There have been lots of rumours about who would be participating in Strictly Come Dancing this year, and all I've heard for ages is people saying other people would like to do it. The best example was everyone's favourite Master Baker Paul Hollywood pausing at all the "wrong" moments in conversation with Chris Evans. It was a fine example of the art of misdirection, which only became apparent yesterday when …

Lots of great TV has returned to our screens recently: The Great British Bake Off, Doctor Who, Only Connect, etc. There is still more to come, I believe, but actually it is Only Connect that caught my attention, making me ponder why exactly it is that we enjoy quizzes that are too hard for us? With Only Connect, I wondered if it was simply that the format is completely engaging. …

It's not been a good couple of weeks, I'll be honest. I had hoped to go out for a longer run this weekend but I only had two opportunities - one of them was far too hot to even consider and the other one... well, I went for a nap instead. You know how it is. The last six runs I have done have been thirty minutes each, and have …

The iTunes Festival is currently in full swing - 30 days of live music, held at the Camden Roundhouse in London and streamed across the globe via iTunes and its many apps. There's a variety of acts available, with warm up artists appearing before more established names, and the diversity is amazing. So far we've already heard from the pop name that is Olly Murs, through the more acoustic Ed …

Presumably, this episode's title comes as an homage or a satire of Snakes on a Plane. I haven't seen the film but if it is anything like as mad as this weekend's Who outing, I'm on board. The action got going straight away, with the Doctor picking up his "gang" and heading straight to the spaceship housing the aforementioned prehistoric creatures. He referenced not having a gang before, but I …

As I tweeted earlier in the week, something I had not considered when I dreamt up this idea of trying my hand at things that the Bake Off featured, was the concept of not liking anything within a given week. Each episode is on a theme, but there are three options within each and a multitude of recipes in each option. How is it possible not to like any of …

When I was posting Trailer Tuesday a while back, the Paddington poster made me want to read the books, so I had a peek on the Kindle store and found many of them (perhaps all?) available for the device. That got me thinking, what other fab books of my youth are also available for the Kindle? The Worst Witch was one of my favourites as a kid, probably because I …

I just recently finished playing a new, actually old, game on the iPad called The Island: Castaway. I can't remember why I bought it, except that I love islands and the concept of being cast away on one. That'll probably do it. There's a video ad for the game that explains it better than I could. It's really very simple, you just run around picking things up, and interacting with …

I've been catching up on some RSS feeds recently (where I am getting down to a reasonable number of unlistened podcasts, my unread items has been creeping up), and I spotted this crazy little item earlier in the month. A DeLorean that is also a boat. It's cool, and fun, but I took umbridge with the concept almost immediately simply because of this, in the Engadget story where I saw …

A lot has happened in a month for Vicky and Mike. Vicky couldn't contain her excitement over the news, announcing it at Phoebe's coming home party. Everyone seemed to take it very well - I was expecting a lot more shock and gossip, but we didn't really hear any of that. (In fact, when Lynda learned of the news, she was incredibly supportive, beautifully so!) Instead, the focus of the …

Doctor Who is back on our screens as the seventh series began yesterday. With Daleks, divorce, a delightful Doctor plus a surprise special guest, this first episode had a little bit of everything. Actually, it had quite a lot of Daleks. Before we get onto the episode proper, it's worth a quick mention for Pond Life - the pre-series build up mini-episodes that featured on the BBC's Doctor Who webpage …

Mr C and I had something of a discussion/disagreement after the last baking adventure. The flatbreads were nice enough, but he was disappointed they didn't match anything that he'd seen on his TV screen. I hadn't realised it up until this point but the BBC do actually put selected recipes from the Great British Bake Off on the site, so for this week's challenge, I promised to do something that …

There hasn't been too much to report for the last two weeks, I'm afraid real life has just got in the way of my dreams of Olympic stardom. In reality, I have been training at work for two weeks, with another still to come, and it's amazing what a difference this change of pace makes. Firstly, I've been getting home from work a little later than normal. With time such …

I was ever so slightly disappointed that this week's topic was breads, as I had such fun with the cake last week, I was hoping for more sweet treats this time round. Nevertheless, the theme was bread based, and the options were as follows: Signature dish - Flatbreads Technical challenge - Plaited loaf Showstopper - Sweet and savoury bagels I was very, very tempted by the bagels because as we …

To tie in with the Olympics, the Kindle store held a Reading Marathon sale. Oh, how I love a Kindle sale. I delved right in, clicking my way through book after book, pondering some new purchases. I spent more than I would have liked, but equally, came out with plenty of books for my money, so I can't complain. It wasn't until I synced them with my actual Kindle that …

The fantastic Great British Bake Off has returned to our screens this past week, with a brand new batch of bakers trying to impress the lovely Mary Berry and feisty Paul Hollywood. For the last two series, I've been a passive viewer - sometimes drooling, sometime awe-inspired by what the amateur bakers are managing to achieve. The showstopper challenge still impresses me every time, particular as they draw near the …

I've kept a diary on and off for years. The first diary I remember writing was in one of those exercise books where half the page is blank and half the page is lines with enormous spacing. We would draw and write about our day. I don't draw well, but I probably didn't write very well in those days either. I also recall later keeping a diary in the back …

Whilst my previous posts on this subject have been bullet point notes of things that have stood out for me, I can't do the same for this one. Already, the specific details are beginning to fade from my brain, and we're only one day post-Olympics. Mo was brilliant, obviously. There were some great final moments in the modern pentathlons, weird as they are. Tom Daley's diving on Friday was fantastic, …

I renamed the category for these posts a while back, opting to call it the Running Diary. As that is the case, here is a true day by day diary of last week's workouts. Monday Definitely in the mood for a run today, having not been out since Wednesday. It was a busy weekend, so no real time to hit the pavements. Went out for thirty minutes, felt good, relatively …

As with my previous post, here are just some random thoughts from the last few days of competition. The Men's 400m final was brilliant. Not only were there twins in the race, but they crossed the line at almost exactly the same time! They came 5th and 6th and were just two hundredths of a second apart! Of course, you can't talk about brothers without mentioning the Brownlee duo who …

Firstly, I can't quite understand where the last two weeks have gone. These are meant to be weekly updates but they keep turning into fortnightly ones because the days are escaping me. It felt like it was going to be a really good week/fortnight for running this time, although now I look back I didn't go nearly as much as I had thought! After running on Sunday, I also went …

This month the troubles at Brookfield came to an apparent end, so towards the end of July we had a glimpse of other impending storylines and a reminder that there are other people in Ambridge too! But, of course, the fire at Brookfield farm really was the key point of the last few weeks and still has some repercussions to come. Fired up At first, everyone was abandoning the farm …

With the Olympics taking over everything, I thought I'd spare five minutes to note down some thoughts on what I've seen so far. These are just scrabbled notes, not arranged in much of an order, Opening Ceremony Highlights Rowan Atkinson's moment of glory was fabulous. The ability of one man to captivate what turned out to be an audience made up of 26 million is so good. I'm sure there …

Oh. so. good. And I do love Ben Whishaw! Cannot wait.

There's just a day or so left before the 2012 Olympics gets underway (or if you're a football fan, they already have!) and I'm excited! I've only really got into the Olympics over the last couple of games, I paid more attention at Beijing than I have before, and I'm really looking forward to watching as much as possible this year. It helps that we'll have day by day threads …

Fresh from my experiment with the free taster teabags that Twinings send out to potential customers, I decided to go with the same company for my next purchase. I've never really understood the idea of nettle flavoured things - aren't they those irritating plants that make walks in the country just that little bit more dangerous? So, Nettle and Sweet Fennel. I bought this before realising it was quite so …

(Bit late posting this one, but the heat! When you get to read about this week's running adventures I already know it will say TOO HOT TO BE ALIVE! But that is for the future.) I don't know. Each week I start with the best intentions and they just get brushed aside as quickly as I can snap my fingers. Instead of whining on about when I did and didn't …