Various things over the last few weeks

Here I am, trying to catch up on my blogging. Presenting some "Twitter" style short paragraphs to catch up....

Our pal Sarah came up for a weekend visit and we went through some of her old video tapes, converting some of those recordings to DVD. One of them was the "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" musical episode! Thanks for the gift of the old video recorder, BTW!

Mark came to see us on his way home from a railway group meeting in Crewe - easy, as we live on his train line home. Apart from watching the first five episodes of "Star Wars: Clone Wars" cartoon, on the Sunday we drove out to the 'Battlefield Line' private railway in Leicestershire. That was a nice little hour or two out, and it was great to visit the museum in the old Shakerstone station, and see the train come in. Lovely easy drive out there, and it was fun to see the village called "Barton in the Beans" on the drive back! Also, I gave Mark some old railway books and other stuff I had acquired as a bit of a late birthday pressie!

I attended the "Memorabilia" show at Birmingham's NEC a couple of weeks ago. It was ok, and nice to see some friends there and meet a couple of celebrities. I only bought one item, a book of photos from "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull".

As she says on her blog, Carla had to go back to the US to attend her father's funeral a couple of weekends ago. :( We are going for a trip there soon to see the relatives again.

While Carla was away, I popped home for a quick visit to see mum and dad in the Great Yarmouth area. I drove pop down to the sea front to see the construction of the new outer harbour, as he is interested in the project. On my way back here later that day, I was caught in a two-hour traffic jam on the A14 near Newmarket! This was due to a fatal accident which had closed the road all afternoon. Of course, this was on Holiday (Easter) Monday and so the roads were busy with returning day trippers from the coast....lots of traffic! The traffic crawled through Newmarket, and I got back late around midnight - a frustrating tiring journey!

I've started to type up my father's Second World War diaries into a little document, including some photos that I got scanned a while back. Must try and get that completed next week!

Last Sunday I got together with my friend Toria who lives locally, and we went to the cinema to see "Monsters v Aliens" after a pleasant walk along the canal as it was a nice sunny day! The film was very entertaining as I spotted a lot of the references to 1950's sci-fi b-movies, such as "The Blob", "Attack of the 50ft Woman" and a load of others. Great CGI animation as well. As for DVDs, we have a few backed up to watch, including a load of Marilyn Monroe flicks, "The Notorious Betty Page", and "Robin of Sherwood" series 2 from the 1980's!

Some films.....

...that we've watched recently!

"Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan": As offensive as the censors would allow, yet rather interesting to watch. Sacha Baron "Ali-G" Cohen takes on the role of the bizarre Eastern block journalist touring the USA, and thanks to his rather rudimentary grip of the English language, this results in some amazing reactions. You will *cringe*! Maybe 'the joke' wears old over the course of the running time, but overall "Borat" is a very funny film. It features some hilarious moments, whilst providing a disturbingly sharp look at ordinary people's attitudes and opinions. Racism, sexism, narrow-mindedness are all exposed.

Oh, one of the cut scenes on the DVD that features a poor supermarket worker is comedy gold!

"The Queen": A marvellous film which focuses on the British Royal family during a time of national crisis: it is August 1997 and Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed are killed in that infamous Paris car crash. Helen Mirren is wonderful in this role, as are the supporting cast. Apart from dealing with a delicate time for the Royal Family, it explores the early relationship between her "old" values and traditions, and the new vision of the country from the recently elected Labour party. Tony Blair (ingeniously played by Michael Sheen) has the difficult task of re-connecting the public with the Royals. Worthy of its Oscar and box office success.

"Talk Radio": A late 80's Oliver Stone film about a Dallas radio 'shock jock', Barry Champlain. Stars Eric Bogosian, who also wrote it with Stone, and is based on the original stage play and book. Excellent and tense character study of an arrogant person who thinks he can help the common man though satirical attacks on his listeners. A complex film that I will definitely enjoy watching again.

I also bought "Doom" and "Clockwise" DVDs the other weekend as they were cheap, but we haven't watched them yet. I remember hiring "Doom" about a year ago and enjoying it for its sheer grade Z naffness! Soon we want to see "The Prestige", "The Notorious Betty Page", and give "Casino Royale" another viewing.