there was this 'thing' staring at me with its horrible dead fishy eye. Ugh!

4:16 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

Ah well - at least it didn't jump!

5:36 pm  
Blogger Roses said...

I believe I fulfil an important function in the Grand Scheme of Things - I am the Holder of Coats, Bags and munchies, so my friends and family can go off and be hurled around.

I can't help it. I blame it on the fact that I'm short; I'm used to being close to the ground. My Viking is 6'3" and he loves death defying stuff.

8:05 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

I'm a shortarse as well...there's at least a foot difference between Kev and me.
But he's scared too.

7:58 am  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I fear nothing. (A lot!)

But my frogspawn is all dead I think which is making me sad.

8:29 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

NiC:
I'm really sorry - but in my back yard I would feel secretly relieved (but guilty as well).

9:46 pm  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I am cured of my fear of lizards and frogs etc by having two young sons, but still cannot hold a cicada.

I also can't stand a wooden spoon in my mouth, though I can touch one, wooden ice lolly sticks drove me insane as a child. Can't touch dry shoelaces with my fingernails, but wet is okay.

My mouth goes dry and my heart races if I have to turn right at an unfamliar intersection.

11:54 pm  
Blogger KAZ said...

missbehaving:
Just found you here and tried to leave a comment at your place but Wordpress was making it way too difficult.
Looks like this wooden phobia is quite widespread.

9:44 pm  

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