TF1's passion for Trash TV as "Qui veut épouser mon fils ?" returns for season 2

After a first series back in 2010 of "Qui veut épouser mon fils ?" ("Who wants to marry my son?") in which overbearing mothers, totally unaware of the camera's presence of course, did their level best to help their stay-at-home sons find the perfect partner, you would think TF1 might allow viewers some respite from such obvious Trash TV.

But no - it's not to be.

Sadly the programme has returned for a second season, albeit in a late Friday evening slot which should deter too many French from watching (although its debut got off to what TV critics consider a reasonable start with an audience of almost two-and-a-half million).

Contestant Frédéric doesn't have "any particular preference why it comes to what a woman looks like (screenshot TF1 "Qui veut épouser mon fils ?")

Yes, France's most-watched television station, is treating its viewers to yet another pile of televisual dung masquerading as "entertainment".

Of course TF1 doesn't have a stranglehold on Trash TV.

Another private and generalist channel, M6, has offered up its fair share of McDonald's type fast food TV over the years including its infamous ground-breaking (please help us) "Loft Story".

But TF1, which is after all France's most-watched channel, seems to have made a speciality of providing viewers with the largest assortment of...well you fill in the blanks, but "merde" while a somewhat vulgar description might perhaps be the most appropriate.

Some are "concepts" unique to France. Others are reinterpretations of similar fodder to be found abroad.

There have been a fair number of flops, usually those "starring" (apologies for the need to revert so often to inverted commas) "celebrities"  such "Je suis une célébrité, sortez-moi de là ! (do you really need a translation?) and Carré Viiip, which was cancelled midway through its run.

And there have been those that continue to draw big enough audiences for TF1's execs to take the decision to order yet another batch: "Secret Story" ("Big Brother" - sort of - season seven is in the pipeline for 2013), "Koh Lanta" ("Survivor" which has been broadcast at least once every year since 2001 and has just begun yet another run on Friday prime time TV) and of course "MasterChef".

The list also includes; "Quatre mariages pour une lune de miel" (based apparently on the UK show "Four weddings") in which brides judge and mark each other's big day with the winner being whisked away to a dream destination with her groom; "Bienvenue chez nous" (based yet again on a UK show, "Three in a bed") which proves itself to be the snarkiest possible of programmes as chambre d'hôtes owners do battle to determine who offers the best value for money, and allowing its participants to betray just how mean and inhospitable some of them can be; and "Mon incroyable fiancé", the French version of the US reality TV programme "My big fat obnoxious fiance" but whose title allowed for a variation in the second season where the unpleasant and overweight actor masquerading as a potential beau was replaced with one pretending to be gay.

Are you still following? Or have you, like TF1 bosses it seems, completely lost the plot?
Anyway back - as briefly as possible to "Qui veut épouser mon fils ?"

The novelty of the first series was - wait for this, especially as the debate about same-sex marriage looks set to heat up in France - one of the five mothers looking for a husband for her son.

Just to spice things up a bit for the second season, not all those looking for potential brides for their sons are overbearing mothers: there's also a father.

Serge is looking for the ideal woman...for his son Julien (screenshot TF1 "Qui veut épouser mon fils ?")

Cool. Who do you think came up with that innovation (rhetorical question)?

Anyway, the show is on late enough for it to be effortlessly avoided.

But in case you're curious and haven't had quite enough of the...ahem..."cultural" garbage TF1 churns out with alarming regularity, here's a clip from the first programme, with some of the "best" and worst moments.

Enjoy.

Thank goodness for the remote control and the on/off button.

An end to living by numbers?

There's help at hand for those of you who might be ...er...a little forgetful when it comes to remembering your Personal Identification Number or PIN for you bank or credit card.

A scheme that's on trial in two French towns recognising customers' fingerprints and allowing them to make purchases "biometrically".

I lost my wallet recently.

Well that's not entirely true. I left it on the roof of my car and drove off: not an uncommon practice as far as I'm concerned with my mind invariably floating somewhere out there, seemingly unattached to events happening in everyday life.

Luckily it was found by a couple, although in the meantime I had cancelled my cards.

Another not so unusual occurrence sadly - cancelling my cards or asking for a replacement.

Lost, stolen, pirated - I've been there all too frequently, every time calling the bank or the card provider immediately and then waiting patiently for a new one to be issued.

And every new card of course has meant memorising yet another PIN number - one of the proverbial banes of my life.

I mean, even when the four-digit code is well and truly stamped in the recesses of that lump of grey matter that passes for a brain,  there are still all-too-frequent moments when blankness descends.

Those moments of far-from-blissful solitude at the supermarket checkout for example,  ready to punch in the required number when... nothing.

It's hard to fathom exactly why.

I'm usually great at remembering numbers; rattling off 'phone numbers (apart from my own of course) or birthdays without a problem but PIN - forget it.

With my last, now sadly-departed, card I thought I would be clever.

You know how each of the 101 French départements is numbered more-or-less alphabetically: 01 for Ain, 02 for Aisne, 03 for Allier...all the way up to 976 for Mayotte (don't ask - otherwise the digression will invade the post completely).

Well I thought I would try some sort of mnemonic to remember my PIN by breaking the four digits up into two pairs and linking them to two of the départements.

The lucky couple (?) were Saône-et-Loire - 71,  and Morbihan - 56 ( actually they weren't , but I'm just using them to illustrate how I went about memorising the real numbers).

Except of course I invariably kept muddling them up - and had on more than one occasion to take a look at my mobile 'phone where they were cleverly saved...although I could never remember where.

While I wait for my replacement carte bleue and PIN - 10 working days and counting apparently - Amex has been far faster.

It plopped through the letter box just days after the last one was reported lost, but...Aaaaaarrrrrrrggggggghhh! It too now comes with a PIN.

Another number to forget.

So it was with more than a little interest that the following story caught my eye recently; a new method of paying by card which recognises customers' fingerprints and allows them to make purchases "biometrically".

It's already being piloted in the northern town of Villeneuve d'Ascq and later this month will also be tested in the southwestern town of Angoulême.

All right so it might all be a bit Big Brother for some people out there who don't like the idea  that banks could also potentially have our digital fingerprints on record as well as any other information they already hold.

But, if successful, it'll do away with the need for a PIN and thereby be one heck of an aid for those of us who have problems in a world in which it's becoming increasingly necessary to be "Living by numbers"

Cue for a Eurotrash song from the 80s with a great intro from British DJ Steve Wright when the group, New Musik, appeared on Top of the Pops.

Have a great weekend.

You're never too old to learn

Just ask Louise del Busto Gomez from the southwestern French town of Castres.

Louise del Busto Gomez swearing in ceremony (screenshot France 3)

 On Wednesday the 84-year-old - yes for the purposes of this story you might want to double check her age - officially became a lawyer at a swearing-in ceremony in the city of Toulouse.

And if that weren't enough, the octogenarian is not only qualified to practise in France but also in the Spanish city of Barcelona.

Not bad going for a woman who only began hitting the books after she had retired and had never even passed her baccalaureate or high school diploma.

Her story is one that must surely draw admiration from anyone and make us all sit up and take notice; a salutary lesson to us all.

Born in Barcelona in 1928, Gomez fled Spain during the country's civil war when she was just 11 years old, arriving in this country as a refugee.

"The day on which Franco entered Barcelona, I left the city on foot and made my way to the border with others who were escaping," she told reporters shortly after her swearing-in ceremony.

Gomez made a life for herself in France, meeting her husband Victor, bringing up two children, settling in Castres and over the years holding a variety of jobs and doing, "a bit of this and a bit of that" from helping out during harvest time, typing for a firm of solicitors, cleaning and a decade spent as a sales assistant at the local Monoprix supermarket.

When Gomez retired, she became involved in a local consumer rights association and that's when her late husband began encouraging her to pursue her studies.

 Maître Louise del Busto Gomez (screenshot France3 report)

She didn't choose the easiest of paths though; not only enrolling at the law faculty in Toulouse but also one in Barcelona at the same time.

"As far as I was concerned, Franco's Spain had deprived me of my childhood," she said.

"That's why I wanted to return to study in the city I was born."

"I had to retake all the exams necessary - in Spanish, and that wasn't easy for me because I had a French accent."

And now Gomez has qualified to practise here in France as well, attending the swearing-in ceremony in Toulouse on Wednesday.

'I'm especially moved because this ceremony made me think about my husband," Gomez said after the ceremony.

"He always encouraged me and told me I could do it," she continued

"And it's thanks to him that I can turn round today and say I'm a lawyer."