That's when good neighbours...

A couple of weeks ago I did a double-take when I noted that young Lance from Neighbours had turned up on a St George ad as a baby-kissing banker.

This weekend I did another double-take when young Lance sold me a ticket* at my local cinema. It's a long way from Ramsay Street to Oxford Street, but not necessarily a bad move if you ask me.

Lance was sure Toady said they were going to
the Coffee Shop for a hot beef selection

That said, the Neighbours page on the network website looks decidedly grown up. Perhaps I'll have to pick up where I left off as a tweenager and start watching again.

* In case you were wondering, I finally saw The Lives of Others. It was wonderful.

There goes the weekend

I haven't watched The West Wing for over 12 mths. I have all episodes on dvd and I have only completed viewing the first three series. What is wrong with me?


I used to be a regular viewer. Every couple of weeks my flatmates and a few friends would get together, cook up a storm, and watch a few eps. It was great, a chance to catch up over some gourmet food and then sit in silence, and awe, to appreciate some of the finest scripting around. My West Winging friends, writers all of them, loved the show as much as I and we would argue at the end of each episode whether we could squeeze another in.

Back then, The West Wing was buried in increasingly bizarre and changable timeslots on late night tv here in Australia. It has now moved to our national broadcaster, where the program has a regular, primetime slot. This is great news for tv viewers. Me, I prefer dvd. No ads, and I can watch it at my leisure.

However my 'leisure' is ever diminishing. I have a lot of stuff on. It's one of those facts of life; growing up, working, spending time with friends and loved ones. For me these things naturally take precedence over tv. While living overseas for a while I could watch a couple of episodes each night. I could squeeze it in given the lack of programming in my native language - and my lack of much of a social life. But back home I get distracted. It doesn't help that the Significant Other has yet to be converted. She doesn't like tv much. But I know she'd like The West Wing if only she'd give it a chance. Just like The L Word, which she didn't want to watch either. She's funny like that.

To be honest, I'm a bit of a commitment-phobe. Twenty-two episodes, to me, is a big commitment and I have trouble making the time to regularly keep up. I certainly couldn't commit if I had to watch it in the old-school, broadcast way. No chance.

Anyway, today I took a day off work, a Mental Health Day. My emotional wellbeing has been strained by an unsupportive work environment over the past few days and I decided that a day off was just what I needed. So I have elected to use my time wisely and get back into The West Wing. I dusted of series 4 and upon viewing episode 1 it's all come back to me. What was I thinking, shelving it for so long? God I love this show. The writing is superb. The characters are intelligent and witty. I want to work with them. I want to BE them. I want these people to really be the leaders of the self proclaimed free world. If only it weren't fiction.

So now I'm trying to figure out a way that I can be professionally unemployed. I want to be able to stay home and finish watching the next 80-odd episodes of The West Wing and still get paid. There must be a way. I bet CJ could figure it out.

Sam Newman is a Knob

Last night I had the displeasure of catching about twenty minutes of The Footy Show (AFL version). I have watched this show sporadically in the past but hadn't seen it for a few years and this of course was my first experience of the new Eddie-less incarnation. I can't say I particularly like new hosts Gary Lyon or John Thwaites James Brayshaw but it's that tool Sam Newman who really gets my goat*.

It's common knowledge that Sam Newman is a tosser but I found watching him last night to be so totally and utterly offensive that I would liked to have hurt him. I am not a violent person but I wouldn't mind giving him a smack in the kisser. Within ninety seconds he had managed to demean gays (three times), the mentally disabled, women and the entire population of Sydney. His sleazy, dirty old man act is just plain creepy and he doesn't seem to realise just how pathetic he is.

I rarely let such trivialities offend me but the degree of this man's homophobia, sexism and general stupidity has hit a nerve. I cannot believe that Channel Nine allows this sort of behaviour from its 'personalities' and I can't believe the stupidity of the Australian viewing public for allowing him to get away with it for so long. I guess appealing to the lowest common denominator really does pay.

Would someone please punch him in the nutsack. Now. Ta.




* I don't really have a goat but if I did I wouldn't be letting Sam bloody Newman anywhere near it.