153. In the absence of my Leader.

Emma Thompson

ABROAD.

Emma Thompson.

This fine actress was recently awarded the 2,416th Star of Fame outside the Pig 'n' Whistle pub in Hollywood. Well deserved. She’s magic. Hugh Laurie and other famous friends attended the ceremony. It is unlikely that any of the bitchy writers who so readily pour scorn on her were present. Now she talks of taking a year off work to concentrate on family life. Good for her: though the harpy hacks will doubtless sniff at that, too.
Meantime, my Leader and I will watch our Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang DVD with extra pleasure and make doubly sure we do not miss her appearances in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Heck, after that she’ll be back. And, who knows? More Nanny McPhee?

HOME.

Granddaughter Jess.
Jess is at that early teens stage of life when adulthood is just around the corner but there are still a few steps to go.
Thanks to a glorious sense of the ridiculous she mostly avoids teenage angst. Among her recent zany offerings this one particularly appealed to me:
“I was wondering…if you tied a slice of bread and butter, butter side up, to a cat’s back and dropped the cat off the kitchen hardtop…how would it land? On its paws? Or flat on its back on the butter?”
She’ll do.
Emails.
Nice people still keep forwarding emails in droves, many of them hardy annuals. This week I have had the one about the impertinent young man being verbally floored by the dry old ’un: “You’re right son, we didn’t have the things you’ve got when we were young…so we invented them…”
Then there has been the glorious picture of ‘my fishing buddy, Sam, with the two trout we caught’…they still really are a nice pair of trout, too…and finally there has been the one about Mujibar, now working at a call centre in India, who famously made the following sentence with the words yellow, pink and green: “The telephone goes green green, I pink it up and say: ’yellow, this is Mujibar.’
If you are on my mailing list and haven’t received any of them from me it will be because, though I can still remember them from way back, I can completely forget to forward them this week.
It’s an age thing.

TELEVISION.

The Silence. (BBC1)
We recorded this four part thriller and watched it in one long session. It tells of 18-year-old Amelia, a profoundly deaf young woman, who witnesses a brutal murder. Her hearing problem, the struggle she is having with new cochlear implants and, among other things, the fact that she is staying with her Uncle Jim (Douglas Henshall) and Aunt Maggie (Dervla Kirwan) initially makes for difficulty in reporting what she has seen, even though workaholic Jim is a senior police detective.
Gina McKee plays Amelia’s concerned, overprotective mother, Annie, and Hugh Bonneville plays her father, Chris, wearily resigned to his wife’s constant apprehension. Genevieve Barr (profoundly deaf in real life) is excellent in the leading role.
With such a cast The Silence should be beyond negative criticism.
But sadly it was too slow and it went on too long.
Would have made a great two parter.
Identity. (ITV1)
Here we have yet another elite police unit (yawn) headed by yet another paragon female (Keeley Hawes) who is in ill-concealed love with yet another maverick cop (Aidan Gillen), who is heartily disliked by yet another distrusting departmental colleague (Shaun Parkes) who is deeply suspicious of our hero’s authenticity. (For template see Dexter.) It was well acted and, like Luther (Post 150), will probably be back.
And again I don’t really care.
The One Show. (BBC1)
Jason Manford and Alex Jones are the current hosts on this load of fluff, the premise of which appears to be that viewers are incapable of concentration beyond a couple of minutes at a time.
Guest stars come along to be given the two minute interview if they’re lucky - twenty seconds if they’re not - and a chance to publicise their latest project. They are routinely set aside by a small band of regulars who provide snippets designed to whet the appetite without taxing the brain.
This week’s guests included Tommy Steele, Whoopi Goldberg, Pamela Anderson and Celia Imrie and ‘regular’ John Sergeant told a story about thousands of pets being destroyed at the outset of WW2. There was also an item about black rats on the Shiant Isles, though none were seen.
Oh, Tommy is to tour again in Scrooge the musical, Pamela Anderson is to appear in Aladdin, Whoopi Goldberg is back with Sister Act and Celia Imrie will be in Hay Fever by Noel Coward.
I shan’t be seeing any of them but it was nice to know.
Getting On. (BBC2)
This little hospital series is written by Jo Brand, Vicki Pepperdine and Joanna Scanlan who also appear in it. I assume all have been nurses. Jo certainly has; it shows.
There is a nice line in indifference and buck passing from the top echelon. There is a lot of bad language and balls to P.C, And there is more than I care to remember about my NHS days.
Who Do You Think You Are? (BBC1)
Never mind the credit squeeze, celebs are still touring the world at the Beeb’s expense seeking to discover their antecedents. In most cases who, apart from them, is all that bothered?
The Deep. (BBC1)
Still don’t quite know what to make of this one. So far nothing much has come of it except the realisation that, no matter how tiresome his offstage persona, James Nesbitt is a bloody good actor.

READING.

M.C.Beaton.
I finished Agatha Raisin and the Vicious Vet (another easy read) and passed it on to my Leader who was well into the Quiche of Death. She has been spending a few days with her sister Marg in Alverstoke; both are avid readers so the books won’t go unread while she is there. Meantime, back at the ranch I have taken a short break from Mrs. Raisin to read the Pompey cop yarn my Leader had just finished and recommended to me, Angels Passing...

Graham Hurley.
DI Joe Faraday is as far from Mrs. Raisin as the Cotswolds is from Portsmouth and Angels Passing shows a side of the city which many of its citizens would sooner not know about. Whether the author writes from fact or imagination I have no idea, but this police procedural certainly has a Scenes of Crime ring of authenticity about it.
I am hooked, as was my Leader. Both of us know (or know of) the places where it is set. Makes it that much more real.
Report pending.

AND AS FOR YOU…

Thanks for looking in.
More anon.

152. Writer's block? Nope...idleness!

My Leader and Thomas in Anne's Cornish kitchen.

HOME.

Welcome visitors.
The Isle of Wight is a visitor magnet which attracts both short-stay tourists to hotels and guest houses and long stay guests to H.M. prisons Albany, Camp Hill and Parkhurst.
My Leader and I have always avoided the holiday business, but it was lovely to welcome our friend Anne (followed later in the week by husband Peter) from Cornwall for a brief stay recently. Their house at Mylor, Falmouth, (Post 84: Back from abroad…) is now completed and they and the cat Thomas are nicely settled in. Thomas is a roughneck double of our Shadow, so they do have one reminder of home when they are here. Our tall, skinny little town house otherwise bears not the slightest likeness to their grand design. They have modernity and large rooms and wonderful views and several loos. We have antiquity and little rooms and hundreds of books and dozens of handy shops and a solitary bathroom incorporating the solitary loo..
Anne is a gentle live wire. I doubt anybody else would have persuaded us to attend a concert of trumpet and organ music at Newport St. Thomas’s Minster, even one in aid of the Island RSPCA, but she did. Maureen and I smiled resignedly and went along and were duly entranced.
Richard Hall (organ) and Joel Newsome (trumpet) are two very talented musicians who deserve every success: the entire concert (from Charpentier to Langlais via Bach, Purcell et al) was a revelation.
I don’t think either of the young men can be found on YouTube yet, but give them time.
(Light-hearted note: The relatively modern organ installed at Newport Minster is situated a considerable distance from the organ pipes. When I asked Richard Hall what affect this has on the organist he said: “Well, you hear the note fractionally after you strike the key. Makes it good fun to play, though.”
Sort of in the round organ playing. Bet it’s a hoot for anyone tackling Bach’s Toccata & Fugue.
All burnt up over painting.
A couple of weeks ago my Leader was stricken with the spring cleaning bug. It happens once a year and nothing inside or out is immune. I make sure I don’t stand still too long. Best way to ensure exemption is to join in, so I repainted the outside railings. Did not properly consider the strength of the sun. Finished up with neatly painted railings and nicely sunburnt feet.
What?
Yes, it was daft and no, there is no bloody justice.
Bone-idleness.
My brush with DIY provided the scribbler’s excuse not to scribble and now I am finding re-motivation a difficulty. Have the same trouble with my infrequent forays into the world of water colour. I try not to be too high flown about it: I don’t think of it as writer’s block or painter’s daub or anything that pretentious. I recognise it for what it is: bone idleness.
Think I’ll go and make a cup of coffee.

MUSIC.

Nilsson.
In Post 146: Votes for all…I included videos of A Little Touch Of Schmilsson In The Night which had been discovered by our son Neil and can be found on YouTube. A few days ago he gifted me A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night & More, a nice 19 track CD produced by BMG Campden and obtainable from Amazon.
Superbly presented and, so far as I am concerned, forever enjoyable.
Andrea Bocelli.
I have just been listening to Viaggio italiano, subtitled A tribute to Italian emigration in the world; an 18 track CD, produced by Phillips, featuring Andrea Bocelli and the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra. It starts with Puccini’s Nessun dorma and ends with Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers’ Duet in which Bocelli is joined by the Welsh bass - baritone Bryn Terfel.
My Leader loves The Pearl Fishers and this is a rendition to match that of my own favourites, Nicolai Gedda and Ernest Blanc (who recorded it back when she was but eighteen years of age).
It’s still great and so is she.

TELEVISION.

Sherlock. (BBC1)
Sherlock (Benedict Cumberbatch) and John (Martin Freeman) are updated versions of Holmes and Dr. Watson in this very clever tribute to the Conan Doyle stories. Already looks as though the series, written and produced by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffatt, could become as popular as Dr. Who. Seems there was initially talk of Matt Smith as Watson. He would have been good: Martin Freeman is excellent.
Only a short series I believe.
Deserves longer next time.
Rev. (BBC2)
If you missed the entire series, Tom Hollander is the Rev. Adam Smallbone, a C. of E. vicar newly appointed to a run down inner-city church. His beat is a basket-fronted bicycle journey away from anything experienced by The Vicar of Dibley or those dear old souls in All Gas and Gaiters.
He smokes, drinks, swears (sans dog collar), is loyally supported by his solicitor wife (Olivia Colman), battles the undermining input of his ambitious lay reader (Miles Jupp) and hopelessly struggles to make a go of things no matter how dismissive the attitude of detestable Archdeacon Robert (Simon McBurney)..
I think it somehow falls between two pulpits: neither comedy nor drama.
But I hope it will be back.
Liked it.
Undercover Boss (Channel 4)
Living as I do in an area where the council employs one overpaid top office tosser after another, Kevan Collins, the chief executive of Tower Hamlets, came across as an immensely caring and impressively candid modern boss. So, too, did Marija Simovic, the new head of Harry Ramsden’s.
That having been said, I cannot but wonder why so few of the local managers or heads of department in both their organizations, given supervision of a ’trainee’ for a day, did not question the new employee’s validity or show the slightest concern that a television company was to follow them throughout the exercise.
I am concerned, too, at the morality of such a deception.
Bosses masquerading as workers? Bit too much like Beggar King management to suit my taste, But I never did like public participation in television and, in the end, this is just another reality show.
It would be interesting to discover what reaction each of the bosses would have to a request to check on the protagonists’ fortunes a couple of years from now. Providing, of course, that the two bosses are still the bosses a couple of years from now. Faced with television cameras everybody was on their best behaviour. Thus we were denied the opportunity of listening in as a boss was bluntly put to rights with the words:: “Christ knows who’s in charge up there, but whoever it is they’re fucking clueless!”
Never mind.
At least this way nobody got fired...yet.
Five Daughters. (BBC1)
At first I thought I had tuned in to a Harry Potter cast reunion. There was Ian Hart (Professor Quirrell in The Philosopher’s Stone) as chief of detectives DCS Stewart Gull, and dear old David Bradley (Caretaker of Hogwarts) as Patrick, a drug rehabilitation worker
This was a play about the girls murdered by the Ipswich serial killer in 2006 and the tragic affect this had on their families and friends. That the girls were drug addicts, driven by their addiction to become prostitutes, somehow made their end the more deplorable.
What drove the lunatic who killed them is beyond comprehension.
Leading roles were played by Sarah Lancashire, Jaime Winstone and Juliet Aubre. The play was written by Stephen Butchard and directed by Philippa Lowthorpe. If you saw it I doubt you will ever forget it.
I certainly won’t.

READING.

M.C. Beaton.
No apologies for returning to Mrs. Agatha Raisin. It was bound to happen. Bearing in mind my ‘easy reading’ verdict on Kissing Christmas Goodbye (Post 146) my Leader bought me Ms. Beaton’s first ten novels about the amateur sleuth. I have just finished Quiche of Death, which tells how Agatha sold her P,R. business and set out to become a happy countrywoman in the village of Carsely in the Cotswolds. Nice combination of believable characters, easy plot and tourist guide. Took me straight on to book two, Vicious Vet. Same main characters, same easy plotting, more touring the Cotswolds.
Lovely stuff.
Have a lot of reading to do.
I must get back to it now.

151. INDEX 2 - Posts 132 to 150

Alan, Ray: 148 Alexander, Bruce: 144 Anderson, Lindsay: 136 Andrews Sisters, The: 137 Anonymous John, friend: 139 Armstrong, Alun: 134 Armstrong and Miller: 136 Ayres, Pam: 135 Baker, Simon: 147 Bakker, Thiemo de: 150 Balls, Ed: 142 Barclay, Linwood: 140 Barker, Ronnie: 139 Barenboim, Daniel: 133 Barlow, Gary: 137 Barnaby, DCI Tom: 145 Barnden, Neil: 132,146 Bassett, Linda: 142 Bassey, Shirley: 138 Beaton, M.C. 146 Beckett, Samuel: 141 Beckham, David: 134,136 Beesley, Max: 140 Beethoven: 133 Belzer, Richard: 132 Bentall, Ruby: 142 Berdych, Tomas: 150 Berkeley, Busby: 139 Betjeman, John: 137 Blackman, Honor: 137 Blackwood, Caitlin: 144 Blair, Tony: 142,146 Bleakley, Christine: 149 Blethyn, Brenda: 150 Blondie: 149 Bolton, Michael: 147 Boyd, D.I. Peter: 134 Bradley, David: 141 Branagh, Kenneth: 140 Brown, Gordon: 137,144,147 Brown, Charlie: 148 Brown, Wally: 135 Buchan, Andrew: 134,137 Burke, DCI Matt: 144 Burton, Tim: 149 Butler, Phil: 143 Butler, Steve: 143 Button, Jenson: 136 Byrne, Michael: 134 Callan, David: 134,137 Callow, Simon: 150 Cameron, David: 147 Cameron, James: 149 Capello, Fabio: 150 Caruso, David: 134,141 Christie, Agatha: 134 Clegg, Nick: 147 Clinton, Hillary: 132 Clunes, Martin: 136,147 Coltraine, Robbie: 136 Conti, Tom: 142 Corbett, Ronnie: 137 Coren, Victoria: 144 Costigan, George: 144 Cotton, Billy: 142 Coulby, Angel: 135 Cox, Brian: 137,139 Coyle, Brendan: 142 Cranham, Kenneth: 141 Creek, Jonathan: 143,144 Cribbins, Bernard: 139 Croft, DS “MJ”: 143 Cronin, A.J. 147 Crouch, Peter: 136 Crowe, Russell: 134 Crowther, Leslie: 145 Cruise, Tom: 148 Daly, Tess: 137 Dance, Charles: 136 Darius (Campbell): 140 Darling, Alistair: 144 Davies, Alan: 140,144 Davies, Russell T. 137,139,148,150 Defoe, Jermain: 150 Dempsey, Clint: 149 Dennis, Hugh: 147 Depp, Johnny: 149 Dexter, Colin: 147 Diggory, Cedric: 148 Dillow, Ian: 149 Djokovic, Novak: 150 Doc Martin: 136 Doctor Who 137,138,144,148 Dudgeon, Neil: 145 Duffy, Gillian: 146 Dunbar, Adrian: 144 Duncan, Lindsay: 137,141 Durham, Geoffrey: 139 Elba, Idris: 147,150 Eliot, T.S: 135 Ellis, grandson: 134,143,145,147 Evans, Chris: 134 Eve, Trevor: 134 Falco, Edie: 140 Farndon, Zoe: 146, 150 Federer, Roger: 150 Felton, Tom: 147 Fields, Gracie: 134 Fields, W.C. 147 Fiennes, Ralph: 133 Firth, Colin: 141 Fishburne, Laurence: 142 Fisher. Brian: 135 Fitzgerald, Ella: 137 Florek, Dann: 132 Foley, Dr. Grace: 134 Forbes, Bryan: 132,136 Ford, Phil: 137 Forsyth, Bruce: 137 Fox, Laurence: 147 Foyle, DCS Christopher: 145,146 Fradgley, Keith: 146 Frost, DI Jack: 144 Fry, Stephen: 138, 140 Garrow: 137 Gently, George: 145 Georgy: 132 Gerrard, Steven: 149 Gillan, Karen: 144 Giovinazzo, Carmine: 142 Gibbs, Leroy Jethro: 140,141 Graham, Julie: 140 Gilbert, Rhod: 138 Gleaves, Nicholas: 140 Granger, Ann: 137 Granger, Hermione: 143 Grant, Avram: 145 Grant, Hugh: 138 Green, Robert: 149 Grint, Rupert: 148 Grissom, Gil: 140 Hale, Amanda: 136 Halnan, Emma: 148 Hamilton, Victoria: 147 Hamlet: 136 Harden, Marcia Gay: 132 Hargitay, Mariska: 132 Hari, Johann: 144 Harmon, Mark: 141,142 Hartnell, William: 144 Hayes, Helen: 134 Head, Anthony: 135,138 Heather, friend: 147 Hickson, Joan: 134 Hill, Bernard: 143 Hirsch, Judd: 140 Hodge, Douglas: 141 Hogg, DCI Jason: 136 Horowitz, Anthony: 145 Hough, Stephen: 132 Howell, Anthony: 145 Hughes, Howard: 143 Hreidarsson, Hermann: 145 Hudson, Mr. 149 Humphrys, John: 140,142,144 Hurt, John: 135 Hurt, William: 145 ice-T: 132 Irons, Jeremy: 141 Isaacs, Jason: 150 Isner, John: 150 Izzard, Eddie: 139 Jacqui, daughter: 132 James, Bradley: 135,138 James, David: 145 Jane, Patrick: 147 Jason, David: Jay Z: 149 144 Jenkins, Gordon: 146 Jenkins, Jim: 135 Jess, granddaughter: 134 Johnson, Karl: 142 Johnston, Sue: 134 Jones, Suranne: 143 Joseph, Paterson: 140 Judge Judy: 148 Kanakarides, Melina: 142 Kay, Peter: 137 Kennedy, Sarah: 135 King, Si: 140 Kingsley, Ben: 145 Kinnock, Neil: 144 Kitchen, Michael: 134,141,145 Lampard, Frank: 149 Langston, Dr. Raymond: 140 Lansbury, Angela: 134 Laurie, John: 147 Law, Jude: 141 Lawless, Eamonn: 133 Lawless, Libby: 133 Laxton, Richard: 132 le Carre, John: 133,136 Lennox, Annie: 137 Lewis, DI Robbie: 147 Lisbon, Teresa: 147 Liszt: 133 Little, Ralph: 134 Logan, Phyllis: 144 Lord Charles: 148 Lumley, Joanna: 137,146 Luther, DCI John: 147, 150 Lyons, John: 144 McCall, Robert: 137 McCartney, Paul: 149 McCoy, Jack: 148 McDonald’s 134 McEwan, Geraldine: 134 Macfadyen, Matthew: 134 McGann, Paul: 150 McGrath, Katie: 135 McGuire, Dorothy: 141 McKee, Gina: 141 McKenzie, Julia: 134 McKinnon, Gary: 132,148 Mahut, Nicholas: 150 Malahide, Patrick: 140 Malfoy, Draco: 147 Malfoy, Lucius: 150 Maltravers, Dr. Edmund: 136 Mandelson, Peter: 142 Manning, Anita: 138 Maradona. Diego: 150 Marple, Jane: 134 Marquez, Ramona: 147 Martino, Al: 137 Mason, Jason: 147 Meatloaf: 140 Meirelles, Fernando: 133 Mellor, Ted: 135 Meloni, Christopher: 132 Mercer, John: 134,137 Merlin: 135,136,138 Messer, Danny: 142 Mitchell, David: 140 Mo, friend: 136 Moffat, Steven 144 Morgan, Colin: 135,138 Morrissey, David: 143 Morse, David: 134 Mowlam, Mo: 142 Mude, Minnie: 142 Murdoch, Rupert: 141 Murray, Andy: 150 Myers, Dave: 140 Nadal, Rafael: 150 Nesbitt, James: 132 Nettles, John: 145 Nieminen, Jarkko: 150 Nilsson, Harry: 146 Norton, Graham: 138,140 O’Briain, Dara: 140 O’Grady, Paul: 138 Ollivander: 134 Ömeroglu, Lara: 148 Ortiz, Cristina: 135 Pack, Roger Lloyd: 141 Palmer, Geoffrey: 137 Parish, Sarah: 138 Parkinson, Michael: 142 Pattinson, Robert: 148 Pendragon, King Uther: 138 Petrenko, Vasily: 132 Pinter, Harold: 141 Planer, Nigel: 140 Pond, Amy: 144 Potter, Harry: 134,143,147,148 Powley, Bel: 136 Preece, Nat: 135 Prescott, John: 142 Pullman, Sandra: 134 Putin, Vladimir: 132 Queen Elizabeth 2: 137 Quentin, Caroline: 134,144 Quirke, Pauline: 143 Rachmaninov: 135 Radcliffe, Daniel: 148 Raisin, Agatha: 146 Redgrave, Vanessa: 139 Redknapp, Harry: 145, 150 Redman, Amanda: 134 Reese, Della: 143,144 Reid, Anne: 143 Renwick, David: 144 Richardson, Joely: 139 Rickman, Alan: 141 Robbins, Tim: 143 Roddick, Andy: 150 Ronaldo, Cristiano: 150 Rose, Karen: 149 Roz, daughter: 132, 149 Rutherford, Margaret: 134 Ryan, Meg: 134 Sachar, Louis: 139,140 Sahil, Saeed: 143 Said, Edward: 133 Saint-Saens: 143 Scott, Dougray: 139 Seymour, Toby: 135 Shakespears Sister: 149 Sheen, Michael: 138,141 Shostakotich: 132 Sidle, Sara, 140 Simm, John: 139 Sinatra, Frank: 142 Skinner, Claire: 147 Small, Sharon: 136 Smart, Callum: 148 Smith, Andreas Whittam: 144 Smith, Alexander McCall: 132,141 Smith, Matt: 144 Somerville, Geraldine: 140 Sorbo, Kevin: 145 Soward, Maureen, 143 Soward, Pat: 143 Spacek, Cissy: 145 Standing, Gerry: 134 Stiller, Ben: 138 Stewart, James: 141 Stockwell, Brian: 135 Stott, Ken: 142 Stravinsky: 132 Stevenson, Robert Louis: 140 Taggart: 144 Tchaikovsky: 132,143 Tennant, David: 137,139,144 Tevez. Carlos: 150 Thatcher, Margaret: 135 Timmins, Robert: 142 Tofield, Simon: 142 Torres, Fernando: 150 Tsonga, Jo-Wilifred: 150 Tunney, Robin: 147 Turnbull, Giles: 140 Turner, Kathleen: 148 Urry, Marg: 135,143 Urry, Mike: 135,143 Vaughan, Frankie: 137 Villa, David: 150 Wade, Virginia: 150 Wainwright, Rufus, 146 Waite, Ralph: 141 Walters, Julie: 139,142 Walton, John-Boy, 141 Wasikowska, Mia: 149 Waterman, Dennis: 134 Waterston, Sam: 148 Watson, Emma: 148 Weeks, Honeysuckle: 145 Weisz, Rachel: 133 Wendy, friend: 136 West, Samuel: 141 Whitfield, Nick: 150 Willetts, David: 144 Williams, Serena and Venus: 150 Williams, Simon Channing: 133 Wilson, Richard: 135,137 Wilson, Ruth: 150 Wilton, Penelope: 141 Wingett, Mark: 143 Winkleman, Claudia, 137 Wogan, Terry: 134,137,139,140,142,143 Wonnacott, Tim: 138, 147 Wood, Victoria: 139 Woodman, George: 142 Woods, James: 145 Woodward, Edward: 134,137 Wordsworth, William: 137 Worsley, Arthur: 148 Wright, Bonnie: 148 Wyndham, John: 139

150. Mostly for Zoe

HOME.

Father’s Day.
I was gifted a great card in the form of a film advert for The Goodfather, which gave everybody a smile. And I had a DVD set of Chance in a Million, first series, with Simon Callow and Brenda Blethyn. We watched it with the same enjoyment we experienced in 1984. Pleasant memories. Lovely stuff.
As for the actual day, the description I best liked of it was: “Another load of American bollocks.”
Thank heavens for outspoken offspring.
The weather.
Driest spell since 1929, we are told. We went out and bought a four seater fishermans’ chair and a two seater rocker for the courtyard.
It has been too hot to sit out there.
We will, we will…

FOOTBALL.

England 0 - Algeria 0.
Ten minutes into the second half the cat Shadow made for the cat flap.
“Had enough then?” I enquired.
“Don’t know which is worse, the game or your language,” he replied.
Ho hum.
Slovenia 0 - England 1.
Harry Redknapp was one of the panel discussing this game and in the pre-match summary, acknowledging his bias as Tottenham Hotspur manager, said that Tottenham striker Jermain Defoe should be chosen to play.
He was and he scored the only goal.
Say what y’like, ol’ Harry does know his stuff.
Germany 4 - England 1.
The cat Shadow came in when it was over.
It was obvious they had been talking up on the roof.
“Well?” he said.
“No comment,” I said.
“You could always blame it on the red shirts,” he said.
“No comment,” I said.
“How about the goal that wasn’t given?” he said.
“No comment,” I said..
“Not having Harry Redknapp as manager?” he said.
I shook my head and shrugged. He sighed.
“Yeah,” he said. “They were crap.”
Argentina 3 - Mexico 1.
I managed to persuade my Leader, a dedicated visitor to anywhere else during football matches, to stay a while and see some real football. She was amazed by the skill and commitment of the South Americans, thought the ebullient Argentinian manager Diego Maradona was great and wondered why none of the England players could hit the ball like Carlos Tevez did.
Why indeed.

TENNIS.

Longest ever game.
Unlike snooker, they don’t give a ‘highest break’ type prize at Wimbledon.
If they did it would have to go to the American John Isner and his French opponent Nicholas Mahut: they played an absolute blinder over June 22nd, 23rd, and 24th 2010 to break the record for the longest ever tennis match. They played for 11 hours and five minutes.
If you have just returned from Mars and want to know more, go to Wiki.
Isner won and was unsurprisingly knocked out of the tournament the next day by Thiemo de Bakker of the Netherlands in 74 minutes.
And more of Wimbledon 2010.
Equally unsurprising was the reappearance of the fleeting shadow, Shadow.
“Poetry time again,” he declared briskly.
“Has the year gone that fast?” I muttered.
He ignored me and struck a poetic pose:
“Poem one: Who Needs a Roof?"

With a brand new roof worth millions of pounds,
Wimbledon’s ready for rain.
So view the baking Centre Court
You could get no more sunshine in Spain
Roddick’s been beaten and Federer, too,
By Berdych at the peak of his play.
Murray hangs on, though for just how long
I really would not care to say
Poor Jarkko Nieminen must have felt some alarm,
When an elderly lady (who does nobody harm)
Granted young Andy the rare accolade
Of her first Queenly Visit since Virginia Wade,
Pushing the lad, growing visibly stronger,
Into beating the Frenchman Jo-Wilifred Tsonga.
And onwards pell-mell to that ultimate hell
A semi final place on a court with Nadal.
It will soon be all over, the grunts and the blisters:
And a Ladies’ Doubles final with no Willams sisters.
Write none of them off. They will be back again.
To try out the roof in the Wimbledon rain.

He looked at me; I pretended not to notice.
“Poem two: Mostly for Zoe.”

I have said Roddick and Federer
Defy the art of rhyme,
Tomas Berdych ain’t much better
While Djokovic is a crime.
And when it comes to football
Ronaldo’s quite a pain
But so are Torres and Villa
Who both turn out for Spain.
I even had a foolish try
At rhyming Fabio Capello,
But my ‘Hello, England manager guy'
Really should have been 'Bye bye.’
So praise be for Zoe Farndon,
A reader and a pal
Whose name rhymes well with Barnden
And that’s my kind of gal.

He had a quick wash; said: “What d’ya think?”
“Farndon doesn’t really rhyme with Barnden,” I said gently.
“Does if you say it quickly,” he said.
“Fair enough,” I said.
We have yet to meet Zoe, but we like her.

TELEVISION.

NCIS. (Five)
Trouble with being able to watch this programme on Five, where series six is coming to an end and on FX, where series seven has just finished, is that you become in turn bemused and too knowledgeable. You also begin to realise that, unless you are prepared to watch another series re-run, you will have bugger all to watch next year on Five.
NCIS continues to be the sort of propaganda stuff we were fed throughout the Second World War and is no more real than that: but I can laugh at the ‘we are under threat from Whirling Dervishes’ twaddle and still stick with it because I like the actors.
Breakfast. (BBC1)
My favourite interviewee of the week was Jason Isaacs. He appeared on the Breakfast show to plug Nick Whitfield’s award winning film Skeletons in which he plays the Colonel, a role he clearly enjoyed.
As the interview ended he was prompted with the: “We can’t let you go without mention that you are Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter films…” line.
The Harry Potter films were not short on publicity, Mr. Isaacs pointed out, politely but firmly. The Deathly Hallows would be out in November and again next July. In the meantime, he was on the Breakfast show to publicise Skeletons, a fine little British film that deserved support.
Well done, Jason Isaacs. My Leader and I like you.
Luther. (BBC1)
Luther came to a gory climax with everybody but Luther’s psychopathic helpmate Alice (Ruth Wilson) and his wife’s lover Mark (Paul McGann) either oozing blood or dead or both. Idris Elba and Co. tried hard but were on a hiding to nothing from the start.
I suppose it will be back but I don't really care.
Dr. Who. (BBC1)
I did worry that the series might falter with the departure of Russell T. Davies, but the fresh approach remained lively and Series Five finished on a high with all the main characters set to return.
Look forward to it.

AND HOME AGAIN.

More tennis.
Got to go downstairs now…more tennis. Mens’ semi finals. Have to be able to say I saw them. The cat Shadow has been asleep all morning. He knows the danger of too much excitement.

149. Technology...Huh!

HOME.

Paranoid nationalists and web graffiti writers.
In the Middle Ages when a bedlam of bigots held sway, anybody who was different would eventually be dragged to the stocks, the ducking stool, or the stake.
Bigots are suspicious of different. It is something they cannot understand. It frightens them. And because it frightens them, they hate it.
Now, with email, a fast growing army of hate merchants are using the web to decry anything that might be construed as a threat to the volatile and vulnerable USA.
Puerile propaganda is circulated worldwide - excluding countries ruled by despots - and is invariably accompanied by a chain-letter style threat as to the consequences if it is not passed on.
Such offerings to come my way lately have been forwarded by liked and respected friends - presumably unwilling to accept the consequences of not passing them on - and appear to have been initiated by American jingoists who claim to have discovered the best ever (1) reply made to a dismissive French customs official (2) explanation of the Muslim terrorist situation, and (3) answer to anybody questioning gun-happy lawmen.
(1) turns out to be the usual “When I came through here in 1944 there wasn‘t a Frenchman to be seen” old chestnut, (2) is headed: A German’s View of Islam, and has allegedly been written by a Dr Tanay, “well-known and well-respected psychiatrist” (believe that if you will). Emanuel Tanay, M.D. compares Muslim fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam to Nazis who were allowed to take over because the peaceful (German) majority did not speak up…(I thought those who spoke up were put to death, but perhaps that’s me being simplistic) and (3) contains the droll reply made by a sheriff in Florida when asked why 68 bullets had been pumped into a cornered (illegal immigrant of course) murderer: “Because that’s all the ammunition we had.”
It isn’t just gung-ho Yanks, either.
We were bad-mouthing people long before 1776. and still are. The following is the latest English example sent to me:
A tourist walked into a Brighton curio/antique shop. After looking around for a while, he noticed a very life-like bronze Statue of a rat. It had no price tag, but it was so striking that he decided to buy it anyway.
He took it to the owner and said: 'How much is this bronze rat?'
The owner replied: 'It's £12 for the rat, and £100 for the story.'
The tourist gave the owner his £12 and said: 'I'll just take the rat, You can keep the story.'
As he walked off down the street, he noticed that a few real rats had crawled out of the sewers and begun following him. This was a little disconcerting, so he started to walk a little faster, but within a couple of blocks the swarm of rats had grown to hundreds, and they were all squealing and screeching in a very menacing way. He increased his speed and ran on towards the beach, and as he ran, he looked behind him and saw the rats now numbered in their MILLIONS, and they were running faster & faster. By now very concerned, he ran down to the pier and threw the bronze rat far out into the water. Amazingly, the millions of real rats jumped into the water after it and were all drowned.
The man walked back to relate all this to the shop owner, who said: 'Ah, you've come back for the story then?'
'No,' said the tourist, 'I came back to see if you've got a bronze Muslim Fundamentalist Cleric, a couple of illegal immigrants, scousers, Man Utd fans and anything French!'
It’s light hearted bigotry which could get a few laughs in the pub. Brownie points may be obtained by replacing scousers and Man Utd fans with drug dealers and expenses fiddling politicians.
At the risk of coming across as a po-faced politically correct prat, I have discontinued forwarding these emails. I’m fed up with paranoid nationalists and web graffiti writers preaching spite is right.
Gossip, even juicy gossip, should be confined to corner shops.
What?
No, I wouldn’t go to a bullfight, a cockfight, a dogfight, or an execution, either.

READING.

Karen Rose.
If you’re looking for gore aplenty Kill for Me (subtitled Kiss the Girls and Make them Die) by Karen Rose should satisfy you.
Hell, at 500 plus pages it should satisfy a vampire.
Daughter Roz gave it to me to read. She enjoyed it. I ploughed through it: thought it had little plot and all the subtlety of Dexter.
Guess I’m getting old.

FILM.

Avatar.
Halfway through this James Cameron film I was convinced he was taking a stand against any nation that waged war simply to appropriate another nation’s natural resources..
I checked on Google and apparently he had no such thing in mind.
Pity.
Alice In Wonderland. (2010)
My Leader has never been one of, or for, the Alice band, so she didn’t watch this DVD. Granddaughter Jess and I watched. I think she saw it all.
I went to sleep somewhere between Johnny Depp’s Mad Hatter tramping up and down his tea table and Mia Wasikowska‘s Alice returning to the real world and turning down her soppy, aristocratic, suitor.
Gather Tim Burton directed and that Alice is the highest grossing film of 2010 so far.
I’d have slept less comfortably in the cinema but I’d still have slept.

FOOTBALL.

Japan 1 - England 2.
“England won,” I said to the cat Shadow who had not bothered to move from his chair in the computer room. “Three goals in it, all of them scored by the Japanese.”
“How was that then?” he asked, more out of idle curiosity than interest.
“Seven minutes in and Japan scored the first goal. Wasn’t until the seventy second minute that one of their defenders converted an England cross into his own net and ten minutes later another of them managed the same thing. That’s what won the game for us. None of our bloody lot could beat their goalkeeper. Frank Lampard even failed from the penalty spot!”
“Ah,” he said, “now I understand why you were bellowing down there.”
I was indignant. “Bellowing? I don’t bellow; haven’t bellowed for years. Raised me voice a bit, perhaps…”
“Well, your raised-me-voice-a-bit echoed all the way up here.”
“Go on!”
“It did…I can tell you what your raised-me-voice-a-bit said…it said: ’Bloody ‘ell, Lampard… apart from Christine Bleakley, when did you last score!?’”
“Oops,” I said. “Heat of the moment...I recant.”
“Don‘t bother, they won‘t be reading you, you‘re not the Screws of the World,” he said.
“You did the right thing staying in your chair,” I said. “It was a friendly, played in Graz: the Japanese were the home team so I guess they’ve annexed Austria.”
“Do you not trust them?” he asked lightly, and added: “I don’t trust Siamese cats.”
“Pack that in, “ I said. “You’ll be the next one sending me racist emails.”
England 1 - U.S.A. 1.
First World Cup game and the cat Shadow, taking advantage of some good weather, was away on the rooftops listening to music from the distant pop festival. When he eventually graced us with his presence at suppertime, I told him the result.
“Who scored?” he asked.
“Steven Gerrard scored ours and a chap called Clint Dempsey persuaded Robert Green, our goalkeeper, to score theirs.“
He saw off his cat milk, demolished his food and headed back towards the cat flap.
“Waste of time watching it then,“ he said, “let alone putting up with that bloody great wasps’ nest in the crowd.”
“I had the sound turned down.“
“You could have been out here listening to some music,” he admonished, pushing his way through. “Sometimes I despair of you, mate.”
Thinking about the match, so do I.

AND HOME AGAIN.

Isle of Wight Pop Festival 2010.
It’s here again, to the joy of granddaughter Jess and over sixty thousand supporters from the mainland: some even came from as far away as Totland.
This year seems to be pensioners’ year, with lovely old people like Blondie and Paul McCartney in evidence.
My Leader and I will not go (we can hear most of it from the house) but when I am asked if I went I shall reply: “Liked Mr. Hudson: didn’t mind Shakespears Sister: couldn’t understand a word Jay Z jabbered, but the girl singer with him was good...”
We watched the television coverage and that was enough.

Technology...Huh!

If you had read this post earlier you would have seen the heading Technology! Wow! and this last item, similarly headed, giving credit to the technological genius who invented it.
'It' was the picture of a woman whose head and eyes followed every movement of your mouse and who would clearly speak any words you typed in for her.
It was sent to me by Ian Dillow, one time head of PR at Wessex Regional Health Authority, and it was fantastic.
Unfortunately it was also too clever to hang around for an indefinite time. In a few days the lady was not for talking.
I think it may be possible for you to obtain something of the idea by Googling
Free demo to create avatars using Text-to-Speech (TTS) by SitePal.
So far as I'm concerned, it was nice while it lasted.

148. Watch YouTube for the best dummies.

HOME.

Real Fur.
This from friend Heather:-
Did you hear about the man who bought his wife a coat made entirely from hamster fur? They went on holiday to Blackpool and he couldn’t get her off the big wheel for two days.
Conversation with my Leader.
We were sitting in bed, supping the morning cuppa, cat Shadow a purr ball between us, when a newsreader mentioned that the new Home Secretary could put paid to Gary McKinnon’s threatened extradition to America. I had doubts and said so.
“When it comes down to it this bunch will be just as gutless as the last,” I opined. “Only hope when he does get dragged over there they’ll get ol’ Jack McCoy’s Law and Order crowd to prosecute him. They never win.”
“Sam Waterston did this week,” murmured my Leader, cleverly disclosing that she knows the name of the actor who plays Jack McCoy. “ He beat Kathleen Turner.”
“You’re right; he did. Afterwards she offered him a job, didn’t she? Then she took off in a black limousine.”
“I think she was some sort of television lawyer,” my Leader opined.
“Yeah. Like Judge Judy. What sort of car d’ you think she has?”
My Leader was in no doubt.
“Bullet proof .”
Death of Ray Alan.
With the death of Ray Alan went another of our gradually disappearing links with music hall variety. He was a superb ventriloquist and a class act. Many years ago when he opened a fete over here, a flustered local dignitary introduced him as: “Ray Charles and Lord Alan!”
“Well, you were close,“ said Ray, amused. “But I assure you I won’t be singing I Can’t Stop Loving You or Georgia On My Mind and I‘m pretty sure he will tell you he’s the one with the title.”
He, of course, was Lord Charles and his response was as expected.
“Silly arse!” he said.
If you want to be reminded of - or even see for the first time - Ray Alan at his hilarious best, go to You tube: Ray Alan with Lord Charles - Worlds Greatest Ventriloquist.- 1986 to savour some real entertainment. And while you are about it, take in my other favourite vent act of all time, the lugubrious Arthur Worsley with his bullying sidekick. Charlie Brown: look for Arthur Worsley - Which one’s the Dummy. Marvellous.
Ray Alan was nine days older than me.
Pays not to dwell on it.
Welcome company.
The cat Shadow has taken up semi-permanent residence on the spare chair in my computer room. I am generally the only other occupant of the room and I am not bothered by his occasional gentle snore. I think he may be wrestling with writer’s block or versifier’s volte-face or something.
He did come downstairs for the England - Mexico soccer friendly: slept through most of it, insisted he enjoyed it, proclaimed it could as easily have gone Mexico’s way and warned there would be more dangerous opponents in South Africa. He can be a cheerful little bugger.
He’s back in the chair now: won’t move until he‘s ready to eat again..
How come they know when you’re going to put their food out?
I’ve asked.
He won’t say.

TELEVISION.

BBC Young Musician of the Year. (BBC2)
16 year old pianist Lara Ömeroglu, playing Saint-Saëns’s Piano Concerto No.2 in G minor, Op. 22, triumphed over flautist Emma Halnan (17) and violinist Callum Smart (14) to win the coveted BBC Young Musician 2010.
The three finalists must surely have meteoric musical careers ahead of them. To the layman their performances were impeccable; a total delight.
I know it is pointless saying so, but we oldies really should stop moaning about the young. The majority of teenagers are worthwhile, kindly and industrious. This biennial competition is proof that an outstanding few of them are gifted beyond belief.
Dr. Who. (BBC1)
I did hope the departure of Russell T. Davies would not detrimentally affect the new format and, despite some cracks in the seams, it hasn’t. There are pronounced differences; but no more than might be expected from new writers and a fresh production team. We remain optimistic by watching the follow up programme:-
Dr. Who Confidential. (BBC3)
Wherein the director, actors, writer and all concerned with the last episode discuss it, show how stunts and effects were accomplished, and clear away many of the cobwebs surrounding the production.
A fascinating character and plot master class for punters.
Good fun, too.
The National Movie Awards. (ITV1)
It was good to see the Harry Potter youngsters (Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Bonnie Wright - Rupert Grint rang in sick) still winning awards with six films gone and two to go. Good, too, to see Robert Pattinson (Cedric Diggory in H.P. & the Goblet of Fire) win The Performance of the Year award for The Twilight Saga: New Moon.
And good that Tom Cruise received a screen icon award. He’s a darned good actor and he does bother to turn up at these functions.

A CAT’S LIFE.

Stop pussyfooting around.
Must bring this post to an end now. The cat Shadow has departed the computer room and is pussyfooting around downstairs in a furry of righteous indignation. “Ain’t anyone going to feed me? I dunno what it’s coming to around here! Y’ just can’t get the staff anymore!”
I’ll go down, tell him not to be so bloody impatient, feed him and give him a drop of cat milk,
Afterwards he’ll come back up here and settle beside me again.
He doesn’t hold grudges.

147. None of them would vote for me...

HOME.

A family view.
Grandson Ellis and I were sprawled in my armchair watching Cbeebies Grandpa In My Pocket.

Of a sudden he asked: “Why has Jason Mason got curly hair?”
“I expect that’s how it grows,” I ventured. ”When I was your age I had fair curly hair.” He peered at me like a predatory nit nurse. “Hmm… now you’re grey, aren‘t you…” he said…“and spiky”
Keeps your feet on the ground, don’t it?
The expected unexpected.
I care not what the ITV people say to the contrary, their adverts are louder than their programmes; I am constantly reducing the sound to avoid being deafened as well as brainwashed. There are frequent frantic searches for the remote.
Recently I was halfway through a British Gas advert boasting how they are committed to ringing ahead so that you don’t wait in all day when, unexpectedly, the doorbell rang.
It was a man to read the gas meter.
Music.
Following up on the treats to be found on YouTube I came across one that combined my fondness for the Harry Potter films with my favourite track from Michael Bolton’s Vintage CD. The scenes are from Potter films and the song is called If I Could. If you would like to give it a try, go to you tube - harry potter/if i could.
Incidentally, for those who hate Draco Malfoy, you may also find a young man called Tom Felton playing the guitar and singing If You Could Be Anywhere. He looks a bit like Draco but is clearly a much nicer chap. I like him.
I bet he’s a good actor, too.

TELEVISION.

Goodbye Mr. Chips.
This television film, originally released over Christmas 2002, was one my Leader and I missed at the time. It was well worth the repeat showing.
Martin Clunes is splendid as Chips and Victoria Hamilton excellent as the freethinking wife who, in life and after her early death, is responsible for his transformation from retiring Latin teacher to respected Headmaster.
Our enjoyment owed as much to the moving story as to the fine acting.
Neither of us was privately educated (family finances scarcely ran to public schools) but we did see Roedean from the car - several times - and were favourably impressed without being at all envious.
Perhaps we should have had more ambition.
Nah.
Who wants to rule the country or study Latin?
We didn’t and still don‘t.
ora pro nobis.
Lewis. (ITV1)
Reliable Kevin Whately is back with laconic Laurence Fox to investigate donnish dark deeds and masterly murders. [I really must stop listening to Tim Wonnacott!]
The casting is extremely good and the plots give a reassuring nod towards an absent Colin Dexter. I think it meets the Morse code. All it needs now is a background tune playing ditdahditdit dit ditdahdah ditdit ditditdit and ol’ Robbie Lewis will be home and dry.
Luther. (BBC1)
New cop on the block is DCI John Luther, played by Idris Elba. He is a coppers’ copper; a loose cannon; a top office nightmare; a hopeless husband, an adoring father; a door-demolishing, table-overturning, friend-testing basket case.
Actually, he’s every cliché in the book.
And so is everything else about this dark psychological thriller - including that description of it.
I’ll not stop watching, but I do hope it will become less predictable.
Outnumbered. (BBC1)
Series three and to my detriment I have only just become a regular viewer of this all-too-close-to-home family romp.
As the parents, Hugh Dennis and Claire Skinner cope splendidly with every actor’s biggest nightmare - apart from somebody whistling in the dressing room or naming Macbeth - working with children and animals.
These parents simply play along. They have to. They are out-talked, outwitted and upstaged at every turn (by children Karen and Ben in particular) but they maintain moderate control and their sanity by the constant employment of gentle reproof and dry asides..
W.C. Fields once said: “Anyone who hates children and animals can't be all bad.” He died in 1946, 55 years before Karen (Ramona Marquez) was born.
He would have loved her. And she would have made mincemeat of him.
The Mentalist. (Five)
My Leader and I recently caught up on a backlog of Mentalist recordings and found we were hooked again. It is daffy and unbelievable and inclined towards the “let’s get rid of a few characters” shock technique, but Patrick Jane (Simon Baker) and Teresa Lisbon (Robin Tunney) have a clear rapport and everything else is incidental.
In a country full of people who seem to act first and think later, I have stopped counting the number of times the insufferably clever and good-looking Jane would have finished up flat on his back and toothless.
You just have to go with the flow,
It’s quirkily watchable.
Doctors. (BBC1)
Just as nobody without the death wish would choose to live in Cabot Cove or Midsomer, so nobody (unless suffering from latrophobia) would choose to be a patient of any other practice than this.
My Leader, who once worked for a GP, regards it as a sitcom; a daily dose of pseudo A.J. Cronin; a farce.
Did you ever find practice nurses, receptionists. managers, accountants, a couple of doctors and the local police sergeant rushing to your home to reassure you that not only would your panic attack not kill you, but neither would your child’s teddy bear - no matter how threatening it looked?
If your answer is “yes” you had better start looking for Alice; you are clearly in Wonderland.
It’s the sort of thing that only happens on Doctors. Ne’er mind, it gives employment to a bunch of actors and technicians and encourages me to have an afternoon doze without feeling guilty.

POLITICAL HANGOVER.

Election post mortem.
That’s it, then. All over for as long as the courting couple stay together.
Who can say how long that will be?
Gordon the jaw-dropping-Scot gained more sympathy in his last appearance as PM, heading with family away from No.10, than he managed to muster from public or colleagues at any other time throughout his tenure.
Blair-clone-Cameron now has to show himself to be something other than a Morecambe and Wise double act with his Lib-Dem-double, Clegg.
As John Laurie oft lamented: “We‘re doomed. We‘re all doomed.”.
So did I vote?
Gosh no.
None of them would vote for me.
Anyway, a wet plank could win an election over here if it was wearing a blue rosette.
One did this time.
Again.

146. Votes for all - well, not politicians....

HOME.

Battle of the Dental Plate.
A routine visit to old friend and long time dental surgeon Keith Fradgley of Ventnor turned out to be more than the customary: “All OK here. I’ll give them a clean and polish…people like you could drive me out of business…” and concluded in a no-holds-barred contest to extract a tooth and a half (an eight and a five I believe) from my bottom jaw.
Tooth and a half? Well, yes, one of the blighters had cracked right through and in the process of taking a mould to extend a small lower dental plate…
Anyway, the final confrontation lasted better part of an hour; the wisdom tooth was a bit of a beast and the remaining half tooth fought savagely.
Keith won on points, but it was a split decision.
I was awarded the Modified Dental Plate for being best opponent of the day.
Music.
Son Neil has sent me a copy of the BBC television programme Harry Nilsson - A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night, a 1973 recording session which made me a lifelong fan. It and many others can be found on You Tube.
All the tunes are golden oldies. Of the five parts, the last two contain my favourite: This is All I Ask, by Gordon Jenkins and Harry’s version of Over The Rainbow which I like very much.
Listen in. There’s not a bad tune among ’em.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9Zsjphc3RI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyfnqEADpSY&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lwdePZg9BU&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNXXSYjWnO4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWF8wkXvPSM&feature=related

AND AWAY..

Rufus Wainwright at Oxford.
Daughter Jac went to the New Theatre (Formerly Oxford Apollo Theatre) on 26th April to see this young chap in concert again.
Her pal Zoe Farndon travelled from Warwick to go with her.
I gather the first half was a somewhat downbeat tribute to his late mother, but it picked up after the interval and he finished in customary buoyant fashion. They enjoyed it.
Of course they did.
They are loyal, if not uncritical, fans.

TELEVISION.

Foyle’s War.
At the end of this short series Foyle departed for America. Before he left he cleared up a couple of nasty murder cases for D.I. Milner; put paid to a council scheme to build on a Roman burial ground; saved Sam’s future husband from prosecution for assault and, with his last word, cut Milner’s bumptious assistant down to size.
Pity there was no sign of Andrew Foyle.
Could have done with a few decent outfits for Sam, too; even if it was Cripps‘ austerity Britain.
The Prime Ministerial Debate.
So all three of the Brickbats at Five Paces sessions are out of the way. According to the pundits, Nick won the first, Gordon probably shaded the second and David took the third.
Most critics agreed that putting the leaders of the largest parties into American style debate was a good thing.
I think it is too much America and would be better left there.
Gordon probably scuppered his chances before the last session by forgetting he was wearing an open microphone when he ‘privately’ pronounced elderly Gillian Duffy to be a bigot.
Later I thought I saw a damp patch under the television.
It wasn’t the cat, so it must have been Tony Blair wetting himself with laughter.
Joanna Lumley’s Nile.
The ol’ girl was on form here. There was plenty of head prefect enthusiasm and slightly breathless wonder There was the expected touch of raunchy naughtiness (think Purdey in The New Avengers and Patsy in Absolutely Fabulous) and there was the customary lack of vanity.
Joanna’s Nile may have been a far cry from her Girl Friday Island or her quest to view the Aurora Borealis but she is never disappointing.
She holds an MBE.
Why not make her a Dame?
An Ambassador?
Hell, now we’ve seen the other three, why not make her Prime Minister?

READING.

M.C.Beaton.
Have just read Agatha Raisin and Kissing Christmas Goodbye by M.C.Beaton. The writer was a Fleet Street journalist and had written 18 Agatha Raisin novels at the time this one was published.. It shows.
Easy reading.

AND POLITICS AGAIN.

The Election.
A former son-in-law used to tell me that if I didn’t vote I deserved whoever I got and had no right afterwards to complain about them.
My reply was that whether I voted or not the winners always turned out to be self-serving pains in the bum and I would most certainly complain about them ad infinitum.
Our polling station is the church just around the corner, My Leader may go to vote on Thursday. The cat Shadow and I will probably not.
We might have done if Joanna Lumley had been standing.

145. Mostly a mad world

HOME.

Refuse refusal.
Latest of the Isle of Wight Council’s tail-wagging-the-dog policies is to order all citizens to place their politically correct rubbish (no bottles, or plastics, or cardboard; and no garden waste unless contained in overpriced green bags bought from the Council) in black dustbin bags and, on the given day, take them to the kerbside - or an allocated spot - outside their houses for collection by refuse collectors, waste disposal operatives or whatever else dustmen are calling themselves nowadays.
If rubbish is put out earlier than six the night before collection is due, the miscreant is liable to be prosecuted. Taxpayers’ money will be used to bring the prosecution.
For years we have been placing our dustbin bag in our front garden the night before the lads who collect it come around. We site it less than a yard from the front gate. Our garden is no more than a large forecourt anyway. Neighbours have adopted the same routine, give or take a bag or two or a yard or two,
This week all those who have ignored, overlooked, forgotten or simply not absorbed the new rule have had their rubbish left where they put it. No warning. The bags have simply been labelled with a notice saying they have not been collected because they are in the wrong place.
Why, I find myself constantly asking, are we employing the arrogant sods who run things around here? And why have none of them reasoned that litter-filled thoroughfares attract litter-scavenging vermin?
At the end of the road running alongside this terrace is a large woodyard wherein reside - if local folklore be believed - some rather large rats.
How long before said rats (accompanied by various other forms of wildlife) realise that the kerbs are being routinely littered with goodie-filled plastic bags lacking so much as a garden gate to protect them?
Since the new rules are clearly not designed to benefit the customer, one can only presume their purpose is to reduce the number of dustmen (or whatever title) we are currently employing. What a mean, futile saving.
A cutback in the number of overpaid, bullshit blathering top officers would be more to the point.
A huge reduction in the number of inflated expenses claims submitted by avaricious councillors would be even more so.
And a return to the days (if they ever existed) when the lunatics did not run the asylum would not come amiss.
The election.
So we’re off to a flying start. They’re going to build Utopia for us - again. The Blues, the Reds, the Oranges, the Greens, the Plaids, the Tartans, the BNP, UKIP and whatever the OMRLP might now be. For the next few weeks every one of them will promise everything you ever hoped for.
Your vote for them will surely make you the equivalent of a National Lottery winner.
And now they’ve imported another American game show, Brickbats at Five Paces, which consists of party leaders indulging in televised verbal jousting. What anybody is supposed to learn from it (other than just how undignified politicians are at election time) I do not know. It comes complete with highly paid opportunist American advisers of course, and that should be warning enough. At first glance they need a more exciting opening.
As a starter, the contestants should have been seated in the audience.
A compere - someone like the late lamented Leslie Crowther - should then have come on stage, introduced the show, and shouted:
“So who’s going to play Brickbats at Five Paces tonight? (long pause) David! Gordon! Nick! Come on down!”
What?
Give it time…
The Easter Hols.
Grandson Ellis has been stricken with the irritating itch of chicken pox, stoically refrained from excessive scratching and is on his way to a clear skin again. (Always happens at holiday time, doesn’t it?)
The cat Shadow has been stricken with cystitis; bad bout. I had not realised cats suffered from it.. We wrapped him in a blanket to take him to the vet. He goes berserk in a cat box. Thank gawd my Leader is a firm but kind administer of medicines. She is dealing with the daily dosage. I’m hopeless: get more fraught than the cat does. He has been very tolerant about it.
“That cat has not got a mean bone in his body,” was Mo’s verdict.
He had a quick wash to cover his embarrassment

FILMS.

Prairie Fever (2008)
This western had drunken ex sheriff Kevin Sorbo (think James Woods without the menace) escorting a group of women from a small town where neither he nor they were any longer wanted. It didn’t get much of a write up but we enjoyed it.
Tuck Everlasting. (2002)
Nice little fantasy from the Disney people. Starring William Hurt and Cissy Spacek, it was clearly family viewing for holiday time.
Ben Kingsley played the villain and the supporting cast included some attractive young people we did not recognise; they were all very good.

TELEVISION.

Foyle’s War.
The three leading characters are back. Sam is out of uniform (pity); Milner is a newly-appointed Detective Inspector with a lot to learn; Foyle is still a reluctant Detective Chief Superintendent who would rather go fishing; and the acting hat is still effortlessly upstaging everybody except its owner, who obviously taught it everything it knows.
Another three weeks of Honesuckle Weeks (what a smashing name), Anthony Howell (whose acting limp may not have kept up with his promotion) and the master of underplay, Foyle himself, Michael Kitchen (complete with his acting hat).
Might have been better to have a complete end to war and give us Foyle’s Peace?
Who knows?
Perhaps Anthony Horowitz does not want Foyle to become a home counties George Gently.
Midsomer Murders.
In a two hour episode, Barnaby and Jones investigated the customary mixture of class distinction, sex, spite and Middle England mayhem.
Dear old John Nettles is still being made to run all over the place before delivering an out-of-breath caution to a detestable toff.
I think he is really looking forward to the arrival of Neil Dudgeon.
　
FOOTBALL.

Mad world.
So penniless Pompey beat Redknapp’s Spurs and now Redknapp’s Spurs have beaten Chelsea. Can’t help wondering whether the ol’ boy will find the right players to beat the Inland Revenue.
Mad world, football.
Surprisingly decent world too, sometimes. When four staff at Pompey’s Eastleigh training ground were axed recently, head coach Avram Grant, club captain Hermann Hreidarsson, goalkeeper David James and the rest of the team, chipped in enough money to pay their wages until the end of the season.
In adversity, eh?

144. At the onset of a month of balderdash.

HOME

That wretched hour.
Again the half yearly muck about with the clocks. Forward an hour this time. Why?
A theory is that it’s for Scottish farmers. But they’ve got electricity up there, haven’t they? And don’t they have machines to milk the cows nowadays?
So why are millions of non-rural folk currently losing an hour’s sleep in the mornings and bundling little kids off to bed in broad daylight?
Cannot the pillocks-in-power be persuaded on a compromise?
Why don’t we just knock half an hour off the time next autumn and never change the bloody clocks again?
That wretched election.
So, the election is to be on Thursday 6th May, eh? Can’t say the prospect excites me.
Well, we either vote for the bunch that has been too long in power now, or the crowd that was too long in power before them, don‘t we?.
You pays your taxes and you takes your choice.
One thing for sure, whoever gets in can be relied upon to put up taxes and forget their promises. I wouldn’t trust any of ’em with my grandson’s money box.
Johann Hari wrote an excellent article (As Britain ages, will generational conflict dominate our politics?) in The Independent on the day before the PM went to HM.
In a lively and sympathetic defence of old Boomers, the journalist deftly dismantled Tory front-bencher David Willetts who, it seems, has written a book blaming the old for taking too big a slice of the nation’s financial pie.
Mr. Hari slyly suggests that the £20bn more needed in support of the elderly by 2017 could be covered by simply recovering the £25bn in tax which the super-rich currently avoid or evade each year.
In the same paper, Andreas Whittam Smith, with an article entitled The triumph of political mendacity, did a fine demolition job on New Labour Chancellor Alistair Darling.
Mr. Darling, he concluded, lacks respect for the electorate and is not alone among politicians in so doing. Mr. Darling, it seems, is nobody’s darling.
He will give a little with one hand and take back a lot with the other.
Even more galling, he will be convinced that we won’t notice
My favourite start to the month of balderdash we shall now endure, however, was John Humphrys interview with Neil Kinnock (BBC Radio 4 Tuesday 6th April) in which the two Welshmen debated whether Gordon Brown would or would not be a liability to his party in the forthcoming election.
Lovely stuff.
They sounded like two old guys in a pub in Pontypridd.
A trill too far?
After commending Della Reese’s interpretation of The Story of a Starry Night I broke a personal house rule and bought The Classic Della CD.
My Leader looked unsure but did not demur. Her uncertainty was not without foundation. (Post 96 refers) I have a collection of CDs containing one or two tracks to which I actually listen: the rest, no matter how appealing they may be to devotees of the particular artiste concerned, are not to my taste and regularly suffer the skip button.
Della was primarily a jazz singer (hear Cleo Laine). It is my loss that I am not a jazz fan.
An excellent collection for anybody who is, though.
In later discussion with Maureen I said that her initial doubts about the CD, though unexpressed, had been apparent.
She conceded that she had wondered whether twenty four tracks would be a trill too far.
Ah.

TELEVISION.

Doctor Who (New series).
All hail the youngest Doctor to breeze onto the scene since William ‘Billy’ Hartnell first graced our screens in 1963.
On the evidence of episode 1 alone, Matt Smith is the ideal replacement for David Tennant, who was one helluva hard act to follow.
The young Doctor has also acquired lovely Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) as his travelling companion (presumably ‘assistant’ is no longer a PC description).
This first episode was really Amy’s story: writer Steven Moffat cleverly used the updating of the Tardis and its time traveller to show how a brave little girl, Amelia (Caitlin Blackwood), became a feisty young woman, Amy, in the twelve years that it took the Doctor to get back from his ‘I’ll only be gone five minutes’ first encounter with her.
Casting and production have got it right again: this team is nigh on perfect.
Jonathan Creek.
Writer David Renwick’s likeable character, played by likeable Alan Davies, re-emerged at last to tackle another bizarre mystery. This time a one-off.
It was the same old, fondly remembered, formula. But for me, once again, there was something missing.
It was not the unbelievable plot and it was not the entire reel of loose ends, both of which were much in evidence.
No, what was missing (and has been for far too long) was Carolyn Quentin.
All the other Jonathan baiters have been good, but Carolyn was the best.
If there is ever another series, she really should be in it.
A Touch of Frost.
Jack came back in a final two-parter, He fell in love with and married RSPCA Inspector Christine Moorhead, played by Phyllis Logan (who, I seem to remember, once played the love of DCI Matt Burke’s life in Taggart).
Of course it all had to end in high drama: how else, with Adrian Dunbar and George Costigan in the cast?
Pity the producers felt the need to make public their decision to film three endings and leave the choice of which would be screened to David Jason.
He chose well enough, but it savoured of another of those ghastly reality shows which would end with the three threatened characters standing in the spotlight while an off-screen voice intoned: “And the first character chosen not to die tonight is...“
Long - long - long - long pause…
“David!”
(Cut to a delighted Jason. Switch to show Bruce Alexander and John Lyons applauding and trying to look like good sports.)
It was otherwise a decent Frost yarn and a fitting farewell to the long running favourite.
Question Time.
The last time I saw this it came from Stevenage and the panel consisted of three members of parliament, a Daily Mail columnist, and (for the sake of sanity) Victoria Coren.
She came across as unbiased.
Say no more.

143. Every cloud has a silver lining.

HOME.

Sahil Saeed.
Only a week or so after my last post this little boy was kidnapped and his family faced with the terrible fear that they might never see him again. Praise be he is back with them now and Interpol (if that’s what it still is) appears to have caught some of the gang involved. Makes you realise how lucky you are to live in a spot where your biggest concern is whether some inconsiderate sod may have parked in front of your garage.
Conversation in a car.
Mention of a little boy takes me to a recent car trip. Just the two of us; Big Boo driving and Little Boo (grandson Ellis) strapped into his special seat at the back. All was quiet and I thought he had gone to sleep.
Suddenly he said: “You’re very old aren’t you, Boo.”
I admitted that to be the case.
“Yes…“ he mused…“You’ll be dead soon.”
I confirmed that could be the case, too.
“Mmm…I shan’t see you anymore then,” he said.
There was a pause.
His timing was perfect: “I shall still see La though.”
La is his pet name for his grandmother.
Every cloud has a silver lining.

AWAY.

254 OBA Southern Chapter.
We have just spent a pleasant couple of days at Botleigh Grange Hotel, Hedge End, on the outskirts of Southampton. The occasion was the annual get-together of our local branch of 254 OBA (Post 135 refers).
The Southern Chapter is organized by ex boy soldier Pat Soward and his wife, Maureen: they do it excellently.
Despite a liberal helping of miserable weather - and our uncertainty on foreign roads (I was even passed by a Smart Car) - with the help of satnav Hermione Granger we journeyed too and fro safely enough. There were some white knuckle moments and no little cursing on my part, but we made it.
It was worth the effort.
Many of the nice people we met last October were there, plus a few welcome additions. It was good to be reunited with kindly remembered folk and to recall events that took place when the world was altogether different from the one we know today.
Our thanks to the, mostly young, staff of Botleigh Grange Hotel. Their performance in dealing with our reunion dinner, a wedding reception and a charity function, all on the same night, was laudable and, with a little more direction, could have been outstanding. They did not let the apparent shortage of experienced management (or cooks or whatever) faze them: they remained calm and cheerful and they did their level best.
Well done…
And the journey home…
Our journey home, via Gosport and Alverstoke, was made in the best weather of the entire trip.
At Gosport we visited my Leader’s nephew, Steve, who wanted me to see his new flat. I should have gone to see it when Maureen did, shortly after he moved in, but I tend to stay put on the Island out of sheer bloody laziness.
It is a nice flat in a quiet area and he has decent - mostly elderly - neighbours. We arrived to find two visitors already there; his brother Phil, and a pleasant lady, Doreen, who used to be the occupant of Steve’s flat and now lives downstairs. She and Steve cook lunch for each other on alternate Sundays. We had coffee and he showed me around. It is an excellent pad, he waited a long time for it and his patience has been rewarded: it suits him perfectly.
Well done…
At Alverstoke we had lunch with Maureen’s sister, our Marg, and her husband, Mike. The sisters talked sister talk and Mike and I cheerfully agreed to disagree on just about every topic imaginable. (So what’s new?) I slept on the late afternoon boat back to the Island. My Leader didn’t offer to take over the driving. She knew I’d be shaken wide awake the moment we hit the concrete ploughed fields that pass for roads over here.

TELEVISION.

Five Days.
Suranne Jones, David Morrissey, Anne Reid and Bernard Hill starred in this drama shown on BBC1.
There was some fine acting, a tortuous plot, and the realistically ironic death of one of the leading characters.
Good television.
Missing. (BBC1)
Second series about a police Missing Persons Unit. The action is set in the Kent towns of Tonbridge and Dover. Pauline Quirke plays DS “MJ.” Croft who leads the team and Mark Wingett (him off The Bill) plays a local radio broadcaster. Any tendency to cosiness is tempered by the constant reminder that high-flying jobsworths run the police nowadays, just as they do pretty much every other concern.

READING.

Terry Wogan.
Finished ol’ Tel’s Where Was I?! I enjoyed it. Bit lighter than his autobiographical books, I thought. More blog-like. Don’t suppose he’d mind me saying that. Blog-like or not, he’s been paid for it: and he won’t have come cheap.

RADIO.

Heard that song before?
Listening to Classic FM one morning recently I heard the haunting Danse Macabre by Saint-Saens and found myself wondering how many people know it only as the theme from Jonathan Creek. I then wondered how many classical composers cavort in their crypts at the cavalier use of their music by film and television producers or, worse still, by numpties who adorn it with banal pop lyrics.
That having been said, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Pathétique, Op. 74, shamelessly hijacked for Howard Hughes’ s 1943 film The Outlaw, was actually complemented by The Story of a Starry Night, particularly when it was sung by the superb Della Reese.
Click on and listen in…
Della Reese - The Story of a Starry Night ...2 min 51 sec She made a very decent job of the Schubert Serenade, too.

FILM.

Zathura.
Two squabbling brothers were propelled into space in their old house. Tim Robbins’ name was there to sell it; he hardly appeared: but we thought it was great fun anyway.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
We have the complete DVD set but ITV is showing the films again and we cannot but look in. Emma, Dan and Rupert were all so small. Keep seeing things we missed the first/second/third time around and keep wondering why we don’t just put on the DVD and avoid the darned adverts.
Got to go: they’re showing The Chamber of Secrets again this afternoon…

142. Melina who?

HOME.

That window.
Happy with the window. Content to pay the bill even if it was more than double the original price of the house. Far from happy with the V.A.T demanded by a grasping treasury. Don’t mind paying those who do it all. Very much mind paying those who do fuck all.
Mini Cooper Y 438 CBL.
And while I am about it, let me express my displeasure with the owner of the above numbered Mini. Last Saturday morning this idiot parked on the hard standing directly in front of our garage door. My wife, prevented from using the family car, was made twenty five minutes late for an assignment.
She left a note on the windscreen of the Mini inviting the owner to call at the front door and apologise.
Fat chance.
As secretly as it had been left, the car was removed. Presumably the owner thought possession of Island Residents Permit IRP 38836 - 01 meant he or she had permission to park anywhere.
I am assuming whoever it was cannot read - there is a No Parking sign above the garage door - so if you know him or her perhaps you would be good enough to pass on this message:
DO
NOT
DO
THAT
AGAIN
YOU
DICK
HEAD.
Thank you for your co-operation.

TELEVISION.

DVDs.
We have started to pile up the recordings again. Don’t remember when Mo was screened, but we watched it last weekend.
Julie Walters was excellent as former Northern Ireland Secretary Mo Mowlam who finally brought peace to Northern Ireland with the Good Friday Agreement.
The credit for her success was hijacked by P.M. Tony Blair and his creepy henchman Peter Mandelson.
Trust politicians?
The News.
Accusations of Bullying.
Don’t care where they are. In the school playground, the workplace, or at 10 Downing Street; bullies are scum. Now the jaw-dropping Scot is accused of bullying staff at No.10. His creepy henchman Peter Mandelson (yes, that little bugger again) hurried to his defence, as did Britain’s prize model of self-control John Prescott. They were followed by Ed (talking) Balls.
With an election in the offing, who the hell knows who to believe.
But I ask you…
Trust politicians?
CSI: NY.
CSI Detective Third Grade Danny Messer (Carmine Giovinazzo) is walking again. I presume he finally accepted this season’s pay offer. His disablement provided a reasonable sub plot based around his will to recover. Meantime, he kept working. Hell, if Melina Kanakarides had been on the staff in my office I’d have kept working if I had to walk there on my hands.
Lark Rise To Candleford.
Ruraltania trotted out its disabled character sub plot when Robert Timmins (Brendan Coyle), distracted by the chatter of Minnie Mude (Ruby Bentall), fell off his ladder. The fall left him in agony, Ivy. (That’s one for the older reader.) Guess it is not too much of a spoiler to say he got over it. There was a fleeting visit from the lady of the manor and a gloriously daffy St. George and the Dragon play. There were fine performances again from Linda Bassett, Karl Johnson and the rest of the cast. You can tell when a series is doing well: it attracts stars like Tom Conti, who appeared the week before last as a concert pianist. He is another Scottish actor, like Ken Stott, who only has to be on the screen to steal the scene. He was gently written in and out and we were all left smiling through the tears.
CSI Trilogy.
This was a good gimmick enabling Laurence Fishburne to fully establish his grip on the CSI scene while reminding the stars of NY and Miami that, in the acting world as in every other business, nobody is indispensable.
NCIS.
There has to be an exception to every rule and Mark Harmon is such an exception. So far as I can see, in what has become close to a cult show, he is indispensable.

READING.

I have just read Lost for Words by John Humphrys. (Hodder and Stoughton). Good book about the mangling and manipulating of the English language. Made me re-read some of my blog posts and think: bloody hell, did I write that? I then recalled the advice given to me years ago by the novelist George Woodman: “It is good that you can admire another person's writing, but never let it undermine your opinion of your own work.” So I shall not dwell too long on the done and dusted.
I am still reading and enjoying Where Was I ?! The World According to Terry Wogan. Not sure about his new show on Radio 2, though. I was never all that happy with Parkinson’s weekly tribute to Frank Sinatra, so a weekly dollop of obsequious TOGs could be a fawn too far. Sunday lunchtime has never been the same since the Billy Cotton Band Show disappeared.
My reading may be further put on hold: Simon’s Cat, the promised book of cartoons by Simon Tofield, has just been presented to me by my Leader.
Not a Christmas or a birthday present: just a present because she knew I wanted it.
Melina who?

141. Sky High with Toad of Toad Hall

　
TELEVISION.

The Sky High story.
We finally did it.
In common with millions of fellow goggle box watchers we decided we would have to throw more money Murdoch’s way and have a Sky dish installed. It had less to do with programme satisfaction than with the erratic reception of freeview obtained via the standard aerial. Our fun began with the news that adjacent buildings precluded any simple siting of a dish. Only a topmost site would do. Ordinary pop-up-a-ladder lads checked their insurance policies and ran for cover.
We spoke to a nice Scottish woman on the telephone. She said it sounded like a job for their high aerial installers. We needed the Sky High boys.
She arranged it.
They came, they saw, they debated, they said they could do it, but not that day: that day somebody else on the firm was using the requisite ladders. They would return later in the week. They departed.
Next day it snowed. Semi Arctic conditions prevailed for the following fortnight.
When the freeze was over we rang again.
Another couple of Sky Highers came. They debated and decided the work would take more time than the allocated time slot allowed them. They left promising that we would be visited again later in the week.
They were true to their word.
Later in the week the original pair arrived. There had been several dry days. On the morning of their arrival it was raining.
They were polite and efficient. Impervious to the weather they set about the task. In one and a half hours they had sited the aerial, installed the box, polished off the standard cuppa, shown me the basics of the remote control and departed again.
Now I only have to digest the instruction manual, pick up on all I didn’t immediately take in about the remote control, re-install my freeview box elsewhere to watch all the unseen recorded stuff contained therein (never a problem when recordings were on old fashioned video cassettes) and add my monthly subscription to ol’ Rupert’s billions.
It’s got to be worth it.
Hell, in only the last couple of days I could have seen James Stewart in Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and Dorothy McGuire in The Spiral Staircase (1945): would have done, too, had I not seen them when they were first released (and probably half a dozen times since).
And if I had been even half sure how to record them.
Lark Rise to Candleford.
To coincide with the collection of the harvest, Ruraltania was hit by measles. Little Man got it and Alf’s little brother got it and only one of ’em survived it and there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.
Unreality television, but real entertainment.
NCIS (Heartland).
Ralph Waite, down off Walton’s Mountain, was discovered to be Gibbs’s father. I am still trying to puzzle out whether that makes Gibbs the half brother of John-Boy Walton.
Lovely episode: beautifully acted.
Arena: Harold Pinter - a Celebration.
It is to my eternal discredit that I never could see the point of Pinter‘s plays. By the end of the evening I didn’t care whose birthday party it was or why anybody came to take him away. I was equally Philistine (despite our son’s singular success in a school production of Krapp’s Last Tape) about the works of Samuel Beckett. Long before David Caruso’s acting sunglasses Mark Harmon’s acting haircut and Michael Kitchen‘s acting trilby, Beckett invented the acting banana. I remember getting the humour but missing the point. There just didn’t seem to be one.
Nonetheless, this Arena programme showcasing the work of Harold Pinter was a fascinating tribute to a unique talent and contained contributions from many of my favourite performers including David Bradley, Kenneth Cranham, Lynsay Duncan, Colin Firth, Douglas Hodge, Jeremy Irons, Jude Law, Roger Lloyd Pack, Gina McKee, Alan Rickman, Michael Sheen, Samuel West and Penelope Wilton, along with students from LAMDA.
Obviously they all thought he was worth it.
I enjoyed most of it.
Still missed the point, though.

READING.

Corduroy Mansions.
I meandered a bit pointlessly through Alexander McCall Smith’s crumbling mansion block in Pimlico, too. Didn’t so much lose the plot as have difficulty in finding it.
Perhaps I should have hired the No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency.

HOME.

That Window.
Whisper it very softly. No fuss, no fanfare, it’s in. A like-for-like wooden replacement window. My Leader spoke to Tammany Hall in her customary reasonable fashion and obtained a surprisingly kindly response. The only time I spoke was to say hallo to a return caller and pass the phone over to her. The window looks good and well in keeping.
Say no more - I hope.
Living with minor fame.
The cat Shadow leapt onto his choice chair in the computer room and struck the pose I know all too well.
“You must have a poem,” I said unenthusiastically.
“Live with it, mate,” he replied, and was orating before I could blink:

Shadow the Blogger’s Model.

Now you’ve seen me in the fur,
Glistening eyes and fit to purr,
If you’re honest you’ll concur
I’m something of a blinder.

Much too smart for dog or flea,
No mouse puts one over me,
Even a bird up in a tree,
Knows I’ll surely find her.

As models go I’m a natural mog,
Made for posing on a blog,
Quite as cute as the cutest dog:
(I can’t say anything kinder.)

And one day maybe I’ll be seen
On the front of a national magazine.
Escorting a female cat, pristine:
If only as her minder.

He had the usual wash before asking: “Well, what do you think?”
“Pure Toad of Toad Hall” I said. “Right up ‘til the last line..”
“Knew you’d like it,” he said.

140. One distraction after another.

The Cat Shadow.

AT HOME.

An apologetic shrug of the shoulders.
For the first year in the last five I failed to complete my computer diary. Made the last entry on the 15th December, 2009. Not sure what happened after that. There was a load of rain, then an early rush to install Christmas decorations inside and out; then the sudden realisation that nice people were sending us Christmas cards and we were floundering to reciprocate.
I have no idea who we missed or who missed us. My Leader and I agreed to jointly tackle the card writing and that is a fatal mistake. In the end neither of us knew who had or had not done what. To be honest, it was much like last year.
So if you were expecting a card and we missed you, please forgive us and we hope you and yours had a Merry Christmas and will have a Happy New Year.
Rest assured other things were overlooked.
My diary for one.

And an air of distraction...

“Got the message in the end, did you?” enquired the cat Shadow sniffily.
I feigned faint distraction (something I do rather easily).
“Message?” I murmured: “What message?”
“You know the one,” he persisted. “The drop the diary and concentrate on the blog one. ‘Forget the diary and stick to the blog,’ I said. Remember?”
“Gawdawmighty, that was a long time ago,” I protested. “More than a year I’ll bet.”
“October 2008,” he said smugly.
“And I tried it and you said it was no different from my usual stuff.”
“I think I probably said it was a bit like your usual stuff but with dates instead of headings. That didn’t mean you shouldn’t stick with it.”
“But I suffer from retired geezers’ syndrome. Not a minute to spare. I just can’t find the time to do a daily blog. Anyway, I don‘t think the Blog Eds would welcome that sort of intrusion into their cyberspace.”
“It’s not their bloody cyberspace,” he said. “And if you think they so much as know you exist you’re even more self - delusional than I imagine you to be.”
I sighed my despairing sigh.
“Don’t go lookin’ to heaven either, mate,” he said. “You claim to respect that Giles Turnbull’s computer nous. Well he says you have to keep blogging on a regular basis; if you look at his blog nowadays it’s up to date and full of daily photo stuff.”
“It’s a bit of a while since I looked in at him,” I admitted. “Haven’t found the time.”

TELEVISION.

Celebrity Mastermind 2009/2010.
The world of television has been beset by celebrity reality and game shows of late, so I almost dismissed this one without looking up from the concise crossword. Glad I changed my mind. It turned out not half bad, even if I didn’t know most of the people taking part.
Episode 9 was won by the actor Nigel Planer with an impressive 17 marks for his specialist subject (Robert Louis Stevenson) and an overall mark of 31.
Described in Wiki as an English actor, comedian, novelist and playwright, he gained my undivided attention when he told John Humphrys:
“I love actors. Actually I think actors are a lot nicer than comedians and a lot less vain than writers.”
Knows what he’s talking about, that one. He’s done it all.
The Hairy Bikers: Mums Know Best.
This male version of Two Fat Ladies has Dave Myers and Si King biking around the country in search of mums’ recipes to be presented by mums at various nosh fairs which I have to admit I had no idea existed.
It’s all as pleasant as the two pleasant blokes presenting it and we wouldn’t miss a single episode.
Finding the recipes on the internet was a losing battle, but perhaps that has been rectified now: they do have a cookbook to sell, though, so perhaps not.
Survivors.
At the end of the first series I thought there had to be a follow up, but realised that would not necessarily be the case because programme producers have their own strange agenda. Nonetheless, goody lethal bug survivors Max Beesley, Julie Graham, Paterson Joseph and friends are back to do bewildered battle with baddie survivors Patrick Malahide, Nicholas Gleaves, Geraldine Somerville and an army of hard-faced extras. It’s still watchable tosh.

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

New series and already the ever open door of the CSI lab has been used to lethal purpose, this time by an armed gang of pseudo funeral directors.
Dr. Raymond Langston punched one of them through a plate glass window and with that KO punch - despite the strange reappearance on the team of Sara Sidle - symbolically despatched ol’ Gil Grissom to distant memory.
NCIS.
Episodes 1 and 2 of series six.
Jenny is dead. Gibbs and his acting haircut are left with Abby and Ducky. The new director appears to be the sort of suspect character who, upon appointment, shreds one of the sheets on his own personnel file and disbands the agency team. By the end of episode 2 we have been brought up to speed. There has been yet another infiltration of the NCIS workplace by Russian gangsters/al Qaeda/China/N. Korea…whatever.Part positive action has been taken. (There must be a threat left for future episodes.) The team is gradually being reconstructed. The new director now seems slightly less ominous. By episode 25 he will be entirely trustworthy - until he turns out to be the second cousin of Osama bin Laden. But no matter how poorly the critic in Britain’s Best-Value Digital TV Guide rates it, we shall continue to watch every head smacking, coffee drinking, silly daft second of it.

Numb3rs.
Another new series. This is the one with the reasonably unlikely premise that a mathematical genius brother of an FBI special agent based in Los Angeles is able to assist in the solving of crimes by scrawling equations on a blackboard. The leading characters are charming and are played by likeable actors; does anyone dislike Judd Hirsch? I watch it fitfully. At school I was a bored, consequently poor, maths student. So I tend to drop off… What? Oh, the gunfire wakes me up.
CSI: NY.
So the sinister black car from which a machine gun opened up on our heroes did not contain a hit man from the mob but an idiot who did not mean to injure anybody and was just looking for publicity. One of our heroes has been put in a wheelchair - maybe until he agrees the latest pay deal - and the rest are unscathed - but probably on much the same salary as they got for the last series…
Wallander.
Kenneth Branagh has just finished another short series as the Swedish detective. Still solving gory murders, weathering a sad family life, sleeping in his clothes and going to the office unkempt, unshaven and bleary eyed. Branagh‘s a fine actor but I prefer the Swedish production. The English version is too morose and sepia tone. And there’s too much wood. All the English Swedes seem to live in sheds.
QI.
Stephen Fry, Alan Davies and assorted guests continue to provide excellent entertainment on this unique show. The episode entitled Genius was particularly good. Messrs. Fry and Davies, together with David Mitchell, Graham Norton and Dara O’Briain, were clever, interesting and funny. It can still be watched on QI, Series 7, Genius (or downloaded at BBC iPlayer) if you missed it. Give it a go.
Popstar to Operastar.
Some production genius suddenly came up with a novel idea.

"Why don’t we try to turn celebrities into dancers - er, no - ice dancers - er, no - singers - that’s it - singers! Eh? No, Andrew Lloyd - Thingy hasn’t done it already. His were unknowns who became Marias or Nancies or something. Ours will be celebs. Tell you what, we’ll get pop stars. We’ll turn ‘em into opera singers. We’ll ask the public to vote for their favourite turn. (So 90% of the public can’t sing…that doesn’t matter…90% of ‘em can’t dance or ice skate, either.) The phone calls will bring in decent revenue and one of the hopefuls will be voted off every week. We’ll have long - long - long waits while they sweat over which of ’em is for the chop. It has to be a hit don’t you think? " Well, yes, I do think. On the first show the judges (even manic Meatloaf) came across as encouraging and responsible, the public vote was reasonable, and there were some rather good voices to be heard. I look forward to marked improvement all round as nerves are conquered, confidence builds, and operatic numbers are more carefully chosen to suit the vocal capability of the individual. I look forward to hearing Darius tackle something like On With The Motley. I do not look forward to the screaming bobbysoxers - or whatever they’re called nowadays - in the audience every week. And I certainly do not look forward to the long - long - long wait to hear which one is for the chop.

Nurse Jackie.

Yet another new series. This one stars New Yorker Edie Falco. Christ! Ain't she a good actress!

READING.

Interruptions on the way to the library.
Finally finished Linwood Barclay’s No Time For Goodbye.
Was intrigued by the opening chapters, enjoyed all the twists and turns, and sussed out the villain long before the end. My sort of thriller. Have just read Dogs Don’t Tell Jokes by Louis Sachar. It is not as good as Holes but it does convey the same degree of empathy with its young protagonists. In the meantime, am still flitting in and out of Corduroy Mansions, harassed by the likes of Louis Sachar and by dear old Terry Wogan pleading: “Where was I ?!”

I’ll have to finish with Corduroy Mansions before my welcome runs out.