Who You Gonna Call...

Not exactly babysitting, but I ended up looking after my 10 year old nephew-in-law unsupervised (me not him) for the first time on Tuesday. We watched Ghostbusters, a film, as a child of the '80's I loved and he did too!

So that forms the excuse for a host of new and (more importantly) old PG rated films to look out for and watch. This list will be updated, but your starter for 10 is...

• Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
• War Games
• Tron
• The Black Hole
• Flight of the Navigator
• Time Bandits
• The Dark Crystal
• Gremlins
• Condorman
• One of our Dinosaurs is Missing
• Digby the Biggest Dog in the World

He may yet be too young for The Breakfast Club, but keep it in the Back Pocket ready...

"When an Unstoppable Force Meets an Immoveable Object..."

An excellent film...! It presented some really interesting moral dilemmas and the downhill spiral that The Joker's philosophy presented was intense. Half way through I thought 'but this isn't as good as the first one', but in the end I think I shall have to think again...

 

 

And of course,  the unstoppable force, immoveable object question as posed by the joker is also posed in the Iain Banks novel Walking on Glass which is a very fine book. I'm not sure I really understood what was going on in the end, but sometimes that isn't always necessary: it is enjoying what is going on whilst you get there...

Poetry please...

My new favourite book of poems (although I admit I've not had many). Hovis Presley passed away in 2005 only aged 44, but has left a fantastic book of inspired poetry that deserves reading.

"Grounds for Divorce..." ?

Is is wrong to want to play this thumping great song by Elbow at the disco of your wedding?

Thinking about it, it's probably not really appropriate...

Eureka...

This is one of the few albums I have owned first on cassette (remember them?), then vinyl, and now CD. It is the album I have probably listened to the most number of times in my life, and listening to it again today it is still every bit as good. I remember all the subtleties, can hum the guitar breaks, everything. And the lyrics are great:

And then you turned to me on the big wheel
and said marry me
I closed my eyes threw my head back and said
what comes next?

I remember listening to it almost daily at the age of 18 on my way to work; periodically through University as new music got in the way; and now occasionally, just to remember just how great it is.

It is fantastic to see Boo is still around (and to see Neil playing recently with David Gray), and now I have found someone else who appreciates this fantastic music, I'm looking forward to seeing him live again soon...

"Lets go to Brighton for the Weekend..."

A top weekend with friends: too many for the Frenchman's one bedroomed flat, so camping in a field with the facilities consisting of a tap was the accommodation. It did mean that an excellent fire could be built though...

And then extending the weekend with a tour of the area was cut a short due to rain, but we stayed at Ye Olde Smugglers Inne on Sunday night in the very pleasant little village of Alfriston which was great: especially good was waking on a monday morning knowing you don't have to go to work...

ps. the title is of course a quote from the excellent Bloc Party track Waiting for the 7.18, which I couldn't stop singing in my head all weekend...