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A place to discuss what's on TV that might be of interest to others. (exc. Top Gear, F1, for example - which have threads of their own)
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Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 15 Oct 15 at 01:43
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Watched various World Cup races on the box this evening. Having watched them close up & personal today the coverage, as always, gives no true indication of speed. It was scary just watching from the other side of the net. Going to bed feelng very inadequate. My new hero is L. Vonn.
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Double Decker Driving School - 8.30pm ITV1
Start of a 6 part series about trainee PSV drivers in London - I like anything like that.
Also Scrapheap challenge tonight on Quest 7pm-8pm.
Last edited by: nice but dim on Thu 19 Mar 15 at 10:30
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At first glance I thought this was The Double Deckers. I had a terrible crush on that Billie at the age of eight.
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I honestly never heard of that, had to look it up.
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Don't play the theme tune on Youtube then. It's been stuck in my head these last 40 years to resurface at odd moments; the same fate shouldn't befall you if you're careful.
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Double Deckers - were they not a rather nice chocolate bar?
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Now having just seen S03.E02 I was (a) disappointed they've not only written out Mary, the sexy Padre, (in S03.EO1) but also (b) blown up the ATO, Nick, who was last seen in hospital, minus a leg and chatting up a nurse.
The language is as foul as ever, I'm glad to say and the new ATO is a pretty blonde lass!
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4C2f916ZMmZ4kN82Rt5Dj2d/armyspeak
Last edited by: Roger. on Thu 19 Mar 15 at 14:38
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Did anyone else watch this? I'm still watching it now, interesting that we in the UK have different rules to most other countries in terms of taking over companies. What can other countries see that we can't?
Last edited by: sooty123 on Sun 22 Mar 15 at 09:42
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>> Did anyone else watch this? I'm still watching it now, interesting that we in the
>> UK have different rules to most other countries in terms of taking over companies. What
>> can other countries see that we can't?
How about looking at it the other way round.
What can we see that other countries can't Currently we can see lower unemployment and higher growth than anywhere else in the EU.
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>> What can we see that other countries can't Currently we can see lower unemployment and
>> higher growth than anywhere else in the EU.
>>
Other countries covered in the program as comparisons, Germany, Japan, US have it wrong in relation to foreign buyouts? And they are trying to stop something that doesn't need stopping/making more difficult?
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I've not watched it and I doubt I will but to compare us with the US and Japan doesn't seem a good comparison. The US is heavily in debt to the tune of around $17tn. Japan's dept is nearer $11tn. But their ability to repay needs to be considered hence a comparison to GDP.
Just quoting figures from a chart on the BBC, some ratios for debt/GDP:
- Japan - over 240%
- USA - about 100%
- UK - about 90%
- Italy - 125%
Last edited by: rtj70 on Sun 22 Mar 15 at 13:40
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Just bought Breaking Bad on DVD all five series for 40 quid as local HMV was having a clear out but have not yet started to watch it .......63 episodes.
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Good for you. I guess we'll see you again some time in May?
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Two guys nosing round other people's sheds, looking for mechanical items to buy and restore.
The 3rd of 4 episodes was on last night - now on itvPLAYER:
www.itv.com/itvplayer/shed-and-buried/series-1/episode-2
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Doh! Sorry, just seen NoF2MR's post :)
Last edited by: Focusless on Wed 22 Apr 15 at 22:47
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You're only a month 'late' posting this then. Didn't BB air on launch night? 15th April??
Last edited by: rtj70 on Wed 22 Apr 15 at 23:11
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Has anyone watched 'The Job Centre' on Channel 4?
www.channel4.com/programmes/the-job-centre
It's a documentary about 'Candelisa People' a private employment agency in Bradford. Last week they were struggling, and failing, to fill vacancies.
Last week, applicants would accept the offer of a job and not turn up for work.
This week they wanted 4 people to work on the production line at a marketing company churning out and posting publicity material. The gave the jobs to 4 applicants who were, if I was paying attention properly, all Polish. They all turned up on time, worked well, exceeded their targets and it was found that 3 of them could do a procedure which normally required 4 employees.
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Yes, I saw bits of it. Reminds me of the job centre who said they couldn't fill vacancies even though they were in an unemployment blackspot
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I have in the past year had 3 things done to the house. One pair were Ukrainian, one pair were an Englishman with a European and one individual was Polish. All worked hard, and I can't fault the jobs, the tidying up or the costs.
Two neighbours are having jobs done with local Suffolk workers and in both cases so much time is lost sitting in the vans having coffee breaks and lunches with feet on the dashboard and smoking. No sense of urgency.
No wonder UK efficiency rates are shown as being low.
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A friend of mine used to employ a lot of Polish. Said they were hard workers and always did a good job, however, he found that they were far more efficient when given a fixed price for a job rather than paid by the hour, and would often finish quicker than planned
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As a heads-up, and I believe it's a repeat that I missed first-time, Timeshift on BBC4 at 10pm this evening features 'Professional wrestling' .......... anyone on here remember that? As a kid, I loved it.
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>> 'Professional wrestling' .......... anyone on here remember that? As
>> a kid, I loved it.
>>
Big Daddy!
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Well ding ding. Hope it's on iPlayer.
Went to actually SEE "professional wrestling" in about 1980 - Big Daddy, The Mighty Quinn, Giant Haystacks and Jackie Pallo, and some minor names now forgotten.
It was all very tongue in cheek, other than a lady next to us who took it seriously enough to glance up from her knitting every few moments and bellow "Wubbish! It's all Wubbish!" repeatedly.
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The programme brought back some memories; I used to watch t.v. wrestling in the late 50s early 60s. After a few years, it dawned on me that it wasn't 'real', and it went the same way as Santa Claus some years earlier.
I reckon that I must have been about 13 when we saw wrestling whilst on holiday at Butlins, Skeggy. I remember that the hall was packed to the rafters and proved so popular that a second show had to be put on later.
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honcho David Dimbleby was wearing the most disgusting tie I've ever seen in my life, black with a huge blood-gorged purple louse on it.
Has he got a new girlfriend or what?
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Looks like those patterns psychologists show you and ask you what you see:
www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b061574v/question-time-02072015
(don't need to play it)
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BTW what's the betting AC comes on here later claiming another of his posts has disappeared? :)
(This was originally a separate thread before being moved into the TV thread.)
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>> BTW what's the betting AC comes on here later claiming another of his posts has
>> disappeared? :)
Not forgetting of course the obligatory "blame Dave" comment.
Well, I suppose this time it's true. I did move it here ;)
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I don't suppose there are many tennis fans here, but I bet a few spouses have been glued to it this week. I don't usually bother too much about it.
We both ended up watching qualifier Dustin Brown (102 in the world) wiping the floor with Nadal last night. Not only that, but Brown actually played tennis, running to the net and volleying scores of times while Nadal seemed nailed to the baseline for most of the match.
Brilliant viewing, I'll try and catch his next match. If he can win another couple of matches he could be playing Murray, and he could have a sizeable part of the crowd behind him.
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I don't watch, but my OH does. She described him as "gorgeous". "If I was 20 again ... blah ... blah ..."
He's certainly easier on the eye to me than Andy Murray with all his grimacing and teeth gritting.
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SWMBO and I are both tennis fans and were at Wimbledon on Tuesday in the centre court, brilliant atmosphere there with 15,000 capacity shouting on their favourites,particularly Andy Murray of course......currently watching Djokovic v Tomic as we speak on the telly. Not the same as being there but you still have to admire the skill .
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You're speaking on the telly? Which one are you? :-)
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A great documentary on BBC1 right now. Too late to catch live, but a very good reason for visiting iPlayer I'd say.
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Never heard of him, for anyone else who hasn't en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginger_Baker
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>Never heard of him,
Cream.
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Before I'm shot it's the name of a band. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cream_(band)
Not heard of them before but i do recognise one of their songs. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunshine_of_Your_Love
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BTW, its the documentary that's good. Ginger Baker was a man of great musical talent, but somewhat of an a***.
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>> Ginger Baker was a man of great musical talent, but somewhat of an a***.
Not the most urbane of men. Bit of a street kid, a year and ten days younger than I am, and working class areas were rough in those days.
I know Ginger Baker a bit, met him by chance in Fela Kuti's place in Lagos. He had a recording studio but was ripped off by his partners.
He knows me too. When was minicabbing a Nigerian I knew got in the cab, asked me to drive him to the Who's Ramport studio in Battersea, and told me Ginger Baker was recording there. So I went in and told a sort of roadie behind the desk that I'd like to see Ginger when he got to a break, and that he might remember me from Lagos.
Eventually the session was paused. The roadie guy went in and a few minutes later came out with Ginger Baker. 'Lagos you c***, not Las Vegas,' he said crushingly to the roadie, before inviting me inside for a very long session in the studio, not my favourite thing to be honest. Better than driving a minicab though.
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What I'd forgotten was what an incredibly good drummer Ginger Baker was, with that enormous drum kit... he could sound like three or four drummers sometimes.
As some have pointed out, he's really a jazz drummer, an acolyte of the bebop drummer Phil Seamen. I remember him in his youth playing at Ronnie Scott's and the Flamingo. He learned jazz from Seamen, and one or two other things as well... even then he had the pale complexion of the heroin addict he had already become, with the same short-cropped hairstyle too, a clone almost except for the ginger hair. He has been in and out of heroin addiction for much of his life.
Baker is a very acerbic character. Drinking at the poolside in Lagos one evening with his girlfriend Taiwo, one of a pair of small foxy Yoruba twins, he was offended by some Canadian airline pilots living it up between flights who used a racist epithet (he claimed) about the girlfriend. Ginger scolded the aircrew, one of whom then pulled his beard. 'So I put one on him,' Ginger told me later. First I knew of it was when the word reached Fela Kuti's house, when all Fela's bodyguards piled into cars and sped off to Ginger's Arc studio to deal with the uppity foreigners. I followed, fearing for the Canadians' lives, but they weren't seriously hurt. Apparently they cried and pleaded, and I was proudly shown a pool of blood that had come from one of their noses outside the studio.
Lagos can be very rough. Sensible people behave discreetly there.
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>> sped off to Ginger's Arc studio to deal with the uppity foreigners. I followed, fearing for the Canadians' lives, but they weren't seriously hurt.
Another thing I'd forgotten was that Arc studio had a night guard, a Kanuri tribesman from the far North East of Nigeria, who normally slumbered outside over his 'Dane gun', an exceptionally crude caplock (or even flintlock) muzzle-loader, the sort of thing that used to be bartered for slaves, ivory and so on. You wouldn't want to be shot with one though, all those nuts and bolts and small stones. When the Canadians were coming at Ginger, the night guard woke up and covered them, which gave them pause.
'D'you mean this guy is your n***** friend and is threatening to shoot us?' the Canadians asked in amazement.
'That's right,' Baker replied. Not a man to waste words.
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>> What I'd forgotten was what an incredibly good drummer Ginger Baker was, with that enormous drum kit... he could sound like three or four drummers sometimes.
The film quoted a number of great, very well-known jazz drummers all of whom expressed great respect for Baker's artistic ability.
He's a short-tempered cat though and heavy sometimes. I mean bashing an interviewer on the nose with your crutch... one can imagine an aristo doing it, or a yob like Ginger, but it isn't the sort of thing a middle-class person would do.
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= = = > A great documentary on BBC1 right now. Too late to catch live, but a very good reason for visiting iPlayer I'd say.
Thanks for that guvnor. I'd seen the first one and ass-umed this was a repeat so I shall be a'watching it layder on.
Pink Floyd and Cream go together (in my day) like strawberries and, um, :o)
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No. 1 is an art freak. In any form or medium.
On a Saturday afternoon she has oil painting lessons from a local hippy who is actually pretty good himself. She spends three or four hours painting at the easel next to him, with her earphones plugged in.
Last Saturday I sneaked a listen at her music - she was listening to Pink Floyd, A Saucerful of Secrets I think it was.
Now there's a good 13yr old!
Last edited by: No FM2R on Wed 8 Jul 15 at 15:49
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I might have agreed had it have been Shine On you Crazy Diamond:)
Pat
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>>Last Saturday I sneaked a listen at her music - she was listening to Pink Floyd, A Saucerful of Secrets I think it was.
>>Now there's a good 13yr old!
How amazing! .. that's not everyone's, um, cup & saucer of tea. I notice a lot of young dudes coming across 60's/70's stuff on YT for the first time, and luvin it.
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Sinatra songs in the original Nelson Riddle arrangements.
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Recording it!
My sort of music :-)
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In lama land there's a one man band, and he'll toot his flute for you.....
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Its not frankie tho is it...... Jeez I wish I had seen him in his prime.
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>> Its not frankie tho is it...... Jeez I wish I had seen him in his
>> prime.
Why didn't you? Not as though you were too young.......................................................;>)
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>> >> Its not frankie tho is it...... Jeez I wish I had seen him in
>> his
>> >> prime.
>>
>> Why didn't you? Not as though you were too young.......................................................;>)
I was 10 when he was at his best.
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>> Sinatra songs in the original Nelson Riddle arrangements.
Fantastic band! And Seth's good - he's the man behind Family Guy (and Ted) for those that don't know. IIRC he's worked with Sinatra's son on music stuff.
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Watched the first ten episodes on Netflix. As a spin off of BB, being a prequel, I thought it excellent. Series two airs next Spring.
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Breaking Bad. Never thought it was for me, one of the youngsters in the office get harping on about it...then the first series fell into my hands on a DVD...box-setted the lot in three weekends mainly off netflix. Totally addictive. Better Call Saul was poor in comparison in my opinion but I'll give series 2 a spin. BB brilliantly produced and rendered...nothing is wasted, even the cars used....or the watches...
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Anyone else into true detective, well into series 2 on now tv. Colin Farrell is very good in it.
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Now I think Better call Saul is on a par with BB. Same writers, same unexpected twists and turns. Great acting, locations, cinematography and dialogue.
BB is not ageist...friends in their 60s got addicted
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I shall actually watch this when it arrives on our screens.
Carol Kirkwood is a contestant.
YAY!
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I have just seen the list of contestants on the BBC website. I have only ever heard of three of them, which doesn't say much for my general knowledge.
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>> I have just seen the list of contestants on the BBC website. I have only
>> ever heard of three of them, which doesn't say much for my general knowledge.
>>
It says even less about their "celebrity" status!
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>> I shall actually watch this when it arrives on our screens.
>> Carol Kirkwood is a contestant.
Not for very long though based on last night's performance :)
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>> >> Wooden.
>>
>> No? I wood.
>>
Phwoar!
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How about switching allegiance to Katie Derham? Posh (radio 3, Proms), mature (45), in the top half of the leader board, and great legs. Judges were predicting she'd do well.
Felt a bit sorry for Carol, who ended up bottom of the board - there are no 'comedy' celebrity dancers this year, plenty of supple young ladies who'd blow away in a strong breeze, and even Daniel O'Donnell was half decent. Biggest surprise of the night though was Jeremy Vine - what he lacked in talent he made up for in entertainment value :)
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p033mz99
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I don't watch SCD, but happened to wander into the living-room earlier where Mrs H was watching it. At the time, Rod Stewart was performing ....... and both of us commented that it was impossible to watch without thinking of the late great Kenny Everett's lampooning of Rod with the expanding and, ultimately, exploding leopard-skin pants.
Was anyone else here reminded of that image?
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>> Was anyone else here reminded of that image?
Ha - no, but now that you mention it.. :)
Hope Roger was watching - Carol wasn't even in the dance-off. The fact that Jamelia was, despite being 6th from bottom of the leader board, says something about her level of popularity with the British public...
Ex-Olympic 400m runner Iwan Thomas, who was bottom of the board, went out.
(As I'm sure you all know, the leader board positions are determined by judges' votes. The 2 dancers who face the dance-off are selected by a combination of board position and viewers' votes, then the judges save one of the dance-off-ers and the loser goes home.)
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On earlier this evening, but repeated on Ch5+24, freeview 55, tomorrow 7pm.. Just watched recording, and some interesting stuff. (First shown in 2014?)
- Dollis Hill WW2 Cabinet War Room (Paddock)
www.subbrit.org.uk/rsg/sites/d/dollis_hill/
Entrance here: goo.gl/maps/U0YHU (google maps)
- Aldwych disused underground station
underground-history.co.uk/aldwych.php
- The Brunels' Thames tunnel
www.brunel-museum.org.uk/history/the-thames-tunnel/
- Lee Tunnel, modern sewer (80m down, London's deepest tunnel)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Tunnel
- West Norwood Catacombs (1.5k coffins!)
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On now on sky news, an inside look at the UK's RAF QRA force.
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New series starting today playing in the post World at One 13:45 slot.
Strapline is 'Hannah Fry looks back at 75 years of computing history to reveal the UK's lead role in developing the technologies we rely on today'
First episode was about early machines and particularly attempts to develop memory. Tomorrow it's Lyons pioneer office computer.
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06bq6j1
Available on I-player and as a subscription podcast.
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I have avoided computer history stuff ever since I went into the Boston Computer Museum to get out of the rain and saw computers displayed that i had worked on when they were new.
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Know the feeling, I keep driving past sites that are missing the buildings I designed.
8o(
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>> I have avoided computer history stuff ever since I went into the Boston Computer Museum
>> to get out of the rain and saw computers displayed that i had worked on
>> when they were new.
>>
Know what you mean, I visited the internal "museum" in the basement at Hursley a couple of months back and saw a lot of kit from the 60s onwards that looked very familiar.
Before anyone comments, I started in 1977 but a lot of 60s stuff was still around in customer sites, in those days technology advanced fairly slowly compared to now.
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>> Before anyone comments, I started in 1977 but a lot of 60s stuff was still
>> around in customer sites, in those days technology advanced fairly slowly compared to now.
>>
I started in 1965, straight into commercial real time computers.
We thought IBM 360s were crude compared with our machines and as for batch machines....
Most folks in those days were hardly aware that RT machines existed.
I later got to know 360s/370s and my view did not change much.
Prior to all that I was exposed to stores/stock control computerisation and what a terrible example that was.
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>> I have avoided computer history stuff ever since I went into the Boston Computer Museum
>> to get out of the rain and saw computers displayed that i had worked on
>> when they were new.
The curator at the national Museum of Computing tried to kidnap me into forced labour, cataloguing what they had in a very large store storeroom, when I peeked in and said, "Oh thats a dah di day" "oh used to work on one of them" "oh got a printer and modem for that in my loft" "hey thats missing a doofer"
I barely escaped with my life
Last edited by: Zero on Mon 14 Sep 15 at 16:02
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Similar happened to me when I visited Bletchley Park. I said a little too loudly "Oh look a mugsy, I'd forgotten all about mugsies". One of the staff rushed over to me and asked if I could remember how to adjust them.
mugsy - Motor Uni Group Selector
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Ok, it was as seen on TV about forty years ago, but for my money it was the bestest creepiest kids show that ITV (well HTV) made. Real behind the sofa stuff in its day. On Youtube now, of course. Might trigger memories amongst those here of a certain age.
Epsiode 1 is at
www.youtube.com/watch?v=eG2NSU5VH8s&list=PLUJ3QmupEsa6hIP1Z3cF307LgxtcI8MjY
Last edited by: Crankcase on Mon 14 Sep 15 at 15:34
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>> for my money
>> it was the bestest creepiest kids show that ITV (well HTV) made.
Largely due to that creepy choral soundtrack! Just watched the first couple of episodes (on TV via NowTV box) and it certainly brought back some memories.
But it prompted me to search for another one, which I get mixed up with CotS. Remember ;Escape into Night', where girl draws house then dreams about it? And stones around house get closer every night? (it's the stones that caused the mix-up)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSOviQqXpRA&list=PLivST5SllKdt8JbDqjK25yyve-_qANgX7
No soundtrack, but possibly even creepier IMHO.
EDIT: bonus points if you can identify the bloke in the poster on her wall (I can't)
Last edited by: Focusless on Mon 14 Sep 15 at 21:27
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I don't normally watch it, but Clarkson's hosting it tonight on BBC1 @ 9pm.
And he's in for constant leg pulling throughout the episode according to sources who saw the recording last night.
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Absolutely first class programme. Merton well on form as was Clarkson - the smarmy Richard Osman was quite offensive to Clarkson....no real need for it.
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"the smarmy Richard Osman was quite offensive to Clarkson....no real need for it."
Agreed - though, sometimes he seemed almost embarrassed to be saying it; was it scripted, and he was 'under orders'?
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>> the smarmy Richard Osman was quite offensive to Clarkson....no real need for it.
According to reports, he got quite a lot of praise for it.
It was inevitable that Clarkson was going to be the butt of the jokes. Fair play to him though for going ahead and hosting the show.
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>>Fair play to him though for going ahead and hosting the show.
>>
Cynic mode.
He also got a very fat cheque for doing it.
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I watched HIGNFY on the iplayer over the weekend, bout the only thing I have watched on the idiots lantern during the last five months - due to having two pups!!
I must say I thoroughly enjoyed the prog, having gorn orf it some time ago. One thing I did notice about Clarky is, the state of his liver - going by his eyes. All that green-folding stuff see, no good to ya.
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>> due to having two pups!!
Yes, you can't beat playing with a couple of puppies ;)
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>>you can't beat playing with a couple of puppies ;)
Many a true word spoken in truth ;)
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Just seen on BBC website
www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-34528586
Sandi Toksvig to replace Stephen Fry for the second half of the alphabet
a refreshing change, yes?
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I like Sandi but she is dire in charge of 15 to 1, really wooden and patronising. Hope she's better on QI.
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She'll have a script, written by somebody who can do funny.
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I think she'll be absolutely awful. As Smokie said, wooden.
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>> I think she'll be absolutely awful. As Smokie said, wooden.
She was pretty good on the News Quiz (Radio 4) but ISTR took time to develop into it. Simon Hoggart was a hard act to follow too. She also had an excellent scriptwriter.
And radio skills don't necessarily transfer well to TV...
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I never heard her on that.
Smug was the other word IO was looking for. Wooden and smug.
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>> wooden.
Deadpan and sardonic I'd say. She's got brains too.
I'm in a bad mood for reasons I won't go into but I find la Toksvig generally sympathetic. Not smug at all especially compared to Stephen Fry. He's as smug as they come.
Well said Rob down below there and thanks for reminding an old geezer of the fellow's name.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Wed 14 Oct 15 at 17:47
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I thought she was awful in the News Quiz. Very much tried to do dominate the program rather than act as chairman. Simon Hoggart was so much better.
Anyway I thought she was leaving the BBC to found the Woman's Equality Party. That's the reason she gave when she quit the News Quiz. I guess she was just after more money after all.
Don't think I will be watching QI any more.
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I dislike Mr Fry. Smugness personified, to him oop north is somewhere near Watford. He was a front runner for ISIHAC....he would have spoilt it.
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>>I dislike Mr Fry. Smugness personified,
Indeed - but always just enough self-mockery to make it amusing rather than irritating.
Or at least, I always thought so. Although, as is so common these days, we was becoming a caricature of himself and it wasn't improving his entertainment value.
But I think you'll go some to find a more amusing 30 seconds or so than the Acropolis/Parthenon bit.
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>> I thought she was awful in the News Quiz. Very much tried to do dominate
>> the program rather than act as chairman. Simon Hoggart was so much better.
It would be interesting to compare the original Alan Coren/Richard Ingrams News Quiz, Barry Took chairing, with the latter Toksvig era version.
Doubtt they'd be recognisable as same programme. Less of a quiz more a comedy vehicle.
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Eurosport - legacylad
