JEREMY CORBETT
JEREMY RECKONS HE’S NOT CUT OUT FOR REALITY TV CONTESTS
Imay have mentioned to you that my better half has watched every episode of The Amazing Race. By my estimation, that amounts to roughly three years of TV.
She often says, “We should do that. We would be so good at The Amazing Race.”
No, we wouldn’t. We wouldn’t even make it from “Go!” to picking up our bags. We’d be eliminated before Phil (the host) had even said welcome. Our episode would be called The Amazing Where Did They Go?
Not that we’re a bad travel team. We’re just not competitive in that way. I suspect that by the time teams are on the start line, they’ve been subjected to hours of preparation. Megan and I would be tired already. We’d look at the weeks of effort ahead, sigh, wave a dismissive hand and head off to the bar.
She’s watched every episode of Survivor too – about 16 years of TV.
She’s never suggested we appear on that show. Possibly because it’s not a couple’s event. Possibly because she knows my skills as a survivor are limited. Possibly because I’m not interested in a tropical island unless I have air-conditioning and room service.
But it has got me thinking: How good would I be at surviving? And not the backstabby, fake allegiances, solving puzzles with giant coloured blocks while wearing a handkerchief as a headband type of survival. Real survival.
If I found myself on a desert island, I wouldn’t last long. I’m completely dependent on the wonderful things generations of geniuses have created to let me coast through life.
It’s possible I’d get a fire started. I’d probably manage to catch a fish or two and eventually a coconut would fall from a tree. But after that
I’d be stuffed.
The problem is that we just don’t exercise those muscles any more. We live on the shoulders of people who actually made things. All the skills we humans were given to aid our existence have atrophied.
As I write this, I’m at
15,000 feet in an aircraft.
Flying! How far is that from my lonely primitive island?
I couldn’t create even one item on this aircraft – the seats, the food or even the boarding pass! To get as advanced as actually flying would be as amazing as a goldfish winning
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
My daughter sits next to me colouring in a unicorn.
In my desert island scenario, I could not help her do this. I couldn’t make a pencil, let alone a coloured one. Off to the beach with a stick if you want to do some colouring – and the only colours are sand and slightly darker sand. “Good luck. Make sure you’re home in time for dinner, which is kelp.”
Maybe I’ll start watching
Survivor, just so I can bask in the fact that I live in a wonderful age where trying to exist without all our modern conveniences is seen merely as entertainment.