Sweet Nothings

I've always loved TV quiz- and gameshows. I was reminded of the subject this week thanks to Dave Gorman's Absolute Radio podcast . Dave spent some time lamenting the state of gameshows today, which arguably reached its nadir with Simon Cowell's overblown and utterly vacuous  Red or Black . The decline of TV gameshows is one of my pet subjects and I could quite easily have made this blog entry a lengthy exploration of why exactly they have all but ceased to be a viable prime time proposition. But then I thought I should record my own experience, if only for posterity's sake. And besides, Game Show Death can basically be boiled down to (a) the rise of reality TV and the subsequent proliferation of micro-celebs into every nook and cranny of the schedules, and (b) the success of Who Wants to be a Millionaire?  since everybody else tried to copy it, and failed miserably. Yes, for a few brief minutes back in 2000 I was a TV star. The show was the sadly-defunct Channel 4 tea...

Arty boat tour shot Top of the Must-See List for Chicago was an architectural boat tour . Although this doesn't sound terribly promising on paper, it lives up to its billing by being an informative 90 minute-lecture on the history of Chicago's most significant buildings - delivered by a genuine expert from the Chicago Architecture Foundation - which doubles up as a pleasant introductory riverbound meander around the downtown area. The tour was certainly a more pleasant journey than the long El ride into the city, which we had to take every day because for reasons of (can you guess?) extreme parsimony we were ensconced in a hotel way out in the northern suburbs. The El (short for el evated railway) is one of those iconic things which turns out to be something of a disappointment. What looks fun and quirky on ER and in the movies is pretty drab up close. The circular section around The Loop - the heart of the City, at least in the financial sense - is quite cool and find...

En route to Chicago we stopped off at Cedar Point  theme park in Sanduskie, Ohio. It has lots of rollercoasters, including the 400ft+ Top Thrill Dragster : I'm pleased to report that I completed this ride without soiling myself. After queuing for a good hour, the ride itself being about 17 seconds long doesn't represent great value for money as it were, but goodness me it's intense. An espresso shot of adreneline, compared to the more traditional coasters such as Millennium Force - itself over 300ft and offering an arguably more satisfying overall ride experience. In our limited time here we also squeezed in a ride on the Windseeker (above)   - just like chair-o-planes except that you again happen to be over 300ft in the air. We tried 4 rides in 4 hours, and barely scratched the surface of what the park had to offer. America - where they do things just that little bit bigger.

Toronto was never that high on my city wishlist, but due to various complex friend-related reasons (which can be boiled down to "I don't have many, so am reliant on the ones I do have") it's where I spent the first few days of my recent north American jaunt. I certainly had no designs on staying at the Holiday Inn Express in North York a good 10 miles outside the city centre either, but again due to various complex friend-related reasons... etc. Still, a night in the drab suburbs did gave me a taste of what life must be like for your average Torontonian - a far cry from the idyllic, summer-cottage-by-the-lake existence enjoyed by their more fortunate brethren. Once properly ensconced downtown at the much nicer Strathcona (although no free breakfast - complex friend-related reasons etc), I was much happier. The CN Tower is by far the main tourist attraction, although despite its great height it's not all that impressive when viewed from close-up - a grey concr...

So yeah... that last post moaning about a handful of minor disturbances on my road was started at the beginning of last week, but by the time I'd finished it and published it last night London was being beset by rioting. Talk about great timing... I guess it's good to keep things in perspective - and pat myself on the back for choosing not to live above a shop again. And not to live in Tottenham, obviously. Yikes...

So it's come to this - a blog in which I complain about my noisy neighbours. I've lived in my current flat for two and a bit years now, and I can't remember another period in my life (even living in student halls and villages) during which I've been woken up during the night and generally been perturbed by noise as much as these last few months. I'm not under any illusions that my little street in Palmers Green is particularly classy. It's also the summer, and the place is like a greenhouse, so the wide-open windows do inevitably increase external noise levels. But nevertheless, it seems that amongst the newer crop of residents in these blocks there are an awful lot of selfish, shouty bastards. The standard disturbances are people coming home from a late night out. Sometimes this involves cars waiting around with the engine on, sometimes it's just the too-loud sound of intoxicated speech. (I should add that I'm on an off-street cul-de-sac, which ca...

Last Sunday, as we made our way from the car park on the third day of Latitude to see The Waterboys , my friend and I realised we were playing a high-stakes game. The festival had been enjoyable enough so far, and although there’d been lots of rain on Friday night and most of Saturday the site hadn’t turned into a total mudbath. (The thing about a quagmire like the 2007 Glastonbury is once you’ve been through it and come out the other side, any festival conditions seem pretty tame in comparison. Our generation never had a Great War or a 'Nam. This will have to do.) Naturally it helps when you get to stay in a big house just outside Ipswich rather than on a soggy campsite. Overnighting elsewhere is a double-edged sword though, and not just because of the hair-raising mudslide that was the drive to the day car park. Festivals aren’t just about watching some bands/comedy/etc on the main stages - they’re about the vibes, maaan. Nothing quite beats the thrill of catching something un...

Well, haven't the last couple of days been interesting? All sorts of things that could be said about News International's nefarious dealings, but this pretty much sums it up: "Hitler was nice to dogs". Brilliant. I'll probably buy the News of the World tomorrow, just to see what they fill it with. Chances are it'll only be an improvement...

An inordinate amount of my last few days has been spent in Hyde Park. Wednesday night's appetizer was a 10K race, rescheduled from April thanks to Kate'n'Wills. Just over 54:00 - not too shabby if I do say so myself, and helped by the perfect conditions and nice scenery (only partially spoiled by the sight of a man tumbling into a dirty puddle thanks to an errant cyclist. I swear they do these things on purpose.) There was of course a dirty great artificial barrier blocking off the northern section of the park - erected because we were in the middle of the annual two-week span during which the park temporarily turns into central London's biggest gig venue. The first festival, Hyde Park Calling, had been and gone, but Arcade Fire 's gig was a standalone affair and therefore not quite as corporate. I arrived in time to see The Vaccines , who one has to feel somewhat sorry for. Had they arrived a few years back they could have made a relatively gentle, low-key entry ...

I put this on my Facebook but figured it deserved the widest possible audience  to be put on here too. Just imagine if these allegations turned out to be true. You heard it here first.

I couldn't let this one go without passing comment, as it is truly the most baffling managerial appointment that I can remember. It was all going so well for Aston Villa - finally rid of Deadly Doug (but not before his parting gift of a fantastic manager), and guided by what seemed that rarest of creatures, a sensible foreign owner. Then it all began to unravel: the departure of O'Neill (who has a fondness for litigation, so let's not speculate about any of that), followed by the appointment of an ageing Frenchman possessing the archetypal "dickey ticker". Houllier's enforced exit should have been a blessing in disguise though - now the club could appoint a decent (and more importantly, healthy) manager who'd have the whole summer to build a team and bed them in. I can't imagine even the most masochistic Villa fan ever dreamed it would come to this. First of all Mark Hughes looked like the obvious choice, but apparently the abrupt manner of his ...

Block-age My relationship with Adam and Joe has been a bit rocky so far. Several different people whose opinions I respect had recommended their 6 Music show to me, but for whatever reason I never jumped in. Then when I finally popped my podcast cherry in South Africa, my expectations had built up to such extreme levels that they were always going to disappoint. Worse, the postmodernism, silly voices and absence of any sort of heart made me furious. I  hated  this self-indulgent crap! Oh well, to cut a long story short I've been listening to the new batch of podcasts from the start and I like them now. Sorry about that. The one quality that helped them to crowbar their way into my affections was how media-literate they are, and it's this that makes Attack the Block  a qualified success. The general consensus seems to be that this is a 7 out of 10 film and I'd have to agree. It's a great concept, and as Cornish has pointed out comparisons to Shaun of the Dead ...

[NOTE: Grr... Blogger went down on Thursday evening and I lost half of this post. What you see below is partly re-written from memory, so if it's rubbish then clearly that's the reason.] I've not really blogged about The Apprentice before, but after checking the whole internet it appears that nobody else has ever written about it, so here we go! We're into series 7 now and the format has passed the well-established stage and is lurching perilously close to "tired". It's nobody's fault, for this is just the way of TV shows in general and reality shows in particular. These tend to peak in their first series when the format is new and fresh, any cynicism about possible match-fixing hasn't had time to set in, and the contestants aren't all hyper-aware thanks to viewings of previous series. This rule certainly applies to the majority of UK reality shows from the last decade or so - Big Brother , Pop Idol , I'm A Celeb ... The exception is T...

They do say that the best way to see Venice is not to plan a proper route and just explore the maze of narrow streets, canals and alleyways not knowing what you're about to stumble upon. My problem is that I'm not very good at aimless wandering. For example, upon exiting the station on day 1, I resolved to follow the Grand Canal as it looped around to the Rialto bridge before heading down to the main Piazza San Marco (St Mark's Square to you); within 10 minutes I was frantically breaking out the guidebook after following the wrong canal. On day 2, after a few minutes of making my casual way through the sidestreets towards the Accademia gallery, I got antsy that I didn't know exactly where I was and ended up following the ubiquitous signs down to the Rialto instead. Even though going via there was a much longer route. Sigh. Still, you're never entirely sure what's what in Venice, wherein lies its charm. Away from San Marco and the obvious tourist traps (and t...

What a curious business this AV referendum is turning out to be. Britain's first referendum in 30-odd years should be a huge deal. Unfortunately, the Great British Public's general disillusionment with politics in general combined with the relative complexity of the AV system is threatening to reduce the whole thing to a sideshow. The ever-increasing tetchiness between the coalition partners makes it a rather entertaining one, admittedly - these kind of spirited exchanges of views are exactly what should have been happening from day one of this Government, at least from a Lib Dem point of view. But the sight of High Tories standing side by side with Labour grandees will confuse many voters, probably making them less likely to vote than they already were. Anyone who's even thinking of voting should be compelled BY LAW to read this briefing paper  which gives as fair and unbiased an overview of the advantages and disadvantages of the proposed system compared with the cur...

Source Code is the second film from Duncan Jones, who previously brought us Moon  and who was brought to us in part by David Bowie, him being his dad and all [/obligatory Bowie mention]. Firstly, I enjoyed this much more than Moon , but then I took the slightly heretical position of not enjoying that movie all that much. In fact, the same applies to pretty much all of the bona fide, classic dialogue-based sci-fi movies that I've seen - 2001, Solaris, Silent Running ... I've clearly been raised on an unhealthy diet of space opera, action and blockbuster FX, for which I can only apologise. Anyway, Source Code on the surface is a big leap into the mainstream by Jones - big budget, A-list star, plenty of explosions (well, technically the same explosion but it does happen LOADS of times). But even from the opening titles, sweeping aerial cityscapes accompanied by pleasingly old-school bombastic music, you get the feeling that this is a filmmaker who cares. Jake Gyllenhaal helps...

I can't decide on one specific thing to write about, but feel I ought to make some sort of entry in order to avoid getting featured on one of those " blog graveyard " sites. So here are a few random bullet points. Feeling Gravity's Pull  - Wonders of the Universe doesn't mess with a winning formula, meaning lucky old Brian Cox once again gets to visit spectacular landscapes the world over from where he delivers his enthusiastic musings on life, the universe and everything. It's very slow and clearly designed to appeal to the lowest common audience denominator, but let's be clear - any attempt to get people watching hard science on prime time TV is worthwhile, and especially when the quality of the visuals is this good. Even better, last night's episode featured Brian in a gravity simulator, and when it sped up to 4 Gs and beyond, and the immense downward forces made his jowls sag and his forehead crease, for once he looked his actual age. Mind yo...