Knicker Conspiracy

Saturday 3 October 2009

Inexplicably, I wake up at 6am. Maybe my Monday to Friday 5am body clock is taking effect and my weekend lie-ins are no more.

I tune into Radio Scotland’s “Out of Doors”, which I haven’t heard for ages. I’m not really the outdoorsy, Munro-climbing, tree-hugging, shark-fishing type but this programme is really good and the credit must go to presenters Mark Stephen and Euan McIlwraith who are very funny indeed. After a quick shower it’s time for Brian Matthews and “Sound of the Sixties” on Radio 2. I normally miss the start due to a thing called sleep. Today I’m ready for him.

I get quite excited when Brian previews the week’s Three-In-A-Row selection from a listener. It’s The Searchers and he says he’s going to play two from them and one from ex-member Tony Jackson. Now, many months ago I sent in a Three-in-a-Row request for The Searchers (I think it might have been for “Popcorn Double Feature”), The Tony Jackson’s Group cover of “Fortune Teller” and “Aggravation” by another ex-member Chris Curtis. I rush around getting a blank tape and start taping the programme in anticipation of another radio appearance/name check. My excitement is brought down to earth with a crashing bump when the listener in question isn’t me but a lady from North Berwick! I’m tempted to turn off the show, in a fit of pique, but there isn’t long to go so I don’t bother. I reason he must get hundred of letters every week and I was just unlucky. I resort to plan B and to ensure he and his producer have plenty of notice I request three Christmas tracks for any December show, with another as a reserve. I’ve asked for Jackie DeShannon’s “Do You Know How Christmas Trees Are Grown”, which features in the James Bond film “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”, “Mr Scrooge” by Coventry band The Orchids and “Christmas Calling” by Valerie Masters, a Joe Meek production. My stand-by is Marvin Gaye’s “Purple Snowflakes”. Fingers crossed.

After a quick shower, it’s on with the work. Every week on my radio show I play a track by an artist whose birthday falls on the day of my show. 11 October is one of the few dates where I don’t know of a musician born on that day. I won’t play just anyone; it has to be someone who fits into the mod/soul/alternative 60s genre. I decide instead to celebrate John Lennon’s birthday (born 9th October 1940) by having a Beatles tribute show. While it’ll contain a couple of Beatles tracks and a John Lennon solo effort for the “Birthday” feature, it’ll mostly be Beatles covers and tribute records, of which there are many. With only the script to do, that’s another show in the can.

The plan today was to continue/re-start writing my book but the study is such a tip I decide to give it a good clear out instead. A tidy mind and all that. I have a break, a spot of lunch and I watch “The Thick of It”.

After some more pottering I stop for prawns with basmati rice for tea, accompanied by “The Thick of It – Rise of the Nutters”, which we’ve kept on Sky+ because we never tire of watching it. I head back to the study. Study makes it sound like it’s a room just off the East Wing, beside the servants quarters, but it’s really just the smallest of the bedrooms decorated with IKEA shelving full of books, CDs and LPs. It’s my little home within a home.

A couple of hours later there’s still nothing on the telly so I see what else I’ve meaning to watch for months on Sky+. There is, thankfully, and I watched the beautiful and brilliant “Control”.

Sunday 4 October 2009

Another early rise, this time at 8am. I plump for fried eggs on toast and a coffee to kick start my day.

Normally I avoid the Rangers v Celtic match but I decide to chill for a while. The game is a decent one with all you would expect from such an encounter. It’s just all the Weedja Meedja saturation coverage and hype that I can’t stand. It’s one of the reasons I stopped going to football and stopped reading newspapers. There’s a world outside of Glasgow and there’s a football world outside the Old Firm.

I put up my radio show set list on the Jocknroll blog, The World of Misery Guts blog and my Facebook page and, after a brief hello and goodbye when the girls return from their travels, I head off up the A92.

Another 'okay' show and it’s back home for my microwaved tea and to hear the highlight of Flick’s weekend, which is learning a new song containing the word “knickers”!! It tickled me as well.

The new series of “House” starts tonight. I love House; he’s the anti-hero who says what he likes and doesn’t give a damn. This show has been good at keeping things fresh and this series the setting has moved to a psychiatric hospital that House has reluctantly checked himself into. The moment he gets there he’s making plans to get out.

P.S Why is it that when I type a document on Word and then cut and paste it into Blogger I have to go through the laborious task of removing all the Html and adding new Html before I can publish it? Answers on a postcard to Me, 14 Me Street, Meville, Meland ME1