time

I've been whammageddoned, by of all places, the Belgian Chip shop. I wasn't even in the bloody place, just walking past!.

Wed 20 Dec 23 Bruce Channel — Hey! Baby 22 Andy Williams — Can’t Get Used To Losing You +2 22 Kenny Ball & His Jazzmen — Midnight In Moscow +2 21 Billy J Kramer & The Dakotas — Do You Want To Know A Secret? 21 Little Eva — The Loco-Motion 21 Chris Montez — Let’s Dance 21 Cliff Richard & The Shadows — Don’t Talk To Him 20 Acker Bilk ft. The Leon Young String Chorale — Stranger On The Shore 20 Chubby Checker — Let’s Twist Again 20 Helen Shapiro — Tell Me What He Said 20 Roy Orbison — Dream Baby 20 Del Shannon — Hey Little Girl 20 Joe Brown & The Bruvvers — A Picture Of You 20 Bobby Darin — Things 20 Cliff Richard & The Shadows — It’ll Be Me 20 Del Shannon — Swiss Maid 20 Ned Miller — From A Jack To A King 20 Jet Harris & Tony Meehan — Scarlett O’Hara 20 Freddie & The Dreamers — I’m Telling You Now 20 Cliff Richard — It’s All In The Game 20 The Crystals — Then He Kissed Me 20 The Searchers — Sugar And Spice 17 Cliff Richard & The Shadows — I’m Looking Out The Window / Do You Want To Dance -3 17 Pat Boone — Speedy Gonzales -3 15 The Beatles — Please Please Me 14 The Shadows — Atlantis

Pete Lucas erstwhile member of Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky Mick & Tich, and also former Trogg, reported dead on his 73rd birthday.

He hasn't been selected in this game, but for the record, Matt Gray* was sacked by Sutton Utd earlier today. *Coincidentally, also the colour of my hallway.

Actor and writer Matthew Waterhouse is 62 today. Mostly famous for playing everyone's favourite companion, Adric, in popular science fiction TV programme Doctor Who.

The beer thread is "extra-curricular".

I was 13 in 1973, and can honestly say it will have no significance to me whatsoever.

Betty Moore, widow of the Intel founder Gordon Moore, dead aged 95.

Where's the faux outrage from the Daily Express?

Compared to the amount of money wasted on yachts faulty PPE etc, its an absolute bargain.

Dingle-buried!

"Unpopular" is not the same as "the majority of British people want Harry tried for treason".

*citation needed Is that you Piers?

Ken Mackenzie of the expansion NY Mets team, has died aged 89. He was the only pitcher with a winning record (5-4) that season as the Mets finished 40-120.

TV writer, producer and director Britt Allcroft is 80 today. She is the person responsible for bringing Thomas The Tank Engine (and friends) to TV screens, following a meeting with The Rev. W. Awdry while making a documentary about steam trains. The failure of the 2000 film Thomas and magic Railroad lead to her resignation as Vice-Chairman of her eponymous company, which she co-founded in 1980 (with then-husband Angus Wright), and was removed from any day-to-day involvement, though she remained a shareholder. In 1993, the company was taken over by HIT Entertainment, and she was invited to join the board.

My Advent Calendar gave me this today... Its a 10% Trappist ale so strong you almost need a spoon. Apparently the world's first Quadrupel and definitely not a session beer (or even a nightcap after a day's DLCon drinking).

Actress-turned-hotelier Anouska Hempel is 82 today. Born in New Zealand of Russian/Swiss-German ancestry, and after school in AUstarlia, she moved to Britain at age 21. She's played archetypal blondes in numerous roles in Bond, Carry On, Hammer and numerous TV programmes. She was also a regular panellist on game show Whodunnit and appeared on Celebrity Squares (useful if you're looking for future HPDP picks). She was also married to theatre director and Everton owner Bill Kenwright for a couple of years back in the 70s.

Can we either change the thread title to "20th & 21st Century American Sitcoms" (or more pithily "American Sitcoms"), or can people stop posting about 21st Century Sitcoms (for example The Big Bang Theory - debut 2007 & Brooklyn 99 - debut 2013)?

Who's 86 now? Only Connie Francis!

The last GE was four years ago today. Happy Anniversary everyone!

That reminds me I have Music From The Body filed away somewhere. Must give that another listen!

Smile Direct Club customers have nothing to smile about.

Scotland's answer to Captain Tom (but without the parasites), Margaret Payne, has died aged 93 (Would have been 94 tomorrow). She climbed her stairs 282 times, equivalent to climbing Suilven (731 metres) and raised £435,000 for charity. She was awarded a knighthood British Empire Medal.

Its 82 years since the death of John Gillespie Magee Jr, an Anglo-American Royal Canadian Air Force pilot, killed in a training accident at the age of 19. Whilst attending Rugby School he began to write poetry, winning the school's poetry prize in 1938. World War II broke out while he was visiting his father's family in the US, preventing his return to the UK, thus missing his final year at school. Wishing to aid his friends in England, he decided to join the RAF, actually joining the RCAF in 1940, rather than attending Yale, to which he'd been offered a scholarship. He received active-service posting to England in August 1941, and was engaged in one air-battle against the Luftwaffe. In his tenth week of service, he was on a training exercise when, rapidly ascending his Spitfire through a break in the cloud, he collided with an Oxford trainer. He managed to bail out but was too low for his parachute to fully deploy, and was killed on impact with the ground. The Oxford pilot, LAC Pilot-under-Training Ernest Griffin, also died as a result of the collision. Magee is remembered for the sonnet he wrote, said to have been inspired by a Spitfire flight to 33,000 feet - High Flight. The poem is often recited at funerals of aviators and astronauts, and is inscribed on the Space Shuttle Challenger memorial at Arligton Cemetary.

Attended 2 Christmas parties over the weekend, and somehow came away unWhammed, so doing better than last year. (Apart from hearing Fairy tale of New York everywhere)