Today's cultural icon

Last night's BBC2 was particularly good value: double Heroes, Newsnight and The Wire. However, greater than all these was Lauren Laverne reading John Keats' 'On Leaving Some Friends At An Early Hour' as a promo for the upcoming Poetry Season! I could have swooned… Unfortunately, Youtube has failed me and the BBC hasn't posted it yet (but watch this space).What's not to love about Lauren? Kenickie were a great band, she genuinely loves poetry, and she called the Spice Girls 'Tory Scum'.

A home without books is a body without soul. (Cicero)

That's enough for today. My claw-hand aches, my eyes hurt, and I've finished the PGCE stuff for now. I've received two books and ordered three, and spent the day torturing my colleagues with Juliana Hatfield. I've also bought tickets for Serious Money on Wednesday. (Student tickets are £15). All in all, not a bad day. Now home - to do some ironing and watch Heroes! Or perhaps to read.

Licence fee - whinge, whinge, whinge.

People sometimes whinge to me about the licence fee being a rip-off, or an unfair, compulsory tax. Never mind that it pays for 100+ radio stations, several TV channels - at least one of which will appeal to you - the World Service and the whole transmission system AND doesn't carry adverts.

Last night's BBC2 vindicated the licence fee for me (despite the Orwellian ads about paying up or being hunted down). Heroes, followed by some variable quality Mitchell and Webb, then Stuart Lee (he won't be appearing on commercial TV anytime soon), then a stunning Cancer Special Newsnight which didn't mention God or 'alternative' (i.e. evil, made-up preying on the vulnerable) medicine, followed by The Wire. Two of these are American shows - fine. They're good quality and cost millions of pounds per episode, and we get them for £140 per year.