Somebody wrote that my voice was more numbing than novocaine.
What is the worst thing anyone has said to you?
Question
Which moment embarrassed you most?
Failure & regret
Question
What does love feel like?
Relationships
Question
What is the worst job you have done?
Craft & work
Question
Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?
Identity & self
Question
When were you happiest?
Time & hindsight
Question
What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Craft & work
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A fixed Guardian Q&A prompt asked directly across respondents and years.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
I was thrown out of a club by bouncers when I walked into somebody and told them that I was registered blind. They said: “Don’t give a fuck – you don’t belong in here.” As a straight white man, it gives you a taste of what other people have to contend with.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 15 November 2025 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 122 →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.
Alison Steadman
British actress
A critic once said she wanted to lift a carpet, put me under it and hold it down until I stopped moving.
John Waters
American filmmaker
'Do you have a hobby?' It was a journalist. I went into a tirade: 'How dare you presume I'm a dabbler!'
More from Chris McCausland
View profile →When I was losing my sight, I couldn’t see where I was going, and I went into an undertaker’s thinking it was a barber’s. I asked the undertaker whether he had many waiting.
Loud and noisy.
A lot of awful gigs. You can’t become a successful comedian without dying on your arse more times than you can remember.
I’m judgmental.
My college years when I was 17 to 19, before the responsibilities of adulthood, just doing the things that I was good at and liked – computers, maths, further maths (I was a geek).
Strictly. I went into it thinking I would last two weeks!
More on failure & regret
- What has been your biggest disappointment? 366 answers
- Who most deserves an apology from you, and why? 209 answers
- If you could edit your past, what would you change? 203 answers
- Which moment embarrassed you most? 122 answers
- How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success? Do you have a favourite failure? 69 answers
- What is the hardest thing that has happened to you, and what did you carry out of it? 36 answers
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