Waaaaaaaa-Hoooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!
Kate Bush announces date of new album.
I'm *wildly* excited by this, even though I know I'm setting myself up to be massively disappointed.
Beautifully Creepy
On my way into work this morning I drove past the graveyard at the end of the road, and wished I could stop to take a photograph. Seen through the railings, with the mist dense around the gravestones, lit brilliant orange by the early morning sunlight, it was just stunning.
The BA Fiasco
I meant to make a comment about this a while ago, when I heard the news report that for the first time in twelve days, passengers on BA longhaul flights would have hot meals provided (I think this would have been around last Tuesday).
This got me thinking about the way things used to be done by BA at Heathrow. Back in the day, there was a massive BA facility called Catering Centre South located (unsurprisingly) on the south side of Heathrow. A hugely impressive facility, it used to produce all of the catering for BA's flights out of Terminal Four (all the longhaul in those days) and if memory serves, a certain proportion of the Terminal 1 departures.
Now of course, Catering Centre South is no longer a BA facility, because in one of the airline's many cost-cutting exercises, the business was sold off. Curiously, it seems that very facility is now Gate Gourmet's Heathrow centre of operations.
BA do this kind of thing on a regular basis, and for some weird reason, it seems that every time they do, the decision comes back to haunt them, usually in the form of massive passenger disruption and negative publicity. I suspect that the weird reason is that they do it for short term savings and then create a situation where the sold-off business is beholden to BA to operate effectively, resulting in long term problems when they try to squeeze them as a supplier (which BA have admitted they did to GG the last time they negotiated their contract). I guess them learning the lesson would be out of the question.
And on the subject of bad publicity - I think three quarters of the negative comment I heard from passengers affected by the situation was about not being told what was going on. Keeping passengers informed during disruption used to be one of the central tennets of BA customer service standards. The recognition is that an airline is subject to so many uncontrollable factors that some disruption is inevitable, so when it happens, keep people informed and they'll be way more understanding than if they don't know what's going on.
It seems like that may be another thing that BA let fall by the wayside as it's gone along.
EDIT - I was just checking out the Catering Update on the BA Website ahead of a flight I'm taking tomorrow:
"Currently the only catering available on-board our shorthaul flights is tea and coffee, however either a voucher for use in the terminal or a deli-bag will be available to collect prior to boarding."
FFS...
Unexpected
On many levels unexpected:
Unexpected that we set out on Sunday morning for a trip to Alton Towers (yes, on a Bank Holiday Weekend? File that one under "Why the fuck?").
To provide some context, David had free tickets, and we took the view "If it's hell on earth when we get there we won't go in, we'll just explore the Peak District a bit."
Unexpected further that when we got there not only was it not hell on earth, it was actually quite quiet. Quieter in fact than when I was there a couple of months ago with work on a weekday outside the school holidays.
So we had a great time - went on all the rides we wanted to without any undue queuing, and got out at a civilised time for the journey back to London through unexpectedly light traffic.
I was, I confess, stunned at every stage.
If It’s Saturday….
.... I must have been to Ikea.
Actually, it's ages and ages since I have been to Ikea, but David's keen to add some storage facilities to the bedroom, so we thought we'd brave it. It's a weird thing to think that I used to go there so much and be so easily swayed by their stuff. Now I'm more likely to just go in, knowing what I want, get it and leave, if indeed I even go at all.
Oh the times they have a changed.
We found what we wanted by the way. But they were out of stock.
Warcraft
Back in March, I discussed how I'd been sucked into World of Warcraft alongside my beloved, and how I couldn't stop playing it.
The prospect of playing quite a lot of it over the weekend seems as good a time as any to acknowledge that I'm still hooked. I can't tell you how bizarre it seems to me that a computer game has me this much in its thrall. I'm just not that kind of person.
Weirder still, David, whose gaming is more varied and extensive than mine, has tried a number of alternatives in an effort to break the addiction, and none of them have taken. He might last a couple of sessions on something else before returning, like a crack 'ho to the pipe, to the amazing world of Azeroth.
Seriously - this game is dangerous to one's ability to have a life.
Bank Holiday
It's odd how I always wish that the August Bank Holiday wasn't the last one of the year and then go into it with absolutely no plan to make the most of it.
For some reason David and I are both perpetually knackered at the moment, so we keep thinking about things to do at weekends, then reaching about Thursday night and saying "can we please do absolutely nothing this weekend?".
It would be a shame to do that with the last three day weekend of the year, but on the other hand, three whole days of doing nothing has an unmistakable appeal.
Who dear? Me dear? Gay dear? No dear.
Watched the last programme from series two of The Catherine Tate Show last night, and as in previous weeks thought that it compared very favourably with the somewhat underwhelming Extras, the main narrative of which never lived up to the brilliant self-mockery of its star guests (Patrick Stewart in the last one - "All her clothes fall off. And I can see everything." - Genius).
Catherine Tate is a sketch show in the classic mould, meaning that each joke is essentially the same every week, and it's only the situation in which it's placed which varies. So it's the familiarity which creates much of the comedy, and the audience being in the know gives the performance a certain amount of short-cut space (the pause before Lauren says "Am I bovvered?" is now as much a part of the gag as the line itself).
The obvious danger in all shows that follow this format is that the joke reaches the point where it's simply not funny any longer, or not capable of being transplanted into any further situations. Dropping some of the thinner concepts between series one and series two helped in this process (so no Aga Saga Woman, no Shocked Woman, and only a couple of showings for Bernie the nurse and Elaine the Internet Romance Woman), and the creation of some new characters was essential, but I don't feel that the balance was exactly right to make the second series as consistently great as the first. In particular I'd say it's time to retire 'Nan', whose one joke stopped being funny quite a while back.
Among series two's creations, the obvious stand out is Derek, grotesque in the way that so many great comedy creations are. His prolonged protestations that he's not gay in the face of all the evidence to the contrary work on a number of levels, not least the one which reflects real people I actually know. Plus, "How very dare you?" is brilliant, though self-consciously 'a catchphrase', which is why I decided against using it as the title of this posting in favour of another Derek line.
Eight out of ten for the series versus nine for series one.
Five Years On
Just an anniversary I think is worthy of note:
Today is the fifth anniversary of me buying my flat. It doesn't seem that long, but I guess that's at leats partly because I've barely been living in it for most of the last year....
I Need Ooh La La La La
Just a quick note to say that we're loving the new Goldfrapp album in our house. We're just listening to it over and over.