Karl's Diary

Creation of Karl's Diary

Karl started keeping a record of his thoughts and experiences whilst on holiday in Gran Canaria with his girlfriend Suzanne. The segment first appeared in episode 8 of the Guardian Unlimited podcasts 23 January 2006. Karl compared his literary efforts to those of Anne Frank, claiming that "If she's sat in a, you know, a loft knockin' stuff up, not much goin' on in 'er life at that point, yet she was still writin' it down...I thought well I'm on holiday...start a diary".

Memorable Diary Moments

• A wristwatch that counts down the remainder of your life.
• The large number of cross-eyed people at the hotel on Gran Canaria and the cat licking its bollocks outside the pub, also in Gran Canaria the bar called "Tattoos" where the landlord never had Tattoos but Karl never saw the landlord's wife.
• Karl refused to wash his hands after eating lemon cake at Ricky's house leading to a major argument.
• Karl thinking that both him and Ricky Gervais are bored when they go to meeting as "after twenty minutes he (Ricky) was trying to wrestle me".
• Karl's idea for a television program 'Look what we can do with Science' in which parts of a person's body are gradually removed until just the head remains.
• The post Karl received that was addressed to Mr K. Dilkington,
• The time Karl was carrying a lamp and bin when moving house and people thought he was in a marathon/
• The tongue twister "if you can't treat a cheerful tramp, what sort of tramp can you treat?"
• That certain tribes of cavemen wave their "tackle" about when they've had enough of visitors
• The 'experimental' mirrored wall in Karl's flat that he has stuck wallpaper over.

The diary itself is a large desk diary and is usually read by Stephen Merchant.

Notable is the fact that the jingle, performed live vocally by Ricky Gervais each podcast, is often remarkably similar to the theme from "Monkey News".