The question
What thought won't let you sleep?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A long-running fixed question in The Guardian's weekly Q&A questionnaire.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Thinking I’ve upset somebody.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 26 October 2024 source ↗
Anything from the concept of human mortality to a faux pas I made at a party in 2005.
The sound of nightingales, but it is the most lovely sound. If someone said it was an elf playing a flute, I would believe them.
Thinking about all the children that are affected by all the wars that are going on right now.
Coffee, which is why I’ve given it up.
Lovely but useless.
Thinking that I’m right when I’m wrong. But not only that – being able to convince other people I’m right and then finding out I’m wrong.
Losing my makeup bag.
I worked in a paper factory at five o’clock on a Saturday morning when I was in my early 20s. I’d go out raving the night before, get an hour’s sleep and then go to the factory. I was covered in paper cuts and used to think I heard people talking to me; they gave me a lot of breaks because they thought I was going mad.
Some man in the street stopped me and said: “If you were a few inches taller you’d be dangerous.” I’ve no idea what he meant.
I worked with Stephen Fry recently and we had a real heart-to-heart. I asked: “What was it like being in prison for being gay?” And thank God someone came in and he didn’t hear me say it. I was mixing him up with when he played Oscar Wilde. I could picture him in his cell.
Aidan Gillen, Clive Myrie, Michael Kiwanuka, Imelda Staunton, Kim Gordon, Marc Quinn
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