They are all chainsmoking, and using telephone boxes! Egg is telling Miles he should try finding love on the internet because it's "the future"! Andrew Lincoln Looks Exactly The Same! What happened to the gay one, and the one with the bad hair? Where did Tanita Tikaram's brother go? It is a Blessing that we have not seen Egg's whingey girlfriend since 1997!And by jiminy, it's Not Very Good, either. Bollocks. I used to fucking LOVE This Life. I thought they were Virtually My Friends, even though they were all lawyers and lived in a gigantic house, and I did menial tasks in an advertising agency and lived in a tiny flat with a flatmate I used to torture with a stick. I wanted to be Anna (but then I reckon that the God-botherers on my corridor at university who used to put "Jesus Loves You" postcards under my door, complete with pictures of kittens, wanted to be Anna too). In fact everyone wanted to be Anna. And then I sat next to Anna (well, Daniela Nardini) at a wedding a couple of years later. And she was top. I have a ladycrush on her, even though I am not on that particular bus.
There is a Christmas Special coming, in which they will be Reunited Ten Years On. I hope that Anna is still wearing red lipstick and flashing her marvellous legs, but is living quietly in the country mostly making jam with a nice chap, looking after her horse, writing novels and occasionally going Up To Town to buy more red lipstick and see her Old Chums. I love her.
With any luck Millie realised how boring she was and killed herself. Egg's OK, he's making a fortune from voiceovers. Miles is mainly hanging out with Johnny Depp in a Pirate Costume but like I say: where's Warren? What happened to Tanita Tikaram's brother?
I go to a Show
I hate musicals with a passion. I don't mind old-fashioned films of musicals with people singing properly and stories, but I cannot even think about Lloyd Webber, Sarah Brightman or Elaine Paige without coming out in hives.
But I saw The Sound of Music the other night. There was Cilla Black, Graham Norton, Anneka Rice and Doreen out of Birds of a Feather, a thousand people up from the suburbs for the night and us. And loads of cameras and that, and some red buses going to Saltzburg.
Maria was played by a girl who won her part from a telly programme in which the best impersonation of Julie Andrews was judged by Andrew Lloyd Webber, who was sitting in a Golden Armchair. I did not watch it. Every time she talked she skipped. It was like the film, but with all the long bits taken out and without Julie Andrews and Christopher "Foxy" Plummer. We ate a lot of Liquorice Allsorts and the Julie Andrews impersonator got a standing ovation at the end.
Someone else I know went last Friday, and as they were doing the Nazi bit (you know, when the Captain sings Edelweiss and they all run away), the person sitting in the seat next to her shouted "They can't do that! That's RACIST!".
Then we saw this lovely bust of Bruce Forsyth, which made everything worthwhile. I listen to Radio 4
I listen to Radio 4 the whole time, even when I am asleep. ("Viking North Utsire South veering southwest 6 to gale 8, increasing severe gale 9 or storm 10 for a time. Rough or very rough, occasionally high later. Rain or showers. Moderate or good.")
But today I heard Lord Stevens (who used to be head of the Metropolitan Police, pictured here on the left) on Desert Island Discs*. He was an Idiot. Lots of jingoistic hymns, a song from Phantom of the Opera sung by Brightman and "If" by Rudyard Kipling (surely the Worst Poem Ever Written), read by DES LYNAM. I read some books
When it rains, you have to read The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford, The Young Visiters by Daisy Ashford, or The Diary of a Nobody. Then you will feel less rained-upon. Fact.
I take a photograph
It's not very good, but London has been sort of like this this week:
But despite the rain, my teeth are beginning to be mendededed, the Vanity Cover is off the Classical Cock today, and Anuja-the-personal-trainer is leaving Holmes Place. I am Free! Free of endless wittering and mixed metaphors! Released from "If you look good, you feel good!". Never again will I have to endure an hour of a story I do not understand, about people I do not know, with no obvious conclusion, whilst doing squats on a half-ball holding 10kg weights.
Things are looking up. I reckon it'll turn out nice tomorrow.
* For Foreign Readers: BBC Radio 4 is the best radio station in the World. Desert Island Discs is a strange but good programme, invented by Roy Plomley in 1942. Celebrities go on and choose the eight records they would take on a desert island, and talk about it a bit. Everyone gets The Complete Works of Shakespeare and the Bible to read, but you can choose one other book and a luxury. (Mine are Molesworth and some tweezers.)
18 comments:
Every word is a gem. I would pay money to read what you write. So far I read them for free.
I have Radio 4 on all day long too.
Andrew in a Golden Armchair and I hate musicals too.
You deserve a larger audience. Global.
I agree - someone should give you a grant to do this. But - Bruce Forsyth? What's a wonderful blogger like you doing calling him lovely? Or perhaps I've missed something. Nice to see you to see you nice.
I love your rainy photo - was that just rain on the lens causing that effect? Some people would spend hours trying to create that with clever software trickery and you come waltzing along and just take a photo like that! Outrageous!
I'm getting more and more into Radio 4 these days - it's the "default" channel in my car and there are some very funny and intelligent things on there. I don't always understand them, because I'm a bit dim.
This Life - I'm pretty confident that most females watching would want to be Anna. I mean, who else would you want to be? I suppose "Kira" was quite quirky but I couldn't look at her without trying to imagine what her Grange Hill character was like, and I could never remember.
Superb. Every word.
At the expense of luring your devoted readers to a rival - and by definition inferior - blog here's one of my other favourites, which you may find relevant..
I say chaps you are kind. Really.
Mikey, will do your 'best of' edit for a special one-off fee of £500 a month. OK by you?
Anxious - was just jolly good luck - was on top of Highgate Hill in my car with my phone in my hand and an OK camera and bright light. The rain was on the car window. Dim? Pur-leese. I started listening properly in 1992 and it has taken me This Long to get it. I still don't understand half of what they're saying (Start The Week is incomprehensible, but good for it - you get a scientist explaining something about four-dimensional maths and Bragg talking about Pope, all in one same half hour, and I'm none the wiser.) Fuck I'd forgotten about Kira being in GH. Explains a lot.
Andie - just the sheer joy of seeing Brucie within 10 feet of the Real Doreen was enough to make it a Sensation.
Lordy, I feel I must comment that Elaine Paige is coma-inducing, she also refers to herself as 'EP' on her godawful radio 2 slot. Unlistenable. Brucie, on the other hand, is fab. Radio 4 (& 3) are good sometimes, but some of the programmes are a bit too up themselves.
I am reduced to listening to radio 4 online, which rather makes me resent jenni murray for talking about periods on my bandwidth, but that's not what I wanted to say. what i wanted to say was that the last time i was in uk, I had to borrow my mother's car and the only thing she had in the tape machine (with no radio reception on the moor) was an Elaine Paige and Barbara Dixon compilation. fucking terrible.
oh, and you do brilliant blog. i supposed I better go and watch children in middle of the road need on BBC godawful Prime ...ooh, it looks like we've been spared this year. HUZZZZZZAAAAAAHHHHHH!
I just thought I'd point out that Christopher Plummer is canadian.
Just sayin'.
(anyone who makes an "eh !" joke shall promptly be bitch-slapped, ether nothwithstanding)
Eh?
I've served Egg's whiney girlfriend.
She was very nice in real life, so she is obviously a quite brilliant actor.
After a few years of intermittent viewing I can almost understand the accent on Eastenders-Coronation St. and Emmerdale are easier to comprehend. Lloyd Weber has always reminded me of a pompous bullfrog but some of his music is nice. Yes, Christopher Plummer is Canadian-he was my second girlhood crush--after David McCallum. NWM-who was your first crush?
Hmm. My first crush was I think Toblemory the Womble. Then I saw Plummer and was Converted. Sigh.
I mean Tobermory. I also liked Toblerone. Still do. Is the Only Acceptable Face of Non-70% Cocoa Solids chocolate, along with Cadbury Buttons.
timbo... served, as in....?
As in, helped her with a thing, gave advice, was generally very helpful to.
That's as much as you're getting. Can't go giving away my life story!
Lucy I bet he doesn't mean that. I bet he offered her his Manlove and she said no, but nicely.
Think I read somewhere that Warren is dead, and they all go to his funeral, although I may have imagined this. Tanita Tikaram's brother has gone to New Zealand to be a whale whisperer.
Warren is now doing duties as cop-sidekick to John Nettles in Midsomer Murders. I hear.
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