My first ever cinema experience. Aberystwyth Commodore. Star Wars. Imagine sitting in a darkened theatre for the first time ever, aged seven, and seeing that spaceship coming over. Magical. Spoiled for life. I was disappointed for years afterwards that all films didn't start like that.

A flash of light, a puff of smoke, Doctor Smith shrieks in alarm. HIts Robot and cries "Well, don't just stand there, you bubble headed booby. DO something!"

ITV, comemmorated and celebrated in the best way. This is *superb*. I love that tube of Gibbs SR...

Just finished "What Makes This Book So Great" by Jo Walton, her collection of appreciative essays as she re-reads SF and Fantasy (and other stuff). One of the final entries covers "The Hobbit", and I was quite taken by one of her observations about it...

This one might even be a 15/10.

Back cover to the first ever issue of TV Times. My god, that is one aggressive bit of copy.

If anyone fancies pissing on ITV's anniversary chips this evening, there's an extract from the "Grace in the Barn" bit of "The Archers" available here. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/a...

Music to be raptured to - Sad Bullseye Julia's Theme The "Our Tune" music Theme from "Monkey" Needed by Bill Oddie I'm personally hoping to go up (if I'm going up) to Deodato's version of "Also Sprach Zarathustra" as used at the end of "Being There".

You Take Me Up by The Thompson Twins, obviously.

If you vote for Reform, if you think they have a point, if you are even considering voting for them, you're a racist. No excuses, no exceptions. Fucking sick of it. Own what you are.

Every time Mark Lawson writes about TV he gets it infuriatingly, persistently wrong. It'd be so easy for him to check things, but he never, ever does. Gah.

Oh, me too. Works every time.

Repost for Irish Film Classifications by Damien Owens, because it's just come up in FB memories and it's still *brilliant*.

10 years ago today, I opened the bedroom curtains to be confronted by *this*. I looked at him. He looked at me. If the window had been open wide enough, he'd have come in, I think.

Bit of insider news here; the gambling adverts are rationed per day, per channel, but if they mention their “gambling awareness policy” or “tools to help you stay in control” they don’t actually count as gambling adverts.

If Jon's worked on it, you know you're in for a treat. Look at that. There's an awful lot of great stuff in there.

A couple of years ago i befriended a lass called Florence in my area who turned out to be this guy's daughter. She just randomly dropped it into a conversation one day. She was very coy about it i must say, as she told me her dad "wrote a book on robots" and knew the poet John Hegley.

Les Binks's drumsticks, a lock of Gloria Hunniford's hair, and the ashes of the Evening Standard that Ken Russell battered Alexander Walker over the head with.

70 years of ITV. I miss things like HTV just throwing something brilliant at me in the dead of night. An episode of UFO around midnight. A Wednesday evening screening of Pink Floyd at Pompeii just after News At Ten. Stuff like that, all announced with glee by the likes of Margaret Pritchard.

So today I learned that there were tie-in novels for THE DOLLARS TRILOGY that went beyond the movies and boy do they have some amazing titles.

This just makes me think of the wee Roman soldier football chanting in Billy Connolly's "The Crucifiction". "I am a Roman I hate the Christians Come to think of it I hate the Romans as well I'm just a little JOBBIE"

The New Avengers- finally coming Blu Ray (and DVD and 4K!) with loads of new special features. Audition footage, interviews from the Chichester convention, and 10 commentaries, including Joanna Lumley on Sleeper and the late Gareth Hunt on The Eagle's Nest and Dead Men are Dangerous!

All of Charles Endell Esq on YT. It may not be there for long if past form's anything to go by, so my advice is get it watched, and fall in love, because it's *great*.

"And he said, I can't do it. I can't do it I'm put off by the CSO I'm whinging This fringing Has left me with a fuzzy glow The Master? Disaster There's a plothole in this script we need Terrance to plaster I can't do it I can't do it toooooniggght"

A thing I've found out today - or maybe I knew it and just managed to forget about it, which surprises me - apparently at some point during their friendship, a spirited argument broke out between Arthur C Clarke and C.S Lewis. Clarke was irritated by the theology in Lewis's Science Fiction (more)

I don't want the Rapture to happen on Tuesday. I have to get up at 5am for something. If it happens I'm going to go into eternity to face my final fate all grumpy and sleepy and wanting my bed. Still, I suppose I'll be alert enough depending on which direction I shoot off in.

Chuck Jones's birthday. I like to post this extract from "Chuck Amuck" most years, because it's one of my favourite bits of writing. Please join me in revelling in Chuck's tale of "Johnson", the grapefruit loving cat who for a while, shared his childhood.

Summer is icumen in Loud sing cuckoo <crunch crunch crunch> Groweth seed and bloweth meed <pours another bowl> And springth the wode now <smacks lips in satisfaction at a truly tasty breakfast snack>

Let's never forget that John Stapleton saw *right* through Chris Morris when he turned up on "The Time The Place". No hint of confusion or hesitation, he just spotted it right off. I've always cherished him for that.

So no one told you that the end would come this way / Joey's head's come off, and Rachel's DOA

The Hopkins Manuscript by RC Sherriff (Victor Gollancz, 1939)

It's that time again. Apparently they're joyously preparing for The Rapture *again* and I won't lie, there's a bit of me kind of hopes they're right this time and they'll all bugger off and leave the rest of us to get on with it.

Since it's nearly October, you might want to keep this in hand. An archive of WKBW Buffalo's tremendous Halloween entertainments, including their quite brilliant 1968, 1971 and 1973 interpretations of Orson's "War of the Worlds" antics. Also, from 1969 - "Paul McCartney is Alive and Well... Maybe"

Another slice of pop greatness from this Mickie Most compilation, which I can't seem to stop listening to. "Walkin'", by CCS. Just *listen* to that brass arrangement. Amazing. Does the heart good when that kicks in. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io0C...

Gabriel, Banks, Hackett and Rutherford at last night's Lamb Lies Down on Broadway event. Phil would be there but he couldn't get passed all those crawling people in the red ochre corridor moving in time to a heavy wooden door.

I think I need to go back to the shop to get my eyes adjusted. They seem to be leaking slightly with the return of Chris and Diane. #strictly

One of the greatest records made by anybody, anywhere. There's something very, very special about this thing. It hits me somewhere that not too many records do. It feels... *magical*.

Oh, let it be so. If true, we've waited a *long* time for this one.

Nick D'Virgilio's going out on tour with Steve Hackett shortly, doing all of Steve's North American dates. Here's his playthrough of "Apocalypse in 9/8", which must surely daunt even the bravest of drummers when they see it approaching. Safe to say, he aces it. Steve's in good hands.

Strange to see episodes of "One Step Beyond" on TV. Back in the days of the wood-burning internet (late 90s) copies of that thing went round in real media format, soundtrack with a single frame that changed every 10 seconds or so. Telesnap reconstructions basically. Odd to see full prints now.

Give me back my 22-26 episode seasons of TV shows, all made to the same duration. I don't care if five of them are bottle shows made out of desperation, or one of them's a clip-show flashback. Sometimes, that's where the magic happens. Unless it's Next Gen's "Shades of Gray".

Caught a bit of "Gladiators - Epic Pranks" this morning, in which they had a Stare-Out interlude. I can't be absolutely sure - there was a lot of enthusiastic shouting going on as Diamond annihilated everyone - but I *think* they might have been using the "World of Sport" theme as a music bed....

And once again, I'm reminded of The Greatest Gif Ever (now long lost) - "Brian Blessed's Dark Secret", which takes a long slow zoom into a photo of his face like that "Powers of Ten" film to reveal his beard is composed entirely of interwoven tiny kittens brandishing megaphones.

Just remembered this, from an old BBC Genome post. Still one of my favourite things ever. Tony Hart teaches you how to draw a cat, and drives himself into a fit of the giggles. Every time I look at this, the sun seems to come out.

Don't kick your own arse. If you have a burning urge to have it kicked, there's a queue of people out there who'll find a reason to kick it for you. Try not to beat yourself up. You're almost certainly alright, you know.

United in Elizabethan England by an unexpected Fez and about to be forcibly incarcerated, the three Doctors ponder their next move. l/r Tenth Doctor (David Tennant), War Doctor (John Hurt), Eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith). "I suppose we could bite each other's tails. Might help pass the timey-wimey"

A world of no to this, you bunch of ghouls. There is no need for this to happen, none at all. Leave the dead alone. Let them rest.

Asking for me - we never did get a Muppet Show version of Chris Spedding's "Motor Bikin'", did we? I can see it in my head (it's not dissimilar to the Muppet version of "I Get Around", if I'm honest). Link singing on an enormous bike, phalanx of Muppet Pigs on either side. Much black leather.

Been listening to a quite brilliant compilation of Mickie Most pop productions, which has reintroduced me to "Journey" by Duncan Brown - a song with more hooks per minute than you might reasonably expect. www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPLv...