Pixellated portent

· life ·

I'm one of those people who really enjoys (in a slightly masochistic way) watching Grand Designs. There's no way that Mr. Bsag and I will ever have the money to buy a plot of land and build a house, but we enjoy watching other people go through the process. One benefit of house-building by proxy is that -- while you don't end up with a gorgeous designer home to live in -- you don't spend hundreds of thousands of pounds and go grey worrying about your house slipping down a hillside overnight and ending up in a pile of rubble by the side of the road.

We have, however, noticed something interesting about the programme which adds an interesting dimension to watching it. If you watch carefully, you'll sometimes notice that some of the building firms or contractors involved in the build have their company logos pixellated out. In a surprising number of cases the be-pixellated ones end up being fired from the job, doing something disastrous, or getting into contractual or legal wrangles with the people commissioning the house build. It isn't always the case, presumably because the production company hasn't got permission to feature the logo, or something like that. But it does add a frisson of anticipation to the show when you see a blurred out logo: "That newly installed wall is going to collapse/leak/explode!". Not that I indulge in schadenfreude, you understand...

Perhaps everyone involved should wear a pre-pixellated t-shirt to spoil our fun.