Snowed in

The fields were green when I sat down to my muesli but by the time I got up from the table everywhere was already white.  It has been snowing steadily all day and by 11.30 we were snowed in as far as vehicles are concerned.  It doesn't help that the road to our house is a steep hill and the drive is even steeper - about 1 in 4!  I had thought that the council would keep the roads open for buses but it seems the snow has been too much for them.  (It doesn't take much.)  We live on the borders of Patcham and Hollingbury - served by the 5B and 26 buses.

The Old Bat would usually have gone to the MS Centre this morning but cried off.  We also decided we had enough basic foodstuffs to defer the regular Friday shopping trip until tomorrow - although it might mean I have to walk to the shop about a mile and a bit away.  We shall see.

The Biskers - the winner

Maybe it's something to do with my age, but it seems to me that the golden era of the situation comedy was back in the 1970s and 1980s.  None of the recent shows have seemed at all funny to me.  But, as I said, maybe that is something to do with my age.  And I have to say that very few of the American sit-coms aired on our televisions have amused me.  There was one, I remember, with Lucille Ball and Dick van Dyke which was fairly amusing but nowhere near reaching the short list for the BISCAs.

While I have been mulling this over in my mind, several shows which I had forgotten about have surfaced in my memory, although in most cases I can recall little about them other than their names!  Oddly enough, though, there are twp sit-coms from way back that I do recall with pleasure although it seems that very few others remember them at all.  There was After Henry, starring Prunella Scales, and A Fine Romance with husband and wife team Michael Williams and Judi Dench.  And there were shows such as The Liver Birds and The Likely Lads.  All good, clean fun and well worth watching.

Most, in fact all of the shows I have mentioned are the sort to raise a smile and a chuckle rather than a belly laugh.  Perhaps among the best known belly-laugh-producing shows is one of the earliest television sit-coms, Steptoe and Son.  And we mustn't forget Fawlty Towers or Only Fools and Horses.

To my mind, the best sit-coms are not necessarily those which produce belly laughs.  Some of the perhaps gentler shows which rely on less farcical humour and more on wit are those which I can watch time after time - and often see something I had missed before.  There are two outstanding shows like that: Dad's Army and As Time Goes By.

And the winner is:

As Time Goes By, starring Judi Dench and Geoffrey Palmer.

I was going to insert a YouTube clip but there are simply too many to choose from.  Do have a look if you don't know this show.

~~~~~

Yet another shot of the French market; this time, the olive stall.

The Biskers, part the second

Yesterday I introduced you to the idea of the Brighton Situation Comedy Awards, the BSCAs or Biskers.  Today I should like to tell you what the judging panel will be looking for when deciding which show to honour with this prestigious award.

Judging panel, huh!  There is only one member of the panel: me.

And you might be wondering what form the presentation will take and where it will be held.  Well now, I had been thinking of the coffee stall beside the roundabout at the junction of the A23 and the A27.  It seemed a reasonably accessible place with sufficient parking but there was one major snag.  If the weather on the day of the awards ceremony should turn out to be inclement, the crowds would be sheltering under just one large umbrella as this is basically an open air venue.  So I had second thoughts and have settled on the caff just beyond the Pylons on the A23.  Granted, it's on the southbound carriageway so attendees will need to drive up to Pyecombe and turn to come back to it.  But if it were on the other side, attendees would need to drive to Pyecombe to return home.  Anyway, there should be just about enough parking - and it is an indoor venue.

We (that's the royal "we") are in discussion with a number of celebrities and it is too soon as yet to announce who will be presenting the awards.  I am hoping that the evening's star attraction will be an actor from Porridge.  He was in the episode were Fletcher was admitted to the prison hospital and played the part of the man in the fourth bed on the left.  It was a speaking part, although I have to admit that his only line was to call, "Nurse!"

Oh dear, I've run out of time again and I still haven't explained what the judges will be looking for.  Well, there's always tomorrow.

~~~~~

Still wandering around the French market in Southwick Square.  Just look at these strawberry tartlets.

The BSCAs

You've heard of the Oscars, the Golden Globes and, possibly, the BAFTAs.  I am introducing a one-off awards ceremony known as the BSCAs, or Biskers.  But before we get to the awards ceremony, let me tell you a little of the background to the Biskers.

Some two, three or four years ago - I am unable to be too exact as my memory is fading faster and faster as my age increases, also faster and faster it seems - anyway, back then the Old Bat and I found that night after night we were sitting twiddling our thumbs and staring at a dark television screen.  Like so many of our generation - and, indeed, the following generations - we were quite unable to amuse ourselves with conversation or cards or by making music ourselves and we would sit gazing vacantly at the flickering images presented to us by one or other of the television broadcasters.  Except that we had found ourselves with nothing, absolutely nothing, that we wanted to watch.  On any of the 734 (or however many there are) channels.  That was when I started buying box sets of situation comedies.  My purchasing habits have extended a little and have recently included past television drama series and the occasional film.  Deciding on my most recent purchase was a tad difficult.  Should it be that 1970s drama, Colditz, or the sit-com from about the same time, Open All Hours?  Colditz won, but it set me thinking (which is always a dangerous thing).  What, I wondered would I say was the best situation comedy of all time?  And so we have the Brighton Situation Comedy Awards, the Biskers.  But what, you ask, are the requirements for a show to be short-listed?  In fact, is there a short list?

Let's start with the second question as the answer to that is considerably shorter than the answer to the first.  No.  Well, not yet.

It is at this point that my intention was to launch into a full explanation of what attributes a show would need to display in order to be considered for the short list.  Unfortunately, I am unable to do so for two reasons:

1. I haven't yet worked out just what those attributes should be; and
2. I have an appointment with my consultant rheumatologist and need to leave almost right now.

It may be that those of an unkind disposition will read that second reason as an appointment with the men in white coats, but we'll let that pass.

~~~~~

To continue our mooch around the French market, we visit the baker's stall.  He has more than just bread on display.  There are also these rather tempting patisseries and charcuteries.

He probably was guilty, but...

I don't know if it is inscribed in the Magna Carta, specified in an Act of Parliament or simply accepted as part of the unwritten common law of England, but the understanding is that any person is innocent until proven guilty.  And that's the nub: proven guilty by either a bench of magistrates or a jury consisting of twelve persons selected at random.  That is what is leaving a nasty taste in my mouth in connection with Jimmy Savile, OK, that as well as the other.

For the benefit of readers of this blog who come from a different planet, sorry, country, I should explain the background to my comments.  Jimmy Savile - Sir Jimmy Savile, OBE - died in October 2011.  He had started out as a DJ and became a television presenter on Top of the Pops as well as Jim'll Fix It, a show in which the dreams of children were fulfilled.  Always dressed outrageously... exotically... and driving a pink Rolls Royce with a trademark cigar, Jimmy was considered a true English eccentric.  He served as a volunteer porter at a hospital in Leeds, a visitor at Broadmoor secure psychiatric hospital and at Stoke Mandeville hospital for paraplegics.  He raised millions on sponsored runs etc, hence the OBE and then the knighthood.  However, after his death allegations were made that Jimmy Savile had, over many years, sexually abused young girls and hospital patients, especially at Broadmoor.

It was not long before the number of people making such allegations had moved into three figures and the media had accepted that Savile was guilty.  A number of investigations have been launched and, at the end of last week, the official report of the Metropolitan Police Service and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children was published.  I have not read the whole report, but I can say that paragraph 4 of the introduction states that the investigation "collated all the allegations against Savile, irrespective of where the offences took place".

That is an official report and in one sentence at the beginning of the report it moves from "allegations" to "offences".  And Jimmy Savile has never been found guilty of any of these allegations.

I'm not saying that all or, indeed, any of the people making the allegations are hoaxers, jumping on a bandwagon in the hope that something might accrue to their benefit.  Nor am I suggesting that Jimmy Savile was whiter than the driven snow: indeed, I suspect he was guilty as hell.  But neither he nor anybody else can give his side of the story; he cannot be proved guilty in accordance with the law of the country.  That's what leaves the nasty taste in my mouth; the fact that anybody can, after their death, be considered guilty as a result of unproved allegations.

~~~~~

Got the phone fixed but only by ringing the customer service centre from the shop.  And nobody tried to sell me a new phone!

~~~~~

We occasionally have an invasion of French market traders who set up a French market for a day, selling such delicacies as bread, olives, cheese etc.  And other things, like these table cloths.

Thrs a thng

Although I have owned a mobile phone for many years, I have yet to use it to send a text message.  I suppose in all honesty I should admit that I rarely use it to make a phone call - and never to receive calls.  In fact, the phone is rarely switched on - and we make a point of not telling people the number.  I have no wish to receive a raft of calls like the one we received some years ago when we were driving to the south of France.  I forget now just why the phone had been switched on: possibly I half expected a call to say that my mother had been taken ill or something along those lines.  Anyway, we received several calls, all of which seemed to come from the same person.  I can't be dogmatic about that as it was the Old Bat who answered as I was driving at the time.  Eventually, she told the caller to delete our number as it was costing both him and us a fortune - and no, Cathy wasn't able to come to the phone and no, neither of us was going to the football that evening.  I nearly flipped when the bill came and I saw what it had cost me to receive all those calls I didn't want.  Nowadays I switch the phone on when we are in France - once a day, just to check.  And that's about the only time I use it - to make a booking at the village restaurant if I can't face trying to track down Nicholas and, if I'm successful, get away from him in under half an hour.

As I was saying, I have never sent a text message.  I've never seen the need - but that is about to change.  We were told on the lookerers course on Saturday that after we have checked sheep, we should send a text message confirming all is well and advising the voltage and pulse rate of the electric fence.  I told the chief honcho that I would need instruction on sending text messages, which gave rise to general laughter.  Head honcho pointed out that the web site specifically says that one requirement of becoming a lookerer is sending texts.  I politely corrected him and told him that the web site says it is a requirement that lookerers have mobile phones; it says nothing about sending text messages.

Yesterday, younger son and granddaughter arrived for lunch so I took the opportunity of sending him a text - just to make sure I knew what I was doing.  It went very well, considering, right up until after I saw the screen saying that my message was being sent.  Then the on-screen message changed to read, "Message failed".  We tried all sorts to get my mobile to send a text message, to no avail.

As it happens, my mobile phone company has a shop in Brighton.  I will hie me there this afternoon and no doubt some spotty-faced underage geek will give me a scornful look and sort the problem in 30 seconds flat or he will look at my ancient mobile phone and try to sell me a newer model.

~~~~~

This peaceful scene is a mile or so down the road from our French house.

Something I've learned

If one holds down the "Alt Gr" and presses the "e" key, this comes up: é.  An "e" with a cute accent!  It works with the other four vowels as well.

I still don't know how to get a grave accent or a circumflex straight from the keyboard.