I ended up doing something today that I never, ever do. I ended up sitting outside, yes, that's as in not inside, in the sun. You know? That big fiery ball in the sky that's too bright to look at? This was not something I'd planned to do this afternoon, just something that happened, so I was entirely unprepared and didn't have my factor 60 billion sun screen with me. I am currently sitting with an ice-pack on each shoulder in the vain hope that somehow I'm going to escape with only minor burns.
People as fair as me simply weren't designed to go outside. We're supposed to stay inside, stay in front of computers and stay pale. It's nature's way.
I'm toast, I tell you, toast…
I've just discovered that BBC4 is re-running the old 80s political thriller Edge of Darkness tonight at 9.10pm, and I'm so looking forward to seeing it again. I missed the first episode last week, but I do remember roughly what happened so that's not too much of a loss.
It will be strange, though – I was 14 when this first ran and I remember being really quite awed by it. Edge of Darkness looked at issues that usually didn't make for prime-time tv back then – the environment, the threat from terrorists accessing nuclear material, the Gaia living earth theory. Of course, now a lot of that is either going to be old hat, or tosh, but then it was new and gripping. At least to a teenager from rural Dorset anyway.
I wonder what it will be like to watch it now, with a good 18 years of cynicism and experience under my belt.
I also wonder if they're going to re-run some of the other really good (or what I remember as really good) thrillers from around then – there was one that I remember as being fantastic which I think was a cold war based spy thing called Bird of Prey. My Dad and I were glued to the tv every week watching that, although I remember nothing of the plot now. Then there was, I think, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy which wasn't as good, but which obviously made some sort of impact on me.
Funny how these things lay dormant in your memory for all these years, then suddenly, up they pop, fresh as last week's underpants.
