You can't tell me I'm the first general to get confused over which my army was

[alexsarll]

I've not been to a zoo since I was a tiny, and dimly remember them as a bit of a dispiriting experience. But having finally visited London Zoo, the vast majority of the animals there seemed reassuringly happy, or at worst indolent rather than stressed; animals from the park next door were also showing a vote of confidence, with their heron coming to hang out with the zoo's penguins (whose most prolific egg-layer is called Stuart), and pigeons sat in the okapis' feed trough. They also have what could easily feel like an excessive amount of monkeys, if monkeys weren't so awesome (especially the tamarin which made an escape effort it hadn't really thought through). Plus butterflies! Burrowing owls! And an ibis, which I recognised because it had the same shaped-head as Thoth. Much the same sort of set-up as they used in the new series of Primeval, in fact, except that here the animal-looking-like-an-Egyptian-god thing seemed to be a bit more of an effort to re-angle the series towards dinosaurs-as-source-of-myths - presumably a focus group told them that they needed a bit of mysticism in with the (pseudo)science. It's a shame, they seem to be retooling too many things at once and not really getting any of them right yet; the chemistry's off with Steven gone, the new young male lead is astonishingly blank, and Cutter's new hair is just wrong. I fear the Curse of ITV could have claimed their last decent terrestrial show.
(Not entirely convinced by the Skins finale either. Super Hans as a parent? Dear heavens)

In top North London news, "Much-missed Islington venue The Garage is to be re-opened after a not inconsiderable refurb in June this year, as part of MAMA Group and HMV's previously reported joint venture, which is operating under the Mean Fiddler name in corporate terms, but which brings the HMV brand into the live space as far as the sign above the door is concerned." Let's hope it won't have lost all its old charm in the branding frenzy - that used to be one of my favourite venues. Or two if you count Upstairs.

Oh, and anyone who's somehow managed not to watch The Wire yet and wants to see what all the fuss is about - it starts on BBC2 tonight. I thought that the model of pay TV shows turning up on terrestrial a bit later was dead in the age of the DVD box set, but apparently not; there's an episode per week-night for the next three months.

Comments

[missfrost.livejournal.com]

To paraphrase the TV guide in the Mail (it was free and I have no Guide this week, ok?) if the Beeb are so chuffed to be bringing The Wire to a wider terrestrial audience, why the hell are they putting it on so late?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Because if it were on any earlier, the Mail would probably be first in line to whinge about how all this profanity and drugs use was being flung in the face of Britain's tots.

[missfrost.livejournal.com]

Point. But I'll again be missing it ftb work. And one a week would be catch-uppable, but I'm highly unlikely to get round to watching it if it's on every night. BBC fail.

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

I'm not too keen on the every night model myself, but I can see the appeal given it would otherwise take over a year to get through it. And TBH, given your work isn't everything a bit of a pain in the arse when it comes to scheduling?

[missfrost.livejournal.com]

Well I usually watch one week on catch up, and one 'live' but if I miss one I get a pile up, e.g at the moment I have two Skins to watch at some point.

(Actually the old Heroes set up was useful, with 'next week's episode' following immediately on BBC3.)

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Yes, although for non-BBC channels where I still set the video, the problem there is that you can't really get both without risking losing the end of one or the start of the next.