Red Dwarf – they thought it was an arts programme
You want comedy? I’ll show you comedy.
When British sci-fi comedy show Red Dwarf came on the scene, the ABC programmers didn’t know what to do with it. First they put it on Saturday afternoons, as a filler.
The following year, the summer of 1990-91, they aired it again, this time as part of the Sunday afternoon arts coverage. Because, y’know, it fits in well with programmes about Mozart and Giotto.
And they got the Sunday Arts presenters to introduce the episodes. The first one, read by Helen Wellings, included a run-down of the plot, just in case we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves.
Just to further irk the fans, they also managed to get the name of the show wrong, repeatedly calling it The Red Dwarf.
Oh wait, you want proof? Very well.
The other consequence of showing it in the middle of the day is that they took the knife to the episodes and made numerous cuts, particularly to the second season. One episode got skipped completely.
A year or two later the ABC figured out what kind of show Red Dwarf really was — a potential cult comedy classic — and started airing it in the evenings.
In a way it’s similar to how other free-to-air networks have treated sci-fi over the years. Badly, mostly.
And the Sunday Arts show? It’s getting a revamp.
Tags: ABC, Red Dwarf, television
12 comments
Hector the Cat
Teaching kids to cross the road safely is a matter of laying out the basic rules, and continual practice. I’d thought over the years it might be easier if the Hector The Cat song was still run on TV, as the lyrics helps make it easy to remember what to do.
Happily, thanks to YouTube, it’s been found again.
(via Mark O’Meara)
Tags: Hector the Cat, roads
8 comments
Stupid grunty cars
Here’s a draft of a bulletin I’ll send out at some stage after I’ve taken over as Grand Emperor of the World and established my benevolent dictatorship.
Dear owners of stupid grunty noisy cars,
I hereby decree that you have three choices for your stupid grunty noisy cars:
1. You may, at your expense, have your car altered to remove the stupid grunty noise;
2. You may have your car sent to be crushed and recycled; or
3. You may continue to drive your stupid grunty noisy car, but limited to daylight hours only, and only in designated hoon areas.
(I’m still considering my position on stupid grunty motorbikes, and may rule the same way for them.)
Tags: cars, Morons on the road, noise
8 comments
When suburb names get stupid
Came across this business. They have two branches. They have a Chadstone branch, which is actually in Hughesdale, and they have a Bentleigh branch, which I’ll grudgingly admit is technically in Bentleigh, but is actually on Patterson Road, right next to Patterson station.
As I’ve noted before, Hampton East now stretches right the way to Moorabbin, as does Bentleigh — both now end just across the street from Moorabbin Town Hall and Moorabbin Station. Ditto Gardenvale, which is now tiny, wedged between Elsternwick and Brighton.
Moorabbin in Melway edition 1, versus now
See, if I ran the world, none of this crap would happen. Areas would be named for what they’re actually nearby to — particularly when there’s things like railway stations involved, as consistent naming helps people navigate. They couldn’t just adopt some nearby suburb name that some upwardly mobile people aspire to cheat their way into: real estate bods wouldn’t be able to influence the movement of suburb boundaries (like the one The Age noted the other week — part of Bentleigh migrated over to East Brighton).
Tags: Bentleigh, Brighton, Moorabbin, suburbs
9 comments
Myki’s biggest problem?
This was a number 96 tram in Bourke Street on Friday afternoon:
Similar scenes are seen in morning peak around much of the tram network, during the lunchtime rush in the CBD, as well as the evening peak, as well as weekends.
Now imagine it with Myki: everyone touching-on and off their cards as they board and alight, at 2 seconds+ per transaction.
If they can speed up the scanners, that will help. This video shows that a Hong Kong Octopus scanner takes only about 0.3 seconds to respond.
(See also: queue of people boarding a HK bus; London Oyster gates, Taipei)
But even that may only go so far. Putting scanners on tram platform stops would also help, but there’d have to be some way for people getting off the tram to tell there was a scanner on the platform they could use, otherwise that wouldn’t work either.
Another idea is, noting that most bus and tram trips are short distances anyway, making them a flat fare like London’s buses and trams, so you don’t have to touch-off.
If nothing happens, expect the trams to get even slower than they are now.
Tags: Myki, public transport, trams
8 comments
Making your argument count
“That is right, 38 new trains, pity they are only 3 carriages long instead of 6 like our current trains. I guess that means we paid double.” — Comment on the Herald Sun web site
Seriously, where do people get these ideas? It’s complete garbage.
“Thirty eight X’Trapolis six-car sets will be rolled-out from late 2009 to 2011.” — Department of Transport web site
See, I’m all for bagging when it’s deserved, but this is just making stuff up. Where does that get you?
In any argument, it’s pointless coming out with some BS like that. If you want your view to be accepted, if you want your criticism to sting, don’t fire blanks — make sure you’re using live ammunition.
Research the facts, find out what’s actually true, that you can provide evidence for, and use that.
Call me Bruce
My name’s really Daniel, but if you like you can call me Bruce.
More fun with Google translations of a Chinese media article:
…
Victorian government has not yet determined when to start full operation ultra-budget Myki ticketing system, it was originally promised in 2007 and spent 130 million on the operation of the system, will begin before Christmas on buses, trains and trams on the use of .…
Myki ticketing system, a spokesman for Wal-Mart (Jean Ker Walsh) told reporters Tuesday that if the passengers forget that credit card, they will pay the Myki ticketing system to automatically set the fare. She added that the system will save commuters a lot of transportation costs, and believe that it soon will Myki ticketing system handy.Public Transport Users Association president Bruce Bowen (Daniel Bowen) that are subject to credit card on the off, especially in the trams, the traffic peak period may be extended travel time, will inevitably increase the tram and bus delays.
…– Australia, Victoria’s controversial e-ticketing system — Epoch Times
Apart from the obvious stuff with the translation back to English mixing-up names and affiliations, I also like the way they appear to have got the cost of the system wrong by a factor of ten.
Tags: Google translation, Myki, PTUA
4 comments
I’m confused
Toothpaste.
There’s a bewildering number of varieties in just the Colgate brand. This is what the Safeway Homeshop site lists, excluding things like Pump packs and size variations:
Colgate Toothpaste 2in1 Gel Whitening
Colgate Toothpaste 2in1 Liquid Gel Icy Blast
Colgate Toothpaste 2in1 Max Fresh Cool Mint
Colgate Toothpaste Advanced Whitening
Colgate Toothpaste Baking Soda & Peroxide
Colgate Toothpaste Blue Minty Gel
Colgate Toothpaste Coolmint
Colgate Toothpaste Fluroide Great
Colgate Toothpaste Fresh Stripe Sensitive
Colgate Toothpaste Great Regular Flavour
Colgate Toothpaste Max Fresh Coolmint
Colgate Toothpaste Max White
Colgate Toothpaste Professional Clean
Colgate Toothpaste Sensitive Multi Protection
Colgate Toothpaste Sensitive Whitening
Colgate Toothpaste Simply White Sparking Mint
Colgate Toothpaste Total + Whitening
Colgate Toothpaste Total
Colgate Toothpaste Total Advance Fresh
Colgate Toothpaste Total Long Lasting
Colgate Toothpaste Total Mint Stripe
Colgate Toothpaste Total Whitening
Colgate Toothpaste Triple Action
Colgate Toothpaste Whitening Plus Tartar Control
Beyond perhaps a preference for a particular mint flavour etc, how can you possibly know which is the best?
I suspect the one they’d most like you to buy is the most expensive version, which also has the most shiny bits on the packet to attract your attention. (”Ooh — shiny!”)
Perhaps in reality they are all virtually the same, and they’re just hoping to dominate the market by providing every possible feature and package colour anybody could want?
Likewise dish washing tablets… I usually buy Finish brand. 4-in-one… 5-in-one… all-in-one… MAX-in-one?! What’s the difference?
