Paul Merton quotes

"It's silly to make generalisations, but if you talk to anyone in the south for longer than five minutes, they will try to sell you fruit."

"About Angus Deayton: His name is Angus. The G is silent."

"I think Iran and Iraq had a war simply because their names are so similar. They keep getting each other's post."

"My aunt died at precisely 10.47am and the old grandfather clock stopped at precisely the same time also. It fell on her."

"Am I the only one who's always tempted to light the wick on top of a beret?"

"If you stay in a house and you go to the bathroom and there's no toilet paper, you can always slide down the banisters. Don't tell me you haven't done it."

"On my first day in New York a guy asked me if I knew where Central Park was. When I told him I didn't, he said: Do you mind if I mug you here?"

"My school days were the happiest days of my life, which should give you some indication of the misery I've endured over the past twenty-five years."

"I'm always amazed to hear of air crash victims so badly mutilated that they have to be identified by their dental records. What I can't understand is, if they don't know who you are, how do they know who your dentist is?"

"I used to go out with a giraffe. Used to take it to the pictures and that. You'd always get some bloke complaining that he couldn't see the screen. It's a giraffe, mate. What d'you expect?"

"There are various ways to give up smoking — nicotine patches, nicotine gum. My auntie used to pour a gallon of petrol over herself every morning."

"The first Underground station ever opened was Baker Street in 1906. What was the point of that? Where would you go?"

On reading the A to Z: "Can't wait to see what happens at the end. The characters aren't up to much but the places, they seem so real."

On David Cameron being sneezed on: "This is what happens in this country. In America they assassinate people; here we just wipe snot on their backs. Fundamentally we're better people."