Chewsround

Caught a bit of Countryfile on the BBC. As someone who remembers John Craven from Newsround, can I just give a little bit of advice? Get some new teeth John. The new ones look good but sound awful.
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The wife's got a new radio so I'm both enjoying and suffering Radio Four. Enjoying such delights as I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue which recently featured possibly the funniest sketch I've ever heard on the wireless, where the contestants had to act out a famous scene from Spartacus but as ducks.
A description doesn't do it justice so get on to iPlayer and get hold of the second episode of the current series and go to about five minutes before the end.
But I'm not a full convert yet to Radio Four. For instance there's a consumer programme featuring Paul Lewis who looks like Count Duckula with hair inappropriate for a man his age. And he doesn't sound much better with one of those clipped BBC accents I thought they'd left behind in the 1940s.
There's other good stuff like Desert Island Discs which has been good every since they got rid of Michael Parkinson. But then there's The Archers, possibly the worst acting I've ever heard, and The Now Show, a poor, stupid man's version of 100 other shows that take the mickey out of current affairs.
Of course the wife's into Woman's Hour because it reminds her how far women have come in this country. So I'm more than happy to leave her in peace to listen to it while she irons my shirts and cooks my dinner.
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The worst aspect of all this Clarkson nonsense is not what the man says or does - intelligent people can make up their own mind about whether or not he is funny. No, the worst aspect is how po-faced and humourless it makes 'the left' look.
Union leaders calling for him to be sacked are no better than the Daily Mail trying to whip the nation into a fervour about Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross when no one who reads the paper has actually heard the programme.
They're both as bad as each other. Besides which, Clarkson was joking. It was obvious he was joking. Even to public sector workers who aren't always the brightest of folk (have you ever tried having a conversation with a surgeon, for instance, that doesn't involve talking about money?)
Far worse are those who believe what Clarkson says on subjects like the environment without bothering to check his 'facts'. Then they come out with the same misinformed arguments in any pub conversation where you dare to express any kind of opinion that maybe things like cars and planes and people can damage the environment if we're not careful.
The Prius is more environmentally damaging than a tank. Clarkson said so. It's snowing so there can't be global warming. Clarkson proved it.
You have to ask yourself, who would you believe? Clarkson or Attenborough?
And which one would you rather see taken out in the street and shot in front of their family?
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It's not a good time to be a journalist. What with Leveson's one sided 'inquest' and the celebrity circus from Coogan to Campbell alleging that photographers eat human babies and tabloid reporters shot Kennedy. Or something like that.
Well, the whole bad rap filters down. According to my local paper, six snappers from something called the Chingford Amateur Photogaphic Club went to take photos at an event called The Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park. You know, arty shots of fake snow and Santa.
But they didn't have security clearnance which means, according to the people running it, they may well have been paedophiles taking pictures of children.
Looks like they'll have to go back to doing studio sessions with dodgy local 'models' instead, the poor sods.
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I did notice that Alastair Campbell described the press as putrid. This is a man who, according to former News of the World politico Ian Kirby, told reporters from that paper to ask Tony and Cherie about joining the Mile High Club so they could get a good headline and make the couple seem 'normal.'
And you have to wonder what is more putrid. Taking snaps of Sienna Miller in a public street or sexing up a dossier that sends this country to war.
Just a thought....take care, Solly