For the past several months I've been conscious that we've been coming up to the 20th anniversary of this blog. But every time I thought about writing the "20 years!" post, I've elected not to do so, on the grounds that it wasn't time yet.
We passed that threshold on the 8th of September, meaning it sailed gracefully and unnoticed into the past. Oops!
The issue of screen time is a question I constantly wrestle with. On the one hand, there's a large extent to which Funsize and Surprise! will inevitably have access to screens, and the important thing is for them to learn to be comfortable and safe using them. On the other hand, it's not healthy them watching too much TV/Netflix/Disney... and there are much worse things out there.
And so there have been tweaks, and more tweaks, and yet more tweaks. At the weekend there was an allocation of some additional time, to reflect an unfairness that had crept in. Today that has been adjusted downwards again.
But I think it may need to be something we discuss again. And again...
Last night Funsize and I finished our read-through of "Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince", which marks the completion of the 23rd book of the year. This therefore means that I have now read more books this year than last, which is obviously a really nice place to be (albeit rather too early - and nowhere near the totals of years gone past).
#23: "Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince", by J.K. Rowling
It has been many years since I was last stung by a wasp. I can't say the experience has improved any over the intervening time.
Perhaps the most galling thing of all, though, is that the awful provocation I made to be stung was to open the window, that the wasp was nowhere near, in order to let the wee beastie escape from our office. Grr!
#22: "Dragons of Eternity", by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman
Seven weeks ago, I posted that we were mulling over what to do about Christmas this year. As it happened, LC and I had a conversation on the topic about six weeks ago and more or less locked it down - we were basically in agreement, and so other than leaving some time to let it settle there wasn't much more to say. Still, I did say I don't start my Christmas countdown until 100 days before, and so it isn't until now that I'm ready to share.
The upshot is that we're more or less going to repeat what we did last year: we'll host people for the big meal at Christmas. I'll head over to see some other family on Christmas Eve, and then we'll meet with everyone for the big gathering on Boxing Day, but Christmas Day itself will be a local walk followed by a large meal, followed by TV. (For the TV, since there's no "Wallace & Gromit" and no "Doctor Who", we've identified a recent film that we'll carefully avoid watching until then, and use that as our centerpiece. Until FS and S! object, that is.)
I think that means we're now getting towards settling our core "Christmas experience". That may be another post for when the season is really underway.
One of the more unfortunate aspects of our current society is that these days reviews are almost entirely useless, especially when the protagonist is anything other than a straight white male - everything else is met with a relentless barrage of review-bombs on one side, and a set of hagiographic "reviews" on the other intent on redressing the balance. Neither of which serves to answer the actual question: it is actually any good?
Which brings me to "Ironheart", a show starring a young woman of colour. So, inevitably, the reviews are mixed, to say the least: some people are slating it on every possible pretext but not stating their real objection; meanwhile, the professional reviews are glowing, ignoring the flaws of the thing.
We finished watching it last night, and actually "mixed" is about as fair a review as you can get.
The positives: the cast are great, the characters are well drawn, the effects are surprisingly excellent, and the story, while basic, is well told.
My first negative is that it could do with some more jokes. I do also find some of it extremely far fetched, even within the context of Marvel - the show rightly made the point that Tony Stark's billions were a massive part of why he was able to do what he did... and then has RiRi do exactly the same without those resources anyway. (And, yes, Stark put together his first suit in a cave with no help. But Stark's first suit was also a comparative piece of junk.)
But those are fairly small beans.
I also felt that the ending was underwhelming - once again, we have a finale where the main plot is suddenly resolved very quickly, and we spend a significant amount of time dealing with other stuff - "Discovery" has just done that, "Doctor Who" has just done that, and now this. (Of course, that's largely coincidence - some of these came out some time ago, and I just happen to be watching them all together.) I almost got the feeling that the first five hours of "Ironheart" were largely an excuse for them being able to introduce Mephisto in the final episode. Which is weird.
Lastly, though, there is something that makes me really uneasy. In the first couple of episodes, RiRi engages in serious criminal activity. It's not 'questionable' or 'borderline', or any other euphemism - she's working with a group of thugs and is party to violence, extortion, and almost certainly murder. Plus, there's one point where she's almost certainly on bodycam footage as a cop is shot and killed.
And the show never addresses this and there are no consequences - we're full-square behind RiRi as she breaks from the group, not out of any moral stance or principled objection, but because they find out she's killed one of their number. There's no question of going to the authorities, or facing due process for the crimes she has actually committed. It's all just handwaved and then ignored.
And that's a real problem.
(And, again, it's true that Marvel has a track record on this, where various Avengers have gone rogue at various times, and even when they haven't they do engage in all sorts of illegality. The key difference, though, is that they don't actively and knowingly go to work for the bad guys. At their very worst, they are duped into their actions, but that's not the case here - RiRi knows that Hood and his team are sketchy as hell, but is motivated by the money.)
The upshot: my feelings about "Ironheart" are deeply mixed. But I'll be more than happy to see RiRi Williams appearing in future Marvel projects, and I'll be happy to watch other things produced and directed by Ryan Coogler (incidentally, "Eyes of Wakanda", by the same producer, is really good). I find this flawed, but not the disaster the review-bombers would have you believe.
This one came from the most recent Tesco magazine.
I have, of course, made meatballs before, though never from chicken, and making a simple sauce is easy, so this one was quick and easy to put together. There are two things I would do differently next time: rather than chopping the onion I'd use the food processor to get a much finer consistency, and I'd actually remember to put the yoghurt in the tahini yoghurt drizzle! (I don't think that actually made much difference - it meant using a lot more water to get the desired consistency, but very little difference to the eventual texture or flavour. Still...) Oh, and I'd make up the meatballs immediately after getting the mince and then freeze - this allows for more flexibility than making them out of already-defrosted mince.
But the meal as a whole was very nice. We'll definitely have this again.
There’s obviously a spectrum of sequels: most sequels are just more of the same, which makes them inherently a bit less good than the original. Sometimes, of course, you see a sequel that is better than the original, indeed sometimes much better. Then there are sequels that are bad, and indeed some so bad that we collectively agree they never happened. And then, very very occasionally, you get a sequel that perfectly complements and elevates the original, somehow serving to not only be great in their own right but to actually make the original retroactively better. It's even possible, somehow, to have a sequel that perfectly complements the original and diminishes the whole, retroactively making the original worse.
I'm not entirely sure which of those latter two categories "1984: Julia" falls into.
On the surface, this one is pretty straightforward: it's a retelling of "Nineteen Eighty-Four" from the perspective of Julia, Winston's lover from the original. This includes a depiction of her childhood in the early days of the rule of The Party, then we revisit the doomed love affair from the original (um, spoilers, I guess), and then we follow her life after their arrest and time in the Ministry of Love.
And, as I said, it almost perfectly complements the original - Orwell couldn't have written this book, not being a woman, but a "female Orwell" (if such a thing makes sense) absolutely could. Of course, Julia's perspective on the events shared with Winston is at once similar and yet not the same as his.
And yet...
One of the key things that this novel does is it strips away the ambiguity of Julia's character. In a novel like "Nineteen Eighty-Four", where so much of the narrative is driven by uncertainty and untruth, that ambiguity is, arguably, much needed. And removing that, and replacing it with one set of definitive answers, may be to do a disservice to the original.
I'm sorry to say, also, that the ending really doesn't work for me. It's carefully, and deliberately ambiguous, in a way that would be really good... except that however I look at it it just doesn't fit - taken at face value you're left with too much of a coincidence, but if you shift it into another layer of the deception you're left with loose ends that just won't tie up. Which is a shame, because the first third of the novel is outstanding.
The other thing about the ending is that, like Atwood's "The Testaments", it really undercuts the horror that the dystopia is apparently scheduled to pop up, engage in cartoonish levels of villainy for a couple of decades, and then collapse within a single lifetime. So much for a boot stamping on a human face, forever. (Though "The Handmaid's Tale" is, worryingly, looking ever more prescient - the West really is facing a serious decline in fertility, and it's hard to think of a solution that isn't absolutely horrific. But I digress.)
Still... maybe after so many decades it's fair enough to peel away one level of ambiguity, and replace it with another?
The upshot is that I do recommend this one, but with the caveat that you should know what you're signing up for. Once you've read this, you won't be able to unread it, so the original will be changed in your perception. Which, perhaps, is the highest praise I can give it.
(One parting thought: "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is of course one of those classic novels that schools used to teach, though perhaps unfairly given that it may be best appreciated by those with more life experience. Anyway, for those pupils in their upper years who have those big essays to write (we called them the RPR and a Dissertation, though they're surely called different things now), I think it might be interesting to study these two together... but have the pupil write their character study of Julia after reading the original only, and then reflect on how it changes after reading this.)
#21: "1984: Julia", by Sandra Newman
Time for another update on goals for the year:
With some regret I have to announce that I have reached the end of BBQ season for the year. We were fortunate indeed that the weather allowed for one more good BBQ, but I'm now calling it - in general, I prefer to end things on my own terms than to be forced to an end, and so it is with this season.
Anyway, we concluded with another burger from "The Handcrafted Burger", and it's another winner - a simple guacamole (not sure if there's really another kind), a minced rump steak with a spice rub, and the application of heat.
The one thing I think I would do different is switching the steak for mince - I'm not sure how much that added step really added, and the burgers were awfully small. I would say "disappointingly so", except that there really wasn't anything disappointing about these. But more would have been nice.
And that's that. We now move into Autumn, and then to Winter, and so a different phase of meals begins - could be fun!
We’re just entering the third month of a three-month deal on Paramount+ - once again, I took out a subscription to catch up on the various Star Trek series, timed to coincide with the new season of “Strange New Worlds”. (We also took the opportunity to watch two other films, one of which was okay and the other was disastrously poor.)
Looking at those new Treks, then…
The oldest of the three, and indeed the reason we first subscribed to Netflix back in the day, “Star Trek: Discovery” had its fifth and final season. Which is fine, all apart from the finale. That final episode was an utter mess, although in fairness to them that seems to be a consequence of an unexpected cancellation – the final episode of the season turned out to be the final episode of the series.
I know Discovery is not generally regarded all that well these days, but I’ve always found it okay – it suffers from starting with a glimpse of a show I’d really rather watch, but does well in presenting the show itself. That said, it’s the weakest of the three seasons I’ve been watching.
The fifth and final season of Star Trek’s animated series continues in the rich vein of form of this series. I suspect this was a good time for the show to end, as various things were starting to wear a bit thin. But this was a strong season to go out on. And, unlike Discovery, they had plenty of time to construct a finale that does a really good job of wrapping things up.
I don’t have much to say about this season (which is still ongoing), except to note that SNW remains uniformly excellent. This is the show that justifies the subscription to Paramount+. Good stuff.
Conversely, this made-for-TV movie is just terrible. Which is a real shame – while I’m no great fan of the whole concept of S31 in-universe, I am a big fan of Michelle Yeoh, and her turn as Empress Philippa Georgiou is usually a lot of fun. But the abridged runtime here really doesn’t give the story any time to breathe, the rest of the characters are really not great (and the presence of Rachel Garrett is especially grating). Such a shame.
All in all, Star Trek has been doing pretty well lately, though I do note that three of the four things I list are ended, while the fourth is ending soon. And I find I’m really not struck by any of their upcoming projects, be they in film or TV, and the prime, mirror, or Kelvin universes.
We’re probably overdue in giving Funsize some pocket money, and indeed in having her take on some chores around the house (those two are somewhat, but not inherently, linked). This raises a number of questions: exactly when, how much, which chores should she take on, and what is the exact relationship between chores and money received? So, all the usual questions parents have dealt with over the decades.
But there’s one new wrinkle that I haven’t seen a good
answer to yet: how to deal with pocket money in a world without cash?
The thing is, I basically don’t use cash any more, to the
extent that it’s a massive pain when I do have to pay for something using it – any
multiple of £10 is fine, of course, since that’s just a trip to an ATM, but
otherwise it’s either contactless, online shopping, bank transfer, or something
like that. And while I am personally very strongly opposed to society getting
rid of cash (which is a whole other rant), I also don’t want to actually have
to use it. Which is a problem if I’m needing to give Funsize regular, small
amounts of cash.
At the same time, she’s also too young for a debit card, and
certainly for a phone (and therefore any pocket money app). Not to mention that
having actual, physical money in different amounts makes the whole thing
tangible in a way that simply waving a card for everything does not.
So I’m frankly a bit stuck.
#20: "Odyssey", by Stephen Fry
There’s obviously a spectrum of sequels: most sequels are just more of the same, which makes them inherently a bit less good than the original. Sometimes, of course, you see a sequel that is better than the original (“X-Men 2”), indeed sometimes much better (“The Dark Knight”). Then there are sequels that are bad (“X-Men 3”), and indeed some so bad that we collectively agree they never happened (why, for instance, did we jump from “Star Trek 4: The Voyage Home” to “Star Trek 6: The Undiscovered Country”?). And then, very very occasionally, you get a sequel that perfectly complements and elevates the original, somehow serving to not only be great in their own right but to actually make the original film retroactively better (“The Godfather Part Two”, “The Empire Strikes Back”).
But “Gladiator II” has achieved something that I don’t think I’ve ever seen before: it perfectly complements the original and diminishes the whole, retroactively making the first film worse.
It actually starts off well enough, beginning with a Roman attack on a frontier city, this time shown from the point of view of the defenders. Good stuff. Naturally, the Romans are victorious and our hero finds himself made a slave, and then a gladiator.
The story then unfolds in much the same way as the original. And all the characters from the original are present, but each is moved around the board one space: we have the person of colour who is a co-gladiator and friend to our hero… but this time he dies early. We have the stablemaster (Denzel Washington instead of Oliver Reed), but he’s not the benign figure from the original. We have not one, but two made emperors… but they never set foot in the arena. And so on and so forth.
And it’s fine, for about two thirds of the run time – a completely unnecessary sequel-by-numbers that would ordinarily fit into my very first category.
And then it goes horribly wrong. It’s almost as if the writers knew the story they wanted to write, knew how it should all play out to a certain point, knew what the end-point should be from there, but just couldn’t make the last few dots line up. And so the last forty minutes consist of everything falling apart in a stream of nonsense, characters making endless bad decisions because they need to because of the plot, characters announcing the plot because otherwise it’s just incomprehensible… basically, it’s a mess.
And, as I said, it all fits perfectly with the original, such that the two now feel permanently entangled. They’re not two separate films; they’re two parts of a whole. This film makes the original feel worse than it did before.
Avoid.
Not much to say about this one – it comes from a random Tesco magazine from some time ago, it was quick and easy to put together, and other than producing a lot more food than we could eat, it was basically fine. But it wasn’t as good as the other paella that I’ve made before, and I find myself struggling to think when we might have this again – it’s too much for two of us (and doesn’t seem suitable either to cut in half or to reheat), and for a crowd I’d be inclined to put in the effort for the better meal.
So I don’t regret this one, but don’t necessarily recommend it either.
#19: “Dragons of Fate”, by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman
A few weeks ago I mused about how long it would be before I wrote this post. After their match on the first weekend of the season, I very nearly published a post with this title, though at that time it would have been as a joke - although failing to win that match was hugely symbolic, in the grand scheme it probably doesn't matter all that much.
But they've followed that up with a sequence of fairly bad results, with only one actually good one in the interim. And then last night they were hammered 3-1. In truth, the result is probably not all that surprising (as in fairness the Europa League is probably Rangers level, while the Champions League is beyond them), the fact that they collapsed so completely so quickly was rather more of a problem - when the local commentators are describing the showing as "embarrassing", there's a problem.
The upshot of that is that the manager is already under massive pressure - he was never really the fans' first choice, his style has utterly failed to have the expected impact, and now everything has just turned. The mood on Twitter was nothing short of poisonous last night.
So now they have about two weeks, and three matches, to turn all this around. On Sunday they face St Mirren, a tricky away tie that is now a must-win. Then on the 31st of August they face Celtic at Ibrox, and again that's a must-win. In between, there's the return tie against Club Brugge in Champions League qualifying. That's the one that it's probably okay to lose - provided they put on a massive performance and just get pipped. But another humiliation.
But on the evidence thus far, there's no real reason to think any of those matches will pan out that way. St Mirren are a tough team to beat at the best of times, and Rangers are both weak at the back and misfiring up front. Celtic are miles ahead. And Club Brugge have already done the hard work in the tie, and so the return may turn into a exercise in them deciding how much to hurt Rangers.
And yet, if things don't go Rangers' way, there's no obvious way forward. This season was supposed to be the start of a new era, and it's on the cusp of disaster. Do they replace the manager yet again? And if so, who could they get who would both be better and also willing to come to the club in that state?
To be honest, at this point it's hard to see how they could have had a worse start to things.
I finally finished watching “Andor” over the weekend. My reaction to it was mixed.
On the one hand, “Andor” is almost certainly the single best “Star Wars” show to date (and if you restrict it to live action shows, that ‘almost’ goes away). It is really, really good – exceptionally well made, with a wonderful cast (the only slight disappointment being that Jimmy Smits wasn’t available, so they recast Bail Organa… but the new guy did the job very well, so that wasn’t too bad), a spectacularly strong set of scripts, and no weak episodes. Yes, the pacing is a little slow at times, but that’s because it’s building tension over time.
It's just great.
And yet… I found that I really didn’t enjoy it. There’s just something about the show that meant I knew that it was very, very good, could appreciate all the things that went into making it so very good, but I wouldn’t watch it again. And, indeed, if I knew then what I know now, I might not have bothered to watch it at all.
Which is really odd, and I don’t really understand how it has come about, but there it is.
So, do I recommend it? Well, yes, because it’s excellent. And yet…
(Incidentally, there seems to be a bit of a split in fandom between “Ahsoka” fans and “Andor” fans. Personally, I’m glad we get both – in terms of production, “Andor” is the better show, but I enjoyed “Ahsoka” rather more. Plus, there’s that one episode of “Ahsoka” that I count as the absolute pinnacle of Star Wars TV thus far.)
And so, the Gala Day season for the year limps to an end. Sad to say, this one is not one on which I will look back fondly – too many events with too few people in attendance, and a general absence of enthusiasm at most of the ones that we did attend, plus one instance of truly awful weather, has made for a rather poor season.
That said, it’s worth noting that we did in fact end om a high note – this was the event at which we had the largest band, the weather was glorious (if anything, too hot and sunny – it’s a long walk!), and as a consequence a really good attendance from an enthusiastic crowd. All in all, good stuff.
And now we go into the winter season, where we might have a Christmas tree switch-on event to attend (or maybe not, if the Uphall Station Gala Day committee have decided to fold completely). I do also need to get my kilt and waistcoat cleaned, as that’s overdue, and should ideally source some new uniform.
And my bagpipes themselves need a little attention, as they’ve been somewhat neglected of late, and that’s starting to show.
For the most part, though, the next few months look like a time for rest, and hopefully some rebuilding.
The end of the most recent season of “Doctor Who” left things in a fairly bad place, and coupled with the uncertainty over the Disney deal, there’s a real chance the show will be going on another long hiatus. Even if not, there will definitely be a delay of a couple of years, as they will need to come up with a new cast (or at least part of one), new writers and scripts, and actually make the thing.
But there’s also the debate of how best to go forward with
it.
My thinking is that the best way forward depends on whether
there’s a short or a long pause before the show returns. But it boils down to three
options:
Option One: A short pause, but otherwise everything
continues
The best-case scenario, at least for the BBC, is that either
Disney continue with their distribution deal or they find a new streaming
partner straight away, RTD continues as showrunner, and they proceed into the
new season more or less right away.
In that case, I’d recommend picking up where they left off:
Gatwa’s Fifteen has regenerated into Piper’s Sixteen, and the fallout from that
becomes the centre of the Christmas special in 2026 or 2027. This is then a
one-off adventure culminating into another regeneration (as Billie Piper is almost
certainly too expensive, and too in-demand, to be the Doctor long-term), before
going into the next season.
Not ideal, but it gets them out of the current mess without
too much turmoil.
Option Two: A short-ish pause, resuming without a streaming
partner
Alternately, the BBC may find themselves without a streaming
partner, in which case the show will inevitably face a somewhat longer hiatus
and then may return but with a smaller budget. In which case the chances of
having Billie Piper return even for a special are slim, and there’s a pretty
good chance that they’d want to replace the rest of the team.
In that case, I think I’d advocate for, essentially, a “double
regeneration” – the show picks up again from just before the end of the
previous season, we see Gatwa regenerate, see Piper appear and say “oh, hello”…
and then the regeneration continues straight through into whoever is cast as
the “real” Sixteen. The explanation, if one is ever felt needed, is basically
the same as for Romana’s regeneration back in the day – the Doctor was “trying
on” a new face but it didn’t stick.
And then you go from there.
Option Three: A longer pause
In the event that Doctor Who finds itself without a
streaming partner, the BBC may take the view that they want to rest it, to let some
time pass under the bridge, let a new generation of writers come to it, and
then revive the series – it was highly successful once, so why not again?
In which case, I’d recommend simply picking up with a new
Doctor on new adventures, and simply not referencing what went before. At some
point, way in the future, they may want to pull another “Day of the Doctor”,
and thus fill in the gaps, but unless and until they come up with something
really solid, just leave it unanswered. (And, crucially, don’t rush into answering
the question, or even hinting at the fact that there is a question to be answered
– let any revival get really confident on its feet first before touching it.)
(I was at this point going to talk about a fourth option,
which would be a full-blown reboot of the series. But the more I think about
it, the more I think that’s a terrible idea. Don’t do that!)
#18: “Tower of Fools”, by Andrzej Sapkowski
I mentioned a few posts ago that we'd seen s few jobs pop up needing to be done: LC's car needed some work, the kitchen door needed a fix, the bathroom wanted repainted, and the washing machine needed something done. Over the last couple of weeks, these have now been addressed.
LC's car was fairly simple, if somewhat frustrating. Basically, it went back to the garage, they did what was needed, and that was the job done. No issues there, it just took a bit longer than we would have liked.
Repainting the bathroom was likewise just a job that needed to be done. So one morning I got up early, got on with it, and that was the job done. Huzzah!
Fixing the kitchen door was a bit harder, but once I'd found the appropriate advice it wasn't hard - the door is now remounted, and the hinges are no longer sagging. It still needs some sort of adjustment, but I'm not sure what wants done there. The advice I've seen looks like it wants a wrench applied, but I'm not so sure about that. I think we might just be leaving it alone.
That left the washing machine, which I took care of on Saturday. This was a job that has been waiting to be done for a long time, and so finally getting it done is really good. The issue was that the washing machine was wired directly into the wall, which I've now switched over to a socket-and-plug arrangement. This turned out to be fairly straightforward, though it did require quite a lot of care and double-checking.
(That's now three of four kitchen/utility room appliances switched over. The last is the kitchen freezer, which I'd like to get switched over as a matter of principle, but we have no plans to replace it any time soon, or really ever, so it would just be a job for the sake of doing it.)
We've now ordered a replacement washing machine - the old one is now pretty long in the tooth, and has some problems we've never quite been able to get fully fixed. That's all fair enough - we got it a couple of years before we moved, and although it didn't come into use immediately after we moved (the house came with a washing machine), it has done about eight years of good service. So it's had a good run.
That therefore clears the list of jobs, at least for the moment. It would be nice to think we'd have a spell without more jobs coming up, but that seems unlikely. I guess we'll see.
My view, when allegations of the sort faced by Neil Gaiman are made, is firstly that these are serious matters and must be taken seriously (investigated properly, and appropriate action taken), and then secondly that the position of “innocent until proven guilty” is not only legally vital but also socially important.
The problem in this case is that the nature of the alleged offences, coupled with where they are alleged to have taken place, makes any such investigation nigh-impossible – “this happened, in an isolated location with nobody else present, and sufficiently long ago that any evidence that once existed is long since gone.”
The upshot of that is that while the allegations must still be taken seriously, they can’t meaningfully be dealt with. That’s not justice, whichever way it falls – if Gaiman did indeed do what was alleged, there’s an appropriate punishment but no way to apply it; if he did not then he has no means of clearing his name.
As for myself, my feeling is that I won’t now be buying any further books he publishes (where previously I certainly would have done so) and won’t be watching any new shows based on his works. I will watch the end of “Good Omens”, as we’re already well into the story at this point, but have removed (or will remove) “American Gods” from my watchlist, and won’t be adding anything else. I don’t like that that’s the position, but that feels about as close to ‘right’ as I can manage.
Posting about “Sandman” in light of the allegations against Neil Gaiman is tricky. On balance, it’s probably right that this marks the end of “Sandman” (and that “Good Omens” has a much-truncated third ‘season’), though for the others involved it’s deeply unfortunate – the quality of the show doesn’t warrant cancellation.
“Sandman” is a bit of a weird thing. It was an iconic graphic novel series back in the day, but very much a product, not of its time, but of the age of its readers – what works when you’re at university isn’t quite the same as when you’re nearing fifty. But as a throwback, it’s certainly interesting. (I do wonder what people who are now at university would make of it – does it work the same as it once would have for me, or is it impossibly dated?)
Other than that, I’m not sure what more to say: there’s a great cast, it’s extremely well made, and it does capture both the mood and the style of the graphic novels, despite the massive changes to society and technology in the interim.
But… if you haven’t already started, I’m inclined to recommend skipping it. (And, likewise, with “Good Omens” I’d recommend the first season, the one based on the book, only.) Not because of the show, but the other stuff. As I said, a real shame, but…
It has been a difficult year for the band. Attendances at practice have been well down over even last year, to the extent that practice has actually been cancelled for the last couple of weeks. Meanwhile, we only have a handful of events for the year, and have been in the position where one of those events we could only go ahead with because of guest players, and another we formed a combined band and would have had to cancel otherwise.
There is, unfortunately, no sign that this is likely to
improve – the band hasn’t really recruited anyone for the past few years (and,
indeed, only one regular player since I joined eight years ago), and the existing
members are either starting to find it harder to carry on due to age or are
becoming increasingly busy with other things. The upshot is that we can’t
really learn and then play any new tunes (since we’re absolutely reliant on
people who aren’t attending practices and so not learning the new tunes), and
even without that we’re down to the bare bones for events.
I’m not really sure where things go from here. The truth is
that almost all non-competing bands are suffering the same problems: because
competition bands absorb almost all of the players, the bands that are left are
all shrinking and finding it hard to carry on.
Meanwhile, the events that give those bands their purpose
are also suffering a bit of a lull – partly because they’ve never recovered
fully from Covid, partly because the organisers are basically getting sick of
what is a fairly thankless task, and partly because the funding for the events
is receding sharply (from the Council point of view it’s basically gone, as budgets
have had to be cut to the bone; and corporate sponsors are cutting back, or seeking
to provide practical rather than monetary support – which will well received,
but sometimes there’s just a need).
All of which amounts to saying I’m not sure if the band is
meaningfully going to survive, and I’m also not sure I’m keen to remain
involved if it’s just to be the person who ends up switching off the lights for
the last time. Which is a shame.
A week ago I found myself casting around for something to do – everything seemed to be nicely in hand, there was nothing much on the to-do list, and I was starting to go stir crazy. I then realised that this was a good thing, and that actually what was needed to be content, and just enjoy things for a while.
But then things started to fall apart – there’s a task to
get the painting of the bathroom finished off, which involved patching a small crack
in the ceiling. In preparation for doing that, I noticed that the door to our utility
room needed another adjustment. But when I tried to do that, I found we’d
reached the end of the road on making adjustments – it needs a proper fix.
Then, Funsize ripped it off the wall yesterday. We’re also looking at replacing
our washing machine, which will require that the wall connection be changed (at
the moment it’s wired directly into the wall; that wants changed to a proper plug-and-socket).
And now LC’s car is acting up again.
So that’s that. It was nice… well, it was okay while it
lasted. But now it’s time to get back to work.
The new football season starts on Saturday, which is fantastic. One of the best things about this, of course, is the opportunity to pretend that it isn’t all a foregone conclusion.
The reality is that there’s a gulf in Scottish football – Celtic are miles ahead of Rangers, and Rangers are miles (albeit fewer miles) ahead of everyone else. And so, barring a major shock, the league will be won by Celtic, Rangers will be second, and then the top six will be made up of Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen, and one other in some order. Sadly, Livingston and Falkirk will probably find themselves in the bottom two positions.
The cups are a bit more volatile, as there’s always scope for an upset that knocks someone out unexpectedly. So while Celtic are massive favourites, that is by no means a guarantee. It would certainly be nice to see the honours spread around a bit – when winning a Treble was an unusual thing it was good to see it happening, but in the world after the “Quadruple Treble” I think I’d prefer never to see one again.
Also, I wonder how long it will be before the annual “Rangers Woes” post?
Now that the Summer holiday is done, I find my mind turning to the events of the second half of the year, the biggest of which is Christmas. And that finds me at a crossroads.
Last Christmas was one of the best that we've had, certainly in recent years. There were several reasons for this, but ultimately it comes down to the fact that we were hosting for the first time, which meant that we were somewhat tied down in location, and that meant we weren't tempted to try to fit too much into the day - there was a walk, the build up to the big meal, and then a relaxing time after the big meal.
However, I'm painfully conscious that that meant we didn't see some people who would very much have liked to have seen us on Christmas, and indeed we didn't see some people we would very much have liked to see on Christmas. Boxing Day just isn't quite the same thing - close, but not the same.
Which leaves the big question of what to do this year: do we do the same again (effectively making the statement that "this is how it's going to be now"), do we revert to what we had done previously ("this is how it's going to be from now on... sometimes"), or indeed do we do something different again (and if so, what?)?
That is, definitely, a tricky one. Not least because there are several other people who have a view, and some of those views are quite important!
Anyway...
For the moment I'm not making any decisions - my countdown to Christmas starts on the 16th of September (100 days), and I refuse to start it earlier than that. However, when we do come to that key date, I want to get a decision in place more or less right away, so that plans can be laid. As I said, there are therefore seven weeks to mull it over for the decision.
#17: "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", by J.K. Rowling (a book for Funsize)
On the ferry back from France, shortly before we docked, I had a notification on my phone that a number of apps hadn't been used for some time and were therefore slated for deep sleep. I didn't pay this one too much attention - given that these were indeed apps I wasn't using, and since there wasn't any option to not take this action anyway, I shrugged and moved on.
But then the horror began.
It turned out that one of the affected apps must have had some connection to the touchscreen driver, but I soon found that it had become painfully unresponsive - pressing one key would lead to another number appearing, or multiple key presses, or none at all. Which made unlocking the phone impossible.
A Google on LC's phone suggested that the most likely remedy would be to restart the phone. Which was not unexpected - turning it off and on again is not only a fine joke, but also the most likely way to resolve most IT issues (and mobile phones these days are hugely sophisticated computers, so this is an IT issue). The big problem with that being that my phone required you to unlock the phone to either restart it or to shut it down.
Luckily, though LC may dispute this, I'm not absolutely dependent on my phone for my life. I know there are quite a few people these days who use their phones for everything, to the extent that they simply don't carry any cash or cards to pay for things - just use Apple-Pay for everything.
So there ensued a few frustrating hours as I carefully, painstakingly, tried again and again and eventually managed to get the thing to unlock. Whereupon I was able to quickly restart it, and all was well once more.
But the moral of the story is simple: don't become so dependent on your phone that if it is lost, stolen, or gets locked or damaged that you're utterly paralysed!
We're back with Paramount+ for a few months, most of which will involve me watching the last several Star Trek seasons (the final season of "Discovery", of "Lower Decks", and the new season of "Strange New Worlds". Oh, and the "Section 31" movie.) However, the other thing we've been watching is the second season of the "Frasier" reboot.
The bottom line: it's alright.
The fundamental problem with the show is that it's very much a repeat of "Frasier", but with less charm and fewer jokes than the original. The cast do their jobs, and do them well, but they just don't quite have the same cohesion as the cast of the original. And so, people who weren't fans of the original are unlikely to be won over by this show, which really doesn't have much to offer them, while fans of the original are left with an inevitable and unfavourable comparison. However, you cut it, that's not ideal.
Ultimately, the show basically sums itself up in an episode in the second season, in which Frasier returns to Seattle and KACL to find the station on its last legs. He eventually persuades Ros to give it up as a lost cause: it was fun, but it's had its day. Which, sad to say, is true of "Frasier" itself.
In the UK, it may well be a close to universal frustration that the bins aren't emptied often enough. Or, more accurately, they probably are emptied just enough, but absolutely no more than that. Which means that if you ever miss a collection you're suddenly in real trouble.
This post isn't really about complaining about the bins, however.
One of the many things I've been reluctantly learning recently is about the concept of Customer Needs, and specifically unmet Customer Needs. Basically, it's really hard to sell someone something that they neither want nor have any use for. But if you can provide something that they want, that's much easier. And if you can provide something that they need, and specifically something that they need and can't get anywhere else, well...
Anyway, we have recently returned from vacation, being away from home for just under two weeks. More importantly, we were away on the day of two bin collections - the garden waste bin (which we could probably have managed without) and the paper/card recycling bin (which is considerably harder to miss). (The worst of all, of course, is the general waste bin.)
Now, as it happens we have a good relationship with our various neighbours, and so we were able to prevail on some of them to put the bins out and put them back. But many people are not in that position for one reason or another.
Which brings me to the unmet needs.
It strikes me that during the summer holidays in particular, there are quite a number of teens at a relatively loose end, quite a number of people who need a bin or two put out, and there's therefore an opportunity: "send us a message on Facebook, or similar, and we'll stick your bins out and bring them back in for the princely sum of {whatever} a bin. We cover these streets..."
I mean, there's probably some horrible reason why it just wouldn't work, of course. This is the UK after all, where nothing really works well. But it does feel like a rather neat solution to what might otherwise be a problem.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I'm waiting on a price drop on a key bit of kit for the Home Automation project. Annoyingly, though, it did drop in price, and indeed dropped below the price I'd been hoping to see, for Prime Day. But, alas, Prime Day happened to fall when I was out of the country, and although I could have purchased the item and had it delivered to the office, I forgot.
Compounding this, I received an email last week about a somewhat tempting offer that I'd decided to take the provider up on, only to promptly forget that as well until this morning... and, of course, it expired at midnight.
Still, it's not the worst thing in the world to not be spending money. It has been a hugely expensive couple of months...
It has been a good couple of weeks. After too much deliberation, I finally took my car to first get its rear parking sensors sorted out and then to get the alloy wheels refurbished. Expensive, but this should clear up the two big issues with the car. It then went for its MOT, and then had its insurance renewed. All of which was horrific, but it's done now.
At work there was some big news (which I can't talk about) which led to some more big news (which I can't talk about), which clears up an awful lot of stuff (which I can't talk about). Meanwhile, I made a huge breakthrough on the project (which I can't talk about), and so suddenly that's all clear skies. There's still some tricky work ahead, but that's rather less disastrous.
Finally, at home we got our windows replaced. Another big expense, and an awful lot of hassle for a couple of days, but again it's done now. And the new windows are so much nicer than the old, and have the advantage of not letting in so many drafts. With luck, Funsize in particular will have a more enjoyable winter.
On that one, there is of course a significant amount of clean up still needed - we have to put the house back to rights. And, unfortunately, that does leave us one particular challenge: about a year ago we got some very nice (and expensive) blinds in our living room, which need to be remounted. At the time, we made sure to ask what would happen if we had the windows redone, and were assured that it wouldn't be a problem - they could be taken down and remounted without issue. When time came to get the windows done, we again made sure to ask what would happen, and were assured it wouldn't be a problem - just leave the mounting points up and they'd work around them.
Yesterday I can to remount the blinds, only to find they'd taken down the mounting points and now they don't quite fit. In other words, there's a problem.
Now I should note at this point that I only had a very small amount of time to actually look at these, while I was tired and hungry and indeed while I was in the process of cooking dinner. So beyond ascertaining that it was a non-trivial task, I'm not sure just how big an issue this is. But at first glance it looked to me like there was an issue with the geometry. Maybe.
Oh, yes. And as of lunchtime today I'm on holiday for two weeks. Which is really good news - the first half of this year has just been brutal.
Here's a weird thing: for me, the best bit of the recent Doctor Who finale, "The Reality War" was the appearance, very briefly, of Jodie Whittaker's Thirteenth Doctor. And yet, as I've mentioned before, I really didn't care for that era of DW - while JW is very definitely a talented actor and has done good work in other things, I felt she was sorely let down by the material she had to work with and was asked to play the role in a manner I found fairly grating.
But that's not the only time that's happened.
One of the best parts of the (very excellent) "Star Trek: Prodigy" was seeing Janeway back in action (and, for that matter, Wesley Crusher, Chakotay, and others). But back in the day, when watching "Star Trek: Voyager" I really didn't like Janeway, or indeed most of the rest of her crew. And, as I am gradually rewatching ST:V, I'm finding that this wasn't just a bad first impression - much of that series just isn't great.
Then there's "Ahsoka", in which the reappearance of Hayden Christensen as Anakin Skywalker made for the very best part of the very best episode (which itself is probably the single best thing Disney have done with Star Wars... including "Andor" and "Rogue One"). And yet, while HC received a lot of very unfair flak for his portrayal, the prequels were really not great (and, for my money, the best of them is "The Phantom Menace", in which he does not appear).
It's very odd.
Part of it, I think, may be just the passage of time. And with so much of the newer material really not being great in general, perhaps time is kind to those things.
But perhaps part of it is that these things fit better in the hands of other writers - that RTD was able to draw something out of Thirteen than Chibnall was, because it wasn't his beloved character.
Or maybe it's just that these things are good to see but strictly in small doses. Who knows?
For my birthday, we took the kids to see the "How to Train Your Dragon" remake. Though as it happened Surprise! fell asleep halfway through, while Funsize was really toiling by the end, so it was mostly LC and I who watched the film.
The original "How to Train Your Dragon" trilogy is almost unique because, at least in my opinion, the first film is actually the weakest. 'Weakest' is still very much a relative term, of course, as the first film is still very, very good (and, of course, it builds the foundation for the other two to stand upon), but both the other two are outstanding - and, for my money, better.
This remake, then, takes that first film and turns it into live action, in their vein of "Aladdin" or "Beauty and the Beast".
And the result?
This new film is basically a shot-for-shot remake of the first film. There's almost nothing new here. And that's no bad thing - so often we've had remakes that have felt the need to put their own stamp on things, only to mess up the source material. And with a strong cast, truly great music (again, basically the same music), and some great visuals, it made for a good experience. At least, I enjoyed it.
One thing: this is a film to see in the cinema - the small screen won't do it justice in the same way, such that you're basically just as well watching the original.
And now... bring on the sequel!
As you know, I have had a long-term quest to have mop jousting introduced as an official Olympic sport. Everything was looking pretty good, right up until the breakdancing fiasco, which seems to have put paid to those plans – apparently the Olympic committee are now going to be much less permissive in the sports they allow to be introduced. Boo!
Anyway, in order to ameliorate some of the pain caused by this setback, we took Funsize and Surprise! to see the older, less mop-based form of jousting.
It was fun!
The event took place in the fields behind Linlithgow Palace, where there were about a dozen tents set up with various Ren Faire type events – the archer and the armoury, scribes and calligraphy, a musicians’ tent, a falconer, and so on and so forth. There were two arenas, one in which the falconer held a display (that we saw), there were jugglers and acrobats (that we didn’t), and a re-enactment of the Battle of Stirling Bridge (though the Wallace wasn’t Australian enough).
And there was the main arena where they held the jousting.
This was not, of course, authentic jousting – that would be far too dangerous. Instead, there was a lot of riding towards one another and carefully aiming lances at shields, which were then dropped with a loud clattering. Even then, there were instances of people falling from the horses, followed by a melee on foot. It was exciting stuff.
It was also hot and sunny, which made for a lethargic, tired type of day. The hours didn’t so much pass as evaporate in the heat.
All in all, it’s something I’d recommend going to see as and when there is an opportunity.
The second of our vegetarian options, and also the last of this little sequence of “Experimental Cookery” posts, this was basically baked potatoes on the BBQ. The method comes from Tom Kerridge’s “Outdoor Cooking”. (I’ve been getting a lot of use out of his books recently.)
Needless to say, the method for this was simple enough: bake the potatoes on the BBQ, then open and sprinkle with paprika and cheese, and then bake for five more minutes to melt the cheese.
Unfortunately, this was not entirely successful – the potatoes took much much longer than expected to cook, which messed up all the rest of the timings. In hindsight, I think maybe I should have done them in the oven, or even put them directly in the coals.
The end result tasted very nice, but they weren’t as cooked as they really should have been. But the other thing that surprised me was that in addition to my sister and I having one each, my mother took one of the potatoes – indeed, she started off by saying she was very full but could maybe be tempted and then fairly quickly switched to asking frequently whether they were done yet. I count that as a good sign.
The upshot of that is that this is another thing I think we’ll have again, but I’d need to give some thought to how I’m going to do them. For best results, these want to be ready much earlier in the day, so that will need some consideration.
Vegetarians tend to have a hard time with BBQs, though they do seem to fall into two camps – some are quite happy to have meat-substitute burgers and sausages (and there are now some good ones available on the market. I’m told the “Beyond Burger” ones are especially good), while others don’t like the taste or texture of meat, and so require some sort of an alternative.
In years past, I’ve addressed this latter case at my birthday BBQ by purchasing a pack of veggie burgers from Tesco, but these have had mixed success – while being very definitely “not meat”, they’ve tended to be met with a lack of enthusiasm at best. And this year I was asked not to supply a burger.
All of which is preamble to me saying that this year I tried a couple of different vegetarian options for the BBQ, of which this is the first. This one comes from my “Licence to Grill” book.
In terms of preparation it was all pretty simple: finely chop some onion and garlic and then cook very gently for a while, grate some cheese and chop some parsley. Then wash and oil the mushrooms, and then cook on the grill. Then top them, cook again, and finally garnish.
Of the two vegetarian options these were by far the better – our resident vegetarian went back for seconds, and I had one, and they were very nice. Frankly, I’d have these again for myself (though I can’t imagine LC would be tempted, and Funsize is going through a slightly fussy stage. Maybe Surprise!?).
In preparation for my birthday BBQ, Funsize wanted to make ice cream, so we did. Initially, she had wanted to make four different types, but we eventually compromised on just this one, which is a second entry from my "I Love My Ice Cream Maker" book.
As is to be expected from ice cream, this one is easy to make: it’s a custard base, then let it cool, add the mint flavouring and choc chips, and then churn in the ice cream maker.
Slightly disconcertingly, my ice cream maker overheated part way, so we had to complete the freezing in the freezer. But it was close enough to being done that that was fine.
Taste wise, this was exactly as you’d expect: minty, with chocolate chips. In terms of colour, though, it’s a light brown, not at all green. Mostly because we added a colourless mint flavouring and didn’t add the nugget of purest green that would have given it the expected colour.
But it’s lovely, and we made it, and that’s that. I certainly plan to have this again.
This one comes from Tom Kerridge’s “Real Life Recipes”, and they were wonderful – possibly the very best thing we’ve eaten all year, and that’s up against some tough competition. And we’ll certainly have them again. However, these were also absolutely a mistake at this particular time, as we were hosting my birthday BBQ this weekend, and in hindsight I should have chosen something a bit easier for the night before. (That said, this was a compromise option – tacos are one of Funsize’s absolute favourites, but LC has become rather bored with them. So mixing things up for her, while still cooking tacos for FS and Surprise! made some sense.)
Anyway, this was a three-part exercise. The chilli salsa was quick and easy to make, with the food processor doing the hardest part of the work. The coleslaw was also quick and easy, with my biggest takeaway from that being that I should stop buying coleslaw – we don’t have it very often, and then most of it doesn’t get eaten, but given how easy coleslaw is to make and given how much nicer the homemade stuff is, that’s an easy sell.
The prawns were where the effort lay, with an easily-assembled batter and then frying. This meant bringing the fryer into use, which in turn meant a fairly unpleasant clean-up job.
But, oh, they’re great once they’re done!
So, yeah, these come highly recommended.
Also, I should note at this time that this will be the first in a flurry of “Experimental Cookery” posts – there was a lot over the weekend that needs captured…
This is an odd little show that we watched on Netflix – a Skandi noir detective show that had somehow been transplanted to Edinburgh. And it’s great stuff, although rendered somewhat weird by seeing loads of actors from other things appearing in unexpected new roles. Odd, not least, because the villain of the piece was best known to us from a TV show that Funsize used to watch.
I don’t really have much more to say about the show than
that. The problem is that almost anything I could say would very quickly get
into the realm of spoilers, and the show is very definitely best enjoyed
without. So I’ll leave it at that. Mostly, though: if you have Netflix, this is
definitely worth a watch.
I chanced to be in London last week with a few hours on my hands. And so, a friend and I went to the "Jeff Wayne's The War of The Worlds: The Immersive Experience", as you do. This is, roughly speaking, a retelling of the story along with Jeff Wayne's music (of course), with a number of actors playing various characters in the story along the way. And there were also some sections where we wore VR headsets and watched cutscenes of some parts.
And it was fine. Truth be told, a lot of the experience is somewhat dated now, most especially the VR components (which are early 2000s level of animation, if that). But it was all good fun, and anyway it was more about the experience than anything else.
Anyway, the upshot is that I don’t regret going… but I wouldn’t go again. Once was enough. Which, in fairness, is a universal reaction to alien invasions, I think.
A little while ago I was gifted a small book, "Licensed to Grill", which was the source of this one. It's perhaps excessive to describe this as "cookery" - it involved threading three marshmallows and two strawberries onto a skewer, and then lightly heating the marshmallows to become soft. Then add some chocolate sauce, and eat messily.
But it does just about count, so...
Anyway, these were really nice. We'll definitely have these again.
#15: "Assassin's Apprentice", by Robin Hobb
A second burger from "Handcrafted Burgers", this was very straightforward in preparation: the tzatziki involved a little chopping and then some mixing, the red onion pickle was much the same (just with very different ingredients), and the cooking of the burgers was near-trivial.
The only thing I'd change about this one is the buns: I made the mistake of going for St Pierre's "Burger Buns" (where I used their brioche buns for the Peanut Butter Burgers a few weeks ago), but these just didn't quite work out - they were too close to the brioche buns in flavour. In this case, a simpler bun would have been a better choice.
Ultimately, though, these were really good, and we'll have them again - both as a whole, and as individual components.
Once upon a time, we went out to see all the MCU films in the cinema. These days, we've dropped to seeing only a few of them. Which is a shame - I would have liked to see this in the cinema at the time. But, between the need to arrange childcare, and the cost of cinema tickets, and the fact that the MCU just hasn't been the same since "Endgame" and, more than anything else, the fact that films go from the cinema to streaming in a few short months, we just can't justify going all that often.
And so, we came to watch "Captain America: Brave New World" on Disney+ this week.
And it's fine, a perfectly serviceable action film with a coherent plot, good performances, and (mostly) good special effects. (Although, like most modern action films, it does have some truly awful CGI as well. I'm not sure how, but they seem to have gone backwards in recent years.)
They've gone for something of a "Winter Soldier" vibe for this one, which is probably wise as that was probably the best of the MCU films prior to "Endgame". On the other hand, it does invite a comparison that "Brave New World" doesn't necessarily benefit from. Plus, as I've seen noted elsewhere, it kinda feels like it would be better as a Hulk film - so many of the characters and plot points tie back to the "Incredible Hulk" film that it does feel that it wants Banner, not Wilson, at the helm.
But one thing this is definitely not, however, is the bin fire that some parts of the internet have claimed. Unfortunately, there's a noisy minority that will decry any film that doesn't have a straight white man at the helm. And this one in particular, with the passing of the torch from Steve Rodgers to Sam Wilson, was always going to come under attack.
Needless to say, I have no time for such lazy critiques. As a practical matter, if nothing else, we can't have a situation where every story has to center around a straight white man - in addition to the monstrous unfairness that would represent, it would also be deadly boring.
(I do find it rather unfortunate that, too often, Hollywood has taken their efforts at increased representation to mean license to just cast a person of colour or a woman in the lead role, and then just make the same films they've been making for decades, showing nothing at all new. But that doesn't work - neither women nor people of colour are obscure and exotic beings whose mere presence makes for a new and exciting experience. Diversity and representation are good things, and indeed deserved and necessary things, but they're not sufficient by themselves. Basically, if the film wouldn't work with a bog-standard straight white male in the lead, it probably won't work if you simply switch out the lead.
But none of that applies to this film, where one of the key themes of the story is precisely that Sam Wilson is not Steve Rodgers. Not just because one is a person of colour, but in the differences in their characters, the differences in the approaches they bring to the situation, and even in the level of certainty they present in their chosen course of action. There was a part of me that was a little disappointed that Sam never used Steve's comment that "I could do this all day"... but it's actually a good thing that he didn't.)
Anyway...
I thought Anthony Mackie was really great in the lead role, giving a quiet, sensitive, and nuanced portrayal. I thought Harrison Ford did extremely well stepping into the role of Thunderbolt Ross, and I thought the whole thing fit together pretty neatly.
That said, it's not as good as "Winter Soldier". And, sadly, it adds another to the list of post-Endgame MCU films that are fine, but just not hitting the same heights. The whole thing is just starting to feel a bit tired at this point.
My recommendation for this one is pretty straightforward: if you have Disney+, it's worth investing the couple of hours in a watch. I wouldn't recommend subscribing to Disney+ just for this. But, then, I generally do recommend Disney+ - there's just so much good stuff on these.
Since I was working from home today, and with it being a nice day, I decided to take Lion out for a walk. And, being of the canine persuasion, about halfway through the walk she decided to stop for a poop. Which is fine.
Of course, one of the less pleasant tasks associated with owning a dog these years is that you are required to pick up said poop in a bag and throw it away responsibly. Which is unpleasant but fair enough really.
Except that I then discovered that the bag containing the poop bags did not, in fact, contain any poop bags.
This led to some frantic and ill-advised improvisation, as I first attempted to lift the poop using some litter a kind person had left (which didn't work), and then using some study-looking leaves (which really didn't work).
And then I wiped my fingers as best I could, and took Lion home, washed, and then returned to the scene of the crime with some poop bags. It's fair to say that that was not the highlight of my day... though it's been the sort of a day when it's not far off.
My car has been in and out of repairs over the last several weeks. This time is was the parking sensors - I had one replaced two weeks ago and another today. Expensive, but not as horrible as I was quoted elsewhere. I'm just hoping that they stay fixed, at least until after the MOT. (Apparently, the sensors themselves aren't cause for an MOT fail. However, the fact that they cause a light to show up on the dashboard is cause for a failure. Which is... unfortunate.)
Anyway, in preparation for this post I looked back to previous posts about cars, and found one talking about some metrics from near the end of the previous car. So, I'll update those: at the time of writing this I have now been driving for almost 32 years, and have owned cars for 27 of those years. In that time, I've owned five cars, at a total cost of approximately £32,000. That works out as an average of one car per 5.4 years, an average of £6,400 per car, and an average of £1,185 per year. That's all pretty good going, although it of course omits the cost of fuel and maintenance.
I'm now coming up to having completed four years with this car, and somewhere in the region of 50,000 miles. I'm hopeful of getting another two years, and another 20,000 miles from it - but that's subject to the various things that have been fixed staying fixed.
For the immediate term, though, it's been an expensive time!
This was another one from the Tesco magazine. It's pretty straightforward - add an ingredient and bake, then add an ingredient and bake some more, and so on. The end result was very nice, but too much for the two of us (Funsize and Surprise! opted out), but the leftovers made for a nice enough lunch.
Again, we'll have this one again, probably sooner than the Pepper Steak stir-fry - it can be added to the list of "easy traybake dinners" that are good to reach for when in a lazy mood.
This one comes from the Tesco magazine, and is included for completeness only - it's basically as the name implies, a stir-fry made up of steak and peppers. It's quick and simple to assemble, and was nice enough. It was certainly nice to have a stir-fry that wasn't chicken again.
Other than that there's nothing much to say. We'll have it again, but it's not exactly something we're going to rush to have.
This weekend marks the start of the gala day season for this year. This time out we have fewer events than usual - we seem to be heading back into a period where there are fewer gala days again, as happens every few years. We have, however, been lucky that the two we had to cancel last year don't seem to have hurt us, as we have been booked to do both again this year.
Of course, we have just enjoyed a spell of relatively good weather that seems to be coming to a close just as we get into the spell of walking long distances outdoors, but I suppose that's half the fun, isn't it?
I've spent the last little while becoming increasingly obsessed with spreadsheets, and using them to track everything. Which is something of a mixed blessing. On the plus side, it gives me a load of data, most of which is nicely reassuring. On the other hand, it has left me somewhat concerned - for the last six months or so we have consistently spent more than has been coming in, with the obvious effect on our savings. (Of course, that's what savings are for, so even that's not a huge issue.)
The biggest problem right now is the cars, which have been horribly expensive of late. My current car has just always been unlucky, with one thing after another and the latest pair of problems being things that just don't want to stay fixed. Meanwhile, LCs car had a recent issue that does, at least, seem to now be resolved.
Ultimately, if it wasn't for those expenses, we'd have been doing pretty well. As it is, the hope is that this next batch of repairs will be the last for a while and then we can get a couple of 'good' years out of them. But if not, we may need to bite the bullet on one or more replacements rather sooner than might be hoped.
(The other thing that has been quite noticeable is that while headline inflation is down, this year has seen a nasty spike in the Tesco shopping bill, and also a significant hike in both the gas/electric bill and council tax. It's almost like the supposed end of the cost of living crisis (which hasn't actually ended of course) was taken as license to pile on some more misery.)
I'm not really going anywhere with this, of course. And it's important to note that we're in a much better position than many others. It's just a reflection of how things are at the moment.
#14: "Mary: or, the Birth of Frankenstein", by Anne Eekhout (the new frontrunner for book of the year)
I’m not sure if it was the BBC, or Disney, or RTD, but someone has really messed up the numbering of the series of “Doctor Who” – there are now three bearing the name “season one”. I can’t say I’m a fan of that approach. And so, this post is titled by the year.
The truth is, had I written this post on Friday, after watching “Wish World” but before “The Reality War”, it would have been very different in tone. I hadn’t really enjoyed most of this series, which just about aspired to the level of “okay”, but I found “Wish World” to be a big load of incoherent nonsense.
In particular, the handling of The Rani had been poor – immediately following her first appearance, the biggest rumour was that Mrs Flood was the Rani, so that big reveal just didn’t work. Then Anita Dobson, having put in all the work, was promptly sidelined in favour of Archie Panjabi (who, it must be said, did a great job in the role), and with another instance of the bigeneration nonsense.
But also, at least as far as “Wish World”, it was never actually explained who The Rani was, or why we should care. And where at least I, as a long-term viewer of the show, understood that, new viewers would have had no way of knowing. Plus, while the classic Rani was not just The Master rehashed, this new one was indistinguishable.
So by the end of “Wish World” I was all set to call for RTD’s departure, to drop the show, and to walk away. It was not good.
However, “The Reality War” really surprised me – RTD has a pattern of having a really strong setup to his finales and then having them collapse in a heap, but this time he somehow managed to turn it on its head.
First up, there was the fixing of the problems: this time, The Rani actually had time to explain not only her plan and also the why of it. And, as twisted as it was, it at least made sense – and was not something The Master would have done. So that’s good.
Then there was the resolution of the various strands. Of course, the Doctor defeating Omega was a hugely underwhelming ass-pull, but that was pretty much inevitable. That’s just what RTD does. But having The Rani defeated by her own hubris, and having Conrad undone in the manner that was achieved was very poetic. So that was fine.
But then there was positively an age of wrapping up the plotlines, and in particular the disappearance of Poppy.
I can’t say I was a huge fan of this bit, as it seemed to drag. And, once again, it was all about the slog of getting towards the regeneration that was suddenly inevitable (although why that was wasn’t at all clear to me). But fair enough.
The highlight of this one was actually Thirteen showing up unexpectedly. As I’ve noted before, she’s my least favourite incarnation of the Doctor, so I was surprised at how happy I was to see her again. The only thing that is a shame is that RTD handled that scene so well that I rather wish he’d been running the show for those years. I suspect they’d have gone rather better. A missed opportunity.
And then there’s the whole thing about moving the timeline by “one degree”. Which of course now gives license to change anything they want, depending on how far back they want to claim the original change went. (It clearly covered the whole of this series, but given that Ruby met Poppy in the abysmal “Space Babies”, that suggests it goes back further.) Hopefully, it at least goes back far enough for them to now ditch the ever-so-tedious mavity “joke”.
And then, finally, the regeneration and the appearance of the next Doctor. Maybe. Or maybe not – fir the first time, we were introduced to a new actor but not “as the Doctor”. So maybe she’s someone else. Or something. I’m not sure I care.
At this point, the future of the show is up in the air. Presumably it has a future guaranteed, in at least some form – had the show ended a few seconds before that could be doubted, but that ending demands at least something of a continuation. But there’s a big part of me that hopes what’s next is a passing of the torch to a new team – RTD1 had two Doctors (Nine and Ten), Moffat had two (Eleven and Twelve, with an interlude with War), and now RTD has had two (Fourteen and Fifteen). So an interlude and then handing over may be no bad thing.
Or not. Maybe there’s a grand plan that we just haven’t been told about.
Time for the third update on goals for the year:
This has been a somewhat mixed update - some really good progress in one area, some disappointment in another, and a recognition that the blogging non-goal is unachievable. I must confess that I am more disappointed by the shortfalls than satisfied by the successes, which is something to work on for next time.
This is the fortieth post on this blog this year, which may not seem like much (and indeed is not), but it does represent the point at which I have posted more often this year than in the whole of last year. Given that we're at the end of May, that's both slightly reassuring but also somewhat damning of the level of output last year. Further, since I'm actually also way behind my normal annual target, I'm not really sure it counts as cause for celebration.
For a football season where the main question was a foregone conclusion even in November, it somehow managed to end with a significant amount of interest - Celtic won the league of course, but failed to win the treble that seemed all-but assured; Hibs went from a disastrous start to finishing third; Aberdeen won the Scottish Cup, and therefore gazumped Hibs' guarantee of group-stage European football; both Falkirk and Livingston were promoted.
So, all in all it was actually a surprisingly good season. The big hope for next year, of course, is for things to be rather more competitive at the top end - in particular, it would be good if some of our other teams could improve to get a bit closer to Celtic (more likely, any closing of the gap would probably come about by a reduction in Celtic's quality, which would not be ideal). But I must admit that I'm not terribly hopeful of that; Celtic's dominance is not just on the pitch but in every arena, so by rights they should move further ahead if anything.
Of course, this summer is one of the ones where there is no international football to look forward to. Though with Scotland's recent travails, that may not be the worst thing ever.
This one came from a cookery course I did with work a couple of years ago - it was actually the demonstration dish rather than something we cooked ourselves.
I made up the paste for this one last weekend (which wasn't hard - chop a load of things, put in a blender, and whiz to a paste), after which making up the curry was pretty straightforward, though it did require a 30-minute simmer stage.
The end result was nice. There's not much more to say about it than that - we'll no doubt have this again at some point, but it's not going to become one of our most common "go to" meals.
And that's that, really. A short one this time.
#13: "La Belle Sauvage", by Philip Pullman
This one comes from Tom Kerridge's "Real Life Recipes", and is pretty much as the title suggests: chicken burgers, with a mustard/Sriracha sauce.
The preparation for this one is dead easy - put the ingredients for the sauce in a bowl and mix thoroughly, marinade the chicken and then coat in flour. Then fry. The only downside was that it was fairly time-consuming, largely because I had to fry the burgers one at a time (and perhaps should have gone for 6 rather than 7 minutes).
But the result was really great. Indeed, LC commented that that was two really good burgers in a week. So that's a winner - the only downside being that it raises expectations. (I was also slightly disappointed that Funsize and Surprise! completely refused to even try them. A shame, as I think they would have liked the burgers, though not the sauce.)
Will we have this again? We'll certainly have that sauce again, but the burgers are a little more doubtful because of the time involved. Perhaps when FS and S! are a little older and more apt to try them...
I mentioned a few posts ago that I had finished reading “Hera”, the fourth novel by Jennifer Saint. I’ve read all four of her novels, and mostly enjoyed all four, but this is probably the best (closely followed by “Elektra”, with “Atalanta” and “Ariadne” following some way behind, in that order). It’s also perhaps the best novel I have read so far this year, though “The Labyrinth of the Spirits” runs it close. So, good stuff.
However, I’m distinctly troubled by the recasting of Hera as some sort of feminist hero, or indeed as any kind of a hero at all. The thing is, you don’t need to read far in Greek mythology to conclude that Zeus is a real baddie – a capricious tyrant interested only in his own glory and pleasure, and a menace to women and females of all species. And it’s even more clear, and especially here, that Hera is very much wronged by Zeus – partly by his siring so many children by so many others, and also in some other ways.
But it’s also true, both in the mythological sources and here, that Hera spends vast amounts of her time wreaking her vengeance not on Zeus, but rather on those aforementioned children and the women who bore them – women who were, by and large, themselves victims of Zeus’s actions. A great many of those women were unwilling in one way or another – be that through sex by deception, a supernatural impregnation while in some other form, or indeed outright rape through simple brute force.
So what we have, therefore, is the queen of the gods, the patroness of wronged women, spending her time inflicting punishments on women who were themselves wronged.
(This is, of course, not the only example of this in Greek myth – one of the origins given for Medusa casts her as a priestess of Athena who was raped by Poseidon. Athena then responds to this attack on her priestess by cursing Medusa. I’m not entirely sure that that was a fair assignment of the blame in that case.)
Anyway, it’s just a small burr of annoyance in an otherwise very enjoyable book. Like all her others, this one proceeds along at a pleasant pace, covering a great deal of story efficiently. Good stuff – recommended.
One thing that struck me somewhat forcefully is that I can no longer in good conscience claim to be Knig of the Ceilidh. This was a shock, but there’s no hiding from the truth.
I must therefore, reluctantly, abdicate my position to a worthy successor. Henceforth, Funsize shall be known as the Qeeun of the Ceilidh.
A few weeks ago my youngest brother (who I shall hereafter refer to as G) was married to his wife (who I shall hereafter refer to as E). Since then, LC has been eagerly awaiting this post, so that she knows what happened. This is therefore a post that has been a long time coming, about an event that was even more overdue.
The weekend started on the Friday, with the usual flurry of chaos that marks all our adventures – I finished work to find LC frantically packing for our weekend away. She’d left this to the last minute, having only started packing the week before. Anyway, we gathered everything that was needed, and about a million other things beside, put Funsize in the car, went to collect Surprise!, and we were off!
For the weekend of the weeding we were staying in the Premier Inn in Leith – not too far from home, but a suitable base for the weekend. (Our plan was to stay there, rather than at home, to allow F and S to stay up as late as they can manage, to gain maximum enjoyment from the day. A plan which worked very well.) En route we went into Edinburgh to pick up our kilts for the event.
This, of course, caused all sorts of a commotion, because in the kilt hire shop they had a great many outfits for the weeding party. And with most of them staying in the same Premier Inn, there was a question about whether we should pick them up or not. In the event, we collected some of them – a very confusing arrangement.
Anyway, we then battled through Edinburgh to the Premier Inn, unpacked a million things from the car, and then collapsed. Except that we didn’t – I was due at a weeding rehearsal a scant five minutes later. So a quick message was sent saying that I was running late but on my way, and off I went again.
Crossing back through Edinburgh was a hugely horrible experience. I really don’t like driving there if I can at all avoid it, and this journey took me through the worst possible part of the city at the worst possible time. Still, I got there in time to miss only most of the rehearsal, but to learn what I needed to learn. And then we were off back to the hotel.
We then had a meal with all my brothers and their families (missing only one wing of the family… but that was still a miss). Then we put the kids to bed, and the day was done.
Saturday saw us rising early and going for our Premier Inn breakfast, which was obviously the highlight of our stay. Then back to the rooms to get changed, to help the kids get changed, to help G get changed (in a different room), and then to change location while waiting for our Uber. And then we were off!
The weeding took place at Chalmers Church in Morningside in Edinburgh. My primary role for the day was to play the bagpipes, so once our Uber arrived (only a little late), I tuned up and played. It was fine – by this point playing at a weeding is fairly well-trod ground for me. So the performance was good enough without being exceptional.
It is, of course, the bride’s prerogative to be late, and despite E’s insistence that she would be on time there was indeed a short delay. But only a short one – the weeding car arrived about 5 minutes after the official start time, I played my last tune, and then went inside. I proceeded to bash my head on a staircase – my bagpipes were being stored underneath, a plan that seemed good until I stepped from bright sunlight into a darkened stairwell with light-sensitive transitions lenses on.
The service itself was lovely. Our brother A performed the actual marriage, I signed the register (as a witness, obviously!), G cried a great deal, there were hymns, a very touching poem, and generally a good time.
Also, the dress was white. I remember that distinctly.
We then proceeded back outside into the sunlight for photos, and also there was tea and coffee and cake. Huzzah!
After a short while we all lined up for G&E to run a gauntlet of confetti throwers, before they jumped in a car to go get their official photographs taken. And shortly after that we called another Uber and went on to the reception.
The reception took place in the Biscuit Factory, a former biscuit factory turned event venue. As we gathered there we were offered some very tasty canapes, before being ushered upstairs for the meal. Here, I was once again called on the play – piping in first the top table and then G&E. Then I joined them at the top table.
We then proceeded to the speeches, of which there were four: E’s dad, followed by my dad spilling his drink all over my tablecloth, followed by G as I frantically tried to clean up the mess, followed by the chief bridesmaid, followed by one of the co-best men, R.
I don’t have much to say about the speeches. They were all great, striking different tones, but they were warm, and touching, and funny by turns. Good stuff. I did, of course, note when the microphone’s batteries ran out – internal rechargeable ones are the way to go there… #justsaying.
Then the meal. I had chicken followed by a chocolate brownie, along with copious quantities of wine. It was good.
And then back downstairs for the dance. This kicked off with the traditional first dance, at which I was tasked to partner one of the bridesmaids, and then the ceilidh. For the first ceilidh dance LC rushed off to change her shoes, only to find herself usurped as Funsize demanded a dance. Tee hee.
Funsize proceeded to spend the next several hours on the dancefloor generally having a whale of a time. Surprise!, meanwhile, quickly fell asleep, exhausted by events. I danced a few more dances, though only a few, then enjoyed a bacon roll.
And then the ceilidh ended and the disco began. At this point, children were barred from the dancefloor (apparently to avoid the risk of a crush), and Funsize really started to wind down. So we called an Uber and went back to the hotel. Surprise! woke up en route and was much less than happy, but we managed to get back, get them changed, and get them back to sleep.
Sunday saw us again partaking of a Premier Inn breakfast before driving home, cursing the car as it developed a nasty fault, and then hosting a family BBQ in the afternoon. All in all, a success, but not the focus of the weekend.
And with that, we completed the set – the last of five siblings to be married. Huzzah!
A few weeks ago Netflix got “Fast X”, the tenth film in the increasingly daft “Fast & Furious” series. Then, last week, Netflix also got “Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning”, the seventh film in the increasingly daft “Mission: Impossible” series. In both cases, these were billed as the first part of the final part of the series. (As I said, increasingly daft.)
Being a sucker for a suitably daft action film, as well as having seen all the previous films in both their series, I proceeded to watch them. And they are, as might be expected, both enjoyably stupid.
In fairness, I must note that “Fast X” is not the stupidest film in the series. The previous film, “F9” featured a scene where our heroes decided to take a car into space (no, really), and that just can’t be topped for stupidity. Not that they didn’t try – between having an omniscient villain, another nuclear submarine (because one can never be enough), and the return of a character who very definitively died earlier in the series, there’s a lot here to mock.
But I was particularly amused by the scenes in Rome. It’s always more fun watching a place get blown to hell when it’s somewhere you’ve actually been, and so that was great fun. And with the characters playing automotive football with a giant bomb on the streets of Rome (no, really), what could be better?
Seriously, if you like these films, you’ll probably find this one a worthy entry. And if you don’t, the tenth instalment in the series is probably not the place to start.
Meanwhile, “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning” is likewise enjoyably daft. By this point there’s a very clear formula to the films, and this one follows it to the letter, with perhaps the fun wrinkle that Ethan goes rogue before he even properly starts his impossible mission. But there’s the usual fakeouts, hijinks, action scenes, and loads of intense looks at the camera. Oh, and of course lots of running. Good stuff.
I had two favourite scenes in this one. Top of the list, in terms of daftness, was when they found themselves once again on a runaway train – our villain set things up by killing the crew, opening the throttle fully, and then destroying the brakes.
On a steam train.
Now, I’m no expert on this, but I’m reasonably sure that the reason steam locomotives have a huge tender of coal, and someone whose job is to shovel that coal into the engine isn’t entirely decorative. That is, if you stop feeding the engine with the fuel that it needs to keep going it is quite likely to, well, stop going. So in short order that runaway train would… not be running away.
But I was particularly amused by the scenes in Rome. It’s always more fun watching a place get blown to hell when it’s somewhere you’ve actually been, and so that was great fun. And with Ethan finding himself handcuffed to another character, and forced to keep moving to ever-smaller cars, what’s not to like.
Seriously, it was highly amusing watching these two films in close proximity, partly because they mostly chased down exactly the same streets and destroyed all the same landmarks in most of the same ways, but also because the films were made at more or less the same time – the people of Rome must have really loved having their city shut down for weeks for one and then the other.
As with “Fast X”, “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning” is a case where if you enjoyed the previous films you’ll probably like this one. If not, the seventh film in the series is not the place to start. But I enjoyed it, and I look forward to the “final” part of the series.
