Category: BBC

Ground Hog Day

What Day Is It?

Work is a four letter word round here. It reminds me of the bitter daily grind and sends a shudder down my spine. I have to admit, though, that gainful employment did provide a structure to my day and a timetable on autopilot  – 6.30am, Heart FM; 7am douche, press, brew, fag, no breakfast; 8am, Tube no seat; 8.55am, Café Nero Americano; 9am PC on. Ready steady go. Now all that is in the past and I can do as I please I sometimes don’t know what day it is. I don’t know where the months have gone since I gave all that up and I often don’t know what I did yesterday. Liam is no better. It’s not a complaint just an observation. Perhaps it’s early onset dementia. Besides it’s easy to imagine I’m Bill Murray in Ground Hog Day when watching the same episode of The Weakest Link on a continuous loop. Tis the fate of all emigreys.

Feel the Love

I’ve long believed that everyone hated us. The British strut the world stage hanging onto the coat tails of our mighty American cousins and I can understand why this gets up the noses of many. Ridicule in Iraq, deadly bombs on the Tube, World Cup humiliation and nil point at Eurovision all point to a depressing impression of widespread antipathy. It’s little consolation that the pushy Yanks are despised more. It’s come as a refreshing surprise to discover than dear old Blighty is the second most popular nation in the World according to a BBC World Service Country Rating Poll. It’s a welcome antidote to the legions of emigrey Brit-bashers and doom and gloom soothsayers on the top of the Clapham omnibus. Alas, we were beaten into second place by the Germans but I suppose we’re getting used to that. Apparently, though, Turks don’t think much of us at all, presumably because they are taught that the English (Britain doesn’t seem to exist in Turkish parlance) were responsible for the final destruction of the Ottoman Empire. That’s what happens when you back the wrong horse.

The Word on the Street

Thank you to those who voted in my playful poll about proxy servers. Here are the results of the Perking the Pansies jury:

31% – Yes I use a proxy server in Turkey

28% – No I don’t use a proxy server

10% – I’ve no idea what you’re taking about!

31% – I don’t live in Turkey

For anyone interested, the way to access a proxy server is to sign up to a ‘Virtual Private Network’ (VPN). This handy service provides a gateway to British terrestrial TV and also circumvents internet restrictions by the Turkish authorities. We use my-private-network.co.uk. The service was easy to set up and costs about a fiver a month. This allows us to stream live TV and watch catch up services on our laptop. We also installed the BBC iPlayer to download BBC programmes to watch at our leisure. For an altogether better viewing experience, we connect the laptop to our TV and sound system.

The Downside

The process can be frustrating and unsatisfying. Live streaming and catch up needs a good internet speed. Ours is up and down like whore’s drawers. A variable picture quality, broadcasts that freeze then jump forward and endless buffering can irritatingly interrupt our  enjoyment. Downloading programmes using the iPlayer works really well as it saves a temporary copy on our computer but, of course, only applies to BBC broadcasts.

Huddled Masses

Misir

We watched the drama unfold in Egypt on BBC World. The dictator was finally toppled by the “…huddled masses yearning to breathe free…” to misquote the inscription on a bronze plaque mounted inside of the Statue of Liberty. History demonstrates that authoritarian regimes, whether left, right or theocratic that rule by fear eventually collapse under the weight of their own oppression. Egypt, the most ancient of nations, has no experience of democracy and I sincerely hope that the experiment will be real and lasting. Let’s wish for a pluralist, secular state that respects individual rights and not for a ‘one man, one vote, once’ process that might cast Egypt back to the Middle Ages and would make the Middle East an infinitely more dangerous place. That would be scary for everyone and Egyptians deserve better.

I also sense my foster land may be sliding imperceptibly backwards. The first sign of compulsory head-scarfs will see us booking the first available Easyjet flight back to flawed but free Blighty.

“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Lord Acton (1834-1902)

Much Ado About Nothing

My nightly tribulations anticipating a cross knock at the door by a scandalised conscript in latex gloves conducting an internal investigation has mercifully abated. All the fuss started when a distressed Digiturk obtained a court order to shut down a couple of insignificant blogs illegally broadcasting highlights from the Turkish Süper Lig. In response, the inscrutable authorities banned hundreds of thousands of websites that share the same Google ‘address’ as the obsessive soccer bores with their wobbly handicams. Imagine the sheer farce of Calvin Klein forcing every market across the land to close because a few stalls flog phony CK knickers.

Yesterday I was off blog in a vain attempt to forget the whole sorry story and return to a near normal life of degenerate leisure. We had a late liquid lunch followed by a reinstatement of Liam’s conjugal rights hurriedly withdrawn when I was branded a petty felon. We topped off our perfect day with an evening of ‘Strictly’ courtesy of the BBC iPlayer. It was delectable to behold that unreconstructed old bigot and professional virgin with two left feet, Miss Widdecombe, finally expelled from the show. National institution? She should be in one.

I retired to my pit pissed and paranoid thinking our phone might be tapped.

Auntie’s Bloomers

You are the weakest link. Goodbye

We amused ourselves with a night of catch up TV by plugging the laptop into the box. It is hugely preferable to BBC Entertainment, a misnomer if ever there was one. The whole channel broadcast an endless nightly loop of old shows indispersed by obscure BBC3 flops. I like a little bit of The Weakest Link now again but not the same episode recycled a dozen times and Robin Hood is a real repeat treat. I’m overdosing on so many cutting edge medical dramas I need my stomach pumped.  I know I can just watch the other side but Auntie, like chocolate, is an essential comfort. Besides, I’m waiting to see the name of an old friend roll by on the closing credits of Holby Shitty when he served his time as series editor. Since we’ve just reached the episodes originally broadcast just after The Six Day War, I’m not counting my goats.

Clement watches Sky but needs a satellite dish the size of Jodrell Bank to receive it. The service is so unreliable he’s constantly getting a little man in to fiddle with his aerial. Still, it keeps a smile on his face.

Clever Bitch

In a half-hearted attempt to integrate into the overwintering emigrey community we popped along to a local restaurant for a quiz night. We’re good at quizzes or so we thought. It was like a Derby and Joan Club with a sorry collection of depressed looking people in BHS knitwear. We stuck out like black people at a Ku Klux Klan convention. We sat next to George and Phyllis from Birmingham. We engaged in the usual exploratory conversation. We overheard George whisper to Phyllis “Look, they’re even wearing wedding rings”.

It seems that Phyllis and George have somewhat mislaid their family. They found out about their daughter’s wedding and pregnancy on Facebook. The are pooch people and their clever bitch can tell the difference between a Turk and Kurd because they smell different. Oh dear.

We came last in the quiz. Phyllis helpfully explained that many of the questions originated from BBC World so we should keep watching for next time. There won’t be a next time. As one of the answers was ‘cruet set’ I asked Phyllis when was the last time she heard cruet set mentioned on the BBC. That shut her up.

It’ll Never Last

What’s with the blanket coverage of Prince William’s engagement on BBC World? Of course I wish them well but it’s hardly a world transforming event. And, I do hope the lovely Kate knows what she’s signing up to. The dull and emotionally stilted Windsors don’t exactly have an admirable track record of matrimonial harmony or dealing sympathetically with eating disorders. The ‘Firm’ will spit her out if she doesn’t make the grade which is to put up and shut up. Don’t do it, Kate. Marry a fat cat lawyer and move to Chelsea.