Scratching away layers

Well the last posting got a bit reflective; it started out as one of my many diatribes on the foibles and flaws in the people featured on tv. I love to study anyone who is self-absorbed (and tv is choc full of them) and to then scratch away at their veneer of gloss till I find the shallowness underneath. It sounds cruel but, hey, they set themselves up for some criticism and I mostly try and do it without being unfairly hurtful. And in the last posting I thought I was straying into aiming appearance barbs at people who were just being filmed doing their very caring volunteer work and not seeking celebrity. And I hope we’re better than that. Even if I did feel one person did deserve to have his look at me-ness pricked a tad. Yes SC, I mean you. 

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Giving Pauls a bad name

So this morning I was watching something on C4, probably Frasier, when at the end of the programme the continuity announcer informed us that later this evening is the start of a super new series (note, not a one-off but a whole f**king series) about the life of cake maker Paul Hollywood. My ears started bleeding.

Rio Trailers

It sounds like the name of a great salsa band or a new Man United defender. But Rio trailers is actually more prosaic; it’s a posting about two new film trailers for the upcoming Olympic and Paralympic Games produced by the BBC and C4 respectively. I’ve only seen one twice and the other once and I’m spell-bound. No doubt I’ll be sick of them before the events but from this perspective they look fantastic.

Narrators

I’m a big fan of the cheap and cheerful competitive home dining/home styling/home catering tv formats like Come Dine With Me, Dinner Date, May the Best House Win and Four in a Bed. Things have moved on since Changing Rooms and Can’t Cook; Won’t Cook where the focus was on the designers and chefs. Now the focus is on the ordinary folk hoping to prove their B&B or home or cooking/hospitality/dating skills are the best. Of course the delight is not finding great culinary, courtship or business expertise but in coming across some of the funniest and most delusional people that hopefully you’ll only ever meet through the medium of tv.

unfunny

I’ve just been catching up with C4’s Big Fat Quiz of the Year. There’s nothing on the box worth watching at the moment. I’m not a very big fat fan of the show nor Jimmy Carr to be honest but I do find David Mitchell droll (and he’s married to Victoria Coren so respect, man) and Richard Ayoade is nicely dry. Kevin Bridges, Mickey Flanagan and Sarah Millican can be fun too (though Mickey Flanagan outside of his stage shows is nowhere near as funny as he likes to think he is). But what on earth was Mel B, or whatever her name is, doing on the show? She’s not just unfunny, she is incredibly sour and angry at everything. There’s just no humour or light-side in the woman and that Yerksher accent is just ser grating. She must be a nightmare to live with, which is presumably why every relationship she’s been in usually ends with the fella scuttling away rapidly after some dramatic falling out. Or Escape from old Coldtitz as I prefer to call her relationship conclusions.

According to Paul

I wouldn’t want you to think I’m a slave to habit but I do get into routines, particularly when it comes to tv viewing. Take mornings. C and I get up around 6.30 – 7.00 and we spend the next hour or so (well I do) browsing online whilst watching C4. I love their morning scheduling of US comedies, even though I’ve watched them all before. It begins with a couple of episodes each of Will & Grace, then Everybody Loves Raymond and finally Frasier. We’re showered and off to work before the final episode but it’s a fun and harmless way to get me going and smiling in the morning (though not necessarily my favourite!). 

old friends

Hello blogsite my old friend, I’ve come to write with you again. It’s nice to be back feeling fit and good. I’ve finished my course of chemotherapy at long last and all looks pretty positive. I’ve even gone through all manner of tests on my heart and have a great story for you about doctors and diagnoses and don’t believe all they say, but that’s for another posting. Today I wanted to write about something uplifting and hit upon the theme of old friends. Specifically an old friend you may not have seen for like a million years when all of a sudden his (or her) name pops into your memory. Have you ever experienced that?

comedy? that’s a laugh

Well the British Comedy Awards event , in its 21st year,  finds itself two new homes – on C4 and at the Indigo venue at the O2. About time, some might say, that it grew up a bit. And has it? Well here’s a shot of the presenters of the first award; a big Irishman with a dwarf on his shoulders.  Now I happen to think Dara O’Briain is brilliant and that Warwick Davis is a hugely talented comic actor but this was as close to a visual Jim Davidson joke as I’ve seen in recent years. Mature? Not really. Bizarre? Just a little. And these weren’t the only odd things on the night.