I had intended to write a post about The Bill the night the last episode aired (in this country) and now I’m looking at a blank input box, I’m not sure what to write. I’m not sad, actually, possibly because the last episode wasn’t as good as some we’ve had recently. Partly that comes of having everyone in it and it having a lot of Jack in a uniform (which I still can’t get used to) and Neil Manson aka Dodgy DI (who seems to have had a personality change from dodgy to bland).

For anyone who hasn’t got a clue what I’m talking about (which the Americans reading won’t), The Bill is a cop show. Read more…

I keep thinking I should update, but then I have nothing to say. I feel like my life has nothing going on it at the moment. Or at least nothing interesting. Which I’ve just realised is a terrible lead in to this post, which is a summary of what I’m up to… Read more…

I haven’t updated a while. First I didn’t have time and then I didn’t want to catch up and then I got dizzy… But these are all the things I might have posted about had I got round to it sometime in the last couple of weeks: Read more…

Last Thursday, when I put the TV on for HIGNFY there was no signal. It turned out later that was because there was a fire at the transmitter. So I just watched it on the iPlayer.

Last night I put the dinner on and came to watch Doctor Who once it was halfway through – and found there was no sound. After playing about with aerials I concluded I didn’t know what the problem was, but since Doctor Who had finished by that point and it was on the iPlayer, I watched it there.

This morning I tried doing a factory reset and rescan, which had no effect. At which point I decided I’d have to have a look at the back of my PVR (I watch all TV through that because I can live pause and rewind, but can’t on the telly). So I pulled the stand out a bit – which was hard because it was heavy – and the picture flickered. At which point I checked the scart lead and the minute I pushed it back in the sound came back…

On the plus side, last night’s recordings all have sound in, so I can watch Confidential and The Prisoner today.

I got Frontier in Space from Lovefilm today after dbskyler talked about the commentary I decided I wanted to see it. It comes in a set with Planet of the Daleks, which I don’t like much because it has Daleks in it. Each story has two discs, but Lovefilm only lists one. I just assumed it was because they’re a bit useless (given that they’re a bit useless), but no, it’s because they send you both and count it as one! Very handy.

I’ve only made it through episode 1′s commentary so far, but it’s quite interesting and funny.

Confidential just reminded me that I wanted to say this after the first episode at Easter, but I don’t like to put spoilers in here because hiding them depends on how people are reading and whether they can hold off from clicking on them.

There are spoilers for The Eleventh Hour in here, but not for any series 5 episodes after it. Read more…

I’d never seen The Prisoner, but I knew a few bits about it – including the ending. So when it started on ITV a couple of weeks ago I was keen to see what it was like, on the basis that if I liked it, maybe I’d like the original and if I didn’t like it, then maybe I’d like the original.

So far I’ve found it to be alright, but not that gripping and quite slow. But I want to find out how they’re going to end it and it’s only six episodes, so I’m definitely going to keep watching.

And then ITV4 showed the original. Which I had to watch on ITV Player because I didn’t found out until two hours after it was on (amazing, something I want to watch actually being on there!). Annoyingly my netbook does sound but no picture, but the laptop’s happy. And it doesn’t have adverts, which is good and unexpected.

So after having seen the first episode (which excitingly had Paul Eddington (Jim Hacker in Yes, Minister) and George Baker (Inspector Wexford) in) I have to say that I prefer the original. It’s more exciting and it’s more realistic. The new one has the residents of the village refuse to admit that anything outside of it exists, whereas in the original they know it does, but they can’t leave. And it doesn’t have as many people – it comes across as really odd in the new version that he’s Number 6 when the people go up to Number 554 or whatever.

And it reminds me of The Avengers because it was made in the 60s so it just has a similar style and feel.

Although The Bill moved to Tuesdays, as far as I’m concerned, it’s actually on at dinnertime on a Wednesday because I’m never in on a Tuesday.

So I’ve just watched last night’s and not far into it I thought to myself that one of the main characters on it looked suspiciously like Lee Ross, who played Kenny in Press Gang. Much as I was tempted to skip to the end, I thought the easiest way to find out would be to look on the website. Except that this episode doesn’t seem to exist! They list the last one as being on 20th April and the next one on the 4th May. Where did the 27th April go, I wonder?

I spent the episode trying to convince myself it wasn’t him – the character he was playing was 10 in 1987 and without looking it up, I know Lee Ross must be older than that. But it was him. I was quite impressed I recognised him, but there’s definitely something in the face that hasn’t changed in twenty years.

I’m amazed at the moment at just how good The Bill is. So many episodes have me on tenterhooks it’s almost like watching early episodes of Spooks, except instead of wondering if everyone’s going to die, you’re wondering if they’re going to work out what happened and whodunnit. I can’t believe they’re cancelling now, when it’s good again.

Just because PowerDVD and WordPress make it easy – a picspam of The Bill from Sept-Oct 1988 (Volume Two DVD). Read more…

I’ve spent the weekend watching The Bill from 1988 and look who pops up – it’s Robert Glenister. And I can do screencaps now I have PowerDVD! Read more…

I am trying to make more of an effort to post to Twitter and not just reply to people’s comments. And post here too, but that requires fewer words, although not necessarily less effort. The number of drafts I’ve gone through in the past to get down to 140 characters…

Last night’s The Bill was good as usual, and amazingly didn’t make me feel really dizzy halfway through. And I think I’ve learnt the names of two of the PCs and I quite like Sgt Stone. I thought he was going to be dodgy, but perhaps not.

Anyway, last night there was a character on it playing the main character’s brother, and I recognised his voice from somewhere, but couldn’t for the life of me work out where. I thought that maybe he sort of looked familiar too, but couldn’t pin it down and eventually decided I must be imagining it.

Except that then I realised where I recognised the voice – he was Colin in Press Gang. At which point he wasn’t in a scene for absolutely ages, but the next one he was in, someone called his name, he looked up and the expression was pure Colin and I knew I was right, even before checking on the credits.

It was very surreal – out of the last four episodes of The Bill we’ve had Luke from SJA, Ianto from Torchwood and Colin from Press Gang. There is sadly no picture on the official website, and nor is there a video clip with him talking, but I managed to find a clip with him in. It’s in this one at 00.00.48 where. And I have taken a handy screencap and annotated it: Read more…

I had a really surreal moment at the end of The Bill last night when, in the trailer for next week, I could have sworn I saw Tommy Knight (Luke in SJA, although I was too tired to remember the actor’s name at the time). I contemplated rewinding – I don’t watch live because I refuse to watch adverts. I’ve been on The Bill website a lot recently to try and learn some of the names because I don’t recognise most of the regulars any more, so I know they don’t have credits or tell you about the guest stars (not when they’re not that big, anyway). But what I did find were more trailers and clear evidence that it is Tommy Knight 30 seconds into this video and a photo that tells me he’s playing Greg. Although I am more excited that Terry was in it – I hadn’t seen him yet, so I didn’t quite believe the website when they said he was still in it.

I am enjoying The Bill at the moment, despite its lack of theme tune and pullover, and I am getting used to the incidental music. I can even name some of the new characters. Not that I can necessarily recognise them first off, mind you, even though they have their names on their uniforms these days…

I stopped watching in June 2005, I discovered from looking through my blog. And started again in October 2009. Thanks to the magic of YouTube I’ve been watching some old stuff and I can honestly that what I’ve missed has been utter rubbish, for the most part. And it’s obvious from the synopses too, which consist of a lot of sentences about the character’s personal lives back then. These days it’s a couple of sentences about the crime, which is what I’m watching for. I don’t mind them having personal lives, as long as it’s a background to the crime and isn’t the main focus.

Now I might go and put on an early half hour episode from the Volume Two DVD I got for Christmas and see who I recognise…

Now that we’ve had ten (ish, since two of them were stuck together) episodes of Stargate Universe, I thought I’d demonstrate just how crap I am at working out people’s names in TV programmes. Although, it has to be said the Confidential-type programme after the first (two) episode(s) helped a lot.

There might be spoilers below for the episodes that have been shown. Read more…

This post contains spoilers for the latest SJA episode, but nothing else.
Read more…

I am very behind in talking about SJA, not surprisingly given that I was at the gymnastics when the first one was broadcast and my copies of the audios had only just turned up that day.

There are going to be spoilers here for Prisoner of the Judoon, The Mad Woman in the Attic, The White Wolf and The Shadow People in that order.
Read more…

Last week I went to a quiz and one of the questions was who was Superintendent in The Bill. I was amazed to find it was Jack Meadows, although less so when I found out he took over when they went to once a week because I don’t think they’ll have got to those episodes in Australia yet.

So I thought I’d watch an episode.

I quite enjoyed it, although I was struggling not to fall asleep halfway through, but I think that was mostly due to me being tired. It was, amazingly, all crime. I can’t tell you anything about the personal lives of a single person in it and neither was the case uncannily like something that had happened to one of the coppers. Mum told me it would be like that but I didn’t believe her – I thought she was exaggerating! The only trouble was that it felt like a half hour episode that was stretched out to 50 minutes (I presume that’s how long it is without adverts since they have so many these days and they’re so long).

I had remembered that they’d said at the time that they were getting rid of the music, but I had thought they were replacing it. No. I still miss the days of the pullover, but at least the intro was short, even if it wasn’t at the start (I hate the way British programmes are doing that – it gives you less time to sit down and get yourself sorted before it starts). I don’t quite know why they felt the need to show shots of London where Sun Hull isn’t even vaguely close to. I was a bit paranoid that they’d suddenly moved it to a part of London where they could show the well known landmarks, but they haven’t, so I’m relieved.

My netbook was a big help because I could look up people on thebill.com and work out their names as it went along. Well, I didn’t need to look up Jack, Dodgy DI, Smithy or Roger. I just need to see an episode with Terry and Twiglet in and I’ll have the set.

I wondered what they’d done with the DCI’s office now that they don’t have one. My question was answered when they showed various parts of the station and the only part I recognised was reception. They had a room with coloured tiles on the floor and flatscreen monitors on the wall! Admittedly the last episode of The Bill I watched was from 1985, but I only stopped a few years ago and it’s moved on a lot from then. Their radios look a lot like my first mobile phone, which confused me at first.

I disliked the incidental music, which I knew was going to be there. It was only in a couple of places but I felt like they were trying to make me feel sympathy, which I already did, but I didn’t need it hammered into me with the background notes that made it hard to hear what they were saying.

Overall, I think I’ll watch some more. There’s been a bit lack of crime drama in my viewing schedule recently, although I really ought to get some Old Bill on DVD.

In other crime related news, the episode of Midsomer Murders that’s on next Wednesday had some scenes filmed outside my office featuring Jesse Birdsall dressed as Neptune(?) who had a dinghy covered in fish and lobster etc. Although my TV guide answers the question that bugged us as to what on earth was going on.

Exciting news: Red Dwarf is getting a new series! Despite Back to Earth not living up to series I-VI I’m excited anyway.

I spent last weekend updating all my Firefoxes to 3.5. My laptop and Firefox Portable were on v3 already, so it was just a case of clicking the button and updating a couple of my add-ons manually. The netbook was a different story…

The trouble with it is that Acer made some programs dependent on Firefox 2 and disabled the check for updates button, so I hadn’t bothered updating. It was faster than my old computer, but it had got to the stage where it was really slow, specially in Gmail where my typing was ahead of what was appearing on the screen. So I found some instructions on the internet about how to install Firefox 3 alongside v2. So I copied Firefox files on the netbook so I could make sure to get back to the old version and followed the instructions.

I briefly had both versions open before I restarted, which made all my old Firefox menus and icons open v3. Which, because it wasn’t installed over the top of the old version meant that it didn’t have my profile. The instructions said that it was easy to get the old version back, but didn’t say how. After spending ages searching the internet and trying things I gave up and set up the new version of Firefox.

Which was all fine except that whenever I opened it it opened up four tabs, which wasn’t what I wanted. I assumed this was a problem with Tab Mix Plus restoring things. A week later I found this was because I’d accidentally set my home page to be all four tabs, which it didn’t even occur to me to do…

It’s worked out ok in the end because 3.5 is much faster, nothing seems to be broken, and I have the Penguin Racing game that’s on the Asus Eee on my netbook. Not that I can play it because it moves, but it’ll be there for future usage…

I’ve also watched lots of new things on TV that all seems to be American. But how exciting is Friday evenings going to look with SJA, HIGFNY and Armstrong and Miller? Read more…

Merlin is being such a pain this series. First we get McKenzie Crook, who was Servalan and in Pirates of the Caribbean (well, and The Office, but I couldn’t make it through a whole episode of that, whatsisname annoyed me too much). Then last week we get a King going something along the lines of “Are you this great assassin?” when the answer was clearly, no, he’s Micky Bricks from Hustle with a silly beard. It amused me that after the beginning credits they put up a big “With Adrian Lester” credit, when it was clearly obvious he was in it.

Then this week I noticed in the beginning credits that Colin Salmon was in it. So I was prepared when he turned up, but was completely floored by a blonde woman, who I have no idea what her name was or what she said because I spent most of the time she was on screen trying to work out who she was. Eventually I realised she was Kerry from The Bill (the blonde PC, obviously, not the DC).

I could just really do with Merlin (and Doctor Who) not casting these big names because it really distracts from the story. I’m still trying to get to grips with it having Anthony Steward Head and Richard Wilson in it.

Mind you, what can you expect from a program named after the cat?

Today, or yesterday depending on how you count it, I’ve been ill for seven months.

Things I have been doing:

Watched Generation Kill, which turned out to be surprisingly good. After seven episodes I can name seven characters, which is pretty good going (Ray, Trombley, Reporter, Brad, LT, Captain America (who I recognise from somewhere but can’t work out where), Godfather). Plus there’s also the bloke that wears glasses who lost his helmet. There may or may not have been other speaking characters, I got a bit confused – they all dress the same, it doesn’t help!

I finished v2 of my Sarah and Harry ficathon story. So I have a draft or two to go and it will be about 5000 words. Handily, the SG Rare Pairings ficathon starts up once that’s done and I’m hoping there will be some Jack/Elizabeth prompts for me to write (and I’ll be leaving some, just as soon as I work out what). Then there’ll be Yuletide and I so want to add Teachers to the list of fandoms. And after one episode of Merlin I want to request Gaius & Merlin again.

I’m meeting Avon on Sunday, yay!

I have a new shower. It’s cunningly fitted into the corner of the bath so if you want to stand under it you have to stand on the bit of the bath that starts going upwards. So I take it down – which required me to take the shower head off so I could get it out from the middle of the soap dish so it would actually stretch far enough to shower with, and to rinse the bath with.

There really isn’t anything else at all going on in my life at the moment. Just lots of things I want to do.

This week hasn’t been too bad a week. It helped that it was only four days long and working from home Thursday afternoon. Although I spent the whole week confused so I forgot that it was the day I buy the newspaper until Thursday evening. It is all on the website, it’s just such a pain to read that way, I’d far rather have the paper.

This weekend I even felt well enough to clean the flat and go out to Sainsburys, so that’s an achievement. I’d quite like to go out for a walk at some point, as I currently get no exercise. I couldn’t fit that round cleaning, though, but maybe next weekend I’ll do that instead.

I’m onto the head moving exercises, which are really hard. But I knew they were going to be because I already don’t nod or shake my head, and try not to turn round at work when I hear something interesting from behind me.

I am working on watching all the stuff on my PVR so I actually have some space to tape everything that starts this autumn. After having had the prompt for a week I managed to come up with the whole plot for my Sarah & Harry ficathon story. I even started writing it. I seem to be on about 300 words at a time at the moment, which is about half my usual, but will get there in the end as long as I keep up with it.

For some inexplicable reason half the week’s TV is on tonight (Last Chance to See, Miss Marple (who I don’t like as much as Poirot) and Joanna Lumley doing something with cats. And the US Open is on the radio from tomorrow, so hopefully there’ll be lots of exciting tennis to listen to and they’ll get it done quickly because I really can’t stay up late these days.

And now I need to have a lie down so I won’t be too dizzy to cook dinner.

I’ve just watched the latest three episodes of Midsomer Murders. They always take me a while to get round to because they’re so slow you have to do something else while they’re on. It was quite surreal because the first one had Vila from Blakes 7 in, the second had Peter Davison and the Borg Queen (and a couple of other people I recognised but couldn’t be bothered to look up) and the last had that woman from Ultraviolet – with exactly the same hairstyle. Although it says everything about my visual memory that I can’t remember if it’s the same colour and I only saw Ultraviolet a few months ago.

And now for the meme that’s been going round and I hadn’t got round to putting up yet:

Ask me my fannish Top Five [Whatevers]. Any top fives. Doesn’t matter what, really! And I will answer them all in a new post. Possibly with pictures.*

* There won’t be pictures.