This is my very first blog -- EVER! -- so be gentle with me, dear blog reader.
I'd never really thought much until about 10 years ago or so* but I grew up watching British programming, even if I didn't realize it at the time. One of the first shows I remember watching (aside from those pesky Watergate hearings, which irritated me because it interupted what I normally watched) was a television show airing on Sunday mornings called "My Partner The Ghost." In Great Britian, this show was of course called, "Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)," (which is kind of confusing, since only Hopkirk was apparently deceased, not the both of them).
In case you're not familiar with it, "My Partner The Ghost" -- or "Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)", if you prefer -- was about a pair of private detectives, and in the first episode, you got it, Hopkirk is killed. Of course that doesn't stop Hopkirk from continuing to team up with Randall to solve crimes, starting with his own murder. Randall, by the way, is the only one who can see his partner. Wackiness ensues.
Here's the beginning of the very first episode, "My Late Lamented Friend and Partner"
Hopefully you can see what I enjoyed about it: The off-beat humor, the crackling dialogue, the blonde in the tub... I also like how they jump right into the episode, which goes almost five minutes before the opening credits start (having a cold opening like that is more common nowadays than it used to**)
So, there I was as a youngin' never really conscious of the fact that this show I was watching came courtesy of another country. But it was only the start of a lifelong love affair with British culture.
*This is a totally fictictious number. I have no idea when I first thought about it, but for the convenience of this blog I'm just going to say 10 years and leave it at that.
**I have no idea whether this is true or not.
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