Category Archives: Online resources

‘Mediating’ your way through Christmas…

In the interest of ‘research’ for this blog post I thought I better look back and browse through some Christmas TV Specials. For this I turned to a very useful tool called ‘Box of Broadcasts’ affectionately known as ‘BoB’.  The official description of this service is as follows: Box of Broadcasts is an on demand TV… Read More »

Murder in the Library!

‘Cluedo’, (or ‘Clue’ as it is known North America), is an all-time classic favourite board game in the murder mystery genre.  Originally manufactured in 1949 by Waddington’s, it is now owned by the American giant Hasbro.  It has had many reissues and updating of characters, most recently with the tragic death of Mrs White –… Read More »

Balderdash

Balderdash In this word game players have to write a plausible definition of a real but obscure word. Points are awarded for the correct definition. All the definitions are then read out and further points awarded to players who identify the correct definition and also to the writers of false definitions erroneously selected as the correct definition… Read More »

A quick reminder

As an addition to the Christmas blog series, we would just like to remind those leaving Oxford in the vacation to make sure you know how to access materials from outside the Oxford network.  We know that you are most likely going to be busy with festivities but if you do decide to take a… Read More »

Is this the real life?

“Mama … just killed a man”* Not the happiest start to a Christmas blog post but nevertheless it is the striking line (after the preamble of course) to the only song to have been number 1 at Christmas twice and given that this is the last post in the series, it seems fitting to end… Read More »

It’s only make believe

This somewhat melancholy and mournful tune by Conway Twitty, was the 1958 Christmas number one.  Conway Twitty, (having changed his name and chosen two seemingly random towns as names), was an American singer and this was his first big hit.  The song was actually written whilst Conway was in Ontario, apparently he had become convinced that this is… Read More »

Hello, Goodbye

  Who can forget the 1967 classic ‘Hello, Goodbye’ by the Beatles? Perhaps not the most diverse set of lyrics of any Christmas number 1, indeed here is a short sample; “You say goodbye and I say hello Hello hello I don’t know why you say goodbye, I say hello Hello hello I don’t know… Read More »