Grey Day

It's a dreadfully gray day here, so taking a trip to England via a new show I found is just what the doctor ordered. LOL! Quite distracting and entertaining. Forgot all about the glum weather.

Don't have cable or dsl here at the grey house, still using the old-fashioned rabbit ears with an analog TV from 1996. So my viewing selections are a bit limited to say the least. It seemed there was a whole lot of nothing worth looking at last night so I flipped through the channels and came across an interesting British series and found myself drawn into it. I had no idea what it was till it was over and I looked it up on Zap2It's television guide. Turns out this intriguing little show is called "Doc Martin". The main character is a very stoic, proper, humorless doctor in a tiny English town of 900 or so people. The scenery is lovely, makes me want to live in one of those old stone houses that dot the countryside.

With a little more research, I found the series available on Hulu. One caveat, it's rated for mature audiences, so you have to sign up on Hulu to verify your age (I assume that's the why of it). It's free and quick so no biggie. I proceeded to watch the first episode in Season 2. The one I'd just seen on tv was the second episode. Season 3 is also available.

It's a fun little romp through a whole cast of quirky townspeople who know everyone's business for the most part while the town doctor from "the big city" just stands back almost shaking his head in amazement. You see, the doc grew up in this town and went away for medical school never planning to return as I gather from all of two episodes.

Now he's back as the town's doctor because for some reason (per one of the characters) he "couldn't hack it in the big city". Village-size "catastrophes" occur regularly with the doc being totally unflappable. Nothing ruffles his feathers except for his occasional comments under his breath "why does NO ONE ever listen to me?" Apparently the townsfolk ask for his help and then do what they want anyway with the inevitable consequences. It's really well-crafted with multiple story lines in each episode.

So now I have something to enjoy when the wasteland of TV offers nothing. It was getting kind of lean there for a while program-wise...I was actually rewatching episodes of "Firefly" on Hulu. Yeah, sad huh? It's an exciting life here in So Cal.