A few months ago, I learned what can happen when you withhold information. See, I wanted to tell everyone I knew that I was moving to Sydney for a few months, and in this age of Not Having Personal Contact, a blog post seemed like the best way to broadcast it.

Of course, I didn’t say why I was moving. The show I was working on was months away from pre-production let alone production, and I figured it wasn’t really my news to tell. In my naïvety, I thought that being secretive would dampen speculation and interest. It felt logical at the time.

So, to release the cat from the bag: I’ve spent the last few months working for The Chaser on the second season of The Hamster Wheel. I’m not quite sure how to describe my role; I’ve been part of a dedicated team watching, basically, all of Australian news media. Picture Alex in A Clockwork Orange, only without the eyedrops. (Julian and Andrew describe our role rather well in this interview. “Logging Slave” pretty much covers it. I mean, the job itself is absurdly enjoyable, but good god does mainstream Australian television suck.)

The first episode airs tonight (that’s Wednesday 26 September) at 9:05pm on ABC1, and will be available for Australian viewers on iView. There’s jokes and media commentary and all that juicy stuff that serves as a panacea to our largely woeful national press. Be sure to watch.

And just in case you don’t know what the above two ads are all about: