Such fun

 I did mention the other day that I was watching Miranda, but there's one of those strange TV channels that is showing it constantly at the moment, and it's on BBC iPlayer too (that's probably where the strange TV channel got it from), so forgive me for mentioning it again. But the point is, I think that's actually the most recent sitcom that I've found really screamingly funny. And it's quite old now. So what's with modern television? Invent something new and funny, people! Quickly!

You really can't beat a bit of bully

 If there's one television programme they need to make again, it's Bullseye, the unique game show testing both general knowledge and darts-playing skills! The balance between the two was perfectly exemplified by the one I've just seen repeated on Challenge - the three teams were made up as follows:

1. Excellent question-answerer and acceptable darts-player
2. Acceptable question-answerer and hopeless darts-player
3. Hopeless question-answerer and excellent darts-player

Team 1 very narrowly beat team 3, but it was a really exciting contest! Team 3 would have won if their question-answerer had heard of Hansel and Gretel. Bring back Bully!

Forty-five

 Look, I'm fine with growing older. It's just a number. I'm never going to act my age, anyway. Or even my shoe size - my feet are bigger than most people's. But I AM going to turn 45 on Thursday, and it's a sort of semi big round number. And here's what some of my friends happen to be posting about on the internet - literally today, this isn't made up - well, it's just paraphrased a tiny bit, but it's real:

Very nice artist friend (who is, by the way, less than five years younger than me, looks incredibly youthful and has no physical or health problems) - "When I finish this latest epic comic in a few years' time I'll be 45, and I can't really keep drawing forever - what if I get arthritis, or my eyesight goes, or I get shakier as I get old and have to give up drawing? I need to find a new career."

Very nice other friend (who is lovely and I feel guilty about calling out like this, but it's the mood I'm in) - "Someone I work closely with has just suddenly died at the age of 45. This is incredibly sad."

I mean, it's just the timing of the whole thing. It makes me get a little bit sensitive...

Isn't it grand

 

I mentioned eOthello.com in passing when talking about the live-action othello tournament, but I feel I should advertise it a bit more, and make sure everyone knows just how cool it is. It works differently from other board-game websites, where you play a timed game of ten minutes or so per player - eOthello is more like a postal chess kind of thing, where people play the latest move in their games when they're at their computer with a minute to spare. And they have tournaments every couple of months, with players divided into divisions based on their ratings, and playing eight or so games simultaneously. It works very well!

And the coolest thing about it is the way you can play othello variants as well as the standard game! Random openings have become popular since new-fangled internet games started to take off, but "grand" and "88" (or "octagon") othello go back further than that, to a very early Japanese attempt to sell spin-offs of their 'new' game ('invented' in the early seventies by marketing a 19th-century game that everyone had forgotten). And losing othello is of course something that you can just play on the normal board, and a fun game it is, too.

But the one I find the most fun is the Grand 10x10 game. We had 10x10 othello at the Mind Sports Olympiad back in the earliest days, from 1997 onwards, but after playing a Grand tournament on eOthello and then going back to playing the 8x8 game, I felt like the smaller board makes the whole thing too simple. Perhaps the big board is my particular speciality, and that's my excuse for being a mediocre player of 8x8? That would work better if I hadn't proved exactly as mediocre at 10x10, but I still think there's something in it. I'll have to play more big-board othello!