Monday November 5th
Bonfire night. Mum and Dad take me to a local communal bonfire and
fireworks display in Fairburn, probably the first community event we attend.
My parents invite their new friends, Ralph and Christine Watson, who bring
with them their two sons, Steven and Richard. Eventually we became great
friends and would see each other regularly for many years. But it seems on
our first meeting, they really annoyed me.
History: Guy Fawkes
Tuesday November 6th
English: Bonfire Night
Sapphire and Steel: Assignment Two - Part 7
Not The Nine O’Clock News: Series 1, Ep 4 - still hit and miss, but it’s starting
to flow really nicely. Maybe the songs help.
BBC 2 Continuity (with Richard Stilgoe)
The Human League perform The Path of Least Resistance and Empire State
Human on BBC 1’s Mainstream.
Meanwhile, in a staggeringly useless bit of scheduling, The Damned play
Smash It Up and I Just Can’t Be Happy Today live on The Old Grey Whistle
Test on BBC 2. At the exact same time. Good job nobody likes both bands
then, eh?
Wednesday November 7th
Quatermass - Part 3
Thursday November 8th
Science: Air Pressure
John Craven’s Newsround
Sapphire and Steel: Assignment Two - Part 8
Doctor Who Weekly No 5
Spectacular Spider-Man Weekly No 349
Hulk Comic No 37
Star Wars Weekly No 90 advertises the Marvel Winter Specials “out now”.
These include Star Heroes, Frantic and Superhero Fun & Games, all of which
I loved. Miraculously, in 2021, I still have all three. Editor Dez Skinn has some
interesting stuff to say about them here.
Monty Python’s Life of Brian is released in UK cinemas. Some time around
now, the BBC show this behind the scenes documentary.
Top of the Pops - once again presented by serial child rapist Jimmy Savile, so
the full episode is hard to find. But these clips are plentiful:
•
Rockabilly Rebel Matchbox
•
One Step Beyond Madness
•
A Message to You, Rudy The Specials
•
Rise Herb Alpert (danced to by Legs & Co)
•
You’re a Better Man Than I Sham 69
•
On My Radio The Selecter
Friday November 9th
Four men are convicted of murdering 13-year-old paperboy Carl Bridgewater
in Stourbridge. Three spend 18 years in jail before a Court of Appeal
judgement rules that they did not have a fair trial and quashes their
convictions. The fourth dies of a heart attack in prison in 1981.
John Cleese, Michael Palin, Malcolm Muggeridge and the Bishop of
Southwark debate the merits of the new Monty Python film on the live chat
show Friday Night, Saturday Morning. You can see the full show here.
And here’s a parody of it from November 20th.
Saturday November 10th
Doctor Who: The Creature from the Pit - Part Three - the episode in which
Tom Baker tries to make the programme more entertaining by blowing down
a giant green alien’s phallic appendage. And still fails miserably.
The Professionals: Stopover
2000 AD Prog 139
Sunday November 11th
Remembrance Sunday. 61 years after the end of the First World War. Only
34 and a half years after the end of the second.
The final episode of Series 1 of To the Manor Born rakes in 23.95m viewers,
making it the highest ever UK television audience according to this source,
but not to this one or this one. Let’s say it was ‘the most watched scripted
entertainment show with actors’. Or ‘the second most watched
entertainment programme of all time’. And it’s still in the Top Ten.
Over on BBC2, Angela Rippon reads the news. The main headlines concern
the hostage crisis at the US Embassy in Tehran and the nascent Zimbabwe’s
continuing struggle for independence. Fans of Not The Nine O’Clock News
will be delighted to know Angela really does overpronounce the word
‘guerrilla’.
UK SINGLES CHART
No 1: When You’re in Love with a Beautiful Woman Dr Hook
No 34: Que Sera Mi Vida Gibson Brothers
No 57: Brass in Pocket Pretenders
No 60: Is It Love You’re After Rose Royce
UK ALBUMS CHART
No 1: Greatest Hits Vol. 2 ABBA
No 51: Machine Gun Etiquette The Damned
Monday November 5th - Sunday November 11th, 1979
TERM 1: Week 9
TERM 1 (Sept - Dec 1979)
Week 0 (Aug 25 - Sep 2, 1979)
Week 1 (Sep 3 - Sep 9, 1979)
Week 2 (Sep 10 - Sep 16, 1979)
Week 3 (Sep 17 - Sep 23, 1979)
Week 4 (Sep 24 - Sep 30, 1979)
Week 5 (Oct 1 - Oct 7, 1979)
Week 6 (Oct 8 - Oct 14, 1979)
Week 7 (Oct 15 - Oct 21, 1979)
Half Term (Oct 22 - Oct 28, 1979)
Week 8 (Oct 29 - Nov 4, 1979)
Week 9 (Nov 5 - Nov 11, 1979)
Week 10 (Nov 12 - Nov 18, 1979)
Week 11 (Nov 19 - Nov 25, 1979)
Week 12 (Nov 26 - Dec 2, 1979)
Week 13 (Dec 3 - Dec 9, 1979)
Week 14 (Dec 10 - Dec 16, 1979)
Week 15 (Dec 17 - Dec 23, 1979)
Christmas (Dec 24 - Dec 30, 1979)
New Year’s Eve (Dec 31, 1979)
TERM 1 IN LINK FORM
TERM 2 (Jan - Apr 1980)
TERM 3 (Apr - Jul 1980)