Well I watched the last ever Monty Python show on TV almost live (had to pause it to take the dogs over the field) and was a bit underwhelmed. To be fair, I think this was one of things where you just had to be there. I remember watching an old episode of Fawlty Towers, […]
Entries Tagged as 'Life'
An advertising question
July 18th, 2014 · 1 Comment · Life
Saw a TV advert the other day. It was for a specific product, said how good it was, then mentioned how it was on special offer at a specific supermarket and ended with that supermarket’s branding. Who would have placed the advert? The manufacturer or the supermarket? Both working together? Maybe the supermarket placed the […]
Starbucks culture shock
June 19th, 2014 · 1 Comment · Life
Earlier today I watched an interview with Howard Schultz, the Chairman and CEO of Starbucks, on The Daily Show, amidst a haze of cognitive dissonance. The Daily Show host, Jon Stewart is very much a left wing liberal in US terms but instead of ripping into Schultz for dodgy tax accounting he seemed to be […]
Looking back at nostalgia
June 8th, 2014 · 1 Comment · Life
I don’t know what to make about this short article about nostalgia on the BBC website. It all sounds reasonable enough, or as reasonable as pschobabble can be, and yet my own experience doesn’t follow it at all. It says that people prone to nostalgia (which I am) are less likely to have lingering thoughts […]
Tags: Nostalgia
Don’t tell UKIP but…
May 29th, 2014 · 3 Comments · Life
…the Swedes and their Nordic friends seem to be taking over. First of all, there are all those TV shows (that I haven’t actually seen) like The Bridge and Wallander, then there are all those crime novels (that I haven’t actually read) by Steig Larsson and Jo Nesbø and the filmmakers like Lars Von Trier […]
Tags: Books
A Man Called Ove
May 27th, 2014 · 2 Comments · Life
I recently read a book with the slightly underwhelming title of A Man Called Ove by a new author, Fredrick Backman which is by a long way the best book I have read so far this year, and with hindsight the title is exactly right. It is out in hardback (and probably e-book format) in […]
Citation needed
May 26th, 2014 · Comments Off · Life, Music
I have just been looking at the Wikipedia page for The Wombles (specifically the band rather than the books or TV shows) for no particular reason. I already knew that Chris Spedding was in the band so that was no great revelation, but several other things were news to me. Unfortunately some of the best […]
Tags: WTF
Ready for the count
May 21st, 2014 · Comments Off · Life, Politics
I received my letter today, the one that gets me into the local elections count on Friday, so it must be time for my traditional pre-election rant about that… Why can’t they just let anybody in? If anybody is really interested and engaged enough to want to go to the count and see democracy in […]
Tags: Elections
I would like to tweet about this ‘ere dead parrot
May 21st, 2014 · 2 Comments · Life, Technology
An interesting article on the BBC News site today about using Twitter to complain about things. Amongst other things it says: According to a poll of 2,000 people by the communications agency Fishburn Hedges and Echo Research in April 2012, 36% of people had used a social media platform to contact a big company and […]
Tags: Virgin Media
Today’s bright idea #9
May 12th, 2014 · Comments Off · Life, Technology
I was watching Mrs. Skuds playing one of those Facebook games the other day. It may be called ‘Tribez’. It looked like a generic Swords & Sorcery meets Sim City sort of game. It made me think that the way technology is going we can’t be too far away from being able to play Sim […]
Tags: Bright Ideas·Games·Town Planning
Happy to find I am being consistent!