Watching Neighbours Twice a Day...: How ’90s TV (Almost) Prepared Me For Life

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TV seemed more innocent, not the stream of rubbish like Love Island, Made in Chelsea, Married at First Sight, I'm A Celebrity that dominates our screens now. Like Lou I have bowel problems – not the same one, but still ‘anal wouldn’t help’ (this is a reference from the book – not me being completely weird when writing this blog post! Despite us both remembering Todd Landers being run over, there is little cross-over (he doesn’t mention ‘Plain Jane Super Brain’ or Dr. It's one of those books that will make you want to chat to the person nearest to you to discuss what you've just read and ask if they also remember Get Your Own Back or Knightmare.

We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. I was super excited when the book landed on my doormat – and even got goosebumps from reading the chapter titles (which are all named after different 90s TV programmes) – as they brought back lots of memories.This comes from someone who is not necessarily a super mega fan of Josh Widdicombe, just someone with a normal level of fandom. I read all the way to the end of the acknowledgements (my neck is stiffer than Beckett’s – another podcast reference, I am such a fangirl) and the part written to Josh’s wife and kids made me cry!

When Covid struck and the country entered lockdown, Widdicombe and Beckett were stuck at home and the reality of parenting young children without the escape of work hit hard. It tells the story of the end of an era, the last time when watching television was a shared experience for the family and the nation, before the internet meant everyone watched different things at different times on different devices, headphones on to make absolutely sure no one else could watch it with them. There's jamming in the kitchen, laughter in the lounge and poetry on the landing - and a whole lot more fun and frolics going on upstairs.I’m almost a decade older than Josh (so my brain’s Broom Cupboard default presenter is more Philip Schofield than Andi Peters) – and my kids are older than his kids too – but I still find the podcast very entertaining. A childhood memoir about growing up watching far too much TV in the 1990s, Watching Neighbours Twice a Day… How 90’s TV (Almost) Prepared Me For Life tells the story of a strange rural childhood, the kind of childhood Widdicombe only realised was weird when he left home and started telling people about it.

reads like one of those projects where a publisher throws a book deal and topic at a well known comedian in the assumption that this name recognition will guarantee both sales and chuckles. Even though I appreciated the throwback to the communal experience of pre-internet television, the actual content of the pop-culture didn’t have that ring of recognition for me. I’ve never seen most of these TV shows, being American, but Josh describes them in perfect and hilarious detail!This pretty much features all the recognisable shows of that decade, whilst other televised events like the Euro '96 tournament and the funeral of Diana. I live in Jersey, also part of South West, and we had Oscar Puffin but Gus covered during his holidays. My favourite memory was of Gus Honeybun, the rabbit puppet that read birthday messages on ITV South West in Devon. Focusing on the madness, absurdity and utter chaos of being a parent, the Parenting Hell book was published in October 2022 in hardback, ebook and audiobook, and features some special guests.

Do yourself a favour and give this book a swerve, and maybe pick up a copy of ‘When Saturday Comes’ magazine instead. It also includes major TV events such as Princess Diana’s funeral, Euro 96 and the 97 election coverage, while featuring topics such as lad culture, Britpop, eclipse fever, adverts, teletext and the impending Millennium. stood for ‘Birthday Club’ which was also not entirely accidentally, the name of the short segments of TV, ‘B. Growing up in a tiny rural village on Dartmoor, no bands came within 100 miles, all the local farmers voted Tory, our nearest football team was in the fourth division, and the closest I got to being a new lad was when my older brother let me drink some of his Hooch.

Filled with all the things they never tell you at antenatal classes, Parenting Hell is a beguiling mixture of humour, rumination and conversation for prospective parents, new parents, old parents and never-to-be parents alike. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.