Series Four
Of New Who that is. The writers are named in the new Doctor Who Magazine, and among points of interest are the fact that Gareth Roberts will be doing a second, after this year's brilliant The Shakespeare Code. I happen to know the setting for this, and I cannot wait to see what he does with it.
Among the others are a bunch of other returnees, and two totally new (to the series) writers, including one James Moran, author of the film Severance, and to judge by his blog, a bit of an old school fanboy. This could be interesting.
In Other News
I'm part of the BBC's iPlayer Beta test. Or I will be when i get home and install it. Very exciting.
Maybe that will give me some alternative viewing 
It’s Heeeeere!
Big Brother 07 that is. Starts tonight, runs until doomsday, and according to one of today's papers it's going to be an all female house, at least to begin with.
I know I'm doomed. I know that despite raging disinterest on my part it'll still dominate our house for however long the vile thing runs. I am resigned to my fate, and will take it like a man.
Wish me luck.
Brutal
The footage on Sunday night's news of campaigners in Moscow being attacked when they tried to petition the mayor of the city for the right to hold a gay rights march was shocking. The punch in the face which Peter Tatchell received was captured on camera, as was a similar assault on Richard Fairbrass.
This is the second year when violence has resulted from Russian gay men and lesbians' efforts to secure some rights for themselves, and in a city where the mayor has denounced them as 'satanic', it's unfortunately not a surprise to see that the police waded in largely against the victims of the violence and hauled them off under arrest. Heartwarming to see the Russian Orthodox Church displaying warmth and love towards all people, even the homosexual ones.
Oh, no, wait a minute. They were in there with the extreme nationalists doing the kicking and punching.
Roping In His Holiness
I know that the whole point of what Madeleine McCann's parents are currently doing is to keep their situation in the public eye, and make sure that pressure stays on both the Portuguese police and the abductor, but my already thinning patience with the whole media circus comes close to snapping over the news that they're going to see the Pope.
I mean, seriously, how did that discussion go? "What can we do to keep the world's attention on our missing daughter? I know; we could go and see a former Nazi who's now in charge of an organisation famous the world over for abusing children!"
Trad
It's been quite a few years (fourteen in fact) since I went to one of those weddings that takes place in the local church of the bride's parents and is followed by a reception in a marquee on their lawn, but yesterday was one such. Barnaby, who has been a mentionee in this blog since a mere three months after its inception, and who we were working out I've known for very nearly nine years, was marrying the lovely Nancy, and it's about time too.
It really had everything you'd want from a traditional wedding - a vicar who seemed reassuringly not that bothered about God, the occasional gurgle of babies from around the church, a smattering of people you haven't seen for a few years, champagne and canapés served by bright young things, a very good dinner, speeches that were by turn slightly rambling (father of the bride), touching (groom) and funny (best man/brother of the groom), jazz band (v good), and a chance to chill for a couple of hours before tackling the vexed question of finding transport back to the hotel.
Good day all round. And the fact that we were back home, having had time to stop and do the weekly shop, by midday on the Sunday of a Bank Holiday weekend, so leaving quite a bit of the weekend still to go was, if you'll pardon it, the icing on the cake.
It’s Only A Gameshow
With this year's UK Big Brother looming, let's pause to reflect for a moment on the Australian version currently running. The producers have decided that they won't tell one of the participants that her father has died while she's in the house. And the participant herself, according to her family, knew that he might die (he was suffering from cancer) while she was in there. And she still chose to go in and risk missing his last days.
I wish everyone concerned would just get a little perspective.
Grrrrrrr!
I'm getting so fucked off about the effort it seems to take to get even the simplest things done in this whole property saga. Between solicitors and freeholders and estate agents, there appears to be no point at which someone won't gum up the works. I get calls from both buying and selling estate agents chasing things the solicitors are supposed to have done, I hear the most ridiculous stuff that the freeholder on the selling property has failed to do from the solicitor, and the whole mess turns into a huge round of finger-pointing.
And I, who am paying money to many of these people to do their jobs and make my life easier, end up sorting it all out.
The latest and greatest is that the freeholders appear never to have updated the deeds to my flat to show that actually, I bought 100% of it, rather than the 40% that would have applied if it was still shared-ownership. And note that I bought in 2000, from someone who had previously bought 100% herself, so this has been wrong for at least seven years.
This move is clearly going to be the death of me.
Opening Lines
I heard a thing on the radio the other day where people were discussing their favourite opening lines from novels. Among all the very high-flown items, and several people citing Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier; "Last night I dreamed I went to Manderly again.", I found myself fondly thinking of my own favourite. This one's been top of my list since I first read it twenty-plus years ago. Not particularly high-flown, and certainly not that well-known, it's the opening line from Miss Mapp, by E.F. Benson:
Miss Elizabeth Mapp might have been forty, and she took advantage of that fact by being just a year or two older.
Makes me smile every time.
The Hotel Inspector – III
And just to make it clear that I don't think our weekend hideaway is completely above criticism: There's one little detail that they apply which drives me mad. And it's sugar.
When ordering tea after dinner, a nice pot with proper leaves and a strainer arrives, with cup, saucer, teaspoon and a little biscuit. And a single sachet of sugar. Now I know there are rules about sugar bowls and the like, but if you're going to do sachets, at least provide a few of the things. I take sugar in my tea. Just the one, but when I've got a pot in front of me I'll probably have multiple cups and therefore need multiple sachets. Getting up to ask for them interrupts my post-meal relaxation and wastes staff time getting them. People who take more than one sugar will clearly have further issues.
I know it sounds like a tiny, almost pointless detail, but when everything else is so good then those tiny things are what one focuses on. And it's the pointlessness of being so apparently mean with it that irks.