Diary of an old cheeser

Wave goodbye, Say Hello...

2009-05-30T01:16:00.001+01:00

Adios Diary of an Old Cheeser...

And if you want to find the new me ....

... Try HERE!!

2009-05-29T12:03:00.002+01:00

DAY TO GO....!!!

YIKES!!

I'm a bit scared now...

2009-05-28T20:22:00.001+01:00

Days left ... countdown IS progressing ...

2009-05-27T17:54:00.002+01:00

it's the magic number...

2009-05-26T14:04:00.003+01:00

and counting ...

2009-05-25T18:46:00.003+01:00

... DAYS TO GO ...

The Return of the Cheeser

2009-05-08T20:27:00.000+01:00

ETA:

Saturday 30 May 2009

I'm coming back

2009-04-25T12:44:00.006+01:00

It's official.

And it's no good.

Or rather it is (good that is)

After a lengthy hiatus and "departure" (ahem ahem), this old Cheeser has decided ....

.... TO COME BACK!!!

Or should I say...

BACK, BACK, BACK!!!

Watch this space...

I'm excited already!!! Hope you are too!!

OC xx

Cheerio from the Cheeser...

2008-10-01T09:37:00.002+01:00

Well. I really didn't want to have to do this. In fact, I can't quite believe that I'm contemplating it. But it seems like I ain't got much choice, my lovelies...

Since I started my new teaching job time has been precious for me, in fact, I still can't find enough of it. My evenings and weekends have become full to the brim with preparing, marking, reading and so forth. We've got an OFSTED inspection coming to the college next week and that's added to everything else for me. I know you have heard this all before, my fellow bloggers and readers...

You can probably guess where this is going can't you?

I've going to have to stop this blogging thing.

Yes. Or, to be more precise, I'm not going to be updating my own blog any more, and probably not for some time to come. Yes, I've had my hiatuses before, my "I'm having a break for a few weeks and I'll be back" type declarations (God I'm finding it hard to get the words out, so much for being a ruddy English teacher!) but this time it's likely to be for good. It's just been so hard to claw back time and at present I need all that I can get hold of (sounds like another of my classic Cheeser double entendres, something I'm sure you'll remember me for if nothing else...)

This decision really doesn't come easily, I can promise you. I have loved having my own blog for so many reasons: the chance to be creative and to write about all of my joys and passions - music, movies, tv (being the "banner" topics but of course you all know I'm a major Dr Who fan); not to mention a vast array of cheese and retro-related topics that have enthused me along the way and also what's current ; writing long and detailed reviews (and boy am I good at them!); "Tagging" my fellow bloggers to write on an array of subjects ... and last but definitely not least hooking up with and getting to know a vast array of other bloggers in the process. And boy, have I met lots of people!

And in no particular order, they are:

The witty and erudite Steve, from Luscious Leamington Spa. Our communiques kicked off with various anecdotes about Beverley Craven and a marrow - I kid you not. He's a proud Dad of two and a bit of a polymath (writer, web designer, facilities manager...!) In our time we've exchanged many a thought on Torchwood and Big Brother. Steve's a bit of a cultural critic too and has a very observant eye/style. Actually I'm wondering if it was Bev that started it all off after all, I actually think it was Leo Sayer's underpants. What an opening. Not that I really want to see Leo's opening...

The lovely boy from US Gaytown, Matty, who never ceases to amaze me with his tales of encounters with weird and wonderful San Fran folk and his conversations with them - plus his love of film, tv and music was something we both shared. He's also an arty and sensitive kind of guy with his heart in the right place (and we've never even met!) with a Barbra Streisand fixation. And a cute dog called Bagel! Going back to Queen Babs, I think that's how our friendship got started - me suggesting that Bubbly Babs go for a "ghetto Barbra" image with lots of bling and a velour tracksuit - I'm sure it would compliment her bubble perm perfectly not to mention revitalise her career...

Amanda from New Zealand. A fun and witty lady who never ceases to make us jealous with her tales and photos of the beautiful NZ scenery and weather. One of her daughters is also a major Dr Who fan - she's obviously been brought up the right way. I can't quite remember how Randy Mandy and I hooked up - probably through another blogger, it always seems to be the way - but I've enjoyed all my chats with her and reading her updates. A fabulous lady.

Tim aka Timewarden! A blogger who has regenerated almost as many times as the good Timelord himself - who knows, PERHAPS I might follow his example. Tim is a major DW fan too, hence the connection. Tim is an "Old Skool" Whovian and I'm sure he won't mind me saying he's much more of a fan of the original series rather than new one. This has lead to many interesting debates between us! He also has an incredible memory for detail (guest stars from DW who have starred in other things) - I thought I was bad! (Or should that be good - look it's a talent, all right??)

High Camp Caress Morell. Named after a character from Dynasty no less, Caress is in fact a gay Glaswegian called Jaimie who has a love of, surprisingly, camp and trash such as Prisoner Cell Block H, Dynasty and Joan Crawford movies, to give just a few examples. He's currently compiling his Top 25 Campest movies and some of the choices have actually taken me by surprise! Like Tim, he's a mine of information (or should that be trivia? I can talk...) when it comes to movies and tv shows - this boy knows so much! He also has a love of ... cock ... and has written a fair few naughty stories on his blog - fair go to him!

From A Voice Plantation aka my old friend Thomas. We both went to Sussex University about 15 years ago (Jesus! Where does the time go?!) and have stayed in touch since - well sporadically, but we're back in touch now, which is good. Thomas is into Indie music and also has his own band, Plus! Go see them! Of course I remember his Janet Jackson period, and Absolutely Fabulous fixations, but I'm not sure he'd want me to remind him of those ... Thomas also blogs about the country walks he's fond of going on, which I can definitely relate to - getting out of London can only be a good thing!

Hot Lunch aka Alan from Chicago! Another American diva queen! Alan actually originates from Bradford ooop North so is a Yorkshire boy by birth (he once wrote to me asking me about meat pies that came from there - I was damned if I knew!) Now he's into music and movies, including the kind of stuff I like. And he also has a bit of a thing for Sheena Easton in fact.

Flaming Nora. A displaced Makem now living in London. She's a major Coronation Street fan and even has her own blog on the topic and once kindly published an article of mine on gay and lesbian characters in soaps. Another cultural critic who is always going to the theatre and gigs. It makes me wonder why I don't bother being a London dweller too. She also used to work near me although we never actually met - may have passed each other on the street at some point though, who knows!

Newplanet aka Graham another bonnie gay Scots boy! Graham is a bit of a Kylie and Kim Wilde fan and again likes many things poppy. He also has a thing for horror movies and every October gives his blog a Halloween style makeover, as he has done now.

And there's a few other numerous people too who I haven't mentioned (soz folks) but if you want to check them out go to my blog roll. All I can say is, ladies and gentlemen, it's been lovely knowing you!!

So before I go...

I will be keeping this blog "live" i.e. I won't be deleting it despite the lack of updates, so anyone and everyone can go back and read all my previous posts! I have actually worked very hard on it in the past and don't see the point in just scrubbing out all of that.

I WILL still be checking into everyone else's blogs, to see what they're up to, what they're writing about and leaving comments where I can. I want to keep in touch! And it isn't the reading that's time consuming, it's the writing that is!! Oh I wish I didn't have to do this but ho hum ....

Incidentally - Pakipoptart aka Deemer, are you still alive? You stopped blogging and deleted your website, but I was just wondering if you're okay? If you read this please drop me a line to say hi and reassure me.

Well. This looks like it. Really can't believe it! Who knows, I might do a Timewarden and come back from the dead, but for now it really does have to be goodbye. We'll see. Take care and all the best.

Big hugs to you all and ... I almost forgot to say ... many, MANY thanks for checking into and reading my blog and your various comments! It's been much appreciated.

Love Simon aka Old Cheeser
XXXXXXXXXX

BYYYYYEEEEEEE!!!!

I'm sowwie

2008-09-21T12:59:00.013+01:00

Hey everyone

Sorry about the recent lack of posts - just for a change. I'm up to my eyeballs in teaching stuff and my weekends have suddenly become chock-full of preparation and marking, etc etc. Natually all of that's had to take priority. I'll write something more substantial when I can find, oh, a few spare micro-seconds or something.

Meanwhile: It seems that the E-Space Trilogy might be coming out on DVD in the not too distant. Hoorah for the rather-good "Full Circle"! And the Marshmen! And Romana being bitten by a marshspider and turning all veiny and nasty! And procrastination aplenty! Hoorah for the very deliciously gothic "State of Decay"! And the Three Who Rule! And lots of vampire bats on strings attacking the Doc and Romana in the woods! And Paddy Kingsland's wonderful incidental musical scores in the aforementioned two stories! A semi-hoorah for "Warrior's Gate"! (A bit of a weird story in my book and not one of my all-time faves, but with some merits nonetheless...) And the lionine Tharils! And a nasty villain in Clifford Rose! And the touching departure of Romana and K9 Mark II! And last but not least, a less-than-hoorah for the debut of mathematical genius cum brat with crap pudding bowl haircut, Adric! Anyway I look forward to that one.

Mmmm. So much for not having the time to write.

My driving lessons are continuing to go okay, though not as frequent as I would like. I'm currently doing right hand turns. My steering needs some attention and the concept of the clutch is a new one to me, but I'm getting there.

Back inside the walls of Wentworth, Doreen's been packed off to the funny farm after twisted psychologist Peter Clements sends her round the bend by suggesting she might be a lesbian (like you do).

The winsome n' whiney Lynn Warner has finally departed the show, never to be seen again (rumour has it she later turns up as an alien in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" and some kind of princess in "Dynasty"... No lie ...)

New arrival and baby killer Bella Albrecht (above with fabulously flicked 70s barnet) has been drowned in a sink with Bea and Monnie being the prime suspects.

However it transpires that it's actually the devious Martha Eaves (aka "Big M", above with Vinegar Vera) who is the culprit. Martha then decides to go up on the prison roof and hold Vera hostage with a kitchen fork (like you do) but eventually gets caught, not before we see that Wentworth is in fact a TV station (hence the radars):

Who knew?! Or could it in fact be a tracking station to locate alien intelligences like the Pharos Project (well, there's precious little intelligence inside Wentworth, so they've got to find it somewhere ...)

Fabulously flouncy prison social worker Jean Vernon has allowed Noeline Burke's daughter Leanne (above, an even better example of white trash than her mum) to stay in Meg Jackson's house, to the latter's chagrin. Cue hilarious scenes of Leanne trashing the joint and lounging on Meg's sofa, smoking loadsa fags, drinking loadsa tinnies and listening to loadsa naff 70s wah-wah music (which also seems to get played on the radio in the Wentworth laundry rather a lot - God, but they had excellent taste back then).

And future full-time warder Colleen "Po Face" Powell has made her first fleeting appearance. Not sure about the John Lennon look though, Colleen, love.

Right. Best go then. Strange how I can suddenly start waxing lots of lyrical when I get onto a favourite subject, isn't it?!

Hope you're all having a good weekend me lovelies ...

OC xxx

The Great Exhibition of 2008

2008-09-06T19:25:00.003+01:00

Yaaaaay!! It's taken me a bit of time to report back on this one, but a few weeks back, my good friend from ooop North, Stephen, his lovely son Max and myself all made a trip to the Dr Who Exhibition which is currently showing at Earls Court. And a very good time was had by all.

It was so funny/strange taking Max with us. He's five years old and just getting into the whole Dr Who thing. There were lots of other kiddies there too who were equally relishing the experience, running around and shrieking with excitement on seeing their favourite monsters / creatures and all of it took me right back to my own childhood. It really doesn't seem so long ago when me and my friends in York, all die-hard Whovians, used to hold "group meetings" in which we got together to "rap" about DW and watch badly copied VHS tapes of old DW stories, which we'd paid through the neck to get hold of (we had a "contact" in Leeds who helped out for some extortionate price ... All I can say is THANK GOD for the advent of the DVD ...) I was also a member of the DWAS (that's Dr Who Appreciation Society to you plebs out there) and a regular subscriber to Dr Who Weekly (I still have a copy of the very first issue), closely followed by Dr Who Monthly. And erm, you are going to think me frightfully naughty, but me and a friend who shall remain nameless once wrote an "adult" version of the Colin Baker story "The Mark of the Rani", on his ZX Spectrum. This was in our later teens, you understand and we were, testosterone-infused not to say frustrated youngsters ... (Mind you it's probably no worse than this recent effort or this one, is it? Some things never change ... ) Regrettably "The Mark of the Randi" never got published.

Another highlight of my Who-infused childhood was a visit to the Dr Who Exhibition in Blackpool - which is still going strong. I think I went in about 1982 or 1983 and remember being terribly, terribly excited. I didn't get out of York very much and this felt like a trip to the USA or something similar. With hindsight I now realise Blackpool is probably one of cheapest and tackiest places one can visit but at the time it all felt sooo glamorous. And we went to the DW Exhibition and loved it. They had the regeneration scene from "Logopolis" on a looped video in the shop and I remember buying a china TARDIS money box and having my picture taken with my friend and his brother outside by the "TARDIS" entrance.

Anyway, flash forward to 2008 and Earl's Court. Here's a pictorial guide of what was on offer that day!

A taster of things to come!

Stephen and Max getting all excited in the foyer!

Doctors numero Nine and Ten invite you to the Exhibition ...

There were lots of good pictorial displays like the one on the right ... lots of good Who info and facts! It was probably more informative than the Blackpool Exhibition I'd say.

Saints preserve us! It's shop dummies coming to life! Could they be ... Autons?

Does the Henriks logo remind you of anything?

The David Tennant incarnation of the Doc outside the TARDIS. If you're wondering why his face is blank, there was a projector which "shone" a moving DT face onto the dummy .... unfortunately it didn't come out very well in the photo so he actually looks kind of sinister!

A David Tennant / Tenth Doc display.

Mewsters! It's a cat nun! Tin of kitty kat, anyone?

Lordy lordy! It's the wise and reputable Face of Boe! What a humongous head (oh, no comments please ... )

Me attempting to commune with the Face of Boe ... you can see the difference in head size ...

A bendy-wendy Slitheen! He (or she?) was positively huge! Big pincers too!

That famous model of Ben Ben from the first Slitheen story. Good model!

Aaaaah! It's that bitchy stretchy piece of flesh, Cassandra!

And one of the Trinnie / Susannah (not sure which it is) robots from "Bad Wolf"!

Uuuuughhh! The Empress of the Racnoss!!

An Ood waits patiently in a corridor. One of the best of the new Who monsters in my opinion ...

A Santa Claus robot! Rather silly staring eyes though.

This was an interesting display - showed you how they "made" an Oood mask. Who knew the spaghetti heads used blusher?

It's - that monster with the long name from "Love and Monsters"! Didn't look as good as on screen, I have to add. The jock strap didn't seem to ... hold very much.

Affirmative Master! Everyone's favourite doggie on show.

One of those scary looking clockwork dolls. Nice britches.

Enter ... the Cybermen!! Great display and great design. Kind of looks like they're on TOTP though.

No, no, NOOOOOOOO!! Don't delete me!!

Roger Lloyd-Pack, or should I say the Cyber-controller?

A solitary Cyber-bloke.

Rose's gorgeous costume from "Idiot's Lantern". Again she seems to be sans face ... but that's what happens when Maureen Lipman sucks the life out of ya ...

Couldn't resist a close up of Rose's lovely pink heels.

Remember those pictures the girl in "Fear Her" drew? The one of the absent Dad was rather horrible ...

Heaven help us! It's Wendy the Weeping Angel! I thought she was a testcard girl?

And no DW Exhibition would be complete without ... the Daleks! Enter the Black one ...

This was a cool bit of the Exhibition. You can't really see it from the photos (and the dry ice kind of obscures things) but three Daleks glided onto the "stage", threatened the audience as "unidentified intruders! and then shot them! Cue lots of laser beams ...

A Sontaran, recently returned to DW! Again didn't like the silly staring eyes though. Guess they couldn't exactly use real ones ...

One of those fishy aliens (again I can't be bothered to find out the name) who got all loved up with Martha in "The Dr's Daughter".

A scary scarecrow! Another one of my fave DW creations ...

A model of the Dalek Emperor.

Please do not touch the exhibits. Or you will be EXTERMINATED!!

The truck thing driven by Kylie of Minogia in "Voyage of the Damned". Remember?

Bannakaffalatta. Is he Darth Maul's baby brother?

Stephen and a Dalek. Actually you can't see, but Max is inside! They had a microphone inside in which you could imitate the Dalek voice - great fun! Naturally the place was filled with screeching kid's voices, all going "Exterminate!" again and again. I guess if you worked there it might drive you slightly mad ...

A saucy showgirl from the Daleks in Manhattan two-parter. Great outfit!

And later at home, Max tries out his newly purchased radio-controlled Dalek!

How exciting!! Oh to be young again ...

Well it was a good day in all. What Stephen and I both noticed (and as you'll probably have gathered from the photos above) was that the exhibition focussed almost entirely on NEW Dr Who monsters (apart from the obvious "crossover" aliens like Daleks and Cybermen) from the revived version of the series. There were no old ones, which was a slight pity. I guess the reasoning behind that is that a lot of the attendees will be too young to remember DW Mark One and far more au fait with Mark Two, hence the recent exhibits. Also the fact that if there had been monsters from Mark One PLUS Mark Two, a very big venue would have been needed! (And Earls Court is pretty big as it is - much more spacious than the Blackpool Exhibition for instance). But it's still great to know that the DW legacy lives on and that a whole new generation of children are being reared on the show, as I once was. Okay, what's the point in denying it. Going to these kind of things is really just an opportunity for my inner kid-like Whovian to manifest itself. Or, should I say, materialise!!

42 inches of pure pleasure

2008-09-06T13:48:00.004+01:00

Greetings ladies and gents.

I'm BACK again. Sorry about the hiatus, but it's been a busy one, particularly with this business of starting a brand new job. And I'm pleased to report that side of things seems to be going well. The college is a very nice environment indeed (gosh for a supposed English teacher I really do need to come up with some more imaginative vocabulary), my new work colleagues have been welcoming, supportive and fun, there's loads of excellent resources in the college, including some very impressive IT packages they use for both teachers and staff and they also use interactive whiteboards which are ultra cool! The one thing I haven't actually done yet after being nearly there for nearly two weeks is TEACH! So far it's been mainly student enrolment and preparing lessons, schemes of work etc. I also managed to get out of having a tutor group which was a pretty good respite as apparently there's a lot of extra work involved in that (a colleague of mine described me as "jammy" which isn't too far from the truth!) I feel like I've had to assimilate enough as it is, so I can't say I'm sorry about that particular development. Anyway lessons proper start next Tuesday so fingers crossed ... I am feeling a touch nervous I will admit. Pray for me, good people of the Bloggersphere!

I had a nice (that insipid word again) time in Weston Super Mare, although I didn't do very much atall, just relax at our friends and eat, drink and watch TV. Watched Goldmember, the third Austin Powers movie, and realised it wasn't actually very funny. Watched Batman Begins (as a precursor for when I eventually get to see the much-praised Dark Knight) which was much better than Goldmember (well, they are rather different different kinds of movies, yeah ...) (And oddly enough, last night I watched the 1960s Batman movie, which was hilarious for all the wrong reasons ... )

Also took a walk on Weston's pier, which, despite the recent fire, is at least partially still intact. On the way I encountered some strangely familiar creatures ...

So that's what eating too many hot dogs and chips does to you in Weston ...

Oh My GOD!! The Dalek Invasion of Weston! Could the evil pepperpots be the ones responsible for the fire on the pier? Okay, that was a little bit tasteless ...

Proof that I ain't scared of no goddam Dalek. Mind you, the barrier between us does kind of help to allay that fear...

But look at the wreck at the end of the pier above ... sad eh. Still at least the whole thing didn't burn down.

I'm still carrying on with the driving lessons, although they haven't been that regular. I must step up their regularity as I don't want to get out of touch and want the driving thing to start feeling more natural and instinctive! I just feel SO scared about going on a big, open, busy road. Oh just DO IT Simone! Okay, okay, I will... And Gustavo and I have purchased a flat screen TV!! Just like the one above. Cost rather a lot but we went for one of those "Buy now, pay in 6 months time" deals, so it should be alright. I have to say in some respects I wasn't bothered about getting one before, but now I've definitely seen the light. It looks and sounds amazing. Like having a mini cinema in your home. And in our cathedral-sized lounge I now perceive that purchasing a 42 incher (as it were) was a definite necessity. Prisoner Cell Block H has never looked better...

Talking of which ... I just CAN'T resist telling you about the latest developments on the Wentworth front ...

Any vacancies for a moustached clone in a women's prisoner, governor? Oh. So Freddie Mercury's filled the post already ...

Male moustached Deputy governor and sex god Jim Fletcher has arrived at Wentworth, a seemingly odd, not to mention, rather bad-tempered and dysfunctional sort of chap. However we soon find that not only has he split from his wife, she's also denied him access to their kids PLUS he's still traumatised by his experiences while serving as a soldier in Vietnam, leading to lots of tortured soliloquies and downing endless whiskeys in bars. Poor bugger, as Lizzie would say. Unfortunately the ladies what lunch at Wentworth aren't too enamoured with Jimbo from the outset, branding him "Fletch the Letch" i.e. a bit of a perv in general. However as Mr F stays in the programme for at least another 200 episodes, I'd wager he has a bit more dramatic mileage in him yet.

Warder Meg is dating resident prison Dr and sex-god Greg Miller, and having to suffer various mocking comments from prison inmates and staff alike in the process, not to mention dirty looks from ex girlfriend Karen Travers. The sultry Ms Travers has now been allowed to go on day release to university, whilst being wooed by hot-shot lawyer and sex god Steve Wilson, but that doesn't really go anywhere ... then in classic "Prisoner" (if not soap opera) style Steve's character vanishes into thin air never to be mentioned again ... ho-hum.

Meanwhile Queen Bea is back inside having been dobbed in to the police by a devious teenage girl - played by one of actress Val Lehman's own daughters no less - hope that's not her REAL persona - the rotten biiiiiiiiiitch!!

Classy Clara Goddard has been shipped off to another prison and whiney and winsome Lynn Warner is finally about to released from Wentworth (again!), both departures causing Wentworth's dopey dumpling, Doreen, much distress. Dor doesn't have much self-esteem you see and tends to cling on to others for comfort and support ... she even tries to frame Lynn for stealing pills from the prison dispensary, in order that her release gets delayed and she stays in prison longer to keep her company ... silly girl.

No Doreen, I don't have any kiwi and cinnamon facial scrub. This is the best on offer, you sneak! You drongo!!

And when Lynn finds out she's none too happy and gives Doreen the mud-pack treatment (and we're not talking Body Shop style ... )

Home and Awaaaaaay ... with you each daaaaaay .... Alf? Where are you? Oh! So the actor who plays you turns up in Prisoner three times does he? Well, I never did!

And Ailsa from Home and Away has also turned up as an inmate, with a secret stash of cash that everyone wants to get their hands on!

JOY!!

Have a fabulous weekend and week after, my lovelies ...

OC xx

Tom Cruise: Is he or isn't he?

2008-08-23T18:33:00.006+01:00

Answers on a Comment, please...

Hint: Remember that ridiculously OTT display of affection from The Cruiser re: Katie Holmes on Oprah Winfrey? Did the closet fag over-compensate too much??

Finito Bonito

2008-08-23T17:50:00.008+01:00

I have now officially finished my job at the University. Last Thursday lunch time in fact.

And I am sorry?

Am I f*ck.

I shall refrain from saying anything else overly negative but let's just say I'm glad that chapter in my life is now over and I'm moving onto something else. Very glad indeed.

Next Tuesday I start my new teaching job. Unfortunately I used up most of my leave in my last position so haven't been able to take a major break in between jobs, much as I would have liked to do that. However as I write this, I am currently in Weston Super-Mare, on a mini-holiday staying with some mates of mine and Gustavo, so that's something. Weather is not so great here but it's good to breathe some REAL air and chill a bit ... just been for a walk in the town centre and on the pier, which is only half its former glory now, due to the recent fire which burnt up many of its amusements (sob!)

I haven't had any more driving lessons yet. Last week's was cancelled but I'm due to have a double one next week. I've also started reading The Official DSA Theory Test. Woo-hooo! So many questions and so much remember, although I have to say, quite a lot is common sense, thankfully. Some of it doesn't seem to have any rhyme or reason to it though, for example, how exactly are you supposed to calculate the stopping/braking distance according to the speed you are driving at? Is there some kind of mathematical formulae for working this out? You can hardly whip out a calculator whilst you're driving can you? Anyone care to enlighten me?! Anyway thanks for all your good wishes re: the driving stuff, 'tis appreciated.

I've also been getting seriously embroiled in the world of Wentworth aka Prisoner Cell Block H. And my hubbie is slowly falling under the influence too. Just a PERFECT way to unwind at the end of the day! We're just finished viewing episode 35. Only 657 installments to go.

Society darling Clare Goddard (that's her on the right above) has been banged up in jail for fiddling funds from her employers and is actually proving a bit of a hit with the women, having got governor Erica (on the left, above) to agree to throw a birthday party for her and the ladies, with lots of yummy food. What Erica doesn't know is that Lizzie, Monica and co are brewing up loads of illicit booze and they all get nicely sozzled on it (there's a very funny scene with Lizzie and Doreen totally pished).

Meanwhile top dog Bea has gone on the run and is hiding out with former cell mate Val. The latter, it has to be said, is wearing one of the worst-looking wigs in history (it's got to be a wig as when Val first appeared in the show she was a brunette and now she's a bloody blonde!) Bea herself is forced to don a disguise to avoid detection, which includes a brown wig (above - somewhat nicer than Val's "dead cat" one though) and a skirt which resembles a table cloth. Yes, this being the late 1970s, high fashion reigns supreme in Prisoner - not in the SLIGHTEST bit tacky or camp atall. Toward the end of the show's run, things did calm down stylistically, but this is surely Prisoner at its apogee in terms of style and fashion. Just take a look at Meg's outfit below:

Blends in with the sofa perfectly doesn't it?

I almost forgot to mention the fabulously trashy Noeline Burke, who has just arrived in the show -an iconic character who I really should have listed in my recent post. She's an, erm, "interesting" looking character who hails from a family of petty thieves - who, unlike some crims, are all actually proud of their doings and see burgalry as a way of life! Jude Kuring who plays Noeline is brilliant in the role, and her character, surely constitutes an original CHAV, before the word ever entered popular usage...

Bliss!!!

Oh, can I also draw your attention to two rather cool blogs dedicated to actresses Patsy King (who played governor Erica Davidson) and Jude Kuring (Noeline). You can find them here and here! Lots of clippings, photos and fact about the ladies in question, and compiled by lovely fellow blogger Eva!

Have a good weekend.

OC xx

Done and dusted (kind of)

2008-08-15T17:25:00.002+01:00

Well, my first ever driving lesson is now done and dusted.

It actually felt incredibly strange to be sitting in the driving seat after nearly 40 years of car avoidance. Weeeeeiiiird!!

Fortunately my instructor seems like a nice, ordinary, down-to-earth chap (not like the psycho in Happy Go Lucky, thank the lord) and that made it easier. He started off taking me through all the functions of the car, gas pedal, brakes, clutch, hand brake etc. Actually seemed like rather a lot to remember.

And then after all the requisite explanations...

I MADE MY FIRST ATTEMPT AT DRIVING.

O.M.G. I felt SO nervous. How would I handle controlling this great hunk of metal that surrounded me? How would I manage to manoeuvre my way down the road without smashing into something or someone? I suddenly felt so responsible and the weight of it all was upon me...

Gawd. I am sounding like a bona fide drama queen aren't I (something I've NEVER done before...)

Anyway, I put my foot down on the clutch, changed into first gear, foot off the clutch, down on the gas pedal, turned the steering wheel to the right to pull away from the kerb (yes I forgot to indicate but there was nothing behind me, and it was my first time, right...?) then started to accelerate down the road. The steering wheel felt very strange and my instinct was to hold it straight, but this of course doesn't mean that the wheels were straight and I started to veer off to the other side of the road! Yikes! My instructor quickly grabbed the wheel and put me right. I drove a few hundred yards, pulled over to the left and parked...phew.

How strange it all was.

And my next lesson is next week!

I've been driving in my car (it's not quite a jaguar)

2008-08-14T09:31:00.007+01:00

O. M. G. Tonight, for the first time ever, I start driving lessons. (And that's O. M. G. as in Oh My God, not Oh M. G. , appropriate though that would be ...)

Ladies and gentlemen, it's Cheeser Confession time:

I have never driven a car in my LIFE.

But I figured (as someone approaching 40) it was high time I learnt. One of the deciding factors for me has been my new job, which geographically is not too far away from where I am living now - well, it's a good number of miles really, but the route by car is actually more direct than that taken by train or bus. Having said that, whilst I'm learning to drive I'll still have to get the train to work... I tried the bus on the day of my interview and it was a nightmare.

Of course I've already been privy to endless stories from various people all bemoaning the high costs of running a car - road tax, insurance, MOTs, parking permits, not to mention the high price of fuel - and how, consequently, it ain't worth it. Mmmm... Still, even if it does all prove rather too costly, I still reckon it's worth getting my licence - a skill they can't take away from you eh??

I do feel a bit nervous about driving on the road though, having never ever tried it. The prospect of being a motorist in London fills me with even more dread, given the often crazy, aggressive nature of some of the drivers and frequent disregard for the Highway code that goes on here. Having said that, I was a cyclist in the Big Smoke for a few years (until I got my bike nicked) something I thought I would never do, and which people often regarded as a brave thing indeed - and I survived that (only one nasty accident once near Kings Cross...) I guess that stood me in good stead. So, fingers, thumbs and all extremities are firmly crossed!

And I have some money sensibly stashed away should I choose to purchase my first car. So... Will it look like this:

Will I be driving a Mini Cooper and feeling super-duper?

Or will it be like this:

Meaning I will have to re-name myself Lady Penelope? (Then again, as attractive as the prospect of being chauffeur-driven is, it kind of defeats the object i.e. it won't be ME doing the driving...)

Or will it look like Sarah Jane's rather funky/retro two-seater that she uses to zip around, solving intergalactic invasions and mysteries? Oooooh, that would be very nice.

Nah. With my budget, my first car is far more likely to look like this:

Quite.

Meanwhile, what have been YOUR driving experiences? When did you first learn to drive? What was it like? Or maybe you can't drive atall and don't give a monkey's??

Wish me luck in my first driving experiences, my lovelies!

The Wentworth Comedy Show

2008-08-13T20:29:00.005+01:00

Okay, after all your comments about how glum n' grim the "Wild" women of Wentworth are looking, and the grimness of "Prisoner" in general, I really must prove that you're all TOTALLY WRONG about the show. The programme was in fact a saucy, silly, comic farce... And here's the evidence:

Governor Erica Davidson has never looked so fabulous sped up!!

The Cheeser's Choice: The Wild Women of Wentworth

2008-08-08T14:53:00.011+01:00

G'day! Some time back I did a "Cheeser's Choice" post on one of my favourite pieces of kitsch (I refuse to say "bad") TV - Prisoner: Cell Block H. And guess what - yours truly recently purchased the entire series (that's some 692 episodes) on DVD! They've brought out the whole thing in a whopping great boxset and, well, I'd come into a bit of money so couldn't resist splurging. My hubbie was horrified at my indulgence and yes, it WAS rather a lot of money but I don't do this sort of thing all the time...fair go, Mrs M!

Anyway last time I gave you the basic lowdown on the main aspects of the show but promised to return with some notes (NOTES! Ha ha - okay, ESSAY) on the leading ladies of Wentworth...so here goes. Incidentally, this time round I'm just going to tell you about the female prison characters...cos there's a whole lot to say about the Prison officers too, but that will come next time!

Beatrice Alice Smith

Or Queen Bea as she was also known. The original and (in my view) the best of the Top Dogs, superbly played by actress Val Lehman. Beatrice Alice Smith was a tough cookie and a no-nonsense lady, make no mistake. Originally a hairdresser, she gets put “inside” for murdering her husband’s mistress. Whilst inside, Bea’s daughter Debbie gets hooked on drugs and dies of a drugs overdose, a lot of which can be put down to her father’s neglect. When Bea gets out of prison and wastes no time in acquiring a gun from her friend, paying a visit to her husband and shooting him dead – one of the best scenes in the show. Go Bea! Consequently she develops a hatred of drugs and comes down hard on any of the women inside who are “using”.

But Bea’s toughness was often justified. If an Australian version of “Vindication of the Rights of Women” had been produced, Bea surely would have been the author. The outspoken ginger one always acted in the women’s best interests and was the first to see that the inmates got a fair deal, often liaising with Governor Erica Davidson or getting the women to go on strike, protest on the roof, refuse to obey an officer’s commands – whatever means were necessary. She also came down hard on those women prisoners who mistreated others. However she did have a softer side and could be a bit of a mother hen to the women as well.

Bea, Doreen and Lizzie are also firm friends and form a kind of triumvirate in the first part of the series. The close relationship and general banter between these three characters makes for great viewing. And some of Bea’s best storylines included her amnesia, her long-standing feud with warder Joan Ferguson (their scrap in a corridor whilst a fire rages through the prison is legendary), her going on the run in Sydney (disguised in an array of camp wigs and scarves) and the “Debbie’s ghost” plotline. See a forthcoming post on Best Prisoner Plots for more info…

Doreen Anderson nee Burns

Wentworth’s nice but dim inmate (the polite term would be "intellectually challenged") Dopey Doreen was a sweet if slightly tubby young woman, often to be seen clutching a teddy. She was also rather easily led and too much of a pushover at times. However in the very early episodes of “Prisoner” we see Doreen go on the run with fellow prisoner Frankie and after Frankie is shot, she returns to Wentworth bitter and twisted and trying to act like a Frankie clone, chucking her weight around the place. It doesn’t last long as Doreen is basically too nice.

Poor old Dor didn’t have much luck though and suffered from low self esteem – after marrying the spunk (that’s Australian terminology for “attractive man”) of her dreams, Kevin, he promptly buggers off when he finds out she’s pregnant by another fella (and it’s not really her fault as the daddy is a horrible old factory worker who’s been blackmailing her into having sex with him). A gutted Doreen tries to hang herself but fortunately is prevented just in time.

Although rather immature in some respects, over the years Doreen does gradually grow up, ditching the teddy bear that she carries around with her and learning to stand on her own two feet. Not long after the arrival of nasty new warder Joan Ferguson, Doreen is released (after being the first prisoner to officially suffer the indignity of one of Joan’s “body searches”) and later turns up in Sydney, where Bea has gone on the run from prison. Naturally they run into each other and it turns out that Doreen is now working in a clothes shop and living in a posh flat opposite Sydney harbour (VERY dez rez and expensive). Her final appearance comes a year or two later when she’s agreed to marry a foreign guy so he can get his visa. She doesn’t want to do it and in a series of funny “stunts” attempts to get herself put back into Wentworth e.g. getting arrested for shoplifting, dressing up as a prostitute….like you do. Needless to say it succeeds and it’s nice to see old Dor back inside for a few episodes before she finally bows out…for good this time.

Elizabeth Josephine Birdsworth aka Lizzie

Chain smoking, wrinkled old bat with a loud cackling laugh. Had a penchant for the “grog” aka alcohol and known to break into the Prisoner infirmary cupboard in order to steak bottles of meths (the best the prison had to offer when it came to booze). Also involved in beer-making scams which invariably went wrong. Lizze liked to play up her health as well and was always going on about “me ticker” – although on some occasions her complaints about her heart actually turned out to be genuine! Other classic Lizzie catchphrases (in her typical caterwauling voice) included: “Aaaaah, fair go!” “Bloody hell!!”, You rotten flaming mongrels!!” and “Bugger me gently!”

As you might have guessed, Lizzie definitely proved to be the comic relief of the prison (if not the programme) but her heart was in the right place and she usually looked out for the younger, more innocent inmates, like Doreen and later Pixie and Maxine.

And Lizzie’s crime? When the series opens, she has already served 20 years for poisoning four sheep shearers during her time working as a cook (although for some bizarre reason she is still allowed to work in the prison kitchen). It turns out that Lizzie is in fact innocent and didn't poison anyone, even though she believes she did. She is immediately released with the promise of compensation but finds it hard to cope, having become so climatised to life “on the inside” and missing her “mates”…

However much later there is a happy ending for Lizzie when she’s reunited with her long-lost family.

Frankie Doyle

One of Prisoner’s original characters and the show’s very first lesbian. Frankie was a dyke in the true sense of the term, a markedly masculine, short-haired, cigarette-smoking, gum-chewing, dungarees-wearing, butch-acting, trouble-making lesbian (I can’t think of any more hyphenated words to describe her but that’s more than enough). Frankie also vied with Bea Smith for the position of top dog, making for some great dramatic scenes (particularly when Frankie thinks Bea has left the prison for good but then ends up back inside, leading to more conflict…)

With her gravely voice and swaggering manner to boot, Frankie was a kind of less attractive female version of James Dean. Not too much of a stereotype then. And yet, like Joan “The Freak” Ferguson who appeared later on, Frankie became an icon to many. Actually that comparison is probably a little unfair, as unlike The Freak, Frankie wasn’t actually evil or corrupt, just a bit of loose canon and a frequent source of unrest within the walls of Wentworth. If someone said the wrong thing to Frankie, she was liable to upend the nearest bookcase in the rec room, or start chucking billiard balls at people. In only the second episode she instigates a riot amongst the prisoners, which results in prison psychiatrist Bill Jackson getting stabbed to death!

Yet Frankie’s volatile, aggressive nature stemmed from her basic sense of inadequacy and low self-esteem (God I’m make a good prison psychologist) not to mention her shame at being illiterate. When the sultry and well-educated Karen Travers arrives, she becomes Franky’s teacher, helping her to read and write. However Frankie wants more than just a teacher/pupil relationship with Karen…In fact she has a definite thing for the prettier, “femme” girls and also forms an attachment with the easily influenced Doreen. Later, Frankie and Dor break out of Wentworth and go on the run together, even dressing up as nuns to avoid detection. But when the police catch up with the Wentworth escapees, tragedy beckons…Frankie’s final defiant words: “Bloody bastards!” as the police shoot her down, are not forgotten and we cannot help but mourn the passing of this most interesting of misfits.

Jeanette Mary Brooks aka Mum

One of the prison’s most elderly inmates and rather genteel and kindly with it, Mary was like a surrogate mother to the prison women, hence the nickname "Mum". She takes new arrivals Lynn Warner and Karen Travers under her wing with some words of advice and wisdom. She’s also released from prison fairly early on, but her snobbish daughter Lorraine (played by none other than Madge from Neighbours) can’t stand the thought of her jailbird Mum coming to live with her and virtually puts her out on the street. The bitch! Poor old Mum has to go in a dilapidated old guest house but falls ill and Lorraine and her husband have to come and take her away. To make matters worse, Lorraine insists that Mum pretend to her granddaughter i.e. Lorraine’s daughter, that she is really her Aunt, so ashamed does she feel. It all gets too much and Mum runs away and gets arrested for shoplifting, so she can be put back “inside”.

Judy Bryant

Big, cuddly dyke and the second major lezzer character in Prisoner. Judy had a much warmer, caring personality than Frankie, even if she did start out as a bit of a hard case. For more on Jude, see here and scroll down to the “Prisoner” section…

Chrissie Latham

Classic tart with a heart, and a cockney in Aussieland to boot (well almost), well-played by Amanda Muggleton. Chrissie was always on the lookout for an attractive fella in order to ease the boredom of prison life and starts out trying it on with Dr Greg Miller, then Bill Jackson, Meg’s psychiatrist hubbie. When the latter doesn’t oblige she stabs him with a pair of scissors (like you do). She gets shipped off to another prison but returns later on, to the horror of Meg, who hoped she’d seen the back of her.

As befits her personal interests, Chrissie’s choice of career usually entailed making a dollar for lying on her back, which inevitably got her sent back to Wentworth. However, even prozzies are capable of reform and Chrissie later gives birth to a baby daughter, Elizabeth, who becomes the love of her life. Given her less than stable lifestyle however, she’s frequently involved in battles with social services to stop Elizabeth from being taken away from her. There’s also a good plotline when she gets involved with the new prison Dr, who is not all he seems…

Myra Desmond

The next major top dog after Bea Smith (well there was Minnie Donovan but she didn’t last long…) Some critics find Myra a bit of a bore – it’s true she didn’t quite have the mischief-making qualities of Bea – and was more of an earnest, “do the right thing” type but Anne Phelan who played her still did a fine job. Myra’s seriousness probably stemmed from her background working for the Prison Reform Group (PRG). Before she became a regular character we did in fact see her in a number of cameos, visiting Wentworth to assist with various reform programs. Ironically, much later she ends up behind bars herself after accidentally killing her abusive husband and soon assumes top dog status in Wentworth.

Sandra Louise Mason aka Pixie

Ditzy blonde beauty with a love of men and weddings – so much so that she gets married several times without divorcing any of her “previous” partners! Hence her arrest for bigamy and fraud and the gates of Wentworth soon beckoned…

Pixie was one of my favourite characters and a genuine “innocent” – an old-fashioned, decidedly romantic girl who believed in proper courtship between a man and a woman and definitely no sex before marriage – although the concept of divorce did seem to be beyond her! Excellently played by Judy McBurney, Pixie was another source of comic relief in the series. When she first arrives at Wentworth, she’s desperate to get out and stages a series of stunts to try and get herself transferred to a mental hospital (from which she plans to escape) – pretending to be Joan of Arc, dying her hair red and claiming that she was kidnapped by Martians, and so forth.

Much later she becomes the focus of Judy Bryant’s attentions, who writes a song about her – “Pixie’s Song”. At first finding it hard to comprehend how Judy feels about her, she eventually appears to come to some kind of understanding.

Pixie’s departure from the programme is one of the most horrible (and undeserved) things to happen to a character – a trio of male prisoners come to stay at Wentworth, and one of them starts making nasty advances towards Pixie…I won’t say any more.

Margo Gaffney

Bit-part prisoner with a mullet haircut who later graduated to proper character. A fly in the ointment for Bea, Margo was one of the first women to challenge Bea’s “top dog” status. Had a face like a baboon and an unpleasant manner, although she did “swap sides” quite often and wasn’t always nasty. When she was, she was trouble. A great villainess though and even got to demonstrate her singing prowess on occasion (Jane Clifton, who played her was a real life performer).

Nola Mackenzie

One of Wentworth’s most memorable and nastiest villains, played to perfection by actress Carole Skinner (although the character did possess a bit of an unflattering “80s rock star” hairstyle, prompting a friend of mine to comment that Nola resembled a member of Status Quo). Nola was on death row in Western Australia for murdering her husband and his friend, but managed to escape cross-country to the East where the death penalty wasn’t enforced. We first saw her escaping from a freight train, then going to hide out at Judy’s half-way house in a bad wig and calling herself Jean. However she soon gets banged up in Wentworth and her true identity is revealed. The authorities then decide to ship Nola back to WA but to avoid extradition she takes matters into her own hands, leading to one of the programme’s most chilling scenes. When Paddy Lawson wanders into the shower block, Nola drowns her in a sink, later insisting that she didn’t do it as revenge, but because Paddy was the first person to come along. Brutal! Her wish is granted and she becomes a permanent resident of Wentworth.

Nola isn’t very popular amongst the women to begin with and soon shows her unpleasant side, bashing up various women and bullying poor old Lizzie (referring to her as “birdbrain” - well, slightly truthful I suppose). She also incurs the wrath of Bea Smith by setting up a number of rackets in the prison, including drug dealing and wins many of the women over onto her side, then ousts Bea from her position as top dog. A disgusted Bea breaks out of Wentworth but later returns and the war with Nola continues. Eventually Bea wins back the support of the women but both officer Joan “The Freak” Ferguson and Nola decide they want to dispose of Bea permanently and join forces to come up with a cunning plan…Suffice to say all does not go according to plan and Nola gets her comeuppance in one of Prisoner’s most dramatic scenes! See my forthcoming post on Wentworth plotlines if you really want to know what happens to the evil Mrs Mackenzie…

Marie Winter

Another Wentworth baddie and fan favourite. We first encountered Marie at Barnhurst where Bea is temporarily transferred. She’s top dog there and doesn’t waste any time making Bea’s life a misery, doping her soup with magic mushrooms and heaving her. Marie is a bit of a nasty piece of work and loves to boss people around. With her loud voice, short white barnet and swaggering attitude, Marie would make a good dyke, except she isn’t.

Later on she gets transferred to…guess where? Wentworth, just as Bea is carted off to hospital for an operation. Taking advantage of her absence, Marie, Sandy Edwards and some of the other women orchestrate a full prison riot. Naughty! She also gets embroiled with the “mad” Dr Kate Peterson and there’s a great scene when Kate realises she’s going to be sharing a prison van with her and totally freaks out at the prospect, with a laughing Marie proclaiming: “G’day Doc! Looks like you and me are going to be making this trip together!”

Marie makes yet another return to Wentworth later on and…helps to organise another riot (surely a talent which should be listed on her CV). Highlights include her throwing plates at Judy Bryant: “You fat mongrel bitch, Bryant!” and then escaping from Wentworth by scaling the fence and dangling from a rapidly ascending helicopter! Make that Marie, stuntwoman extraordinaire!! (Actually it was a blow-up doll of her, but that’s beside the point). Rather an about turn to see Maggie Millar, who played the devious Marie, turning up years later in “Neighbours” as a female vicar!

Well, I reckon that's more than enough about the female inmates of Wentworth. You'll see I've left quite a lot of characters off the list, but then, one heck of a lot of ladies passed through the gates of the Aussie prison during its 692 episode run, and there just ain't enough room to consider all of them here, mate. However a few other favourite inmates I could have mentioned are Minnie Donovan, Cass Parker, Helen Smart...some deliciously diabolical villainesses like Dr Kate Peterson, Sonia Stevens, Reb Keen and Lou Kelly....as well as other top dogs like Sandie Edwards, Nora Flynn and Rita Connors (but the latter two just didn't cut the mustard for me like Bea did...) There were also some truly annoying characters like Gail Summers, Sally Dempster, Alison Page, Ettie Parslow...

Anyway, I'd love to know who all of YOUR favourite Wentworth inmates were, so if you want to redress the balance, drop us a line here, me old maties! Your blood's worth bottling!

Next time on Cheeser's Choice: The Warders of Wentworth - some straight...some bent...in more ways than one...

Jason Donovan: Is he or isn't he?

2008-08-07T13:31:00.009+01:00

Okay. Inspired by the conversational antics of Steve and Amanda, I have decided to create a new (fairly) regular post:

Is he, or isn't he?

Or -

Is she, or isn't she?

In other words, is this person a: raving queen/a rug-munching lezzer and just in a massive state of denial? Or, in the interests of "maintaining a public image" are they so far back in the closet they're practically in Narnia? (Quoted too many times but it still cracks me up).

Oh God. Do I REALLY have to spell it out for you? Okay, the issue I am addressing is:

ARE THEY REALLY GAY OR LESBIAN?

This week's focus: Jason "I'm not gaaaaay I'm heterosexual" Donovan. Remember the famous court case back in the 1990s when he sued The Face for even daring to hint at his sexuality? Honestly. One could argue that the Jase protested too much...

So...what do we all reckon? Is he or isn't he? And if he IS, what evidence can you bring to the bench, ladies and gentlemen of the jury? I am DYING to know, so get posting your thoughts PRONTO.

PS Thought you'd REALLY like the tasteful pic of Jase above. Only slightly less classy than his former partner Kylie below. And what could the bottle be hiding? It's fair dinkum. Or should that be dick-um?

WOW x 100!!

2008-07-31T13:11:00.001+01:00

Well, here I am AGAIN. Does this mean I'm becoming a full time as opposed to full time Cheeser? Not quite. But I'm getting there.

And - I am pleased to say Kylie in concert the other night was bloody magnificent!! Very good indeed. My laptop is currently in dock for repairs, otherwise I would have uploaded some photos I took on my digital camera to show you what she/it was like. Fortunately here's a few ones I nicked off the net in the meantime:

As said I'm going to write a proper review soon(ish) but highlights for me included:

The excellent Kylie costume changes (even if she was quite "covered up" she still looked very interesting - some great dominatrix outfits!)
Great moves from the dancers and so many different styles - ballroom dancing, disco...
Some brilliant backdrops on the screen behind the stage e.g. Kylie as geisha girl in a flowery garden; Kylie as a Japanese prostitute (? I think) walking down the street with Atari-type graphics; glitter balls and Saturday Night Fever style flashing squares...and so forth...
The different sets/styles utilised for "groups" of songs e.g. The "Copacabana" section with Kyles on a ship hanging out by a cocktail bar; the "American football" bit with lots of hunky footballer-dancers supporting Ms M and pom pom girls to boot; the "Russian ballroom" look leading into "On A Night Like This"...all highly creative!
The excellent and different interpretations of old tracks e.g. sampling "Spinning Around" with Cheryl Lynn's "Got To Be Real" - a masterstroke and on a par with Madonna's ingenious mash-up of "Music" and "Disco Inferno" (a particular favourite of mine). The acapella version of "Step Back In Time"...

All in all, damn good stuff from Mistress Minogue and certainly value for money -£50 as opposed to the £160 I splashed out previously for Madonna. Talking of Madge, Kylie's show did bear a certain resemblance to her's but was, in my view, equally entertaining and good!!

I was also very impressed with O2, having never visited the venue ever before. O2 as in the old Millenium Dome. It's bloody massive! And has far more there than Wembley Stadium or Arena - tons of bars and restaurants and room to walk around and all the better for that. Me and Gustavo had a very nice tapas meal and some sangrias before the show to get us in the mood...very nice!

What else. I have three weeks left in my current job before leaving for my new one and I can't wait to go!! Nuff said. Typically I've got tons of stuff to sort out before I go, so the stress is on at the moment. Grrrr!!

Re: my proposed blog-meet, thanks to those of you who responded and showed an interest! All we gotta do now is agree on a date and place. I didn't have as many people get back and say "YES!" as I would have liked though. What about my fellow faggot bloggers? Sorry, I mean the ones of homosexual persuasion. Only Mr Newplanet has shown an interest. What about the rest of you? (!) I also had another brainwave - to those of you who have taken up my offer, if it makes you feel better (and to also make up numbers), why not invite some of YOUR fellow blogging pals as well? Just a thought.

Now. I'm spinning around...get out of my way...

OC xx

Wow wow wow WOWWWWW!!

2008-07-29T13:21:00.003+01:00

Guess which Austraaaaaalian popstress I'm going to see in concert tonight??

Mmmm. Difficult one to answer.

Suffice to say I am very excited!!!

Full report forthcoming.

How very odd...and very sad

2008-07-29T13:08:00.006+01:00

Just over a year ago, Gustavo and I visited some good mates in Weston Super Mare and had a jolly jaunt around the pier. And here's the proof:

And this is what's just happened to it now:

I can't quite believe it.

Oddly enough we're visiting again in just a few weeks. It will be completely bizarre to see the contrast.

Apparently the cause of the conflagration was a chip pan catching fire. Okay, so the pier (and Weston in general) has a tacky reputation, but what a tragic thing to occur (on a par with the burning down of the West Pier in Brighton which is now but a charred and blackened hulk...)

What do we all reckon?

And from the Dancefloors of Skaro...

2008-07-19T00:06:00.007+01:00

May I present this:

And this:

I wish the second one was a bit longer!

Can we get together?

2008-07-18T23:14:00.002+01:00

As Madge once sung.

Okay, ages and ages ago I came up with an idea. Having participated in this whole blogging marlarkey for close on two years, I've got to know lots of delightful and different people from many walks of life. It's been wonderful, enlightening and enriching. I've so enjoyed finding out about others; their lives, their experiences, their likes, their dislikes, their coming and goings, and...the rest. Not to mention sharing similar tastes, stories and anecdotes.

And now... I wanna meet all of you. In person.

I kid you not.

Mmmm. Now I know, there's probably a fair few of you who aren't so keen.

It's funny, the whole virtual communication thing. As said, I feel like I've built up some great relationships and, even though I'm hundreds or thousands of miles apart from some of my fellow bloggers, I feel like I know many of you. Of course that's not the same as meeting someone in the flesh. And a bit like internet dating, there's always the risk that you might get on famously online, but when you meet that person for real, it's just not the same. I'm also aware that some bloggers want to retain their privacy and whilst perfectly happy to wax lyrical and bare all about themselves on their websites, they don't want to extend the boundaries any further than the virtual sphere. In other words, they want to maintain their privacy. Fair enough.

But I'd still love to meet up with you and get to know you better. It would be wonderful to have a good conversation, share a laugh, have a drink, and most importantly, I'm intrigued at the prospect of meeting the real YOU!

Well, I hope I haven't freaked you all out. I did speak to Steve some time back and he expressed an interest, which is good!

So. Any takers??

PS I think a meet-up in London might be best ... so yes, that cuts out rather a lot of my overseas counterparts ... unless of course you want to jump on a jet and visit the UK! I'm not stopping you, ladies and gents!

Love
OC xx

Journey's End

2008-07-18T21:57:00.005+01:00

Ooooooweeeeeeoooooo!! It’s Dr Whoooooooo!!

Except it isn’t any more, cos the last episode of Season Four has now been and gone!! * The Cheeser starts sobbing uncontrollably….* How am I (and many others for that matter) going to spend my Saturday evenings now?! And next year we don’t even get a proper series, just a few specials!! Oh well, better than nowt…

And have you heard the current rumours about how much the Beeb are offering David Tennant to stay on for Series Five? (Which would seem to indicate he might be departing some time next year….) (Oh and if you click on that link before there's a birrova spoiler at the end - just to let you know!)

Anyway. In the meantime, what were my thoughts on the second part of the Dalek “epic”? Yes, I'm late, I know... just for a change.

The Good

Just let me get me old fingers on that old Dalek joanna! All together now....any old iron, any old iron, any any any old iron...

Donna’s amazing transformation into half human half time lord. Okay, so it was a convenient plot device that the “temp from Chiswick” with a low self-image was finally imbued with the intelligence, know-how and wisdom to enable her to render the Daleks and Davros impotent, free the Dr and co and ultimately save the day, if not the entire universe (and rather similar to what happened to Rose’s transformation into an omnipotent, god-like being at the end of Season One, don’t we think?) However Catherine T played it very well and proved Rose’s remark that she really WAS the most important human in all creation. “Ooooh yes, I’ll just the render the thingamy whatsit thus doing the thingamy…..” (Sorry can’t remember the lines but you know what I mean). This in part was down to Catherine Tate’s brilliant rapid fire delivery and comic lines –The comedy really did work this time.

Look I know I've only got a one series contract, but you can't wipe my brain, Dr! No! No! No! I don't wanna appear in a West End play in the nude!

Donna’s “death”. Very poignantly done and tragic. Some of my fellow bloggers have said that it was horrible and diminishing. Yes it was, but then wasn't that the whole point? Having Donna forget all that happened to her since she’d met the Dr; all of her travels through time and space; all of her extra terrestrial encounters and so forth and then having her revert back to the self same unchallenged temp from Chiswick she was at the very start of “Runaway Bride” rendered her whole situation far more tragic than just being blown up, Adric style. And although the outcome for Donna was obviously negative, wasn’t it more realistic NOT to have an entirely happy ending sometimes? (Whereas on the bright side they did manage to defeat the Daleks and return the planets to their rightful place, which was something wasn't it? If Martha had had her way, the whole of planet Earth would have been nuked!!)

All together now. You put your left leg in...you put your left leg out...hang on. The TARDIS ain't no bike...

The companions all operating the TARDIS console. The console room had never been so crowded! But good to see the literal “hands on approach”.

Greetings Village People! Any vacancies for a decrepit old Kaled with a Gucci tunic and a disco fixation? Look! I can do the hand wave to perfection...

Julian Bleach as Davros. Great performance. There was only one bit which seemed non-Davros, when he threw his hands up in the air in a rather YMCA fashion (see above).

However (and this should really go in the “not so good” section below) they could have done more with him. Old Dave Ross was stuck in the vault for all of the two episodes. Couldn’t we have seen him out “in the field” (no, NOT with Phil Lynott and Gary Moore) supervising the Daleks’ takeover of the Earth/the Cosmos? Or iconically trundling across Westminster Bridge with his creations following him behind? Or shopping in H&M on Oxford Street for a trendy new tunic? Then again, we did get the bit about how the Daleks wanted to “contain” Davros, hence him being stuck in the “basement”. It was just a bit kind of limiting for old tortoise face.

Mistress! Master! Oh this is a bit boring being stuck in an attic...

The return of K9. Not quite how I predicted but good to see everyone’s favourite dog back all the same.

I liked the "helping to fly the Earth back home" bit and the fabulous accompanying choral music. Very uplifting and magnificent.

The okay but could have been done better

Who you gonna call? Chavbusters!!

Mickey and Jackie’s return. They didn’t do very much. Granted, they saved Sarah from destruction (though as an all-action adventure girl with her own series, I would have preferred to see Ms Smith doing this herself) but overall The Mickster and the Jackster were rather underused. And the rumours have it Mickey is back in the next series of Torchwood! Mmm. I’ve never been a fan of Mr Clarke’s acting in spite of his good intentions and directorial aspirations, but we’ll see….if we get lots of scenes of him showing off his naked bod like in Rise of the Cybermen, that might just help to compensate. Or a three-way with Jack and Ianto?

No! I don't want the camera to pan down any further! This is a kid's programme!

The second Dr being reborn in the TARDIS. This did just about work but was a tad too convenient e.g. having “another” Dr on hand to help Donna whilst the other Doc was held captive, and of course, ultimately partnering up with Rose, which is what she’d wanted all along. Quite nice to see DT topless too, a first I think. What might the rest of him have looked like, we wonder? One clue might be Billie Piper's nickname for him, which was "David Ten-inch". Anyone know why?

The not so good

The non-regeneration thing – a swizz and a cop out? We all knew the hand would, erm, come in handy, somehow didn’t we?

Haven't we been somewhere like this before? Deja vous or what...

Some of the companions felt under-used (in spite of the aforementioned TARDIS scene). And sticking The Dr, Rose and Jack in a very similar scene to "Parting of the Ways" wasn't very original.

Mmmm...mmmm....oh what's that? Oh. So, it's true what they say about your nickname, David...

After her butch-Sigourney-isms of Part One, Rose didn’t get much of a chance to flex her muscles in this episode. I would have loved to see her going hell for leather with her giant gun, blowing up Daleks left, right and centre, but no such luck. A waste. And whilst still on the subject of Ms Tyler, her presence was...well...kind of swamped by everything else that went on, and the Return to Bad Wolf Bay scene felt a bit too familiar. And yeah, getting a Dr Number 2 to snog made it nice n'easy...

The gappy-toothed one and the comedy doorman from Torchwood also didn’t do very much in Part Two. I suppose if they’d let them out of the hub and into the TARDIS all of the guest stars would have been squeezed up in the console room far too tightly, worse than a London bus during rush hour.

The rather convenient placing of the device machine thing (forgot what it was called) in the Vault that enabled Donna to defeat the Daleks and save the day. Would it really have been so easily accessible?

That's right, Ms Jones. Have the decency to look a little bit guilty...

The key thing – would Martha really be prepared to blow up the whole world? Her transformation into ruthless killer prepared to zap all of mankind for the greater good was slightly hard to stomach. Had her time with UNIT turned her into a hard-nosed military b*tch? It didn’t really wash.

Well it seems I have as many criticisms as positive things to say about the whole affair. Sure it had it's drawbacks. But it was still one hell of a lot better than the Master-Mess of 2007 and on the whole I enjoyed it lots.

And now we have to wait until 2010 till another full and proper series!! But there's a few specials to console us along the way.... until then, I shall probably dig out a few more of my DVDs...

Oh and like last year, I shall shortly post my Top 13 list of Season Four (thanks for the reminder, Tim) - erm, actually that doesn't make much sense as there were only 13 stories, but you know what I mean. All the stories in order of preference. Watch this space!

Back, back, BACK!!

2008-07-08T13:14:00.009+01:00

Am I actually capable of using a different phrase to herald my return?! Apparently not!

Well, here I am. After a few weeks of hecticness (doing extra work in addition to my full time job) I finally have a bit more time on my hands. A bit. Life STILL seems to be fairly full and bursting at the seams at present...

My first and biggest piece of news is....I GOT A NEW JOB!! I have been waiting to announce this one for some time (should I say I've been bursting? Maybe...) but now I can tell y'all officially. I am so pleased. It's a lecturing post at an FE college in South London, teaching English Language and Literature A Level and GCSE to 16+ students. It's only a maternity leave cover post so it's not forever, but it's much more in line with what I want to do job wise and will enable me to use my teaching skills and creativity, as well as being a more dynamic role overall (frankly, what I am doing now just doesn't allow for any of that). Anyways I start there at the end of August and have already given my notice in my current job. Can't wait!!

And here are the rest of today's news items...

I have started having Brazilian-Portuguese lessons. In a bid to keep up with my husband and also if we ever move to Brazil (well it's a slight possibility). Not an easy language to master what with all the masculine and feminine, different "to be" verbs etc but I am determined to try. I think I need to be more conscientious with my homework though...

Dr Who has finished!! At least until Christmas! And a pretty good finale it was too, perhaps not a true classic but infinitely more satisfying than the Master-mess of 2007. More on that one in a while...

The OC spotted some famous celebs on a train last Saturday. Well, C list ones to be precise. Miaow. But it was soooo weird and funny!! More on that one a bit later, too...

Fellow blogger Deemer is leaving us!! Noooo! In case you didn't know who he is, Deemer is a gay Pakistani American from Chicago (or thereabouts) and he's lovely. In some respects, he's a lot more sussed about the real world than me - well the world of Islam and American politics for instance - but he's also written a lot about pop culture and there our tastes and interests gell. Oh and gay culture too - lots of interesting debates have been had there. So I (and many of us) will really miss him. Wishing you all the best, Deemer!

Went to see Sex and the City (the movie, that is) a couple of weeks back and thoroughly enjoyed it, despite some negative reviews. Okay so it was quite predictable and not exactly world-shatteringly different, but the four actresses slipped back into their roles seamlessly - like meeting up with your best friends again. There was some excellent drama as well as weepy bits. Loved the Samantha suishi scenes and Carrie's ditching of her old wardrobe bit.

I haven't watched the latest series of Big Brother atall. All that I know is there was a nasty black girl from Croydon who got booted out for bullying (I pray I don't run into her as Croydon's only up the road from where I live) and a strange blind albino man (that's not meant to sound prejudiced in any way, but he IS strange). Has anyone else bothered with it? The impression I get is that they haven't.

And THAT is about IT for now, folks...laters!!

OC x

The Stolen Earth

2008-06-29T13:47:00.013+01:00

So much for the hiatus. I just CAN'T stay away. Well a little break from the old routine is always welcome (and I'm rather busy this particular weekend) besides which, I just felt compelled to write about last night's DW episode! Yep we've finally reached the season finale. Came round quickly hasn't it? It had a lot riding on it (which I've kind of mentioned before) but here are my thoughts...

THE GOOD BITS

It had a very "epic" feel to it as the previous season finales have done.

Rose, you have been refused access to Doctor Who facebook on the grounds of your weird and lispy accent...

The bringing together of all the past companions/characters on the whole worked very well, contrary to fears that it wouldn't, and everyone got a decent amount of screentime.

Nooooo!! Please, please, PLEASE don't show anyone that embarrassing title sequence from "K9 and Company" with me in legwarmers...I'm BEGGING you...

And I liked their various reactions to the invasion of the Daleks e.g. Sarah Jane's terror-struck expression and tears. Well, her and those pesky pepperpots go back a long way, so it was understandable...

And then there were three...until Torchwood Season Three that is...

Having the Torchwood gang in there was a definite coup and I hope they get to properly hook up with the other DW characters later on. The dynamics could be very interesting. Gwen and Donna having a fishwife scrap, anyone?

Well at least I've been in a good few DW episodes...well, it's been fun, boys...Back to the RSC for me, then...Any openings for a corpse with a posh accent?

Great to see Penelope Wilton back as Harriet Jones in a touching cameo and appropriate that she was trying to "make" amends by getting all the major characters to team up and contact the Dr. The "Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister" bit though slightly overplayed was funny stuff. But is this the true end for Harriet? And was she really a "goodie" or is something more sinister going on?

He's BACK and he's menacing! And doesn't have much body left under his tunic! Yuk!!

The resurrection of Davros!! Great performance from Julian Bleach which (so far) is more reminiscent of Michael Wisher than Terry Malloy (I won't even mention David Gooderson). A nice build up of menace with Davros "shrouded in shadows" and he looked good (or should that be bad?) when unveiled. Hope he'll live up to his promise in Part Two.

No, I HAVEN'T fallen out of a bargain bucket of KFC! Exterminate!!

Dalek Caan - now looking rather worse for wear, the poor love, and coming out with all manner of weird comments. But very creepy in his weirdness all the same, a kind of warped Dalek Messiah (well the same could be said for Davros really, couldn't it?)

Black Dalek? Pah. Dalek Caan?? Double pah! Davros?? WHATEVER. I'm better than all of you, nah nah nah!

The Red Dalek was cool. I heard rumours that he was really a human in disguise, but we'll see. Hope he gets a good face-off with his opponents in Part Two.

Okay! Okay! I WILL run down the road in a pair of lurid pink legwarmers!! Just don't kill me...I have a contract for Sarah Jane Adventures series two, after all...

Liz Sladen as Sarah - as good as ever!! Plays the part with such conviction and believability. How will she escape getting exterminated in her car? (I have a strong suspicion that K9 will pop up in the back and zap 'em? Or, maybe Sarah will strip off and shake her bejuvlies at the metal monsters, thus causing them to go into paroxysms of ecstasy? "My vision is impaired, I cannot see...". Erm, yes. That was a TAD rude). Anyway I hope she gets a reunion with Davros - would be highly fitting after, erm, some 33 years?? Perhaps they can catch up with a cup of nescafe and some custard creams!

Sorry, Noble family members, just playing a quick game of Space Invaders...it's good practise you know...

Billie Piper as Rose. Loved her "back off or I'll shoot you with my enormous Terminator-style weapon" bit to the robbers in the shop scene. Very Sigourney Weaver/Linda Hamilton. For a former shop girl she's come a LONG way. And her reactions when she couldn't contact the Doc on the PC were touching. As for the reunion bit with the Doc - very nicely done, but nipped in the bud of course! (Though how the hell could Donna tell it was Rose from so far-off?)

Not again...

And finally...the shock regeneration of the Doctor!! Is he really going to regenerate?? Is this the end for David Tennant??? It can't be! There have already done reports on the filming of the forthcoming Xmas episode and from what I can remember, David T was involved... anyone know any more about this than me??

You mean...??! I've had physical relations with an actual rhino??

Nice to see the Judoon back, if only for a brief cameo.

THE NOT-SO GOOD BITS

What's Lady Bracknell doing in outer space?

Forgive me for sounding thick, but what was the POINT of the shadow proclamation scenes?

Rather a lot of Daleks...hope they've paid their congestion charge...

The return of the Daleks yet again, wasn't handled with any kind of fanfare or surprise, highlighting how over-used they have now become (in spite of my comments before about them looking good, with some new "aspects"). They are rapidly turning into formulaic monsters and this isn't a good thing. Time to lay them to rest once and for all after this story, methinks.

The explanation as to why a massive new army of Daleks and a Dalek fleet had sprung into existence, after the previous whittling down of their race to ONE i.e. Dalek Caan, was done in a slightly glib fashion - surely more exposition/a decent flashback, rather than a few hasty comments, would have added more credence to the whole thing?

The revelation (even though we all knew) that Davros was back would have been better saved until the very end of the episode I reckon - along with the regeneration bit it would have made a great "double whammy" cliffhanger!

Has he been eating too many pies? Or swallowed some hamsters?

Ianto's rather tubby face. Had the comedy doorman-cum-stalker-of-Jack been eating too many pies? Perhaps it was the grief of losing Tosh and Owen that caused him to stuff his face...

Any openings for a former drag queen in Doctor Who? Or even Torchwood?

The slightly silly celebrity cameos at the beginning e.g. Paul O'Grady. Now obligatory in every season finale but perhaps we could have done without it?

No, I am NOT married to Harriet Makepeace in real life! Now ZIP it, Dr Jones!!

Michael "Dempsey" Brandon's rather hammy performance as UNIT General whats-his-face. Personally I would have preferred to have seen Colonel Mace back again, he had a certain charm in spite of his blandness...Seems there isn't much continuity with the UNIT characters these days...oh for the return of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart...

The planets sweet

The moving all the planets across the cosmos thing (hence the episode title). What the hell was going on with that? How did the Daleks find the technology? Okay, I'm being churlish as I'm sure we'll get an explanation for all this in the next episode.

And that, groovesters, is about it! On the whole I thought "The Stolen Earth" was fabulous, blockbusting, emotional and exciting fare. I hope you all enjoyed it too. Would love to know your thoughts on episode too, so get posting a comment NOW, or you will be....well, you know what.

Byeeeeeeeeee!!

The gang's all here...

2008-06-25T13:50:00.001+01:00

Okay, I lied. I couldn't resist coming out of hibernation (temporarily at least...) to post this rather splendid pic of the ensemble cast from the forthcoming DW season finale, which kicks off this Saturday:

Great stuff eh?! (Click on the pic if you want to see a larger version). One can't help wondering what they're all looking so scared by. Is it RTD with his clothes off? Answers on a comment please.

From left to right, we have:

Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen); Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke); Jackie Tyler (Camille Coduri); Rose Tyler (Billie Piper); The Doctor (David Tennant); Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman), Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) and Donna Noble (Catherine Tate)! Woh! All of whom will be present in the last two episodes...and that's not including a few other returning personages, such as former Prime Minister Harriet Jones (who's rumoured to have something nasty happen to her - is this divine retribution for her blowing up the sycorax spaceship?), K9 (trusty metal mutt with a long back story and a long laser gun), Luke Smith (Sarah's adopted alien "son"), Gwen Cooper (gappy-toothed Torchwood member), Ianto ("comedy" doorman and Torchwood member)...and that doesn't include an old villain with a strong connection to the Daleks...

Which surely leaves us to ask - how the hell are they going to fit so many characters into two episodes? Mind you, it's been confirmed that the second episode is one hour and five minutes long, so gives us a little more time...There's already been a few trailers like this one and this one which all look very epic and dramatic.

I must admit I AM excited. I just hope they can carry it off and it's not a repeat of last year's Master-finale-fiasco. Crossed fingers!!

The Queen is BACK (Donna Summer that is)

2008-06-21T19:10:00.008+01:00

Hello! Hello! Hello! Yes it's your part-time pal Cheeser here again. Once again, there's been a bit of a hiatus from moi...just for a change. But (here it comes) I have been rather busy of late...At present I'm doing some extra "work" in addition to my day job and it's taking up much of my time...life's chocca! Plus last week there was a VERY interesting development which I shall share with you soon, once I have official confirmation of things...let's just say that I'm feeling very happy and smug at the moment.

What else? Firstly a mega, massive THANK YOU to those of you (i.e. all of you as far as I am aware) that responded to my Top 10 albums tag. Well done, boys and girls! I was impressed with the breadth, depth and length of your, erm, posts (no cheeky comments, purlease, that's strictly a Cheeser prerogative). Seriously, I loved reading about all your fave musical raves! And many of you listed exactly the kind of things I would have expected. Unfortunately I still haven't responded to all of your postings yet! (That's what happens when you tag a lot of people and ask them to write about 10 albums I suppose - it makes for a lot of reading - am I making a rod for my own back?!) But once again, enlightening stuff and thanks!

Doctor Who continues to thrill, excite and delight. Steven Moffat's two parter was probably the best of the season yet and proof that his appointment to the post of Exec Producer was indeed a wise move. There's something about this writing style that's wonderfully unorthodox and different which bodes well for the future. The whole library-saving-people-in-a-giant-PC concept was well-executed and clever.

Shall I tell you a secret, sweetie...? I don't just have corkscrew hair on my head...

Waaaaay too much information, Professor. Still at least you didn't tell me I was once Mr Moll Flanders...I'm just not the bodice-ripping type...

Alex Kingston was intelligent, sultry and fab as Professor River Song. The whole "previous relationship with the Doc in the Doc's future" thing (shades of "The Time Traveller's Wife") was intriguingly done and by the end we were still none the wiser as to exactly what her involvement with the Doc was (although husband and wife is a good guess). I do hope she comes back for a reappearance and further exposition. Otherwise it's just all toooo frustrating.

Mmm, maybe you're overdoing the whole "goth chick" thing just a bit, love...

The "Donna in the Matrix" plotline of part two was also a welcome and an unexpected surprise, eerily done and proving Catherine T's acting abilities even more as well as taking the character of Donna down new avenues (married and with kids). The bit when she screams when her kids "disappear" was very well done and the scenes with "woman in black" Ms Evangelista (was she related to Linda?) convincingly creepy.

Last week's "Midnight" was one of RTD's better offerings and I really enjoyed this one too. It was obviously low budget and a bit of a "filler" episode, not to mention "Donna-lite" as opposed to "Doctor-lite" (is the latter a new concept then? Shades of "The Deadly Assassin" with the Doc going it alone!) but as psychological dramas go, it was very well done and proof that a lot can be achieved with even limited resources (i.e. a story taking place largely on just one set). The whole possession thing was marvelously creepy - who would have thought that so much nastiness could come out of two people just staring at one another and repeating each other's words??

I'm weird! I'm scary! I'm stary (not sure if the latter is a proper word...)

Lesley Sharp was a nasty lady with her staring eyes and weird manner, and well supported by the rest of the class, who were all in suitable "Disaster movie panic" mode.

Biancaaaaaaa!!! Oh, sorry. Wrong programme.

Lindsey Coulson, who I always thought was brilliant as Carol Jackson in Eastenders was a bit shrewish and whiny though.

Nothing wrong with being a ginga, darlin'. I was married to one once, you know....

And tonight we see the return of...The Pipester!! The story sounds likes it's got an interesting angle (what would have happened to Donna if she hadn't met the Doc) and apparently Ms Tate's best performance yet...we shall see. After which we get the season finale...it's come round quick. There's already been a mass of spoilers and I'm not going to reveal what they are here. You only have to go onto a DW website to find out...or The Sun's (who recently blew the gaff re: pics of returning monsters...) Suffice to say it all looks exciting but I hope to god it's a better offering than Season Three's "camp Master" conclusion...please, please, PLEASE!!

And on the music front...of late I have mostly been listening to:
Cut Copy - Aussie band with an 80s retro fixation, and their latest album, In Ghost Colours, is rather excellent...
Donna Summer's new album, Crayons, which is a magnificent return to form after a mere 17 year hiatus. The Queen is BACK!! Which, coincidentally, is the name of one of the tracks...more on her later...

Cyndi Lauper's new one in which the caterwauling Cyndi has gone all dancey a la Madonna! Saints preserve us! But it works and it's rather good. Thanks to Alan for giving me the lowdown on her...

Well, that'll do for now. I shall return in a few weeks...Ciao for now my lovelies and take care...

OC xxx

The Cheeser's Choice: My Top 10 Favourite Albums

2008-06-03T14:26:00.023+01:00

Music was my first love and it will be my last,
Music of the future and music of the past.
To live without my music would be impossible to do,
In this world of troubles, my music pulls me through.

So sung John Miles in his simultaneously pompous and thrilling hit “Music Was My First Love”. And never a truer word has been spoken. For I too share the very same philosophy as he. And I’m willing to bet many of you out there feel the same. I’ve always been a big fan of…I was going to say oral, but perhaps “audio” would be slightly more appropriate. My musical tastes have always been fairly eclectic, although I guess I’ve never been much of a rock or heavy metal fan.

So under the banner of another “Cheeser’s Choice” post, I wanted to share with you some of my favourite artistes. Or to be precise, my top 10 musical albums. Whittling them down to a mere 10 has been bloody hard actually. There’s lots of others that I love too (hence the shorter, "Bubbling Under" list at the end) and of course, one’s tastes can shift and change over different periods…anyway I hope you enjoy. As per usual I tried to make this relatively short, but for me that’s usually nigh on impossible, so it’s pointless me trying to explain my way out of that one. And as I’ve always said, when you’re waxing lyrical on your favourite topic, it’s kind of difficult to be succinct….Anyway fasten your seatbelts, pop pickers, as without further ado, here comes Album Numero One…

1. Hounds of Love - Kate Bush

As I once said on a post on “Army Dreamers”, I used to seriously rip the p*ss out of Muff, I mean, Kate Bush. With her vocal affectations (Wowwww!!), crazy dance movements and so forth it wasn’t particularly cool to like her. Until the arrival of "Hounds of Love", that is. Kate’s 1985 come-back single "Running Up That Hill" really grabbed my attention with its pounding, percussive rhythms and intriguing lyric about making a deal with God. After hearing it, I thought I'd check out the album and I wasn't disappointed. By this stage Kate's voice had really matured, managing to sound sensitive, child-like, gusty and sexy in equal measures. Moreover, there are some excellent tracks that meld good melodies with unusual production. Kate’s earlier albums were much more simplistic – piano and guitar affairs - but by the mid 1980s she was being a lot more experimental and adventurous, using synthesisers, drum machines, string and brass sections, vocal effects and a string of other techniques to enrich her repertoire.

Ms Bush circa 1980s looking somewhat imperious and haughty but gorgeous nonetheless...

After the introductory “Running”, comes title track “Hounds” with a great bang-bang beat, stirring strings and a belting vocal: “When I was child, running in the night, afraid of what might be…” And some hilarious “oww oww” backing vocals which sound like dogs but fortunately don’t ruin the effect. A mini-epic. “The Big Sky” follows, a rock and roll stomper with another great vocal from Kate. It’s a bit of a one-note song but engaging and lively nevertheless. "Mother Stands For Comfort" is a gentle ballad undercut by breaking glass sound effects. And the final track on Side One (as it was back in the days of vinyl) is one of KB’s best, “Cloudbusting”, all about a professor who invents a rain machine and his relationship with his daughter. Lovely strings, pounding percussion and a passionate vocal from Kate: “Every time it rains, you’re here in my head, like your sun’s coming out. Ohhhh, I just know that something good is going to happen…” The track builds to an amazing crescendo as the drums and beats grow louder, reaching a euphoric conclusion with a cute steam train effect to round it all off. I also loved the accompanying video with Donald Sutherland as the Professor and Kate in spiky wig and dungarees as his son! And did you know that “Cloudbusting” was sampled by the dance act Utah Saints? It was wiiiiicked!

The "modelling bits of a hedge" look. Naturally Kate pulls it off with aplomb.

Even more intriguing is the “Side 2" of “Hounds”, entitled "The Ninth Wave" a conceptual piece all about a girl drowning in the water, with lots of sound effects and more weirdness. Yes, sounds VERY 1970s prog rock I know, but fortunately La Bush does it much better than groups like Marillion and Yes (I’ll be having fans up in arms now I expect…) Take “Waking the Witch” for example – it starts with lots of voices in a variety of accents: “Wake up love!” “Wake up child, pay attention!” invoking a kind of having dreaming/waking state as the child comes out of sleep. Then, a sinister voice like something out of a child’s nightmare: “You won’t burn! You won’t bleed!”…” But it all works.

KB today. Nice polka dot number and she holds up pretty well...

Even if you’re not a major Kate fan I’d strongly urge you to listen to “Hounds”. Ms Bush is a highly original, creative, theatrical, literate individual, in a niche of her own and all of these things are part of her charm. And getting into Kate got me interested in a whole lot of other female singer-songwriter types like Joni Mitchell and Judi Tzuke, all of decidedly hippy persuasions.

2. Dare - The Human League

This was one of the first ever albums I possessed. I got it for my 12th birthday I think. It’s a classic of the 1980s, awash with synthesisers and computerised sounds. And although it sounds rather dated and stark now with its Bontempi/ZX Spectrum style production, “Dare” still endures, managing to possess a freshness of its own. And it’s also very danceable.

The League around the 1980s. Dig Phil's fringe!

Over time The Human League have been much derided for their plink-plonk synthesiser sound and ropey backing vocalists, Susanne Sulley and Joanne Catherall. But that’s part of the appeal. The fact of the matter is, the League’s music is far better than a lot of people have given them credit for. They’ve produced some of the best pop music in history. Their last offering “Secrets” was a brilliant but cruelly ignored piece of electronica. Phil Oakey was, and remains, a brooding lead vocalist and sooo deep (even if he doesn’t always quite hit the right notes), take sample lyric from “Love Action” for example: “I believe, I believe what the old man says, Even though I know there’s no law above, I believe in you, I believe in me, And do you know I believe in love?”

“Dare” also sported a striking white album cover (see above) with “eye shots” of the group. Positively iconic. And what about those era-defining New Romantic haircuts? Phil Oakey’s lop-sided, asymmetric fringe was a force to be reckoned with. AND he was a guy who wore make-up, quite revolutionary in those days. I even remember a girl from my school had exactly the same hairstyle as Mr Oakey and she was the talk of the playground. In terms of fashion The League were on the cutting edge.

As for the album itself, "Love Action" and "Don't You Want Me" are undisputed pop classics, the latter with its universally known lyric: “You were working as a waitress in a cocktail bar, when I met you.” Great concept too – about a guy who dates a girl and “remakes” her into a star, then finds she’s no longer interested in him (the trappings of fame, eh?) “Don’t” also utilises the (then) unusual song structure of the guy singing verse one and the girl verse two, as a kind of rejoinder to his comments. Other standout tracks? "Do or Die" is brilliant (featuring some percussive effects that sound like someone farting which still make me giggle); “I Am The Law” has a doomy, foreboding feel with its slow tempo and striking synth effects and makes great use of Phil Oakey’s authoritative vocals – “You know I am no stranger, I know rules are a bore, But just to keep you from danger, I am the law!” and "Seconds" is creepy (all about the assassination of JFK) - "It took seconds of your time to take his life, It took SECONDS!!"

For me, the League laid the foundations of 80s synth pop, a genre I still love to this day.

The League today. Are they copying ABBA with their profile shots?

Many argue that this album was never bettered and indeed the follow-up, “Hysteria”, whilst generally okay, didn’t really come up to scratch. That’s what happens when you create a pop classic - you set yourself up for a fall…

3. Destroy Rock and Roll - Mylo

Absolutely bloody marvellous. I was listening to “Destroy” on my iPod recently just to remind myself how good it is.

Mylo in action. Quite a burly fella isn't he?

Mylo (real name Myles MacInnes, born on the Isle of Skye) is a bit of a musical genius. “Destroy” was released in 2004 when he was only 26 years old and he recorded the entire thing on a computer in his bedroom! The first time I heard “Destroy” I was captivated. Cutting edge dance and electronica with a generous helping of sampling is probably the best way to describe it. And in spite of the fact that he’s employed a heavy dose of sampling, drawing on lots of recognisable tracks from the past, young Mylo has created something truly unique, fresh and original.

It kicks off with the wonderfully warm, mellifluous “Valley of the Dolls”, which samples a groovy vocal bit from the soundtrack of the movie of the same name. It’s lovely to listen to, with the vocal fading in and out “phased” style and the whole thing building in intensity.

Then we’re in different, slower territory with “Sunworshipper”, which has a languid, looped synthesiser hook and a quirky sampled bit: “Well, to solve all my problems and get out of drugs, I’d had enough of that, I’d had the college, I’d had the earning the money and the material trip, I just decided I was going to find a new way of life, and so I took off on my bicycle”. Yeaaaah man.

Subsequent tracks veer between up tempo dance and slower numbers, all using electronic effects, computer / synthesiser hooks and sampling. There’s many gems across the album. “In Your Arms” has a tempo that would be perfect for any aerobics class, sampling a lyric from “Waiting For A Star To Fall” and the synthesiser backing from Kim Carnes’ “Bette Davis’ Eyes”!! But it works brilliantly, creating an exuberance and energy that’s hard to resist. I also really like “Guilty of Love” (which employs the backing track from Prince’s “Kiss” and a kind of mad, building strings type effect – I just CAN’T think how else to describe it); “Drop The Pressure” an electronic danceathon with a vocoder effect (also released as a clever mash-up with Miami Sound Machine’s “Dr Beat”); “Zenophile” a gentle but danceable little number and the closer “Emotion 98.6”. Old hippie Judi Tzuke’s former hit “Stay With Me Till Dawn” even gets sampled somewhere along the line.

I’m really looking forward to Mylo’s next release, although of course, he’s got the “Difficult Second Album” syndrome to contend with…

4. The Best of Chic/Sister Sledge

I think it was listening to this lot that really helped to get me into 70s / 80s disco, soul and funk, genres which I still love to this day. I remember picking up a vinyl copy of this album in a second hand record shop in York and liking it immediately. And listening to this album made me realise what truly brilliant songwriters and musicians Bernard Edwards and Nile Rogers (the core of Chic) were. The excellent guitar hooks and funky bass bits. The strings and melodic hooks. The lay-dees on vocals - whilst not the most memorable of singers, they still managed to contribute to the whole air of sophistication and glamour that Chic projected. This was disco for the rich – as exemplified by the cover of their “C’est Chic” album:

I suppose there was an inherent snobbery and elitism in Chic with their sometimes emphasis on high living and exclusivity.

But in terms of their musical style, there's something about them which still sounds fresh and exciting and cool today. As I mentioned before, the cool bass lines and guitar riffs surely have a lot to do with it, producing a sound which is quite sparse yet elegant and somehow timeless. They also employ strings a lot - a disco hallmark – which work to give Chic’s songs that “classy” veneer. "My Forbidden Lover". "My Feet Keep Dancing." "I Want Your Love" are all excellent tracks.

The material that Chic produced for Sister Sledge was pretty damn marvellous too - "Lost In Music" has a timeless, tragic-disco quality to it. "He's The Greatest Dancer" is fab and has some of my favourite ever lyrics - okay they’re a bit laughable, but hey, here goes:

One night in a disco
On the outskirts of ‘Frisco
I was cruising, with my favourite gang (was this a woman singing or a gay man?)

The place was so boring
Filled with out of towners touring
I knew that it wasn’t my thing (than?? Honey!)

I really wasn’t caring
But I felt my eyes staring
At a guy who stuck out in the crowd (mmm-mmm!)
He had the kind of body
That would shame Adonis
And a face that would make any man proud… (lucky him!)

I wonder why? He’s the greatest dancer…

etc...

The second verse is even better:

The champion of dance His moves will put you in a trance
And he never leaves the disco alone (Sounds rather like me)
Arrogance but not conceit (On the other hand…)
As a man he’s complete (No, NO, it IS me!!)
My crème de la crème (Pardon??)
Please take me home (Something I was ALWAYS asked)

He wears the finest clothes
The best designers heaven knows
Ooooh, from his head down to his toes

Haulston, Gucci Pia rucci
He looks like a still
That man is dressed to kill… (Ooooerrr!)

WHAT a stud. Wouldn’t mind meeting him. By the way in case you hadn’t guessed, the bits in brackets are NOT the original lyrics…

And of course there was the Chic-produced “We Are Family” – a universal anthem if ever there was one, which still sounds fresh today and a guaranteed floor-filler.

Chic also wrote "Why" for Carly Simon which made her trendy and danceable! I would have loved to have seen the results if they’d done a whole album for her – shame that never saw the light of day.

5. Bad Girls - Donna Summer

Or any of Donna’s other 1970s albums produced by Giorgio Moroder for that matter. "Bad Girls" is one of Ms Summer's finest accomplishments though - a double album of epic disco proportions with a non-stop beat. Well that's not strictly true as there are a few pauses between tracks and side three is all ballads, but the pace rarely lets up.

Ms Summer resplendent in feathers...and erm, not that I'm one for rudeness, but it looks suspiciously to me as though she's sans underwear...

This is Donna la Diva at the height of her powers and the zenith of her career, singing with power and passion and backed up by sassy, soulful production that really makes you wanna jump out of your chair and shake your disco booty. Almost every track is of a high calibre by Miss Summer standards and she's doing what she then did best: knocking out great dance tunes with strong and emotive vocals on the theme of love and relationships. There's excellent musicianship on this LP too; Georgio Moroder, Pete Bellotte and Harold Faltermeyer all wrote and produced the album and it's obvious they work well with Donna. We get lots of great guitar, keyboards and uplifting brass as an accompaniment to Donna's powerful voice, helping make virtually every track on the album a winner.

Donna once dueted with another diva of the high octane vocals, Barbra Streisand!! Not that their number appears on Bad Girls, I just thought I'd mention it...But Matty will be especially pleased by this piccie, I'm sure...

The singles, “Hot Stuff” and “Bad Girls” are already well known and get things off to a rousing start and there’s plenty more where that came from. Some of my personal faves are “Dim all the lights” and “Journey to the centre of your heart”. The former starts off slowly then builds to a dance beat with Donna holding a single note effortlessly. “Journey” has some saucy sax (the instrument that is) and zappy synthesiser effects. I love all the lyrics about her wanting to journey “cross the borders of your mind”. Cosmic, man. "Lucky" is one of the truly amusing tracks on the album - even if this wasn't intentional – all about a girl called Lucky giving into the charms of a mysterious stranger: "Lucky comes easy, Lucky's not shy, And if you're Lucky, You'll go for a ride" (!!) Draw your own conclusions!! There's a bouncy beat to this song that makes it very infectious and fun to listen to. Last but definitely not least is "Sunset People", a strong closer to the album all about Sunset Boulevard in LA and the weird and wonderful goings-on that can be witnessed there...an interesting shift from the previous love songs with a strong beat and haunting synths...a great track.

The album cover of “Bad Girls” is hilarious - Donna looking very sultry and in a rather flimsy outfit, standing next to a lampost with a copper loitering next to her (and is that a truncheon is his hand or is he just pleased to see her?) You see, the title track, "Bad Girls" was all about ladies of the night!! Apparently Donna tried to renounce the album later on, saying it had all been a mistake. Does she not realise it was the greatest move of her career? Anyway, thanks to Ms Summer I got into a whole lot of other disco diva types – e.g. Diana Ross - and thank the lord for that. “Bad Girls” ranks as Donna Summer's opus, the disco/soul equivalent of what "Ulysses" was to James Joyce, for example. No, I am NOT going too far. Hear it for yourself and realise how right I am, ladies and gents!

6. Foxbase Alpha - Saint Etienne

Saint Etienne are a highly creative and eccentric pop group, with Indie leanings, who (I feel) have never achieved the true recognition they deserve. If you haven't heard of The Etienne, they’re an English three-piece band, fronted by classy blonde vocalist Sarah Cracknell, and collectively they have a bit of a 1960s / retro fixation. They’re also named after a French football team. “Foxbase Alpha” was their debut album and released in 1991 (great title by the way, kind of Space: 1999) and it combines '60s type sounds with a more modern pop sensibility / production. Sarah’s cut-glass, oooh so English intonation works really well and her voice has a kind of nostalgic, summery feel to it (God it’s so hard to describe singing / music in WORDS!)

Lead singer Sarah caressing a tower block? Flanked by fellow band members Bob and Pete...

Opening track "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" is a great dance reworking of the original Neil Young song (Sarah’s not on this one but singer Moira Lambert still does a pretty great job with a languid vocal). "Spring" is a lovely 60s-tinged toon, with strings and you can just imagine Julie Christie skipping through a London park whilst it plays. One track, “Girl VII” name checks lots of random places for no particular reason: “Primrose Hill, Staten Island, Chalk Farm, Massive Central (?), Gospel Oak, Sau Paulo, Boston Manor, Costa Rica…” Places the Etienne have all visited? And "Nothing Can Stop Us" is one of my favourite ever Etienne songs, with clipped guitar, lovely strings, horns and a gorgeous multi-tracked vocal from Sarah C: “I never felt so good, I never felt so strong, Nothing can stop us now!” Parp, parp, go the horns. The penultimate track, “Like The Swallow” is eerily effective – a kind of shimmering effect, a hovering flute, weird “monster” noises (again my powers of description are abandoning me) out of which a percussive beat and almost sinister-sounding synthesiser wash emerges with Sarah’s vocal: “She’s like the swallow that flies away, She’s like the river that never runs dry, She’s like the sunshine on the lee-shore (? that’s what it sounds like) I love my love, And love is no law…”

And there are also lots of humorous samples in between tracks (some tracks in fact are constructed entirely of samples). "Would you like some sweets, Willy?" “Come on Auntie, we’ll miss the bus!” "And now it's time for today's...Countdown Conundrum!" All of which contribute further toward the album’s retro / nostalgic feel.

I still love the Etienne. Subsequent albums were all pretty good too such as “Good Humor”. “How We Used To Live” is an epic single in three movements which I’d urge you to check out. Their most recent album “Tales from Turnpike House” was a bit of a flop which was a shame as it was pretty damn good. Viva La Etienne!

7. Dancing For Mental Health - Will Powers

I have already raved about this one elsewhere and its monumental effect on my life. I will spare you my ravings again, but if you want to know more, try here.

8. Discovery - Daft Punk

Daft Punk’s last offering, “Human After All” was pretty cack, a rush job that was apparently recorded in about six weeks and it shows. I’m not altogether keen on “Discovery’s” predecessor, “Homework” either. Granted, “Around the World” and “Da Funk” are two rockin’ good singles - even if slightly monotonous as they’re built around one recurrent hook but which nevertheless are highly funky and danceable – however the rest of “Homework” consists of headf*ck-inducing hard house dance tracks with little decent tune or melody. “Discovery” is an entirely different affair and - zut alors!! - j’adore this album – it’s tres bien. (Gosh, don’t I parlez Francais well, cheries?)

The Punk obviously about to go shopping round Sainsbury's. Oddly enough, this is how they appear in public most of the time i.e. don't show their real faces an awful lot...

In case you didn’t know, Daft Punk are two French DJs who mix together a mish mash of musical styles: Disco, House, Break beat, Electronica and Rock, plus a healthy dose of sampling and scratching. And “Discovery” exemplifies this melting pot of genres / styles to amazing effect.

“Discovery” commences with the single “One More Time” – even though this is probably the album’s most well-known track I actually find it rather samey and not one of their best, but it’s a fairly enjoyable slice of Disco-House nevertheless. “Aerodynamic” comes next, a great song for doing p*ss-take air guitar, which I recall happened once at a friend’s party. “Digital Love” which follows has as an electronic vocal with a wistful, whimsical feel and is gorgeous!

“Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” utilises more electronic vocoder effects: “Work it! Make it! Do it – makes us…Harder! Better! Faster! Stronger!” and is a cool dance track as well as being great for a work-out or down the gym. One of my personal favourites, “Crescendolls” is next and its plain loopy / brilliant. Duh duh duh duh duh duh da da da da da!! Okay that didn’t come out very well. It’s very hard to replicate the sound of a song in words you know. It’s disco goes mental and a great track for chucking yourself round the room to.

The album also boasts some lovely ballads / more slower-paced tracks, for instance, “Something About Us” with its soft, vocoder-infused vocal, set against a gentle funky backing and producing a ponderous, melancholic atmosphere. And I love the lyrics:

It might not be the right time,
I might not be the right one.
But there's something about us I want to say,
Cause there's something between us anyway.

I might not be the right one,
It might not be the right time.
But there's something about us I've got to do,
Some kind of secret I will share with you .

I need you more than anything in my life,
I want you more than anything in my life,
I'll miss you more than anyone in my life,
I love you more than anyone in my life...

The last line fades away into quietness, almost as if the singer is scared to declare his real love.

Some other favourite tracks include “Voyager”, a funky instrumental with good guitar, “Face To Face” which employs a weird sample that sounds like “Ohh who-oh, Mr Lovelock” (please tell me anyone what it should REALLY be) and “Superheroes” which hilariously samples Barry Manilow repeatedly singing: “Jump into the air” over a pounding house beat and pulsating synths. The latter has a brilliantly cod-epic feel about it, like one of those synthesiser “classics” produced by Vangelis or Emmerson, Lake and Palmer in the 1970s.

C’est fantastique! I sincerely hope the next album by La Punk is up to this standard (come on garcons!! Where have you been??) At the moment it can’t be bettered.

9. Any ABBA album from “Arrival” onwards

I’m cheating slightly here. It’s very difficult to select a “BEST” ABBA album as so much of their output has been pure pop brilliance. When people refer to Steps as “an ABBA for the 1990s” I can’t help but scoff. Granted, the Stock, Aitken and Dennis Waterman produced foursome knocked out some fairly catchy pop numbers, but they’re in a different league entirely to the Swedish supergroup. I’ve already written about why I like ABBA so much, so if you want to know more, go here.

But let me pick one ABBA album by way of example. 1976’s “Arrival” which I remember my parents owning a copy of, on vinyl. The album cover grabs one’s attention from the outset with the Swedish quartet looking very modish in their white jumpsuits, sat in a futuristic looking helicopter…

The album kicks off with the rousing “When I Kissed The Teacher” and some intriguing lyrics:

Everybody screamed, When I kissed the teacher And they must have thought they dreamed
When I kissed the teacher

All my friends at school
They had never seen the teacher blush,
He looked like a fool…

Indeed. At the time of the album’s release I was about 7 years old and I remember taking it into school when my class had a party and we were all allowed to bring in all our music. Oh, the mirth of showing my primary school teacher Mr Illman the name of this track – even he saw the funny side – who really would dream of kissing their teacher?? So daring and risqué! And one that tapped into every school kid’s fantasies (And before you ask, NO it wasn’t a fantasy of mine to kiss Mr Illman although perhaps the fact I shared this track with a male teacher had some significance as regards my later, erm, development…) Anyway “Teacher” has a jangly guitar and ABBA’s trademark triumphant multi-tracked vocals, making it an uplifting album opener.

More jumpsuit action from the fab foursome from Sweeeeeden

Next up is “Dancing Queen”, a song I’m sure you’ve never remotely heard of. I can’t actually think of anything to say about it except that it’s still a great song but has been ever so slightly overplayed. The album includes two other classic ABBA singles as well though – “Knowing Me, Knowing You” and “Money Money Money”. The former is a masterpiece of the “relationship break-up” song:

No more carefree laughter,
Silence ever after.
Walking through an empty house, tears in my eyes,
Here is where the story ends, this is goodbye…

The “Knowing me, knowing you, ah-haaa” chorus has of course become notorious and ripe for having the p*ss ripped out of it. But I don’t care! It’s a damn good ballad which somehow manages to be epic and rousing in spite of the negativity of its subject matter - pulsating synths in the background, guitar motifs and the usual excellent vocals from the ladies. I love Agnetha’s whispered responses to Frida’s singing:

Memories (memories!)
Good days (good days!)
Bad days (bad days!)
They’ll be (they’ll be!)
With me (with me!)
Always (always!)

Not to mention the classic video that accompanied this song with Agnetha in a blue halo and the trademark ABBA “profile” poses.

The album's other semaphore single, “Money Money Money”, is ABBA at their most inventive and crazy. It’s a track that’s hard to define – not disco, not quite dance (yet curiously danceable), perhaps more “Fiddler on the Roof” if anything, with it’s lyric about a poor lady wanting to get lucky:

I work all night,
I work all day,
To pay the bills I have to pay,
Ain’t it sad?

And still there never seems to be
A single penny left for me,
That’s too bad!

In my dreams, I have a plan
If I got me a wealthy man
I wouldn’t have to work at all,
I’d fool around and have a ball...

Wouldn’t we all? I love the cod-Russian, dramatic atmosphere to this number with its harpsichord-like keyboards, melodramatic chords and sweeping bits, not to mention the marvellously cynical, bitter vocals/lyrics from Frida (proof that ABBA weren't always jolly, happy happy postrels...)

Other tracks of note include the lush "That's Me", the ephereal "My Love, My Life" and one of my personal faves, "Tiger", a hilariously OTT, guitar-infused ode to the dangers of the city (something I can relate to living in London):

The city is a jungle,
You better take care,
Never walk alone after midnight,
If you don't believe it, You better beware of...me.

I am behind you,
I always find you I am the tiger.
People who fear me,
Never go near me I am the tiger.

So menacing! So brooding! So scary!

Okay, enough about ABBA!

10.Rooty - Basement Jaxx

The Jaxx are a DJ twosome from Brixton and they're pretty cool. I guess they're best described as a dance act overall, and yet there's lots more to them than just that. They've embraced a whole welter of styles - from rap to house, bangra to jungle, disco to techno...and create something new in the process. I loved "Red Alert" when it came out - an immediate attention grabber with its zappy ray gun effects and zany lyrics - "Red alert, red alert, it's a catastrophe! But don't worry, don't panic! Ain't nothing going on but history..." Follow up album "Rendezvous" didn't quite do it for me though and although it had its moments like "Bingo Bango" and "Jump N' Shout" I didn't feel it quite fulfilled the potential of "Red Alert". "Rooty" however, was a different proposition, and the album in which Basement Jaxx really did come into their own with some knock-out tunes.

Single "Romeo” makes for an excellent opener to the album:

You keep on giving me the hold up,
You know I wish you'd make your mind up.
Cos when we get it on, it's so-so
You used to be my Romeo...

It's an exuberant track with a driving beat but tinged with sadness at the decay of a relationship:

And I miss the warmth in the morning
And the laughter when I can't stop yawning
But the tears on the pillow have dried my dear
Gonna let it all go cos I have no fear...

There's the jaunty, jamboree "Just One Kiss", and with its steel drums and grooviness a bit like something you might hear at the Notting Hill Carnival". It manages to be dancey and mellow at the same time. "Broken Dreams" utilises melancholic horn and an intro/sampled bit that sounds like something out of "Trumpton"/"Chigley", along with warbly synths and a vocal from a lady who sounds like she's singing underwater.

Then there's "Get Me Off":

Give your body to me,
Give your body to me,
Let your body be free,
Free your body, your body with me.
I want to undress U
I wanna caress U
Don't wanna be coy
It's time to get me off...

Blimey!! And the lady singer isn't talking about turning off the cooker. A saucy, charged number and another pumpin' dancing track, it's got a mean and moody synth backing and a highly intense feel...HOT!

Basement Jaxx in person! Nice white suits, boys...

And let's not forget "Where's Your Head At" - a storming, headf*ck of a track which is brilliant in its madness:

Don't let the walls cave in on u
We can live on, live on without you...

It's sinister but danceable with a nasty background synth and screaming vocals. I particularly like the screeching banshee woman at the end: "Where's your head aaaaaaaaaaaaaat??" The song was also released as a single and had one of the most imaginative/disturbing videos to accompany it - a group of monkeys with human faces in a laboratory break loose and start causing havoc, attacking scientists....uggggh!!

Well. That's about it. Thank you for following me on my musical journey, pop pickers (and yes, as you might have guessed by now, I started this post a long time ago...another labour of love on my part). And as I said at the start, it's bloody hard trying to come up with just 10 best albums of all time. In a few years' time I'll probably have totally revised the list. Hence here's a few that deserve to make the grain but didn't quite make it...

Bubbling under...

Until the End of Time - The Sunburst Band

They're groovesome! They're fab! They're funky! Okay all a bit obvious but this is a truly wonderful album. It's great when you come across a brand new band/artiste you've never heard of before and they take you by surprise...Joey Negro is a man who can do no wrong, a Brit DJ with a 70s/80s disco/soul/funk fixation and this album meshes all of those styles together brilliantly.

The Kick Inside – Kate Bush

KB's debut album and a charming one at that. Although its production is very simplistic by today's standards, "Kick" is still proof of her extreme talent at the mere age of 18 and dealt with some quite adult themes. And "Wuthering Heights" and "The Man With The Child In His Eyes" are weird and wonderful in equal measures.

The Lexicon of Love – ABC

Slick, classy and stylish, ABC eptomised the 1980s but also produced damn good pop. They also utilised a full orchestra on this, their debut album, adding further sophistication to proceedings and lead singer Martin Fry was the master of the wry and witty lyric. "Poison Arrow" and "The Look of Love" were just the icing on the cake.

Thriller – Michael Jackson

I remember the first time I heard the rap by Vincent Price from the title track of "Thriller" and thinking how brill it was. This is MJ before he turned into a total freakoid robot, back in the day when he knew how to produce truly soulful and decent music (producer Quincy Jones helped out in this dept too). "Billie Jean", "Human Nature", "PYT"...they're all here.

Off The Wall – Michael Jackson

Another excellent MJ long player from the days when Jacko woz good. "Don't Stop Till You Get Enough". "Rock With You". The gorgeous "I Can't Help It". The fab, jazzy "It's The Falling In Love".

Songs In The Key of Life – Stevie Wonder

Brilliant double album from another king (as opposed to MJ = the queen?) of soul, Mr Wonder. When the 80s kicked in, Stevie got all horrid and tacky with stuff like "I Just Called To Say I Love You", but this is him at the height of his powers, turning out passionate and rousing stuff like "I Wish", "Sir Duke", "Pastime Paradise". A classy affair.

Shakedown - The Freemasons

I love uplifting house music and this double album is no exception. The Freemasons bring a classy, feel-good approach to dance music. Great for a party or for working out down the gym. There’s moments of brilliance like “Zap Me Lovely” which can only be described as the Charleston meets House, "Love On My Mind" which you'll probably already know, and even Judie Tzuke on "Love Don't Live Here Anymore!" Blimey!

Wellllll that really is it, folks. Thanks for enduring yet another Cheese-a-thon. But before I go, you just KNOW what I'm going to ask, don't you?? Yes, I wanna know about YOUR favourite albums! It can be your Top 10, it can be a few more or a few less, whatever takes your fancy. And I DON'T expect you to wax lyrical to the extent that I have...just a few lines on each of your fave raves and why you like them will suffice. Ta!

Sooooo...I'm tagging the following peeps: Steve, Amanda, Thomas, Caress, Alan, Matty, Newplanet, Deemer, Nora, Reluctant Blogger and Timewarden! All you gotta do is do a post on your blog about the aforementioned subject...look forward to reading them, folks!!

Oh, and just one more thing I wanted to share with you all...you have just been reading my...

300th post!!!

Hip Hip Hooray!!

Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!

Au revoir Russell...

2008-05-21T13:18:00.002+01:00

Hey y'all!

I'm a blogging part-timer now as you all know, but this story is worth sharing if you don't already know about it...

1. About bloody time!

2. A big, BIG hoorah for the appointment of Mr Moffatt! He's definitely produced some of the best stories in the new DW - not to say much more unorthodox, interesting ones than RTD - so this bodes very well. With him as lead writer I hope we get more of the same.

3. As a friend of mine has pointed out, this doesn't necessarily mean MASSIVE changes to the current DW style and format, if that. After all, from the the ratings/viewing figures point of view, RTD has proved that it's a winning formula (for better or for worse...and he definitely has his detractors). But it's still good news!

Laters!

OC x

PS I'm still enjoying the new series. The conclusion of the Sontaran story was satisfying if not particularly earth-shattering (car exhaust fumes = cloning gas? mmmm...), the Dr's Daughter was enjoyable if a bit flimsy plot wise, with a perky performance from Georgia Moffat and not much decent explanation as to her conception and the Christie one was the most lightweight and silly story yet. Zzzzz, indeed!

PPS Boooooo to Eurovision for taking DW off the air for another week. Then again I'm gonna be in Brighton with my hubbie and probably would have missed it, so it doesn't really matter that much to me. Ha!

PPPS Madonna's new album is growing on me, Duffy's one if marvellous and Portishead's is wrist-slashing.

PPPPS That really is all. Ta ta for now and hope you are all doing wondrously...

Saltaire...

2008-05-04T13:15:00.006+01:00

...is a lovely little town near Leeds and Bradford. And Salt Mill is an amazing converted mill (a bit like the Tate Modern) with an extensive David Hockney exhibition, amongst other things. Here's the proof (including a bit of artistic rudeness - guess the actress...)

Hampton Court

2008-05-04T12:28:00.002+01:00

Lovely. Loads of history. Loads of antique rooms, alleways and nooks and crannies. Beautiful gardens. An amazing maze. Here's the proof.

April Update

2008-04-28T12:55:00.018+01:00

Hello!! Hello!! Hello!!

Saints Preserve us!!

The Cheeser is back, back, BACK!!

Well, for one of my less than regular posts, any road.

And how have we all been? I have been popping over to your respective blogs to keep an eye on things, as you might have gathered ... Trust all is hanging, as they say, well, with y'all.

As for me, all is generally okay. Firstly I'm pleased to say that I have started doing some writing, as I said I would be doing in my last post. It's slow but I'm dipping my oar in, as it were. Initial stages and plans all that and I'm keeping things under wraps for now. It has also been nice to just have some spare time back for meself to be honest.

What else do I have to report?

I've been to the gym a bit.

I've varnised the surfaces in my kitchen.

I've been relieved that at long last this bloody English weather is getting warmer (the weekend just gone was a glorious one, especially Saturday).

I've been to Hampton Court which was lurvely. Last time I went was over 20 years ago.

Life, as you can tell, is just TOO exciting.

And, moving on to the things that REALLY matter, what about Dr Who!?

I'm pleased to announce that I'm enjoying the new series rather a lot. Every story broadcast to date has been of a decent standard with no major clunkers as of yet. Although there have of course only been four episodes televised so far. My, aren't I ever the optimist. Still I can hardly believe the show is now into its Fourth Season! One again DW becomes a national institution ... and so it bloody should be! I hope it runs for another 20 years at least!

And contrary to all my previous moanings, Ms Catherine Tate has (in my view) more or less acquited herself as Donna Noble. Okay, I wouldn't class the character as a brilliant creation of writing and there have been some grating Donna-isms along the way, but in general she's been nowhere near as awful as I was feared. Rather Donna has managed to demonstrate ... thoughtfulness (gasp!) ... sensitivity (double gasp!) ... humour (triple gasp!) ... a grasp of thorny issues (quadrupal - okay let's stop this now). Etc. Probably because Ms Tate is a decent actress with good comic timing, and a nack for doing accents and facial expressions... Who would have thought it? I still wish they'd chosen a non-Earth person for a companion though and hope that they break the now very predictable mould next time round.

An authentic Roman set

The Fires of Pompei was DW's attempt at doing an Italian epic and for the most part it worked. Very handy that the Beeb were able to use the set from Rome, must have saved them a bob or two. The set designs and costumes were jolly good and the whole look of the thing was authentic (okay a wee bit CGI above...) Although actually, in spite of the fact this was meant to be "big scale", the focus was quite small i.e. on just a handful of characters.

The rock monsters were quite good. That's about all I'm going to say on that score.

I wonder if my outfit would have made the House of Howard?

Good guest cast and solid performances, in particular Peter Capaldi and Tracy Childs...didn't really like Tracy's red haired perm though. The days of long-haired sloane Lynn Howard are long gone.

Oh great gods Dr, Donna, please send me some nice underpants from TK Maximus ... It gets awfully parky in this toga ...

Their son was quite a cutey (I half-wished there'd been a sudden gust of wind to lift his toga ... Carry on up Pompei anyone?). Loved the touch with him praying to the gods of Dr and Donna at the end.

I'm snarly! I'm nasty! I'm a bit underused!

As for Phil Davis he was okay and suitably snarly but could have been better used.

Going on up to the spirit in the sky...that's where I'm gonna be...when the volcano erupts and I get melted to nothing by the fiery hot magma (original lyrics!)

However the psychic sisters, as one of my friends pointed out, did look rather like the backing singers from Dr and the Medics ...

If you don't go back and save a few people, I'll pull this bleedin' lever! And pull a bleedin' fit while I'm about it! Bleedin' 'ell!

The whole issue of should we-shouldn't we save Pompei from destruction was well handled I felt, with Donna as an appropriate moral voice - her concern for the people and appeal to the Dr to do something was touching and gave a new dimension to the character. Whilst the Doc wanted to preserve established history we were shown it wasn't always that easy. So we got a nice compromise at the end.

Some of the lines grated though, especially "TK Maximus" and the attempt to "normalise" the Romans speech didn't always work - the cockerney stall holder was just annoying. But fairly minor gripes.

And what's this about Donna having something on her back? Whilst it seems that the Dr's number might be up too (or should that be David Tennant? Leading to all those soon-to-regenerate rumours...)

Walking in a (interplanetary) Winter wonderland ... It's all real you know ...

Planet of the Oooooooooooddd! Ooooooh I liked it. And even me old blogging mate Timewarden (and did you know that he too is back, back, BACK?) did as well - blimey. It must have been a decent story to convince him! A cracking tale with proper sci-fi elements - a human base on another planet under seige, aliens going on the rampage ... A nicely bleak (there's an oxymoron if ever there was one) industrial setting with loadsa snow that didn't look too fake (lovely vista shot when the Doc and Donna stepped out of the TARDIS near the start). Liked the Ood marketing bits and the Warhol style Ood pictures. (Might have to get my own to go alongside my Divas one).

Persil balls ahoy ... And someone's tipped a whole box of Persil behind us by the looks of things ...

And darker undertones too with the story's treatise on the wrongs of slavery as presented via the Ood. It was great to see the spaghetti heads back - definitely one of the most successful of the new Who monsters, so deserving of a resurrection - and this time we got to find out more about them. I loved the Ood "song" which brought a poetry to their plight and the feel of the whole story.

No, I don't know who Edmund Blackadder is ...

Good performances from Tim "Blackadder" McInerry as Mr Halpin (his Ood transformation at the end was disgusting but arguably deserved).

I'm a gorgeous marketing person and I don't want to die!!

And the gorgeous doe-eyed Aeyesha Dharker as marketing girl Solana who also met a nasty end.

And I've just watched The Sontaran Strategem and thoroughly enjoyed it. Hoorah for the return of the two-parter! Hoorah for another Earth invasion story! (Yes I know we've had a lot of 'em, but...) And there are a few other hoorahs are in order too ...

If you ask to see Rik, Vivien or Neil one more time , I'll shoot you with my scary Sontaran shooting stick! (Oooh lovely siblilance ...)

Hoorah for the return of the potato heads! Yes after a 23 year hiatus, the mighty Sontarans are back, back, BACK! Their outfits were nicely militaristic and bulky and their faces didn't look as bad as some of the early publicity shots seemed to suggest, even if they were a bit rubbery and fake. Christopher Ryan as General Staal was great, full of swagger and typical rhetorical Sontaran warrior-talk and his (small) stature as an actor was an obvious blessing when it came to this role. I couldn't help thinking of Mike from The Young Ones though, as his voice wasn't exactly disguised or anything like that. The guy playing his sidekick, Storr, sounded even more human and not very menacing for a supposed alien warrior. Sack the voice coach!

And has anyone told the spud-heads that the Judoon nicked their uniforms? Another reason to get mad…

Oh and I loved the "Sontah" - chant! Very football holligan-ish.

The gassing everyone through car exhausts strategy was quite clever although why didn't Bernard "Wilf" Cribbins just smash the window of the car at the end?!

Colonel Mace at your service, Maam! I'm a military stereotype and I'm a bit bland!

Hoorah for the return of UNIT! They're back, back, BACK!! A proper resurrection this time after their not very proper appearance in "Aliens of London/World War Three". Here they’re obviously much more to the fore, with their own mobile HQ and led by the very English Colonel Mace who it has to be said is rather…bland. He doesn’t really possess the charisma of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, although I guess it's still early days. Why couldn’t they have brought the Brig back for a cameo anyhow?

And there was a nice jokey reference to the DW Unit stories of yore when Donna asks the Doc when he worked for them - "The 1970s. Or was it the 80s?" playing on all the past controversy about precisely WHEN the Unit stories did take place (which geeky DW fans always get sooo worked up about).

Crossroads motel can I help - sorry I mean, hello Dr! It's Martha! And I'm bringing you BACK toEarth! Back to life! Back to reality! Back to the - sniiiiiiiiip!!

Hoorah for the return of Martha! She's back, back, B - okay this is getting tiresome...But I’m pleased to say that Ms Jones appears to have improved since Season Three. Probably cos the “Dr I lurve you” strand has finally been ditched and she's now working for UNIT as a proper medical scientist. (And her Torchwood appearances most likely helped to bolster up the character as a more mature, independent personality too). Okay so Ms Agyeman still delivered some of her lines somewhat woodenly, but overall she IS better. Talking of poorly delivered lines, at least Ms A CAN get away with that when playing Martha’s “evil double” – a fun sub-plot with the potential for some good drama, although personally I think the Dr is a tad thick not to have noticed the difference in Martha’s phone manner…And now she’s engaged to Dr Tom Milligan! (Who we didn’t even get to see, how cheap…) And no Donna-Martha bitchfight either – such a shame – it could have been just like this. Or maybe not. Actually there was a bit of tension at the start when the Dr and Martha were reunited and Donna gets acquainted with the former companion, but this was dealt with sparingly and convincingly with some sharp dialogue and soon got forgotten about … just as well, really as there were other things for the story to focus on.

Luke Brattigan looking pretty in pink but frankly rather annoying ...

The only thing I didn't much care for was the annoyingly clever-clever character Luke (B)Rattigan. (Who probably solved the Rubics cube the moment he came out the womb. Except he's probably too young to know what a Rubics cube is ...) But his irritating brattishness was kind of intentional. Let's hope he gets his just deserts in Part Two ...

Anyway, this looks set to be a classic Earth invasion story provided Part Two delivers! Here’s hoping!

I almost forgot to mention David Tennant. Now into his third series as the Doc, he's really hit his stride and thankfully quite a lot of his irritating tics and mannerisms seem to have vanished. Which I'm not especially sorry about. Okay we're still getting the wide-eyed, shouty Dr sometimes but on the whole he's doing alright and is very much THE DR. *

Well, that's about it for now. Byeeeeeeeee!!

* Actually I've just realised I said almost exactly the same thing about DT in a post below. Ahem!

Decisions, decisions...

2008-04-14T13:11:00.004+01:00

Well. I haven't put up a post for over a week again. Obvious to say, but time is both fleeting and precious at the moment. In fact it ALWAYS seems to be. So much so that I've had to come to a decision.

I'm not going to be writing on my blog so much any more.

Hark! Can I hear a chorus of protest bubbling up in the background?! I hope so! Or maybe I'm just being a delusional Old Cheeser....

Anyway. At present there are other things which I need to be focusing on, job-hunting being one of the major ones. And the weekend just goes toooo quickly. I am sometimes neglecting my hubbie in favour of the computer which isn't a particularly desirable thing. Etc etc.

The thing is, I really do love to write and if I had one wish that could be granted, it's that I would be making a living from doing just that. In this respect, writing a blog is an excellent "apprenticeship" (though thankfully not of the Alan Sugar variety) or testing ground for practising one's writing skills. It's certainly kept me active in that department. God knows though, I am such a major perfectionist I have sometimes spent literally hours editing and tweaking just one post until I've got it the way I want (and then even when it's "up", I usually spot a spelling mistake or missing word and have to go back and correct it again...) I can also get seriously carried away when I'm waxing lyrical on a favourite topic and don't know when to cease my ramblings. I've stayed up past midnight finishing off some posts, such has been my intense and insane dedication to my craft.

But, if I'm to ever make it as a legitimate writer, I've got to finish off some of the stuff I started! And submit it to publishers! (Yes obvious again I know). And those hours dedicated to my blog have eaten into that time, in fact they've served as a diversion/distraction/excuse not to properly complete all my other writings!

It's funny, but with blogging you can almost feel "duty bound" and become very conscious of your readership. I know several of you out there who have had periods of "going quiet", so inviting the usual "where are you?" or "are you alive/okay?" type remarks. You almost feel like you're letting your audience down when you don't put up a post for a while and become very aware of time ticking by. But at the end of the day, one can't submit to such pressure, tempting though it is. To thine own self must thy be true.

So as of today I am going part-time.

Sorry folks! What that means is that I'll probably do about 2-3 posts per month from now on, as opposed to the more frequent ones I was doing before.

But wait! The new series of Doctor Who has just kicked off! I hear you all cry. And he loves to write about that! Is he mad? All true (except perhaps the last bit) but I'm afraid that the reviews will have to wait....for now.

This does not mean that I am ceasing to exist.

This does not mean that I won't be returning on a more permanent basis at some point (though I can't say exactly when at the mo).

This does still mean that I will continue to read and comment on all of your blogs, because I love catching up with your news, gossip and info. Yes sirree.

This does mean that I will try to do some decent quality posts when I DO write.

This does mean that I still love you all, and thanks to all of you who have been with me to date. I really appreciate you being here!!

So ciao for now. And thank you!!!

Ta ta
OC xxx

Saturday nights are cool again...

2008-04-06T19:28:00.002+01:00

It's back!! Unbelievably, last night I wasn't able to sit down and watch DW when it was actually on (we had friends round) so me and my hubbie caught up with it on BBC iPlayer instead. What a marvellous invention it is.

Well, I really enjoyed it.

A few Cheeser criticisms out of the way first though. Like Steve, I thought the Adipose plotline was kind of daft and ultimately they weren't really the "sinister" threat that the pre-programme publicity made them out to be - ultimately just a load of baby aliens waiting to be born and then depart Earth to return to their home world. The Adipose themselves were more cuddly and cute than scary, and reminded me of something out of Ghostbusters, with their Pilsbury Dough Boy/Marshmallow man appearance, baby/giggly noises and waddling - hardly a worldwide menace. Definitely one for the kiddie audience. Consequently the tone of the episode did sometimes veer towards the silly rather than serious. On reflection though it was probably a deliberate ploy on the part of the writers to start off with a fairly lightweight story, in order to focus on the reintroduction of Ms Donna Noble and the dynamics of her relationship with the Dr.

And, whilst on the subject of Ms Catherine Tate/Donna...

I thought... ... she was actually pretty good!

OMG!! Yes, after numerous posts slagging off RTD et al for deciding to resurrect the character of Donna, I may well have to go and munch on some humble pie. For this was a far more "reigned in" Donna that we got to see, some time after the events of Runaway Bride - and generally a much more restrained and reflective lady after the fishwife performance of her debut story. A lot of the screeching and moaning of yore had vanished. Okay, there were still some "comedy" CT moments but on the whole these slotted in quite well with everything else. For instance, the scene with the Dr and Donna silently mouthing at each other through glass. Dr: "Donna?" Donna: "Oh-my-GOD!"Dr: "How?"Donna: "It's me!" Etc... Odd, cos when viewed in the original Season Four trailer, Donna's "Doctaaaaaaaaaaaar!" bit seemed awful (prompting me to do a "What's Donna saying?" post) but here it was very funny (the p*ss-take "tense" orchestral score in the background was a nice counterpoint too).

It was also good to see Donna getting more backstory - having to put up with her nagging, continually whinging mum (now we know where the fishwife characteristics originated) her scene with her Grandpa (a lovely cameo from Bernard Cribbins) where she talks about the Dr (nicely acted/done) and the bit at the end with Donna and the Doc waving to Gramps from the airborn TARDIS was actually rather touching and sweet!

Another positive aspect of Donna is the fact that, unlike Rose and Martha, she's a stronger and older character who is NOT romantically fixated on the Dr. Actually that's rather inaccurate as Ms Tyler and Ms Jones DID have their "strengths" as well, but the fancying the Doc thing at times seriously undermined their respective personas. It was established pretty much early on in "Partners" that Donna didn't like the Dr "in that way", Donna's amusing lines "Mad Martha that one...blind Martha...charity Martha..." firmly establishing her p.o.v. on that subject. And I liked the clever bit of dialogue with the Dr stating: "I just want a mate" which Donna mistook to mean "I just wanna mate" (!) leading to her response: "You're not mating with me, sunshine!" Again, in the original Season Four trailer, the latter Donna declaration had sounded pretty cringeworthy, but here worked much better when viewed in the context of the whole scene. And now that one's under their belts the Dr and Donna can embark on a more mature relationship. Here's hoping...

I was pleasantly surprised by Catherine Tate overall. One thing I will say is that unlike Freema Agymen, she is an accomplished character actress (having played a variety of roles in her own comedy show to perfection) and she's also got depth, range and excellent comic timing. There were several times during "Partners in Crime" when her facial expressions and line delivery were spot-on and this bodes well for the future.

What else? Having the Dr and Noble both investigating Adipose industries at the same time was a definite coincidence but a way of bringing them back together. The way in which they kept missing each other by a hair's breadth until their eventual "reunion" - e.g. the popping up and down between the cubicles - was a bit farcial and far-fetched though...

The "Close Encounters" style spaceship looked impressive (and funny when Gramps, watching out for alien lifeforms, totally misses it).

Sarah Lancashire as the villainous Miss Foster was excellent, a far cry from the days of Raquel Woltenshulme - icy, efficient, businesslike and humorous albeit in a controlled fashion. Even if the Adipose plot wasn't up to much, she helped to carry the whole thing. I couldn't help feeling sorry for her when she twigged that the Adipose had just used her and she plunged to her death. But what was she doing with a sonic device? Early rumour had it that she was Time Lord, even the Rani, but this was not the case...

David Tennant, now entering into his third season as the Doc, has really hit his stride in the role. His sometimes annoying tics and mannerisms were far less evident on this occasion. A good thing too. We got some of his "wide eyed acting" but on the whole he was good and his scenes with CT worked well.

And finally! Totally out of the blue we got a ... cameo from Rose Tyler!! Looking very moody and serious. How did she get back from the other side of the void? Why was she there? It was a great and genuinely surprising addition to the episode (even if she was only onscreen 10-15 seconds) and added nicely to the sense of anticipation re: the "proper" return of Rose later this season.

So, an entertaining start to the new series. Roll on the rest of Season Four!

PS I am intending to finish off my Torchwood reviews of Season Two... but as you know DW always take precedence for moi. Nah nah nah!

Cheeser's Choice: Prisoner: Cell Block H

2008-04-06T17:25:00.012+01:00

Yep, it’s time for another Cheeser’s choice post. Welcome! It’s been a while, folks, since I waxed lyrical on the joys of Joanna Lumley. This time it’s the turn of a certain Australian soap opera/drama which ran from 1979-1986 (although it reached

screens rather later than this).

It’s…Prisoner: Cell Block H (although originally entitled “Prisoner” in Aussieland, it’s name was lengthened over here, so as to avoid confusion with the Patrick McGoohan surreal fantasy drama of the 1960s – couldn’t be more different content wise though…) And I love the show. I’ve currently been addicted to watching loads of repeats of ""Prisoner", thanks to lots of uploads on You Tube – it’s been great to watch it again after all these years. They’ve even brought the programme out on DVD – all 692 episodes!! – and there’s a massive boxset you can purchase which I admit I’ve been sorely tempted by, if only a) it wasn’t so damned expensive b) I wasn’t paying a mortgage.

"Aaaah, fair go, Mrs M!" "I’m just going to the dunny for a smoko!" "You’re a rotten, flaming mongrel for dobbing me in to the governor, you beeeeeeeetch!"

Er, yes. Those are a few examples of some “classic” Prisoner dialogue, and any of you who are au fait with the show will know exactly what I’m going on about, I’m sure. If not, you’ll probably still know of the show by reputation – all about a load of loud, unattractive women in a prison wearing denim and getting into lots of fights and hair-pulling. The “fetching” brick wall interiors of the prison (they actually reminded me of Sussex University where I once studied) and the wobbling sets. The sub-standard acting. The fact that "Prisoner" was always shown really late on TV in some graveyard slot (usually after the news) and consequently made for essential trashy viewing after rolling in from the pub. Some of these things are true and some are apocryphal. Thus I am here to set the record straight. Or in some cases, confirm the rumours...

The ladies of Wentworth enjoy a spot of light lunch. Or breakie. Dig the yellow chinaware...Was it from IKEA?

To start, a common perception of the show is that its female characters, in particular the prisoners, were all, erm, a load of dogs, never wore make up or bothered to do their hair properly, as well as being a bunch of lesbians. Alright, this was PARTIALLY true - in its efforts to be realistic a lot of the women were certainly made to look as unattractive as possible and no-one could honestly say that characters like Bea Smith or Lizzie Birdsworth were “lookers”… (although it you look above some of the ladies aren't half bad...) And remember, this was supposed to be about prison life wasn’t it? It wasn’t “Dynasty” after all…

The great Queen Bea ... she ruled the roost ...

However the absence of glamour was more than compensated for by the characterisation – Val Lehman as leading prisoner Bea for instance made a fine central protagonist – gutsy, outspoken and rebellious, with a take no sh*t attitude. Yes, I know some of you out there will probably be chortling away to yourselves as you read this, thinking “What the hell is he on??” It’s true that in classic Aussie soap tradition, the characterisation, not to mention the acting in “Prisoner” was not ALWAYS of a particularly high calibre. There were some very cliched and stereotypical characters – not to say situations - in “Prisoner” and the way in which these were written could be quite two-dimensional – uptight, repressed prison officer Vera Bennett for example is a continual ogre of a person throughout her time in the show and rarely lets up, jokes or cracks a smile – could anyone really be so horrid? Maybe she’s not the best example to use though, as old Vera (or Vinegar Tits as she was more fondly known) became a bit of a fan favourite but there were other instances of poor characterisation in the programme. Not to mention the fact that the characters sometimes became a peg onto which the series writers hung whatever issues they were dealing with that week e.g. wife-beating, drug abuse, pregnancy, teenage delinquency…the list goes on.

Which kind of leads into another point about the storylines. Although I’ve (mildly) berated “Prisoner” for its tokenism, it was at least willing and able to deal with some fairly controversial themes – albeit in watered-down, sometimes simplistic soap opera style – as well as tackling the issues I’ve mentioned above there was lesbianism, political intrigue amongst the prison staff and more besides…And Prisoner did this years ahead of its UK counterparts (Val Lehman has been quoted as saying that they showed gay/lesbian characters long before English soaps and this is true). Often though, when a storyline involving a particular character had run its course, the character/s involved would completely vanish from our TV screen, never to be seen and rarely mentioned again, what I call the SSS (Surreal Soap Syndrome).

Going back to the sexuality thing, the majority of the female inmates in “Prisoner” were mainly heterosexual, although there were some major lesbian ones who sprung up during the course of proceedings, in particular the show’s first proper dyke Frankie Doyle, followed later on by Judy Bryant and then evil warder Joan Ferguson. What was also quite interesting was that a few of the ostensibly heterosexual inmates would “turn to women” during times of loneliness and isolation, like Doreen with Frankie or Chrissie with Sharon. Probably truer than we know, after all if you were banged up without a fella for all that time, wouldn’t you have to “make do”?!

Queen Bea squashes young Lynn's hand whilst Dopey Doreen looks on. Nasty!

Another crucial element of “Prisoner” and life in Wentworth was the top dog. Charming term! The top dog was basically the leader of the women inmates and the point of contact between the prisoners and the Governor. Over the course of the show we saw several of them, and lots of power struggles ensued between the women over who was going to seize ultimate control. The focal point for the top dog was the, erm, steam press in the laundry room and whoever got to operate it was in charge! Woe betide anyone who got on the wrong side of the top dog too – they’d usually get their hand forced underneath the press by way of punishment like the naive Lynn Warner in the very first episode.

Prison officer Vera "Vinegar Tits" Bennett and Margaret-Thatcher-lookalike Governor Erica Davidson

Another good aspect of the show was that it focused not only on the lives of the prisoners but also some of the prison officers too - the firm but fair Meg Jackson/Morris, the acerbic Vera Bennett, governor Erica Davidson, and others too. As for the prisoners, we got to see what happened to some of them before they became incarcerated "on the inside" and the crimes which led to their imprisonment. With some ex-cons, we saw their life "on the outside" once they were released and whether or not they could cope with this adjustment.

The “Prisoner” dialogue was another mainstay of the programme – some examples of which I have already provided above. From the point of view of us whinging Poms, all of this Aussie speak was highly entertaining as well as amusing. Of course we had the more refined and well-spoken characters like Erica Davidson too, so there were some "normal" conversations going on somewhere. Relatively speaking.

And the music? The “Prisoner” theme tune, “On The Inside” - played over the closing credits in which an officer locks up the prisoner cells for the night - has become iconic and one of the show’s most successful elements. I’m sure most of you will have heard it even if you never actually watched the show. “You used to bring me roses, I wish you could again…” A gentle, slightly camp folksy number sung by vocalist Lynne Hamilton (it even made the charts over here) it’s somewhat in contrast to the “tough” and sometimes violent situations we see portrayed in the programme itself. If you want to see the lyrics, try here…

Toothpaste tripping (with appropriate background music)

The show’s incidental music was a different matter entirely and sometimes side-splittingly funny for the wrong reasons. In the early episodes it was kind of 1970s stabbing strings (when something dramatic occurred, like Karen Travers stabbing her husband in the shower), replaced later by tacky 1980s synthesisers that could easily induce a migraine (I remember one scene in which a prisoner is tripping on LCD and drawing a face with toothpaste on a cabinet in her cell. The music which accompanied it was … unusual).

One more thing: contrary to popular expectations, the walls of Wentworth did NOT wobble.

Well, that’s the general lowdown on “Prisoner”. Now, as you all know, once I get onto a subject I like, I’m capable of rattling on for eons, so I shall now cease. Rather than turning this into another Cheese-a-thon and in the interests of making my musings more palatable, I will be returning a bit later on with some more Prisoner posts.

And if you want to know more about "Prisoner" I'd really recommend this website and this one.

Next time on Cheeser's Choice: The leading ladies (and fellas) of Wentworth.

And the winner...

2008-04-02T13:40:00.002+01:00

...of the Old Cheeser Certificate of Commendation for Deliciously Diabolical Donna Dialogue goes to...

*drumroll*

LOST BOY!!!

*Thunderous applause*

Well, he was actually the first blogger to submit a suggestion and I have to say, my own personal favourite. But the rest of you all did very well indeed and I was amused and entertained by many of your suggestions. So ta muchly for participating, everyone! Your certificate's in the post, Lost Boy.

And as this blog is far too tasteful to actually reproduce the winning entry here, I'm afraid you will just have to click on the "comments" link on the previous post, to see why Lost Boy fared so well...

Meanwhile...

...it's just a few days until the unveiling of Season Four! I can hardly believe it! It seems to have come round very fast.

Bought the new Radio Times yesterday which comes in a choice of four Dr Who-themed covers (well naturally, what else could possibly be taking precedence next week) like the one above, which I chose. There's a nice preview section of all the forthcoming stories too, some of which sound very interesting indeed. I'm particularly looking forward to the Sontaran two-parter, the Agatha Christie one and the Steven Moffat one. Oh, and "The Doctor's Daughter", provided Georgia Moffat can cut the mustard and it's a decent script for such a revelatory theme. Have to say though, giving this episode such a name totally blows the gaff, and although we'd all heard the rumours about Peter Whats-his-face's daughter playing the offspring of a Time Lord, it would have been nice to have kept the lid on that one a little longer, by NOT going for such an obvious title. Conversely, they HAVEN'T revealed the title of Episode 12 for fear that it will give the game away, but we all know it's going to include "Davros" or "Daleks" in the title don't we?! RTD is a bit of a law unto himself.

Anyway, Saturday 5 April, BBC 6.20pm...THE place to be.

And apologies for the lack of posts. Real life has been getting in the way again. I will try to write more soon...

Look at meeeeee!!! I'm a gobby ginger clown!!! (Or should that be "claaaaaaarn"??)

2008-03-26T16:18:00.004Z

Well, that's one thing La Noble might be saying here. Any other ideas, ladies and gents?

Okay, I'm tagging the following people: Steve, Tim, Nora, Newplanet, Dan, Lost Boy, Paul, James and Amanda! And anyone else is more than welcome to respond should they desire ... it's just that I'm aware that you guys and gals are best equipped to comment on DW, having more than a smattering of knowledge between you!

Your mission: Fill in Donna's dialogue for her. What's she saying in the above pic? Something eloquent and intellectual? Or something downright stoopid and irritating? The choice is YOURS. Answers on a posted comment, please...

The overall winner gets the Old Cheeser Certificate of Commendation for Deliciously Diabolical Donna Dialogue (try saying that after a few cans of diamond white).

Ta peeps! One just couldn't resist!

OC xxx

Saturday 5th April....

2008-03-26T14:19:00.001Z

... is not too far away! Yaaay!!

Most of you have already beaten me by putting this up already, but here goes:

Have to say that La Chav doesn't look too bad in this, aside from the horrid "Doctaaaaaaaa!!" shouting-silently-through-glass bit. In the talking-to-Gramps scenes she almost seems ... deep. Good grief! Will Donna prove to be a decent Doctor-foil yet?

The rest of it looks positively gripping! I will approach it with an open mind...There's choc-loads of other info about the forthcoming Season Four too, but again the diehards amongst you will most probably have read it all on t'net by now, so not much point posting it here...I might do a little (little? Ha!) new series preview soon though...

Oh and the Beeb have also done some short alien teaser trailers too if you want to check those out. Kind of blows the gaff on the return of one monster, even if the rumours about them coming back were pretty strong anyway....

And I had a very nice Easter break and trust that all of you did too. Good to get away to York and also went to see Wicked the other night, courtesy of my lovely hubbie! More anon...

OC x

39 - it's official

2008-03-18T14:14:00.003Z

Well I am now officially 39 and I'm pleased to say that I'm not feeling bad atall. The same as ever really. Thanks to those of you who sent me birthday good wishes, I was very honoured and touched. I had a nice day yesterday with Gustavo - we both took the day off work and took it easy, although there was the slight problem of a leaking kitchen ceiling to fix. However I'm pleased to say that it got sorted pretty promptly. The estate agents who are selling the flat upstairs sent a plumber round forthwith who was able to pinpoint the problem - leaking pipe underneath the floorboards which was dripping down from above into the kitchen. Anyway the drippage has now stopped although the wallpaper has done the clasic thing of peeling away from the ceiling - so I will see if I can get someone to foot the bill to fix it!

Rest of the day we went shopping in Croydon and I treated myself to some new togs - jeans and some groovy retro t-shirts and a few DVDs. As for presents, my hubbie got me a groovy summer jacket and zip up top from Top Man. Apparently I'm due something else but it hasn't turned up in the post yet. How exciting! Late afternoon we had nice meal and some wine at home and just took it easy. Birthdays should come round more often! (Without the growing old part, I should add...)

Oh and my father - who lives over in Amsterdam and is delightfully eccentric, not to say creative - wrote and emailed me this poem:

Dear Simon,
It's the 17th today

And I'd just like to say,
That you're looking rather grey.

Were you celebrating yesterday

Or just practising for Monday,

-Was that a yeah or a nay?

Cheesy pomes are now my style,

(but beware an excess of bile),

You may find them cringingly vile

And want to run an hundred mile.
PS. Of loot I have no pile,

So I'll send you a bathroom tile;

It's a cloggy one with a naughty picture

I'm hoping it will become a fixture,
And yearly tiles'll add to the mixture,

Many Bacchanalian scenes to titillate yer,
And of course the frequent visitor,

Hopefully not a detective inspector.

I'll stop this now coz I'm beginning to cringe,

Yer father needs a bit of minge,

He's older than you, and cannot binge

His hair's an even greyer tinge

And he's far too fond of the endless whinge,

Beware the 39 candles, thats one hell of a singe!

Isn't he clever? A bloody masterpiece eh?! (Even if the second line in the final verse is rather naughty...!)

30 something (just)

2008-03-16T21:39:00.002Z

Tomorrow it is .... my birthday! And I will be .... 39 years old!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

Erm, yes. Just getting that one out of my system. Not to mention adjusting to the fact that I am about to enter my final year as a thirty-something. I can hardly believe that the big 4-0 is so close. When I start to think about it too much I also get depressed. Now I know how Margo Channing felt. Where has all the time gone??

Ah well. I have plenty to be thankful for, as my good blogging pal Deemer was recently reminding me. I have a loving partner and I'm in a stable relationship. I have good health. My hubbie and I have our very own lovely flat (although I should add, since yesterday, we have had a leakage problem - water is currently dripping through the kitchen ceiling!! No!! I hope to God we can get it fixed). So, yes. Generally all very positive things.

If there's one major thing that I am dissatisfied with though it's: my job. I'm not going to go into any more detail than that, as it's not good to start saying negative things about my career on the net, where all and sundry can be privy to my thoughts... Let's just say that I'm not feeling fulfilled and the fact that I'm nearly 40 has brought me to the realisation that some changes need to be made. It's funny, cos my recent post on gay characters in soap operas attracted a lot of positive feedback/comments (thank you to those concerned!) bringing home to me the fact that my skills and talents as a writer, not to mention my knowledge in particular areas, is just not being utilised in what I'm currently doing. I've actually got all of next week and some of the following one off work, so that will provide an ideal opportunity for me to have a good think and take some action. It's hard isn't it. I know that quite a lot of you out there aren't exactly in your dream jobs either, but like me, need the required security to pay the mortgage and the bills! But birthdays are an ideal time for you to take stock and make some changes. So we'll see.

I'm also going to York for a few days to see my family. It will be great to see everyone and have a break away from the routine.

Meanwhile, as long as I don't get a birthday cake like the one above, I will be more than happy.

He's regenerated again!!

2008-03-16T20:11:00.001Z

Attention all Alphans!! (and Earthlings, bloggers and any other general beings come to that...)

This is Sandra Benes speaking, from Main Mission on Moonbase Alpha. At present I'm on an out-of-control moon that's shooting through space. Slightly inconvenient and we've absolutely no f*cking idea where we're going to end up. Oh do forgive me, that was very unlady-like. Do you like my 1970s page boy cut and bangs?

Oh dear, I'm going slightly off the point aren't I. But I do have a VERY important announcement to make: Timewarden has regenerated!! Again!! He's back, back, BACK! Yes, my colleague, Old Cheeser, had to laugh when he went over to Timewarden's blog and found that he'd written some new posts, like this one and this one! It seems that the lure of blogging is just too much for all of us. Anyway, welcome back once again Tim! This must be your third incarnation now. Soon you'll be catching up with a certain Time Lord in the regeneration stakes...

Well, I'm off to change into a skimpy leopardskin costume so I can get manhandled by a load of cavemen. There's only so many times that a girl can sit behind a desk and saying "We've lost contact, Commander" you know!" And if you don't know what I'm talking about, you've very, very sad. Byeeeee!!

Toad in a hole

2008-03-12T13:37:00.008Z

'ere! Who's been spreading strawberry jam on me chest? B*stards!!

Yes, proving that Torchwood CAN do continuity, the two most recent episodes of the sci-fi/fantasy prog, “Dead Man Walking” and “A Day in the Death”, mainly concerned what happened to Owen “Toadface” Harper, after being shot dead by Jim Robinson at the end of the previous “Reset” (well at least it wasn’t Harold Bishop wot did it). And quite involving and well done they were too. So much so that after “Dead Man…” I switched over to BBC3 to see “A Day…” rather than do the usual of waiting another week for the next instalment (which at any rate has already been shown on BBC2, such was my delay in writing and posting this…tut, tut!)

In case you hadn’t guessed, Owen doesn’t actually stay dead (at least in the conventional sense) for very long. Foolhardy Captain Jack decides to revive him with a resurrection gauntlet i.e. glove, similar to the one used to bring former team member, Suzie back to life, in the last series. But things go badly wrong. Owen is brought back to life with no pulse or heartbeat and worse, becomes possessed by the spirit of Death itself! You would have thought Jack would have learnt after the last disaster with Suzie…

First off, this is an interesting concept and one that looks set to run and run i.e. Owen’s state of living death. How often do we have a regular character who, to all intents and purposes, looks, acts and speaks like a normal living person, but is in fact, dead? The first episode “Dead Man Walking” had some genuinely unsettling moments, particularly the bits when Owen finds himself in a strange black void and his eyes then totally black out and he mutters in a strange voice (reminded me of when Sapphire was possessed in Sapphire and Steel). There were also comic/sick bits, like when Owen does some lovely projectile vomiting, Linda Blair style - as a dead man his digestive system is kinda messed up you see - in a police cell. Things come to head with Owen’s decision to literally face the demon within him, leading to a climactic fight in a hospital in which he has a scrap with a skeleton.

“Dead Man” was not a bad episode at all – even though the skeleton-death figure did look a bit too CGI/fake – and there were some good dramatic moments. More significantly, this episode sent T-Wood on an interesting new trajectory i.e. Owen’s situation. What was refreshing and different was that Owen DIDN’T suddenly and miraculously spring back to life at the end, in contrived fashion. Nope. Despite successfully warding off Death himself, Owen remains very much one of the living dead, leaving our Toad in a definite hole. And this situation continues into the next episode, with Jack making the decision to relieve Owen of his position as Hub medical officer. Well, nice for Martha I suppose, although her three episode contract was shortly drawing to a close so she didn't have that long to relish it…

I actually thought that “A Day in the Death” was better than “Dead Man” as it delved even further into Owen’s state of living death as well as his inner psyche. Relieved of his job, he’s sent home but has nothing meaningful to occupy him and sits around in a state of permanent ennui. More significantly, as someone who is meant to be dead, he can’t touch, he can’t feel, he can’t taste, he can’t eat…All sensation just isn’t there, thus leading to a massive state of alienation for Mr Harper. Toshiko comes to visit but she’s so caught up in talking about her own problems, it makes him feel even more isolated. Even an attempt to drown himself in Cardiff Bay doesn’t work – how can you die when you’re already dead?

I know I have slagged off his character in the past, but Burn Gorman was excellent at conveying all of Owen’s angst and frustration at his situation, and this new slant on the character opened up lots of previously unexplored avenues, not to mention giving Mr Gorman the chance to portray previously unseen facets of Owen’s persona. The smarmy charmer of old was gone, replaced by a bleak and hopeless attitude (although by the end of "Day" he's a LITTLE bit more positive about his plight) and in general Owen has become a much more reflective individual. Amazing what dying can do to/for you.

This was compounded by quite a well-done sub-plot in which Owen meets a young woman called Maggie who is contemplating suicide after the death of her husband in a car crash (he died just hours after their wedding!) But he manages to talk her out of the doing the deed by showing her an alien device that is a reply to the messages sent out from Earth in search of extra-terrestrial life. Heavy, man.

And the device itself forms the rest of the plot – before Owen gets his hands on it, it’s being horded by a reclusive millionaire and collector of alien artifacts, Henry John Parker, played by none other than Richard Briers! Nice little cameo from Mr B as Parker, who is now looking considerably older than in his “Good Life” days and you kind of felt pity for his character - Parker mistakenly believed that the device was keeping him alive when in fact it was in danger of exploding and killing people and it takes Owen to make him realise the truth. What is even more ironic is that when Parker has a heart attack, Owen is unable to give him the kiss of life to resuscitate him – as a “dead” person he doesn’t have any breath!

So…how long will the “Owen as walking dead” plot line run on for? Looks to be interesting…

Meanwhile after a promising return in “Reset”, Ms Martha Jones was somewhat underused in these two episodes I felt, functioning as little more than a glorified medic. She needed a bigger slice of the action, for sure. Oh well, we'll soon be seeing her again in Dr Who.

But all in all, two quite decent episodes! Yikes! Am I damning Torchwood with feint praise?!

And in this week's instalment: Gwen finally gets hitched to Rhys! Will it be a “Hello” magazine style wedding? What’s this about her declaring her love for Jack? (Oh WHAT a surprise). When it gets to the “no cause or just impediment” bit will Jack pipe up? Or Owen perhaps, alluding to his and Gwen’s past? (Mind you, it’s a bit hard to take the rantings of a dead man seriously). And Nerys “Liver Birds”/”Kinda” Hughes even gets to appear, even though she must be pretty ancient by now. Hoorah!

(Screencaps courtesy of time-and-space.co.uk )

Get used to it

2008-03-11T13:14:00.002Z

Has anyone seen one of the above posters/billboards? Well, perhaps only if you live in the UK, as they have only been used over here, to my knowledge. The posters by Stonewall are part of a campaign that seeks to tackle homophobia, in particular homophobic bullying in schools. Excellent strategy and I like the unapologetic message of the poster.

Oddly enough, only a day or two after I put up my recent post on Brokeback Mountain - leading to lots of very interesting debate from you, my fellow bloggers! - I saw one of these billboard posters on my way home from the gym! (About 5 minutes walk from my house no less). Strange that I'd been talking about the area in which I live as being a less than gay-friendly one. Hopefully messages like this are going to make a difference or at least get people to sit up and think!! However, sad to say, the poster/billboard has since disappeared. Is it too much for the neighbourhood to deal with?

Then this morning on the bus to work, just before Tulse Hill I saw another of the very same posters underneath a railway arch. Good, good! But underneath the "Get Over It!" part someone had written in clear graffiti: "Boom bye bye". This was a clear reference to a song by jamaican rapper, Buju Banton, in which he advocates the shooting of gays - just look at the lyrics:

"World is in trouble
Anytime Buju Banton come
Batty bwoy get up an run
At gunshot me head back
Hear I tell him now crew

(Its like) Boom bye bye
Inna batty bwoy head..."

In case you weren't aware, "batty bwoy" means "bum boy" and is a term of abuse for gay men, often used by black people. And no prizes for guessing what "Boom bye bye" means. Absolutely disgusting and I actually feel pretty bad about posting up such words on my blog... Fortunately at the time of the song's release, it was met with much protest and Mr Banton hasn't exactly made himself popular in certain circles as a result, being banned from performances in some venues.

Yes the song was released over ten years ago. It would seem that ignorance and narrow-mindedness still prevail.