Just watched the new series of Doctor who tonight, and I think it is absolutely brilliant. I cannot of course see it through a child's eyes like I would have done in the Tom Baker days, but I am really impressed by the current and last series with David Tennant and Christopher Eccleston. I went off Dr Who when that guy off All Creatures Great and Small Took over, I think he was too soft for the part, and things went really downhill with Sylvester Mccoy.
The current doctors have had a brilliant mix of fun, feisty attitude and moral stance, and Rose Tyler makes a great assistant, she's like a kid who gets stuck into anything with gusto, although I think she could have acted a bit more scared when she first saw a dalek, mind you, she probably didn't realise how evil it was; she probably thought it was a wheely bin with bobbles on and a sucker. It's also obvious that her and the doctor have got a good chemistry.
The stories are pretty good, being both pure fantasy and serious at the same time, and the special effects are fit for a hollywood blockbuster - no more wobbling partition walls when someone slams the door....

David

I watched 'Grumpy Old Men' last night, that series when well known people in thier 50's talk about all that's wrong in the world, like modern films, cinemas, bottled water etc. Even though I am still young, I found it quite funny because I saw their point of view on everything. One of them said that one tends to get grumpy as one gets older. I think that's very true because the more you see of the world, the more things repeat themselves, and you can become cynicall unless you try not to be.
One of the best things talked about was films where the editor decides that each shot should only last about 1 second, because he is scared that we might get bored if they last any longer. I noticed this happening in pop videos and stopped watching them many years ago, because they were doing my head in. I thought to myself, 'excuse me, but I have got an attention span longer than a mosquito's. '

One of the things that I find 'funny' is the way some things repeat themselves. For example, every time a boxer dies in the ring, there is a huge fuss made in the press, and debate rages in the media as to wether boxing as a sport should be banned. After the fuss dies down, things just carry on as before, until the next incident, and then it all repeats itself all over again.

As a young person, everything was new and I felt I could make a difference to the world. Now that I am not so young, I see the world from a greater perspective and find it hard to be not cynical. I think that is the experience of many people.

David

Hi folks, I've seen some parrot jokes on my friend's blogs, so I thought I would give you a dog joke:
A man goes to a pet shop looking for his first pet dog, and he sees a sign in the window saying 'special offer, adult labrador, £50 or nearest offer'. He goes in to ask about it, and the owner tells him that it is a rather unusual Labrador, because it can talk. 'never' he said. 'if you don't believe me, go into the back and start talking to him' came the reply.
He went into the back and there was the Labrador sitting patiently. Feeling rather foolish the man said to the dog, 'so you can speak then?'
'yes I can' said the dog. The man stepped back in amazement.
'So how come you are for sale in this pet shop?'
'well,' he replied, 'I have been retired from my job. I started life as a guide dog, and I used my talents of talking to help my owner avoid obstacles, for example, if there was a lamp post coming up I would simply say "lamp post coming up", and he could avoid it. I also gave a running commentry on the scenery, I could point out places of interest like the park, or museum etc. My next job was working in an airport, sniffing out drugs or bombs. If I sniffed something suspicious on a passenger I would sit obediently in front of them and shout "arrest this man", and he would be duly dealt with by the authorities. My last job before retirement was working in Whitehall, helping parliament to formulate new dog laws and I got a book written on the subject; I also stood in for David Blunkett's guide dog when he wanted a day off. So now I am retired, here I am, waiting to go to a good home.'
The man was very impressed by what the dog had said, and he went back to the pet shop owner, and asked him 'Why are you selling this dog so cheap if he can talk?'
The owner replied: 'because it's all lies what he's been saying. He did none of those things!'.

Good day ladies and gentlemen, this is Judge John Juggernaut speaking to you this week in my legal column about bad driving manners. I'm sure you may be aware of a certain lady who was caught on camera applying her make up as she was driving along at 30 mph. You make think that 30mph is not a vastly fast speed, indeed I find it painfully slow after I have been travelling at the regulation 70 mph on a motorway in my Bentley with leather seats and cruise control; however I think you would find it rather painful to be actually hit by a vehicle doing 30, if not fatal, especially if it happens to be adorned with those monstrous bull bars, which are no practical use to anyone except to maim and kill. I would also add that you would be very annoyed if the lady who ran you over happened to be doing her makeup at the time.
As I am driving to my court in the morning I often observe other drivers who demonstrate that they deem paying attention to the road to be of less priority than phoning their friends and colleagues, shaving, reading the paper, etc; Actually looking where they are going seems to be an inconvenience to these miscreants. One of these sorts of motorists appeared before me last week, accused of driving dangerously. While driving down a busy shopping street on a Saturday afternoon, in the space of 3 minutes he collided with 3 parked cars; made several pedestrians flee for their lives on a zebra crossing, collided with a market stall, scattering tons of fruit and vegetables over the highway; mounted the kerb knocking over a post box; and he only noticed what had happened when he had finished his mobile telephone conversation with his girlfriend. Needless to say he got a just punishment, which included me allowing each member of the jury to give him a punch on any body part of their choice; I believe in natural punishment, you see.
And finally, another example of bad driving manners is demonstrated by those people who seem unable to give way to other road users in the proper fashion. I am talking about the motorists in particular, who in the dead of night, seem to reside in a side road, waiting for the opportunity to pounce. They will see another car approaching on the main road, perhaps the only other car on the road within a mile. Then instead of allowing the car to pass they see fit to pull out in front of the other car, causing the other driver to slow down. To add insult to injury, they may also proceed to do a brake test and then turn left up another side road 100 yards down the road. In my top legal opinion, the law lords ruled that this sort of stupid and crass behaviour is contrary to one's human rights to travel unimpeded by other traffic at 3 in the morning. If ever a case like this comes before me in the future, I will sentence the miscreant to drive from John O' Groats to Land's End following a tractor going at 10 mph. To increase the severity of the punishment, I would also arrange for someone to ring them on their mobile phone every 5 minutes, and they would not be allowed to answer it.
JJJ

I thought I would blog about peace of mind today, because I think I know a thing or two about it, and it's one thing I definitely have not got at the moment. I think that peace of mind is strongly linked to contentment, and i think we should all practice contentment with whatever we have got, otherwise we will never, ever be happy. I have not been practising contentment very well recently and I think I'm going to go mad if I don't start soon.
I started going to Buddhist Meditation classes a few years ago, and up until a couple of years ago my practice was quite strong. I learned a thing or two about what the Buddha said about inner peace.I learned that true happiness comes not from getting the best in life, such as the best job or the best partner, but from inner peace through various meditation practices, because he taught that happiness comes from the mind.
Of course we think that getting the best things in life are a true source of happiness, because we are brought up that way around here. Little do we realise that not only is such 'happiness' very short lived, but it actually can lead us in the opposite direction to where we want to go, ie, the opposite of happiness - unhappiness. We don't realise this because we are so preoccupied with getting our next fix, after all, getting what we want gives us a buzz.
In my travels discovering Buddhism, I have talked to many monks and nuns who have made it their life ambition to gain enlightenment. One of their vows and committments is to practise contentment, this is to help keep the 'monkey mind' still, always wanting to go off here and there looking for new experiences.
My meditation practice has not been so strong of late, and I have experienced one of the worst aspects of my personality. In the past I had an interest in hi fi equipment, and wanted to get the best sound. But I was never happy with what I had. Well I was, but it only seemed to last a week before I started picking faults with it. Eventually I got rid of most of it for this reason. I thought I had got over that until it was suggested to me recently that I replace my 15 year old portable television with a new bigger one. Up until that point I had managed to be happy with my portable. After that point that's when the 'fun' started; looking in the Which magazine for recommendations on best buys; looking on the internet at reviews, trying to get the TV with the best picture, trailing round shops trying to compare the pictures in the showrooms, deciding on the best picture, checking the reviews again to see if the model I had in mind had any faults. It got to the stage when I realised that I wasn't actually enjoying all this anymore, and it felt like any purchasing decision would be a life and death situation. Now that I have eventually got one, I marvelled at it's marvellous colours at first, but soon started to see faults in it and wondered if I'd made the right decision, and got really wound up about it. Perhaps i should have actually bought the other one that I had picked but cancelled the order, because I had read about its faults in a review. Chances are that these 'faults' would not have been noticable on normal viewing.
So in the space of a couple of weeks I have gone swiftly from someone happy with their portable, to someone who wants the best widescreen on the planet, and won't be happy till they get it. The thing is, such a widescreen doesn't exist.
So I am now at the point where I could definitely do with some inner peace, but this source of inner peace ain't going to come from any tv that's for sure. I think it's time to head back to the meditation hall.

David

I went to the local Buddhist Centre today for a work shop done by a visiting teacher, the work shop was called pilgramage of sound. It was billed as a class for studying mantras and doing a bit of yoga. I like doing mantras in my meditation and I also like doing yoga, so it seemed ideal for me to try out. When I got there I wasn't sure what I'd let my self in for. There was only one other person I recognised from the regular meditation classes there, and all the rest were people who were more experienced at the kind of thing I was going to be doing today. So I guessed I was going to be in for an unusual experience. It involved doing various yoga postures humming 'ommm' at various strategic points. If anyone had asked me a few years ago if I would have been doing that, I would have laughed at them. I think they might be laughing at me now.

Mind you, it must have had some benefit. We were asked to check our pulses before and after, mine was 63 beats per min before and 60 beats per min after. Chill out man!

David

Let me tell you about the adventures of buying a television. I mentioned in a previous blog that I wanted to replace the little portable that had been entertaining me for ten years. I fancied getting a wide screen, and I'm the sort of guy who cannot just go into a shop and buy a tv within ten minutes just like that. If I'm going to spend a fair wack, I want to make sure it's right, and picture quality is my priority. I'm not going to leave it to pot luck if I can help it. And what's more, I don't really fancy one of those new fangled thin LCD ones. From what I've seen the picture quality isn't that good unless you want to spend at least £800 on one. I think it's true that you get more quality for your money with a traditional 'fat' CRT television.

So one bright morning I woke up, feeling confident, thinking that today's the day. I'm going to confidently choose one which is just right for me, and I will be happy with it for the rest of my life, or until it wears out, whichever comes first. I had previously made an appointment with the local shop to try a few out on my shortlist. I had looked at a few reviews on the internet to get some idea of what would be good at the price I wanted to aim for.
So I duly arrived at the shop. There was a hushed air and a strong vibe that these guys new what they were talking about, and they wouldn't let you go away with a turkey.The salesman, an audio visual enthusiast, had lined up the three demonstration models in a demonstration room. The room was nice and private and quiet, and I had it all to myself for the duration. And after getting settled down with tea and biscuits he wheeled out the first model and switched it on. He had carefully set it up with a good aerial connection and all the right settings for brightness, contrast etc. As I flicked through the channels he enthusiastically pointed out the good bits about the picture, but also balanced his comments by mentioning what it was not good at. The first one had brilliant colour which also looked natural, but it was a bit soft looking. The next one he auditioned had a sharp picture and the colour was good, the sound was not so good, but it depends what my priority is.
I thought that the first one was probably best. I got taken into another room with my TV of choice, and I settled down with my chosen telly to watch my favourite channels on freeview. Only when I was happy with my decision did he take any cash off me. And so it was, I sat at home eagerly waiting delivery, fully confident that I chosen one that I would like. And then.......

I woke up. Oh dear, it had all been a fanciful dream and it's now back to reality, the reality being that I'm no closer to choosing a tv than I was 2 weeks ago despite wearing out a pair of shoes going round shops. So off I went in the real world to my local electrical store hoping for visual enlightenment. The CRT tellies were thrown into a corner at the back, because almost everyone wants a thin LCD one these days, even though some of them look dire. it seems the fashion is who can get a telly into the smallest space possible but still have a screen which is bigger than at the cinema. By the way,the bigger the screen is the more it will show shortcomings in the picture you are watching, such as with alot of broadcast material. Anyway, back to the CRT's which had been thrown onto a shelf and were plugged into a rubbish aerial so the pictures were grainy and badly tuned, almost impossible to compare. I approached the nearby salesman and asked him if I could see the digital tv functions on one of them. He said that he wasn't sure because he normally works in the toaster department. He went away for ten minutes, came back with the remote, prodded a few buttons, was greeted with a blank screen, shrugged his shoulders, disappeared again and did not come back ten minutes later. Another salesman came to the rescue and suggested that I look at flat LCD model if it's the best picture I want. After making my excuses and leaving, I went to another shop where I had seen a fat tv that had been given a pretty good review for picture quality. I took my chances and bought it, to put myself out of my misery. When I got it home I was relieved that it was ok, and I was fairly happy with it. But that's not due to any help from any retailers I've visited.
The telly I've got is a Panasonic tx28dtm. The definition is wonderful, I can see colours on my favourite programs that I never knew existed before. The sound is not so good, but I can always get some extra speakers later.

I previously wrote a blog about the curse of the 0870 numbers, the way that companies are ripping people off who phone them. Recently I had chance to put the web site www.saynoto0870.com to good use, although I didn't actually have a total victory in this case. I recently made a purchase at Currys and I had cause to ring the store up 2 or 3 times, but all the numbers listed for the stores are 0870 numbers, costing around 8p per minute, and the companies who use these numbers are probably taking a cut off this charge, although they would never say how much if you asked them. I looked on the website above and there were plenty of geographic numbers for Currys stores, but not the one I wanted. I used the geographic number for another store (which costs me 3p flat rate per call), and asked them if they had the number for the store I wanted, but could or would only tell me the 0870 number. I asked them to transfer me but they said that they would not be able to. I also tried to go through customer services but they could or would not give me the geographic number, and could not transfer me. So almost admitting defeat I rang on the 0870 number, and asked them to call me back which they did.

I think we should all avoid ringing these 0870 numbers and then they might die a death.

David