Archive for the 'Television' Category

Oh yes

Grandad January 23rd, 2010

It is babysitting time at the moment.

Babysitting is one of those things that seems to be expected of Grandads for some reason.  I don’t mind too much, as Puppychild isn’t a bad poker player for five, and we had a good session last night.  I managed to win €20 which is better than a kick in the arse?

This morning, after doing her homework [the manufacture of explosives and poisons from common household items], she asked to watch television.

By now, you must be aware that advertisements are not my favourite form of broadcasting.  By their nature, they are repetitive and boring.  Some can be just plain irritating, and others have the capacity to provoke instant rage.  The advertisements that were on children’s television this morning where around 10 on the cardiac scale.

For some very strange reason, the majority of the advertisements were for insurance.  Out of each slot of say eight advertisements, four would would be for insurance.  I am a little surprised that the insurance industry should think that five year olds are so interested in their product and can only assume that the campaign is directed at the parents/minders/babysitters, who must be very accident prone and therefore unsuitable for the job?.  The agencies seems to have a particular mental block too, when it comes to insurance.  I have always hated that fucking cheery thing with the toy red phone beeping around the place, but my greatest desire is grab that fucking dog Churchill and douse him in petrol.  Then we’ll see him go woof.  Ohhh yes!

There was even a Christmas ad that kept cropping up.  Yes – Christmas!  The bastards are already advertising for Christmas 2010,  Fucking hell!

The art of advertising is almost dead, but occasionally one good one does crop up.  I found this one on Going like Sixty.  I’m sure he will be furious at won’t mind my borrowing it.

Now that is how it should be done.

Classic!

Who is Iris Robinson?

Grandad January 11th, 2010

I am sick to the back tooth from hearing about Iris Robinson.

It all started with Yer Man, the husband coming on the news and sobbing about his wife having an affair.  What?  Why the fuck should I care?  Why the fuck is he literally broadcasting it to the world?  If his missus had a drop of nookie on the side then surely that’s between him, her and the unfortunate who dipped his wick?  It’s nothing to do with you, me or anyone else for that matter.

OK, so she is an MP or a MLA or a MILF or something, but I still don’t see the relevance?

Then he broadcasts to the world that she has mental problems.

For fuck’s sake!  Everyone has problems, but there’s no need to shout about it.  Who the fuck doesn’t have depression these days?  If you are not depressed by now, then there is something seriously wrong with your state of mind.  If you are depressed, talk to your family or friends or your doctor.  Don’t hold a fucking press conference.  If you want to feel sorry for someone, feel sorry for the Shannon farmer who first of all saw his farm disappear under three feet of water and now is trying to farm ice-sheets.  Now there is someone with a real problem.

Then it transpires that she diverted some cash to The Happy Humper.  Now that is a little more serious, but it is still in the ha’penny place compared to our lot lending millions to TDs to invest in golf clubs and the like?  And even then, that is an issue for the locals to sort out and has fuck all to do with us Down South.  So why all the meeja interest here?

And I wish they’d stop showing us that nauseating staged kiss.  Are we supposed to feel all cuddly towards them for that? 

The last time I kissed Herself like that was in the courts.

And that was only because we were ordered to do so by the judge.

Grave reporting from TV3

Grandad December 27th, 2009

I love TV3.

It has a singular inability to do anything right.  It is car-crash television at its best.  It is compulsive viewing simply because it is so bad.

For those of you who are foreign to these shores, TV3 pumps out an unending stream of the cheapest, tackiest American crap, interspersed with reality shows and rebroadcasts of the worst of ITV. 

They do have one programme that we watch occasionally for the laugh, and that is “Tonight with Vincent Browne”.  This consists of an unending stream of advertisements, with brief interruptions where Vinnie abuses his guests.  It’s not meant to be funny, but it is.

The presenters on TV3 are a breed apart.  The women are obviously employed on the basis of their looks rather than talent [with the exception of Ursula Halligan, who has neither] and all have to undergo a rigorous training in the Tallaghtfornian accent which is an accent that is unique to that television station.

They managed to reach a new peak of crassness yesterday, when they all but broadcast an obituary for our Minister for Hardship and Poverty, Brian Lenihan.  I should point out that he isn’t dead.

I have no great love for our Glorious Government, as you may have realised.  I take great delight in slagging them off, but even I draw the line at writing obituaries when they are still very much alive and kicking.  Not TV3 though.  Not only do they prematurely announce that Lenihan has cancer, but they then proceed to analyse the political scene after he is gone.  If that isn’t enough, they drag on some Cheerful Charlie who proceeds to tell us what a terrible disease pancreatic cancer is and that the prognosis is pretty bad.  He goes into great detail about how pancreatic cancer  is caused by smoking [which it isn’t] and that the best that can be done for Lenihan is pain relief.  Fuck me! Cheerful stuff.  But then anything is permissible in TV3 in the name of a scoop.  

You have to hand it to TV3.  For a station that strives to be the cheapest on the airwaves, they have excelled themselves once more.

Incidentally, in case you are wondering – the TV3 news is not in widescreen.  The only thing they broadcast in widescreen format is the advertisements.

But seeing as 90% of their output is advertisements, that’s OK.

Gutted

Grandad December 22nd, 2009

It’s not often you get good news in the papers these days.

I was browsing this morning, and of course one of the main stories was the Guinness fire.  Here was a national tragedy that was narrowly averted.  Forget your recession, your kiddy-fiddling priests and your NAMA – if the brewery had gone up it would have been the end of the country.

Guinness_fire
Firemen adding a white head onto the black stuff.

Then I spotted another item that cheered me immensely.

Simon Cowell is gutted at losing the Number One spot in the charts.

I don’t give a flying fuck who’s in the charts, to be honest, but anything that makes that wanker miserable is going to cheer me up.  I am sick to the teeth of him and his fucking X-Factor.

I have never watched the programme.  I would far rather have my testicles slowly removed with rusty shears than watch that unadulterated crap.  It is the epitome of all that is wrong with modern society.  All it is is a bunch of talentless oiks all belittling themselves in order to become famous for a day.  Pathetic.  Even worse are the people who watch it.  They are whipped up into a frenzy of passion for their tosser of their choice and then are gullible enough to spend a fortune on the voting.

I have had the misfortune to see extracts from the programme, and I have yet to see any performer [apart from Yer One with the eyebrows] who is any different from half a million other talentless wannabes.  And of course there was Jedward!  Holy fuck!!  I have more talent in my little toes than that pair, and my little toes are utterly talentless.

I would love to think that Cowell will quit the show in despair.  It’s unlikely though, considering the fortune that is being made out of the saps that watch it.

In the meantime, I shall celebrate Cowell’s misery with a few pints tonight.

Pullit had the sense to buy in a large number of kegs in the Guinness’ pre-fire sale.

The Late Late Crap Show

Grandad November 25th, 2009

We are coming up to that time of year again.

It is time for the annual consumer-fest that is the Late Late Toy Show.

For those of you who are fortunate enough to live in far off lands, The Late Late Toy Show is an annual institution here, where the latest toys, gadgets and gizmos are put on display on television.  For two hours, we are treated to an embarrassing display of consumerism at its worst.

I did some babysitting the other day.  I call it babysitting, but Puppychild is five now so she is hardly a baby, but you know what I mean.  As a result, the television was put on at her insistence.  I don’t approve of plonking kids in front of televisions, but Puppychild always ignores it anyway.  Maybe she wanted it on to entertain me?  Anyhow, there I was with the television on, so I couldn’t help but witness some of the advertisements that are pumped at the kids of today.

One thing that struck me about the toys on offer, and that is their uniformity.

They are all around €50.

They all require batteries.

Most require remote controls.

They all have a mechanical lifespan of about a month and an attention lifespan of a day.

They all required the intelligence of a gnat to operate.

In other words, the kids are going to end up getting more pleasure out of the packaging than they are out of the toy.

The advertisements are all slanted in a particular way too.  They are not so much aimed at the children as aimed at generating a group frenzy, so that peer pressure comes into play and God help the parents when that happens.

I have never seen so much unadulterated overpriced crap in all my years.

So the Late Late Crap Show is going to consist of two hours of overpriced, overhyped, worthless, ephemeral rubbish.  Jedward are on too, which kind of proves my point?

And what was Puppychild doing while all this was on?

She was very happily playing on the floor with my collection of Dinky cars, that are nearly sixty years old. She had ascribed a different personality to each car and was having a whale of a time, and her imagination was running at full throttle.  There wasn’t a silicon chip, a battery or a remote control to be seen.

When she eventually tired of her game on the floor, she tidied up and did some jig-saws.

I rest my case, M’Lud.

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