My 'Me-V'

Me-V: Hamish Thompson

1. I do a podcast called ‘Polar Opposites’, available from all you usual podcast providers, which describes ditching my urban life in the UK and moving to the other side of the world, to rural Tasmania.?It has had some nice reviews and there’s the odd decent joke.?The town I live in is a little like Green Acres with Australian accents.?I’ve bought an old 1850s gold rush bank building and I’m ‘doing it up’. ?
2. For the last year or so I’ve become entranced with the number of depictions of the shape of Australia that fail to include Tasmania.?I’ve collected more than 100 and I have them in a semi-permanent exhibition in my bank hall.?I called it State of Invisibility and it was a bit of a hit with the media and with Tasmanian politicians.?People who come to see it really like it.?I think it’s an interesting meditation on identity.
3. I co-founded and co-curate the Museum of Crisps (that’s potato chips, Australians).?It’s an online museum and we have documented 1.317 flavours of crisps to date.?‘Highlights’ include the following flavours: Lamington, Christmas tree, Vanilla and salt, Bacon and cabbage, Baked bean, Banana, Brussels sprout, Chicken and Pepsi and Raspberry ripple.?Look out for our forthcoming ’Snackademy Awards’, which will reward the best new flavours of the last 12 months.
4. I paid a visit to a town called Banana in Queensland, discovered that the town was named after a bullock, and went on a Raiders of the Lost Ark-style quest to find a banana in the town.?I found a huge traffic island right in the centre that is shaped like a banana.?I am in long-term discussions with the mayor and the Queensland Department of Transport to get the banana painted road-safety yellow.?You can find it on Google Earth.
5. I run a site called Polifiller, devoted to documenting the cliches that politicians use in their speeches and announcements.?It struck a chord and has been covered on media around the world, including BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme and the New York Times.
6. I also run the Buzzsaw, an online tool that strips buzzwords and jargon out of announcements, memos, presentations and speeches.?I did an interview on Sky News Australia about it a few weeks ago.
7. I devised and ran an arts project called the Concept Album Talks several years ago.?The idea is (a) choose a concept album, (b) take the song names and lengths as the constraints, (c) invite speakers to do a talk inspired by a song title and restrict themselves to the length of the track.?It was great and I hope to relaunch it in Australia sometime soon.?It was a media success too.
8. I love music. I’ve played guitar for more than 30 years.?I haven’t got much better, but I’m quite good at strumming.?I do a decent cover of Willie Nelson’s version of the Rainbow Connection the Kermit the Frog/Paul Williams classic.
9. I’m a fan of 1980s action movies and of 1970s afternoon TV shows.?If I was forced to go on a quiz show, I’d be able to recall all the theme tunes and the actors, the best of the dialogue and most of the plot lines.
10. For a few years I used to commute to my office in London occasionally in my replica Apollo 11 space suit.?At the time, my office was in Somerset House and London Fashion Week used to take over the square in the middle of the building.?One day I decided to try and make a stir, so I accessorised my suit with a scarf and walked into the square.?The paparazzi went mad.?I appeared as a ‘trendsetter’ in London Fashion Daily and the best part was that 6 months later there were spacesuit-inspired outfits on the catwalk at fashion shows around the world.?I can honestly say that I changed the course of fashion history - much to my then teenage kids’ chagrin.

So that’s some of the Horizontal Line in a nutshell.?All of it for the joy.?Let’s see if any of it resonates :-)