St. Patrick's Day

I was curious to find out whether the English celebrated St. Patrick's Day with the same gusto as Americans. Americans tend to adopt any holiday that would allow them to partake in cultural drinking, regardless of how much the holiday is celebrated in its region of origin. The Irish and the English don't have the best history so I thought there was a chance that the English wouldn't celebrate St. Patrick's Day at all, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that they do celebrate. I think Americans take it MUCH more seriously, but still the English do have their own St. Paddy's fun.

This weekend I went with my friends Nikki and Sara to a local music venue, its actually pretty much the only bar in town that has live music. There was a fantastic Irish band on and it was such a great time. It really struck me as I enjoyed the music how much traditional Irish music resembles Bluegrass. Banjo, check. Fiddle, check. Boot stomping rhythm, check. I have heard other American bands who do a lot of Irish covers but this was the best Irish band I have heard to date. (Although they were a local group, so I am sure if I went to Ireland I could probably hear better but this was close enough for me.)

I feel like fewer things are new to me these days, in the first months of this blog I had a hard time narrowing down what new thing to talk about that week and now I feel I really have to dig deep so I am going to start a new "series" to keep things fresh. I watch a lot of TV, and although most of the shows on British TV are American, there are are plenty of domestic programs I can watch but I haven't been very adventurous lately because there are just so many familiar American shows to choose from. So I am going to try to watch one new British TV show every week and I will write a little synopsis and review here. A lot of shows are available online on network websites like BBC and ITV so if the show is available online I will make a note of it in my review in case you are interested and want to check it out on their website.

For my first review, I will ease you into British TV with a brand new franchise of an American series...

Law & Order: UK

This is a brand new series, and I think it followed the proven Law & Order format very well except it wasn't as corny as the American L&O shows can often be. Pretty much, cookie cutter Law & Order but with wigs in the courtroom.

The first show was good, it was a case that dealt with a baby who was killed by carbon monoxide poisoning. I won't give away the details but I think it was a good place to start because it addressed a lot of very relevant issues.

The only point of contention I have with the show is the name. All of its precedents have pretty specific descriptive names like "Special Victims Unit" and "Criminal Intent" but this one is a really vague "UK" which I think is a bit broad since it is limited to London.

I don't think I will watch it religiously, Law & Order and a lot of the other crime dramas are the kinds of shows you can turn on any time and follow without knowing a lot of background so if it happens to be on, I will watch it but I won't be marking my calendar to tune in.

This show is available on the ITV Player