Natural habitat

One of the hazards – or highlights, depending on your point of view – of living in Bristol is inadvertently finding yourself on TV. It's not the world-famous BBC Natural History Unit, based on Whiteladies Road, and presumably where they keep David Attenborogh in deep freeze, ready for his next voiceover, that's behind this possibility of small-screen fame. Oh no. It's the nice people from the BBC filming the never-ending hospital drama Casualty, and Mistresses, the British answer to Sex and the City, that you've got to watch out for, not to mention the E4 crews behind the drug and sex-fuelled teen drama Skins. Round-about-M-list Celebrity spotting is, in fact, pretty normal in Brizzle. A friend swears she's being stalked by an actress from Skins; last year a Casualty actress turned up at a friend's party; and on a trip to the local supermarket last summer I spotted the ace of spades of Bristol actorati: Charlie Fairhead. Wearing a thick, dark coat and hat with ear flaps, despite the sweltering weather. Next time stick to the sunglasses like every other sleb, Charlie.

On my new route to work (oh yes, a new route. That's worth a post in itself. There's no escape), therefore, I wasn't overly surprised when I spotted a couple more Casualty actors loitering on a street corner. Granted, 9am on a weekday morning seems an odd time to loiter, but who's to judge? I continued to meander along. What beautiful houses, I thought. Gorgeous Georgian architecture. Who once lived here, I pondered. And what was that large crowd doing on the pavement on the other side of the road? Looks like they're waiting for something. But what? Odd they're not talking at all. I kept walking. More vaguely familiar people, this time being prepped by an animated individual.The penny dropped. Why hadn't they shut off the road? I felt the eyes of the crowd on me as I continued to walk by. The road panned out ahead. Did it even end? Better just keep going. As I turned the corner a man in a big waterproof jacket picked up his walkie-talkie. 'Girl's gone'.

Casualty might have shunned my acting ability, but apparently Raymond Blanc's Bristol-based The Restuarant, in which couples compete to go into business with the culinary Frenchie, thought otherwise. According to a reliable source, I've wasted a good minute of the meagre 15 minutes of fame we're all allocated in this lifetime walking down a road in a reality TV show. There's a tale to tell the grandchildren.