A poll of questions

[slemslempike]

A poll for a morning, a Thursday morning, apparently, which means that I must remember to buy the Guardian to get the booklet about Freshers Week.

[Poll #1446248]

And I would have posted about this horrible review in the Independent before if I'd been here. I haven't seen The Girlfriend Experience, though it sounds interesting, and I've no idea if his other criticisms are valid, but this:

One of them, the elephantine Tessa (Debbie Chazen) giggles nervously about going to see a play that she's in.
There's no point in not saying that these huge and unappetising women come across as being incredibly sad and curiously stupid, with their whale-like lolloping around

is fairly vile no matter what.

Comments

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

That reviewer seems very confused indeed whether Debbie Chazen and the other actors are in fact actors or really prostitutes. Far be it from me to suggest that he has trouble telling the difference between women who are being paid to be 'appetising' to him and women who are not when he's outside a theatre, as well.

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

I agree. I always root for the young whippersnappers against the DPhil students.

[serriadh.livejournal.com]

Um, I expect that this answer will make everyone hate me, but I usually support a university challenge team that IS Oxbridge. Or at least, Oxford. Does it count as 'personal allegiance' if it's the same university, but a different college? I don't know.

[serriadh.livejournal.com]

Ooh, yes. Me too! I don't eat breakfast.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I like the logic of motorway numbering, but I think just "what is the number of the motorway that goes from a to b" is a dull question.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

But just matching up a number with a route for a question? I would probably quite happily read a (reasonably well-written) book about motorways, but I reject them utterly as a quiz question.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

That's personal allegiances, though, isn't it? I think a hate against a university because you went to a rival one counts as a personal tie. Like if I were the sort of person who gave any sort of fuck about the whole roses thing.

I suppose in many ways the least of the changes! Is it entirely dry? When we were in Doha (at that time) there was a compound where expats could go and buy booze every month. And then pretend not to consume it anywhere but at home.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Nah - why watch if it does not entertain you? It was a very assumption-laden question, but then most of my polls are.

I would have red black velvet cake twice on mine if I'd filled it in.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Do you think you'd mind being sober around all the other drunks? I waver on that. My pub quiz time can sometimes be a bit weird about me not drinking. No I would not like some vodka in that, that's why I asked for ORANGE JUICE and not VODKA AND ORANGE.

At the moment it is pretty much 60/40 people thinking they're optimistic/pessimistic, and 40/60 people thinking I'm optimistic/pessimistic. I can't quite work out what I think I am. I keep being told my work is negative and I think it's quite positive to say "no, this isn't as good as it gets, this isn't okay yet".

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Thank you! But I have my own copy now, which was quite disappointing. but only 30p on campus.

We tend to do quite well on these, and usually there's either a theme for all intros, or a theme linking them two at a time, so we can stick a guess in. Our music round is one question where he reads out the lyrics in a completely different rhythm and tone to the original, then one where he plays us a tune on a stylophone, then five standard guess the intro, and then guess the film/TV show.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Mmmm, that would be a lovely breakfast. I think my ideal food day would be wake up, have very small snack/glass of juice, then about an hour later a MASSIVE breakfast.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Very true. In having a larger lunch if you want it, fine, but having a separate meal just because SOCIETY TELLS YOU TO, no.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Yes, very. Also, that there is apparently no difference between "not attractive to me, personally" and "objectively hideous to everyone". It made me want to see the play more, actually.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Yes, of course that counts as personal allegiance. And I don't know why you think it would "make everyone hate [you]". It's not like no-one else in these comments has said anything similar.

[yiskah.livejournal.com]

Yeah, probably, but then so's 'anyone but Oxbridge' in a way, isn't it?

It is technically totally dry: the only legal booze is Thursday night at the British Embassy, which is technically not Sudanese soil. People do drink of course, but possibly not so much these days. I think it's a lot tougher than last time I was there.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

My "anyone but Oxbridge" is that I would prefer it if they entered as universities and not colleges, and they constitute too many of the teams. (I do know why they enter as colleges.) And more generally, it's not my personal allegiance to another university that would be preventing me from supporting them, you could be unaffiliated to any HE institution and still not support them.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Actually, having thought about it more, the dodgier his demand that everyone on stage pander to his personal aesthetic preferences becomes.

I mean, whilst Debbie Chazen is talented and funny, and a strong contender for the position of Only Fat Woman On Telly Other Than Dawn French once Annette Badland has finished with it, I kind of doubt that she'd have been cast to play a specific sex worker if she and that sex worker didn't resemble each other a bit. Ditto with the actress who I don't think he could even be bothered to name because he was too busy being rude about her wig. I really doubt the casting director was sitting there thinking 'Well, the woman whose voice was recorded was a blonde with an athletic build, but unfortunately due to the lack of roles for athletic blonde actors and the general disdain for athletic blondes in our society, the only actors with the appropriate levels of skill and training are outsized brunettes'.

So... does the idiot reviewer seriously think that fitting his idiosyncratic standards of attractiveness and grooming is more important that being true to the sex workers' own experiences? I expect that if it was a play about trafficked Eastern European women, he'd think it important to mention that it was sad how scrawny and underaged they looked, and that personally he associated that sort of accent with bus drivers and plumbers. :p

I'm not even going to touch the idea that studying the way someone moves is a good way of telling their intelligence, except to say that he's on the slippery slope to ableism there.

[yiskah.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, I agree that they should enter at universities. Why is it they don't? I've never known.

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

Heh, my last 5 things were all going terribly well until I ran out of healthsome lunch and went to the 5 kinds of cake available at playgroup.

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

Though I suppose if I'd answered an hour ago, I would simply have put "five kinds of cake" which would have had a certain style.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I think I got this from the book about UC, that when the programme started there weren't enough universities to make a long enough series, so they were invited to enter as colleges. I've just been to check Wikipedia, which claims that they're limited to five per series each, which I didn't know about, and only makes it slightly better. I'd rather have more universities entering though, more interesting to watch. (Ooh, and the Wikipedia page has a small list of cheating Oxford teams! Cheating is a bit strong. But still.)

[whatho.livejournal.com]

I decided to be firmly in opposition to the crisp thing, which I've never encountered, probably because I don't go to parties. Even if I like both flavours. 'Cause someone else might not and it would be vexing for them. Ain't I altruistic?

Also I tried to click 'not oxbridge' about 97 times. I know there are more important things. Sort of.

Also Michael Coveney is an arse.

[whatho.livejournal.com]

(And no, for anyone who's concerned, that doesn't make me hate anyone who does support Oxbridge teams.)

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

It does seem terribly virtuous until the last bit! Though it could have been carrot cake, which I don't care how much sugar it has, isn't really a proper lovely cake.

Five kinds of cake. Style indeed.

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

Very altruistic! I quite like it, as long as you like both, because then it's a little surprise with every crisp as to what it is. Unless it's wotsits and quavers, then you'd know. I like sweet and salt popcorn in the same bag at the cinema and especially the layer where it mingles and you don't know what you'll get.