Your favourite newspaper headline/billboard

"JACKSIE POTATO"

A vicar turned up in agony at a hospital – with a potato stuck in his bottom. The clergyman told stunned casualty nurses he fell backwards onto his kitchen table while hanging curtains. He happened to be nude at the time.

A great headline indeed BUT I'd have been tempted to go for "SPUD YOU LIKE" or better still "POTATO WEDGIE"

You wouldn't want to live next door to him though would you? "Maureen? The Vicars at the kitchen window with his meat and two veg out again – No hang on!!! Three veg"

One comedian you would definitely pay to see

If he ever returned to stand-up Woody Allen. Not only an inspiring film writer, director and actor but one of the best stand-ups ever. His material is a mix of the everyday and the surreal delivered with genius timing. I've got all his early stuff on cassette! Watch "The Moose" routine on YouTube

Tell us one thing that people won't know about you

Assuming people are familiar with my previous 32 year career as a Biomedical Scientist in Haematology I'd go for my ability to sail a yacht! I have a Day Skipper certificate theory and practical (Oh aye). I've always been drawn to the sea, I don't know why - I'm Bolton born and bred but maybe I was a sea creature in another life; a ship's cat or something. Anyway I enquired of the RYA where my nearest training centre might be and it was in Bolton! Fate, destiny, providence call it what you want they all mean the same thing. So I did the theory there and a year later my practical in Majorca.

Last book you read?

"Under the Skin" by Michael Faber which is an extraordinary novel which defies categorisation really but in which you get drawn into a completely unexpected and terrifying world.

What's your favourite meal?

Nice and simple. Spaghetti tossed in olive oil, garlic and fresh chilli with a sprinkling of parmesan and black pepper. My favourite Italian restaurant in the world is Antonello's in Leyland and they have thrilled me by putting it on the menu as "Spaghetti a la Spike" (I'm sure that diners think he's spelled "Spice" wrong). But that honour is up there along with my Comedy Awards

Do you have any phobias?

Gravity - so heights is the big one. I'm afraid of going up ladders, my wife has to sort the guttering and upstairs windows out, I can't go up that high. One year when I forced myself to do it it took me about an hour to get up the ladder a rung at a time, deep breathing for a minute after every step. When I got up to the top I heard a big cheer and when I found the courage to turn around I saw all the neighbours had come out to watch. They were stood there with mugs of tea and cans of beer, a bit of a street party thing going on.

Oh and Spiders – I forgot spiders, I've been bothered with them since my sister pulled the legs off one and gave it me to eat as a raisin when I was kid . I read somewhere that there's 30,000 spiders for every person on the planet but I don't want mine.

Three figures from history you would love to get down the pub for a night

Jesus Christ - I'm not at all religious but he seemed a good bloke and I'd love to hear his story

Charles Dickens – Try and get some tips from the greatest storyteller ever.

Elvis Presley – Get up on the karaoke when we've had a few

What's your favourite album?

Marvin Gaye "What's Going On?"

On which this tortured soul genius carries the world's ills on his shoulders. An amazing album which addresses the human cost of war (What's Going On), environmental breakdown (Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology), the protection of innocence (Save The Children) and social injustice (Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)), to a soundtrack of honeyed, loose, rock-solid soul with strings and a uniquely expressive singer pleading for sanity and humanity.

Where is your favourite place in the UK?

Home. No question. A beautiful, underrated part of the country where I'm surrounded by good friends and wonderful family. I spend a lot of time abroad but home is where the heart is and the place I always yearn to return to.

What's your TV guilty pleasure?

Deal or no Deal. It's just ridiculous – "I'm getting a good vibe from box 12 Noel" – It's an empty red shoe box! Anyway I record it then fast forward to last five minutes – that's the only bit worth watching. I've recently written a treatment for a new game show to replace it. It's a similar game of chance but with attitude. Contestants steal prizes from each other on the turn of a card and guaranteed personality clashes will add to the animosity and tension. Really I have – not joking

If you could have one superpower what would it be?

Russia

What is your pet hate?

Bad manners and the associated lack of respect.

Good manners don't cost anything so simple things like saying "Please, Thank you and Sorry" and holding a door open for people who are close behind you and giving up your seat for a pregnant lady or older person.

Trouble is that as far as I can see examples of bad manners are on the increase. People spitting or littering – chuck the can or burger box in the bin mate, there's one there. Will you stop texting while I'm talking to you and put all the mobiles and tablets away at the table for goodness sake, let's have a conversation. Take your bag off the only available seat so someone can sit there – how rude and ignorant is that? They can see people standing up and searching for a seat and if you could move away from the bar when you've got your drink instead of standing there chatting to your mates so other people can get served. And stop hogging the middle lane – it's for overtaking only! If you don't hear what someone says to you then say "I beg your pardon" or "Sorry?" not "Say Again" – have you any idea how rude that sounds, it's a command – say again! No, wash your ears out. And last but not least please don't order spaghetti if you're going to cut it up with a knife and fork! That's a crime in Italy. Maybe just me on that one but it drives me mad especially if it's "Spaghetti a la Spike"

If we made you Prime Minister what law would you introduce/change straight away?

I'd scrap the ludicrous HS2 project and divert the billions of pounds saved into the NHS.

No reputable transport economist – other than those employed by Whitehall – backs HS2. It saves little journey time. Its London terminus, Euston, is the worst connected in the capital, adrift of the Central, Circle and Crossrail tubes. Extra capacity for premium fare "business" travellers is not a priority need and will almost certainly lose money. So-called diversionary capacity can be met far less extravagantly, and high-speed rail is energy inefficient.

The proposed advantage is that it will cut journey times by half an hour! Oh well-worth £300bn then! What's half an hour in this day age where you can work on the wi-fi enabled train on the journey? Have they not considered that by the time it's finished less and less commuters will be travelling to London? Many meetings in the capital will be redundant – even now Facetime and Skype conferencing has reduced the need for face to face meetings. There'll be hologram conferencing all over the place, it's started now – do they not know this? Are they idiots – rhetorical question.

Favourite subject at school?

Biology.

What's your favourite joke?

In bed the other night my wife suddenly put down her book and announced out of the blue, I've decided I want to be cremated". I said, "Fair enough, get your coat"

She didn't think it was funny.

Dave Spikey brings his Punchlines tour to Colne Muni on Thursday, September 29. Details from 01282 661234