Babi a Fi

Here are my goals for 2017! Be Active, Get Fit I totally sucked at this goal in 2016. If anything, I was less active and put on more weight than I did in 2015. Still, optimism is the key looking forward! I want to lose two or three stone this year, and generally eat more healthily. Work Obviously the main focus this year has to be on winning the election in May. If I succeed, I can pour all my energy into being Mayor and then see how things go from there. If I don't succeed, well... I'll need to find a new job ASAP as Anthony is still out of work and we're totally reliant on my income. I'm hoping to grow the blog to the stage where it could sustain us as a stop gap, otherwise my parents will be welcoming long term guests to my old bedroom... Finances Following on from the work goals, this year will be all about working on getting out of my overdraft. In an ideal world I'll win the election and Anthony will find a job, but who knows. I'm going t

It's the very last Friday Frivolity of 2016 and our host theme for this week is New Year's Resolutions. I'm posting my 'proper' resolutions post tomorrow, but here are a few slightly more frivolous goals for the coming year... Source - Realistic New Year's Resolutions at pixmus.net

I saw this meme over on nrgburst's livejournal and, well, you know me and memes. :) Which TV shows did you start watching in 2016?  We invested in an Amazon firestick this year, and we've watched so much TV. Here's a quick A-Z: Better Call Saul, Chasing Shadows, Designated Survivor, Dirk Gently, Doctor Thorne, Forever, Gotham, Happy Valley, Houdini & Doyle, iZombie, Marcella, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, Murdoch Mysteries, Stella, Supergirl, That 70s Show, The Aliens, The O.C., Thirteen. (The naff ones are shows Anthony made me watch...) Which TV shows did you mean to get into but didn't in 2016? Why?  There are a few shows I've been meaning to watch but just didn't get around to. Brief Encounters   springs to mind, and the latest series of Scott & Bailey . Hopefully I'll get chance in 2017. Which TV show impressed you least in 2016?  Game of Thrones . It's just televised torture porn at this point. Your favourite

I've read a lot of Yuletide fanfiction this month - check out my recs list - but my other reading has been a little limited. Here are my goodreads reviews for December: Christmas: A Very Peculiar History  by Fiona MacDonald My rating: 4 of 5 stars Non-Fiction, 2010. If you've ever found yourself wondering about the background behind your favourite Christmas traditions, or simply wanted to wow those around you with your Christmas trivia, this is the book for you! Wilde by Jonathan Fryer My rating: 4 of 5 stars Non-Fiction, 2008. This biography is the perfect introduction to the life of Oscar Wilde - it utilises an easy to follow linear format, and doesn't get bogged down in too much detail while still managing to give a good sense of the era and Wilde's supporting cast of characters. Where's Polar Bear by Nico Hercules My rating: 5 of 5 stars Fiction, 2016. Very cute little rhyming story about a polar bear who appears to have disappeared in t

On the firestick there's a section with all the best picture oscar winning films - 90% of which Anthony has never even seen! I told him he had to start right at the beginning so we watched Wings the other night. I've seen it before but it's still good, if way too long as most silent films were, let's be honest. It follows the trials and tribulations of Jack Powell (Buddy Rogers), the boy next door who goes off to war buoyed by the belief city girl Sylvia loves him. In reality she prefers the rich David Armstrong (Richard Arlen), who ends up becoming good mates with Jack when they serve together in the Air Corps. David eventually dies in Jack's arms in a scene which is often described as the first male / male kiss in cinema. Don't believe it - it was happening at least as early as 1912 . Later on he returns David's medal to his mother, along with the little childhood teddy bear he took with him for luck. It's a real tear jerker. Meanwhile Mary

Yuletide is the biggest multi-fandom exchange of the year. Participants write a story of at least 1,000 words to another user's specifications, and then receive the same in return. It has been an annual event since 2003 and grows bigger every year - back in the beginning there were around 300 participants, this year there were over 2,000. For more information on Yuletide past and present, take a look at the Fanlore page . I didn't sign up this year, but I have had fun reading lots of awesome fics in the fandoms I know well enough. Here are ten of my favourites: My first rec is for The Yellow Wallpaper (the spinning jennie remix)  by lunabee34 . I love the short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and this fic uses an outsider POV - John's sister - to shed more light on what is actually happening. The last line is just as chilling as that in the original story, which if you've read it you will recognise as high praise indeed! Christmas is all about family, and s

It's Christmas!!! Well, almost. Perfect time for some Slade anyway :D

For more like this, please click the image below:

Harry Enfield and Chums was a follow up to Harry Enfield’s Television Programme, and originally ran for two series between 1994 and 1998, in the 9pm slot on BBC1 - plus Christmas specials. This clip is of one of ‘The Righteous Brothers’ sketches - Angry Frank was a super popular character, and the pair of them even advertised Hula Hoops snacks together in 1996. Every sketch would start with a seemingly reasonable discussion about popular culture… before Frank went off on a tangent and lost his temper, big time. Here’s a bit of context for this particular sketch: The Generation Game was the BBC’s Saturday night game show, and had been running on and off since 1971. In 1995 Jim Davidson, a stand up comedian well known for his womanizing, had just taken over presenting duties from family entertainer, Bruce Forsythe. Michael Barrymore was a fairly ubiquitous presenter of game shows and light entertainment who, following a spate of drunken and bizarre public behaviour, ou