Hide & Seek

Occasional readers of this blog may have come to recognise that it is only with great irritation and self-reproach that Sordel condescends to respond to the Pervasive Evanescent.

Nevertheless, the P. E. is always with us, and so it is that I hang my head in anticipatory shame and turn my attention to: Wimbledon coverage on the B.B.C.

(Just be grateful that I am not watching Big Brother this year.)

The stereotypical depiction of an audience watching a tennis match involves the swivelling of eyeballs right and left at regular intervals, and so it is with the B.B.C.: from One to Two and Two to One the audience is invited to pop with the grace of every serve and volley. "Viewers hoping to see the end of this rally should turn to our coverage on B.B.C. Two" smirks the elusive Sue Barker.

Thank God for remote controls, or it would be more exercise than frail flesh can stand.

Worse still, however, is when the entire channel switches channels. You know that moment when a train pulls out of a station and it seems for a second as though the entire world is moving around you? During Wimbledon, that illusion becomes reality. Rather than switch tennis from 1 to 2 they sometimes switch all other programming from 1 to 2 instead.

Try complaining to the B.B.C. about this (go on, I dare you) and your whining, self-pitying epistle about missing The Supersizers do ... The Fifties because Crimewatch has broken & entered into B.B.C. Two will almost certainly be read out on the air. Shortly thereafter, a B.B.C. "executive" will explain (as one addressing a small and exceptionally dim child) that providing coverage of a live sporting event will inevitably mean adjustments to the schedule.

S/he will then go on to point out (as broadcasters have been very keen to do over the last 24 hours) that 12 million people watched Murray's so-called "epic" five-setter. (On which subject, tell it to the Greeks ... they were ten years outside the gates of Troy and knocking a fluffy ball over a net for four hours doesn't compare.)

12 million people can't, it seems, be wrong, even when four million of them are fruitlessly waiting for Crimewatch, two million of them are watching under protest having planned to watch The Supersizers do ... The Fifties and another three million or so are imprisoned by B.B.C. One having earlier thrown their remote controls out of the window in frustration.

Come to think about it, there must be a sizable proportion of the population who can only receive B.B.C. One. That's the only thing that would explain why anyone is watching it in the first place.