BBC America update

Back in January, I blogged about how Comcast was changing our channel lineup and we were going to lose BBC America if we didn't pay significantly more each month, which I didn't want to do. I mentioned at the time that we had had the experience with Comcast that they don't always follow through right away with their threatened changes. True to form, four and a half months later there have been no changes as far as Comcast is concerned. BBC America, however, has moved Graham Norton an hour later on a Saturday night - too late for me to bothered staying up anyway :-(

The cost of BBC America

Years ago, when the kids were very little, I was trying to cut down on our expenses and I decided that one bill we could easily slash was for the cable TV. I called and canceled all but the most basic of cable service, which brought our bill down to something like $5/month. Years later when we finally decided to go with cable internet access instead of dial-up, the sales rep tried to talk me into a more expensive TV package. I said I really wasn't interested in paying so much more for so many channels I had no interest in watching when the only channels we didn't have that I knew we were interested in watching were the History Channel and BBC America. I was glad I'd mentioned the specific stations I was interested in as the rep immediately informed me that we didn't need to spend much more money to get a package that would include BBC America. The deal she offered was quite reasonable and that's the package we've had ever since.

A couple of years ago we got a message from the cable company that the package we subscribe to was no longer being offered, but we were 'grandfathered' in. In other words, we can keep the package we've got so long as we don't make any changes to it. Unfortunately, they didn't guarantee that they wouldn't make any changes from their end! Last month we got a letter informing us that BBC America would be being moved from the 'Digital Preferred' level of service to 'Digital Starter'. Of course I have no idea what channels are included with which packages so I had to look it up.

The way the packages are listed, it looks as though they are listed in order of expense:

• Limited Basic (that's the super cheap package we had for years - it's still only $7.28/month for 30 channels, though you won't find it listed on the cable company's website of course!)
• Expanded Basic (48 channels)
• Digital Economy (35 channels)
• Digital Starter (64 channels)
• Digital Preferred (90 channels)
• Digital Premium (46 channels - HBO, Starz, Cinema and the like)

So we have Limited Basic+Digital Preferred and I'm thinking having fewer channels doesn't bother me because we mostly just watch PBS and BBC America anyway. Limited Basic+Digital Starter will obviously be cheaper, and we'll still get BBC America. But of course (and I know you're way ahead of me here) - it doesn't work out like that. To get Digital Starter (the only package that includes BBCAmerica) you not only have to get Limited Basic but Expanded Basic too.

On looking closely at the list, I discovered that the Expanded Basic channels are, for the most part, the same ones you get with Digital Starter except they are not digital. So Expanded Basic+Digital Starter is not 48+64, but more like 7+64. To switch from the package we have to the one that has BBC America will mean going from 120 channels (124 of which I  rarely if ever watch) to 101 channels (96 of which I will rarely if ever watch).  I will lose Nat. Geo., BBCWorld, and a couple of other channels I like to watch occasionally, but I'll gain some other channels that  don't currently have that I'm sure will prove entertaining from time to time. So why I am still wittering on about this as though it's a huge issue? It's because the only change that the cable company has made that has even made me think about changing my subscription is to move BBC America to another tier. Had they moved almost any other channel I couldn't have cared less. And if there was no change in cost, or even a savings, I wouldn't be wittering, but there is a change in cost.

My current bill (including internet service) is just over $75/month. I know plenty of people who choose to pay more, but I don't. If I switch packages just to keep BBC America my monthly subscription will change to $120. That's a HUGE percentage increase. Is Graham Norton really worth $45/month?

Great ad!

Another viral ad doing the rounds . . . Can you guess what it's for before it's over? (This is not a sponsored post.)

Catchphrases (2)

1. "Ooh, Betty!" - Frank Spencer (Michael Crawford) in Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em
   
2. "I didn't get where I am today by . . . " - The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin
3. "Get down Shep!" - John Noakes on Blue Peter
   
4. "You're gonna like this - not a lot, but you're gonna like it! " - Paul Daniels, magician
   
5. "Good game, good game", "Nice to see you, to see you nice", "Didn't they do well?", and when memory fails say "Cuddly toy!" - Bruce Forsyth on the Generation Game
   
6. "Ooh, you are awful! But I like you!" - Dick Emery
   
7. "Boom boom!" - Basil Brush
   
8. "Rassen-frassen" - Muttley in the cartoon Wacky Races
   
9. "Can you tell what it is yet?" - Rolf Harris
   
10. "What do you think of it so far?" - Morecombe and Wise (I think their answer was always "Rubbish!")
11. "You dancin'?" "You askin'?" "I'm askin''" "I'm dancin'" - The Liver Birds
    
12. "And now for something completely different..." "I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition!" "This is an ex-parrot!" - Monty Python's Flying Circus

Catchphrases

Some more phrases from my TV watching past.

1. "I didn't get where I am today by . . . "
2. "Ooh, Betty!"
3. "Get down Shep!"
4. "You're gonna like this - not a lot, but you're gonna like it! "
5. "Good game, good game", "Nice to see you, to see you nice", "Didn't they do well?", and when memory fails say "Cuddly toy!"
   
6. "Ooh, you are awful! But I like you!"
7. "Boom boom!"
8. "Rassen-frassen"
9. "Can you tell what it is yet?"
10. "What do you think of it so far?"
11. "You dancin'?" "You askin'?" "I'm askin''" "I'm dancin'"
12. "And now for something completely different..." "I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition!" "This is an ex-parrot!"
    

Phrases remembered (2)

1. "Stupid boy!" - Captain Mainwaring in Dad's Army
   
2. "It's good night from me" " And it's goodnight from him" - The Two Ronnies
   
3. "Que?" ("He's from Barcelona") and "Don't mention the war!" - Fawlty Towers
   
4. ''You've all done very well'' (in a quavery voice), “It’ll ride up with wear”, "Are you free?" "I'm free!" - Are You Being Served?
   
5. "May your God go with you" - Dave Allen
   
6. "I've started so I'll finish" - Magnus Magnussen on Mastermind (Did you know he wasn't British? Lived in Britain most of his life but never took British citizenship.)
   
7. "Evening all!" - Dixon of Dock Green
   
8. "Exterminate!", "It’s bigger on the inside!" - Dr Who
   
9. "Shut that door!" - Larry Grayson
   
10. “Just like that” - Tommy Cooper
    
11. “Gissa job” - Yosser Hughes in Alan Beasdale's Boys from the Black Stuff
    
12. “42″ - is the answer to the ultimate question in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which was a radio show before it became a book, computer game, comic book and TV show.

Bill and Ben and Little Weed

Answers to Saturday's questions:

1. "Little weeed!" - Bill and Ben, the flowerpot men (1950's and 60's)



2. The Woodentops and their Spotty Dog. While Daddy Woodentop was busy doing 'men’s work', Mummy Woodentop was busy in the kitchen with assistance from Mrs Scrubbit. (1950's and 60's)



3. This (American) one from the 1960's was in color - but I mostly remember Stingray in black and white.



4. "Hugh, Pugh, Barney, McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub!" The firemen in Trumpton.



5. "A house. With a door. One. Two. Three. Four." Playschool.



6. The Clangers. (No soup dragon in this episode though.)



7. "Making good use of the things that we find, things that the everyday folks leave behind." The Wombles - who went big time with a hit record and a movie!

Vision On!

One of my favourite TV shows as a kid:



Tony Hart and Rolf "Can you see what it is yet?" Harris both made art look so easy!



"Jim fixed it for me!" - another cultural reference that DH doesn't get!

The real Magic Roundabout

Lynneguist posted about Sesame Street and other kids' TV shows this week and started me thinking. She commented that "From the Flower Pot Men to Clangers to the Teletubbies, there are many British children's television characters who don't speak in discernible language." Hmm - I'd not really thought of that as a cultural difference before, but I suppose perhaps it is. I'm sure American kids like Trixie's "Aggle flaggle" in the book Knuffle Bunny though*, and incomprehensible language does provide parents with the opportunity to discuss the philosophy of language with their children. Yeah, right! [sarcasm] Of course I used Teletubbies as an opportunity to introduce my kids to the philosophy of language! [/sarcasm]

One of the things about living other than where I grew up is not being able to use catch phrases from TV shows or share memories of the strange shows I grew up with. I remember Listen With Mother ("Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin!") on the radio in the afternoons, and Watch With Mother which was a time slot rather than a specific show on TV.

The Magic Roundabout was on right before the 6 o'clock news. In our house (when I was little at least) as soon as it ended, it was time to go and get ready for bed.

This appears to be an entire episode, except where's Zebedee saying "Goodnight! Time for bed!" Was that not in every show after all? And what is with that awful music?


I can't imagine why as a kid I thought this was interesting. Looking through the videos on YouTube, I'm amazed how bad so many of the the kids' TV shows were! I remember bits and pieces of a few of them.

Can you name the shows that go with these memories?

1. "Little weeeeed!"
2. Spotty Dog (who walked in a really weird way).
3. "Anything can happen in the next half hour!"
4. "Hugh, Pugh, Barney, McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub!"
5. "A house. With a door. One. Two. Three. Four."
6. The soup dragon
7. "Making good use of the things that we find, things that the everyday folks leave behind."

I think I've arranged them in roughly chronological order, though my memory may very well be faulty. 1 & 2 are the definitely the oldest - I think they debuted even before my time, in the 1950's. (Answers in a couple of days.)

*My favorite phrase from Mo Willems' Knuffle Bunny is not "aggle flaggle" but "going boneless" to describe a toddler who does not want to be picked up!

Britz

Quite by chance I ended up watching the second part of Britz on BBCAmerica last night. Shortly before the end I was pleased to discover that it is being shown On Demand on our cable service so I will be able to watch the show in its entirety. (Though it is being repeated next weekend, it's on during the day when I won't have chance to watch it.) From the BBCAmerica website (where there are even a couple of video clips from the show):

On July 7, 2005 four men strapped explosives to their bodies, walked into the heart of London's transport network and blew themselves up. Fifty-two people were killed, in addition to the bombers - three weeks later, four more men tried to do the same.

None of them were mercenaries or émigrés sent from abroad. No one spotted them, they didn't stand out. They were born, brought up and educated in Britain - Manchester United supporting, iPod owning, dress-like-us, speak-like-us people. They were Brits.

Britz explores how a young intelligent British Muslim could feel so disenfranchised, so powerless and become so angry at their country of birth that they would commit an extreme and despicable act and ultimately it asks how we can ever hope to prevent such an incident re-occurring.

The idea for the films, according to Peter Kosminsky, started with the July 7 bombings. Kosminsky considered telling the personal stories of the July 7 bombers, in the way he had told the story of government scientist David Kelly in The Government Inspector. But in light of his own experience as a second-generation immigrant, he wanted to look more generally at second-generation Muslim disillusionment with Britain (domestic and foreign policy in particular.) "I decided, in discussion with my colleagues, that the best thing was to fictionalize it - to research the way Muslims think and feel at the moment - and then try to create some fictional characters drawing on what we'd learned."

Given my interest in immigration and cross-cultural issues, I found it fascinating, despite what seemed (to me) like some overgeneralizations. Clearly if it were a book there would be more time to develop some of the characters' motivations. Did anyone else see it? What did you think?

The next Dr. Who

Dr. Who is one of the reasons I'm glad we have BBCAmerica. I wonder if the original creators of the series back in 1963 ever envisaged that it would continue as long as it has? Having the hero be able to die and regenerate into a new body obviously helped!

David Tennant announced this week that he is leaving the Tardis and will not be playing the role of a Time Lord in the next season of Dr. Who. His successor has not yet been chosen, but there are plenty of good actors to choose from. I suppose it's extremely unlikely they'd choose a woman! Of the contenders suggested on the BBC website, I think I like the looks of Paterson Joseph and David Morrissey. Whoever gets the role, I'm glad the series will continue for yet another season.

The nature of fear

Is this a scary picture?

Believe it or not, for a long time as a child, I was scared of daffodils!


DD sat and watched two episodes of Dr Who with me last night . I remember watching Dr Who as a child and being terrified by it. She watched cybermen, Daleks and disappearing children and loved it. On the other hand, every time the ads came on for the next show - Robin Hood - she put her hands over her eyes and refused to watch. Apparently men in tights with archery equipment are much scarier than aliens.


It makes sense though. The thing I was most frightened by in Dr Who was the daffodils. There were what were probably aliens looking like rotund, jolly men selling daffodils. When people got the daffodils home and went to sniff them, the daffodils sprayed plastic on their face. It stopped them from breathing and they died. I was terrified of daffodils for years afterwards. The aliens, the Daleks, the cybermen, were clearly not real, and therefore not scary. The daffodils and the men in tights with bows and arrows are real, and therefore much more threatening.