Am I the only one?

So I'm sat here watching the Bafta's. Mainly agreeable (bar the fact that Boy A didn't win best single drama, a utter travesty for quite possibly the best piece of television in the last ten years) apart from one glaring piece of turd.

Gavin.

And

Fucking

Stacey.

Am I the only person on this island who finds this programme the most nauseating, self indulgent, prime time cuntwash that has ever graced the screens? Maybe. The fat bloke who loves himself (Gavins mate in said toss) who also doubles as the writer, walked away with some best comedy performance. He beat Mitchell (nominated for Peep Show, quite possibly the best sitcom ever, bar Partridge) and Merchant. After watching his performance on Something for the weekend a few weeks back (a I'm so great bastian of cuntishness pastiche with a layer of I'm famous name dropping), followed up by a disgusting display of unmitigated flirtatious puke on Lily Allens couch (like she'd ever, and the thought of even the possibility makes me want to peel my skin from its bones anyway) made the guy (I don't even care to learn his name) Alan's public enemy number one.

But to my surprise, his award speech was unbelievably humble and grateful, dedicating the award to his co-writer, Saxondales wife. My previous view felt harsh, and my guilt ran deep. I was preparing my apology.

But then said bloke stepped up to accept another award with the rest of the gang, Bryden and all.

Return of the cunt.

Please tell me I'm not the only person who feels this? Is Gavin and Stacey really the genius that we are led to believe? Am I just being harsh, led by my obvious disdain for BBC3 or because every time the news comes on they only mention the fact that G&S won two awards, in turn winding me up? Or just because the writer bloke annoys me and seems to be everywhere at the moment? I don't mind Gavin, he seems like a nice guy. But the other blokes just gets on my nerves! I feel like my judgement is stained. Please tell me, under this intense pressure from the great bastions of our television society saying this series is great, that my vision is somewhat clouded? No it is not. Gavin and fucking Stacey is rubbish. And so is Cranford (The 'I'd rather have a period' school of drama).

Bring back Spaced!

Mother Knows Best

I've been here a week and I think I'm pretty well positioned to start passing judgment on the people I encounter conducting my duties. Being a bigger facility theres a greater array of weird and wonderful folk, but none more stranger then James, the editor who resides in edit 9.

James is an awkward fuck. He's a slim chap, with a kind of 1990s style floppy hair do that fans of Pop Will Eat Itself used to wear. He wears a tatty brown corduroy suit and bright patterned shirts made from organic cotton. No matter what the weather, a old pair of Birkenstocks that look like hes owned them since he stopped growing adorn his feet. If James was any more eco he would actually be a six foot tall Hessian sack labeled "I am not a plastic bag". If James was any more middle class he would be a semi-detached house in Islington.

His messy English gent style is complimented with the latest Blackberry and Macbook Pro, and an immense need for every single technological advancement in his suite, like hes about to guide the next space launch home from the confides of his edit. Fortunately he also insists on configuring all the settings himself (he has an array of USB drives permanently hanging around his neck containing his personal settings for every piece of software ever created), which makes my job slightly easier. I say slightly because theres more to come.

James likes to mate. How do I know this? Well the man has six children, and hes been insisting on bringing in at least three every day the past week due to the late easter holiday break. Another poor runner has to spend the day offering free childcare for his demanding brood; "Tabatha needs a break, you don't mind do you?".

Just like dog owners, people with children think the whole world loves their spawn as much as they do. Personally I'm with the late Bill Hicks on this one: "Childbirth is no more a miracle then eating food and a turd coming out of your ass."

Media kids in general - Tarquin, Rowan and Sasha etc, all seem (according to their parents) to be special little geniuses. One day they might all grow up and rule the world from behind their TV specs, but to me they generally just seem posh and wet. They could expect years of torment from bullies at school, apart from the fact they're probably sent to special little media kids ones where the alpha males are the kids with the latest iphone, instead of the ones who can do something half decent with a football. Media kids are wrapped in layers of cotton wool and protected from the real world, god knows what would happen if they went to a inner city comprehensive, it would be like dropping the famous five into the Bronx.

This is honestly just the tip of the iceberg though. James is currently indulging his love of children with his current edit job, a upcoming cookery series for new mothers called "New Mum in the Kitchen". The production company have already sold the format to a U.S. network retitled "New Mom in the Kitchen". Do you see what they did there? So just what TV needs, a 6x30 of organic whole food recipes for puking, crying newborns, and tips for their post-natally depressed mother's on how to lose that baby flab. James likes to consider himself a method editor and to get himself in the 'zone' he has been demanding that his cappuccinos be made with his 'special milk' which he brings in every morning in a old thermos flask.

Intrigued as to what was so 'special' about his milk, I couldn't help but ask, thinking he'd reply with "We keep goats at home and Tab's gets me fresh milk from them every morning". I couldn't be further from the truth. Tabs indeed does supply the milk fresh, but it doesn't come from goats.

Having six children means that Tabs has had to have a certain amount of milk on tap for years now; and even though its been a while since she popped the last one out, the family (James included) has developed a distinctive taste for her own special blend of Cravendale. This has seen her invest in a breast pump to keep her brood full up on all manner of lactational treats, from breast milkshakes and hot chocolates for the younger ones, to lattes and cappuccinos for James. She has set up a 'no teat' rule on his request; he's insistent that to have the children sucking on her breasts now that they are slightly older would be socially unacceptable. Drinking her milk in a cappuccino seems absolutely fine in his book though!

So thats what I've been doing in the mornings lately, making cappuccinos from Tabs' breastmilk. James seems to love it so much, that he pretty much uses up all his supplies by lunchtime. But fortunately for him, theres a coffee shop round the corner that offers the same service. I am not kidding. So if anyone out there ever fancies it, you too can get yourself a lovely tasty breast milk cappuccino.

You have to wonder whose supplying it though.

Answers on a postcard.........

A Fresh Start; The Office

I cautiously knocked on the MD's door trying to judge the ratta-tap-tap somewhere between self assured and not too cocky. It was only my second day and I wanted to tread very carefully. My last encounter with the upper echelons of media power still smarted; I wanted to get this right. The MD had requested my presence in his office and it was an encounter I wanted to go as smoothly as possible this early in my employment.

A deep voice commanded through the door.

"Enter."

I opened the door.

"Ah Alan - our new runner, take a seat."

I already knew a lot about Stephen, the boss. The facility grapevine had fed me some gossip and the tragic story of recent events pretty much as soon as I was through the door on my first day.

Stephen had recently come out of the other side of a a particularly bitter divorce, with his wife pretty much taking the denim shirt of his back and giving only fleeting monthly meetings with his children for the foreseeable future. It was only by employing the talents of a divorce lawyer so expensive and talented (he would have even made Heather Mills shit it), that he kept hold of the facilities house from the clutches of his ex-wife. Stephen apparently didn't really have a leg to stand on in most of the proceedings (absolutely no pun intended relating to the previous paragraph!); there would have been many evenings when he could have gotten away with receiving a blow job from a Soho rent boy in his office, but alas for Stephen the night of the company Christmas party his wife had organised was not one of them.

Although caught trousers down, Stephen had aparently been devastated by the breakup. Thrown out of the family home, he spent two months sleeping in his office watching his wedding video on a loop and listening to Coldplay and Dido albums. Now he seemed to be getting himself back on track, and has bought himself a bachelor pad in Vauxhall.

He sat the other side of the desk and stared at me as though examining the like of which he had not encountered before. Stephen was cut from a different cloth than the posing prick who owned the last place I worked. He seemed a bit more old school; clad in the fifty-somethings uniform of head to toe denim, widely know as 'The Clarkson' in fashion circles. Eventually with a theaatrical flourish he began.

"I've already heard good things about you Alan. Keep it up and you could go far here. There are only two things you really need to remember...... one there are no glass ceilings here.... and two...... I like my coffee black, strong and no sugar, none of these poncey frappa-latte things."

And with that he wished me luck and motioned me out of his office. Not bad I think, I got out of that one alive. Must remember how he likes his coffee though. Strong and black, that's easy enough...........

As according to the office rumour, its how he likes his men as well!

Sugar Daddy

Another year, another series of The Apprentice. Now, you probably think I'm about to give the show both barrels - well your wrong.

The Apprentice is the most entertaining show on television. Why? I'll tell you.

First we have Sugar himself, the king of sarcasm. With great lines such as "You need to stick to that sale like shit to a blanket" I can quite easily forgive the fact that he looks like a angry hedgehog. Sugar is pure entertainment; he knows how to play the game and to keep the most annoying contestants in as long as possible. They're the ones the public want to watch, they get the ratings and Sugar gets more cash - the mans a genius! I actually remember watching the original American version of The Apprentice with Donald Trump (I've never understood why one of the richest men in the world can't afford a decent hairpiece) and while entertaining, Sugar blows that shit right out of the water.

But its not just Sugar that makes the show - its the contestants. The girls spend all their time arguing, and the boys wooping and hi-fiving each other. They're generally all quite posh (with the addition of a few token 'geezers' and self-made ghetto kids), and are as thick as pig shit, having spent the majority of their privileged lives banging on about how great they are at 'sales' and forgetting to learn any common sense. I wouldn't be surprised if they had motivational words tattooed on to the inside of their eyelids so they can can focus on winning even with their eyes closed. In any normal situation I would run a mile, but by giving these idiots simple tasks to do which their combination of egos ultimately always fucks up makes for utterly riveting television.

This series has already set a benchmark in a stupidity, which is a considerable achievement at such an early stage in proceedings. The teams (which I would personally call 'testorone' and 'estrogen') were set the task of running a launderette. The boys were managed by Raef, who was constantly edited laughing like a crazed megalomaniac, and also featured Vicky Pollards brother (he's done a food hygiene course apparently). The monumentally frog stupid girls team, managed by Jenny (who looks like a female version of footballer Darren Anderton), tried to charge their clients £4.99 to wash a pillowcase, and also lost a mass of their clients clothes. This was discovered AFTER they had begged these people for tips, a sequence which hasn't caused me to cringe so much since watching Borat. These 'business' decisions were met with absolute derision by Sugar, and the girls reacted by arguing like mad and pointing the finger at each other, with the upper crust Lucinda feeling the force of the rest of the team. Suffice to say the boys won. Thankfully Sir Alan fired the boring one and we can look forward to many more weeks of bungling and backstabbing.

I'm yet to make judgment on the rest of the contestants, but my first impressions tell me that the ex-army guy is going to win it, but I'm not really that fussed to be honest. The most important thing is that at last, theres finally some television that I can sit down and watch.

Thanks Sugar!

A Taste Of Paradise

Regular readers will remember I came across a particular nasty development gurus ideas book a few months back. I completely forgot about this until having a clearout at the other day (well I have got time on my hands the moment), so heres the best of the rest...........

Tate and Kyle (30x30, ITV1)

Jeremy Kyle takes guests from his early morning chat show to the Tate Britain, to see if art can solve their problems.

Wheres Wallace? (1 x 120, More4)

Danny Wallace has another drunken bet with Celebrity house mate Dave Gorman, and challenges him to be able to spot him in mass crowds at the worlds pilgrimages. Think Way of St. James, the Hajj, Vatican city Rome, Lourdes France, Santiago de Compostela Spain, and Fatima Portuga. More4 are all over this.

Bounty Hunters (15x60 + 1xCeleb Special)

On a scale not seen since the heady days of Challenge Anneka, Treasure Hunt and the Interceptor, the mass UK wide gameshow format returns to ITV. Two teams of intrepid Bounty Hunters are given a list of dangerous criminals to hunt down, capture and deliver to the authorities to claim an array of amazing prizes. High adrenaline, high octane, dangerous, daring and breathtaking; the UK will be glued to their seats as the whole nation goes Bounty Hunting. This is going to be huge!!!! Presented by Duane 'Dog' Chapman and teams guided and trained by his wife and sons.

Pete and Diddy (6x30 BBC3 or E4)

Pete Doherty and P-Diddy join forces to create a hip-hop indie fusion hit and the cameras are there every step of the way.

May Days (6x30 BBC2)

James May sets off on a personal mission to compete in the most bizarre ancient British customs know to man, from cheese rolling and bog snorkelling, to tar barrelling. If May's not interested then Fogles definately your man.

Wife Shock (Ch5 1x60)

When wives go mad it can sometime end with some of the most horrific ramifications. John Wayne Bobbit had his penis severed by his wife Lorena (a popular revenge act for Thai Ladies as well), Kerrang! DJ Tim Shaws wife sold his Lotus Esprit on Ebay and Jane got her revenge by hiring out a advertising board. This is just the tip of the iceberg - hell surely hath no fury like a woman scorned.

Friends of Fogle (BBC1 30x30)

New flagship Saturday morning chatshow hosted by the ever loveable Ben Fogle. Every week Ben will be joined by the nicest celebrity guests, who join him for a cup of tea and a piece of cake. There will be music, animals, DIY tips - Ben will even be cooking! This has the potential to be huge - think Blue Peter for adults. Everyone loves Fogle don't they? Ross won't be happy but fuck him, hes got enough money. Fogle is the future!