Tag Archives: old

Get yer rhododendrons oot for the lads

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My kids and I caught the ferry from Gourock to Dunoon at the weekend. I say ‘caught’. It was thankfully pretty stationary when we drove aboard. I figured taking the car was a no-brainer. We didn’t have a lot of time and without the car we wouldn’t have been able to explore much more than the dock on the other side, which would’ve been about as pointless as flying from Edinburgh to Milan, wandering around the airport then immediately flying back again, all the while raving about how culturally enriching ‘the Italian experience’ was.

Gourock. That’s a strange name, isn’t it? [note to any non-Scots reading this – it’s pronounced ‘goo-rock’, not ‘gow-rock’, you fucking idiot. Honestly, imagine not knowing how to pronounce the name of a place you’ve never heard of before in a country whose pronunciation rules aren’t immediately clear. What a loser] It’s next to Greenock. What is it with ‘ocks’ on the west coast of Scotland? I’ve no idea what an ‘ock’ is, much less why two ‘ocks’ would be next to each other. I’ve even less idea why one of them would be ‘green’ and the other made of ‘goo’. A simple Google search would doubtless put paid to my speculation, but I can’t resist an enduring mystery, plus I’m ignorant and lazy. I’d prefer to imagine ‘ocks’ as whatever I bloody well want them to be, thank you very much. I mean, are ‘ocks’ decapitated crocodiles? Dismembered octopi? Is it how Jonathan Ross would refer to the green guys in Mordor if he moved to Middle Earth? There’s no doubt in my mind that the real answer is incredibly boring. It’s the same with Coatbridge: was the whole town named after a bridge of stitched-together Medieval jackets? As far as I’m concerned: yes. Yes, it bloody was. And don’t get me started on Bathgate.

None of us had ever been to Dunoon so we knew little about what to expect once we arrived, beyond what I’d gleaned from a cursory Google search (I still refuse to Google ‘ocks’). We met a kindly old man on the deck of the ferry as we clambered out of the car. After a brief exchange he was quick to suggest places we might go and things we might do. Well, truth be told, he only really had one thing in mind…

I’ve clearly phrased that in an unnecessarily sinister way, haven’t I? And I’ve left you thinking that this poor, innocent old man wanted to ‘Jack and Rose’ us in the back of his motor. Or paint us like one of his Gourock girls. He didn’t. His real intentions were, mercifully, a lot more boring than that. What he wanted us to do was visit the botanic gardens.

‘You’ll love it’, he said. ‘The rhododendrons are out.’

I looked back at my kids: two be-limbed bundles of kinetic chaos; a couple of Nagasakis in skin-suits. Voracious, vital, joyful, and mental. The whole world – its sounds, colours and energies – piped perpetually into their skulls with the force and power of the zap-bite that cooked the shark in Jaws 2. ADHD in human form. Tom and Jerry meets Israel and Palestine. ‘Mister,’ I thought, ‘These kids REALLY don’t give a fuck about rhododendrons. Come to think of it, neither do I.’

My kids might’ve been interested in rhododendrons, but only because it sounds like a shape invented by a drunk pigeon, or some sort of giant robot who spends his days fighting Godzilla. As long as they laboured under the impression that a rhododendron was one of those things they’d be excited, but the minute they found out it was a fucking flower their eyes would glaze over like Cheech’s and Chong’s would on a microscopic journey through Bob Marley’s left lung.

Don’t get me wrong. We adore nature. Its canvas. Its scope and humps and hues. Its vistas and vacuums. We rarely get hung up on the specifics, though. We’re quite happy to gaze at flowers – Geilston Gardens, for instance, is a stunning wee place – just don’t ask us which ones are rhododendrons. We don’t know what they are, much less when they’re going to be out. And we don’t want to know.

But this man wanted to know. And he wanted us to know, too. And I’m pretty sure that he wanted us to know that he wanted us to know that he wanted us to know, too. But did he always know? Did he tug, teary-eyed, at his mother’s apron strings and wail: ‘Oh, mumma, will the rhododendrons be out again this year? Oh, will they, mumma? Please say that they will!’ Was rhododendron his first word? When did this rhododendron obsession take root? And would it happen to me?

After all, there was a time when I wouldn’t have believed you if you’d told me that a time would come when I’d be willingly listening to Radio 4 in the car. Or feeling a sense of accomplishment for getting that third wash out on the line. Would I turn sixty and get inducted into some secret, and incredibly boring, society? Would I receive a card from the King that read: ‘You give a fuck about rhododendrons now. Deal with it.’?

We didn’t go to the botanic garden. We ate ice cream. We climbed rocks. We skimmed stones. We saw a seal. We wandered the fringes of a loch that used to house US submarines. That’s a bit better than fucking flowers.

Mind you… [Googles rhododendrons] they are LUSH. Oaft. That’s a beautiful flower. Maybe… you know, the next time we’re near a botanic garden… just once I could, you know [Keeps Googling] So THAT’S what an ‘ock’ is.

Classic Doctor Who: hammy, hilarious, and worth it

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I’ve been slowly but surely working my way through old episodes of Doctor Who, rejoicing in the wobbly-setted delights of the first four doctors. I’m currently concentrating on a chunk of episodes from Pertwee’s tenure in the 1970s, some of which I vaguely remember seeing on UK Gold many moons ago, most of which is entirely new to me.

It’s become something of a cliché to talk up the rubber monsters, the hammy acting and the all-round low-budget feel of the show’s yesteryear, but, Christ, some of it’s downright hilarious. Last week, I saw a Northern Irish bureaucrat screaming in terror as he was slowly eaten by a plastic armchair; a posh old toff wailing miserably as he was attacked by a ridiculous, scrunch-faced plastic doll who’d come to life and leapt onto his neck from a mantle-piece, and Jon Pertwee himself reacting to a malevolent phone cord trying to strangle him to death. Granted, these are events out-with the normal sphere of human experience, and thus reasonably difficult to react to with any measure of verisimilitude. Even more difficult considering the special effects technology that was available at the time. In most episodes from that era the poor actors had to feign death in response to nothing more than a series of increasingly daft sound effects and shimmering blobs, that were only added in post-production. Meaning they were actually reacting to absolutely nothing. However, in all cases the director appears to have shouted from off-camera: ‘BOGGLE YOUR EYES OUT, THAT’S IT! LIFT YOUR HANDS UP LIKE A HEROINE IN A SILENT MOVIE WHO’S ABOUT TO BE HIT BY A TRAIN! THAT’S IT! SCREAM LIKE A SHOT TORTOISE! NOW STICK YOUR TONGUE OUT LIKE YOU’VE JUST BEEN STRUCK DOWN BY A STROKE MID-WAY THROUGH TRYING TO MAKE A BABY LAUGH! THAT’S IT! THAT’S PERFECT!’

I do like Pertwee though. A lot. I like his haughtiness, his abruptness and his occasional bouts of silliness. Pertwee’s doctor and Capaldi’s share much in common, although Capaldi tends to accentuate the doctor’s strange otherworldliness, while Pertwee always strived to put the ‘Lord’ into Time Lord. However, Pertwee’s Doctor was a Lord who seemed to have a fondness for poor people and the less fortunate, which is a rare Lord indeed.

The act of criticising a piece of television for the crime of reflecting the society in which it was created is a little like shooting fish in a barrel, but the way that race was handled in some of the early Who stories can’t help but make me cringe. I keep expecting Jeremy Clarkson to materialise alongside Pertwee’s Tardis in a time-travelling Porsche, muttering about ‘woeful indoor plumbing’, ‘spears’ and ‘laughable head-wear’. Hindsight’s 20/20 I suppose. The great Roman orator and lawyer Cicero owned a slave, George Washington owned slaves, and we all used to hum along to Gary Glitter songs.

It’s still uncomfortable to watch, though. In the Troughton serial ‘Tomb of the Cybermen’, an archaeological expedition team has a giant, ox-like, black slave/henchman who trundles in its wake, issuing monosyllabic grunts and clobbering people. In the Pertwee serial ‘Terror of the Autons’, a circus baddie has a giant, ox-like black slave/henchman who trundles about the circus, issuing monosyllabic grunts and clobbering people. In ‘Mind of Evil’, the Master has a black limo driver. That could just be the law of averages. There were probably a lot of black limo drivers in those days, and there may even be a fair few of them today, I don’t know; I don’t have the statistics to hand. However, perhaps less forgiveable, that same serial features a Chinese lady whose every appearance on screen is accompanied by plinky-plonky, mysterious oriental music, which registers as a little lazy and gratuitous to modern ears. Thank heaven for small mercies though. At least the lady wasn’t required to ride around on a ceremonial dragon whilst eating rice and shouting about communism.

And let’s not forget this line, uttered by a Scotsman in the opening seconds of the Tom Baker serial ‘Terror of the Zygons’:

MUNRO: Hey, listen, Willie. With tomorrow’s supply ‘cop trip, can you no send over a few haggis?

Hey, Munro, Groundskeeper Wullie wants his patter back! I guess the contrast between the two Who-eras is only made starker by how inclusive and reflective Nu Who is of contemporary British society. Are we ready for a black, asian or female Doctor Who? Well, I’m ready, insofar as I wouldn’t care one way or the other. It’s not a case of ‘We should have a non-white male as Doctor Who’ and more a case of ‘Why shouldn’t we have a non-white male as Doctor Who’? The only problem the show would face if it recast along those lines would be our own history, which has discriminated against women and non-whites for long millenia. Every time a non-white Doctor Who travelled to earth’s past, the storyline would invariably have to tackle racism and prejudice, which would become incredibly tiresome for the actor in question who presumably would just want to be left alone to dash along corridors brandishing a sonic screwdriver and shouting at Daleks.

Still, I’m enjoying my little journey through time (on-screen and off), despite the fact that my partner will occasionally walk past the screen and offer her considered opinion on classic Who in all of its glory:

“How can you watch this awful, awful shite?”

How indeed.

Or should that be Who?