Good afternoon.
It is Tuesday but the first working day of this Bank Holiday seasoned week - hope you had a good three day break. If you didn't , sue.
Martyn Lewis was a terrific ITN newsreader who also made a name for himself writing books about pets and pleading the cause of "good news" . When asked by the Prince of Wales why we only reported on aircraft that crash and not that fact that hundreds of 747s successfully fly across the Atlantic every-day, a colleague said "Because that's what they're supposed to do, sir. Not crash." News is a bit of a devil to define, good or bad.
Let us try:
BAD NEWS - thousands of people turned up for the Notting Hill Carnival to have a great time. Towards the end it all when unpleasantly pear-shaped with tazers and baseball-bats. Hundreds of arrests.
GOOD NEWS - the daughter of Martyn Lewis (see above) caught it all going off on her video-phone and we have secured the rights to share it with you.
GOOD NEWS - a little baby, born spectacularly premature a couple of years ago, with more ailments than the index to Gray's Anatomy, has survived and we are talking to him and his mum.
BAD NEWS - we only have 30 minutes of programme tonight otherwise we could let this uplifting tale of parental love and medical genius run and run.
GOOD NEWS - Christine O is coming home, the last 400 metres are always the hardest. Boris hasn't lost the Olympic banner yet. Both are back in London.
BAD NEWS - there are only 12 seats in First Class on a BA Boeing 747 - who sat where and who lost out?
George VI , dad to our current Queen, smoked like a chimney. Shortly after her coronation which was, of course, preceded by his death, Elizabeth II went to see the Royal Horse Artillery barracks in St. John's Wood. She was so wowed by the troopers she christened them, there and then, KING'S Troop, Royal Horse Artillery in memory of dad. Now five current troopers have been sacked for failing drug tests. No one has ever suggested George VI ever consummed anything other than Virginia's finest so, if the troopers defence is that their consumption was in memory of a Great Old Man's habits, the defence will go up in a cloud of .... enough, already - save to say Virginia was named after Elizabeth I , The Virgin Queen. I should get a GCSE for this lot....
We've a geography lesson - The Tour of Britain is not the Tour de France, it is the Tour of Britain. London is in Britain so why are we getting excited about the fact that part of this year's Tour is coming through the capitol? I think it is because there will be Olympians involved and men in very dubious pink lycra outfits.
And we ask, which is best? North of the river or south? Glen straddles the question like the collosus he wakes up, dreaming he is.
Oh, there's also something about "STEP BROTHERS", a movie I saw promoted at the weekend and about which I made one of those "like a plague" mental notes but I am told I am wrong as it features a fresh creation from " that stable of idiotic characters, that " is a "chuckle-ette" but with too much "wee" and "pee" humour in it... I rest my case but you decide.
I am still with the little boy who survived against the odds: drop nearly everything else and let's have more of him.
This, dear friends, is why I am a presenter and not an Editor. Notice the sychophantic use of the capital...
Siraj has just asked if I have mentioned her, yet.
There.
Done.
We will both be here at 6 unless she beats me to a pulp for not mentioning her before now. She is currently wittering on about how great she is. She is, but I won't be swayed.
Alastair and Salma "beautiful, elegant, popular..." [she is STILL talking] ... Siraj.
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