Ramble 1

It's time for the start of what will be a fairly regular (i.e. whenever I feel like doing it) feature on this blog.

I'm going to take you on a gentle meander through a variety of topics of current interest. Please take your litter home with you.

There's an oldish saying- "500 channels and nothing to watch". It's distinctly true. Have you seen how much junk there is on satellite TV? I'm not going to name the channels in question (that would just give them free advertising), but it says something when the only thing remotely worth watching is Basil Brush on the CBBC Channel. Boom Boom indeed.

Speaking of the CBBC Channel, I watched the first episode of Raven: The Island, spin-off from, er, Raven. I'm not going to spoil it for you (I understand people don't like having it spoilt for them), save to say that there was a little too much exposition in it.

This leads me onto two more topics: monarchy and CGI. I'll start with monarchy. As some of you may know, the central character, the host per se, in Raven: The Island is a princess. Which got me thinking about monarchy in general. I'm mixed on monarchy. I don't like the idea of someone having a political position solely by virtue of who their parents were. However, I don't want to abolish the monarchy in the UK (mainly because I like the Queen. Charles on the other hand...). So I was distinctly mixed about this Princess character. She probably is a decent person, who just happens to be a princess. Then again I thought: just ignore, it's a TV programme.

Now onto CGI. Is it me, or is CGI really obvious these days, especially on TV? It was the case with R:TI. It's the same with Stargate. It doesn't look 'real' and the illusion is lost. Then again, I know a bit about TV production. By the way, I think model work on spaceships is better than CGI.

Joe Lieberman, as you know, narrowly lost the CT primary on Tuesday, over the Iraq War. I've taken the decision on my US Election prediction table to label this seat as an Independent seat, because Lieberman has effectively resigned as a Democrat by announcing his intention to run as an independent. I'm currently projecting an Independent Hold for Connecticut. My overall prediction for the Senate is:

Republicans 51
Democrats 47
Independents 2 (Saunders and Lieberman)

I haven't done the House or Governors yet. They'll be done gradually.

News today has been dominated by the terror arrests and the alert today. I'm not going to comment further until after any possible trials, save to say: Good job.