Monday, March 24, 2008

Radio 4, Bees and shirts


I've had the flat to myself this weekend, the flatmate has scampered off north to see her mum for the long weekend. I didn't go to Devon because I had my CBT training on the Saturday so I had to be in London. It's the first time I've missed out on Easter in Devon for a while. I think I'll bimble down soon, perhaps when the weather is a bit more pleasant.

Since I've had the flat to myself I've been listening to a lot of Radio 4. I love radio 4, I've accidentally learned loads while pottering around doing other things. Did you know the Nazis banned jazz but approved of The Tango? I seem to live with people who don't like Radio 4 very much, which strikes me as strange but it has caused Radio 4 to become a dirty little secret. Now it's a thrilling treat that I dabble in when I can. I sneak out of the house and listen to it on a portable radio, or when I'm alone, I lock the doors and have it burbling along in the background. Of course I don't like everything on Radio 4, I hate the Archers with a passion that you only get if you actually grew up on a farm.

Yesterday I went to a house party sort of by accident, I was talking to a chum lets call her Bee and she said she was going to a party but wasn't sure if she was going to go and she invited me. I'm not the sort of chap who says no to an adventure so I bimbled across London on the tube to get drunk with strangers. It was a nice bash, but I had to leave early due to tube issues. I spent almost the entire tube journey (when I wasn't reading about Mongolian battle tactics) thinking 'gosh if I was on a bike I'd be there by now', of course if I had been on a motorbike I would not have been able to drink and probably would have spent half the night popping out to check on my bike, but still. I expect I shall be having a lot of thoughts like that in the days to come until I do sort out the bike stuff.

We talked a very reasonable amount of nonsense and then someone the conversation got onto politics (gulp) Red Ken (double gulp) and then how this country is going to the dogs (triple gulp). I'm always amazed how political types can mess something up completely and yet some people will always support them. Also why does everyone who abandons England to live somewhere warm always turn right wing? Is it something about the hot weather that drives people a bit bonkers?

I'm on a bit of a clothes hunt, I want a shirt of the sort wore by cowboys but I can't find the blasted thing. I managed to describe it well enough to a friend that she could find a picture of one but her name for it doesn't match a name that the Internet recognises. She calls it a double-breasted windcheater shirt but that's not what the Internet calls it. I want one, in a rugged low-key material the sort a cowboy might wear. Don't worry I won't be wearing ten gallon hats anytime soon, although I must admit some nice cowboy boots are on my hit list, in a low key sort of way. I had to borrow a pair for my cowboy training day and they were excellent fun.

10 comments:

Everything Stops for Tea said...

How can you not like radio 4, all those surreptious RC voices... bizarre interviews with people who collect spoons and strange plays... Plus what precisely does a cowboy training day involve?

Everything Stops for Tea said...

Well obviously I mean't RP (Less gin required me thinks...)

Louche said...

Sarah - You are right, it takes a very strange sort of person not to like Radio 4.

Cowboy training day was a day of Western Style riding and lasso instruction. It was excellent fun.

Clair said...

My boss HATES R4 with a passion; I really don't understand it. He says it's too middle class - boo! Jeremy Hardy once said that it's the only station you just can't turn off, and I agree. Even if that rather out of place Neil Sleat says 'And now, a programme about Dutch porcelain importers in the 16th century', you don't switch over, do you?

Louche said...

Clair - I think it's the sound of civilisation.

Clair said...

.. but not Quote, Unquote, though. It's the only thing which sends me screaming for the 'off' switch.

Amanda Castleman said...

Your next assignment, should you choose to accept it, is the Cowboy College.

Yee haw!

Louche said...

Clair - No civilisation is perfect.

Amanda - Oooh, have you done that?

Amanda Castleman said...

No, I keep meaning to, as my parents live nearby (or what passes for nearby in the Wild West). But I have a sort of mental block about researching when I visit them: my brain goes into survival-only shut-down mode and I am forced to drink white wine by the pool and read trashy science fiction.

Ax (shamed now. Going away)

Louche said...

Amanda - That sounds like a pretty good holiday too, especially the wine by the pool part.