TCC Watch.

Finally have a few new bits and pieces on The Children's Channel.  This time its a shot from the Stories Without Words segment that I've mentioned before.  The cliff notes explanation is that it was a programme that showed Eastern European cartoons, but without giving any credit of what they were called originally. 

Its an excuse to show stuff like Hungary's Bunny With the Chequered Ears, Polish fare such as Teddy Drop Ear and the Magic Pencil and German bits like the Plastinots (here called the Plonsters, told you we never had proper names).  As well as having stuff like Hennapippa (cartoon chicken chroma keyed onto a live screen background) that is an enduring myth to me unto this very day.

Top down, English, Finnish, Swedish, Danish, Dutch.

This is from the opening titles to the show, the words would scroll about the screen pulling off all sorts of tricks while a classical theme played.  I can't quite place who its by and where its from although it is reprised in all places, in Little Kings Story for Wii and PS Vita.  I can play it on keyboard but I tend to go into the theme tune to Brum which sounds similar. 

The hardest thing is writing why I remember this obscure stuff from way back when.  I lost my nan on my mums side around that time I think I was about 8 or so and can remember just thinking it was all my fault and that.  We had cable due to poor quality TV reception so I was home for two weeks so I could get over it.  As kids programming was in its infancy I watched a lot of TV and feeling like hell.  As BBC used to go to teletext in the afternoon,  so I'd turn to cable, this would be stuff like Voltron or Rambo on Superchannel, and The Children's Channel which had Toybox with Carol Chell and the stories without words in the morning.

I can remember asking my uncle who spoke German what the bottom bit meant as I tried to memorise it, but he couldn't help (not surprising as its Dutch).  So scrolling around the Internet I found that someone had a few screen shots of the opening titles on a forum thread and hit save and here they are I wonder if it would be worth typing in the words on the list + TCC to see if they give you any hits (Tried it with the Danish and no joy).

Holiday 16: Fiesta de Santa Tecla and Mulassa

You'll be pleased to know that this is the end of my holiday round up, but I have left the best till last. This last trip is probably better explained by someone into mystery beasts like the excellent Karl Shuker, but on one of our trips to Tarragona we found round by the Cathedral steps, were people setting up for some sort of parade.

There were two giants (Gegantes Catalan or Gigantes in Spanish) a man and a woman in medieval dress.

Los Gigantes

Also a mule known in the Catalan bestiary as Mulassa (bottom Photo).

Donkey one.

Mulassa with band.

The strangely priapic Castell.

Mulassa sort of operates like a panto horse with a person in the front as the head end and another person at the back providing the back legs so to speak.  I have seen Youtube clips of it dancing around in a circle to music but when we saw it, it had to move out the way of a truck so it could pass which was quite funny in itself.   The main obstacle to what was going on is that there is precious little in a language I can understand, its Catalan folklore and as they seem to be fiercely protective of  their language and customs, nothing is bilingual not even in regular Spanish, which I can at least have a fighting chance at.  Its maybe part of the Santa Tecla Festival (St Thecla?), or it may not, I would welcome some comments as to what its all about. What I do know is that this was on behalf of a sick kid in hospital and they sold shirts for 5 Euro.  They had an inflatable human tower and a band playing music which was quite nice.  We sat for a good half hour watching them set up and play a few songs and stuff before moving on.  It was an unexpected find on a good day out.

 

 

 

 

Holiday 16: TV and Brexit.

Traditionally part 2 has always been about the other stuff normally TV and anything else my scrambled memory can dredge up.  Also we will be poking around the Brexit which we'll do first as it neatly dovetails what I was watching. We've also decided to put an update to my side blog Robot Nunca Visto, near enough a whole year later than its last entry.

Brexit.
Well all the votes are in and for once the public have spoken, the UK is leaving the EU thanks to the slimmest of margins and is hopefully going to make its own decisions like a big grown up country now.  If you've been a long time reader you'll know I've given a toss about immigration or the EU (because that's all right wingers think about yo ;)). Project fear seems to have portrayed us as small minded little Englanders that only think about refugees or migrants and spam us with images of fire, plague and Godzilla if we ever had the temerity to leave.

The truth is that the Eurozone isn't perfect, for every Germany there is a Greece with its basket case economy and problematic countries such as Turkey with its horrible human rights records and un free press.  Or even more penniless states than Greece, such as Albania looking to join the larger EU area, which is massively fucked.  

I don't care about immigration, we've always adopted people get over it, although we could do with a national register of those immigrating, so whenever the Mail scaremongers to its idiot readers about a tidal wave of migrants we know how many and what the impact will be. 

You wonder why all this is in my Holiday round up is because that is all that was on Spanish news #Brexit, that and Cassius Clay snuffing it and the Orlando shooting.  A trilogy of bad news basically, and with nothing except Doraemon reruns and Wheel of Fortune and its in house band to give us any joy.

There where a few channels but most of the English ones were badly tuned in, a few German stations and BVN for the Dutch speakers and some Russian stations that showed either news or really old films.

Spent most of my time watching the box including middle of the night shit when my insomnia kicked in.  We didn't get a porn channel so no Ruleta del Sexo this time, in fact most Spanish channels resort to live music in the small hours so if you like flamenco or folk this is pretty good, if you don't then its torture.

So what were the highlights.

A classic re run of some old Tom and Jerry cartoons, nothing weird or strange there but just nice to see the old cartoons again.

BVN had a strange game show about Tetris and with clips of Roxette at around 5am in the morning. Reminded me of Blockbusters in its set up but no board just tetris and questions.

Also on BVN was a nice Dutch documentary on rap with plenty of interviews in English so you could follow.

An advert for Ketchup Plops a saveloy riddled with ketchup that is as horrible as it sounds.

Yokai Watch in Spanish.  Sadly I think I saw the same episode from the same point at least twice.

Finally what looked like a big haired version of Ruby Wax providing sign language for Spanish news.

Ruby?

Holiday 16. Bichos yo!

Hello You.   I was toying with the idea of a live update during my hols and  that but thought better of it. Even though we had free Wifi and cut off mobile data and roaming I'm not sure how much it would have cost me (turns out its bugger all) and the fact is I've grown accustomed to a physical keyboard. Without ceremony here is our report part 1.

This was a welcome break from work and the norm, we stayed at the Golden Donaire (pronounced don irie rather than don air) hotel in La Pineda.  Previously we only visited for a day trip so it was all new to us,  I thought it would be further down near the old town and such but we were completely the other way down past Cap Salou and onto the main strip itself.  Hotel is nice, Golden hotels are renowned for their food which is top notch, had pancakes every day for breakfast along with many other nice stuff.  Also managed to have a good room too even though it was maze like in its design.  Pool is cold but a sensible depth for once and was mainly used for activities such as water basketball and water polo.  There were also some smaller pools that my room overlooked, these were largely dominated by kids and a few sun loungers for the adults.  Indoor pool was thin and long and hot for once, there was a sauna used only by Russians which kinda looked like a shop window for boiled Slavs.  Nice

The beach is a  huge sandy one complete with a few rock jetties out into the bay at one end, the other end is dominated by an industrial landscape and harbour complete with random fires and visiting container ships. There is an old sketch with Reeves and Mortimer blacked up as Otis Redding and Marvin Gaye sitting on the dock of the bay in an old TV watching the boats come in and that was us really as its quite busy.  The sea wall is the most intriguing place on there being random boulders with a small beacon at the end and a jumble of flat areas for sunbathing.  But mainly its good for snorkeling, and by good I mean really good.  I've seen things I've never seen before and ticked off one of my bucket list items as well. 

What was down there then.  A few Peacock Worms on the rocks and hermit crabs including a white one clawed species.  They had less urchins for once which is a blessing and as a result had space for much more weirder residents.  I saw 3 octopuses and was crawled over by another which was totally unpleasant, nasty suckery tentacles ugh.  They also had a few fish around the rocks including stuff that had its boundaries.  This included a black fish with round pectoral fins that only lived at the bottom under the rock itself and small Blennies that lived in the rock peering out with their blue dotted faces. 

If you want to know my bucket list item then read on as its quite involved.  I've always wanted to see a sea slug in the wild.  I kinda realised this back when I first started going to Spain in the 90's, as I saw a Sea Hare on my first visit to Mallorca but as its brown and not very photogenic it doesn't count (even though Aplysia is a Nudibranch).  It didn't help that all the photos and pictures I saw back in the books made them out to be beautiful.  This time though it was going to be different though, my first trip round the sea wall I found and photographed a couple of what I thought would be a sea slug but turned out to be a Flatworm Pseudoceros Velutinus. The next time I was down there I found what I was looking for a tiny Aeolid Sea Slug called Cratena Peregrina. It was pink with a white body and is easily overlooked and that I thought would be that.

Can you spot it?

Felimare!

The next time I was down by the wall I thought that I had seen most of what it had to offer and a good look around the rocks had scared up the aforementioned Octopus (really nice moves like a cloud across the rocks with accompanying camouflage to boot.) This time I came across, what I thought was a large yellow fish that turned out not to be.  I'd clocked the big gill on the back and knew I had my second sea slug and this time its huge.  I mean its about 5 inches long and bright yellow decided to take a few shots and then because it might not come out some film as well just for good luck.

I don't think its got a common name but I'm proposing calling it a Yellow Fellmare from a corruption of its Latin name and its colouring.

Here endeth this lesson.

Round Up Again.

A few bits and pieces before an obligatory hiatus comes this way, including a shout out to one of my favourite places to keep you going.

Crest Charity Shop. Walthamstow

I've made no bones that I quite like Walthamstow despite it being stuffed full of leftie weirdos and Christians. Its essentially a massive street market complete with shops off to the side. One of these is Crest Charity shop.  Whereas most Charity shops are resolutely corporate in their pricing and outlook this looks like a mix of junk shop and the craziest bazaar ever.  Most charity shops do no look like some mad hoarders back room filled with random piles of junk now, however this does.  Its always worth a look just in case you need to pick up a Slovenian - English dictionary or cables for obscure outlet points.

One of the most odd things I've found there is a small A5 magazine called Home and Freezer Digest from 1980, a mix of old ads, recipes and articles for women that doesn't really exist anymore. I check out Take a Break and Now! in Smiths but they seem to have an uneasy fascination for Paedos, Psychos and Celebs that Whitehouse would be proud of.  So I kinda pine for the old days of women's mags where hearth and home were always fore front and you always got a serial (story) and never a serial killer.  I know its probably sexist (everything is nowadays) but it seems more wholesome than the endless my boyfriend is Ian Brady / Chanelle Hayes loses / gains weight drama.

Face Exercises.

Really should have ponied up the pittance they wanted for this just to get a better shot / scan of the article above.  Part of a facial exercise regime featuring some weird androgynous child woman thing (that nowadays would have its own Tumblr blog complete with 6 made up personal pronouns and genders) that totally does not look like a blow up doll.   They had a good few vintage ads in there for Kotex jam rags and American Burgers as well as fridges and food ideas.

I also briefly touched on weird cables and shit above and I'm not kidding, I saw a VGA to HDMI connector last time I was there and decided to dig through the various gubbins they had spread through various baskets to see if its still there.  Lots of things for obsolete phones, quite a few PS/2 cables, Toner cartridges for Laser printers and what probably is a coup. a dock for a GP2X handheld console.  Looking like a USB hub on drugs, it packs a serial port as well as 4 USB ports for good measure into its form factor.  I'm not sure if it can be used outside of the console itself but its a strange thing to actually find seeing as the device itself is a obscure homebrew only device.

Quite strange.

Like I said its quite a place for weird and wonderful things and outdated PC hardware.  I picked up Knights of the Nine DLC expansion pack for Oblivion and have previously got a J Pop 3" CD there. If you are there come and visit as its worth a look.

Then and now. Anatomy of a Clickbait article.

Been looking at clickbait on Metro again.  I'm supposed to be reading Gamecentral but at the end of the article there are always links off that say one of three things.

Gifs that are distracting as fuck, check.

30% of Britons do not know they have PPI (which I automatically read as please fuck off and die horribly)
His bollocks fell off in the street, what happened next will leave you speechless.
15 Life hacks that are so US specific you really wonder why they're included here.

There is a fourth type though that basically boils down to, star you used to like in a show from way back now looks different now (older and stranger normally or in child star cases, merely grown up).

I normally don't bother with those preferring my clickbait to be about Twitter hissy fits over trivial issues in Television from the professionally aggrieved, and Tumblr Whales.

Pro tip, in an article, if anyone calls black people POCs you know they don't have shit worth saying. There is a difference between being polite and not being racist and just being a PC asshole.

Anyway back to the clickbait.

I've decided to put together a sort of article based on trope number four, but with a NSFW twist.

I call it  These are the girls of Charmed and this is what their tits look like.  So if you want the bloke who went on to star in Nip/Tuck or Brian Krause in the buff ladies and gentlemen you'll have to search elsewhere for that.

First up you may remember Charmed as part of  Channel 5's early evening line up when it first started.  A show about 3 witches living in an old house with boyfriend troubles and a cat if I remember rightly.  Guys only really watched it because they were hot and women because of the drama.  It weren't bad but some episodes where akin to having you cock removed and being beaten to death by feminists with it, thanks to it being skewed toward women viewers.   Also bastard Morrisey on the theme tune heaven knows I'm miserable now.

Also another thing that bugged me was White Lighters Piper's holier than thou boyfriends job.  I guess they couldn't call him an angel because of Middle America. Anyway you came for tits and tits you shall have
NSFW FROM THIS POINT ON.

Shannen Doherty

Holly Marie Combs (My Favourite)

Alyssa Milano.

Rose McGowan

Sorry for turning this into the Daily Sport, normal service will be resumed next week.

Edit typos and Rose McGowan now shows up instead of links.

Brexit. Round Up.

Here are a Round up of a few things that have been bugging me of late.

Brexit.

I'm not going into the whole leave the EU stay in the EU debate and there has been a lot of scaremongering going on about this. If you don't know, David Hameron has most graciously given us a vote on if we want to leave the European Union or not.  I personally would want to leave as I still cling to the ideals of a British (NOT Brittas) Empire ruling the world regardless of Boris Godwinning the whole thing.  The weird thing is I've yet to see a single stall saying we should get out rather than the usual stay in brigade.  What I like to do is read both sides and see what I side with before going out. Its what I did for the mayoral elections but seems that I won't be doing it in this case.

Snoopy no Otsukai Translated.

Good lord, this is actually done now can remember recommending this for translation on RHDN years back.  This is a late era Gameboy game in which Snoopy has to run errands for Charlie Brown.  Its Isometric in style and you have to place arrows to lead him into shops to get various stuff for people (hence the translated title Snoopy's Early Errands).  The patch was done by Zynk Oxhide who's done a good job on this.  Also running this in BGB it seems it had Super Gameboy support as well, as you get a nice colour border with it, which is nice.

Eurovision

The UK came second last in the latest Eurovision song contest.  We deserved to lose thanks to the weak sauce boy band bender song we put out.  I didn't watch it of course as its not my cup of tea but I did however watch Pointless Eurovision special.  Apart from Cheryl Baker I knew none of the other contestants, I'm guessing this is what an all techno episode would be like to the general public.  It was won by a plastic looking chap and a ginger lady who called themselves Scooch and runners up were an Irish couple and two blonde birds who could pass for porn stars (Fucks Bizz?).  Cheryl and Bucks Fizz went out first, (incidentally who remembers Eggs and Baker the short lived cookery programme she did) leaving me scratching my head over dinner just who the rest of them were.