Merry Christmas!

On Thursday morning I got up, got dressed and went to the butcher. About a 10 minute walk each way. I was wearing a knee-length denim skirt. By the time I got to the butcher, the skirt had rotated through 180 degrees and was on backwards. By the time I got home again, it had traveled through a further 90 degrees so as to be facing sideways.

It's not the most festive blog posts to end on, I'll grant you, but I thought it worthy of mention. I'm off to Mozambique now, back January 7th, ideally not full of lurgy. Have a fabulous Christmas, and see you here once I have got home and watched both the Strictly Come Dancing Christmas special and Doctor Who, out of season, too scared to turn my computer on for fear of rogue spoilers.

Top of the Pops

This is proving harder than I thought - *much* harder than the original broadly-rock CD. As before, I have taken your suggestions and put them through my filter (ie left out anything I don't know (this means almost everything on your list, Persephone) or don't like or don't already own - pausing to register with shock that I have neither 'Love Shack', possibly because if I hear it even one more time my brain will turn into taramasolata, or 'Groove Is In The Heart' - then suddenly craving all kinds of other things I've never owned, like Avril Lavigne, who nobody suggested, but even so, rushing over to iTunes to start rectifying these absences, before realising that if I download anything at all I am not going to be able to stop), added a few ideas of my own, and then ruthlessly pruned the list.

The rules that I have been playing by are: it must be a proper pop classic; the artist cannot have appeared on the previous CD, as that interferes with educational purposes; it must be something you'd totally love if you heard it for the first time between the ages of 3 and 11; and I can't put on anything that might warp their tiny minds. I don't mean because of lyrical filth - that would rule out Prince, for a start - but I mean because it can only be approached with a heavy dose of world-weary ironic appreciation if it is not going to lead you seriously astray. So that ruled out Take That. And also, to my immense disappointment, Lionel Ritchie's 'All Night Long' - I don't want to curse these kids to a lifetime of sloppy R'n'B.

After all that I have been left with the following list which is far too long and not at all conclusive and is still a great matter of internal turmoil for me. I know: why don't you make that turmoil worse with your comments?

1. Take On Me - aha
2. Walk This Way - Aerosmith / Run DMC
3. Respect - Aretha Franklin
4. Holding Out For A Hero - Bonnie Tyler
5. Baby One More Time - Britney Spears
6. Video Killed The Radio Star - The Buggles
7. Move On Up - Curtis Mayfield
8. The Magic Number - De La Soul
9. Hot Stuff - Donna Summer
10. Son Of A Preacher Man - Dusty Springfield
11. Mr Blue Sky - ELO
12. Sound Of The Underground - Girls Aloud
13. River Deep, Mountain High - Ike & Tina Turner
14. Higher & Higher - Jackie Wilson
15. I Want You Back - Jackson 5
16. Can't Get You Out Of My Head - Kylie Minogue
17. Lady Marmalade - Labelle
18. Music - Madonna
19. I'm A Believer - The Monkees
20. Ca Plane Pour Moi - Plastic Bertrand
21. Kiss - Prince
22. Don't Stop Me Now - Queen
23. Shake Your Tail Feather - Ray Charles
24. Rock DJ - Robbie Williams
25. Leader Of The Pack - Shangri-las (non-negotiable: it's their mum's favourite song)
26. Everyday People - Sly & The Family Stone
27. Wannabe - Spice Girls
28. Birdhouse In Your Soul - They Might Be Giants

I know what you're thinking. What about...? Not to mention....? But the sad truth is we have to *cut* this to the tune (ahem) of about eight songs. Which is not to say that there can't be substitutions. But they had better be good ones.

Oh, FFS.

The BBC has described its mistake in messing up the Strictly voting as "unforgivable". For crying out loud. If someone from the BBC were to come round, break into my house and piss on my curtains, all funded by the unique way that the BBC is paid for by you, the license fee payer, that would be unforgivable. If the show was called Strictly Come Dying, with a celebrity couple being shot each week by firing squad in an order determined by a combination of judge's voting and phone votes, and they shot the wrong person because they counted the phone votes wrong, so Matthew Cutler got six bullets to the brain leaving Brendan Cole unscathed when the public had demanded the exact opposite, *that* would be unforgivable. Taking slightly too long to realise that 3 + 1 = 4 just as much as 1 + 3 = 4, thus cheating the public out of 15p from a BT landline, up to 75p from mobile phone providers, and then freezing the votes, and rolling the votes over, and having an eviction halfway through the final which will take into account those votes, and offering a refund to those who are still unhappy?

BBC, I FORGIVE YOU.

Now please, let this lie.

Plaintive Plea

Like many of you I'm sure, I've recently been getting a lot of spam which appears to have been sent from my own e-mail address. This beats the computer but it's doesn't beat me, as I am no more likely to buy Canadian Viagra online if I have recommended it to myself than if someone else has recommended it to me. Anyway, today I received one of those pieces of self-posted spam, only this one had the subject line: "Please, forgive me and answer."

Forgive myself and answer. Forgive myself and answer.

That's going to haunt me all day.

Preview: Chosen

For those in the UK, I highly recommend tonight's Channel 4 documentary 'Chosen'. I caught it earlier in the year when it was broadcast on More 4 and it is exceptional. It's a very simply made documentary, in which three men, now in middle age, talk with extraordinary honesty and articulacy about their experiences of being sexually abused at prep school. As the film tells us, 3 in 20 children are abused at UK schools, so it's an important film, as well as a desperately sad one. Please make the effort to see it, even if it sounds like a gruelling watch for a Monday night - it's rare that a film of such good quality makes it onto our screens.

Bonkers question of the week:

Could I be allergic to my computer monitor? The "evidence":

1. I have been ill ever since I got it.
2. Every time I sit down to start work I sneeze uncontrollably.

Maybe it just attracts a lot of dust.

X Factor Final

I recorded the X Factor final and the results show which means that with judicious use of the fast forward button I managed to get through about 2 hrs 40 mins of television in approximately half an hour, and I probably enjoyed it a hell of a lot more than anybody who actually had to sit through Kym Marsh in North London, surrounded by Alexandra Burke fans, asking them if they thought she was any good, which, I am guessing, they did.

As did I. Thank god she won. There was no way that I could countenance a JLS victory after the one on the end with the funny shaved head pulled a cheesy R'n'B come-on grin during Hallelujah - which, Simon Cowell, is not a Christmas song, even if it has a religious word in it. Eoghan, the High School Musical leprechaun, went out in the first half of the finals so we were denied his version, about which I am utterly dejected, because I was hoping they they would have the same dancing teenagers they wheel out for everything else he sings. Alexandra turned it into a massive power ballad which was only to be expected but at least she does massive power ballad well.

I actually love Alexandra, and I feel quite guilty about having thought she was a cheap Leona Lewis knock-off, and I am totally delighted that she has won, and can actually put up with the thought of her releasing singles and stuff, which is not quite the case for all reality show winners. (I do wonder what it is like for the likes of Dannii Minogue and Cheryl Cole "mentoring" people who are such better singers than they are.) Anyway, I particularly enjoyed Alex singing with Beyonce, who tried to look happy about it but gave off the unmistakeable aura of a member of royalty not used to having to touch other human beings and really hoping that Alex didn't get snot on her dress when she sobbed into her shoulder. I was, however, disappointed that they didn't give her an upbeat song to sing but just a series of soupy ballads. Thus, in tribute to her win, I post her rendition of Candyman from Big Band week, in which she looks absolutely stunning and has FUN and is surrounded by sexy sailors in stripy tops. I am all about fun at the moment. Probably because I have spent the entire festive season at home ill and haven't had any. Anyway, enjoy:

Strictlywatch 2008: Semi-final and Results

Or not quite results, because (a) my PVR threw a wobbly and decided not to record the results show, and (b) there wasn't a result anyway, as they decided to put all three dancers through to the final. Officially this is because Lisa and Rachel tied for the top spot, meaning that there was no way that Tom could avoid the dance off, but I suspect that it makes for a better final if there are three dancers in it, and also there was a mathematical irony after John Sergeant dropped out in that everyone was complaining that his staying in was forcing a better dancer to go out each week, but once he dropped out it meant that a better dancer had to go out a week early each week anyway. Also I do wonder whether Tom is miles ahead in the voting, and if the entire voting public voted for him but couldn't save him from the dance off and then the judges put him out they would advance on TV centre with pitchforks. Someone should probably set up a little stall selling pitchforks just outside White City station, they'd make a killing. But anyway, they all go through.

So there are only three dancers left now, Rachel, Tom and Lisa. This means that in my week one prediction I got two out of three, with Lisa the wild card. Lisa - handicapped by being partnered with horrible Brendan, and by having slept with George Clooney thus earning her the eternal jealousy of at least half the viewing audience (and can we imagine that relationship, people? Seriously?) - is definitely the most improved dancer overall, and did a lovely quickstep to Dancing in the Dark (to my eternal disappointment, not the Bruce Springsteen song, but some 1940s swing thing) and got four 10s, which I am not entirely sure that she deserved, but the judges are throwing tens around like sweets this series. They have to, otherwise they would not be able to keep telling us that this is the best Strictly ever, as if we have all lost our memories and can't remember last year and Alesha Dixon and the whole Matt / Flavia / Vincent love triangle. Lisa also got a 10 from Len for her distinctly less than perfect Argentine tango, but I think he had dropped the rest of his paddles.

Rachel is the best dancer left the competition and as such ought to win. Her Argentine Tango was amazing (and scored lower than Lisa'a quickstep). Her American Smooth (to "Mandy", officially the most bleurgh song ever written) was as weirdly un-American Smooth-like as her previous American Smooth, and I know you can adapt any dance to the American Smooth up to and including Breakdancing and that Robot dance that was big in the 80s, but when I know there's going to be an American Smooth I want big band music and Fred and Ginger moves, so no matter how good that alternative, I will be disappointed.

As for Tom, while putting in a worthy performance on both dances, he was the least good and deserves to go out, except that he remains as likeable as ever, and with two rather bland girls left in the competition this is proving rather more significant than a perfect fleckle or exquisitely delivered spot turn. His jive was the only dance that even approached fun - fun! remember that? you know the one I mean, it's similar to entertainment - and for that alone I am delighted that he will be in the final, which otherwise promises to be a very po-faced affair. At the end of the jive, he jumped over Camilla's head, and I can't imagine that happening with either Rachel or Lisa, who take the whole thing terribly seriously. As for his Argentine Tango, it didn't have a whole lot of tango in it, but there was lots of Argentine acting and it was to my favourite piece of tango music (from 'Scent of a Woman') and he had bicycle clips around his elbows, and that gets another bonus mark from me. Essentially I'm biased because he's hot, but I do think it would be a miserable final without Tom. Rachel for the win, though.

Before I go, two things. Firstly, a word about Tess's breasts. I wouldn't dream of speculating whether they are the ones God blessed her with or if she got a helping hand from Harley Street, but they are like two grapefruits stuck to her front, and I just don't remember them featuring so, ah, highly in previous series. Has she got some kind of new scaffolding under those dresses which is pushing them into unnatural positions? Or do they just stand to attention by themselves? These days I am spending about half of Strictly thinking about Tess's breasts, and that can't be right.

Secondly, believe it or not I will be out of the country for the Strictly final, en route for Mozambique. I won't have computer access there so I can't watch the dances or blog about them, you will have to form your own opinions and I'm sorry about that, because I know mine are better. I'll set the grumpy PVR to record it and hopefully I'll be able to watch it and the Christmas special when I get back, but I wouldn't count on it. But in the meantime, keep dancing!

Dances, as ever, here.

Hamlet

Hamlet is THE role for a young(ish) actor and so it is inevitable that it goes to the big stars. Next summer, Jude Law will be performing his at the Donmar, and tonight, of course, was supposed to be David Tennant's night. Now I cede to nobody in my admiration of David Tennant, but believe me when I say that I could not have enjoyed tonight's Hamlet more if his back had allowed him to take that lead. I could have enjoyed it as much, perhaps, and in a different way - but not more.

David Tennant is a brilliant, charismatic, lead actor, and his Hamlet I'm certain would have been that of a virtuoso, exceptionally performed and wonderfully entertaining. But I don't think it could possibly have been as heartbreaking as Edward Bennett's. What, for me, made Bennett's performance so magical is that he is not the star. He had not been chosen for his brilliance and charisma. He is, like Hamlet, a man trapped in a story that is much bigger than he is - the understudy thrown into the limelight. What, in sum, made Bennett's Hamlet so special for me was that in many ways he is quite ordinary.

His Hamlet is unprincely, even slightly nerdy. At the start of the play I would go so far as to describe him as goofy. He does not shine brightest on the stage - that honour goes to Patrick Stewart's masterful Claudius, whose power to inspire both love and loathing is made all the more potent by the way his stage presence outshines that of his rather more average nephew. Circumstance has thrown Bennett's Hamlet into a situation which he cannot handle, try as he might. It is too big for him. He is intelligent, he is resourceful, he becomes ruthless, but it isn't enough, because Fate has all the cards. He is a normal person woefully unprepared to do what he is called upon to do. No wonder his self-doubt rings out through all those soliloquies. How can an average bloke decide whether to be or not to be? The sight of an unremarkable man driven to the great heights - and depths - taking on such an immense force, was gripping in a way that I have never experienced Shakespeare to be.

And so, at the end, when Fate plays out its hand bringing Hamlet down and the rest of the court around him, it is heartbreaking. Great heroes are meant to die great deaths. But Bennett's Hamlet is not a great hero, he is one of us, doing his best - and it is not enough. As he dies, surrounded by destruction, he reverts to the decent, flawed person he was all along. It is devastating.

To be clear, there is nothing ordinary about Bennett's acting - he is incredibly skilled. But he is a character actor, not a star, and to see Hamlet performed as a character rather than a star turn was something special, and probably unique to these circumstances.

Praise must also go to the rest of this production, particularly Penny Downie, bringing astonishing emotional complexity to Gertrude, Oliver Ford Davies as a sweet, sad Polonius, and Patrick Stewart, aforementioned, as a surprisingly sympathetic Claudius. The directing by Gregory Doran was exceptional and the production design by Robert Jones wonderfully effective in its simplicity.

All in all, magnificent.

"Break a Leg!"