Who wants their pooch done up like Coleen Rooney on a hen night?
THERE are inventions that ought never to exist. Smell-O-Vision is one. The idea of being squirted with sprays and scents as you watch TV is too revolting to be allowed — a waft of cinnamon and hot bread while you’re enjoying Bake Off might be nice, but think of the stench of all those unwashed aristocrats in Versailles.
And imagine the embarrassment when neighbours called round — ‘Sorry about the pong, but auntie’s been watching Countryfile again.’
The 3D printer is another technological advance I’m not anxious to see. The heap of flimsy junk currently connected to my computer is bad enough, with its paper jams and expensive inks. It’d be cheaper to fill it with 90-year-old Napoleon brandy than keep topping up those slots labelled ‘magenta’ and ‘cyan’.
The cost of 3D printouts is bound to be crippling. The best thing about plastic tat used to be how cheap it was to produce, but now we’ll be buying refill cartridges at £100 a time, to print rubbish that was once made in Hong Kong for pennies.
Or so I thought. Then animal medic Noel Fitzpatrick changed my mind forever, in The Supervet: Bionic Specials (C4). He X-rayed a patient called Archie, a four-year-old Norfolk terrier with a permanent grin on his furry face and a nasty limp in his left front paw, and discovered the dog’s elbow was disconnected.
Archie had been born with twisted bones. Every time he put weight on that leg, it hurt. The usual treatment would have been to fuse, or even amputate, the joint. But thanks to 3D printing, Noel had a new idea, something he hadn’t attempted before.
He designed a hinge, one that would reset Archie’s leg and allow him to walk. And by modelling it on a computer, he was able to create the joint with a printer, using metal powder instead of coloured ink.
After a four-hour op, Archie was back on his paws and learning to walk properly for the first time. That’s a spectacular use of mechanical wizardry. How long till we’re able to buy these machines in PC World?
This new series, focusing on the latest advances in vet medicine, is less concerned with the human element. Gone are the gossiping receptionists and daffy pet owners of previous visits to Noel’s practice in Surrey.
Instead of the usual three or four case studies, this episode had only two — as well as Archie, there was nine-year-old Molly, a spaniel with a brain tumour who was given a titanium plate in her skull.
Serious shows about animal health demand a difficult balance: too many shots of Meccano-like components on laptop screens can be frustrating, especially when we’ve just glimpsed a labrador in a diamante collar in reception. Never mind the miracles, you think — who wants their pooch to look like Coleen Rooney on a hen night?
Historian Dominic Sandbrook was sporting a pretty impressive collar too, in The 80s (BBC2). An enormous ruff of fur around an anorak hood, it looked as though he’d borrowed it from the wardrobe department of Game Of Thrones. His second visit to the Thatcher era was filled once more with cheekily unconventional ideas. Health and Social Services Secretary Norman Fowler did more to alter public perceptions of Aids than Princess Di, he said, and the miners’ strike boiled down to a football match between Mansfield and Chesterfield.
Most controversial of all, he reckoned that the sailing TV soap Howards’ Way, far from being a solid mahogany chunk of dire acting and gratuitous nudity, ‘brought a dash of glamour to Sunday evenings’. Really, Dominic, get a grip.
Once again, this was a hugely entertaining way to get your thoughts provoked, even if the sight of Radio 1 DJ Mike Smith showing us how to unroll a condom was something that shouldn’t have been broadcast without a three-minute warning.
The soundtrack continued to be a joy. During the Aids segment, we heard What Have I Done To Deserve This?, by the Pet Shop Boys: very apt, very clever. My favourite, though, was the theme tune for morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse — Foreigner’s Waiting For A Girl Like You.