Priceless Paintings from W7

I used to think nurses were women,
I used to think police were men,
I used to think poets were boring,
Until I became one of them.

The BBC quoted this poem in their Mastercrafts program on stained glass, and the poem is now cited in a new stained glass featuring in a school in Peckham, south London.

I was intrigued and consulted with a popular Internet search engine, and thus discovered a poet called Benjamin Zephaniah. What a great guy! Well worded, non-boring, non-traditionalist, inventive, fresh. I also like Wot a Pair.

Read it for yourself, and read it aloud. It’s right here.

Books, Thoughts BBC, BBC Television, book

Lily Allen, the caller sais, is slightly unsuitable for his young daughters. The caller rung the Radcliffe and Maconie Show on BBC Radio 2 (18-Feb-2010), so he was of course agreed and his call turned into another couple of minutes of inane babble.

These guys play all the right music, but really shouldn’t be allowed to speak.

Anyway. Slightly unsuitable. Right. A little bit pregnant.

A little bit stupid. Yes, that’d work.

Thoughts BBC, BBC Radio 2, life

It’s Only a Theory is the perfect example. It’s the perfect example for what makes BBC4 television what it is: a TV station regularly criticised for the fact that it fails attracting the huge big audience (criticised by those who oversee the BBC’s spending of license money), and regularly praised for failing to attract the big audience (like, by myself).

How’s that?

It’s got to do with engaging the mind. Take a look at It’ Only a Theory, for example. A comedy program in which candidates propose and defend a theory, challenged by Andy Hamilton, Reginald D. Hunter, and a guest judge. The theories are serious, but of course chosen for their headline and entertainment value. Their party-talk value, if you like. Previous theories included “Texting improves children’s literacy,” “The first person to reach the age of 1000 years is already born,” and “Romantic comedies make people miserable.”

Similar to QI, It’s Only a Theory doesn’t strike a balance between comedy and something more serious. It’s not serious. It’s comedy, its pure entertainment, but it goes without the roaring-out-load, thigh-slapping style of humour.

Not the kind of show that will save BBC4, and not a show ever to make it out of BBC4. Nice entertainment though.

Thoughts BBC, BBC Television, television

The BBC runs a new program on David Hockney, and The Master contributes three little paintings, which you can put […] onto your phone or computer. These downloads are available right here, and for 48 hours only.

Once David Hockney’s time-limited offer has expired (why this childish for-48-hours-only nonsense anyway?), feel free to take one of mine – that’s OK as long as you don’t change it or pretend you made it yourself. I use Alfred on my mobile phone, and use the Manukan Island sunset as a desktop wallpaper.

Whether you chose David Hockney, one of mine or maybe one of your own making, I find this is a very nice way of personalising an impersonal device.

An endless number of web sites and utilities help you to create the wallpaper that fits your phone from an existing image; see http://www.mytinyphone.com/p/make-wallpaper/ for an example. Go for it!

Painting, Thoughts BBC, david hockney, Painting

I fear I may have lost out in evolution through a loss that goes all the way back to the fruit flies. Some male fruit flies carry powerful pheromones on their tails, which makes them irresistible to their female counterparts.

But then, the commentator tells me in the superb BBC South Pacific production, one wrong move [by the male], and she is off for good.

Evolution all the same all around, and my world order is restored.

Thoughts BBC, BBC Television, evolution

People in Britain complain, as it emerges that collections of domestic recyclables are currently stockpiled. Prices are down, so companies fill warehouses with recycling paper, plastic, metal and glass rather than selling at a loss.

The complain roots from a sense of being cheated. We do all this separating and recycling, one interviewee said in a tear-stricken voice, and all they do is stockpile it.

Makes sense to me. Doesn’t make sense to moan and complain, not in the way portrayed by the BBC. After all, it’s still better than throwing everything onto the landfill, isn’t it?

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• Back at junk value, recyclables are piling up….
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• Councils dumping more than 200,000 tonnes of recycling every year
• Recycled waste could be stored on MoD bases
• Mountains of recycled rubbish spring up across UK as market for waste collapses

Thoughts BBC, Britain, recycling

Here’s some nice lunch time entertainment: BBC London’s Strange London Photo Gallery: Strange London.

Thoughts BBC, london

What a wonderful concept! BBC’s Imagine had a program and reported about El Sistema in Venezuela; a scheme that provides children with free musical instruments and tuition in an attempt to re-socialise and improve the impoverished and disadvantaged. They put the fun back in learning music, too, because they don’t make the kids go through years of learning and practising an instrument prior to joining an orchestra. Instead, the children join the orchestra, and learn there and then.

One of the first pieces performed, they told us, is Tchaikovsky’s 4th. Not because it’s particularly easy, but because it is not particularly easy.

A very stimulating report from Venezuela. Great to see that the Venezuelean scheme has been adopted by Sistema Scotland, also known as The Big Noise. Please support them, if you get a chance.

Thoughts BBC, Scotland;, Venezuela;

The BBC was trying to talk us out of the recession. I guess this won’t be the last attempt. This one goes like so:

How the Pound was so weak now, compared to the Euro or the Dollar, that it made sense for foreigners to come to Britain for their shopping. The proved their case by showing price tags of various items of designer clothing, including T-shirts selling at £57 in Britain, and at the equivalent of £69 on the European continent.

I propose a new law.

Just like health warnings are printed on tobacco products, price tags for designer-wear should warn about the mental health implications of such purchase.

£59 for a T-shirt, it would read, and possibly even consider it a bargain, are you completely insane, bonkers, nuts?

Thoughts BBC, Britain

What is it with the BBC these days? The accuracy of their weather forecasts isn’t exactly great, but here is one forecast that I can make with very high accuracy indeed:

Two out of three BBC weather girls will be pregnant at any given time.

There’s no problem with this, is is just astounding.

I wonder if part of the BBC’s recruitment policy requires high fertility and child wish, or if some other aspect of being a BBC weather girl actively promotes pregnancy.

Thoughts BBC

It’s very rare that I watch cooking programs on television. I zapped into this BBC program by chance, and ended up watching the whole broadcast.

It’s nice to see a TV chef, even though in need of a better script writer, who doesn’t do any of the usual cover-up nonsense of “having prepared one earlier” or using semi-prepared ingredients.

Ching-He Huang shows the nasty business of dealing with a large crab, explains why a Sea Bass ought to be steamed with its head on (because the idea of wholeness is important to Chinese cooking, and because you can tell when its done from the whiteness of its eyes), and identifies a fish as fresh by smell (doesn’t smell of fish) and touch (not sticky).

I thought her recipes a little monotonous, but enjoyed watching someone who knows how to handle fish and seafood. Check it out!

Food and Drink, Thoughts BBC

You might have noticed in yesterday’s post already, the BBC and I have decided to go for larger images. I opted for a new image size 138.5% the original width (the height works out according to the aspect ratio).

Not quite as well explained as the BCC’s changes (and not quite as elaborate), but the new width equals the default width in the editing package that I use, thus saving me the fix-up of the image size every time. Less stress when posting, yeah!

I hope you like the larger pics.

Thoughts BBC

2,500 post offices nationwide are under thread of closure, including 169 of 850 London post offices (BBC report here, full list of proposed closures here).

Nice to know that our local post office seems to have escaped that thread, now that they recently made such a nice effort to find peaceful stamps.

Cashier number two, please!

Thoughts BBC, london, Post Office;

Right after the 10 O’Clock News presented the latest of the Coca Cola Football League, here comes the weather. A missed opportunity, I say.

The BBC could massively improve funding, if only they sold more advertising.

And now… the Tesco weather, followed by the Fuller’s Breweries Crimewatch. Meanwhile, over on BBC Two, Vauxhall Newsnight brings you more about…

I am glad we aren’t quite there yet, and would wish people could return to simply play the Premiership League or whatever it used to be called, back in the good old days. Ha! I can feel a grumpy old man coming on!

Thoughts BBC, Football, Tesco;

Did you catch BBC Four’s recent three-part production “Atoms?”

Professor Jim Al-Khalili provided the most outstanding, most interesting and most comprehensible roller-coaster ride through the world of atoms, nuclear physics and quantum mechanics, ever.

I missed most of it, but saw enough to watch out for repeat broadcast. This should be an award-winning series. I hope it will. Bravo!

Current Affairs BBC