FOOD: this is tied to particular restaurants. Best Italian restaurant in the world is Don Antonio's Withington Manchester. Queues to get in every night.
Best Indian Restaurant is the Jaipur Palace (just down the road from me) in Wellington Point, QLD
I always order my favourite -Spaghetti Carbonara- when testing out a new Italian restaurant, it's an ideal benchmark.
Chicken Tikka Masala has taken over from Chicken Madras as my favourite Indian dish.
I love porridge (with salt) and also dark chocolate.
BOOK: Cider With Rosie. Laurie Lee is a superb writer. I hardly read fiction nowadays. Love stories of the old west, and Australian first settler stories. "1788" is a bloody great read, an eyewitness account of the first settlement in Sydney through the eyes of a Marine Captain, Watkin Tench.
FILM: I'm no film geek, but I'm as likely to nominate Planet Of The Apes or Star Wars (for what they meant to me and to filmmaking at the time they were released) as "Hunger", a Scandinavian film which won the Cannes Film prize in 1966. Brilliant movie which stays with you.
WRITER: Laurie Lee, Clive James, Stephen Pile. Cartooning? Reg Smythe, Posy Simmonds, Claire Bretecher. Not sucking up or playing tit-for-tat, but Roger is at the top of the tree as far as writing cartoon strips goes, especially for the Brit market. I use his seamless transition to Andy Capp as the only example of a legacy strip which is as good as the original.
HOLIDAY: I don't believe I've ever been on a specific holiday for holiday's sake (no past destinations come to mind). I would like to go to New York.
DRINK: Murphy's stout -far superior to Guinness but can't get it on tap here.
BAND: Yes, The Who. I spend hours on You Tube downloading Who footage. Check out their "Won't Get Fooled Again"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAlpsiaVNEATownshend is wasted, but almost never misses a chord. Daltrey can't sing anymore these days, sadly.
Jeez, bands these days are wimps.
Also, Deep Purple, Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Neil Young, Knopfler, too many to name.
T.V.: Fast Show, Two Ronnies, Pete and Dud, Victor Borge, Smothers Brothers (
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgwH-XngXKo) Laurel and Hardy, Victoria Wood.
PASTIMES: Football (I'm a qualified coach hoping to go for my Asia "C" licence this year)
CARTOONS: Warner Brothers. Yosemite Sam, Bugs, Daffy. Disney characters stink. Newspapers? In the UK, Beau Peep, in the States, Get Fuzzy, Pearls Before Swine, What The Duck, Barkeater Lake, Medium Large.
The last three on that list can only be accessed via the web. Google 'em.
