One of Mrs Hermit's seasonal traditions is the purchase of the Christmas edition of Radio Times. And my annual tradition is to look through this in the rare hope BBC2 might have the Seven Samurai on at 01.30 on Boxing Day morning.

But in the process, I have to flick through what (for me at least) is the worst magazine in Britain, the reading of which is roughly akin to the chinese water torture that is listening to Steve Wright's "big show".

There's something about the RT's knowing style - and never using one adjective where three will do - that really gets my goat, though no doubt it's written with the target audience of middle England housewives (and not me)in mind.

Or am I just becoming the proverbial Grumpy Old Fifty Pound Guy?

And speaking of which, isn't a there are need for an econmic downturn version of the latter?

And while I'm on, isn't Gavin and Stacey now a case of the emperor's new clothes?

Given that coming out of the closet as a birder (feathered ilk) seems in vogue with the massive of late, it's worth flagging up my book of the year, which is as high a quality small-press publication as you will find anywhere, namely Wing Beats: British Birds in Haiku.
See http://www.wingbeats.co.uk/the_book.html for more info

With intros by Mark Cocker and Stephen Moss, superb photos by Sean Grey and the best of the UK's haiku poets, what's not to like, like?

Further to my post back in August re Elliott Bristow's project to transfer his Road Dreams series screened on Channel 4 in the 1990's to DVD, the product is now available via his website:

http://www.retroroadtrips.com/

And having now watched the initial films, if you enjoyed Road Dreams, you'll enjoy this. Plan 73, here I come...

There's a link on today's BBC News website for a site to replay the

"Newsreaders sing Abba for Pudsey"

from the horror, the horror, that is Children in Need.

Oh Chris Morris, where art thou?

Nomination 1 - Lau

http://www.channel4.com/music/video/lau-live-hinba-acoustic-video.html

While wabi sabi http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wabi-sabi is arguably the aesthetic for our troubled times, it's a quality in short supply in most of what passes for popular music.

But then you stumble across this...

Any other suggestions?

Does what it says, etc, etc...

There's more like this, together with updates on the project to put all of Elloit Bristow's Road Dreams films on DVD at

http://www.retroroadtrips.com/

And if the whole project isn't an article of interest to The Word demographic, I'm not sure what is...

For an interesting fusion of popular culture types, see the video for Hey Ya below done in the style of the tweenagers on-line dungeons and dragons alike of choice, Runescape. And a noob is a new player (or someone faking that they are a new player) apprently...

While in my 70's politically incorrect childhood, I was often told not to "mock the afflicted" I had to stifle a titter at this:

Word readers wondering where the well-written song has gone could do worse than checking out James McMurtry's Ruby and Carlos, from his new CD, Just Us Kids.

The track is a Pancho and Lefty for the post-Bush years and McMurtry has few peers in the contemporary song-penning stakes in my view.

Any other suggestions?

The thought occurs that there hasn't been a lexicon of new terms in The Word for a few months now, so I'm pitching a few suggestions in below:

The Three Legged Dog - that feeling of melancholia that comes over the music fan of a certain age when listening to Accelerate and realising that REM will never get it back. Source being Stipe's (patently untrue) comment on the departure of Bill Berry that "a three legged dog is still a dog".

T5 - the new "pear-shaped", see the travails of our so-called National Carrier. As in Mrs Brown's (presumably) oft repeated line "Gordon, you idiot, the economy's gone T5"

3G CGF - the NEET yoof hanging round a Spar near you (Acronym for third generation, couldn't give a feck)

Hoodie Pop - low rent alco-drink favoured by the young people above, see Carlsbad, Frosters, Manglers etc

I can't imagine I am the only Word reader who spent time during the late 1980s & early 1990's watching Channel 4's screenings of Road Dreams, a US travelogue made by British filmaker Elliot Bristow. This was (for me at least) a once seen, never forgotten series that has long since been worn out on my video copies. The films featured scenes recorded over the film-maker's extensive travels around the US, together with great music from Pat Metheney, The Band and Leo Kottke among others.

However, a recent search on the web threw up Elliot's blog http://www.retroroadtrips.com with anecdotes from the making of the films together with the good news is that there should be a DVD version for the films available from Elliot soon.

And there must be an article/interview/review of interest to "the demographic" in there somewhere...

Folk curmudgeon Chris Wood's new CD Trespass is based around the theme of the Enclosures and the subsequent effects on English society.

And while this might not, at first glance, be a subject matter to send the discerning non-Word reader rushing to the download site or Amazon, the album has much to commend it, not least a short essay in the sleevenotes as to why the Enclosures don't feature large in English history, why the British ruling classes were quite happy to test out their plans for the colonies on thier own population first and how this manifests itself in contemporary society today.

All of which adds up to a far more interesting read than you'll find in any newsprint this side of Christmas, Word accepted.