The Pryordurkins

Posts Tagged ‘television’

We’ve been in our house for coming up to nearly two years and in that time there has been a TV and Electric plug socket high up on our kitchen wall, both looking very lonely.  So it was with my staff discount being available that I ordered up the PANASONIC TX-19LXD8 LCD Television from Panasonic’s own online shop.  Within forty eight hours of ordering the man who comes in a very bright red van banged on my door and got me out of the shower to put his little package into both my hands.

Knowing how Paul operates, I then managed to be out of the house when he got home this evening, but had casually left lying around the kitchen, the TV itself and a wall mounting bracket.  I arrived back from visiting a local car dealership (subject of another story) and found Paul finishing off the installation of the new TV in our kitchen. Apart from missing a hole out (I’m sure it will stay up with only three screws intstead of the madated four!) he had done a good job with fixing it to our wall.

Of course, I can now rest easy in the lounge without having to worry about keeping Paul company or holding conversation while he cooks.  Fantastic!  As for the TV,  the picture seems great and the sound is very good indeed.  An all round good buy according to many a review I read on the t’internet and I have to say I agree. You can’t go wrong with Panasonic in my experience.

Pryordurkin rating 4 stars.

Next door to London Television Studios at Southbank was Riviera Restaurant at Gabriel’s Wharf.  The setting for this evenings dinner after work.  With a couple of colleagues I sat at a window table around 7.30pm.  With views across the river to St Paul’s Cathedral and Canary Wharf it was a great location to spend the next hour or so. 

Unfortunately I can not be as positive about the food.  I went for the Soup of the Day at £3.95 for my starter.  It was a butternut squash affair and reasonably priced.  However I was disapointed to find it didn’t come with crusty bread.  My main course was a rib-eye steak at £14.95.  To be fair, it was actually cooked very well i.e. it was medium as I had asked.  However what let it down was the taste of fish.  It had clearly been cooked on the same griddle pan as the fish mains served up to other diners.    It would have been a good steak otherwise.  

The restaurant itself was clean and could handle 70 covers across two floors.  The toilets were reasonable but inaccessible to the disabled.   The service was poor as is usual in restaurants and bars near tourist hot spots. I therefore didn’t leave a tip. 

Rating: 2 Stars.  Visited 13th August 2008.

I’ve reached rock bottom.  It was bound to happen soon.  After receiving the phone call from Paul to say he was going into York to meet up with some colleagues from the University for a few drinks, I turned on the TV thinking I would have another relaxing night in my hotel room.

A glass of wine later and I was laughing and cringing at the same time, while watching the British Soap Awards 2008 on ITV.  The Sexiest Male category was won by some such person who was clearly embarrassed by the whole episode and I could only imagine he was there because it was in the ’soap’ contract he had signed.  Mumbling something about, “it’s great to be recognised for my acting talent” sarcastically, I really felt for him.

The show continued with Sexiest Female (I went to the loo at this point as there is only so many ways to pout) and rolled on into several more categories while Phil and Fern tried to make reading from an autocue interesting and jovial.  It was day time television brought into the evening slot.  Awful.

The one notable exception was Liz Dawn who won a Lifetime Achievement award and had the grace not to take it all too seriously.  I suspect with her own real life issues, she had a better perspective on this whole sorry event than the rest of us.

What I have never been able to figure out in Hotels that provide mini bars in rooms, is why the prices charged are so prohibitively expensive.  It has over my working life always puzzled me, why this particular aspect of the capitalist society is immune to the normal supply and demand principles that apply to pretty much every thing else.

However at last I have found a hotel that breaks this rule once and for all, albeit in a very strange and frankly annoying way.

I arrived back at my hotel for the evening and as you will see in an earlier review, settled down to watch a bit of mindless television with a glass of wine.  I noticed in the mini bar a small 25cl bottle of white wine, checked the price and thought £3.95 was extortionate but given my current state of dress, worth taking.  It was only when I was recounting the previous evenings meal in the hotel restaurant that I remembered I had been served the same 25cl bottle of wine at £5.55.  So in my mini bar, I could buy (albeit only 1 was stocked and this is important to remember) the same bottle of wine as I had in the hotel restaurant the previous night for an extra £1.60.  OK you might think I paid a premium for the use of the restaurant.  Fair point, for now.

However this evening I wanted to stay in my room and started leafing through the short room service menu.  This time, the same bottle of wine was again priced at £5.55.  I had a choice.  Ring reception and tell them to re-fill my mini bar, where I could then take said bottle for £3.95.  Or, I could ring room service, likely to be answered by same people, and order a bottle of the same wine from the room service menu and pay £5.55.

This was an annoying option in it’s own right simply because it had no logic.  However things got worse.  Feeling a little peckish I decided to order up some food.  Like many hotels now, there is a tray charge (£2.50 here) and that itself winds me up. However it is just about (with a strong wind) justifiable on the grounds they have to carry the food upstairs.  So I browsed down the new menu, and noticed many of the exact same dishes as were served in the restaurant, only this time they were more expensive.  An example (not a good one as it shows my taste but hey, I’m working class), Benn & Jerry’s ice cream.  Served at £5.00 in the restaurant for a little tub (they don’t even try to add value these days), but on the room service menu it was £6.00.  Outrageous.  Not only were they charging £2.50 for the tray charge to bring it to my room, but the cost of the food had mysteriously gone up by 20% as well.  How can this be.  Is it me.  No logic to the pricing structure, except one that is based on the assumption customers are stupid and there to be ripped off while tired and relaxing in the hotel.  I am very tempted to stop coming to this hotel on these grounds alone.  That all being said I quite like this hotel.

The hotel accomodation is fantastic. Clean, smart, stylish and fresh from a recent refurb.  The service is generally friendly and attentive.  The lifts work (not like the Holiday In Regents Park) and the place is popular with business people and cabin crew alike. Not many tourists thank goodness.

The hotel is next to the Bloomsbury centre, where a range of (chain) restaurants and shops seem to do a roaring trade.  So instead of room service or visiting the hotel restaurant, along with colleagues I will often dine out.  Around the area there are also a good many Italian and Greek restaurants, some of which are very good indeed.  Failing all that the Waitrose shop in the Bloomsbury offers you the chance to just buy some basics and prepare your own meal in your room.

Anyway, give it a go and see if you can figure the wine pricing structure.  If you see me, I’ll be the guy asking stupid questions at the bar.

Pryordurkin rating. 3 stars.