Just follow this easy template:
Sprinkle liberally with “however”, and serve for between 300 – 2500 hits.
I have to admit, it’s been a slightly odd last few days. Having just written an article about The Young Ones which people really responded to on Twitter, I managed to follow it up with… erm, another article about The Young Ones which people really responded to on Twitter. Thank you, everyone. Although I have a nasty feeling that I’ve just published the most interesting stuff I’ll do all year in sodding January.
Still, for those of you who are vaguely interested in updates about this place, I realised recently that I never actually explained the current situation with my Twitter accounts. So if you wish to follow me on Twitter – and I do realise there is no guarantee this is the case – here are your two options:
You can also subscribe to the RSS feed if you’re of a mind, although I suspect if you care about that, you’ve already found it.
One thing you will note is that I don’t have is any kind of Facebook presence whatsoever. Partly because I want to claim the moral high ground, and partly because I only really have time for one social media platform at a time, and – for good or for ill – that’s Twitter right now. Though I wouldn’t object if anybody wants to help me out and post the odd link to my stuff on Facebook every now and again. My moral high ground isn’t that high. Or moral.
Anyway, thanks again for all your comments, likes, retweets, and so on. I really do appreciate it. Hopefully there’s some other fun stuff to come this year, both Young Ones-related and otherwise. Maybe I’ll even follow through with my threat, and find the VHS recording I made in the late 90s, tricking 10 minutes of free porn out of my analogue cable box.
What else would you rather watch, come on now?
There is a fantasy I have, when everything is getting on top of me. When news events get too much, when Twitter is just irritating, when work is perhaps a little more stressful than it needs to be. Why not just disappear for six months, work on something amazing, and then return with a flourish? “Look at this brilliant thing I’ve made, while you’ve all been wasting your time.”
To be fair, it can be done. I’ve seen people go AWOL, and return having written a fucking book. It’s a very appealing thing to do. Get away from the noise of daily internet life, and do something more useful instead. It sounds immensely soothing for the soul.
I just can’t do it.
The reason is twofold. For a start, I need to talk to people in order to make things; so much of the really good stuff on this site comes from conversations with likeminded people online. But the other problem is all in my own head: I just can’t work on one thing for six months. I need distractions along the way. I wish my brain behaved otherwise, but it just doesn’t.
So once I got to 10 distractions I really wanted to work on, and managed precisely no work on my Big Project, I had to make a decision.
* * *
In short:
a) Dirty Feed is back from hiatus.
b) Yes, I am a fucking moron.
c) To make up for it, I’ll publish something before the end of the month which really is a tremendous amount of fun.
d) Yes, I am a fucking moron.
2015 • 2016 • 2017 • 2018 • 2019 • 2020 • 2021 • 2022 • 2023 • 2024
“Look, I can’t pretend the last year has been much fun. It doesn’t even seem to have been much fun for all the various fuckweasels around the world considering their general mood, let alone if you’re the kind of good and decent person who appreciates in-depth articles about sitcom edits.
But that’s no reason why you can’t grab a cup of tea, stick your head in the sand for an hour, and read some of the best stuff I’ve published here over the last 12 months.”
Me, right now: can it be 2017 again, please?
Oh well. This year has been a nightmare, but over here, we’re more concerned about Knightmare. While the world has been howling outside, I managed to find the time to do some fun stuff. In fact, for the first year ever on here, I can pick out something I wrote each month which I actually like.
Let’s get to it. And if you care about the future of this site – and if you’re reading this, I presume that you do – then don’t miss the end for an IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT which is IMPORTANT, and not BORING like you think it is.
* * *
“Two dead, twenty-five to go…”
To start the year off, a little look at how a moment from Fawlty Towers first showed up in another sitcom a full decade earlier. I love tracing the origin of jokes like this, and I don’t think anybody has ever linked this example together before.
A Weekly Look at the World of Science and Technology
A mystery about Series 2 of Look Around You, finally solved after 15 years. This is what happens when my mind just doesn’t let go of something.
An Exceptionally Important Piece of Analysis About Blackadder Goes Forth
1,856 words about set reuse in Blackadder Goes Forth. Loads of people really liked this piece, which I would suggest is what happens when a country enters lockdown and goes a bit loopy.
Here’s to You, Mrs. Littlefield
By far the most popular thing I wrote all year, looking at a cut character from the pilot of Cheers. It even got picked up by The Independent, which is as much a testament to the ongoing popularity of Cheers as anything.
“Feeling Poorly Again, Are You?”
This year, I’ve written a lot about my memories of TV as a kid. This can stand in for all of them; a touching moment between me and my father, about a scene featuring sexual frustration and extreme violence.
The Young Ones Music Guide: Series 1
For years, I’ve wanted to make a soundtrack for The Young Ones, in a similar vein to this one for I’m Alan Partridge. I didn’t manage that this year, but the research for it resulted in this piece: a list of (nearly) every single piece of music used in Series 1 of the show. See also: Series 2.
Condition: Red
Probably the most personal piece I wrote all year, about a terrifying image from my childhood. This article has floated around my head for decades, so I’m pleased to finally get it down. It’s probably my favourite thing I wrote all year. Which is good, because if I’d thought about it for that long and then it sucked, that’d be really annoying.
The Dull Religious Music Programme
Ever wondered how difficult it can be to research obscure parts of TV comedy history? Wonder no more. This is why I don’t write enough; because of rabbit-holes like this.
Rescuing Bladedancer, or: The Fall and Rise of a BBC Micro Enthusiast
A very atypical piece for this site, about how I helped with the preservation of a long lost BBC Micro game from 1992. This is the thing I’ve been involved with this year that I’m proudest of.
Arnold J. Rimmer, BSc, SSc
OK, so I said at the beginning of the year I wasn’t going to do any proper writing about Red Dwarf for a while. I lasted ten months. Could have been worse. This is a good one, though, tracing an important part of the show’s mythology back to its origin.
“Faulty? What’s Wrong with Him?”
A strange tale about a Fawlty Towers misquote, and how it spread across the internet. I love that I managed to figure out 95% of the story… but sadly, not the last 5%. There’s still time to answer my email, Mr. Metro Man. There’s still time.
A Day in the Life of The Young Ones: 6th February 1984
And to round the year off, yet more bollocks about The Young Ones, taking a look at the recording of the episode “Nasty”. This was another of those pieces that I thought might get just four readers, so it was a surprise to me that it ended up one of the most popular pieces I wrote all year. You are all absurd. Thanks.
* * *
And if you’re aching for more, here’s a few other things I wrote this year that I think turned out well: memories of a terrifying film, an unfortunate echo of Paul Daniels, tracing the library music in a classic Trev & Simon sketch, a brand new fact about Father Ted, how Doctor on the Go broke the fourth wall, and failed futures in Red Dwarf.
It seems frankly tasteless to say it, but this year has been a good one for Dirty Feed. Leaving Ganymede & Titan at the start of year gave me more time to work on the site than ever before, and lockdown meant a fair few people have been starved of entertainment. The result: I’ve written more stuff on here than in any other year of the site’s existence, and it’s also been by far the most popular year the site has ever had too.1 As ever, thanks to everyone who has read, liked, and shared my stuff over the past year. I really do appreciate it. Hopefully, I at least managed to take your mind off things for a while.
But with all of that, comes a problem. I love writing things here, but I think it’s obvious that the research for some of these pieces is an absolute bastard. Most of the best stuff on Dirty Feed isn’t tossed off in an afternoon. The danger is that this place becomes a treadmill; that I spend so long researching and writing my usual kind of articles, that I never try anything new again. And much as I enjoy writing ridiculous things about sitcoms, I really am itching to try something new.
Which leads us to the big2 announcement.
From the beginning of 2021, Dirty Feed is going on hiatus, for the first time in the 11 years I’ve been publishing it. How long for, I don’t actually know yet; it depends what happens over the next few months. But for a while, I need to try something different. I’ll be working on a few projects behind-the-scenes, and hopefully some of them will be published here eventually, but don’t expect anything new on the site for quite a while. Those of you waiting for my THRILLING EXPOSÉ about how material from an unbroadcast Grant Naylor radio pilot ended up in an episode of Alas Smith and Jones are going to have to wait for a bit.
Thanks again to everyone who has been nice about the site in the past year, and let’s hope 2021 is better for all of us. For now though…
It’s January 1999, and Ronald D. Moore – writer/producer on Star Trek: Deep Space 9 – is chatting on AOL, answering fan questions about the show.
One particular question catches my eye. You don’t need to know the actual storyline, or have watched any of the episodes – that isn’t the important bit here.
Ron, I read on the boards that there was a scene in “To the Death” in which Weyoun somehow slipped Odo some virus that eventually resulted in his having to return to the Link in “Broken Link.” I read that this ended up on the cutting room floor. Is this true or just a wild rumor?
It’s just a rumor.
Now, one delightful thing about DS9 is that – unlike most TV shows – every single script is available for us to read. Not a boring transcript. The actual script, as used in production, including cut material, and the scene descriptions. Which means we can check and see if Moore is correct in this instance.
So, in the script for “To The Death”, we can read the following1:
Weyoun looks at Odo for a beat, then gives him a good-natured clap on the shoulder. (In case anyone’s interested, when he touches Odo, Weyoun is purposely infecting Odo with the disease that almost kills him in “BROKEN LINK.”)
WEYOUN: Then it’s over. After all, you’re a Founder. I live to serve you.
And with that, Weyoun steps back into his quarters.
True, this scene didn’t end up on the “cutting room floor” – it’s in the episode as broadcast, just without the physical act of Weyoun clapping Odo on the shoulder. But the main thrust of how most people would interpret Moore’s response – that the episode never intended to contain Weyoun infecting Odo – is incorrect.
I very much doubt it was a deliberate lie. There’s certainly no obvious reason to try and hide anything. Moore almost certainly just forgot. That’s what happens when making TV shows; you can’t remember everything, there’s far too much important stuff jostling for position in your head. It’s completely understandable.
Still, the moral is clear. Don’t trust people’s recollections. Always trust the paperwork.
* * *
It’s 2020, and I have decided to trace every single piece of music used in The Young Ones, for some godforsaken reason. But not to worry. I have some production paperwork to help me out, which should list every track cleared for use in the show.
So let’s take a look at part of the sheet for the episode “Summer Holiday”:
Ah, “Tension Background”. Wonder what that was used for? Let’s take a listen, I’m sure all will become obvious.
Oh. That literally doesn’t appear anywhere in the episode at all. Brilliant.
To cut a long, tedious story short: the paperwork is wrong. Not entirely wrong; a track from the Conroy library album Drama – Tension is actually used in the episode. But the cut used is Track 3, “Chase Sequence”, not Track 15, “Tension Background”.
And that piece of detective work means that we can enjoy the full version of the music used when Neil goes all Incredible Hulk:
So, the moral is clear. Never trust the paperwork.
* * *
Have I mentioned that I hate doing research?
Reformatted here for readability. ↩
Least promising headline on Dirty Feed ever, amongst some stiff competition, I know. Dirty Feed editorial policy is an even more niche subject than Hale & Pace fan fiction. But I do know there will be a few people wondering about it. Consider this a boring publishing note that most people can skip, and read something more interesting instead.
So: recently, I’ve started publishing a few posts on here which I originally wrote for Red Dwarf fansite Ganymede & Titan, which I departed from back in January. I thought I’d give a little explanation as to my choices, because republishing my old shit has never been this site’s modus operandi before. (It’s always been about publishing my new shit.) But as I said at the start of the year, I do like the idea of some of my work from G&T having a home here too, especially given that it’s the perfect chance to revise and improve a few things.
Still, some of the stuff I’ve chosen to republish over here so far isn’t exactly the obvious stuff you’d think I might pick. So here’s my thinking behind it all, for those who care.
Obviously, plenty of stuff I wrote over on G&T just isn’t Dirty Feed material. For a start, I published literally hundreds of news articles over the years, which actually consisted of the bulk of my writing – precisely none of which are worth reviving here. Pieces on the imminent transmission of The Crouches aren’t something which need to pop up on Dirty Feed in 2020.1
Then there’s the longer, but still time-sensitive articles, such as my review of The Bodysnatcher Collection DVD back in 2007. I love that they are still available online, and hope they always will be, but I don’t see any point in throwing them across to here. They capture a particular point in time, that a 2020 date attached would entirely destroy.
Finally in terms of stuff that won’t come over here, there’s the old jointly-written articles, like this piece on the climax to Red Dwarf VI. I honestly can’t remember who wrote what in those pieces – in the early days, it was often a Lennon/McCartney situation2 – but that’s all the more reason not to publish them on Dirty Feed.
So, what of stuff that is likely to find its way over here? Currently, it’s the shorter material being revised and republished, especially stuff written over the past couple of years that I still actually like. Pieces about the early satellite repeats of Red Dwarf fit neatly into the kind of thing I already publish over here, for instance.3
Then there’s the bigger pieces. Stuff like my old Hancock’s Half Hour article are thoroughly Dirty Feed material, and you’d think they would be the first things to make their way across over to here. The reason they haven’t so far is simple: I want to do a proper job at revising them to make a little more sense outside a fandom context, and that takes time. Then there’s my analysis of the sets in Series 1 and 2 of Red Dwarf, which I abandoned after three posts. That needs finishing off, but it’s a big project that really needs proper time setting aside for. It’ll happen eventually.
And finally, there are the old articles which are revised so much that I haven’t even bothered acknowledging their roots in old G&T pieces. For instance, the piece I wrote on here last month about a character-defining joke in Red Dwarf was initially inspired by a G&T piece from 2017, on an old Grant Naylor radio sitcom. But there are so many additions and changes in the Dirty Feed article – the first two-thirds are brand new, for instance – that it’s not really a rewrite of an old piece any more, and so doesn’t get labelled as such.
So there you go. Boring, but if you were confused as to the slightly-strange-from-the-outside republishing policy, then there’s your explanation. I’m not interested in porting over every single piece of writing I’ve ever done about Red Dwarf to here – anything I publish I want to reflect what I think about things today. After all, there are plenty of old articles which aren’t time-sensitive, and you’d think would make a decent post on here… but after ten years, I have decided are actually complete and utter bollocks. No point dragging out my ill-thought-through pieces about how whatever the faults of a piece of comedy, “it doesn’t matter as long as its funny”.4
Now, let’s forget about Red Dwarf for a bit. Who fancies something about Doctor on the Go instead?
I do like the headline, though. ↩
Yes, I’m afraid I actually did just make that comparison. ↩
The revising takes two forms, incidentally. The first is to mainly strip the pieces of fandom in-jokes which wouldn’t really work over here. The second is proper improvements to the material. This piece on an old Night Network show adds some research involving TV listings which really should have been part of the original G&T version, but I was lazy. ↩
This is one trap I fell into time and time again in old pieces of writing about comedy: segregating off “comedy” and “everything else”. Which is nonsense. Everything feeds into whether something is funny or not. A lot of my early writing about comedy is me splashing around, desperately trying to come up with something worth putting on the page… and failing. ↩
Internet / Meta / TV Comedy / TV Presentation
I’ve had it up to here with Twitter. This is not an in-depth article about the perils of social media. It’s just a simple statement of fact. I’ve had it up to here with Twitter.
I could list the many reasons why I’m bored with it right now. People coming into your mentions and explaining your own jokes back to you is a big one. People piping up with the ludicrously obvious take, when you’ve tried your hardest to tweet something more interesting, is another.1 The constant stream of unpleasant news is a third. I know the world’s going to shit, I am literally paid to put news bulletins on air, and monitor them closely. I don’t need to be told all this stuff in my free time as well. It’s just too much to cope with.
Then there’s the thing which pushed me entirely over the edge yesterday: making a crap joke about “nations and regions” in terms of television playout, only for someone who doesn’t even follow me to pipe up with some nebulous political point against me. And when I tried to politely explain I’m talking about something technical rather than anything wider, they block me. I got enough of this kind of aggressive, bad faith shit in the playground when I was 12. Right now, I don’t feel like willingly putting myself through it as an adult. I am bored of other people making their neuroses my business.
So for now, I’m deactivated.
Of course, it won’t last. I’ve not stormed off for good. Lots of people who I really like talking to, I only actually know on Twitter. And speaking entirely selfishly, Twitter is where I get the vast majority of hits for Dirty Feed from.2 At some point I’ll be back, like a dog eating its own fetid puke. But the longer I can take a break from it, the better for my mental health. So if you wondered where I’d got to, there’s your answer. I’m just trying to do something more useful for a bit.
There are many pieces of terrible pop culture writing online. I’ve done plenty of it myself. But sometimes, a piece of work is so dreadful, that it lingers in your head for well over a decade. To the point where it actually falls offline, and you need to use the Wayback Machine to find it.
Such was the case with this piece on Knightmare from 2002. And it really is absolutely bloody awful.
The scene is set in the third paragraph, with possibly the least promising sentence ever written:
“Actually, as I write, I realise that I haven’t seen Knightmare for sodding years.”
An admission which leads to beautiful moments like this:
“It got rubbisher, as well: in a desperate attempt to fiddle with the formula, the producers ditched many of the more atmospheric locations and charismatic characters (notably Pickle, Treguard’s wonderful gay elf sidekick) in favour of comic hangers-on and tedious gimmicry. The eyeshield, anyone? Pah.”
Unfortunately, the facts are as follows: both the eyeshield and Pickle debuted in the same series. Series 4, to be exact.1
After that, deconstructing the article is like shooting fish in a barrel, to the point where it’s pretty much worthless. For instance, take this, on why Knightmare ended:
“It died because its niche fanbase eventually either a) got older, b) got computers or c) got sex – in any case, the market for its pedestrian, camp fantobabble was never going to last.”
This article was published in 2002. Three years earlier, creator Tim Child had already written a history of the show on Knightmare.com, which gave detailed reasons for why the show wasn’t recommissioned. But the writer of this piece isn’t interested in the actual facts; they’re interested in a pithy turn of phrase. Which also explains the bizarre line about “pedestrian, camp fantobabble”, which comes out of absolutely nowhere.
I could go on – what the hell is the bit about the “niche fanbase” all about, when it was an absurdly popular show, and a touchstone for a generation? – but you get the point. The main reason I bring all this up is because I realised the other day exactly how much this article influenced me when it came to writing my own piece about Knightmare, published last month. A piece that yes, has its fair share of reminiscing about the show.
It also throws in plenty of cold hard facts, as well. It transcribes actual sections from the show. It quotes Tim Child twice, from two separate sources. It’s a piece which proves you can still write about your memories, and fact check them at the same time without destroying anything.
That old piece from 2002 makes a point of acknowledging “nostalgia’s rose-tinted eye”, but doesn’t actually do anything about it. The way to avoid nostalgia is to watch and research what you’re writing about. And who knows? You might find that what you’re writing about doesn’t “look a bit, erm, crap”. You might just find it’s still fucking great. And if you don’t think it’s great, at least you can explain why, rather than guessing.
And I write this not because I want to say I’m brilliant. Well, not entirely. But it did shape something in my approach to writing that I think is worth noting: that just because you’re writing about pop culture, it doesn’t absolve you from doing the legwork. Just because you liked a kid’s TV show when you were younger, it doesn’t mean your half-remembered guff about it is enough.
Realising that at least sets you on the right path, however well you ultimately manage to traverse it. I think I get to the start of Level 2 before being killed off, but at least that’s better than dying in the first room.
There’s also no evidence that Pickle was gay, either, but I have no issue with slash being written about him. ↩
Thanks to The Hollywood Reporter, for reminding me that back on the 18th June, it was the 30th anniversary of the Next Generation episode “The Best of Both Worlds”.
“From 1987 to 1989, the voyages of Captain Picard and the crew of the Enterprise-D struggled to be anything more than a passable background watch in its creatively-turbulent first and second seasons. (Season two’s “The Measure of a Man” and “Q Who?” being the lone must-watch exceptions.)”
I mean, everyone’s allowed an opinion, even if it is one of the most tedious Trek opinions I’ve seen for quite a while. I’m just going to vaguely point in the direction of “The Big Goodbye”, “11001001”, “Heart of Glory”, “Elementary Dear Data”, “A Matter of Honour”, and “The Emissary”, and fold my arms in annoyance.
“The episode also doesn’t get much credit for how satisfying it wraps up that storyline for Riker. By radically accepting that an extra rank pip on his collar doesn’t determine his status or worth, Riker makes the very emotionally-honest realization that lets him have an arc even though he’s staying put on the Enterprise bridge. (Piller’s script argues that one doesn’t need to move on or change jobs to evolve personally within their profession. Ironically, Piller would stay on the series as well, before leaving to help oversee Star Trek spinoffs Deep Space Nine and Voyager. The former wouldn’t exist without the storyline established by “Best of Both Worlds”, either.)”
How is that ironic? It’s literally the exact opposite. It would be ironic if Piller had written about how you can evolve personally within the same role, and then left the series anyway, but he didn’t.
OK, whatever, I’m bored with picking apart this article. The reason why I’m pleased to be reminded of this little anniversary is because it lets me be massively self-indulgent, yet again. Back in 2018, I wrote a little piece on here called “6 Times Your Favourite TV Shows Jumped the Shark”. A pisstake of clickbait journalism and the entire concept of jumping the shark itself, I have to admit it’s one of my favourite things I’ve ever written.
It was, however, not originally “6 Times”. In the first draft, it was 10. I’m sure you can already hear the joke wearing thin from here; halfway through the article, the idea just died. So acting on advice from someone used to script-editing comedy or something, I kicked four of the sections out the door. Those excised sections were on Blackadder II (“Bells”), Frasier (“The Ski Lodge”), Happy Days (Season 3, when they changed the theme tune), and… Star Trek: The Next Generation. Guess the episode?
And while the article was fifty times better with these sections deleted, I always had a soft spot for that last little section. My favourite parts of the article were the bits where I was teetering on the line between a bad-faith argument, and something that might be, sort of, valid. I think the below definitely manages that.
So, on the 30th anniversary of that famous episode, here’s a deleted scene from an old Dirty Feed article. I told you it was self-indulgent.
* * *
The third season of TNG is often seen as the moment where the show really came into its own. And it’s true: once Michael Piller came on board, the show took enormous strides in almost every single area. Showpiece episodes like Yesterday’s Enterprise and Sins of the Father are the best remembered, but I’m especially fond of shows like The Offspring – quiet, character-based shows that are the lifeblood of the series.
And then, at the end of the season, the show blows it all away.
It’s difficult to count the number of things the Borgfest Best of Both Worlds gets wrong. There’s Borg expert Lieutenant Commander Shelby, forced into the show purely so Riker can worry about his career. Written by Piller, this pathetically reflected his own worries about whether to move on from the show or stay for a fourth season; possibly the most indulgent thing ever written for the whole of Star Trek. This perhaps wouldn’t matter so much if it worked in-universe, but the whole point of TNG was to show that Starfleet officers had moved beyond petty conflict. The famous “You’re in my way” speech is a betrayal of everything Gene Roddenberry stood for.
But I could deal with that, if the resulting show was entertaining. Sadly, it isn’t. The reason Q Who was so scary is that the Borg acted as one hive mind: relentless, unstoppable. To have Picard assimilated, and act as a Queen Bee figure for our crew to talk to kills off everything which is unique about the Borg. It reduces them to stock villans, indistinguishable from the Romulans except for a few tubes sticking out here and there. You can betray Roddenberry’s future, or destroy a great villain: but in doing both, the series doomed itself.
Season 4 started with a perfunctory resolution to the absurd cliffhanger, and then followed it up with the ludicrously self-indulgent Family, a show with no science fiction elements whatsoever, and thus not even remotely within TNG’s remit. I stopped watching, and I can’t imagine I was alone.
I try to keep housekeeping posts at a minimum here on Dirty Feed, but I feel the need to mark this one, as I’ve written a lot about it in the past. As of the 25th January, I’m no longer part of Ganymede & Titan. I know, I know, I don’t know why the media aren’t parked out on my doorstep either.
This has a few implications for Dirty Feed. Firstly and most immediately, I can suddenly spend rather more time working on silly articles for this place, which is a positive thing. More on that shortly.
Secondly, over the next few months, a few selected articles I wrote over on Ganymede & Titan might be republished here, slightly rewritten and improved. Don’t worry, there won’t be a deluge of reheated Dwarf nonsense – there would be no point moving the site’s bread-and-butter posts over to here. But some of the better stuff probably deserves a new home somewhere under my control. And I’d like the opportunity to improve a few of them too.
Thirdly, it would be complete madness for me to leave G&T, and then immediately start writing brand new Dwarf stuff over here. But once I’ve had a year or so’s break from that kind of thing, there are a few things about old Red Dwarf that I’d like to finish off here. In particular, my series of articles looking at the show’s sets has been abandoned halfway through; I’d like to bring that to some kind of conclusion. So for those of you who enjoy my Red Dwarf writing, it’s not disappearing entirely. It is going into hibernation for a bit, though.
Fourthly, I am definitely going to write something about Come Back Mrs Noah, purely to be annoying.