Bank Holiday Monday, DVDs and so on

Well, it’s a typical Bank Holiday Monday, so it's raining, cold and grey. No matter, as we had no plans to go anywhere today, just into town to mooch about the shops, and buy a cast-iron skillet and muffin tin. Oh the height of frivolity.

Last week, we got to see the following DVDs:

"The Last King of Scotland"

"Rocky Balboa"

"Stormbreaker"

All three were very entertaining. I can see why Forest Whitaker won the Oscar for playing Idi Amin in "Last..". A gripping performance, about an extreme individual. The production was nicely done on what looked like a big tv budget.

The last "Rocky" film was great to watch as well. I thought Stallone completed the story well and sent the character off on a high. I will search out the Rocky 1-6 DVD box set now!

Oh, the trailer for "John Rambo" is up and running on-t'internet. Looks action packed, and features some way over the top violence. Stallone once again is our hero in the jungle, destroying the enemy with his explosive arrows. 1980s all over again!

"Stormbreaker" was just a bit of fluff: 'James Bond - Junior' really. Still, the film was quite good fun to watch. I enjoyed laughing at Mickey Rourke's 'chewing- the-furniture' role as the baddie, and Bill Nighy (who seems to be in everything these days, including shows about meerkats) as the head of secret service operations. Ewan McGregor turned up for a day's shooting and car racing (he is only in the opening sequence) as well.

Oh, our pal Mandy came down over the weekend, and we were lucky enough to visit Warwick Castle on Saturday. What a brilliant day out this is, especially if the weather is nice like it was for most of the day. Glad we caught the jousting as well. Heck, it’s a bit "Hollywood" but there ya go.

Bizarre happenings at the sci-fair!

On the morning of Saturday 12th May (prior to our "Eurovision" revelry that evening - see my last post) I went down to a sci-fi collector's fair at the Leofric Hotel in Coventry. I had never been to this particular event, and as it was local I thought I would check it out. I wish I hadn't bothered, as it was, well, rubbish! Still, it was free entry and I got a couple of laughs out of it, and I managed to chat to a pal who was there as well as some other fan types. Anyway, disorganised chaos and small (about 8 dealers) was the order of the day here, at least for the first couple of hours. Most of the celebrity guests I didn’t recognise as they either appeared in sci-fi tv or small grade-B films, so no real need to bother with autographs this time. Have a look here at the guest list.

There were fans milling around not knowing where to go, bored and confused looking staff, and a general sense of disorganisation about the place. I think the real chaos came from the fact that there was a Smallville/Supernatural convention ("Asylum") going on in the same hotel at the same time, hence hundreds of fan girls clogging up the crowded corridors getting excited when they glimpsed Jensen Ackles. I really think the two events should have been kept separate. One table sold me a photo of actress Alison Mack, which they said I could get signed. Ok, groovy. However, they failed to tell me that this actress was part of the convention ONLY and not the sci-fi fair. So in the other part of the hotel I wasn't allowed to see her as I wasn't a convention guest! Oh well, at least they gave me my money back for the photo (I then found the photo on the net later….for free!)

The most bizarre thing happened early on as the crew/bouncer types were escorting actor Jensen Ackles from one room to another: a mad fan girl leapt on him and kissed him on the lips! Of course, she was wrestled to the ground while Jensen was hurried into a nearby lift. She then tried the "lemur leap" attack again and was restrained and removed from the hotel! In 17 odd years of going to shows, I've never seen anything that bad! I guess they had a crowd control problem. When I left to pop over to Forbidden Planet, she was crying outside and her mother was giving her a talking to. Haha!

(Mentions it all here.)

Still, before meeting up with Sarah I managed to have a mooch around Coventry shops including Waterstones, where I picked up the fantastic "The Making Of Star Wars" by J.W.Rizler. This was as birthday pressie to myself. Great book, worth buying even just for the photos. It covers the original 1977 film from its early conception, script development, casting, filming, the visual effects and release. The hardback version has additional stills and drawings in the back, so go for that one, collectors.

Catch ya'll soon…

Eurovision madness and my birthday!

So the walking holiday went fine, our internet works, and we are now addicted to watching crappy American infomercials on the satellite shopping channels. Life is good!

Our friend Sarah came up to stay with us over the weekend, the main reason to listen to Terry 'BBC God' Wogan yammer on through the "Eurovision Song Contest" and of course, as a bit of a social as we hadn’t seen her since "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" came out! (a big 'Hello Sarah!' when she reads this). Yep, sad I know, but we are all fans of this TV institution. The show is great to watch with a few glasses of wine! Some of the performances are quite, how shall we say, 'out there' on planet crap. :)

Anyhoo, we loved our entry: "Flying the Flag" by Scooch. Top campy pop… great fun, and featuring wonderful flight attendant costumes!! Shame no one else in Europe thought so as the voting put us second from last (just above Ireland). It seems the political voting has been getting worse over the last few yeas as it has now become the "Eastern European Song Contest love-in". Still, there ya go….the show was fun all the same. Why that les-bo Serb won with that dirge I have no idea. Our non-UK favourites were Ukraine (a Christopher Biggins look-a-like with a star on his head), a cross-dresser from Denmark, and the Belgian entry sung by what looked like the love child of Jay Kay (the lead singer from Jamiroquai) and Lenny Kravitz. Unfortunately, Belgian disco boy got kicked out in the semis. Shame, that track was proper bo! Carla also liked the French song - I admit, that was a fun performance. Especially when they ran around the stage. Sarah loved the Belarus song that had a heavy 007 influence. Have a look at these bizarre acts here!

Oh, I became 35 years old on Sunday, so we had choccy cake and (at least I had) the remains of the previous night's plonk!

More silliness tomorrow.

Our recent holiday

Ye gads, I must add to this blog! So here goes with some recent stuff….

We were on holiday from late April up to bank holiday Monday….which was pretty good. After I made a quick trip over to Great Yarmouth to see mum and dad and sort out more junk in the attic, we did a day walking around the beautiful town of Henley-in-Arden in Warwickshire. We had a great day of country walking in gentle green hills and sunny weather. Nice picnic as well. On our way home, we stopped off in Birmingham and got loads of Chinese food in Chinatown. Carla made several yummy meals with this!

A couple of days later we moved on to Shropshire. What a beautiful county, and so close to us! The first day we stayed in Ludlow. The town is ok in a sort of old-y-world-y middle-class kind-a way. The castle ruins are certainly worth a visit and the woodland near to the river is lovely to walk in on a sunny afternoon. Lots of very tame ducks there! Shame the stupid fair was in town to clog up the market place, and we had the usual trouble with getting decent vegan options when it came to eating out. Great B+B though! Anyway, afterwards we moved on to Church Stretton for a few days to go walking in the picturesque hills. This was with a group of fellow walkers from all over the country, and lead by a local expert. Not bad, but I think that we prefer to do our own thing, as we felt a little restricted by going on a set path and having to walk with others. Also, the food in the hotel was rubbish as once again, these idiots don't know the concept of a vegan diet….or even soya milk. Still, the actually walking was fabulous, as the countryside is stunning there. No wonder they call it 'Little Switzerland'. Thankfully we had nice weather up to bank holiday Monday, when the rain and mist descended on us when were up walking the Stiperstones. Thank goodness for waterproofs! Two days before, on the summit of Caer Caradoc it was hot and sunny!

I need to get the photos sorted out, as we had a film to finish in our 35mm camera. Hopefully I will remember to take them into ASDA and get them on-line soon.

...more of my catch up blogging tomorrow…

I'm back!

Hello world!

At long last, we are back on-line here at Tate central. Yaaay! We got Sky satellite TV got installed a couple of weeks ago (oh, "Takeshi's Castle" on Challenge TV is fantastic!) and we are also now on Sky broadband. For some reason, my old account with Freeserve/Wanadoo/Orange/Whatever_they_are_calling_themselves_this_month died in early April. So now we have a fab new Sky livebox flashing away in the corner, which provides us with a link to the outside world and the fun that is internet geekdom.

….now of course, I have to type something worth reading!

Well, I'll try and catch up somehow over the next few days. Loads to cover apart from our usual DVD and film watching, as we have just come back from holiday in Shropshire, where we did lots of hill walking in the beautiful countryside.

:)