Scam – Mr Latif Returns

Eight years ago, in 2018, I wrote about a business card that was put through my letterbox from Mr Latif, a miracle worker who could supposedly solve any problem you have within 24 hours. It was clearly nonsense, and I was able to trace the con back to at least 2004 under a different name, so it had been going for quite some time already. It was one of the more unusual posts in my scam awareness series, as I had mostly been writing about email scams at the time.

Well, he’s back – in Australia! Not only that, but he’s now a professor with a website! He’s gone up in the world it seems – or down under to be precise. And strangely enough he seems to have close connections with other people offering remarkably similar services. Either there’s a whole family or network of these amazing healers that nobody knows about, or it’s the same person. Or perhaps he’s the modern day Doctor Who and is so powerful that he can keep regenerating into different people!

In any case, many thanks to Ryan for drawing my attention to this, and sending me down this latest rabbit hole. He had searched for Latif’s name after receiving a flimsy card in the mail just like I had, and found my old blog post as a result. I hadn’t expected to receive a message about it after such a long time, and from such a long distance away, but it certainly grabbed my interest because of that!

So let’s have a look at what Professor Latif is up to these days.

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June 2026 Favourites

Hello again, I hope you’re doing well. This has been another quiet month for me, which is a good thing, and there has been some positive progress too.

In terms of my home situation, there isn’t much to update you on. I’m still feeling good about the fact that I left my job to become a full-time carer for my mum 3 months ago, with a little bit of accessibility testing work on the side, because my days are now much less intensive. My time is still productive, as I have plenty of tasks I can do and lots of things I enjoy to keep me occupied, but I can also spread things out and relax much more easily. We’ve also survived another uncomfortable heatwave, so we’re quite relieved that’s over, although we know there are more on the way this summer, and there could be worse to come in the decades ahead.

It also feels like my injury has almost fully healed now, touch wood, as I’m not getting pain in the ball of my foot any more. But I know I need to be careful, given how long it took to go away, as it’s probably still repairing and strengthening itself, and I’m anxious not to trigger the issue again if I can help it. So I’m currently taking some short local strolls to ease myself back into things, and I’m seeing if I can get better trainers and socks as well. It’s all a bit trial and error really, and my foot is still giving me occasional gentle warnings not to push things too far too quickly, as if the issue is still a bit borderline. The hot weather probably hasn’t helped either. But I’m glad I’m a lot better now.

All of which means there are no major outings to mention again this month, which is a shame as I had a theatre show booked that I really wanted to see, but never mind. I still have other things arranged in the months ahead, one of which is a birthday surprise from a close friend, so that’ll be fun.

I can, however, talk about things that I’ve been watching and listening to as usual. In particular, there are 3 new Blu-rays that I’ve bought, so I’ve devoted most of my viewing time to those. But there are other things that I’ve been watching and listening to as well, in terms of comedy and music. So there’s a nice variety for you to look through here, none of which is sponsored or gifted, and I hope you enjoy!

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Queen Album Review – Hot Space

We’re really Under Pressure from this latest heatwave, so it would help if someone could take Action This Day to Put Out The Fire in order for me to be a Cool Cat again. Then I can start Calling All Girls to pass on The Words Of Love and emphasise my Body Language as a Dancer. I’ll prove that I’m a Soul Brother who knows that Life Is Real, I have the Staying Power and I won’t take any Back Chat.

Yes, that’s right. For this next post in my series of Queen reviews, we come to an album that proved to be quite controversial – Hot Space. It was hardly unusual for Queen to be experimental, but this foray into funk, disco and R&B, with a heavy focus on synth sounds (although there were still rock elements as well), was too much of a change from their traditional style. Even within the band there were arguments as they put it together.

The reaction from their fanbase wasn’t lost on them either, as Freddie remarked during a show in Milton Keynes: “Now, most of you know that we’ve got some new sounds out in the last week. And for what it’s worth, we’re gonna do a few songs in the funk/black category – whatever you call it. That doesn’t mean we’ve lost our rock ‘n’ roll feel, ok? I mean, it’s only a bloody record, people get so excited about these things. We just want to try out a few sounds.”

It is fair to say that Hot Space is their weakest studio album as a result (if we don’t count the soundtrack score for Flash Gordon that preceded it). However, it’s not awful either, and there is some good stuff on it, especially Life Is Real, Las Palabras De Amor and Under Pressure, as they’re closer to Queen’s usual style. It also peaked at number 4 in the UK chart, altogether spending 3 weeks in the top 10 and 13 weeks in the top 40, which is fairly good. And when they performed some of the tracks live, they were interpreted in a more heavy rock style that made them sound better, because of the instruments the band used on stage.

So here’s my personal review of each of the tracks, along with alternate versions, live performances, covers and more. I hope you enjoy!

An artistic image showing images of the 4 members of Queen against a black background. Each is facing forward with light hitting their face from the left side of the image, leaving the other side of each face in shadow, blending into the black behind them. Each face is shown in a different colour, with John in red, Brian in blue, Freddie in yellow and Roger in green.
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Doctor Who Review – The Movie (30th Anniversary Blu-ray)

My interest in Doctor Who has mainly been confined to the Modern era from the 2005 reboot onwards, as that was when I first got into it, and I’ve been gradually revisiting and reviewing those series in recent years. It looks like I now have quite a bit of time to complete those reviews too, given that the show is going on hiatus again.

However, I have very little experience of the Classic era. I was still in my childhood for most of the Wilderness Years, when the programme was off air between 1989 and 2005, so it wasn’t a big part of my life growing up.

I did of course become aware of the show, particularly via a couple of charity specials that were broadcast on TV in the 90s, because it is a British institution that is deeply embedded in popular culture. It’s impossible to live here in the UK and not know about it. But I was too young to care. It was just one of those many old programmes that the adults used to watch, and it had long gone. And since getting into the Modern era, I’ve only seen occasional stories from the old days, either in their original form or via modern re-edits.

During its 16-year absence, however, there was an attempt to bring the show back in 1996, via a feature-length American TV pilot simply known as Doctor Who: The Movie, featuring Paul McGann as the 8th Doctor. A lot of fans in the UK liked it, but there wasn’t enough interest in the States to resurrect the show fully.

So it completely passed me by at the time. But I did eventually see it many years later, on Netflix in December 2013, when it was available there alongside a tiny selection of Classic era episodes that I also watched. I had taken the opportunity to check out those stories because of the 50th anniversary of the show – which means my first experience of Paul McGann had actually been his Night Of The Doctor mini-episode the previous month, showing his regeneration into the War Doctor. And as it happens I’ve recently seen that story again, having just rewatched the 50th anniversary specials during May. He also later made a cameo in The Power Of The Doctor in 2022 that I enjoyed.

12½ years on from my one and only viewing, therefore, I have no clear recollection of the film or whether I liked it. So buying the new 30th anniversary Blu-ray is a bit of a gamble for me, but a fascinating one too, as it’s my first proper deep dive into any Doctor Who story before 2005. It feels like I’m watching the movie for the first time again, and all of the special features (apart from the trailer for this release) are completely new to me, as I’ve never owned any previous editions.

So join me as I experience the movie in all its remastered glory and explore all the bonus material. I’ve also put together a playlist of highlights, music tracks, interviews, convention appearances, etc that you can look through too. I hope you enjoy!

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Doctor Who – End Of Another Era

Ever since last year’s series of Doctor Who came to an end, there’s been a lot of confusion and speculation about what will happen next – not just online and in the media, but also within the BBC.

The Disney deal may have kept the show ticking along for a couple more years, with some interesting stories resulting from it, but it wasn’t good for the long-term, and ultimately descended into chaos. Disney’s dithering over whether or not to renew the contract, even though it was obvious they weren’t going to, forced Ncuti Gatwa to quit so that he could guarantee himself work elsewhere instead of waiting around. In interviews he actually said that he left because he was exhausted due to the tough filming schedule, which is probably also true. But the timing of his departure strongly suggests his career was also a major factor, totally understandably. He wasn’t treated fairly, he deserved better. You can’t mess around with an actor who’s in high demand like that.

That in turn forced the finale of the series to be rapidly rewritten and parts of it reshot, with Billie Piper brought in for the regeneration without any consideration as to how it would be explained away. The result was a relatively weak and disjointed closing story, which was a shame given all the build-up to it, including the promise of a greater role for Carole Ann Ford returning as the Doctor’s granddaughter Susan Foreman.

Things have been very unclear ever since. But now, finally, we have some certainty, even if it’s created more uncertainty as a result…

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May 2026 Favourites

Hello there, I hope you’ve had a good month. Thanks to my foot injury I haven’t been out much for a while, but I am doing fine, as it has been feeling a lot better. And my mother is doing well too, although she did struggle in the heatwave we just had. I’ve included a little update on my caring situation in this post for those who are interested.

For the most part, however, my focus here will be on entertainment. And on that front the most significant thing is that I’ve been on the radio! I was very kindly invited to join in a discussion about audio description, and it’s already had some excellent feedback. Then beyond that, my mother and I have been celebrating David Attenborough’s 100th birthday, and I’ve been watching Doctor Who and some comedies.

So there’s plenty to get through in this roundup as usual, and I hope you enjoy!

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Harry Hill – Stand-Up Comedy & TV Burp Reviews

Former doctor Harry Hill has been on the comedy scene for over 30 years, and is renowned for his surreal mind and daft antics, including the use of silly stories, observational humour, slapstick, music, props, puppets and other quirky characters, often with cultural references, running gags and callbacks woven throughout his performances. Yet beneath all the nonsense there is a lot of structure, creativity and cleverness as well. So sometimes you’ll find him mocking TV shows, celebrities, human behaviour, language, the world around us, and so on, while at other times he’s just delightfully absurd for the sheer fun of it.

He recently had a great new stand-up special broadcast on Sky this month. So because I enjoyed that, I thought I would revisit all of his previous specials as well, just as I’ve done for several other comedians in recent years. And while I’m at it, I figured I would go through his TV Burp DVDs that I own too, because I loved that programme. Plus I’ll briefly mention some of his other work. I’ve also put together a playlist with a wide selection of clips, music, interviews and more, including videos from his own Youtube channel. So I hope you enjoy looking through it all!

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Doctor Who Review – 50th Anniversary Specials

Yes, I know, we already celebrated Doctor’s Who’s 60th anniversary a few years ago. It’s all a bit wibbly wobbly timey wimey. But this epic post for the bank holiday weekend is part of my ongoing series of reviews for all the series in the modern era, as I’ve been rewatching them in order. Recently I wrote about Series 7 (Part 1 & Part 2), and the cliffhanger at the end of it directly leads into the 50th anniversary specials, so naturally I wanted to move straight on to those.

The 2013 specials mark the end of Matt Smith’s stellar reign as the 11th Doctor. Some people had doubts about him when he took over from David Tennant – who also appears in the anniversary story, along with John Hurt as the War Doctor – but he really made the role his own, and showed he was capable of everything from chirpy humour to dark intensity. So he’s been very much missed ever since the brilliant send-off he had in these specials.

Meanwhile Jenna Coleman (who dropped the “Louise” from her name from this point onwards) continues to be a wonderful companion as Clara Oswald, with the mystery of why she’s the ‘Impossible Girl’ having been resolved at the end of Series 7. And there’s the welcome return of Billie Piper as a version of Rose that we’ve never seen before.

The score by Murray Gold is sublime as usual, so I’ll be picking out some of my favourite pieces from his soundtrack album in these reviews. And of course everything was overseen by showrunner Steven Moffat, who somehow managed to fit it all in alongside Series 7 of Doctor Who and Series 3 of Sherlock. Plus there was a biographical drama about the origins of the show, written by Mark Gatiss and featuring music by Edmund Butt, that I’ll also be reviewing in this post.

Altogether there’s a lot to mention from the Blu-ray set, along with additional stuff that wasn’t included in that release. So I hope you enjoy celebrating this key milestone in the show’s history with me.

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April 2026 Favourites

Hello again, I hope you’re doing well. As I explained in my carer update post yesterday, this has been a good month overall, apart from Mum and I picking up little injuries, but we are both slowly getting better.

Because of that, I still haven’t been out anywhere exciting just yet. But there’s still some entertainment for me to mention as usual, for which the main themes this month happen to be the cosmos and comedy. So let’s crack on with it, and I hope you enjoy!

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Carer & Career Updates – April 2026

It’s now been a month since I left my job as a support worker in order to focus more on caring for my mother, as I explained in my Easter post. And things are still going well on the whole, apart from both of us getting little injuries that have knocked us back a bit. But we are on the mend and there has been positive progress in other regards too. So here’s a little update on how things have been going lately.

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