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Lessons from daytime telly

Thanks to a pretty bad head cold, I’ve found myself snivelling away in front of daytime TV recently. I find daytime television absolutely fascinating – what it says about a country or, probably more to the point, what it says about what TV executives think about a country never ceases to astound me.

Quick lessons from daytime television:

  1. Making money is easy (Trash to Cash, Cash in the Attic)

    Need money? Simple. Just flog off your great, great grandma’s teapot that’s cluttering up the sideboard and that holiday in Spain can be yours. Family heirlooms?! Pah!

  2. Anyone can be an antiques dealer (Bargain Hunt, Dickinson’s Real Deal, Sun, Sea and Bargains)

    Could this be the only country in the world where making money out of buying and selling antiques (even if it’s only for a £5 profit) can be turned into a competitive game show?

  3. Everyone else’s house is nicer than yours and look how much it cost them! (Homes under the Hammer, To Buy or Not to Buy, A Place in the Sun, Escape to the Country)

    These shows are probably aimed at our innate voyeurism, but I suspect that they also play their own small part in pushing up property prices and buyer/seller expectations. Afterall, absolutely everyone wants to (and can afford to providing they sell enough of their attic clutter in Trash to Cash) live in a 5 bedroom house with 4 bathrooms, 3 car garage, aga, huge cottage garden and heated swimming pool with superb sea/countryside views, which is all just down the road from the worlds best pub.  

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 4th, 2008 at 3:30 pm and is filed under Random. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “Lessons from daytime telly”

  1. BLTP Says:
    June 5th, 2008 at 9:38 am

    I think day time telly is plan sprung by a stern God to make us go to work rather than have our brains dribble out of noses. It’s doubly pointless for me because I don’t own a house and the chances of me selling any of my tat are nil. If I was on one of the auction programme I think the producers would sack me when I came back from the car boot with arms full of dodgy vinyl and paper backs with camp titles rather than the usal claris cliff.

  2. Cocktails Says:
    June 5th, 2008 at 10:39 am

    Actually, an episode of Bargain Hunt which I saw last year, and which has stayed with me forever it was so good, featured two men in their 20s who did just that – they bought some LPs and a battered WWII field stretcher that they thought was cool. Boy, was the host not impressed.

    You are right though. I am not 100% better and am back at work partly to get away from daytime TV.

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