Bill Bailey quotes:

(Imitating a Belarus citizen commenting on their national flag) Stupid National Anthem....Look at this flag; Two bears fighting over a pineapple. What kind of message does that send to the world? Come to Belarus, where wild animals will steal your fruit

I spent money on a decent bike, a bit of kit for paddle boarding and I like bird watching so I bought a decent pair of binoculars but as far as bottles of Cristal champagne and Gucci loafers? No, blingy and showy stuff isn't me.

There's more evil in the charts than an Al-Qaeda suggestion box.

On the Taliban: That ethos was never going to work, was it? It was just cobbled together from different beliefs. The anti-intellectualism of the Khmer Rouge, the religious persecution of the Nazis, the enforced beard-wearing from the world of folk music, and the subjugation and humiliation of women from the world of golf.

Not so great in England at the moment; in an online poll we came last, we actually came bottom of European countries for quality of life, because of things like the weather, obviously, late retirement, poor holiday, poor public services, poor health service; it's basically just a kind of grey, godless wilderness, full of cold pies and broken dreams.

Contentment is knowing you're right. Happiness is knowing someone else is wrong.

Or, as I call it, a Cheesel, it's a Weasel with a Cheese finish.

My wife bought me a vintage Gibson guitar that isn't just beautiful but has tremendous sentimental value. I have plenty of guitars for live gigs but this is one to treasure.

Three blokes go into a pub. One of them is a little bit stupid, and the whole scene unfolds with a tedious inevitability.

Aldous Huxley took the drug mescaline and then chronicled his experience in the book The Doors of Perception. Now, I don't actually think that's the first thing he wrote: he probably wrote 'my brain is melting' ten thousand times, but it was the book that the critics latched on to.

Relaxed Empiricism -- I only believe something to be true if someone I know quite well tells me if happened.

I know that to be a true fact because I read it in Heat magazine

Without the beat in the background, Jazz basically sounds like an armadillo was let loose on the keyboard

I spent my childhood scrambling round badgers and foxes and playing fantastic country kid games like knocking on people's doors and running away. God that was a good game.

"God save our gracious Queen": Why would we invoke a non-specific deity to bail out these unelected spongers?

Add a drop of lavender to milk, leave town with an orange, and pretend you're laughing at it.

Of course, uh, the universe is gradually slowing down and, uh, will eventually collapse inwardly on itself, according to the laws of entropy when all it's thermal and mechanical functions fail, thus rendering all human endeavors ultimately pointless. Just to put the gig in some sort of context.

Come to Belarus, where wild animals will steal your fruit

In Unity there is strength; We can move mountains when we're united and enjoy life - Without unity we are victims. Stay united.

It's true. Hitler was a vegetarian. Just goes to show, vegetarianism, not always a good thing. Can in some extreme cases lead to genocide.

Three women walk into a pub and say, `Hooray, we've colonised a male-dominated joke format'

I got ham but I'm not a Hamster

On GM crops: I think we've missed a trick there. We could develop wheat with the properties of velcro, to catch whatever it is that's forming those crop circles. But then the spaceship would have to have the corresponding velcro so it's a bit of a long shot.

A horse walks into a bar, and the barman says "Why the long face?". The horse replies: "I'm deeply troubled by the anthropomorphic aspects of my existence and the extent to which I am now protected by law."

I suppose you could be a member of a terrorist organization in a non-violent way, in the laundry or the catering department.

The day after tomorrow is the first day of the rest of your life - that way you've always got a couple of days in hand.

I am a confectionery-based existentialist.

I tried to like it. For me, it was like being smacked around the head by a piece of IKEA furniture: it hurts, but you've got to admire the workmanship.

Three blokes go into a pub. Something happens. The outcome was hilarious!!

You remind me of the Siberian hunting spider, which adopts a highly convincing limp in three of its eight legs in order to attract its main prey, the so-called Samaritan squirrel, which takes pity on the spider, and then the spider jumps on it and injects the paralyzing venom, while the squirrel remains bafflingly philosophical about the whole thing. Not to be confused with the Ukrainian hunting spider, which actually has got a limp and is, as such, completely harmless, and a little bit bitter about the whole thing.

Tonight's show is about doubt. Or maybe it isn't - haven't made my mind up yet.

Do not crush the flowers of wisdom with the hobnail boots of cynicism.

I'm English and, as such, I crave disappointment. That's why I buy Kinder Surprise.

I tend to go through periods worrying, "Where am I going, I can't see a way out of this," and it becomes quite stressful. But sometimes you have to take a bet on yourself.

I'm a post-modern vegetarian. I eat meat ironically.

The reason we'd stopped was that the buffet car was on fire, that was the reason we stopped. One of the giant biscuits spontaneously combusted out of boredom. Whoever was charged with making the announcement momentarily lost all sense of procedure and we got this tantalizing glimpse into the chaos on the trains, and all we could hear was (bangs on microphone) "Gary, it's burning, what we gonna do?!" And everyone on the carriage just cheered, "Hooray! We're rubbish!"

Toughest job I ever had: selling doors, door to door.

This was my attempt to deter cold callers: "There's no past, there's no future, just one pulsating present... Please leave your message after the tone."

Orchestras have often been used to conjure up the natural world: Swans, sharks, trout, but not, as far as I know, the often maligned jellyfish.

How many amoebas does it take to screw in a light bulb? One, no two! No four! ...no eight!

If you have enough money to be comfortable it makes life a lot easier and that's undeniable. But I think happiness is more elusive.

Work hard, save and live within your means.

I would never condone the burning of a Dan Brown novel, much though I loathe and detest his work. Well, I say work, you know, words, randomly arranged to form millions of dollars... I'm not bitter at all...

Marijuana? It's harmless really, unless you fashion it into a club and beat somebody over the head with it

So many beautiful things, I cannot possess them all!

The way we live in the West we live like kings. People moan about this and that in Britain but we have running water, electricity, security and a rule of law and so many people in the world don't have these.

Thank God for Darwin, eh?

Why do people want to swim with dolphins? The equivalent would be an Indonesian fellow coming over here, going up to a farmer and saying 'Can I get in with the cows? I just fancy scuffling about with them.'

Yes. Yes, when we live our life like 1950s detective films. I often go to my fridge, "Hullo, we're out of milk. I say mother, where's the milk?"

I feel sorry for James Blunt, he has to wake up every morning and think 'Oh my God, I'm James Blunt, what have I done?'

The scotch egg is such a Scottish food. It's as though a great Scottish chef said: I need a tasty snack. Let's take an egg... and wrap it in meat!! Makes it a bit harder.

I'm English, and as such I crave disappointment. That's why I buy Kinder Surprise. Horrible chocolate; nasty little toy: a double-whammy of disillusionment ! Sometimes I eat the toy out of sheer despair.

Talking of white supremacist violent types, I was in America, recently...

I try to appreciate the simple things. I've just been camping with my son and I enjoyed that just as much if not more than a holiday in a posh hotel. I like making a cup of tea and bacon sarnie in the morning.

It's the augmented fourth, or diminished fifth, depending on your outlook on life...

A feminist jumps out of a manhole - oh, and she didn't like that.

I am Zebedee, lord of the woods! Bow down snail, I have dominion!

Nostalgia: How long's that been around?

I'm a vegetarian, I'm not strict. I eat fish. And duck, but they're nearly fish aren't they.

But our country's equivalent of gritty reality is more like "Look out Sarge, he's got a shooter!"

I never really thought comedy was a career option, just something I did for fun. Suddenly I realised I was getting paid which was a bonus. I studied for a diploma with the London College of Music, and teaching was something I thought I might do but comedy intervened.

I once punched a bloke in the face for saying 'Hawk the Slayer' was rubbish, when what I should have said 'Dad, you're wrong.'

This shed does not contain me.

At college, I felt frustrated thinking three years was a long time and I just wanted a job but afterwards I was in employment the whole time. I got into a theatre company and started doing stand-up gigs for cash, so I lived hand-to-mouth, but there was always enough to pay the bills.

Live comedy's a very reckless, foolhardy profession. You're only as good as your last gig so earnings fluctuate.

Television is where you earn regular money so you can plan a little bit but even then only when you have a regular gig. If you're just doing the odd appearance, you don't know if it will carry on.

Welcome to the O2. A unique building in Dublin, in that it is actually finished.

There we go, that's it. I just hold my hand in this position for the next couple of hours.

People say 'Bill, are you an optimist?' And I say, 'I hope so.'

The BBC did a survey of the top 50 things to do before we die. Not while we're still alive, before we die.

What I'd like to do now - well, what I'd like to do now is grow my beard very long, weave it into my pubes and strum it like a harp.

Joke number 1, I have a bit of a problem with jokes, bit of a handicap for a comedian obviously, um, I tend to bail out of the joke, I lose commitment in it, I'll give you an example: Three blokes go into a pub. One of them is a little bit stupid and the whole scene unfolds with a tedious inevitability.

Contentment is knowing you're right

Three blind mice walk into a pub. But they are all unaware of their surroundings, so to derive humour from it would be exploitative.

It's not a beard, it's an animal I've trained to sit very still

American rock has a sort of self-pitying whine to it.

I'm quite lucky, because I've got a small, decorative concrete pig.