Snapshots Spillover: More Sitcom Songs

As promised, here are a few more songs that share their names with sitcoms. Let's start with that extra clue I gave you all on Saturday morning...

Cliff Richard & The Shadows - The Young Ones

...which naturally leads us to this...

Beyond that? How about these?

The Rah Band - Porridge

Pet Shop Boys - Absolutely Fabulous

Splodgenessabounds - Two Pints Of Lager & A Packet Of Crisps

Martyn Joseph - Please Sir

The Mekons - Rosanne

Lucky Jim - The Honeymooners

You may have some other suggestions. If so, please share them with the group.

But to close, a different Harry from the one we started with...

Snapshots #296: A Top Ten Dolphin Songs

I wish I could swim like dolphins, like dolphins can swim. But the closest I got was the huge inflatable dolphin I clung onto during my earliest swimming lessons, while I was also wearing armband, a foam rubber float, and reaching out for the hooked pole the swimming teacher was offering from the side of the pool. And still I sank. I did eventually learn to swim, but my mum swears the instructor had a nervous breakdown first.

Here are ten songs about dolphins...

10. Ivan, Joni, Elton... how?

All one big anagram!

Olivia Newton John - The Promise (The Dolphin Song)

9. Hunter, like a Girl in a Ring.

Ian Hunter + Brown Girl In The Ring...

Ian Brown - Dolphins Were Monkeys

8. In concert.

They were Live.

Live - Dolphin's Cry

7. Henry... and Cher.

Henry Rollins + Sonny & Cher =

Sonny Rollins - On Green Dolphin Street

6. Polar fortnight.

Polar bears are iced. There are 14 days in a fortnight.

14 Iced Bears - Like A Dolphin 

5. Attributed to Tony Stark's dad.

Tony Stark was played by RDJ - Robert Downey Junior. His dad was RDS. If something was attributed to his dad, it would be BY RDS.

The Byrds - Dolphin's Smile

4. Colourful coat found in Jarvis's college.

Joseph wore a coat of many colours. Jarvis went to St. Martin's College, where he met a girl who studied sculpture.

Martyn Joseph - Dolphins Make Me Cry

3. Secret kids in a hut.

The Secret Seven get trapped in a Shed.

Shed Seven - Dolphin

2. A Playboy and a Diamond.

John Fred had a Playboy Band. Add that to Neil Diamond and you get...

Fred Neil - Dolphins

1. Far from stern, that is.

The bow on a boat is at the far end from the stern. That is = i.e.

David Bowie - Heroes

Swim back here next Saturday for more of the same...

Mid-Life Crisis Songs #38: Tests

So it's been a tough few months. Moving house really took it out of me this time, and when I started back at work in late August, the bosses threw a load of stressful crap at me, forced a change on my working hours (which I've had for 8 years), and half my colleagues either quit for other jobs or went off on the sick.

Then, during a routine appointment to sign up at a new GP's, they found blood in my urine. Teeny tiny traces - 8 blood cells! - but apparently that's enough to fast-track you for a barrage of pretty serious tests. And I received one of the above leaflets in the post, something that nobody ever wants to receive.

Over the course of the last fortnight then, I've had a prostate & testicle exam (probably overdue), an ultrasound of my kidneys and urinary tract, and... best of all... an endoscopy.

"I thought an endoscopy was where they shoved a tube down your throat," a mate of mine said.

It wasn't down my throat.

"Up your bum?"

Nor up my bum.

"Well, where else are they gonna... oh."

Apparently the NHS will now happily stick a camera up any hole on your body, so why go for a big, boring hole like your mouth or bum when they can stick a camera up the smallest hole in male anatomy? The highlight is when the camera pushes through the sphincter that separates your pee pipe from your bladder (the thing that stops you weeing yourself). After that, they pump water up the tube to fill your bladder because it photographs better when it's full. All this while the doctor is telling you it'd be far less uncomfortable if you just relaxed.

"I bet you'd rather be at work right now," said the nurse.

If only she knew...

Sitting around in the recovery room, they gave out a questionnaire, the main question being "How likely would you be to recommend this department to family and friends?"

"You're doing a brilliant job," said one of the other guys in the room, "but... recommend this? I think I might have to say no."

The NHS is an amazing thing, and why anyone in their right mind would want to see it dismantled or sold off to the Americans, I cannot comprehend... unless there's a sizeable chunk of money in it for the ne'er-do-wells who want to see it happen, perchance?

Eight bloods cells led to a swift referral, in which time I've been checked for prostate cancer (no sign), testicular cancer (no sign) and bladder cancer (no sign). And my kidneys looked OK too. 

"Blood in the urine is pretty common and the majority of times it goes undiagnosed," said the consultant. But they still wanted to get me checked out. And every appointment I've had was not just on time, but ahead of time. What a marvellous organisation. 

So, fingers crossed, nothing to report. A few sleepless nights and a little perspective on the bigger picture. I'll see if I can get back to semi-regular blogging soon.

My Top Ten Dolphin Songs

Last week's post about vacuum cleaners had less hits than anything I've ever written here. Which I guess shows that nobody is particularly enamoured by pop songs about household appliances. (So I'll be revisiting that again soon, dead horses need flogging.) I'll surely be on safer territory this week... everyone loves dolphins, right? (Although...that one above...is it just me...or does it look a bit like the Alien?)



10. The Byrds - Dolphin's Smile

 A song about cutting your moorings and floating free away...sounds tempting, right?

9. Ian Brown - Dolphins Were Monkeys

Well, if anybody would know about being a monkey...

8. Prince - Dolphin

Leave it to Prince to write a sado-masochistic reincarnation fantasy about dolphins... weirdo. Of course, considering this was written during the Slave / Symbol / TAFKAP days, its lyrics are pointing straight at his record company...

U can cut off all my fins
But 2 your ways I will not bend
I'll die before I let U tell me how 2 swim
And I'll come back again as a dolphin

7. Martyn Joseph - Dolphins Make Me Cry

The grown-up world is seriously depressing Martyn Joseph... that's why dolphins make him cry.

6. Shed Seven - Dolphin

From the York yobboes' debut album, this was their first single to crash into the Top 30 at the dawn of Britpop in 1994. They'd go on to much greater things, but Dolphin stands the test of time pretty well.

The video features Rick and the band performing in a waterless swimming pool. Can't help but think it'd have been more interesting if they'd filled it up as the song went on... but I guess there might have been health & safety issues with that.

5. Terrorvision - Perserverance

From York to Bradford, and more brilliantly raucous Britpop hooligans... they were right about the whales and dolphins. (Terrorvision went on to name their greatest hits album after this very lyric, so it obviously meant something.)

4. Crosby, Stills & Nash - After The Dolphin

This Dolphin was the London pub where the first aerial bombing of WWI took place. Here, Graham Nash asks if the world was ever the same after that fateful night...? 

3. Ooberman - Dolphin Blue

Ah, Ooberman. They should have been so much bigger.We need more pop stars called Popplewell.

2. Beth Orton & Terry Callier - Dolphins

Written and originally recorded by Fred Neil (who also wrote the gorgeous Everybody's Talkin'), this is surely the most covered Dolphins song in history. Tim Buckley's is probably the most famous; Billy Bragg did a heartbreaking cover on Don't Try This At Home; but there's something about the dreamy combo of Beth O. and folk-jazz pioneer Terry Callier that just does it for me like no other...

I've been searchin'
For the dolphins in the sea
And sometimes I wonder
Do you ever think of me?

1. David Bowie - Heroes

Arguably Bowie's greatest moment, with a little help from Brian Eno, Tony Visconti, and Robert Fripp on feedback. Strangely, it wasn't that big a hit when it was first released in 1977, but time has been very decent to it. Shows what the recording buying public know!

I 
I wish you could swim
Like the dolphins
Like dolphins can swim...

Which is your Flipper?