Drops of Jupiter

We're odd. We must be. We don't watch either X Factor nor Strictly Come Dancing. In fact, I, personally, would rather take razor blades to my genitals than be subjected to this utter bowel movement of 'entertainment'.

I've never really been much of a common denominator TV kind of person and the last time I watched anything on ITV (other than possibly a film) was in 2001. So I missed all those gloriously shit programmes like Britain's Got No Talent or Pop Stars: The Wankers. The thing that appals me more is that my two nephews both seem to be fans, which means that all their young friends are also watching these poor excuses for entertainment. I sort of understand that their dad, my tasteless brother, and his wife watch this crap, but they have lives even less exciting than mine; but what the fuck has happened to the world? It seems we (and I use the term 'we' very loosely) like encouraging arseholes like Simon Cowell or Anton Du Burke to take over our TV screens. And Bruce fucking Forsyth should know better.

Oddly enough, I know a really really crude story relating to a play on words regarding that ballroom dancing piece of shit. A mate of mine, who shall remain nameless, but will know who he is (as he reads this) has a thing for outdoor sex (he's obviously not going to be doing it today based on the monsoon going on outside my window) and fortunately for him, so does his partner. Once coitus has finished, she is left with this problem that I'm sure some women are all too familiar with - and one that I'm reluctant to be specific about. Suffice it to say, after the sex has been finished, she gets up and dances around, prompting him to christen her moves as Strictly Cum Dancing...

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The BBC it seems has declared that autumn lasts 2 weeks. Why? Well, on the last Sunday of October, there was a Country File: Autumn Special, which celebrated the arrival of autumn. On last night's show, the truly dislikeable Julia Bradbury (who it seems replaced the 4 previous female presenters because they were too old and unattractive) announced that next week's episode they would be celebrating the end of autumn...

Speaking of seasons; the wife pointed out an article in last weekend's Observer, where the author of the piece claimed that this year we saw four season for the first time in years. Just where did this guy live?

I'm sure you could say we had four seasons. Winter lasted until May; Spring came to a thudding halt halfway through June and Summer ended at the end of July. Autumn is still going strong, but ends next Sunday according to the BBC. This year has been anything other than a normal year; which might explain why the fruits on trees were so big; which I think is a real puzzle considering the blossom on our apple and plum trees didn't come out until the end of May.

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Jesus, it is grim out there. I woke up this morning and staggered (literally) out of bed and if the alarm clock hadn't said 8.53am, I would have thought it was about 6.30am. Looking at the weather forecast on the BBC, it seems that this particular low pressure area has stuck a pin in Northampton and is going to circle it for the next 24 hours.

I feel exceptionally sorry for the two aerial fitters over the road, who are up on the roof of the house to the right of the one opposite. It's chucking it down and blowing a gale and they look like they could do with a nice cup of tea and a hot blanket (and a few safety nets).

Why the hell couldn't this have settled over the UK throughout the weekend. it might have put some of those firework wankers off of disturbing every living soul with their childish antics...

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Apparently, there was a study that determined that there is no such thing as a grumpy old man; it said that we're either grumpy or not and getting older doesn't have any bearing on it. Hah!

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I am staring at a front garden full of mushrooms! The house over the road (the one with the exhibitionist Eastern Europeans) has a huge clump of field blewitts (lepista nuda) growing on it. They came up last year and I was tempted to go and tell them they could eat them. You'd think, them being from Europe and everything, that they'd know an edible mushroom if they saw one. But, then again, on Saturday night, while I was checking my emails, I noticed they were watching X Factor on their 80" flat screen TV...

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So Pulp are reforming in 2011.

Woo and indeed hoo.

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While writing yesterday's blog entry, the Blogger spell checker refused to accept the word "show's"; it would allow me "shoe's" and "shows" but not the former. It is an American spell checker to be fair, but as most Americans refer to TV programmes as a show, surely the possessive of that would be show's?

Oops, sorry, I forgot... Americans... How silly of me.

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Having exhausted the B movies (and a really crap TV mini-series from the 90s), I'm moving onto obscure films of the 1960s and that means a film that I'm reliably informed inspired George Romero's zombie movies. The Last Man on Earth stars the brilliant Vincent Price in the original adaptation of Richard Matheson's I Am Legend. Made in Italy in 1964 for about a million lira (or £40), it has all the hallmarks used by Romero in Night of the Living Dead, but in the immortal words of Michael Caine, not a lot of people know that.

I also have (inspired by Roger) Excalibur to watch again; the unexpurgated version of The Exorcist, The Disappearance of Alice Creed (which may or may not feature Gemma Arterton in the buff), Scott Pilgrim versus the World (which if its anything like the comic I will probably stop watching after 5 minutes) and a film about Elvis Presley battling the Mummy called Bubba Ho-Tep, which stars Bruce Campbell, from The Evil Dead trilogy, as the ageing burger-meister.

Who says being off sick has to be boring...