Why I will never be a spy, a best selling author, a zoo keeper, or actually ever get anything done.

Sometimes, you can be sitting in front of the TV when a thought suddenly hits you.

Instead of sitting here watching crap-yet-strangely-watchable TV, you should be doing something else. 

Not washing up, or making tomorrow's Tupperware offering of pasta and ready made sauce with some token bits of courgette. Not painting the old school desk that's been sitting in the cupboard under the stairs for a month now waiting for you to sand off the words "WANKER" and "NICK WOZ ERE 82" and make it look nice (I haven't even bought the paint yet), but something else. Something important.

You wonder: could this be that that eureka moment where people go "Cor blimey, that's it!" and immediately start penning their first bestseller, or begin charting their long lost family members, or book that life changing trip across the world?

And is it really happening to me during an episode of Don't Tell The Bride?

With this little sudden impetus inside me, I waste no time. I start thinking about what I could do to leave a little mark on the world.

Like writing a book - that's what English graduates do, innit? We aspire to be novelists, right before we realise it's all a bit long and become journalists (or bloggers) instead.

Then I realise that my attention span tends to falter around the 600 word mark, and I don't really want to write a book. Because quite frankly, the world has enough sob stories about boys written by girls with English degrees.

It's then I recall an advert that caught my eye in the morning's Metro.

MI5 NEEDS YOU 

it said.

And low and behold, they have a position which, with some amount of career shifting and wishful thinking, I could probably, maybe do. So I put the wheels in motion to become a spy, and breeze through the first stage of the application:

Name:
Date of birth:
Are you definitely British:

And having passed that, I'm onto the next stage; whizzing through the online tests and giving serious thought to which close family member or partner I would confide in about my application, and whether I'd still be able to have a blog if I was in the secret service, when...

So that's out.

Failing a career as an award winning author or a spy, perhaps I just need an extra curricular hobby.

I know! I like penguins. And dogs. And WHALES. I could volunteer at the zoo!

Alright, alright. Maybe not with the animals, then. But surely I could do something equally useful, save the world's animals through administration and filing?

Oh.

And by this point, to be honest, the flash of inspiration is beginning to dwindle. 

Sound familiar? Come on, rouse me with a chorus of "We all do it".

It's not that the ideas aren't there, it's not that the enthusiasm is lacking: my 'to do' list is as long as my leg (not that my legs are particularly long, but still). It's the fact that when you sit down to put all these little ideas into practice, they often, for whatever reason, just don't seem so achievable any more.

Barriers pop up, whether it's money or work or lack of skills. There's so much I want to do, but sometimes I wonder how I'll ever get round to doing any of it.

I suppose this is why people decide to run marathons. 

Ooh, now there's a...

Nah. Sod that.