Random assorted 11 years ago memories (whatever I can remember), December 2006:

This very day, 12th, was the cornerstone game played by Donna. Lied about her profession, unless glamour models did supervise construction sites in the era before the big recession, accepted an offer in the £20,000s under the possible influence of her boyfriend in the audience, only to then sob her way to a 'dream' finish and the jackpot in the box. Support from audience members had been popularised by Okiem and his brother earlier in the year, but this was the beginning of the slow dismembering of that trope.

On the 8th, Lynsey accepted a marriage proposal from her boyfriend in the audience. Memorable at the time, it became dulled by several other ring dwellers using the platform of a popular game show to propose.

On the 3rd, after a protracted period of time, the £250,000 appeared on the table but was undersold by a distraught Ingerlise. £15,000, I think. However, not long before this game somebody had leaked the £250k win that would occur just on the other side of the new year, so the waiting game of ''who will be the first?'' had already been given a date in stone.

The least gutting underselling of the £250k occurred on the 17th, when the all but forgotten Claudine scooped up £107,031.

On the 20th, Sue had a very poor trainwreck. At this point in time, there was still some prestige and exclusivity in winning 1p, the total number of club members still stood in single figures. Faced with £5 or 1p, she was willing to win 1p just to be remembered. Nope, not even that. Five squid.

Christmas shows. On the 25th, in the early afternoon, Rachel played. Noel clearly fancied her. I don't remember anything else. Apart from her gap teeth. Loved those.

But in the evening, a £500,000 show, Wrighty played. He did quite well out of it, despite finding it a stressful experience. £32,000.

26th, Jenny played the early afternoon show. The 1p was replaced with ''PEANUTS'', which I think was unique to this game. It's slipped into the ether, though, it's not surfaced on YouTube. Sod knows what else happened.

The evening show was played by Alex Turner lookalike Danny, who looked and sounded like his balls had only just dropped. He won an extra £10k in a bonus box at the end of the game and I also remember a montage of DOND clips being played with the (inferior) Gary Jules version of Mad World as the soundtrack. This is another 'golden era' moment that has evaded YouTube and I only recently binned the tape that contained this episode. Sorry!

Final show of the year on the 31st, Alfie played all suited and booted. He'd been a winger for a while, the whole of December, and was probably a given choice to see out the year. He won about £20,000 but his box contained the jackpot, much to his chagrin. A peculiar thing I recall thinking at the time - because Alfie had done nearly 30 shows without having had £250k in his box, I deemed it basically impossible that he'd finally have it for his own show. Hmm, yeah. Don't think too much into that.

This time last year, we were two shows into DoND's farewell tour. The Dream Factory was long gone, and DoND spent the final kernels of it's lifetime on the road. This day it was Karen, who was the longest-running player on the wings from the final studio show and i think she dealt at £8k or thereabouts and undersold a £20k box??

11 years ago, Simon had a pretty average and unmemorable game compared to the previous day's melodrama. His game struggled to really get going as he's offers peaked around the £9k mark and he dealt at a fairly average offer of £5,990 on a £250/£20k final 2 and had £250 on sitting just a couple of feet in front of him

12 years ago, Rob practically decimated his board in the early rounds, yet out of nowhere recovered to a £10k win by opening his box!

Random assorted December 2007 memories, 10 years ago:

Pre-fame Olly Murs playing as a civilian and leaving with £10. Was controversially (?) allowed to play as a celebrity during one such special edition in 2012 and won 50p.

The curiously named Orry swapping £100,000 away to win £1.

That's all I can remember, this was the last month where I paid any sort of attention to the show until around April 2012.

On this day one year ago. After 11 years and a little under 2 months on the air, it was DoND's final curtain call and the show went out with a bang as Scottish Vicki became the show's 9th and final quarter-millionaire - Probably the most hard-earned £250k win ever in a game that was totally free of ANY gimmicks, forcing offers or box 23!

It's interesting how the first and last £250k finishes in live play during DoND's 11 year run were both £750/£250k endings!

12 years ago on Boxing Day, having just watched her game on YouTube, Angela had a very interesting game which, unusually for a 2005 game, had surprisingly generous early offers, and fairly crap late game offers until she got a generous £21,000 on a £750/£50k finish, which she dealt and only had £750 in box But it was a TPW rather than an OPW, as the offer she dealt at could've been slightly bettered by her third offer, which was £22,700

She got a very generous opening offer for those days, as she had a red-heavy opening round (good reds too - £10k, £15k, £20k and £75k) and still got offered £7,500, then turned down offers of £15k and £22,700 with the remaining 4 of the power 5 in play, but after losing the £250k in the very next box followed by 2 blues, her offers fell to a punishing £9,500, and then despite having an all-blue round and having THREE of the power 5 at 5-box, her 5-box offer was a derisory £18,200 But thankfully, she declined it and recieved a VERY generous 2-box offer which she dealt and almost - but not quite - got the max out of her game

Twelve years ago, Nick became the first player to win 1p. He played his game in good humour, and took the ignominy very well. A rumour persisted that he had sold his 1p cheque on eBay after his show aired, and I believe this was true; how much it earned him I've forgotten, unfortunately.

Long before talk of a phone box or a barge, the 1p Club at this time had only one registered member, Nick, and he would remain alone until Trevor joined him in the most devastating of circumstances two months later.

No way has it been a WHOLE DECADE since Farmer Clive!!!

A legendary character who played during the 'Beginning of the end of DoND as we knew it' era of season 3. After the heyday of DoND's first 2 seasons, the show was starting to change dramatically around this time, and sadly not for the better. With some dark days ahead for the show (and the forum for that matter, no need to elaborate), the bad run had already began with Helen B's ludicrous post-game handouts from the banker, £1k Michael of horrible deal infamy, Judy's forcing 5-box offer, Mario's dramatic crash from a promising 5-box, that week when everyone dealt at £16,500 (except for Artak who swapped £50k away and won £750), and December 2007 was the beginning of the melodramatic sob-story era, but far worse was still to come between here and November 2008

2008 was arguably the worst year in the history of DoND. January and February 2008 were pretty middle of the road, but i feel the misery really started around Easter and after that, things just kept getting worse and worse. £100k Betty's game was the oasis in the middle of the desert, and things didn't really show any sign of improving until very late in the year

Around this time 3 years ago (Late 2014/Early 2015) was the beginning of the end for DoND. The weekend shows had already been (seemingly) scrapped for good in October 2014 and the show took a break over Christmas and new year.

Shortly after, the first signs of DoND being on it's way out began to show as the show started being on less and less from here with the show taking breaks due to horse-racing telecasts on an almost weekly basis and then suddenly being off screen for months on end during the middle of the year

10 years ago was the game of Semi, whose real name was Steve. By this point, they'd started giving contestants gimmicky nicknames to use on the show, often to try and avoid name duplications

This was the second time the Banker's Gamble was used and Semi accepted the gamble this time around, as it was a piss-easy gamble handing back £14k on a £10k/£20k having dealt a round earlier and then swapping to win £20,000! After the unsuccessful trial of the Banker's Gamble in Phyllis' game a few months earlier, its successful second trial in Semi's game marked the beginning of gimmicks and artificial stuff regularly being used in people's game

The other memorable moments from this show were

*Bing's unusual box opening, where she opened her box REEEEEEALLLLY slowly in the fifth round.....and revealed the £250k Bing broke down in tears moments later . Of course, after her stint in the dream factory, Bing would reappear several years later in the one-off live specials in 2011, almost unrecognisable compared to her first appearance, as she'd lost a lot of weight between her 2 DoND appearance - Go girl!

*Semi forgetting to switch his phone off as it beeped halfway through the show. So what better way for Mr E to deal with the problem by dumping it in a full mug of water?

*The newbie was Joy. A lovely old soul who wasn't as strong as she used to be, and had to take a two week break during her run because of her health. She was struggling in her life on the outside and sadly, her game of Deal Or No Deal couldn't help her. Lovely lady, bless her

12 years ago was the infamous John who was offered the eighter at the start and then crash dramatically after a reckless gamble at 5-box

5 years ago, Ryan dealt at £26k on a 5-box board that warranted a lot more

9 years ago, the forum's own David (H2005) had already made his wing debut but was replaced for this show due to personal reasons and returned in a different position the next day. Jimmy was the player of the day and had given a lot of advice on the wings. His game looked like a trainwreck at one point but he recovered to a £75k finish and dealt at £25,000. The banker unfortunately got away with it when Jimmy had £75k on the table

7 years ago yesterday, Vicki gambled for the £35k at 2-box and became the 35th member of the 1p club

Noel's a consummate professional from all accounts, but he let the mask slip when John G no dealt the £25k, right after spilling syrup about how much the money would help his family. Noel looks positively ''what the F--- are you doing you IDIOT'' for a brief but brazen second.

11 years ago, Scottish Bob went from being pretty much silent on the wings to being an utterly crazy character in his game! Some people on here were somewhat irritated by Bob's antics (i thought he was funny though) and he had a pretty average game where he dealt at his lowest offer of £5,000 but missed out on offers of £12k and £21k, but spared an outright loss to the banker when £5 was revealed in his box

9 years ago, David returned from his one show absence, now standing in the 'Lucy' position on the east wing next to Doreen and Julie had a great game where she dealt at £42,000 but could've had £72,000 if she went another round. She only had £1,000 in her box and i remember when Noel did the buildup to her box opening, he said something "has the chance of a lifetime slipped through your fingers?" and then, upon opening the box, Mr E himself got slippery fingers as he struggled to open the box!

I actually thought Noel kept that mask off until the show finished - he was completely fake in what little emotion he tried to convey, and very brash with John when it all went downhill. He seemed genuinely disgusted. 'Ring ring, thanks the offer is ninety quid do you want Barry Sheene's box 7 I just want you to *beep* off mate bye'

Ah, sounds like psychokiller has injected a bit of him into you Dan!

I don't inject myself into people anymore, not since... the accident.

On the subject of Noel's charade in John G's game - What a contrast to the same time a year later when Noel was EXTREMELY blunt (often OTT) towards players who dealt too soon. February/March 2007 was the worst period for Noel's 'Wakey-ism' as the old school forum referred to it. One of the worst examples was Limbo Alex who dealt at £18,500 on an 8-box with £50k, £100k and virtually nothing else (And the offer was 92% of the average), yet when he dealt, everyone gasped in horror and Noel turned into a right prat in the proveouts. Didn't Noel make a big fuss out of Alex's £21k proveout offer - just £2,500 more than what he dealt at - at 2-box or something?? \

Spiky Paul, £41k Nev, Ingerlise, Teary Donna, Limbo Alex, £42,047.48 Gus, £27.5k Steve and £29k Kelsie were among the worst of Noel's guilt trips during the late 2006/Early 2007 era. He was pretty bad in Ann-Marie's game in late April 2007 as well, but by then, the early 2007 annoyances like Noel's wakeyism, blue chants, red chants, lack of characters on the wings, offers being too high (especially in the proveouts) etc. were waning

12 years ago today, Okiem played. What was notable about this game? He called upon his audience dwelling brother to support and advise him during important decisions. This was a watershed moment for the time and earned him a spot in the hall of fame as well as a repeat during the 2007 'classic' DOND slot during Saturday afternoons.

That is rather funny to reflect on because of course, not so long afterwards, participation from family in the audience became a DOND staple and actually clouded a fair few games as the player was obviously influenced by their, shall we say, persuasive input. What was once a noteworthy trope became something that was outright detested by many people and they would hopelessly wish for a game where somebody *didn't* intervene.

Oak was fantastic! and for the banker to reward him with an almost on-the-mean final offer of £17k on a £50/£35k final 2 after an all-blue final round was fantastic Shows you just how generous the banker's late game offers were back then, alas the super generous late game offers were on their last legs before they suddenly stopped a weak later and the banker slipped into a bit of a stingy offer phase for the next couple of months - In fact, there was another game a few weeks later which followed the exact same path as the Oak's game to 2-box (Steve from April 1 i think?) but felt quite bland and forgettable in comparison as he dealt at a stingy 2-box offer of £7,000 on a slightly better 2-box

Speaking of crap deals, it's 12 years since since Beryl's game Lovely lady with a great personality but unfortunately remembered more for her dealing at £3,100 at 11-box with the £250k, making her perhaps THE most cautious player of all time (Though i think £9k Glen from a couple of weeks earlier was the founder of the 'horrible deals club' rather than Beryl). Beryl sadly passed away in 2014, and even in 2006, she wasn't in the best health, hence her being in a wheelchair/frame and playing on only her 13th show

12 years ago was the lovely Anna who played the 100th game of DoND. A game that marked the end of an era for the show, as it was the last show to feature the original white box inserts before the new red and blue box inserts were brought in, and was also, arguably the end of the banker's 2005 late game generous offers.

Anna had a great game that was spookily similar to Mally's game as she declined 4 joke offers and then suddenly got a cast-iron deal offer of £43,000at 5-box which she DEALT, but ended up with a £1/£250k finish and had the £250k on the table The only real difference between this game and Mally's game was that Anna's proveout offer was 'only' £91,000 (the first ever sub-£100k offer on a £250k finish by the way) and not a ridiculous AMO like Mally!


From the first game to air on this date to the last game to air on this date, 2 years ago, Olivia played the last game to ever air on this date and gave us an entertaining game with a difference as she put on a fire dance in her game She also got a great win of £26,000 and an OPW to boot!


Not much happened 1 year ago today as DoND was long gone by this point. But in my series with Jimmy Carr hosting, it was Bridget's game, she got off to a great start by not touching the power-5 in the first two rounds and getting generous (for early in the series) offers of £7,500 and £14,000, then she lost the £100k in the third round which saw the banker suddenly go into stingy mode by DROPPING her offer to £9,800 From there, the game started to fall apart, but she turned it around in the last round, where the perfect round left Bridget with a £5k/£50k final 2 and a VERY generous offer of £26,500, which Bridget DEALT but was denied a much-deserved spanking by having £50k in her box

And of course you naturally got the ''fixed it'' brigade out simply because the £250,000 was on the table for what happened to be a 'milestone' show.

Then this was very shortly blown open by the revelation of 'sequencegate' which really did plunge the show's sincerity into doubt. Easy to forget how big this was at the time, I've been reading around on contemporaneous forum threads across the 'net land and it was a source of fervent discussion, even the 'normals' were shooting the breeze about it.