Listen, little Lurgi-ridden yakko.

I stumbled across an episode of the Goon Show on BBC 7 last night. It was confusingly described as 1985 - an episode from 1955 which took some working out until it became clear that this was Sellers, Seacombe and Milligan's version of 1984. I was trying to work out whether this was elitist what with the book only being out a few years before but of course there was the 1954 TV version with Peter Cushing.

Attention! The BBC canteen is now open. Doctors are available.

I never really got on with the goons; their shows seemed disjointed and slightly irrelevant, but maybe that is because I just didn't understand the narrative. With the 1985 show, I know the story and so it fitted together quite well. The harmonica version of It had to be you was good as well.

I am still slogging through Lucky Jim. As I get older I seem to be able to keep going with books I am not really into. I used to jettison the boring ones - maybe I still should. Lucky Jim seems to have too much narrative for what it is actually trying to say. It's almost a journal of events with no real tension. Excuse my philistinism (lovely word) but why the hype over KA? MA is a much better writer. This slog through LJ is all the more annoying because the following three books arrived yesterday: -

The Consolations of Philosophy
Samuel Pepys
Pretty Girl in Crimson Rose (8):


and they seem to rattle in the small pile which they form on the bedside table. I will finish LJ.