172. Winter and Watching...

HOME.
More about Watching...
Since blathering on about the format of Watching…(at the end of Post 170), my attempts at an alternative have come to naught. I have dabbled, but been unsuccessful, with a move to Google Chrome (it started to become too much of a palaver for a man who rings for a mechanic if the car doesn‘t start) and I was magically visited for a week by alOt, which intrigued me because I had no idea it was coming - or would so quickly go. It was quite nice while it lasted, though. The net result has not been entirely zilch. Somewhere along the way I managed to lose my blog picture. The solemn little snapshot eventually summoned up to replace it has me looking like a Parkhurst escapee, but it will have to do until son Neil’s happy holiday collection can be raided; he and Pauline have just moved house again so lord only knows when that will be.
Meantime…
It would seem the blog is still visited, for whatever reason, by somebody out there. Last week I received an email from a chap who wanted me to know how much he enjoyed barnden.blogspot.com/ in general and my last two posts in particular. I was pleased to learn that my meanderings continue to inhabit the ether and, initially, slightly flattered that a stranger should take the trouble to remark glowingly upon them.. However, it turned out he was another company rep seeking to involve me in some way with his business and when I cleared out my Outlook Express his message got lost. Pity, because I did mean to answer it. Gathered his company was based in Limassol, Cyprus. Never mind, if he had really read the blog he would know I don’t join things of which I know nothing. If I did I would have done it last year. Heck! I could have had a new pair of slippers then: gratis. No, I avoid any involvement outside my comfort zone. This chap did not offer any inducement, but timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. Nice email, though.
That bloody hour!
Yep, that bloody hour again. Autumn and the clocks went back. I am now waking up at six thinking it must be seven and dozing off halfway through QI because it comes on at 10 pm, which will remain 11 pm to me for at least another month. Is this really just for Scottish farmers? And if it is, will we still be governed by it when Alex Salmond gets self-rule for Scotland?
TELEVISION.
Hidden. (BBC1)
Philip Glenister apart, this convoluted four part conspiracy twaddle should have been kept hidden.
Joanna Lumley’s Greek Odyssey. (ITV1)

Lovely Joanna swans around Greece meeting fascinating people and being the most gracious ambassador at large England never had. Everybody and everything enchants her and everybody and everything is enchanted by her. Fortunately none of her outings (Aurora Borealis, Nile and now this) has lasted long enough to cloy. Short and sweet. Way a documentary series should be, It was nice to see Nana Mouskouri again, too: still singing and still, like Joanna, a quality act.
Strictly Come Dancing. (BBC1)
Nothing about this reality romp has changed (except the Sir before Bruce Forsyth’s name and I don’t count that). The professional dancers are still consummately professional, their choreography is still marvellous, the celebrity contestants are still increasingly difficult to choose between, the costumes are still stunning, the orchestra is still superb and the joker in the pack is still much in evidence: this year in the rotund shape of Russell Grant. We’ll watch it right through. Well, it’s a conversation piece, ain’t it.
Downton Abbey. (ITV1)
This came to the expected tear-stained conclusion: writer Julian Fellowes carefully rounded everything off with enough loose ends to ensure another series. That’s it, except to say that Tom Sutcliffe summed it up better and at greater length in The Independent on Monday 7th November. Worth a quid of anyone’s money.
As for the rest...
Y’know, I don’t much care about the rest right now. Whether it’s age, or winter depression, or just too much of a not too good thing, my television viewing has of late become desultory. Oh, I still enjoy QI and Have I Got News For You and Merlin and suchlike, but I do not hesitate to abandon most of the rest for more important things like filling the dishwasher or making a cup of tea.
Perhaps it is a prolonged sulk brought on by the inexplicable popularity (to me, anyway) of so much cheap-jack reality rubbish. This starts with a plethora of antique (which we used to call junk) dealer programmes, goes on to encompass the finding, buying, selling, inspection and repairing of houses by and for people I have neither met nor wish to meet, and is rounded off by an avalanche of cooks (calling themselves chefs) eager to instruct me in the art of cooking with panache and too much butter. There follows the constant line-up of publicity hungry masochists waiting to (1) show me they can eat crap in a jungle, (2) cook for - and cheerfully hate - each other in their own homes (while a loud-mouthed voice-over makes sarcastic comments); (3) enjoy a competition where a self-proclaimed ‘food nutritionist’ bellows that cooking does not get any harder (as if he knows) and shovels food into his mouth like a hungry gannet; (4) be patronised by a bunch of millionaires who may or may not wish to throw a sprat to catch a mackerel and (5) get themselves fired by a bullying little sod who badly needs a shave.
Anybody for a cuppa?
READING.
A backlist…
Perhaps it is age, or winter depression, or even just too much of a very good thing, but my reading has fallen behind, too. On my ‘just started’ list I have Simon Kernick’s The Crime Trade, and Bill Bryson’s The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kid, while on my bedside table resides a looked-at-the-first- page-or-two-may-never-get-any-further pile which includes Life of Pi, One Day and Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha. More on one or the other - or even all - of them if and when I ever find the inclination and the damned time.
FOOTNOTE.
Fellow feeling.
My Leader was recently sent a box from Amazon containing a small model of Jack Sparrow for Ellis. The box was big enough to hold the entire set of Pirates of the Caribbean and Jack was surrounded by enough wrapping paper to make a sizeable gap in one of the rainforests along the river after which Amazon is presumably named.
The cat Shadow, who over the years has disdainfully declined just about every designer cat bed known to man, decided that the box and its brown paper packaging was the ideal relaxation spot for a discerning moggy. He took it over. Now, when I am not in my armchair, he spends long days in it. Seems, though, that I am not the only one affected by dark day depression. Once I am settled in my chair he comes quietly and joins me. I don’t ask him why. Reckon it’s fellow feeling. We both get fed up in winter.