I despair of the BBC at times. I don't mind paying my licence fee since I love BBC Radio 3 and 4. And BBC TV generally does comedy and natural history rather well. But some of the other stuff is desperate... too many repeats, an insistence on copying the worst of other channels (particularly reality shows such as The Voice and Strictly Dancing), and I don't understand radio stations that list their programmes by presenter (i.e. BBC Radio 1 and 2). And now worst of all... Alan Flippin' Titchmarsh leering out of the screen again!
All was going quite smoothly down The Legion last night. Holding my own at darts, with great hopes for a home run at pool and an evening's victory over my sons. Then it happened. The Chelsea Flower Show came on and there he was leering out of the 42 inch high definition TV screen. Had to stop mid dart throw to have a rant. Hardly surprising from then onwards there was a swift deterioration in my play, to the extent I hardly won a thing thereafter. Really put the mockers on my evening.
Consider myself a fairly sane and level headed chap and pretty even tempered 99% of the time as well. But there's just something about T*t*rse that gets me all of a lather. That smug face. The patronising tone. The fact he's likely to pop up just about anywhere on any topic. As soon as he appears I suffer a bubbling, fulminating, shaking rage.
It was almost acceptable when he just stuck to gardening stuff... at least there was a chance of avoiding him. But now he's got an afternoon chat show and his smug mug smiles out from dozens of books at the local garden centre. He's also described as a 'novelist' and has fronted several other TV programmes. Think I reached a tipping point when I found him waxing lyrical introducing music on Classic FM. Yes, the programme's called Alan Titchmarsh. And he's got another music programme on BBC Radio 2. Called Alan Titchmarsh. Fully expect to find him competing on centre court at Wimbledon this year.
I'm sure he's quite a nice chap in the flesh. But surely I'm not the only one to find him SO BORING! Forced myself to do some research by looking at his web site. If you're partial to a bit of terminal boredom you can read All About Alan. Probably the most useful part the site is Out & About: Where You Can See Alan... so you can avoid him!
Sadly he's so typical of BBC's gardening content. Dumbed down and so so uninteresting. Why can't we have more of the likes of David Attenborough and his Life Stores, whose explanations some time ago on BBC Radio 4 of the origins of potatoes and jerusalem artichokes were fascinating.
PS: His middle name isn't Flippin'... it's Fred. Why doesn't that surprise me?
PPS: I tried hard to get an image of the back of his head but failed. Must remember to delete this post some time in the future. Just my luck if, when I'm aged about 99 and can just about raise a digit to browse through my past posts, I come upon this one and, in generating my usual reaction, I peg it with a terminal seizure!
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