Amazon exiles discussion

I tried listening a couple of times, suzy, but couldn't get interested. It was always going to struggle to match up to the original, simply because it WAS so original and surprising. We had heard nothing like it before, but the style has been much copied since that this, so that just seems like another pale imitation. Should have left well alone.

I heard a few bits of the series that just finished and it was exactly as I'd suspected: a rehash of Douglas Adams's catch-phrases without any of Douglas Adams's wit or imagination. I really don't know why they made it.

I'm SO glad that it wasn't just me! ;o>

I was sat there wondering why my Mind kept on with wandering off - and if maybe I had lost my sense of humour since it first came out?

I didn’t even try, didn’t want to spoil the memory.

New series of 'Fags, Mags and Bags' just starting.

On Radio 4? ... I'm on it! - YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!! ;o>

Don't you mean 'Hashtag YAYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!" ? :)

"Five Alive!!!" ... ;o> ... ;o> ... ;o>

Thanks, lovely Sue.

LOL!!!

It's good to have it back on Air again ... Shop is both amazing and great ;o>

The Wall of Crisps is real:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcoKk...

nocheese wrote: "The Wall of Crisps is real:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcoKk..."

Brilliant! :-)

All you reggae fans - 6music is celebrating 50yrs of Trojan Records on Monday 27th. Some vague info here:-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/schedules/p00fz...

Helen The Melon wrote: "All you reggae fans ..."

... All, Helen? - or do you have just one in particular in mind? ... ;o>

" ! ! ! TECH ! ! ! - HELEN HAS GOT SOMETHING TO TELL YOU ! ! ! "

i and the millions of reggae fans here thank you both!

it looks like a decent schedule

Tech wrote: "i and the millions of reggae fans here thank you both!
it looks like a decent schedule"

Some programmes on tomorrow too, a couple by Don Letts that might be of interest to you:-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/schedules/p00fz...

cheers, helen, don letts is always a pleasure to listen to!

I'm listening to 'Just a Minute', having last night watched "Eyewitness' on Talking Pictures TV, with Nicholas Parsons as the doctor. 62 years on he hardly seems to have changed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyewitn...

I woke up to find myself suffering from Chomp and # withdrawal symptoms already and so I've been enjoying listening again today ;o> ...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00f...

Interesting mixed metaphor on Today just now. Someone being interviewed about something to do with preventing fraud by the "big four" accounting companies (won't happen, of course). At the end he said "A few bad apples are painting a picture of..."

I didn't hear the details of the apples' artistic efforts because the interviewer talked over him, as interviewers on Today always do.

That aggressive interviewing technique is annoying at the best of times, but to ruin a perfectly splendid mixed metaphor is unforgivable. Why, I've a good mind to seek it out via iplayer. What time roughly, Gordon?

I think that’s one for ‘Feedback’, Gordon!

Still on Radio 4 - Henry Normal has just described Brian Cox as 'an intellectual Benny from Crossroads'. I'm always going to think of that every time I see him now. (Sorry, Lez).

As I never saw Benny from Crossroads I’ll stay in my own little world of floppy hair and Lancashire accent. Mmm .
Btw, my astrophysicist niece is very scornful and doesn’t like him at all.

https://www.bing.com/images/search?vi...

nocheese wrote: "Still on Radio 4 - Henry Normal has just described Brian Cox as 'an intellectual Benny from Crossroads'. I'm always going to think of that every time I see him now. (Sorry, Lez)."

The chant goes up, who da f... is Henry Normal?

JFGI, Tim!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_N....

He's very funny; his opening remark today was 'This time last year I resolved to give up cliches, and the rest is history'.
He also talks very movingly about his autistic son.

Lez wrote: "Btw, my astrophysicist niece is very scornful and doesn’t like him [Prof Brian Cox] at all."

Without wishing to self-publicize (it's on a blog I haven't posted to for nearly 2 years), I wrote a blog post about this quite a while ago: https://gordondent.wordpress.com/2011...

I would say my view of Brian Cox has, if anything, become more positive since then. This probably matches the view of the streams of local people I see coming onto our campus for stargazing evenings. I suspect the view of many astrophysicists will have become more negative.

As for being "an intellectual Benny from Crossroads", I'd quite like to know how Peter Carroll's (Henry Normal's) academic publication record measures up against Brian Cox's 950 papers. Just sounds like spite to me.

nocheese wrote: "That aggressive interviewing technique is annoying at the best of times, but to ruin a perfectly splendid mixed metaphor is unforgivable. Why, I've a good mind to seek it out via iplayer. What time roughly, Gordon?"

It was just a couple of minutes before I posted that message, if you can work out when that was.

nocheese wrote: "JFGI, Tim!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_N....

He's very funny; his opening remark today was 'This time last year I resolved to give up cliches, and the rest is history'.
He also talks ..."

And to think I was blissfully unaware of his existence until today. ;-)

nocheese wrote: "That aggressive interviewing technique is annoying at the best of times, but to ruin a perfectly splendid mixed metaphor is unforgivable. Why, I've a good mind to seek it out via iplayer. What time..."

Found it: it’s at 1hr 21 (7.21am) and features an antipodean gentleman.

I hurried over here ‘cos I wouldn’t want you to miss it:

“We’re switching on the sound of Christmas on Classic FM!
Tomorrow is 1st December, which can mean only one thing – it’s time to switch on the sound of Christmas on Classic FM! Join me, tomorrow morning at 8am, to hear our very first festive piece of 2018. I’ve even written a special poem for the occasion.

We have some wonderful Christmas treats in store for you this December: Aled Jones narrates The Snowman with Howard Blake’s beautiful music, there’s the annual carol concert from Buckingham Palace and of course we’ll be playing festive music aplenty.

So whether you’re writing Christmas cards, decorating the tree or braving the shops, Classic FM has the perfect music this festive season.
Best wishes,”

Alan Titchmarsh

Like a fart in a lift - wrong on so many levels.

Oh, goody... :o(

(Classic FM has killed many a good piece of music for the DH by constant repetition. He's almost given up listening, especially with the delightful advertising breaks...)

I used to share an office with someone who listened to Classic FM. Drove me nuts! I could pretty much set my watch by the time certain pieces were played every day. And this was before people like Titmarsh turned up.

Then again, as tomorrow is the first Sunday of Advent, it's likely that I'll be playing Messiah in the car continually for the next three weeks.

I’ve not listened to CFM for a few years now. It’s hard to believe but when it first started, in amongst the ads and Für Elise there were some really good programmes. Every weekday pm there was a concerto programme with at least one lesser known one each day. For Australia Day they played entirely Australian composers which was where I discovered Peter Sculthorpe, Ross Edwards etc. Henry Kelly in the mornings was very funny as well as remarkably informative and didn’t have that awful reverence of a lot of presenters. I won CDs on his Whose House? 3 times!
Quentin Howard on late Saturday nights ran a really difficult phone quiz with cryptic clues (no internet interaction in 1992!) and I won all sorts of Charbonel et Walker choc goodies several times too.
Sad all the professional musicians have vanished and the playlists are full of film and video games soundtracks.
I’d forgotten, there was also a contemporary music hour once a week where I first heard Hovhaness, Rautavaara and Pärt. So it wasn’t all bad.

Listening and laughing away to something on Radio 4Extra that I first heard a few years ago ... Gerry McKee - 'My Sky Blue Trades' ...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007...

A bit hit and miss in places, still Nicky Henson narrates Victor's first great adventures into the often utterly bewildering world of adulthood very well indeed ... first Foods, first friends, first enemies, first Fashion sense, first Bike, first Record, and first kiss with first Girlfriend ...

And best of all, a wealth of wonderful memories have all come flooding back to me of my own childhood surrounded by dotty old Irish Catholic Aunties - all sat together in the Front Room defiantly brandishing their Rosaries against the World (and just as Victor comments ... "always carrying three Rosaries in case two of them broke") ... whilst continually preoccupied with rather competitive rounds of Hail Marying their own fast-track way to Heaven ;o>

Ohhh such Happy Days! - the like of which I never really fully appreciated at the time - yet treasure now as I'll surely never know the like of them again ;o>

Gordon - just a reminder: ‘Round Britain Quiz’ started last Monday 3.00pm repeated Sat. 11.00pm.

Thanks Lez. I heard a bit of it when I went to bed last night. Stuart Maconie's team was labouring terribly with the house/hotel question.

Indeed. I got all but the Trollope one straightaway.

I got Trollope (and DM Thomas) straight away but didn't know the Rogers & Hart song, although I sort-of guessed it from the Trollope connection.

It's probably not going to be to anyone else's taste on here but nevertheless ... I was finishing off cooking Tea yesterday and found myself often agreeing with and even occasionally crying out loud with laughter in listening to ... 'Angela Barnes: You Can't Take It With You'

I only heard odd bits of a couple of episodes in the last Series but I feel like I shall have to make time now to go back and listen properly to them as well as listen to the rest in this Series - as she really did have me completely in stitches at times ;o>

The one that I heard all the way through the other day was ...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00...

I heard the end of the Angela Barnes programme on my way home yesterday. I thought it was pretty good. I haven't caught up with the rest of it yet as I keep falling asleep while listening to The Unbelievable Truth on the iPlayer in bed and want to finish listening to those properly before listening to something else.

It had a very funny line in it about not wanting to have Children ...

"... I myself have never had the calling to be a Mother, it's just never happened to me. I do understand biological urges it's just that mine are mostly for Carbs, and Babies, they are famously Protein-based ..."

I shall have to remember that one for whenever I get that pitying look! ;o>

Of probably no interest to anyone here, Simon Mayo’s new classical radio station launches on Monday. Said to be ‘modern and fun’, doubtless full of the ubiquitous Karl Jenkins, Einaudi and of course, ghastly Garrett.
DAB scalaradio.co.uk

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainm...

I'm not keen on any kind of Mayo - LOL!!! ;o>

Michael Jackson music banned from BBC after 'Leaving Neverland' child abuse claims ...

"Michael Jackson's music has been banned from BBC Radio 2 after a documentary exposing his alleged sex crimes is about to air.

According to The Sunday Times the decision was made last week ahead of Channel 4 screening Leaving Neverland, a four hour two part documentary featuring alleged victims James Safechuck and Wade Robson.

A BBC spokesman told the publication: "We consider each piece of music on its merits and decisions on what we play on different networks are always made with relevant audiences and context in mind" ...

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainmen...

https://www.chortle.co.uk/news/2019/0...

Oooh yes! yes! YES!!! ;o>