As I get older, I have a very strong urge to know about stuff. I want to learn the names of trees and birds; that's the sort of knowledge I want to pass on to my son.

At yoga you get some sense of spiritual space so that people don't intrude. You can go there and close your eyes and no one will talk to you. People are too worried about not fainting to bother with some bloke who was on the telly.

Comedy should be fluid. It should be both Left and Right wing.

Comedy is an indoors thing, so I take every opportunity to go outside. A lot of that involves finding places that are remote, or places where you can look at birds, or do mountain biking or paddle boarding or walking.

One of the things I do really appreciate is that my audiences tend to be a wide range of ages and backgrounds, and I ascribe that to putting in the hours.

If I'm a national treasure, does that mean I'm like the Elgin Marbles and will get repatriated at some point?

The worst thing is when people try and take pictures surreptitiously. I always say, 'Look, you can ask me for a photograph. You will get a much better one than just the side of my face.' Sometimes they just run off. They can't cope.

All kinds of things have gone into my shows - cajun and rock bands, Bollywood, Kraftwerk tributes, effects and so on. As long as it services the comedy, everything is up for grabs.

I realised that the 'future' is different to how I imagined it. When I was a kid I thought it would be a bright, shiny Tomorrow's World. It isn't.

In a way, I wish none of it had ever happened - Facebook, Twitter - if it had never happened the world would have just carried on serenely. It's utterly redundant and yet we all have to be involved in it somehow.

My grandparents lived with us. And I remember watching 'Doctor Who' with my granddad on his new telly. These were the days before remote controls but my granddad, being quite a resourceful sort of chap, had fashioned his own remote control - which was a length of bamboo pole with a bit of cork that he'd glued on the end.

Paddle boarding: it's the closest you get to walking on water.

Normally, with stand-up, it's quite solitary, you write the material on your own, you perform it on your own, it's all very much on you. Your own thoughts. You have to sort of modulate your own performance.

For me, audio books was about when you can't actually physically get hold of a book, like when you're driving. It's a fantastic companion on a long journey.

I have anti-establishment hair.

My grandfather had strong opinions. He was an argumentative character and quite staunchly socialist.

My mother was a classic matriarchal figure. She'd sing round the house and always had music on.

I was an only child but I never longed for a sibling. It just didn't occur to me.

Family helps you make clearer choices about things. Your priorities become clearer. Your obligations become clearer, and that is something I welcome.

We are almost in a time beyond jokes, beyond satire. When the Trump era is called the 'post-truth' period, then this is the greatest joke of all, albeit quite depressing.

Doing comedy around the world is a way of finding out how people tick.

I did a show in this tiny town called Longyearbyen. We went snowmobiling around Svalbard and saw Arctic foxes, snow bunting, polar bear footprints and almost got lost in a blizzard.

Melbourne has great eateries and you can go birdwatching.

The Dutch do have a slightly odd sense of humour.

There was an existential moment - I don't know if I want to call it crisis - when I turned 50 and I felt 'this is interesting; how did this happen?' It affected me in a way I wasn't expecting. It made me pause for reflection.

I prefer the simple things and I love walking in the countryside, or going camping... but simplicity is hard. It's easier to over-complicate things.

Riding a horse and using a phone camera is tricky but if you don't take pictures or record the moment, you lose it. You want to have a record of it.

I hate all those celebrity sculptures like Tussauds, where everyone is dressed in spangly suits and they are all smiling.

I met Amy Winehouse a few times and she was always funny, charming and self-deprecating - just a delight to be around.

I was asked to do an ad campaign for a supermarket once. I was baffled. It's strange when you realise your popularity or reputation is a marketable commodity; it's a stock, a currency.

When I was in Cardiff, playing with the National Orchestra of Wales, they said they get letters from people complaining if they're smiling during the concert. Nuts, isn't it? As if you have to respect the solemnity of the music by not smiling. Music is this joyful thing that enriches our lives, and you're not supposed to smile?

It's a lovely moment when everyone's part of something greater than the sum of its parts. That encapsulates what a comedy gig should be, with the comic as the lightning rod, the Norse mischief god, getting the audience to do something they wouldn't necessarily do.

But being in 'Doctor Who' is a dream come true. I've been a fan since I can remember watching TV.

You have to go to Scotland at all times of the year - in order to appreciate the times when the sun does come out.

A lot of the time, you need to find the right home for ideas. You know, sometimes you think 'oh this'd be a sitcom, oh, no it wouldn't, it'd be a drama, or an educational thing, or a doco or something.' I've got loads of ideas and you just have to keep sending them and pitching them.

You spend a lot more time on your own as an only child. And there's space to allow your imagination to take flight.

At school, I was bored with the teachers, and there were moments where I felt they were singling me out.

I don't think any comic could say there isn't a bit of them that doesn't want to show off.

You have to have a thick skin, yes. If you're going to do something as foolhardy as standup, you've got to be able to take it on the chin if someone has a go at you.

I quite like confounding people's expectations.

I think that generally there's a pressure to live the best life you can.

I'm one for new things: I like new technology, I like new music, I'm not entrenched in some view of what culture should be. I like the fact that it's constantly changing and that language is changing, that behaviour changes.

I think happiness really happens when you least expect it: it's when you're not really thinking about it, when you're not trying to achieve it, when you're not trying to get the perfect holiday, the perfect life, the perfect body, the perfect existence.

People are obsessed by how I look.

Twenty-two years I've been doing this comedy lark, so it's been like a meteoric rise to fame... if the meteor was being dragged by an arthritic donkey across a ploughed field, in northern Poland.

If you're going to perform, you're going to attract criticism. You can't please everyone all the time. You don't know how things are going to come out. But that's part of the fun of it, the adventure of doing any kind of art.

I didn't have any brothers or sisters, so I did a lot of stuff where I entertained myself playing games, reading a lot, a lot of fantasy novel stuff.

I think gaming has influenced popular culture in a huge way. It's worked its way into novels, and blockbuster movies.

When you're a birder, you have all sorts of reference books, and you know about migratory patterns and technical stuff. Most people just look out the window, and say 'is that a pigeon?'

Films and gaming are blurring together, and it makes for brilliant popcorn entertainment.