I don't know what's happened to this neighbourhood...
Actually, that's not true, I just don't want to sound racist or anti-European by ranting about the bloody rowdy Polish morons down the road.
Right, well... We have some noisy neighbours. Not just the Poles, it has to be said. Some nights, I can hear some very English arguments going on - very loudly - along the road. Varying stages of drunkenness in the voices, as is to be expected. Over this weekend, though - and I genuinely haven't noticed it before, so hopefully it's some kind of specific celebration, rather than a taste of what's to come every night from now on - a certain household of Eastern European origin has been out in the streets being loud long into the morning and, this evening, playing guitar (quite well, as it happens) and singing (not so well) in their back garden.
I'm glad this isn't a work night for me... then again, perhaps it is for them... they seem to have stopped, finally.
Sunday, 10 June 2007
Flee! Flea!
I suppose it's a peril of owning a pet...
There I was, minding my own business, surfing the internet on a lazy Sunday afternoon, contemplating Pimms (though not drinking any... bizarrely, we seem only to have Pimms Winter, which clearly cannot be drunk during summer... it just wouldn't be proper), watching movie trailers, and feeling generally quite good for having sorted my display shelves to accommodate the TF Movie toys I shall inevitable accrue...
...When I felt a little tickle on my neck. I reached up to scratch it and felt something small and mobile. I've seen flies dancing around my room all day because (gasp) I've had my bedroom window open since yesterday (even slept on top of my bed, starkers, because it's been so warm. Steady on, gentle reader, that's as explicit as it gets). When I looked at my hand, I had a brief glimpse of small, dark insect-y thing before it jumped away, landing on my trousers. I caught it (loosely speaking) and tried to grab it to (ahem) dispose of it, but the bloody thing bounced away again... and, despite spraying my room with household flea killer, I'm still getting those strange prickly itches that my body does when it's aware of biting insects. The flea is probably dead somewhere... but you try telling my nerve endings that.
So, while I'd planned to visit Uxbridge tomorrow, my first order of business will be vacuuming my room. God knows, it needs to be done. There are scone fragments scattered about under my desk that are at least a week old because I'm so bloody lazy about cleaning. It's not as if it's much effort, thanks to the wood tile floor, but for whatever reason, I always leave vacuuming too long... Partly, I suppose, because my mother occasionally claims to have vacuumed (carefully not mentioning that she's only done the couple of square metres of visible floor when the bed is down and the door is open), and it would feel rude to do it 'again' only a day or so later.
There's the plan, then. Wake up, shower, have breakfast, vacuum, go to Uxbridge. Possibly eat out... though it always feels rather pathetic to be eating out on my own.
There I was, minding my own business, surfing the internet on a lazy Sunday afternoon, contemplating Pimms (though not drinking any... bizarrely, we seem only to have Pimms Winter, which clearly cannot be drunk during summer... it just wouldn't be proper), watching movie trailers, and feeling generally quite good for having sorted my display shelves to accommodate the TF Movie toys I shall inevitable accrue...
...When I felt a little tickle on my neck. I reached up to scratch it and felt something small and mobile. I've seen flies dancing around my room all day because (gasp) I've had my bedroom window open since yesterday (even slept on top of my bed, starkers, because it's been so warm. Steady on, gentle reader, that's as explicit as it gets). When I looked at my hand, I had a brief glimpse of small, dark insect-y thing before it jumped away, landing on my trousers. I caught it (loosely speaking) and tried to grab it to (ahem) dispose of it, but the bloody thing bounced away again... and, despite spraying my room with household flea killer, I'm still getting those strange prickly itches that my body does when it's aware of biting insects. The flea is probably dead somewhere... but you try telling my nerve endings that.
So, while I'd planned to visit Uxbridge tomorrow, my first order of business will be vacuuming my room. God knows, it needs to be done. There are scone fragments scattered about under my desk that are at least a week old because I'm so bloody lazy about cleaning. It's not as if it's much effort, thanks to the wood tile floor, but for whatever reason, I always leave vacuuming too long... Partly, I suppose, because my mother occasionally claims to have vacuumed (carefully not mentioning that she's only done the couple of square metres of visible floor when the bed is down and the door is open), and it would feel rude to do it 'again' only a day or so later.
There's the plan, then. Wake up, shower, have breakfast, vacuum, go to Uxbridge. Possibly eat out... though it always feels rather pathetic to be eating out on my own.
Parallels... or Déjà Who
You've got to wonder about the team behind the new Doctor Who when, towards the end of the third series, they've already recycled several ideas from series two.
First, they treated us to 42, very nearly a heavily condensed, blow by blow rehash of The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit minus the big scary CGI monster. Now we have been presented with Blink, effectively very similar to Love & Monsters in premise and because The Doctor is hardly in it.
Let's look at that part first.
The Doctor isn't in Blink until the final few minutes, apart from his fleeting appearance on TV screens. The Doctor isn't in Love & Monsters until the final couple of minutes apart from fleeting appearances in chase scenes. The reason for this? Are the writers becoming daring, and coming up with interesting stories in which The Doctor can safely become a minor character? Well, in the case of Blink, they could use that excuse, but it's actually down to something far more practical: Scheduling conflicts.
Somehow, they've managed to schedule the filming of series two and three so that David Tennant has to be filming elsewhere while one whole episode is being put together, so he only has time for a brief appearance. Isn't that a bit... sloppy? Especially when the two episodes that he's in so little have so much in common?
A quick breakdown:
Series 2, Love & Monsters
Features the Abzorbaloff, a monster which feeds on life and is after The Doctor because a Time Lord's many lives would make a great meal, and a main character searching for The Doctor. The Doctor, meanwhile, is just going about business as usual, having adventures with Rose, making only fleeting appearances until the end, when he meets the main character. Everyone around the main character starts to fall victim to the Abzorbaloff.
Series 3, Blink
Features 'The Weeping Angels', a group of monsters which feed on life ('potential energy' - they send their victims back in time, then take the energy of what would have been their remaining days in the present... Eh?) which are after the Tardis, as it would make a great meal. The main character, meanwhile, stumbles upon them while photographing a 'haunted house', and happens upon a message written by The Doctor, to her, back in 1969, where he's trapped because of an encounter with The Weeping Angels. Several people around the main character fall victim to the Angels, only to leave her messages to help her on her quest. The Doctor makes fleeting appearances on TV screens until the end, when he meets the main character.
Um. Yeah.
Blink is far better than Love & Monsters, and in so many ways... Not least because it features neither Peter Kay, nor the suggestion of a man having a love life with a sentient paving slab. Blink is cleverly written - the writer adapted a short story he wrote for a Doctor Who annual - while Love & Monsters was a farce. The Abzorbaloff wasn't remotely scary and, aside from being smaller than intended, was an accurate representation of the creature which won the Blue Peter competition. The Weeping Angels, meanwhile, are a cleverly thought out race of creatures, whose premise is designed to scare and unsettle the viewer: While they are being observed, they are stone statues... as soon as you look away or blink, they come to life and move with impossible speed. There was a very clever sequence toward the end of the episode where one of them made a light bulb flicker, meaning they couldn't be seen while it was out, leading to a sequence of flickering images of them approaching the episode's protagonists as they tried to get into the Tardis. They were defeated because they ended up looking at each other.
Even so, I feel somewhat cheated. That it was a great episode in its own right does not make up for the fact that it's the second time series three has rehashed ideas from series two. That said, I'd be perfectly happy (in so many ways) if the series two episode Love & Monsters had never happened. Conversely, given the choice between series two's double bill of The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit versus series three's tired, clichéd and clumsy 42, I'd go for the older offering every time.
You know, I'd quite like to write an episode of Doctor Who one of these days... Hum.
First, they treated us to 42, very nearly a heavily condensed, blow by blow rehash of The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit minus the big scary CGI monster. Now we have been presented with Blink, effectively very similar to Love & Monsters in premise and because The Doctor is hardly in it.
Let's look at that part first.
The Doctor isn't in Blink until the final few minutes, apart from his fleeting appearance on TV screens. The Doctor isn't in Love & Monsters until the final couple of minutes apart from fleeting appearances in chase scenes. The reason for this? Are the writers becoming daring, and coming up with interesting stories in which The Doctor can safely become a minor character? Well, in the case of Blink, they could use that excuse, but it's actually down to something far more practical: Scheduling conflicts.
Somehow, they've managed to schedule the filming of series two and three so that David Tennant has to be filming elsewhere while one whole episode is being put together, so he only has time for a brief appearance. Isn't that a bit... sloppy? Especially when the two episodes that he's in so little have so much in common?
A quick breakdown:
Series 2, Love & Monsters
Features the Abzorbaloff, a monster which feeds on life and is after The Doctor because a Time Lord's many lives would make a great meal, and a main character searching for The Doctor. The Doctor, meanwhile, is just going about business as usual, having adventures with Rose, making only fleeting appearances until the end, when he meets the main character. Everyone around the main character starts to fall victim to the Abzorbaloff.
Series 3, Blink
Features 'The Weeping Angels', a group of monsters which feed on life ('potential energy' - they send their victims back in time, then take the energy of what would have been their remaining days in the present... Eh?) which are after the Tardis, as it would make a great meal. The main character, meanwhile, stumbles upon them while photographing a 'haunted house', and happens upon a message written by The Doctor, to her, back in 1969, where he's trapped because of an encounter with The Weeping Angels. Several people around the main character fall victim to the Angels, only to leave her messages to help her on her quest. The Doctor makes fleeting appearances on TV screens until the end, when he meets the main character.
Um. Yeah.
Blink is far better than Love & Monsters, and in so many ways... Not least because it features neither Peter Kay, nor the suggestion of a man having a love life with a sentient paving slab. Blink is cleverly written - the writer adapted a short story he wrote for a Doctor Who annual - while Love & Monsters was a farce. The Abzorbaloff wasn't remotely scary and, aside from being smaller than intended, was an accurate representation of the creature which won the Blue Peter competition. The Weeping Angels, meanwhile, are a cleverly thought out race of creatures, whose premise is designed to scare and unsettle the viewer: While they are being observed, they are stone statues... as soon as you look away or blink, they come to life and move with impossible speed. There was a very clever sequence toward the end of the episode where one of them made a light bulb flicker, meaning they couldn't be seen while it was out, leading to a sequence of flickering images of them approaching the episode's protagonists as they tried to get into the Tardis. They were defeated because they ended up looking at each other.
Even so, I feel somewhat cheated. That it was a great episode in its own right does not make up for the fact that it's the second time series three has rehashed ideas from series two. That said, I'd be perfectly happy (in so many ways) if the series two episode Love & Monsters had never happened. Conversely, given the choice between series two's double bill of The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit versus series three's tired, clichéd and clumsy 42, I'd go for the older offering every time.
You know, I'd quite like to write an episode of Doctor Who one of these days... Hum.
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