Saturday, January 28, 2012

Zoo Quest To The West Country

Armand and Michaela Denis film one of the localsWe'd decided - finally! - to go on our first proper holiday, as opposed to the occasional day out and that week we spent in bed. We were a bit tentative as we're both picky sociopaths so we decided that we'd best move about a bit, just in case. So we did a lightning visit to the pointy bit at the bottom of the country. (Alas, too fleeting to give a shout to them nice Pat and Scarlet.) After a few nice days we pootled back home, taking a meandering track that would eventually get us back hereabouts...

There was a giant flea Market at Newton Poppleford. Imagine our dismay to find that they were, in fact, selling giant fleas.

The gents lavatory at Bridgewater had advertisements for Easter eggs, which is wrong on so very many levels

Egad!!! I am sure I bumped into Armand and Michaela Denis in the Book Barn at Hallatrow on the way over to Mummerset. They were filming the habits of two middle-aged ladies who were complaining that the Shell Guide to Gardening wasn't in the conchology section.

"I've never read a Jilly Cooper book, have you?"
"I don't know that I have."

Oh come now! You'd know if you had…

There were acres and acres of Thackery and Dickens and yards of Collins pocket literature. Meanwhile, as always, the collectors of detective fiction hang onto their spoils. And I really have to ask: were there really that many copies of John Halifax, Gentleman printed?

In Bath we met a chap by the river who invited us to his 53rd birthday. We were politely non-committal; as a rule we don't accept party invitation from people who are foaming at the mouth. Especially not when it's still only ten in the morning. It's a bit too much like being back at work.

Monday, January 02, 2012

Bank holiday television

You can tell it's a bank holiday Monday by the state of the programmes they put on the telly, though God knows it gets more like a perpetual bank holiday every day:


  • There is, of course, no news .

  • On Channel Five a bunch of oddly-wrought blokes from places you've never heard of (including Dartford) are competing for the title of "The World's Strangest Man."

  • On Alibabble, Miss Marple forsakes St. Mary Mead to spend a weekend at Melchester to watch Roy of the Rovers pit his footballing skills against Billy the Fish.

  • Oh goodie. A special holiday showing of " Indiana Potter and
    the Eggheads of Hollyoaks."


I'm looking forward to later tonight when Tess Daley and Nick Knowles present "Zoo Time" live from the Trocadero, Southport.