Hannah's a friend, so I may be biased, but I really did enjoy listening to the chat, over on the next table, about three series with which I'm not especially familiar. Looking forward to another visit soon.

A pile of colourful print designs

Sometimes being a one woman creative business isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
Today has been one of those days where I haven’t sold anything in my online shop.
Have a look at my shop and please repost to spread the word. Thanks.
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That's good.

One of my favourites of this kind of thing happened almost 15 years ago, on 18 April 2011. On that day, the broadcast of the pilot for Thames Television's Looks Familiar series was exactly as far back in time as the start of the 1930s had been, when the pilot aired on 25 August 1970.

Facially, it looks like Lena Horne to me, but I don't remember her with hair that short.

Is that before, after or during the period that he was writing the 'Five Towns' novels.

There's a new system starting here. We've had info about the new bins but I only found out by chance that they've changed collection day too. I'm expecting chaos, not least because the new regime is supposed to start from 6 April but there'll be one kind of collection on the new day this week too.

SWASTIKAS... AT ABC'S STUDIOS. [NORTH] Swastikas and German uniforms were much in evidence when I looked in on ABC-TV's Studio One rehearsal of Counter-Attack (writes Jack Barlow). Over a dozen complicated sets of the Channel Islands scenes of the new children's Sunday afternoon serial were erected and no effort was being spared to add realism to the story.

This piece, from Television Today (28 Jan 1960), might suggest that it's Didsbury given the 'North' heading.

This poor bastard: no arms.
#kevinmcaleer

I'm now wondering if that makes Joan B 'er indoors.

Apart from the hair he looks a bit like Jack Haig there.

Yay Nancy Banks-Smith. 97 and still with us. The greatest TV critic who ever lived. Turned down an OBE. Both Guardian anthologies of her writing are shamefully out of print. Every sentence she wrote was the very opposite of me me me showy clickbait. Genius with a pen.

This version seems quite short, though: 55 minutes including ad breaks (21:05 to 22:00) where the original BBC 1 broadcast was billed as 100 minutes (20:15 - 21:55) excluding them.

Mouse-art Elton.

That's for other people to say.

Who among us can forget when Frank Spencer unilaterally rejected the Good Friday Agreement and masterminded a series of paramilitary attacks alongside both the Continuity and Real IRA?

Hope it works for you.

Is that an annual total or per book?

Perhaps you can take the key changes as indications of time passing.

Meanwhile: what kind of shit place is Clarksville, if the last train of the day gets you there by 4.30.

True.

In case anyone's wondering, I did get the price range I mentioned by looking at the backs of various books on my shelves - I wasn't just relying on a rose-tinted memory.

And yet, when I started regularly buying paperback books just over 50 years ago, they'd cost between 50p and 75p. According to the Bank of England's inflation calculator, the equivalent would be between £4 and £6 now.

Many happy returns, youngster.

He was replaced by Bob Wellings for series two, whether or not that gives a clue...

A black pen (in a crosshatch technique) and black printing ink (applied with a roller) illustration on off white paper of a Signalman and his box. The man stands at the foot of the stairs to his signalbox which is situated at the bottom of a rocky and wooded ravine. The box is illuminated from within, its light casts shadows of the man onto a railway track, the track runs into a dark and damp tunnel. Outside of the mouth of the tunnel stands a ghostly figure waving its arms, one across its face the other in the air. A gloomy and atmospheric scene.

I’m going to make prints of this one soon.

The Signalman.

A thread that's well worth reading...

That's really good but also hilariously incongruous. Just brilliant.

Alfie is so good in this, isn't he? When I first saw this episode, in 1982, I hadn't realised that was his only appearance in the series. I suppose I'd assumed that all the actors playing policemen were at least semi-regulars.

Do we know if these are an improvement (better quality, more complete etc) compared to the BBC's copies of the serial?

Home | Matt Owen | Freelance Writer | Speech Writer I offer a broad and diverse range of writing services. Get in touch!

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I'm so sorry, Moose.