It's strange that news either floods in or forms a drought with just the silly season stories making the news. Today was certainly nearer the flood.
Living in the west country we've been bombarded with severe gales for most of the day. 90mph with stronger gusts, not what we're used to - at least not often. Six people killed across the country and more to come over the next week. The roof is still on (just) although it's improved the view by flattening a fence or two!
Then the Big Brother fiasco. Not being a fan of reality television I can honestly say I don't watch it but even I was taken aback by the goings on in the past two days. For those who don't know, the Big Brother house has a Bollywood starlet and a couple of fairly unsophisticated English female 'celebrities'. I'm not sure what I found most curious; the fact that we should be alarmed at allegedly racist remarks made by two basic personas or the fact that it led to protests in India, questions in the House of Commons and questions to the Prime Minister. And through all of this the production company Endemol keep a cynical, (rating building) silence. Is this type of programming really the best we can expect? Doesn't anyone else want something more challenging, less trivial and about real issues. (Not suggesting that racism isn't a real issue but let's face it Big Brother is certainly going to do nothing but stir up more of the same.) Can't we do better than this?
Thanks for all the comments on the earlier blog entries. Particular thanks to Musingsofamenopausalmama for her steer on Obama (US democratic senator) - From what I've found so far he looks a really interesting and genuine politician. I wasn't making a quick joke about his name by the way I genuinely did misread it on a text as Osama and assumed it was Bin Laden ... You can see why that might be confusing in relation to running for the Whitehouse.
I'm not sure he has the money behind him that Hilary Clinton has but from what I can tell the democrats have a great team from which to select a strong candidate - assuming they don't battle each other.
There's a striking difference with the last piece of news I heard today. It's reported that Mr Blair will be requiring the services of a butler for his last few weeks/months in office. So what I hear you cry ... the twist is that the butler costs £50,000 ($100,000 US) and guess who's paying? - Wait for the tax code change I suppose. So Obama - if you don't get selected in the states.... look east - I think we could do a lot worse !
