Someone's made off with my August, and I'm not happy about it.
I'm not pointing any fingers, but it's been widely rumoured around Vulture Towers that it's something to do with Wincy Willis, John Kettley, Ian McGaskill and a large weather machine of the type that Bond villains do so well. That could, of course, be rubbish. Although if I'd been a meteorologist in the 1980s, I'd be bitter too. The effect of small velcro cloud static on some of those mullet haircuts was painful even to behold.
And on windy, rainy, cold and dreary August nights, there's nothing to be done, nothing at all, but to curl up in front of a glowing television screen and warm your toes on the toasty fires of broadcast media. And how better to decide what to watch than to check out our picks of the day, from this week's Guide and today's Guardian.
Extras 9pm, BBC2 Patrick "make it so" Stewart guests in the final episode. Can he help Andy get his sitcom off the ground? Does feel slightly like it's running in a small circle here (Andy's show is about an annoying old boss), but the details really work: Maggie's helpfulness, Shaun "Barry" Williamson licking envelopes, Stewart's "then their clothes fall off" script.
Richard Vine
The Man Who Captured Nessie 12.40am, C4 A rather sombre tale of the man who staked out Loch Ness in the 1970s and produced some of the most famous pictures of the legendary monster. Problem was, they were faked. Frank Searle was an ex-soldier from London's East End who spent years along the coast of the Loch. Much to the annoyance of professional monster hunters he received fame, a bit of wealth and more than his fair share of young women. As the film admits, Searle remains frustratingly elusive — there's a lot to unpack here but no one to do it, though the two old locals reminiscing and fishing deserve their own programme.
MS
The Simple Life: Interns 10pm, E4 How could anyone not like New York rich girls Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie? They're so privileged that they hardly bother to talk, they're not really interested in anything apart from shopping and dogs, and they slum it with such nonchalance that you cannot help but admire their total lack of fear of authority, being shouted at, or messing up. This week they're trainee car mechanics in New Jersey, a place they didn't appear to know existed. "Which one's the engine?" they ask to their boss, before stealing a police car to buy nail varnish, crashing the cars they're meant to be fixing, and buying the family with whom they are staying two enormous great danes — but forgetting to pay the $4,000 bill for them. They're great.
Will Hodgkinson
Britney And Kevin: Chaotic 10.30pm, E4 It's hard to know who to feel more sorry for — the pop princess turned queen of US chavs or her bit of hot totty Kevin, along for the free ride. No wait, actually, it's anyone who has to watch this hotchpotch of Britney's home movies and "exclusive" interviews, which together provide the "real" story of how Britney and Kevin fell in love and got married. Here, both Kevin and Britney tell us what love is, Britney boxes with her security guards and there's more footage of her and Kev hanging out in her hotel room on tour. Gripping. Like velcro, only less interesting.
Katrina Dixon
Arrested Development 11pm, BBC4 The hunt for George senior takes the Bluths down to Mexico this week. Lucille's hired her old private eye Gene Parmesan (Martin Mull) to help out. He's a master of disguise (well, fancy dress), if not actually that good at finding people. Michael manages to lose the "Ann hog", Gob looks for a friend and they milk another joke out of Tobias's Blue Man understudy role. Meanwhile Buster's going ahead with his threat to join the army. Lucille isn't impressed: "He's just doing it to spite me." "Then why are you throwing him a party?" "Just to spite him."
Richard Vine
No Waste Like Home 8.30pm, BBC2 Sustainability expert Penney Poyzer is amazed at how the Lambert family squanders the planet's limited resources. The father, Peter, insists on having the jacuzzi kept warm all day, and daughter Krystle thinks it's a good idea to warm up her bedroom with her hairdryer every day. It's not long before Poyzer sorts them out.
Mary Novakovich
Kidney Transplant 9pm, BBC1 The BBC's DoNation season continues with this moving story of a living donor kidney transplant between a husband and wife. Rajesh Patel's kidneys failed five years ago, and his wife Varsha has decided to undergo the great risks involved in donating one of her own kidneys in order to save her husband's life.
Mary Novakovich
Kids Behind Bars 9pm, Channel 4 Twenty five years after Rex Bloomstein made a film about adult prisoners, he's back with a disturbing insight into juvenile crime. The film makes a natural progression from 14-year-old Jenny, who is merely in a secure unit, to Tony, 18, who was given a life sentence for setting another boy on fire and is in a large young offenders' institution. While Jenny, in spite of her history of assault, inspires compassion, some of Bloomstein's other subjects - the 16-year-old hardened car thieves - are much harder to warm to. It's not even worth placing bets on the next time they'll reoffend.
Mary Novakovich
Kidney transplants, Paris Hilton and secure units. With an added dash in imagination, that's what I call a feet-up night in front of the sofa. Perhaps with a nice bottle of Chianti.
