Morning all, welcome to the blog.

Well, I've done the Facebook connect thingy so we'll see what happens! I'm also glad that some of the site fixes are starting to filter through such as the missing TC emblems and so on. I'm about to do some cast submissions so hopefully the promised easier checkboxes will be in operation as they are so fiddly on the current form. It seems to have taken months and months to get these things done. I can't help feeling that time spent doing these things would have been more worthwhile than some of the redesign fiascos that have gone on in the last years. [End Rant].

As for what's going on here, the Under 9s cricket team my son plays for are going from strength to strength. They had a great match on Saturday, thrashing their archrivals in a thrilling local derby that ended with them winning by 134 runs - a record winning margin for the team. The great thing is that they will be meeting them in the quarter finals of the Cup this Friday so if they play as well again they should sail through to the semis.

I have also been enjoying using Facebook, making contact with friends old and new. I probably won't publish my comments from this site over there but am happy to meet tv.com friends over there for a chat/status update. Talking of chat, it comes to a pretty pass when I found myself using Facebook chat the other night to tell my daughter to go to bed when she was on the laptop in the next room! Good grief this must be taking web technology a step too far.

I'm a bit behind on my TV watching commitments (Big Brother is suffering at the hands of the Facebook distractions at the moment) but I will be making a concerted effort to catch up over the next day or so. I'm also behind schedule with sorting out GMTV Today but that's on the To Do List as well. I have also acquired the editorship for the current GMTV and GMTV with Lorraine show guides too, though I've been a TC on those two for a while.

Helen

Good morning to you. I'm just about conscious though the hay fever season is well and truly upon me. I'd been feeling pretty bad for a few days but have only just really cottoned on as to what it was. It's been pretty warm recently too so the pollen count has gone into overdrive. The hall was warm at my son's school yesterday afternoon as well. His year (Year 3) joined forces with Year 6 to produce a very moving half hour on heroes, which culminated in some beautiful singing and some very poignant slides of military heroes. He was a football hero during the performance, kicking a football across to his mate. Regular readers of this blog may well remember that he's a cricketer but he's just taken up football (i.e. soccer) and is now talking about starting rugby in the autumn.

Talking of cricket, the Under 9s comprehensively thrashed their opponents in the local cup last night, which means they are now in the quarterfinals. As they lost in the 3rd round last year they are very happy! Let's hope they can go all the way. As his dad is away in Croatia at the moment, I had to keep texting highlights to him throughout the game, which really amused some friends of mine sitting next to me! He got his highest ever batting scores last night (7 off his first 2 overs including a 6 and 24 off the second 2, including 3 6s and NOT OUT for both innings! And he took a wicket. Next match is a league game on Saturday morning against their closest rivals. Both clubs are in the same small town so most of the boys go to school together from both teams and this particular fixture is always a grudge match.

As for TV, I watched the live nominations for Big Brother last night and as it was against the clock it meant they really cut out the drivel and got straight to the point for once. The nominees were not a great surprise. Halfwit, the really annoying posh boy got nominated yet again (that's all 3 weeks so far - yet he's survived the previous 2) and Angel the wacky Russian who likes skinny dipping and telling her fellow housemates they're fat- guaranteed to get you nominated that one). In the highlights show I loved the fact that they failed absolutely everything in the Tudor task - useless or what?

On TV.com I got sidetracked by other things so GMTV Today didn't get much done to it over the last 2 days but it is getting there slowly. Submitting the daft things that the housemates on Big Brother have been saying has kept me busy instead I'm hoping to watch a bit of Wimbledon too though I haven't had a chance to see much of it so far this year.

Morning all, welcome to Monday. Hope you all had a nice weekend. Apart from dropping off my other half at the station to catch his flight to Croatia and watching the Under 9s play cricket (they beat their archrivals by 68 runs!) I mainly spent time doing chores, mucking around with Facebook and continuing the mammoth task of updating the GMTV Today guide. Now that I've done all the episode pages and about 75% of the cast I'm finally starting to feel I'm getting there. I'm determined to get it finished by the end of the week. I also got The One Show fully up to date - the first time that's been the case for a long, long time.

I forgot to watch episode 2 of Chuck last Tuesday so I'll have to watch the repeat (think that's tonight). I did watch another episode from the season 2 DVD of Pushing Daisies though. Watching TV live just seems such a struggle these days. It's so much easier to watch things On Demand or on DVD or downloaded or whatever. It seems the only live TV we watch nowadays is sport. Talking of sport, I hope the rain stays away from Wimbledon, it's looking a bit grey out there.

Let's get the week started!

Helen

Morning all! I can't believe Friday's here again. Though I suppose it was a short week for me being away on Monday and all. Actually I haven't had time to do much for the site this week other than submit a few summaries for the shows I am trying to update regularly. I've mainly been watching sport, Big Brother and Big Brother's Little Brother - in the name of research, naturally The latter 2 have been difficult to keep up with - I still haven't seen the ones from Sunday and Monday when I was away. Virgin Media annoys me because they are so slow to put the episodes on Catch up TV and the 4oD site seems to stall all the time.

Now that tv.com has a Facebook group I've been checking things out over there from time to time. My daughter can't believe I'm on there. 13 year olds are so sceptical aren't they? They seem to think that anyone over 21 can't possibly be interested in computers, the Web, technology etc. I've been interested in computing for a loooong time now - though I have to confess the one thing that really does nothing for me is video games. Now I know they're really popular and I read plenty of your blogs that talk about them but I'm just not into them. I occasionally play tennis on the Wii with the kids but that's as far as it goes. Just as well really as I spend so much time on this site (and now Facebook!) as well as watching TV, films and listening to music that I just don't have the time for them. What do you think?

My lad's playing cricket tomorrow morning - a must win game against the archrivals in the Under 9s league so I'm hoping the weather stays dry. As for my other half, he's off to do field work in Croatia for 2 weeks, which is all right for some. The kids and I will still be here, though. I may get to catch-up on some of the season finales that I still haven't seen!

Helen

Good morning all! How are you? I wasn't on the site yesterday as I was up in the north-east visiting my Geordie in-laws and taking my husband up to Howick on the Northumberland coast where BBC Radio 4 were recording an episode of Open Country all about Doggerland and The North Sea - perfect timing as his book was launched last Wednesday. The presenter and producer were brilliant and we had lunch afterwards in Craster - home of the world famous Craster kippers! My son and daughter had a great time on the beach - him scamperting around the rock pools getting soaked and covered in sand, her listening to Radio 1 and reading Twilight (oh how times have changed!) The show will be broadcast on Radio 4 at 6:05 a.m. on Saturday 25th July if you're interested with a repeat at the more civilised time of 3:00 p.m. the following Thursday. It will also be on 'Listen Again' on the BBC site after the first broadcast for about 6 weeks. Listen out for the Geordie with the Gaffney surname.

As to sport - England are out of the World 20:20 Cup thanks to the dreaded Duckworth Lewis (sp?) rule for recalculating the overs when the time is reduced because of pouring rain. Always a problem with our summers. West Indies had to get 80 off 9 overs, England had 161 off their 20. West Indies won with 4 balls to spare. Oh well, time to concentrate on The Ashes nesxt month. As for tennis - Andy Murray won at Queens - first Briton for over 70 years! I hope he can keep thisup for Wimbledon. England did manage to beat Andorra in the World Cup Qualifier (football/soccer) 6-0 last week so that was pretty good for us. Hopefully that's sealed the place for 2010.

I've watched almost nothing else except Cricket highlights as I have just been too busy doing everything else. I watched Hope Springs on BBC1 on Sunday out of the corner of my eye but didn't take much in. It has a good cast though. And of course Big Brother carries on. I saw the eviction show on Friday but haven't yet caught up on the more recent ones.

Helen