Birthday present
I got one last week.
My birthday is in October.
This present is from the same lovely friend who once told me in April that she knew what she was getting me for my birthday. So that I don’t forget, it’s currently strung up – literally – and hanging from a rafter in the kitchen.
My favourite part of this whole story is that she’s originally written “warning – birthday present – if opened before Oct 5 will self-destruct.” She’s then reconsidered, realised the Australia we live in, and changed ‘self-destruct’ to ‘be null and void’.
And yes, I have copped a feel of the thing. It’s a book of some sort; has a hard cover; but also has something else in there, which could be part of the front cover – it feels oddly like pipe cleaners. Whatever it is, I know it will be fantastic. B doesn’t give bad presents ever.
Rosbif
Or, without the atrocious French accent, roast beef.
Until Saturday night, I did not like it in the slightest. I think this is because we basically never had it at home, so my few experiences with it have been at average buffets and worse wedding receptions.
But then there was Saturday.
Saturday, we had a party. It was a bit of a fizzer in the afternoon – only a couple of people came by because the weather was icky – but we ended up with 14 for dinner. And J had this brilliant idea that wouldn’t a roast be fun?
3.8kg of beef later, a kilo or more of beans, plus potato and carrot for the mob… I was impressed. And very full, of course. It was fantastic! And there were two pieces left… hello, lunch. So I’m a convert, at home anyway.
the HELL?!
Channel Ten, in its Infinite Wisdom, has changed the time for Torchwood.
Midnight! Tuesday night/Wednesday morning!
Midnight?!?!
Seriously! indeed. That is so … unspeakably annoying. Admittedly I usually tape it, but – !! I had to go to the Ten website to find out when it was on because it sure as hell wasn’t announced anywhere….
Grr.
OK, over it now. Until tomorrow when I have to set the video.
FarScape Season 3
So I really wondered how they would resove the whole two-Crichton thing.
Ouch.
Most definitely not what I expected. Impressive, while heart-breaking.
Sleeping Beauty
My friend Kate (read her short stories here) told me about this production of Sleeping Beauty at the Malthouse: “it’s got Renee Geyer in it! It’ll be great!” We went along on Tuesday.
It wasn’t at all what I was expecting. It was all music, no dialogue – and all of it was pop songs (some of which, to my shame, I didn’t recognise). Things like “Little Ray of Sunshine,” “Oh Happy Day,” and “Dreamer.” And “All the boys in town,” by the Divinyls, which I heard on the radio a couple of days later and had to turn off… because I am still a bit too traumatised by the performance to be able to hear that song, in particular, without having flashbacks. Because Beauty (played by Alison Bell, brilliant) sang it as a lament, almost (which is entirely appropriate to the words), and it was so sad.
So the performance starts with a mum and dad wanting a daughter… getting one… doting on her and her getting annoyed at the attention.* Then… something happens, and she either goes back in time or to another world. Weird things happen there. Like Geyer singing a song that is either Eminem or 50 Cent, which was perhaps the weirdest thing of a weird night. That, and the anime section in the middle. I don’t know whether it was anime produced for the performance or not – I would guess not, that it was sections from at least one if not multiple pre-existing films, spliced together for this.
The set was sparse, and they used light to brilliant effect. The performances were all magnificent. And the music was great – apparently one of the people involved was from Boom Crash Opera which, you know, just makes it all good from my point of view. It was a breath-taking performance… and I am still not sure what happened at the end.
*This is my interpretation of it. I am perfectly willing to admit that there are aspects that I simply didn’t get, so my putting it together may be faulty.
UK beer… and food
I have been promising myself since, oh, February that I would blog more about my UK trip. I’ve mentioned very little so far… in fact, it feels a little surreal…. Anyway, I thought I’d do a short quirky one: the beer we drank! Since we drank a fair bit – and before you start making quips about being alcoholic, much of the beer there is lower in the alcohol than the beer here in Aus, so it doesn’t compare! Since we stayed mostly in smaller towns, we tried very hard to drink local beers; I went for those with unusual names, as you will see… and I decided that just the beer was really quite boring, so I’ve added in the best food we et too.
Sheffield: Tetley’s for J; Carling for me; an ambrosial Samian dessert wine. Christmas dinner with J’s relatives was totally unforgettable. The turkey!!
Windemere: Boddingtons (and a brilliant Chilean sauv blanc at a Mexican place). Tapas – brilliant. And a nice steak and Guinness pie at the pub.
Dumfries: Deuchars Pale Ale; Stowford Cider (not a fan); Timothy Taylor’s Landlord. Alex discovers that fish and chips and beans means baked beans. Not a lesson to forget. Also smoked haddock and spring onion cakes – very tasty.
York: Copper Dragon. Poached salmon and asparagus; J had venison and cranberry stew! Great Italian.
Llanberis: Bass Ale; Unicorn Best Bitter. A truly heroic Indian banquet at “Spice of Llanberis”.
Abergavenny: Reverend James; Brains’ Smooth; Rhenmeny
Crosley Heath (weirdest place we stayed!!): Henry’s IPA; Doombar Bitter
Oxford: Harp and Caffreys – both not cask, very sad; some Cypriot version of ouzo that tasted like it was mixed with metaxa… whoosh! and something random at The Eagle and Child, famous for bring frequented by Tolkien, Lewis, and other literary types. Magnificent Lebanese; brilliant tapas again.
Cambridge: Abbot’s Ale; mulled wine (from a machine! J will never, ever forgive me for making him order it for me…). Dinner at King’s College, thanks very much Bridget! Tapas, again, and noodles at Dojo’s.
Canterbury: some Kentish beer; Archers’ A Good Tern (truly!). Manoli’s Taverna – stupendous Greek food (apparently, in a building that used to be a stable, at which Ben Jonson apparently stopped!).
London: boring beers I didn’t bother to record. Take-away Indian for a colossal price.
So there you go. More random bits and pieces to follow… that’s a threat…
Playing hookey
Not with work or anything, but with my responsibilities. Instead of reading some of the anthologies waiting for me, I’ve got Ilium, by Dan Simmons, to read. It’s mine, it’s just been with someone else for an awfully long time. Long enough that I’ve bought the sequel, Olympos, and haven’t read it yet – despite the fact that my hands almost literally itch every time I see it lying there on my bookshelf – because I must re-read the first so that it’s clear in my mind.
I love this book. I love it a lot. In fact, I love almost everything by Simmons, but that’s another issue. There aren’t too many books that manage to combine the Trojan stories with lovely, breath-taking scifi (yeh, OK, there’s Simon Brown’s Troy anthology – did I mention and I did a podcast on it?! – but short stories are a different teapot of eels from a full-blown space opera epic novel). It confused me delightfully the first time I read it, and I am loving reading it again – because I already know what various things mean, but there’s a lot of detail that I’ve forgotten and it’s just wonderful.
Pity I didn’t get this at the start of the holidays… as it is, I’m going to have to play a little bit of hookey when I go back to school next week, as I’ve got too much on this weekend to be able to finish it…
Are you thinking what I’m thinking, B1?
There’s a new Boeing just been released, the 787.
Airbus released the A380s not that long ago.
Is anyone else out there thinking “it’s time to play chicken!” ?
Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan
I am watching it right now. I’d just like to say gosh they imagined the Enterprise as enormous.
And James T really does have a recognisable voice!
And… the effects look terrible, but probably brilliant for the time…
The Moneypenny Diaries
I started and finished it this morning. Apparently ‘edited’ by Kate Westbrook, Jane Moneypenny’s niece, it covers 1962: starts with Bond’s wife Tracy dying (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, I think), and ends with Bond in Japan (You Only Live Twice). Lots of stuff in between, of course, some of it about Bond – but mostly about Moneypenny, naturally enough. There’s a romance, intrigue, all the stuff you’d expect. It’s separated into months, with each month starting with a short bit from Westbrook about her search to validate the contents of the diaries.
My mum and sister told me it was great, so they loaned me their copy. I have to admit that I didn’t read it in all that much detail. I’m not really in a Cold War mood, and the writing wasn’t quite good enough to sucker me in completely. Which is why I was able to read it in a couple of hours. It was pretty good, and I would definitely recommend it to fans of Bond and the Cold War. Interestingly, it’s written with lots of footnotes, explaining exactly who various personages are in ‘real’ life. Some of them definitely are/were real, others I’m not sure about – they could be, and Westbrook has woven them into the story, or she’s just made people up conveniently. I’m actually happy with either explanation, personally.
And it’s totally up for a sequel, too, which I think I would probably read.
Randomly Yours, Alex 