Sunday 23 December 2007

The Hour is Nearly Upon Us

Sunday 23rd December: The presents are wrapped and, mostly, hidden.

The beer is in the fridge, keeping more than enough food company.

All that remains is to wish anybody reading this a very Merry Christmas and all the best for 2008.

Cheers!

It's Behind You. Oh, No It Isn't...

Saturday 22nd December: The last Saturday before Christmas and time for the annual trip with friends to York's Theatre Royal pantomime.

Sadly, this year's turn-out was quite a bit down on previous years. One couple weren't able to make it and the husband of another friend was still posted in Basra. Numbers were slightly increased by Elizabeth's first presence (although not her first pantomime - that honour went to the Grand Opera House, which she attended with a school friend's family earlier in the week).

For anybody not au fait with the famous Theatre Royal panto, it's not quite like all (or most of)the others. There's no big names, usually very little plot and it's more for the adults than the kids (although there is a bit of slapstick every year).

What there is, however, is a small, dedicated group of people (friends??) who come together every Christmas to provide brilliant entertainment. They are led by Berwick Kaler - writer, co-director and the best Dame out there. He should be, he's been practising for over thirty years. His script leaves plenty of room for ad-libs (usually his own, in an attempt to both get the rest of the cast laughing and to take the mickey out of his nephew, who gets better every year.)

This year, said nephew played the titular Sinbad and there was, surprisingly, quite a complex plot. As usual the cast, especially regulars Martin Barrass and David Leonard, were excellent and, in a bizarre synchronicity with our contribution to the audience, were missing a couple of regulars and had added a newcomer in the form of lovely Scot Julie-Anna Castro (Donna Kebab). The jokes came thick and fast, as did Kaler's naughtiness. The slapstick had been toned down but the sets were fantastic and seem to get better every year.

I used to go to the panto every New Year's Day, with the rest of my family and friends of my parents, until we were deemed "too old" to go. A few years back, we started going with the aforementioned friends and I now look forward to taking Elizabeth for as long as possible.

Epiphanic Rock

Friday 21st December: My last day at work before the New Year and, due to a lack of team Christmas night out, I decided to spend the (late) evening listening to a band with the core of the FNFS (Friday Night Fibbers Squad).

With nothing to whet the appetite actually appearing to Fibbers, we decided to meet at the Roman Bath to see rock covers band Freeway. I'd not seen these before, but had heard good reports. They were excellent, playing a mixture of Whitesnake, Guns 'n' Roses, Free, UFO, Bad Company and a rather good Deep Purple medley. They were joined in the second set by Livvy Sparnenn (Breathing Space, her dad is Freeway's drummer) and she sang a ZZ Top song, which I didn't recognise, and Led Zeppelin's Rock and Roll.

It was towards the end of the show that I had a bit of an epiphany. I was watching the old (well, past middle-aged) men dancing and hand-banging at the front, thinking how slightly ridiculous they looked, when I realised that it was about twenty-five years ago that I saw Whitesnake themselves performing Slide It In (my second ever concert) and that, age-wise, I'm not that far behind them.

Good job I'm still to self-conscious to dance like that, though...

Friday 14 December 2007

No bang, a whimper and two leaks

Monday 10th December: Well, my birthday came and went with less of a bang and more of a whimper than usual. For the first time in years, I didn't take the day off work - Debbie was at college and Elizabeth at school and sitting at home seemed a bit pointless. So, after opening the pressies (clothes, smellies, the new Babylon 5 DVD, Queen Rock Montreal on CD, a shower radio, a book of classic album covers and selections of beer and chocolate) and dropping Elizabeth off at said school, it was off to Twork. A high-profile project kept me there longer than I wanted to be, then it was back home to spend the evening with the women in my life.

Tuesday 11th December: Today is a day off. One of two this week. The main aim of this one is to see Elizabeth in her school Nativity play this afternoon. She's a dancing angel and has been practicing her song for a few weeks now.

Before that, though, it's time to try to stop some of the upstairs chipboard floors from squeaking so badly. Armed with a rather large screwdriver and a box of screws, I spent the morning trying to pin down where the squeaks are coming from and screw down the floor to eliminate them. Things go well for a while. Then I spot a corner of one sheet which moves alarmingly when pressure is aplied to it. There isn't a screw or nail within inches of it. Without pause, I move in to fasten the chipboard down. The screw goes in easily. After all, it's only going through chipboard...

...and the copper hot water pipe beneath it. Another (yes, I've done it before. Last time with a saw and a plastic heating pipe) dash downstairs to the kitchen to turn the water off is followed by much swearing at my own stupidity.

Luckily, there is a heating engineer/plumber working at a house at the back of us. Debbie sets off to (metaphorically) bat her eyelashes at him to see whether he will offer assistance. He does although, after a quick visit to check out the problem, he admits that he won't be back until later in the afternoon as it's his son's Nativity just after lunch (not the same one). So, a few hours later the leak is fixed and I have vowed to give up DIY. Or, at least, be more careful. The squeaking is really getting on my nerves.

And the Nativity? Very entertaining. A group of four and five-year-olds singing and dancing on stage very confidently. Elizabeth managed to forget about the cough she had had for a couple of days (or, at least, not let it affect her). The performance was enhanced when we spotted one of the teachers standing on a table at the back of the hall, prompting lines and dance steps. Until then we had been very impressed that all the kids new every step. At one point, I looked across at Debbie to find her in floods of tears.

I thought I was going to need the plumber again...

Friday 7 December 2007

So good, I saw it... twice??

Wednesday 5th December: Tonight, I saw Beowulf. For the second time.

It's not that often that I see a film twice at the cinema. It either has to be very, very good or it's part of a multi-bill (for example, when I went to see all six, at the time, Star Trek films in one day).

Beowulf is neither very, very good, nor part of a multi-bill. There are two reasons that I saw it twice. The first is that both Debbie and a friend that I haven't seen for some time wanted to see it and neither were available on the same day. The second is that when I saw it originally, after a hard day's Christmas shopping, followed by steak and eggs at the Flying Legends, I actually fell asleep. One minute we had just been introduced to our titular hero, the next (or so it seemed) Debbie had given me a quick nudge and Beowulf was already in Heorot, bragging to Hrothgar and his people about the time that he defeated nine sea monsters.

It turns out that I had missed a good ten minutes...

For anybody who doesn't know, Beowulf is based on the ancient Anglo-Saxon poem dated from around the 11th century. Real actors (Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, John Malkovich, Angelina Jolie, etc) were filmed using motion capture. The finished film resembles a computer-generated cartoon but the characters, for the most part, look uncannily like the actors. There are problems with the process - eyes tend to look lifeless, for example - and some sequences look a little like bad animation but, on the whole it works well. Some cinemas are showing it in 3D, using a new method which does away with the cardboard specs prevalent in the 80s. It's supposed to be very good. Unfortunately, York has only got it in 2D.

There are a few questions which seem to turn up in most reviews - why use motion capture to film Ray Winstone and then turn his on screen look to be more like Sean Bean? Why use known actors with incorrect accents? (In the film, Hrothgar, a Danish King, is obviously Welsh and Beowulf, a Scandinavian, is Cockney - "I've come to kill your MONSTA!!"). Unknown actors with Scandinavian accents would have worked just as well, if not had the box-office draw.

Overall the film is entertaining. The final battle in which Beowulf takes on a dragon is spectacular. The opening sequences, in which the demon Grendel attacks Hrothgar's mead hall and Beowulf defeats Grendel, manage to make the demon both terrifying and pitiful. However, ultimately, it's a little unsatisfying. The middle section drags a little and there were, for me, too many unexplained, ambiguous details - for example, Beowulf is originally portrayed as a bragging liar rather than the hero he turns out to be. Hrothgar himself may be portrayed as part-demon after he falls to his death, but no reason is given. Maybe I just need explanations rather than having to think for myself. Overall, I would give it 6/10