I have been blogging since before the word blogging was invented. Before Google was around, before Facebook, before Youtube, before Myspace, yes, I was blogging. Nothing ever disappears from the internet, and so I was recently able to look back at some of the things I blogged 15 years ago, back in 1997.
How about these five nuggets:
Pat Sharpe
Great to hear Pat Sharpe back on the air this week after his sudden disappearance from the mid-morning show on Capital last year. He was sitting in for Bruno Brookes on the drivetime 4pm thru 7pm thing on 963 Liberty in London. I never believed the hype that he was leaving Capital to concentrate on his strange Challenge TV link-man career. Whilst his style is very dated, he still has the umph needed to be a good on-air jock. Despite a few sticky moments to do with using the equipment, he was fast moving and “Pat Man”-esque, not boring. So many on Capital sound bored and robotic with no personality of their own. Pat is missed. Woh! Woh!
Mark Radcliffe:
Good luck to Mark who starts the new breakfast show run on the UK’s BBC Radio 1. I warmed to him after a few mornings of listening during his stand-in weeks last year. Took me a while to get it, but I fell in and liked it, even though he speaks in a foreign accent (from Manchester, which is somewhere north of Watford) instead of the proper Queen’s English like what I speak. I hope his new permanent run will be as good, not watered down.
Chris Evans:
It was sad to see his passing from the breakfast show. The saddest bit was seeing all the smug faces on those who didn’t understand what his programme was about, and thought he was some kind of a demon. I would have preferred it if those who couldn’t understand Chris Evans had just disappeared off to listen to the safe old-gold formatted radio stations that are more in tune with their mental (and probably “actual”) ages. Instead, they stood around tut-tuting at anything new and innovative that Evans tried. I didn’t like the Evans format for breakfasts, having loved him for his BBC GLR (Greater London Radio) Saturday morning shows many many years ago. But, I loved him for trying and being different. He should be remembered and awarded for that. In the sea of boring safe radio formats it is nice to see people try to break the old fogey mould.
Simon Mayo:
He might be an old geezer, but am I alone in thinking that he did Radio 1 proud during his pre-Radcliffe sit-in on the breakfast show? I’d been quite bored of him during his mid-morning regular run, to the point where I’d been laying bets as to when he’d be walking that famous route of “concentrating on his television career” that aging Radio 1 disc jockeys have to announce before they slip off into oblivion.
Then, especially with the inane Zoo format (where lots of people in the studio for no readily apparent reason laugh and whoop at anything the main presenter says) he seemed to have a new breath of life. This has forced me to recalculate my original predictions about his walking the plank. Not bad for an old geezer who you’d think should be on Radio 2 by now. How did he do it?
Well, I think it’s due to his God. Not so publicised is the fact that he is a fully ordained priest (or whatever they are called by his particular branch of the Middle Eastern originated cult religion called Christianity). I reckon his God was so fed up with the early morning prayers from Mayo waking him up to give guidance on the mid-morning show, that he engineered a few weeks during which he (God) could have a sleep-in. Makes sense to me, I’d have done the same had Mayo been praying to me.
O J Simpson:
The Jury found him “Responsible” for the deaths. About bloody time an’ all. I laughed and celebrated at the news. When he was tried for murder nearly two years ago, and found not guilty despite all the evidence, I condemned the racist behaviour of his Defence Lawyer and certain jurors. To let him go regardless of the fine and conclusive evidence against him, just because he was Black and the jurors (mainly Black) feared God so much was disgusting. His Defence Lawyer using the Bible and race to convince them to ignore the evidence obviously shows how the Justice System in the States is seriously bad.
England's England 
Amazing quite how long you've been full of ****!
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You just sooo want to have sex with me don't you!
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