The Amazing World of Si Hart

Amazing insights into my mind as I battle against the inefficient world of the library, moderate a message board, write Doctor Who audio adventures and try and stay sane!

Sunday, April 30, 2006

Meetings, Quizzes and DIY

It's been rather a tiring weekend so far, but really rather good. I'm feeling really tired and drained today, but not in the same narky way I was the other week, maybe because a lot has been achieved and the tiredness is through effort rather than indolence.

Friday began early. I went to work half an hour earlier than usual to make sure everything was ready for the meeting. The meeting itself went as well as could be expected, perhaps better. I think our preparation paid off, as we managed to get our points across in a well organised manner, so that we didn't come out wishing we'd mentioned something we'd forgotten about. We were pleased to see someone from human resources there too, taking lots of notes, which means we might stand some chance of things being changed.
It was wonderful to see the stunned look on the head of service's face as I reeled off the statistics of days we've been left short staffed since January... I don't think she ever expects us to be as organised as we actually are. I think it's important to let them know just what we've been through so far, as they always ask for the figures and examples, at least this time they were ready. Obviously we couldn't know about the things they've discussed about our workload already, and it's reassuring to hear that some of the burden at Bracknell will be taken by the branch libraries (I think we also made some constructive points about how things can change for the better, if they'll listen) and not necessarily be a central job. Of course, we managed to rile the head of community services, our boss, a bit, but that was only to be expected... and it is always a joy to watch! We'll see what comes of it all, if nothing else, it has been said.

Friday night was Vic and Mark's quiz night, which they'd organised as part of their fund raising efforts for Great Ormond Street. I know they were both a bit worried about how well it'd go, how many would turn up and stuff, but they needn't have been. It was a tremendous success overall, with the Forest Suite of Bracknell Sports Centre being packed full of full tables! It was wonderful to see it all work so well, and that so many people supported them. Special thanks go out to Tim, who came along from Bristol for the evening, was put on the team with the library ladies (he got a glimpse of my life there!) but seemed to have a great time despite it. Of course, he should have come with us, and we should have sorted that out, but it seemed to work anyway!
The night itself went with few hitches, even the first meeting between Mum and Dad and Steve's Mum and Dad went really well, with them all saying how lovely the others were (and I was pleased to see them and Susan and Robert there to support us, that was lovely of them). The Library Ladies won on the end, which delighted them and Margaret also won tickets for Wookey Hole in the raffle, so they did really, really well (actually the support from everyone at work has been tremendous and I'm ever so grateful to them all. They're a special group of people!)
Overall, it was a great fun night, and they raised a massive £1400 or so in one evening, which is really astounding!

Yesterday, we (or rather Steve) managed to do some DIY, when the shower pole was replaced without too much bother! We picked up a big pile of paint colour charts too and spent an hour going through them and making a few plans... I don't know when we will get round to doing anything with them, but the plans are being made at least...

Anyway, it's a lazy Sunday morning here. We watched School Reunion again, and thoroughly enjoyed it too, Steve is busy making another video and me, I'm still in my dressing gown! How decadent!

Current music:Pink Floyd: Shine on you Crazy Diamond
Current favourite episode of the new series: School Reunion
Current favourite Robot Dog: K9

Saturday, April 29, 2006

Old Friends

Tonight's Doctor Who hit the mark perfectly. It may not have been the best episode of the new series overall, but I think it might be my favourite, if only for doing the impossible, or what seemed like the impossible and exploring what happens when the Doctor leaves you behind (in Aberdeen!!). It's rather an obvious story to tell really, and although it's been done in a couple of the books, being able to see it happen was amazing.
It was really rather amazing to see Sarah Jane and K9 back in action. Along time ago, myself and Si were contributors to a very silly thread about what might have happened to Doctor Who if it had continued after 1989. One of the silliest posts involved the return of Sarah and K9 who were still out investigating mysteries together, when they stumble across the Doctor again... We dismissed it as a great joke, but of course, that's precisely what's happened tonight. Neither of them disappointed either.
I've never been a huge fan of Sarah, but I have to admit that tonight Lis Sladen was absolutely spot on, from the warmth of the magical first scene in the staff room, the moment where she sees the TARDIS and stumbles away in shock and horror, and when she cried when she hears K9 has been blown up (I did too I have to admit!), not to mention the oneupmanship with Rose, Sarah was written perfectly and Lis gave a performance worthy of the script. It was just great to see the Doctor finally give her the goodbye she deserved. That hug was a special moment in an episode full of great moments.
As for K9... well as I've said before, I have a special love for K9, and although he didn't do as much as I hoped, it was great to see him back in action, all rusty and old! I loved it when his batteries were running down (some things never change) and was pleased they got the sound effects right for his return. Seeing K9 Mk 4 at the end made me grin hugely!

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Spokesman Si

I wrote recently about how I'd become passionate about my job... It's got worse. This week I've set myself as the spokesman for our team. On Friday morning we've got a meeting with the heads of service and I've found myself, over the last few days, getting everyone sorted ready for it, I've organised their comments into arguments and pertinent points and written it all up as bullet points so we can make sure that everything we need covered is covered. How did this happen? Well I suppose I've got a reputation as a troublemaker ever since the day I maliciously walked down the corridor and possibly pushed past the head of service (and was duly hauled in her office for it too)
I don't know that it will do us much good, but as I've been saying all week, if we can make them squirm and feel very uncomfortable for a while then we've achieved something. We've got nothing to lose and we might as well get it all out in the open. There's certainly plenty of grievances to be aired.
Oh and the Bracknell News called today to ask about library closures. It could be the start of something rather damaging for the senior management. We all joked about shopping them to the papers, but no-one really meant it, now it seems that it's all about to come out in the papers. Oh my.

I'm having a very cheerful week. It's good after the low moods of last week. I've always been fortunate that I don't seem to stay down for very long. I think it also helps that it's Spring. Someone once said that Spring was my season, when the world comes back to life and everything becomes green and colourful after the greys of winter are over. Whoever said it was right, this is my favourite time of year. It's the most optimistic time of year, which is me all over!

Current Music: Lemon Jelly: Elements
Current Book: Robert Rankin: The Brightonomicon
Current Mood: Cheery

Sunday, April 23, 2006

A Weekend of my Own

I've got one of those rare weekends that's all my own. Steve has been very busy, going to parties in Walthamstow and playing computer games, and so I'm here all by myself. I used to hate this, you know, having all my time to fill on my own, but once you're in a relationship (and certainly once you're living with someone) it becomes something of a treat.
I wish I could say, though, that I've used the time profitably. I haven't really. I've been knackered all week, so there's been some catching up with much need sleep going on, there's been the usual net surfing, and not much else to be honest. Ah well, it's just nice to be here alone for a while I suppose. I will be pleased to see him later though!

Last night's Doctor Who seems to have silenced all last week's critics. It was a great episode, really atmospheric and very well written. I thought the werewolf was really well realised too. As they said in Confidential, fur isn't easy to render, so they deserve much praise for doing such a great job.
Pauline Collins was the star of the show though. Her Queen Victoria was really superbly brought to life and she played her to perfection. I liked the way the Queen wasn't made out to be the humourless woman she's often portrayed to be, and that she often had a little twinkle in her eye. It made her unexpected banishing of the Doctor and Rose even more unexpected. Within Doctor Who itself this is almost unique, as the Doctor usually charms authority figures like her by the end of the story. I was quite shocked!
David Tennant was very good. His portrayal seems to be dividing opinion at the moment. I liked the moment when he mentioned the knowledge in the room stored in the books being the greatest weapon they had. That's a brilliantly Doctorish moment! People are commenting that the relationship between the Doctor and Rose is rather smug, but then, to outsiders, don't all really close relationships/ friendships come across like that? I know I've been accused of that at times!
Next week, of course, we have Sladen and K9! Fab! I hear they might be on Blue Peter tomorrow... who could have imagined that would ever happen this side of 1981?

Current Music: Keane: Hopes and Fears
Current Book: Doctor Who- The Stone Rose: Jac Rayner
Current top: Navy Union Jack T-Shirt

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Whinge!

This week I mostly hate being a Doctor Who fan.

Mostly I love being a fan, but this week has been very wearing . I don't normally get upset with fandom at large, because I know I'm another anal fan, the same as the rest of them, but there are limits. This week has seen the new epsiode, New Earth, criticised, kicked around, scrutinised, picked apart and spat out the other end, with the final result that any magic or fun has been drained out of it by the constant miserable moans of a very vocal set of fans. There's been even worse at OG. Thank god I don't post there.
Now I don't think the episode deserves that much of a kicking. It wasn't the best episode ever, but it was by no means the worst. I think I just find it so soul destroying that no matter waht, you get cries of "RTD can't write" (ahem, yes he can), "Its not like it was in 1980s/ 1970s", "I've already decided I'm going to hate this episode, but I'll be watching it anyway" and so on and so on.
I know Doctor Who isn't perfect, and I know that the new shorter episodes mean that there isn't always room for everything to be as well constructed and explored as it could be and that sometimes there's going to be a quick resolution... but it just really gets to me that people aren't open minded enough to accept the change, that they're only happy when they're whinging about what it's not, rather than what it is. It's been the same forever... no fans are ever happy with what's being made at the moment... it's never as good as it used to be, and well frankly I'm bored, fed up and tired of reading post after post of it.
Only minutes ago we've had a poster complaining that it's another Victorian era episode this week, saying why don't we get stories with Solon the Greek or Alexander the Great or Petrach... well I don't know about you, but they sound dull compared to Queen Victoria and a Werewolf? I'm sure RTD knows what he's doing. It might be an era that's been visited before, but it's a dramatic and recognisable time period, which is why time and again Doctor Who goes back there. Would a Doctor Who meets Petrach story be nearly as accessible as A Queen Victoria story for the viewers at large (actually I can hear the poster's snobby reply to that right now, so I won't say on the thread).... I really don't think so.

Rant over!

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Earache

I've had really bad earache all day today.
One of the things that not many people know about me is that for the first 6 years of my life I suffered really badly with ear problems. I had earaches a great deal of the time (I can remember some excruiating nights in our house in Weymouth when the pain was too much for me to bear and just sobbing my heart out) and I had many hearing tests to make sure there was no permanent damage to my ears. Fortunately it seems to have been something I've largely grown out of, but every so often I still get horrible earaches that keep me awake at night. Last night I had to get up for a while and find some painkillers to stop the pain so I sleep. I've been a bit out of sorts really because it.

Today has been ok for a day off. I did some more work on the dissertation, though I'm in a bit of a pause stage, as I can't get on with getting the questionnaires out until my tutor returns in a week and a half time, as she needs to make sure they're ok before I go ahead. So, I've had to do more of the dull bits today, pulling apart the lit review yet again and a bit of the write up of the methodology, which is as dull as it sounds.
Fortunately I've had a few things to do to help my sister out with things for her fund raising today too, so that kept me nicely distracted for a while, but really it's just been a day when I've felt largely detatched from everything.

Current music: Athlete: Vehicles and Animals
Current Book: Doctor Who- The Resurrection Casket by Justin Richards
Current mood: Distracted

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Foul moods

I was in an absolutely foul mood for most of yesterday.
You see, sometimes I get really cross about silly little things. Yesterday Steve woke me up at some ridiculously early (for a Bank Holiday) hour, and I desperately wanted to sleep in for a bit longer, but he shook me awake and that was it, I had to get up. It put in a really horrible frame of mind. It happens every so often... usually after a couple of days of late nights I need to catch up a bit. I'm not like Steve and I can't just snooze wherever and whenever I like, I need to sleep at night, and so being woken up at 7.45 for no good reason (it wasn't as if we were doing anything until 4pm) really didn't do me any good.
I'm stomped about, looked miserable, wasn't enthusiastic about anything, irrationally told him for everything he did and complained a lot. I wish I could say it helped me feel better, but it really didn't at all. My mood didn't really improve until late afternoon, after watching what was a fabulous Neil Finn concert on DVD (it's been ages since I last watched it and I'd forgotten how wonderful it all was)... Sometimes just hearing the music you love can have a positive effect.

It was good thing too, as yesterday afternoon marked the start of barbeque season, and if I hadn't been in a good mood, I think I'd have made the afternoon rubbish for everyone. As usual, Chris and Chris did us proud with some great food (Little Chris is a Barbeque expert... He likes his meats!) and it was a nice end to the day. I'm glad I cheered up.

Being back at work wasn't too bad today. Usual stuff. Just preparing stats for the chats we're having with the SMT about the restructure next week. They're going to be great fun once I get started on them!!

Current Music: The Flaming Lips: At War With the Mystics
Current DVD on Pre-Order: Best of the Harry Hill Show (coming in June)
Current Doctor Who: Fury from the Deep (Recon)

Monday, April 17, 2006

Easter

I suppose I ought to mention the first episode of the new series of Doctor Who, New Earth, but since it's been analysed to death on Planet Skaro, I find I don't really have a great deal to say about it. All there seems to have been since it aired is arguments and bickering about whether it made sense or if it was good or not... I really don't know what to say. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's not the best Doctor Who story ever, but it was great fun and highly entertaining.
I have to admit I've been in a strange and very defensive mood about it since it was on. I don't quite know what to say about any of it. Maybe I'm just tired and tired of people looking for holes that have to exist in these things... as far as I could see, it all hung together pretty well. There could have been less body-swapping going on, but nothing is perfect. I suppose in some ways I'm better off watching the show in a completely isolated way, so that I can maintain my own little bubble of happiness! Ah well.
Still, my nephew is well on his way to becoming hooked on the show. After watching Bad Wolf/ The Parting of the Ways on Thursday (and telling me, excitedly about all the best bits on Good Friday) and then watching it on Saturday and really enjoying it, I think we might have a new fan in the making. Don't tell my sister though! He's the same age I was when i got hooked and it's wonderful to see that all the kids are back into loving it again. That's the best thing of all that could have happened.
When you think about it, it's done extraordinarily well. There's a children's comic, action figures, enough merchandise to bankrupt you if you try and buy it all... I always knew that if the show was treated carefully it could be a hit again, but I never expected it to be this popular. Once again on Saturday night it was the most watched show (over 3m more viewers than Harry Potter on ITV) of the evening. Could a 4th year be assured? I do hope so.

It's been a great weekend. On Good Friday we were invited over to Laura's Mum and Dad's for hot cross buns and coffee, which was great. They always have a house full of people, and it's nice to be involved... we ended up playing hide and seek with Luke, and had a good chat with the rest of the family. Jay broke his toe at the start of the week, so he looked a bit uncomfortable all morning, and despite the present problems between them, Dad and Mark seemed to get on ok... Mostly by ignoring each other, but that's still better than them arguing some more.
Once we'd managed to get away ( never easy where saying goodbye to family members is concerned), we went into Reading. After a silly throwaway comment a couple for week's back at Si's we'd really thought about getting anew TV. I've had mine for 8 years (and brought it second hand) and it's just starting to get a bit temperamental, so with Steve having had a nice tax rebate, we thought it might be a good idea. The trip to Reading itself, was as ever, stressful (it's a bastard to navigate round), but once we got to Richer Sounds things were fine.
We ended up with a 32" LCD widescreen Philips TV, and it's absolutely gorgeous. The picture is superb and we spent the rest of Friday watching TV and films to see what it could it do (the new Doctor Who titles look magnificent! Would it be sad to admit that they were one of the first things we watched?) We watched Solaris last night and it looked so gorgeous! It's certainly a worthy purchase!

Saturday was good. I baked a pretty good Carrot Cake (though not having a set of kitchen scales means I was guessing the quantities, which is never ideal and it wasn't quite sweet enough alas) and it did make the house smell lovely just as our guests Si and Simon arrived. We had a great day with them. We took them to black park, the location for a couple of Doctor Who stories (and Superman II) and had a good chat as we walked round the woods and the lake. They're always really good company and it was nice this time, for a change to have a chance to chat all evening rather than sitting watching something on TV. I really enjoyed that and despite Si's worries I wasn't really quiet because he was taking New Earth apart, I've just been a bit tired the last few days and it after the beer it was beginning to hit me a bit by Saturday night. Still, his home made hot cross buns were wonderful! I'm glad to hear they had a nice evening with us... They're two of our favourite people.

Today is another easy day before we go off to see Chris for a barbeque this afternoon. Lets hope the sunshine holds, eh.

Currrent Doctor Who: New Earth (with Commentary)
Current Music: Dusty: Wishing and Hoping
Current friend who's birthday I forgot: Mark :(

Thursday, April 13, 2006

It's true to say that Doctor Who fans never agree on anything. This week has seen the release of Genesis of the Daleks on DVD. Fans tend to get themselves twisted in knots about the extras we get on the DVDs. Doctor Who fans are far luckily than most, as each release gets as many extras as can be crammed on the disc, a full restoration and commentary... there aren't many archive series's that get that kind of treatment.
Anyway, I have to say we rather enjoyed the DVD really. It's a bit of a favourite (it was growing up listening to the LP version that did it) and the documentaries seemed very enjoyable. I don't know what it was about Roy Skelton's guide to doing Dalek voices, but they seem to have really annoyed some people. We loved them! They're silly and probably not essential, but there was something really nice about seeing how he approached some of the classic lines in the story. Ah well, no fan is ever truly happy... I mean i could carp on about how they've never beaten The Leisure Hive as an all round great DVD, but I won't for now!

I had a lovely day yesterday. Mum rang at lunchtime and invited me over for lunch. She had Annabel for the afternoon, so there was a good oppotunity to spend some time with her. She's getting to the interesting age now where she's paying attention to all that's going on around her. She recognises us, and gives us huge grins when she sees us and she turns round when we say her name and she loves playing with her baby gym.
We were joined later by Vic and Luke, and so I spent an hour playing trains with Luke (the same Duplo set my brother loved when he was young!) and reading him Mr Men stories (the same books I was read and read to Jonathan!), which is always fun. They're both great kids and it's good to spend time with them.

Current number of lengths swam each Wednesday: 40
Current Music: Belle and Sebastian: Acts of the Apostles pt II
Current number of Support Staff in the Basement: 1 (me!)

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Keep K9 Company...

It's always good to have a Doctor Who cover on the Radio Times. Over the years we've had some really imaginative ones and this week's sells the new series rather nicely. It's great to see K9 immortalised on the front of the magazine at last.
Of course, K9 was my first ever Doctor Who icon, before the Doctor, The TARDIS, all the other things there are to love in the show. I don't know what it was about him that really caught my young imagination back in 1979/80, but whatever it was, it's stayed with me. I can't wait to see him in action in a few weeks time.
We're gearing up the new series. Si and Simon are coming to stay to watch the first episode with us, which'll be fun (it's always good to see them) and I think we've got others coming to watch subsequent episodes with us. It makes it all far more of an event I suppose.

The lack of support from the management has again worried me today. last year we caught a customer stealing videos from the library and out CCTV footage was sent to the police. We were told at the time that he'd had a letter to say he was banned from using the facilities of the library.
Today he turned up. We've been told never to confront difficult customers without a member of the management team. None of them would come to the floor to deal with him. Even better, our head of service is convinced a letter was never sent. This is typical behaviour. It's not supportive of the frontline service, and even a simple thing like writing to this customer can't be managed. I'd almost be surprised if I wasn't so angry about it.

Current Music: Elliott Smith: From a Basement on a Hill
Current cake: Hot Cross Bun
Current people I'm working with: Sheila and Maggie

Monday, April 10, 2006

Weekending

There's always the hope of a quiet weekend in our house, but it never quite goes that way. We'd planned to do nothing at all, but a visit down south by Steve's friend Muz ensured we had a lovely evening out on Saturday.
I'd only met Muz once before and on that particular evening I wasn't in the best of moods (we'd had a bit of an argument before we went out to meet him), so it was really good to get out and talk to him properly this time. He's a lovely guy, one of Steve's oldest friends, who is now living in Bradford. Sometimes when you meet your partner's friends you can get lost in the conversation as they start to talk about things that happened years ago, but it wasn't like that at all on Saturday. You wouldn't have thought a cinema foyer ice cream parlour was the best place to go out (Muz's family are muslim, and so drinking or even going to the pub wasn't a viable plan), but it worked and it meant we could chat away without too much noice spoiling things. I'm glad I've got the oppotunity to get to know him a bit better and I'm sad now I can't make it to his stag-do in Poland (it clashes with that wedding I mentioned before, would you believe). Ah well!

Sunday was good too. A bit of a lie-in, some cleaning, visits from my parents and a good friend of ours, Ant, who was dropping some stuff back to us and then Doctor Who Night on BBC3. The new episode of Confidential dropped some tantalising glimpses of the new series (beginning next Saturday- Hooray!), most excitingly of all some glimpses of the returning Sarah Jane and K9... I can't wait!

Current Doctor Who: The Wheel in Space (still!)
Current Music: Elliot Smith: Figure 8
Current book for storytime: Charlie and Lola: I will not never ever eat my peas.

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Future Echoes...

After a few days of everyone saying how great Protii was on PS, the more honest comments are starting to come in. People are beginning to single out their favourite performances and just be a bit more honest with their thoughts. I'm pleased, because the only way we can get better is if we know what we're doing wrong. I know it's not perfect, and there are plenty of ways we can get better on the next one (it's amazing how easy it was to type that... we know it's going to happen!). Technically it's not great, with some of us (including myself) holding the mic too close and there were lots of popping sounds, but we can make sure we improve on that next time.

I think Paul hit a certain nail on the head when he said he should have read the script through a bit more and thought about the lines. It was a shame there wasn't time for a full run through really, to get everyone thinking about the script. It was easy for me and Si to know what we wanted, but I suppose because of lack of time we didn't really go in heavy on the direction front. Perhaps we should have? Paul has been generally harsh on his performance as the Doctor, but I think he did well. It's not an easy part to play, but he did bring something new to the role, and he seemed more at ease as the day went on. Perhaps, as he's said, he just needs a bit more of a push. I think he'll be great next time.

Current Music: Genesis: Duke
Current Book: Scarlett Thomas: PopCo
Current Magazine: Doctor Who Adventures.

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Time for another cup of tea?

After getting a general thumbs up for my dissertation proposal and the first 6 marks, I've started working on it for real this week. Of course, I should have been doing this in the background over the last fortnight, but sometimes you need a little time to take stock and last week was particularly busy, so not a great deal got done. At the moment I'm concentrating on the Lit review, pulling my initial one apart and expanding it. There's a lot of material out there that's relevant, but a hell of a lot more that isn't, so its been quite an intensive few hours today searching for more references, and finding that much of what i found wasn't great. Ah well, it'll all look good in the log at the end I'm sure.
Maybe I ought to have worked on the questionnaire today instead? It's very difficult to decide what should be a priority. Ah well, maybe that'll be next week's task!

Still, if nothing else, I've had a several really good cups of tea today. In the best traditions of avoiding what I should be doing I've gone downstairs and made tea! It just goes to show that nothing has really changed since I did my degree!

A wedding invite turned up in the post today. I feel bad, but I don't think I want to go. Its not as if I'm close to my cousin (who's getting married for the second time) but there's an obligation there I don't like much. Dad has been pushing us to go, as he's not going to be able to be there. On the plus side there was an invite for Steve, which was something of a change, but as he's got a stag do to go to around then, he may not be able to go with me.
I felt I was being a bit mean about going to the stag do too. I've only met Muz for a couple of hours, and I just felt I'd be out of place there.I'm very probably wrong about that, and am just being a bit insecure in general about things. Ah well, both situations will be sorted out one way or another over the coming weeks I think.

Current Music: Kate Bush: Aerial
Current top: Grey Lonsdale Sweatshirt
Current Big finish Spin Off Series: Sarah Jane Smith Series 2

Monday, April 03, 2006

Premiers, Tension and Laughs

It's an odd feeling hearing people you know speaking lines you've written and other people you know listening and laughing at it. I was very odd really, but at the same time, really lovely. As I mentioned in my interview, when Si and I wrote Echoes of the Protii, we wrote jokes that made us laugh a great deal at the time, and while I've always found it funny, I wasn't sure if anyone else would get the humour (let's face it, back in 2002 Andrew Orton certainly didn't!) so it was rather gratifying to hear all the giggles on Saturday night as we sat in Si's living room listening to the play. Some bits didn't get the laughs I expected, but as I said it was all rather geared to our tastes at the time!
I'm probably a bit too close to it all to be able to give an unbiased view of the quality overall, but I have to say despite the limited resources of the recording (compared to other Doctor Who audio play producers), it's great. Si did a great job taking the recordings of various quality and stitching it all together. That we all contributed to something that was as good as this was is something everyone involved in it can be really proud of. I certainly am!
It's made to smile to read so many nice things about my performance on the forum (well, ok, a couple of nice things!). I wasn't really sure how it would go down, as me playing a woman was always going to be something that would divide the audience, especially as the voice is very silly, but to go to bed and hear downstairs everyone doing a Vera impression made me smile a great deal!

The plans are already being made to make a sequel later in the year. It's even managed to create a few tensions already, which I'm pleased to say were sorted out very quickly (though maybe I should have responded last night, but I was very, very tired and needed time to sort out what I felt about the situation and not get myself all cross about it, which I might have done if I'd replied last night) and a few excitable emails have been swapped between me and Si today as the project gathers a little momentum.
I'm very proud of the work that went into The Soap of Fatal Death, and I think that we've learnt a lot from Echoes and will put those lessons into the work we do for this one later in the year to make it even better. It's all so exciting!

Current Music: Kylie: Better the Devil You Know
Current Doctor Who: The Wheel in Space
Current favourite TV Trailer: Doctor Who Season 2