Friday 12 March 2010

Cardamom (n) An Italian Mothers Day Tradition in which children post written greetings to the mother in question.

As part of our Book Club selection I am now reading ‘The Reluctant Fundamentalist’ by Mohsin Hamid, somewhat reluctantly.
Last year the BBC did a whole series in which Andrew Lord Webber, with the aid of the public, Graham Norton and the ubiquitous Barrowman, selected a candidate for Eurovision for whom Lord Webber wrote a suitably schmaltzy tune.
This year, the songwriters are chubby professional cockney Pete Waterman and his evil sidekick, Mike Stock. Perhaps worried by the effect that Pete Waterman may have on BBC viewers with his menacing glare for six weeks, the PTB wisely cut the whole thing down to one show.
With his customary modesty, Waterman auditioned the hopefuls by requesting them to sing some of his old hits. ‘This is a classic pop song!’ he said, with absolutely no sense of irony, when requesting one poor boy to sing ‘Too Many Broken Hearts’.
A girl called Esma screeched, shouted and hit nearly every wrong note in the catalogue, but was nevertheless put through to the final three by Mr W.
Thankfully, the public have a great deal more sense than Pete Waterman and kicked her arse off the stage straightaway.
Our singer this year then, is a nice man called Josh with a large nose.
Due to the nature of Eurovision, and the fact that songs from the Stock/Aitken/Waterman stable tend to be pants beyond even the Ashley Cole level, we might actually stand a good chance of winning this year.