Quotes from Alexander Armstrong

I'm dementedly optimistic, and whoever I'm with usually feels they have to balance my more wayward optimism.

I used to drive a scooter and once a minicab driver pulled a U-turn in front of me and I went flying over his bonnet. Happily I didn't do myself much of an injury at all. It was straight out of 'The Dukes of Hazzard'.

If you grow up somewhere where the pace of life is very slow you enjoy the gaps between the pulses. I read a lot and, boy, did I practise the piano.

I lived on a barge for the first six months, with a cousin. Then on the floor of a friend's house.

I have a blessed life. I do a job that I really love and I have a really good close-knit network of friends and family.

I draw great comfort from remoteness and wildness. I suppose that is why I have always felt the lure of the Arctic so acutely.

Durham is the most beautiful place. Whenever I'm on a train going north I have to stand, nose pressed to the window, as we pass Durham. I don't think there's a better view in the world.

I love food and wine, they are both passions of mine.

Actually, I've been doing stand-up on the quiet for the last 15 years, in the form of corporate gigs.

It makes me cross that no one takes great pride in doing a good job. It's so rare to find someone who really loves their trade.

For years we've had all the big-hitting HBO box-set dramas, all these brilliant, witty, clever shows, and in return the only thing we've had to offer is big period dramas like 'Downton Abbey'.

I'm not very religious, but having reached middle age I rather enjoy the quiet and the contemplation of spending an hour in an old building.

The Arctic as a lesser-known region of the world was the ideal destination - beautiful, mysterious, lethal, enchanting and, crucially, populated with extraordinary death-defying communities who somehow manage to thrive there.

Andy Parsons was always very funny. He was in a double act with a guy called Henry Naylor. Dan Mazer was always a very funny guy.

I always have my lunch watching Tim Wonnacott doing 'Bargain Hunt'. I get quite twitchy if it's not on for whatever reason.

I am going a bit deaf and I am hoping that technology is going to come on leaps and bounds and that one day I will hear better.

What I loved about Radio 3 back in the olden days, when it didn't give a toss about the youth, were the silences - socking great caesuras just left blank for quiet reflection.

I was quite an odd child. We grew up in the middle of nowhere in Northumberland - it was lovely, idyllic, but we had remarkably little contact with other people.

I have a horrible capacity to be unctuous to people I want to impress.

So, if I ever find myself hankering for the long, respectful silences of the olden days, I remind myself that classical music broadcasting was a whisker away from becoming one long silence itself.

I'm a trained classical baritone.

Someone put us onto 'Nashville' which we loved. To start with anyway. It was trash but proper trash if you know what I mean.

There was a period in the Nineties when the BBC wanted to act as if it was a trendy Soho independent. They broke up all sorts of things and got people to work as freelancers who had previously been BBC employees. It corroded a sort of esprit de corps, I think.

There are plenty of reasons for disliking people, but this tribal aversion to anyone with a posh voice is very boring.