Reece Shearsmith: What has been your biggest disappointment?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

This exact question recurs in The Guardian's institutional Q&A pool.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Reece Shearsmith said elsewhere, not written here

That I grew old.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 August 2014 source ↗

Others on this question

Joanna Scanlan British actress and writer

Never getting back to a size 12.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 31 March 2018 source ↗

Philip Treacy Irish-born haute couture milliner

My friends dying: Alexander (McQueen), Isabella (Blow), a friend of cancer last year.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 August 2014 source ↗

Candi Staton American singer–songwriter

Choosing the wrong mate.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 30 April 2016 source ↗

Three times when I lived in New York, I missed seeing David Bowie in real life by moments.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 8 November 2025 source ↗

There's a man at the tube who hands out ShortList magazine. He has never given up trying to make me take one. I admire that.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 August 2014 source ↗

Sometimes the overwhelming realisation that I will one day die; but mostly that ShortList man from the tube throwing stones at my window.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 August 2014 source ↗

Managing to find my wife and trapping her into marrying me.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 August 2014 source ↗

On my honeymoon in Lapland.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 August 2014 source ↗

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