VersesVsVerses

My friend Benny made these things out of noises. I am most partial to Lowfiful, which I love love love.

Celebrity Crap Spot # 7

Anna Friel, coming out of the Empire Cinema, L. Square. It was raining, and she brought an unbrella.

She is tiny.

Secret Cinema present Bugsy Malone

(500) Days of Summer. Again.

No one likes to realise they were wrong about something, so it's nice to be reassured, by what ever fates or mediums come your way, that you were right all the long. I recently had to watch popular indie rom-com (500) Days of Summer AGAIN, but am pleased to report that while I found more things to like about it the second time round, I still disliked it as much as I remembered. At the heart of the problem, of course, is its female lead, the eponymous Summer. The role is played by the doe-eyed ZDC, who've I explained my problems with before. The good thing about (500) Days of Summer is that it also stars Joseph Gordon -Levitt. JGL is a proper acting genius. He was amazing in Mysterious Skin, and completely carried the dribbly mess that was Brick (ask anyone, anyone what they can remember about Brick. Popular answers are 'a payphone' , 'a bridge', 'a sort of warm sunny wall', 'the girl from Lost, but she wasn't Australian' and 'Joseph Gordon-Levitt'). Luckily, no-one asks JGL to hoist (500) DOS onto his back and drag into post-production and for the purposes of this movie, nothing too taxing is really asked of JGL. He wears a very good wardrobe very well (I am sticking to my guns on this - his wardrobe is the best thing about this film by miles) and smashes a karaoke scene with a triumphant Pixies interpretation. If there was an award for Best Male Karaoke Performance within a Fairly Pointless Film, Bill Murray (Lost in Translation) would be passing it over to JGL right now.

The film had the same faults - the most interesting character {the best friend who hasn't had a girlfriend since seventh grade} still only gets four minutes of screen time, the sister still seems to have walked on to the set from a different production and I don't get the bookend voice-overs. Also whats with the title? Is the film really called Days of Summer or just 500? Like 300? "This....is.... Chicago!!"? Was it set in Chicago? I can't really remember, which is weird because wasn't the films protagonist was supposed to be an architect in love with the city? Wasn't he? Oh who cares. Your man wears two different Joy Division t shirts within two hours, for Christs sake, and then wonders why he gets dumped. In fact, I think that's the problem with the whole film. It does have some really good moments. The karaoke (JGL, not ZDC singing that song that sounds like the theme song to The Shoe People), the Han Solo reflection bit, the party expectation/reality split screen. But all the gaps between the clever bits are filled in with nonsense and non-characters with non-backgrounds.

And that is exactly the problem with the film. It's too many Joy Division tshirts mixed in with too many average tshirts. Then your Joy Division shirts stand out too much and show everything else up as tired, mediocre rubbish.

Heres the audio of the winner of the Official Best Male Karaoke Performance within a Fairly Pointless Film Award 2009

Cut-price Celebrity 'spots'

I saw this lady walking down Portabello Road on Wednesday.

Her name is Vera Filatova, and she played Elena on Peep Show. I mention this because I once had an elaborate plan to devote an entirely separate blog to my Crap Celebrity Spots, but considering I seem to be unable to regually update even this blog, its possibly for the best that I didn't extend my evil blog empire. So, I'll cram them all in here.

1) Vera Filatova, obviously. She was very short (shorter than me), had small features and seemed calm.

2) Samantha Mumba, walking along Poland Street, talking on her phone. She is very, very tall, super-smiley and seemed full of energy (so I guess that one number one hit didn't take it out of her too much).

3) Ian Brown. Greasy of hair and slumped of shoulder. He was in an off-licence in Soho.

4) Alan Carr. Oxford St.

5) Simon Amstell, different end of Oxford street

6) Lily Cole, Charing Cross Road. Very nice mittens.

It reads like the guest list for the Ant and Dec ITV Xmas Special. *sigh*

Chapter 24

Until all good thing start happening to all good people, You have to be satisfied with some good things happily happening to the occasional good person.

My friend Claire Smith is one of the good people. We met in 2007, both working for the same insane Edinburgh fringe venue production company. We ended up spending a week plaster-boarding the walls of a burnt-out building (it was a fairly big room, it was just the two of us most of the time, and our levels of plaster-boarding experience prior to that week can safely be described as poor-very poor). We pushed each other around on scaffolding towers , listened to a little radio and we shared the common ground of thinking most other people were daft or deranged most of the time. Claire was pretty shy when she wasn't ragging on other people in the safety of our sequestered work area, so I was surprised to find out that she was the front-woman and melodica player in a band. Ever suspicious and hyper-critical, I was even more surprised when I got around to hearing them and found out that they were great, she was great, everything about them is totally great. I've been to a couple of their shows over the last two years - the band manage to always sound slick and bouncy, and Claire sings like an angel and dresses like a black magic woman who has twirled through the worlds most incredible clothes shop and emerged with whispers of splendour vaguely attached to her.
They are fun, creative, enchanting, and I cant think of anyone to compare them to, but you can listen on their super-minimal myspace here.

Anyway, the good thing that has happened to them is this review from the NME. It's there, right in the middle. The review above the is The Lemonheads. Thats some hallowed space they are occupying, in my book anyway. Click on it to make it big.



Chapter 24 are playing next Thursday at the Hoxton Bar and Grill, at 8.15, for twenty minutes to the Moshi Moshi A&R peeps. Come and swoon down the front with me.

See, good things can happen to the good peoples.

The Moany-moanarium of Dr Bethassus

So The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is a bit rubbish is it? Really? What tipped you off? Was it, perhaps, this trailer

Me - Ohh, Parnassus trailer
Voice of Film Reason (VOFR) - Yep.
Me - Looks cool. Nice. Colourful. CGI.Okay.
VOFR - Yep.
Me - And here's the plot summary. Nice and simple. Okay.
VOFR - Yep.
Me - Christopher Plummer. He's a bit of a budget Christopher, no?
VOFR - l'il bit.
Me - And here's Lily Cole. She's fun looking. Oh, no talking, Lily?
VOFR - No. Remember St Trinian's.
Me - Oh yeah. Good Point. Oh, here's the interesting 'lots of people playing the same part'.
VOFR - It's not really that interesting.
Me - No, not really. Isn't it funny to think that Johnny Depps actually really old? Hey, here comes the blurb clippings. 'Stunning'. Ok. 'Dazzling'. Right. Lots of little words probably relating to production design then, which come to think of it, looks very similar to the Jodorowsky Dune sketches.
VOFR - You can't prove anything.
Me - Christopher Plummer was in Twelve Monkeys. That's a good film, shall we watch that now?
VOFR - You can. I'm just here to facilitate your internet bitching, remember....?

Parnassus is currently rocking a 7.6 on the IMDB. I'll probably really enjoy it. I saw this on Tuesday, and definitely enjoyed it. It's a little too long, the editing is so-so in places, and it mixes amazing performances with ones that sort of make you wince. But it's wickedly fun (and currently rocking a very appropriate 6.6 on the imdab).

There's one shop. Does that make it a town?

Whilst face-booking my way through my day yesterday, I noticed that a face-friend of mine had updated their status to

"Jessica Fox is looking forward to dying her hair red for the last time".

This sent me into a spiral of worry, Jessica Fox dyes her hair red because she plays a character on television who has red hair. If she was going to stop dying it, she wasn't going to be playing the character anymore, and that, my friends, would mean the end of my excuse to watch Hollyoaks.

Hollyoaks first hit our screens in 1995 - it's a soap opera aimed at young people/adults, and is set in the (town? city? hamlet?) of Hollyoakes, Chester. Hollyoaks storylines first centred around the lives of about 10 'young people' but now involves a cast of 50 +, which are frequently refreshed by the HCC (Hollyoaks Community College) freshers intake, which top-up the population after a years worth of carnage has dispatched half the village.

Since 1995, Hollyoaks story lines have included drug addiction (all kinds), murder (planned and accidental), arson(in one case coupled with an attempt at suicide bombing), hit and run palavers, abortion, suicide, car crashes, plane crashes, homelessness, financial problems, interracial relationships, racism, religion, bisexuality, homosexuality, homophobia, sexual confusion, alcoholism, rape (male and female), cancer, child abuse, domestic violence, anorexia/bulimia (and the one character who was fat), incest, sexual harassment, general bullying, what happens when you 'accidentally' accuse your foster parents of abuse, carbon monoxide poisoning, living with epilepsy, hiding your diabetes, HIV, pupil/teacher relationships, self harm, roid-rage,schizophrenia, OCD, gambling addiction, shoplifting, fostering, teenage pregnancy, miscarriage, kidnapping, brain aneurysm, surrogacy, faking your own death, the totally harrowing Cot-Death of Baby Grace and The Claire Cunningham Story Arc.

In 1996, Hollyoaks was voted "Most Dangerous Place in the World. Ever".

I've been lucky enough to have a few friends take their lives in their literal hands and feature on this chronic mash-up of doom-opera, playing, respectively,

• a bloke who was didn't date-rape someone, but somehow confessed to it, which everyone believed because he somehow had managed to burn down his ex-girlfriends house, was sent to prison, escaped by holding his sister hostage, then burns down the pub with half the cast and himself in it. He dies.
• a guy who had testicular cancer, crabs, and saw his sister raped. he has since disapeared to France(?) having kidnapped some kid who may or maynot be his son.
• a teacher who slept with a schoolboy, had his baby, and was put in prison after he cried rape where she was promptly stabbed to death.

But none of this can possibly be as bad as what Jess must be facing in the run up to her exit, because Jess is Hollyoaks no-hold-barred property. Yep, Jess plays one of the 'Oaks alternative cast members.

As bad as life if for anyone who makes the mistake of alighting at Hollyoaks Metropolis Station, life is a million times worse for the interesting ones.

Sasha the goth and keyboard player in Hollyoak's only band got hooked on heroin in year 9 and started stealing and eventually hooking.
Newt the emo kid (fostered by Jack and co) 'got' schizophrenia and several split personalities which tried to kill various people, and then him.
Zoe (who wasn't even that cool but just looked like a normal person) currently rots in jail after she started dating an old man and had a lesbian affair with his daughter who has just committed suicide during a sky dive.
Chris the transvestite is regularly beaten half to death and sort-of had HIV for a while.
Rhys (who is a total loser, but did form the Hollyoaks band) tried to date the local swimming star, but was then seduced by her mum to sabotage the relationship. His attempt at a new relationship also went tits-up when he found out his new girlfriend was also his half-sister. But it was all okay, because he accidentally killed her later on.

Jess plays Nancy. She's already had a reasonably rough time as her sister was murdered leaving her looking after her sisters son whilst still at college. Then the son was ill, and she started dating her sisters former husband who then abused her. I doubt things are going to get better. Nancy has dyed red hair. The wikipedia for her character notes that she is "portrayed as a less conventional character compared to the rest of the Hollyoaks teenagers". She is in for it. In fact not only is she quirky, shes also one of the characters who moved to Hollyoaks 'from the South'.

Oh dear.

Yeah, Yeah (I'm Not You) ...

I'm a bit of an MTV fanatic. I can get a little addicted to some proper rubbish on it (Made, Switched, The Hills etc) so I felt it was my duty to check out recent a offering, the overly-longly-named Sharon Osbournes Rock of Love Charm School. Now, I'm not so sure that Sharon Osbourne is properly qualified to teach 'charm' to America's young charmless women, in fact, I have a Brownie Guides 'Hostess' badge, so in terms of formal qualifications, I may have been a better candidate. But teaching charm she is, and her loud, hair-extensioned, gum-chewing charges seem to be benefiting from the experience. In the episode I watched, they had to entertain a fake duchess. They seemed to do okay. And it offered the minimum of entertainment value, but was regrettably unquote-able. In between vaguely watching, I channel hopped, taking in some of Dogg After Dark (some kind of chat show, set in a night club, with Snoop Doggy Dogg hosting) and watched a little of a short film, which was on the channel that no-one watches, that just shows short films. The short had a couple of well-heeled super indie US actors in, and just as I was giving up and going to bed, Zooey Deschanel popped up.

The problem with Zooey, of course, is that its all a bit much. Shes very pretty, very well-dressed, gets to be in movies that range from huh? to pseudo-blockbuster to pretty damn good. And she got to kiss Paul Dano in Gigantic. She's in a band that have a record deal, and she's engaged to Ben Gibbard. Of course, on the other hand, she's not a great actress, her band are fairly rubbish (despite having M. Ward as a song-writing partner), and she's engaged to Ben Gibbard (fellow social commentator Samuel Dougherty remarks "that's got to be a totally insipid relationship").

The problem really, and the main issue facing young women today, is that however they look at it, they have little to no real chance of being Zooey Deschanel. She is Zooey, and no one else can be. She even gets to have her otherwise mediocre (but not unpleasant) name (ZOE) spelt in the most uber-cool way possible.

It's such a tragedy for the rest of the world that I (late, sleepy and not Zooey) wrote a song about it. I have stolen the tune from a ditty Kaydence and I co-wrote in June (the instant classic "Yeah, Yeah, I've Got Zips!" - inspired by Kaydence's discovery that my coat had buttons, but hers had zips) and created the mostly inferior "Yeah, Yeah (I'm Not You) ZOOEY!

I have no way at the moment, to share this wondrous piece of song writing, but I can offer a sample of lyrics, for everyone who is not Zooey.

Yeah, Yeah, (I'm Not You) ZOOEY!

I'm told most every machine comes with defects built in, just to keep you buying spare parts,
But I'm fairly sure, yes? that you are flawless,
So smile for the camera, sweetheart.
It's not you, it's just me,
Are you Zooey? No, I'm not. Yeah? but,
Yeah, yeah, I'm not you (ZOOEY!)
Yeah, yeah, I'm not you (ZOOEY!)
Yeah, yeah, I'm not you. Yeah, yeah, yeah...

And thats quite enough of that.

It's on the TELEVISION.

Couple of experiences recently with TV commercials...

“Choose a different ending” was the Met’s anti knife crime advert campaign aimed at 13 to 15-year-olds. Through a series of interactive short films, the campaign asked viewers to make decisions in relation to various scenarios relating to knife crime. These were presented on television as bookends during your average 3 min advertising segment. I'm sure you remember the ones, a POV camera followed a jacketed yoof type as he was shouted at by a bunch of other yoofs, goes home, gets a knife and prepares to get shivvy with it. The ads would cut away pretty suddenly, meaning they kind of ran into what ever the next adverts were, confusing everybody. Especially the wonderful day when I saw “Choose a different ending” cut directly to a Robert Dyas advert, which opened with a Robert Dyas storefront. Amazing. “Choose a different ending” - consider buying your knives from quality high-street kitchenware emporiums. Those knives cut deep, kids.

Despite parking myself in front of the TV with my camera for literally days, desperate to see this amazing piece of TV blunder-ation again, it has remained elusive. I can't explain how amazing it was. I had to actually stand up, point at the Tv and look around saying "Oh! Oh my..! Did you? Did that?", despite knowing I was the only one home. Now that's how one should react to a advert.

Here's how one should not react to an advert Coca-Cola - by blinking (a bit), shrugging, and muttering "Welcome aboard the hipster train. Losers" Sorry, C-dubs, Calvin Harris weak-ass summer song, weird puppety beasties, organs, shiny happy people: I don't buy it, or your sugar-water.

Rock Star

Kids a genius.

Just another day ...

I have a few issues with temper control, and what professionals call "anger management", Its something I work on, and I know I have a terrible temper. It's mostly under control but there are certain things that really set me off. As I walked down towards the train station this morning, I had to cross a narrow bridge, I stood aside for a young woman and her pushchair, and prepared to do the same for a middle-aged gent, plump, sweaty and balding. A business suit chap, I guess in his early forties. As he passed by, instead of the the mumbled "thanks" I was expecting, he decided to "pass comment" on my breasts.

Turning on my heels, I followed the fat bastard up the hill.

At the top of this particular hill, happens to be one, singular office block (TIBCO Biopharm and Pharmecutical Reasearch). I was fairly sure this was where he was heading, and happy days, it was.

I gave him four minutes, then buzzed my way into reception.

"Excuse me" said I (to the receptionist) "I was just walking up the hill when a man dropped his phone, he came in here, its quite an expensive phone, and if I'm sure its the chap in question, I would like to return it to him. Hes large, balding and wearing a sky blue shirt"

"Well" said the receptionist "That sounds like Mark Saunders,the marketing CEO, hes just gone up to his office"

The kindly receptionist let me into the lift for the second floor, where delightful Mark oversaw an open office.

Upon arriving at his floor I dropped my bag (to attract attention) and declared as the office looked up "Ladies and Gentleman, my name is Bethan Hopkins, and I am 17 years old. Mark Saunders, your CEO, just made graphic and tasteless sexual remarks towards me as I passed him on the street. He is a filthy, desperate excuse for a man".

Saunders cried for security and the police. I grabbed an extension phone and said I would call the press. I'm not 17, I'm 26, but don't really look it. Still, Saunders, you filth-bucket, that's no excuse.

Trek.

I am certainly going to enjoy, if not like, the new Star Trek film. That is just a fact. But I really, really enjoyed and liked this, from the good people at The Onion.

Killer Bees? Again?

Today I watched Castle in the Country, at approx 1pm on BBC 2. I have never seen anything quite like it in my life. For a while, I couldn't tell if it was a genius spoof a la Posh Nosh, or if the BBC had finally flipped its lid and was now dedicating an hour of its daily programming to shows specifically designed for the recepients of the Barbour Jackets Club-Class Collectors mailing list.

From the BBC 2 website "Castle in the Country is a daytime magazine programme based in some of the UK's finest castles focussing on rural affairs, agriculture, environment, food and the countryside".

This epidode focused on Burghley House, seems like a nice little spot, hmm?

But the hidden terrors. From the show, I quote ..

"Tom discovers a rare bird in Burghley House, and it's pinned to a wall"
"Gordon is preparing a desert inspired by his Grandmother"

"So, Sybil, the house was completly destroyed in a fire in the 1800's, did you lose everything?"
"Actually, no, the Beringer Rose garden remained undamaged - quite a relief"

Quite. Especially when over in the other wings of the estate, crazed cannibals are basting octogenarian family members and nailing sweet avarians to the walls in blood-lust.

Sadly, the show chose to focus on a show-jumping competition curently being set-up in the 'grinds' of the 'hice'. Nora Bunsenton-Bunsenton was eager to explain that the jumps were made impressivly difficult by being narrow, set near water etc - things that horses don't like. Why not take it to another level, Nora? I bet horses really don't like fire, do they? Or killer bees?

But thats another episode, I'm sure.

First day..

Today was Kaydence's first day at her new nursary, which is attached to a pre-school, which makes it a big school.

Crazy blue font.

Well this is... colourful.

Hmmm.

Does the music travel?

From the middle of January to the middle of March this year, I was sailing with my Dad. This is the music we listened to on the boat.

Nina Simone
Verve Jazz Masters - Stan Getz
Astrud Gilberto - Verve Autour de Minuit
Bob Dylan - Good as I been to You / Desire
Manu Chao - Radio Bemba Sound System
John Holt
Desmond Dekker
Jimmy Cliff - The Art of Segovia
Sam Cooke - Portrait of a Legend 1951-64
The Rolling Stones - Black & Blue
Etta James - Chess
Eric Clapton - Me and Mr Johnson
Cassandra Wilson
Norah Jones
Jacques Loussier

This is what I missed.

A tragi-comedy rendered in facebook.

Graham Moore thinks you wouldn't believe him if he said he went to a gig and experienced the lead singer singing along to his slideshow of 'A Complete History of Communism vol. 5', drawn in crayon. And then giving out his mobile numer to see who in the crowd would call first! :) 22 hours ago

Bethan Hopkins at 12:20am April 23
dude, who did you see?

Bethan Hopkins gutted, gutted, gutted. Some sort of time machine? Me not forgetting about the Jeffrey Lewis gig? That would be nice. 41 minutes ago

Graham Moore at 10:40pm April 24
Very sorry to hear, twas a gooood gig last night...

Bethan Hopkins Are you serious? I'm so jealous I could die
3 minutes ago

Graham Moore at 1:02am April 23
Jeffrey Lewis, at Scala, Kings Cross, goooood times. Supported by some guys I've never heard of; Johnny Flynn and the Sussex Wit". _Very_ pleasantly surprised by those guys....

This makes no sense, but its the order that it all was revealed to me, despite its noted timings. Its two separate conversations that ultimatly add up to form something that could be expressed thus;

Beth - I missed a good gig.

Graham - Yeah? I didn't. I was there, and Jeffrey Lewis sang along to his slideshow of 'A Complete History of Communism vol. 5', drawn in crayon.

Beth - Rubbish.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I also note that I have been spelling the word 'goooood' incorrectly. I was under the impression that 2 "o's" were all that were required.
People who type like that should not be allowed to go to awesome gigs that I forget to go to. Factus.

Literally hundreds of words rhyme with 'Dougherty'

It's not often boys get songs written about them. I guess it's nice when they do, even if/ especially when it's a song written by other boys. Hark at the 'bromance. What is a band to do when it's drummer jets of to Japan for a year?

This is 'Panda' by Kimmy Yeah, performed by Kimmy Doyle, Kimmy Armstrong and Kimmy Linskill, at the Shakespear Hotel, in sunny Sheffield.

Vicky would say it was boss, but in this case it's mostly bass.

Books Update.

I am so out of date and months behind in typing up my "Books I Have Recently Read" lists. The last time I did it was before Christmas, and I can't even remember what colour scheme I settled on. Also, since then I have been in a number of different countries and updating the list in several different notebooks (including one which I am trying to ignore the fact that I have probaly lost).

Anyway, the best I can, and in no particular order, salvaged from bits of paper...

Books

Modern Ranch Living - Mark Poirier

Mulliner Nights - P.G Wodehouse

With A Strange Device - Eric Frank Russell

The Naked Sun - Isaac Asimov

Living, Loving, Party Going (Three Stories) - Henry Greene

At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances - Alexander McCall Smith

The Eve of St Venus - Anthony Burgess

O-Zone - Paul Theroux

Maurice - E.M Forster

Where Angels Fear to Tread - E.M Forster

The Lady with the Little Dog and Other Stories - Anton Chekhov

The Crack-Up (and Other Stories) - F. Scott Fitzgerald

Him With His Foot in His Mouth (and Other Stories) - Saul Bellow

The Mosquito Coast - Paul Theroux

Brick Lane - Monica Ali

Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino

Forty Stories - Dave Eggers

Nature Girl - Carl Hiaasen

The Darling Buds of May - H.E Bates

For Whom The Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway

The Raw Shark Texts - Steven Hall

Mainlines, Blood Feasts and Bad Taste: A Lester Bangs Reader - Edited by John Morthland.

No title for Vicky.

Please everyone read and enjoy harkavagrant.com.

On the Nose..

I'm not a fan of Coventry trio the Enemy, but I did enjoy this quote from an article in the Observer Music Monthly...when asked why more UK bands were not responding or reacting to the current State-of-the-Nation "chaos", Enemy frontman Tom Clarke replied
"They [other bands]'re either thoughtless, stupid, or they've disappeared up their own arses".

S'a good rainbow, this.

tanks.

Hello Trinidad.

href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5Cian%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml">

So, appetites have been truly whetted by my confusing last post... boat? land? what? I don’t know what the day is today, let alone the date, but following my fun-filled family Christmas with my sister and her babba, I got into the whole 'family' bit, and wondered where could I take it from here? 'Where' indeed, turned out to be pretty far, three plane trips, in fact. Armed with my recently discovered sense of peoples mortality and my newfound zen-like non-angry persona, I ended up arranging to go and visit my father, and spend some time with him, for, as I said on the phone as we arranged the visit "Its occurred to me that you could like, die. Because, you’re like, old".
My dad happens to be living on a yacht. He normally sails about on said yacht with his wife (the nautical - wind -appropriately named Westa) but she is recovering from some fairly major shoulder surgery, which left Dad on the boat on his own. I'm a pretty poor sailor - lets be clear on this. Sheffield trams could make me vomit, so I'm full on Linda Blair on a boat. I can’t often tell my left from my right without several attempts, I get sunburned easily, and don’t absorb vitamins as well as the other hominoids (hence I'm prone to bouts of scurvy). Still, I was intrigued by the chance to spend some time trapped in a 39ft floating tin, with one other person, and that person would be the male, grown-up version of me. I know what you’re thinking... two Beths in one small place? With no-one but the other for company? Is this some kind of sit-com from-hell pitch? Possibly. We definitely have the 'sit (ch)' - the boat, and there’s a fair amount of miss hearing and bumping into things -could this be the com? Anyway, after researching (I googled "Films where kids bond with their fathers" - sadly mostly all about fathers and sons, at least one of whom had to be terminally ill, and all pretty appalling movies, although My Life as a House was quite sweet) and packing up my $200 hair straighteners and pair of 'super-awesome' bluebird cowboy boots, I left grey old UK, via Heathrow and Manchester airports, to go get my nautical on.

I flew to Grenada, where Dad picked me up. His boat is the good ship Marsha Claire, pictured above. It is 39 feet long, and 12 feet wide. It has three bedrooms and two bathrooms -making it more impressive statisticly than anywhere I have lived in my adult life. We stayed in Grenada for 4 days where we were moored in the sea in Prickly Bay. It was a five minute dingy ride from the boat to the shore. This is the first time I have ever been able to start the dingy. A good sign. We went for two practice sails before our big overnight sail to Trinidad. It turns out sailing at night is pretty lame, especially when its pitch dark (the moon doesnt come up here until quite late in the night), its dark, scary and lonley. But not cold. It is never cold here. Its about 30-something degrees in the day, and once I saw the thermometer go down to around 24 one night. Anyway, we managed to avoid and death or disaster that night (although I dont think Dad wore his harness once, even during the very short but marginally exciting 'squall'). We arrived in Trinidad in the morning, where the boat was going to be hauled onto the ground to have its bottom painted. So now we are parked in a big old boatyard, where all the boats stand upright, balanced on their keels and metal support poles. You get in and out of your boat via a metal ladder, so its like living in a very hot treehouse. Good fun though, in a very Baden-Powell way. We will be hear for another week or so, until the boat work is finished. trinidad is much more fun than Grenada. Theres a jungle behind us, with howler monkeys which sound like machinery, and giant butterflies. There are steel-bands who practice in yards and are much cooler sounding than I ever expected. We've been out running in the jungle and are going bird-watching on an old plantation tomorrow. The internet connection comes and goes, but I will get some better pictures up soon, promise.

How appropriate.

I'm on the boat. I'm in Trinidad. The boat is on the land which is a curious thing. More to follow.

Unexplainable

I hate packing. I don't know why, all I know is that it leaves me a mental wreck and a broken woman. To combat this my normal approach is to wait until the last possible second, and then devote 80% of the time I have to stomping around soliloquizing about how I cant handle and hate packing, then use the remaining time to throw inappropriate and often unwashed clothes into a bag, before losing control completely and throwing half of them out, because "No one can be expected to carry a bag this heavy!" and "Shoes are overrated" and "I'll buy towels!!". Or, in the case of my November trip to Sheffield, going wine-tasting the night before, waking up late and forgetting to pack entirely.

So this time I have shocked and surprised myself by starting to pack not four hours or four minutes before I leave the country, but four days before. Its incredible. I had all the same break-downs this morning, while Kaydence looked on appalled but remained calm and was always there with an "Its okay" and "Don't worry" and had several strops where I declared the whole idea of packing was impossible and convincing myself that I had many hours of watching the situation get much worse before it got any better, but now, eight hours later, I think its going to be okay. My bag is packed. Tomorrow I will unpack it and wash everything, Friday I will unpack it and throw half the clothes out (shoes are over-rated, and often unnecessary) - but the point is that for the next few days I don't have to worry about packing, because, its kinda done.

Winner.

Something in my eye...

Last night I started watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Its a long movie, but a damn good one - so far. It was about 59 minutes in when I started crying, and when, at, the 72 minute mark, I was still crying, I decided to leave it for the day, as it was super late and I didn't want to go to bed a teary, sniffly wreck. As I was drifting off it occurred to me that I don't cry very much, not without the assistance of 17 or so amaretto sours, and I couldn't remember having a seriously good cry at anything from real life since Mandy's baby died in Hollyoaks. Then I remembered that Hollyoaks was not real life.

Movies, however, make me cry a fair bit, so here is (specifically) a list of Movies That Have Made Me Cry While At The Movies (in no particular order, in any way).

Pans Labyrinth - I went to see this with my then-boyfriend Sam, who had completely opposite film taste to me - to the extent that after a particularly stressful two hours for him at the movies with me, as we emerged blinking into the sunlight, he declared that if I ever tried to make him see another movie that had the word 'bittersweet' mentioned in reference to it in anyway, he would unceremoniously strangle me with my copy of Sight and Sound - but he did announce Pans Labyrinth to be the third best film he had ever seen, after Gladiator and Dodgeball, and we both tried to pretend we hadn't balled like babies at the end.

The Pianist - I went to see this at my University cinema with my friend Therese. I started crying at about 36 minutes in, cried all the way through, and for most of the 20 minute walk back to Halls. Therese didn't even sniffle, but she's from Leeds, and studied feminist literature.

Castaway - Cried for most of the second half, but only because my Dad sails, and I got worried that if he was ever shipwrecked, he would be lonely.

The English Patient - Oh I know, I know - but only when the dude cant get anyone to understand him and his lady's dying in the cave. Saw this with my Mom in a cinema in Slough.

Titanic - This is super-embarrassing, I must have been about 14 when this came out, and it was a big deal. I tried twice to see it at the movies, the first time I was removed by an usher for being hysterical, and the second time I excused myself. I have since tried to watch it twice on television, and have never even got close to the end. Not remotely close. I can make it to the bit with the third class passengers behind the gate, then its game-over.

A Little Princess - Again I was about 14 when I went to see this with a schoolfriend named Zoe. We wept openly, while a group of tear-free 8-year-old girls peered curiously at us in the dark.

Transformers - Unexplainable. It was the nobility of the damn things. Saw it at the IMAX.

These are just films I've seen in a cinema, by the by, there is no room on this list for other embarrassing causes of emotion-show, like The Green Mile, The Notebook, Armageddon (seen twice on airplanes, and cried both times, and not just because of the shitty script), Dead Poets Society, The Railway Children (even seeing a clip of this can get me twinkling), Awakenings, Good Morning Vietnam (double whammy for Mr Williams there), (don't even get me started on anything horrific like Bambi, Dumbo, The Land Before Time, The Lion King etc) oh and that weird flick with Marissa Tomai (sp?) and the autistic kid. Oh God Lord, and nothing with evil parents like Radio Flyer or This Boys Life, and while we're with Leo, Basketball Diaries, and while we're on drugs Requiem for a Dream and American History X.

I have just checked with my sister, and she says the only film that has ever made her cry was United 193.

So what have we learned? Don't sink my boat, beat your children or inspire classrooms of privileged man-boys in front of me, or I might just cry. Carpe Diem, boys, seize the day!

Ace of Cakes.

I Like TV Shows.

Since spending Christmas with Ceri and Ben and their Sky Tv, I have been enjoying a lot more of it (we had Sky at the house in London, but it broke in March, and when I got back from Edinburgh in September, it was still broke. And yeah, we were still paying for it. Ridiculous) Anyway, I had recently become a fan of both Bones (the incredibly monikered Dr Temperance Brennan solves murder cases using forensic technology that is not going to exist for about another billion years, and is completely immersed in her work because, as far as I can fathom, her parents disappeared when she was a teenager and no-one could ever figure out what happened to them. Umm, Okay. She does this with her team of angsty, witty, INCREDIBLY good looking doctors etc and its all good fun) and Stargate Atlantis (its space, its the future - but they run out of batteries, bicker and get lost a lot. Awesome). But these two things have been totally eclipsed by my recent discovery -Ace of Cakes. Ace of Cakes is a Miami Ink style reality show, set in a bakery in Baltimore. They make 'extreme' cakes. Cakes. Its incredible. Unbelievable. Its on some food channel very late at night and its engaging, bizarre, upbeat and completely wonderful.
I set off for Cuba on Monday, so plan to Ace of Cake it until then.