Scenes of Devastation

So it's late October in the UK, and the storms have moved in. The winds were bad enough on Sunday night that most of the London Underground was out of action on Monday morning, and key lines still struggled into the afternoon. My local area wasn't too terribly hit - a load of leaves stripped from the trees and lots of litter blown around - but, with a tarpaulin on my roof weighed down by spare bricks and fragments of paving tiles, it was a loud night for me. So loud, in fact, that I woke up in the middle of the night with a splitting headache that stayed with me till morning. One of these days, I'll remember which parts of my brain can be fixed with paracetamol (front right, lower rear) and which requires the less friendly painkiller ibuprofen (front left), which I've all but sworn off and only use in real emergencies.

There were dire warnings of further adverse weather to come, but it's been strangely calm since Sunday night/Monday morning... and the Met Office (a body well known for predicting the weather by esoteric means that never include looking out of a fucking window) suggests things are going to remain fairly calm, at least until the weekend...

I learned yesterday I'd suffered some devastation of my own: my ancient Sega Saturn is working fine (no surprise, it's often said it was the most reliable console of its time, and mine will even run a game on a broken disc!) but my main memory card is buggered. It seemed to be OK initially, but after playing a couple of different games, the Saturn lost track of it. I pulled it out and put it back in (with the console off, obviously) and, after a few attempts, it picked up the memory card again... but it was suddenly blank. Bang goes all the saved games I had from when I was regularly using the machine - everything from Fighters Megamix to Panzer Dragoon Saga, from Castlevania X to Policenauts. It seems as though the battery in the memory card had finally died but, having switched it out for an equally old replacement memory card (which I thought had been bought new, but must have been second hand as it came with some saved files for games I never owned), things seem OK. Weird.

It's a bit of a blow, especially to lose completed games of Policenauts and Castlevania X (bar one painful boss battle that wasn't utterly necessary for the completion of the game), and a game of Panzer Dragoon Saga that was quite close to the end... but at least I can replay Panzer Saga. The other two, being imports, are rather more problematic. I have an emulator they both seem to work on, but it's not the same as using the console.

Plus One

So I've missed the seventh anniversary of this blog by a couple of days... No great shakes, since I did a big nostalgia-fest last year, but it's still disappointing that I didn't even realise until yesterday, when I happened to see the reminder on my cellphone, and then just couldn't be bothered to write anything.

Things have changed a fair bit since then, but almost everything I wrote then still applies... particularly the bits about writing. This year has been a bit drier on the work front - after my long-term role ended, I've had only a few scraps of work here and there. My finances are a bit rubbish, largely because of another inflated service charge bill, ostensibly for renewing the main roof.

On that subject, in spite of assurances from the managing agents that the landlord will allow the roof renewal to go ahead once the residential leaseholders' services charges are paid, they have also expressed some doubts. I've paid a total of something like £5K over the last two years on the understanding that the first floor roof was supposed to be done back in 2011 and that the main roof was to be done this year... and yet neither is any closer to happening. For this reason, I've actually engaged a solicitor to look into it for me.

Considering how expensive the roof non-renewal has been so far, it almost feels pointless and contrary to take on the additional expense of a solicitor, particularly after he told me that I probably won't be able to recover my expenses from the landlord... Any of the solicitor's bills could be crippling. Unfortunately, after owning a flat under a leaky roof for five years, it's only about the money in an abstract way. The point is that I've paid inflated service charges for absolutely necessary work which the landlord has failed to go through with. The point is that the managing agents had to threaten the landlord with ditching his business before he agreed - in principle - to carry out the work this time, and now it looks as though it's still not going to happen.

All this came about because I happened to hear someone up on the roof a few weeks back, then overheard part of a conversation about the roof and alternative methods of roofing, and decided to call the managing agents to ask what they knew about it... and they knew nothing about it. It doesn't inspire me with confidence when the landlord (most likely him, anyway) goes behind the back of his managing agents to look into alternatives after they've gathered quotes for the job. Two years ago, he insisted they look into 'liquid roofing' for the first floor roof, but still wouldn't agree to the expense. I've no idea what it'd cost to renew the roof with fibreglass, but I'm guessing it's not the cheapest option... and it's also not compatible with the work that needs doing when the landlord doesn't own the entire building, and so wouldn't be replacing the entire roof...

Finding myself a regular income just got that little bit more important, however you slice it...

Another expense was about £2.5K on a new boiler - very important now the weather is turning and the bills are set to rise - along with a heated towel rail for the bathroom. Thankfully, my folks bailed me out for that one, so I haven't had to delve into my savings too deeply as yet. I'm hoping that the new boiler will give me a more manageable winter fuel bill, but I'm still keeping the heating off for the time being, and until it gets completely critical.

On the upside, in about two weeks, I'll be celebrating the first time I met the young woman who is now my girlfriend and, a month after that, we'll be celebrating a year of being a couple... We celebrate being a couple basically every time we meet, but it'll be nice to have a proper anniversary.

Continuing The Roundup/Further Impressions

Following the TV roundup post from the beginning of the month, my impressions of a couple of the shows are shifting slightly.

This is most noticeable for Orphan Black, the alleged Sci-Fi show featuring a bunch of doppelgängers. Introducing us to the killer the way they did could have provided plenty of shock and intrigue... if only they hadn't tied her to some weird religious cult which - wouldn't you know it? - considers a bunch of clones to be a despicable heresy unto the Lord, which must be scourged from the Earth. That has to be the most tired plot twist ever in the history of television, and it drags the show further from its self-professions of Science Fiction. Now it's just becoming a knock-off Dan Brown 'thriller'. Further clichés include the small fact that Sarah's daughter can tell the ostensibly identical doppelgängers apart without any effort, and that the killer's motivation is a pack of lies fed to her by the folks who recruited her. The show is revealing some of its secrets, albeit clumsily, as in the conversation between Sarah and Alison, where the latter seems surprised that Sarah has a natural daughter, but it's still dragging its heels in the main plot. I've read the write-up to this week's episode, and it sounds as though things may start to hot up... but a quick side-trip to IMDb sent a chill down my spine for all the wrong reasons: there's already a Season 2... meaning, most likely, no questions truly answered by the end of this season, and an annoying cliffhanger.

Under The Dome, too, continues to play into clichés and stereotypes with the clash of wills between 'Big Jim' and Ollie over the fate of the town, both assuming the Dome will remain forever, and both determined to make the most of it. There is one interesting hint that the Dome is maintaining some kind of equilibrium - just as a baby is born (somewhat prematurely due to the mother's contact with the Dome) another character dies 'of natural causes'... Though the idea of 'a life for a life' doesn't quite jibe with the bodycount thusfar...

I didn't even bother watching the second episode of Atlantis, despite being intrigued by the trailer introducing Medusa in a decidedly un-Gorgon-like state... And the write-up for this week's episode almost left me weeping. The BBC needs to figure out what its target audience is for these shows. If they're aiming for the same 'family group' that watch Doctor Who, a bit more authenticity and a bit less utter stupidity would be welcome.

Egad, It Continues...

In spite of having a truly awful night's sleep last night, I managed to squeeze in another completely bonkers dream, in which I was apparently collecting mail-order exotic pets. One of the newest arrivals was a baby alligator, and my first instinct was to house it in the bathroom. It seemed happy enough, pressing its snout against the door, but I was suspicious of the fact that it seemed to be staring at me. Standing on the lavatory was enough to fool it into thinking I wasn't looking (the towels hanging on the door were somehow, magically, in its line of sight, though surely it could still see my legs?), and it made its first bid for escape, squeezing under the corner of the door. I gave chase, scooped it up and, in search of a more permanent home, tracked down my local mob-owned pet shop with the frisky little critter "in my pants". Because, obviously, when one speaks to stereotypical Sopranos-style contemporary mob folks, one speaks in American. The baby reptile was actually in my pocket, not my underwear.

I can't quite remember what happened in the pet shop, except that it was dark and somewhat spooky. It was a Horror Movie Pet Shop, rather than a real pet shop, and none of the lights - other than the eerie green glow from a couple of terraria - were working. The next thing I knew, I was back home, chasing the baby 'gator down the stairs in its second bid for freedom. My folks had suggested flushing it down the toilet - both amused by the 'urban legend' angle (well, I mean, there are terrapins in the canal near where they live) - or generally just destroying it, so it was no surprise that my father stamped on it the moment it ventured too close to the lounge... but, rather than going splat like a real baby alligator might, this dream creature went splat like Play-Doh, splitting in half and smearing around.

Firmly believing that the wilful murder of a Play-Doh creature was just as criminal as that of a normal animal, I was left wondering what to do... so, just like last time, I copped out and woke up.

In the end, it turned out to be quite fortunate that I was so restless... I'd set my alarm for 7.30am, but that was actually dangerously close to the time I'd need to leave home to get to work... and I really needed to shower. Waking up an hour before my alarm was due to go off, I had time to consider my timing, and realise that I should get out of bed right-fucking-now, or risk arriving very, very late...

So I had a day of work today, giving me a bit of extra cash (hopefully) by the end of the week. It was much the same stuff as my last single-day placement - lots of images to be rebalanced and some to be cut out in Photoshop. Their so-called 'Designers' are clearly a completely fucking lazy bunch... There would be more than enough of a Production role there even without the image editing they can't be bothered to do for themselves, so it's no surprise that they're feeling short-handed enough to employ a temp... But it's very weird that they're only being allowed to seek out a junior (with pay to match) rather than experienced people.

Of course, it sounds as though lots of experienced people have been interviewing there anyway... and having about as much luck as I have lately. My boss there told me that several candidates had mentioned having to lower their expectations on remuneration, because so little work for 'senior' types is available.

By the end of the day, a twinge in my eyebrow had become a full-blown headache and I felt quite nauseous on the way home. Hungry as I was, dinner seemed rather unlikely. I took painkillers as soon as I got indoors and eventually tried to take a nap... While my head started to clear, I didn't get any sleep, just ended up getting up and finishing off my cereal in an attempt to stave off the hunger... didn't work very well but, hey, it's time for me to go to bed now...

Trippy Dreaming Again

Of course, I really should have started writing this while it was fresh in my mind, but was otherwise occupied over the weekend... Still, here's what I remember from an awful lot of truly wacky dreaming from the last couple of nights:

A stage production of The Wolfman, with an all-star audience in attendence, was invaded by a real werewolf. Unfortunately, it appeared that the monster makeup was so good, no-one was quite sure which was the real monster, the protagonist or... well, the werewolf. People scattered out of the theatre and bolted for the exits, and I (trying to push back into the building for whatever reason) was passed by the likes of Benicio del Toro (har har - that'd be my subconscious acknowledging the 2010 remake of the classic monster film) and, perhaps most strangely, Dominic Monaghan. What little I remember of the rest of the dream was basically a cat-and-mouse chase through the theatre...

Then, in the same night, there was my subconscious trying to get in on the 'infidelity dream' schtick that has been troubling my girlfriend recently... But it was a complex tale all in itself. It was set largely indoors, but the geography of the house was a combination of my folks' place and my girlfriend's family home. Most of my family were there, in one form or another, and there was one additional inhabitant - a babysitter for the niece. I'm not sure it was ever explained how or why it came to pass, but I seemed to spend a lot of time snogging the babysitter. At one point, I was asked to wash my niece, but what was presented to me as my niece was a tiny baby, easily fitting into the palm of my hand, rather than the rowdy four-year-old from real life. Nevertheless, I started shampooing her bare head (classic dream logic!), only for the real niece to turn up shortly thereafter. I asked what should be done with the tiny baby and was unceremoniously told to flush it down the toilet. I don't remember doing so in the dream, but nor do I recall seeing the baby again. Later on, still in the hybrid house, I happened to look out the window, and saw a group of three or four men, looking suspiciously like tramps, sat on the opposite side of the road, and a couple of finely-dressed women limping toward them. Well, one was limping, the other was dragging herself along the ground using her hands, as if her legs weren't working. Both seemed to have been injured somehow, and I got the impression they were looking for help. One of them looked over at the house, and exclaimed something along the lines of "that's the one with the dolls' house", and both of them - suddenly able to walk perfectly well - strode over to ring the doorbell. By this point, thanks to the wonky geography of the house, I was in the front garden... and had to sneak into the neighbours' house to get back into the house without also allowing the two women in. The rest of it is rather hazy now, but I do recall suddenly realising toward the end that I'd soon be returning home to my flat and - most crucially - my girlfriend... and that there was no way to avoid the terrible scene that would inevitably ensue from my infidelity... other than waking up and returning to a world where the babysitter doesn't exist. So that's what my dream self - cad that he is - chose to do.

Both of those were from Saturday night, and Sunday night's dream was no less all-over-the-place but, weirdly, most of it seems to have been far less memorable... I remembered bits of it before I started writing but, having written up the previous two, I can't seem to recall any of it now. Ah well.

My girlfriend - only recently returned to our fair capital - spent the weekend with me and if I were to say that neither of us slept especially well, the most obviously-drawn conclusion would be incorrect. When last we slept together, the bed was slightly - yet significantly - larger and the mattress possibly harder. I'm beginning to think I need to replace mine, as it's not especially comfortable for me alone these days, let alone with another person. Having restarted her course only a day or two before, my girlfriend was understandably restless, but things improved steadily as the weekend wore on, and we watched movies, TV, did some shopping, did some cooking, and I learned how to play Top Trumps using a set of Doctor Who 45th Anniversary cards.

While it seems her week hasn't got off to the greatest start, mine has had a small positive note - I'll be working another single day, back at the place that brought me in for a single day last month. Likely the same sort of work, so my eyes may be bloodshot and unfocussed by the end of the day, but it'll be fun... and money in the bank.

Autumn Telly Roundup

Just for fun, you understand... and because I often end up writing about the TV shows and movies I've seen sooner or later... This year's autumn season has been quite surprising in its diversity, and by the sheer number of new shows that I'm actually interested in. I'm probably not watching much more TV than usual, but I'm certainly setting things up to record more often, on the off-chance that I'm too engrossed in something else (read: pointlessly surfing the interwebs) to switch on in time.

That said, and before I get into specific shows, I've also been impressed that the new shows are actually being repeated more frequently so, on the rare occasion that I miss something (or, for example, accidentally cancel a series linked recording because my Freeview box is weird), I can generally pick it up again in the following couple of days... or just watch it on the channel's web service, if available.

But onto the shows themselves...

We'll start with Under The Dome, based on a Steven King novel, running on Channel 5. The story can be summarised as "small town America gets cut off from the rest of the world by a mysterious, invisible dome. Shenanigans ensue." and, based on what little I know about small town America (whatever turns up on the news), some of the shenanigans wouldn't even require the presence of a mysterious, invisible dome cutting them off from the rest of the world. Hell, I've known people from small town America who would happily admit that those kinds of folks would probably never go as far as the next small town, so they may as well be living under a dome anyway. The characters are horribly stereotypical, even down to the interracial-lesbian-couple-with-rebellious-daughter who were caught under the dome while 'just passing through', and the town has accepted them far too willingly, especially when you consider that one of them is the only black character I can remember seeing. On the upside, their sexuality isn't the centre of their characters - one is a lawyer, the other a doctor, and they come across very well as individuals. Most of the other characters are a pretty motley crew and most of their actions are predictable. Still, it's just about watchable enough to continue... and the series is halfway through at this point.

Next we have BBC3's new Friday night headliner, Orphan Black. Billed as a sci-fi show, it took three episodes to actually introduce its sci-fi angle. Up till then, we had the central character - some kind of con artist - taking over the life of a woman who jumped under a train... and who just happened to be physically identical to her. Complications arise because she's a police officer (and initially under investigation for the fatal shooting of a civilian), then the full plot kicks in, and she finds that the woman who killed herself is not her only doppelgänger. The side-story, of the protagonist's desire to be reunited with her daughter (currently in foster care) doesn't add a great deal of character, and the main story has been pretty slow-burning so far - all the audience has is questions, because that's all the characters have. Sadly, it's another show with a comedy gay sidekick (the protagonist's fellow-orphan 'brother') who seems to fall into the 'gay dude trying to make all the dudes gay' stereotype (including introducing a pair of suburban pre-teens to crossdressing and picking up a morgue attendant while identifying a body)... which is a shame, because the actor makes him seem pretty charismatic for such a one-dimensional character... Though, is it me, or is his hair never the same from scene to scene? The doppelgänger angle is certainly very interesting, and it seems to be an investigation into 'nature versus nurture', in that what is ostensibly the same person is very, very different in each case... but, even having identified itself as sci-fi, there's very little science fiction going on in the story.

Then, of course, we have Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. on Channel 4... which is a bit of a coup for them. Now, I've only seen the pilot, and they're never the best indicator of quality (other than in the exceptional case of Chuck), but it seems "so far, so TV". There are things one would expect to see in a TV series based in the Marvel universe and centred around Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement & Logistics Division, and the pilot certainly showed potential for lots of that... but it also showed far too many of the 'ensemble cast genre drama' clichés that have been part of US TV series for many years. You've got your 'mysterious backstory' character, you've got your 'bad attitude' character, you've got your 'nervously babbling scientist' characters and you've got your 'implausibly good with computers' character... And you know from the moment you're introduced to Agent Grant Ward that he'll be slowly learning 'people skills' throughout the series, softening up those hard edges and generally becoming less of a dick. You know that the two babbly, bickering scientists will be the key to saving the day on more than one occasion. You know that Agent Melinda May's past will catch up with her, and she won't just be 'driving the bus'. You know that superhacker and Rising Tide insider Skye will be playing both sides until she realises S.H.I.E.L.D. are the good guys after all (probably around the time Rising Tide turn out to be Bad Guys rather than just concerned whistleblowers). You also sense there's something amiss with the story of Nick Fury faking Coulson's death, just from the dreamy way Coulson talks about Tahiti using exactly the same phrases every time. In many ways, this isn't Joss Whedon at his best... but that's still far better than most of the dross on TV these days.

And on the subject of dross, I gave the BBC the benefit of the doubt with their new home-grown fantasy series, Atlantis... but it's basically the same crap as their interpretations of Robin Hood and Merlin. It looks like something thrown together in a studio and features passable CGI, but plays very fast and loose with its source material, sending a contemporary Jason back in time. There, he becomes an ancient Greek superhero (somehow speaking ancient Greek so fluently there aren't even any jokes about his accent, and allowing everyone to speak English with British accents), meeting up with Pythagoras (who, y'know, spent time in Atlantis perfecting his triangles, obviously) and a boastful and possibly cowardly Hercules. Like its predecessors, it's cut from the same TV cloth as Power Rangers, though it aspires to be more like Sam Raimi's TV series about the mulleted demi-God and that one about the warrior princess... And you know where it's going from the first moment the hero draws a flirty look from a local princess. I might give this a couple more weeks to find its stride, but I'm fairly confident that its stride will be identical to the BBCs other 'early Saturday evening fantasy drama' shows, so my expectations are very low.

In other news, I've applied for two permanent jobs recently... One picked out of a newspaper's online jobs section, the other via my regular agency. I'll also be dropping a line to yet another agency, because they seem to have a fair few jobs going. Not sure when I'd be likely to hear back on my two current applications... but it'd certainly be nice to have some full-time, permanent work again. If nothing else, a bit of interview experience would be useful.