Greetings of Various Seasonal Appropriateness
Merry Christmas and other winter holidays all.
Because of the difficulty I seem to have in keeping up with radio, I’ve never gotten to plug this on time in the past three years. Therefore, in completely unrelated news, you can catch the last episode of the Man in Black. Pure radio horror stories, bookended by comments from the Man in Black, here the purring Mark Gatiss.
“Please, take care.”
Heads Up: Doctor Who Audio Play Updates
Has Doctor Who fueled my love of audio plays, or have audio plays fueled my love of Doctor Who?
First, for those in the Boston area, The Post-Meridian radio players are putting on two performances of their radio play The Starship of Madness, March 25th and 26th. I saw this group at Arisia and they were incredible, very talented. I highly recommend you go. How can you beat seeing a live Doctor Who radio story!?
-> More info
I thought I was the only one that remembered, let alone liked the apocryphal Death Comes to Time. Includes Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann in new, non-Doctor, roles and also the line “When I need your opinion I’ll…shoot myself”. I’m excited to see what this is about, as the Minister of Chance is an all time favorite character.
-> More info and a free Prologue
[via: The Doctor Who News Page]
And last, Tom Baker has joined Big Finish. …I think that statement can stand alone in its awesomeness. New Fourth Doctor stories.
Quick Heads Up: Just a Minute, Season 57
Picture unrelated. But it was this or Nicholas Parsons.
Season 57 of Just a Minute has just begun and episodes are available weekly on the BBC Radio 4 website.
For those unfamiliar with Just a Minute, it’s a panel show where guests must speak for 60 seconds without “repetition, hesitation, or deviation.” I’ve been a fan of the show since listening to my first episode where the lovely chairman Nicholas Parsons warmly welcomed listeners, including those around the world listening online. I listened to more than 40 hours of Just a Minute while grinding in World of Warcraft. Although I eventually left Warcraft behind, Just a Minute was a addiction I couldn’t kick.
[via: Just-a-Minute.info, the most complete fansite I've seen for anything, anywhere. The amount of work it must take to compile all this information and keep it up to date is staggering. Dean, you are a god among men.]
Quick Heads Up: The Museum of Curiosity
I’m a little behind the times, but you still have a few more days to catch the last episode of the current season of The Museum of Curiosity on the BBC Radio 4 website. This final episode includes Neil Gaiman.
Want more Doctor Who nostalgia?
If you enjoyed “On the Outside It Looked Like an Old Fashioned Police Box,” might I recommend “Moths Ate My Doctor Who Scarf“? A comedic tale of a life of Doctor Who fandom. You’ll find it funny, you’ll find it sad, and, if the Doctor occupies even a small place in your heart, you’ll find it uplifting.
Quick Heads Up: On the Outside It Looked Like an Old Fashioned Police Box
You’ve got seven days left to listen to Mark Gatiss talk about Target Doctor Who novelizations.
-> BBC Radio 4 Programmes – “On the Outside It Looked Like an Old Fashioned Police Box”
You can tell Colbert never listened to Car Talk…
…because he describes Car Shout as “just like NPR’s Car Talk except I know nothing about cars.”
Really Stephen? Everybody knows Tom and Ray hardly know anything about cars either!
-> Car Talk
Without Sir Clement Freud I Would Never Have Learned the Correct Way to Make an Omelette
(This blog post almost got trashed because I had such difficulty deciding on the best clip to put with it. In the end I stole one from the Guardian’s tribute. It’s a great Just a Minute moment but by no means the best Clement Freud moment. If you need something clever and amusing to listen to, there are collections of hundreds of hours of Just a Minute to be found on bittorrent. I strongly recommend it.
I’ve always meant to write a post about my love for the BBC Radio show Just a Minute. Consider this post a preview.)
I feel very sad today after reading on Neil Gaiman’s journal that Clement Freud has died. His regular appearance on Just a Minute became one of those familiar things that I thought would always be.
Thanks for all the lists, limericks, advice and recipes!
Christmas link dump, in keeping with the situation!
I hope Santa brought you something good.
Some miscellaneous Christmasy links for you:
- Is it Christmas?
- Scrooge (1951) on YouTube – Easily my favorite version as well as one of my favorite movies.
- Classic Christmas Videos Online – This list includes the Star Wars Holiday Special and Mickey’s Christmas Carol. I won’t tell you which movie frightened me more as a child.
- Deep and Dreamless Sleep- Doctor Who short story with a Christmas theme.
- Hogfather – TV adaption of comedic sage Terry Pratchett’s book. This video site sucks but it was the only one that seemed to have it. I would recommend bittorrenting it. You will thank me for seeing this.
- A Garfield Christmas on YouTube – I still watch this with my brother and sister on Christmas morning.
- xkcd 361 – Represents my situation nicely.
- A Christmas Carol : Many Old Time Radio Versions @ The Internet Archive
- A ‘Car Talk Carol’ – For all the public radio fans. I cried with laughter.
Do people ever get tired of A Christmas Carol? I sure don’t.
Merry Christmas!