I know I've always been prone to having strange dreams. In recent months I've dreamt that I was taking a tourist trip to the moon with my sister that resulted in watching the Earthrise and singing Moon River in a cafeteria with a group of our fellow travellers. I've also dreamt that Masi Oka (Hiro on Heroes) broke into my mum's house to steal my electronic gadgets before I tackled him and proceeded to demonstrate how I could fly (a common theme in my dreams).

However, over the past six weeks things have taken a bit of a twist. I don't know if it's been my counselling or my antidepressants or what, but... I've started doing weird things in my sleep. I've woken up shouting obscenities, spouting gibberish, screaming in fear, knocking my hand on my bedside table and, once, hitting my thigh so hard the pain took a while to subside. It's really been quite unsettling as I've only ever known myself to wake up from talking in my sleep a couple times in my life. My counsellor didn't seem overly concerned and thinks it's just a result of stirring up my emotions, but Allie, understandably, is a little more worried. Especially when I wake her in the middle of the night. Hmm...

Wispa got stuck in the door to her house last Tuesday night. We'd been giving her a medicine to stimulate her appetite, but she still wasn't eating and was growing puffier and puffier until that happened. She was clearly becoming very uncomfortable so Allie and I took her to the vet on Wednesday night and had her put down. I hated having to do that, but we both thought it was for the best. There'll be no more pets for a while now, I think.



We also got a parcel from reallyamermaid that afternoon. It was packed with Oatmeal Creme Pies, Funyuns and a big bag of candy corn, none of which we've been able to get our hands on over here. Thanks very much for that, Courtney, and if you can think of anything at all you'd like before we come over just let us know!

I started Thursday by watching part of the MST3K episode Teen-Age Strangler on YouTube. Very strange to hear references to places that I know on MST3K. That afternoon I went to the doctor for both the second part of my swine flu vaccination and to get an increased dose of citaloram. Fun, fun.

In the late afternoon/early evening Bill and Nat came over and we cooked Thanksgiving dinner. We went with a couple of turkey thighs this time around with stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed sweet potatoes with marshmallows, steamed baby potatoes, honeyed roast carrots, broccoli and gravy. Nat helped us cook and she made up the pumpkin pie for us this year and it turned out wonderfully. After dinner we settled down with some wine to watch Planes, Trains & Automobiles to close out the evening.

Thursday's flu shot floored me on Friday and I spent the better part of the day asleep in bed or on the couch watching Star Trek or reading The Dark Knight Strikes Again. Lunch, thankfully, was easy with leftovers around and I had turkey and cranberry sauce pitas. That evening I did have a brief visit from my Open House friend, but skipped Open House itself and ended up watching Patrick Stewart's Christmas Carol with Allie.

Allie went out Christmas shopping on Saturday whilst I stayed in playing video games and reading and then, when she came home, we made a curry using cauliflower and leftover turkey. In the evening we went to Nat's. We'd planned to watch one of Bill's French films, but ended up watching the 1934 version of The Man Who Knew Too Much. I also enjoyed some fries and a nice greasy lamb kebab for the first time in ages. Mmm... Oh, and Nat made brownies. Delicious, chocolatey pecan brownies made from scratch. Allie and I must try making brownies sometime.

And today. Went to church. Slept a lot. And not much else. Allie made a lovely buttery mustardy potato thing for lunch, we're about to have some more curry for dinner and then we're watching the last bit of Christmas Carol that we didn't make it through on Friday.

This week's looking to be a bit busy, but I'll report back on that later. Now I have to go help Allie with dinner.

I didn't do much last weekend. Allie was working on Saturday and I stayed in all day until Allie came home and Bill came over. We got chips and watched The Pink Panther which I'd never actually seen in full. Very funny.

I didn't do much on Sunday either. Church was very sad as I learned that one of the young men from the youth club had been stabbed to death in Harlesden during an argument. The afternoon was okay with my settling down with a beer and watching the Star Trek:TNG episodes The Best of Both Worlds and its follow-up, Family.

I had a doctor's appointment on Monday. She signed me back to work. Then I came home and played some more of Half-Life 2. I've now finished it along with the follow-ups Episode 1 and Episode 2 and can happily say that I had the most fun that I've had in years playing an FPS. Now if Valve would just hurry up and finish Episode 3 so I can know how the story ends...

Later on Monday evening Allie and I watched a film called Starter for 10 which was entertaining enough, but also fairly predictable. I liked it most for getting to see Rebecca Hall again who I very much enjoyed watching in Wide Sargasso Sea a couple years ago and for the 80s soundtrack.

Tuesday was back to work day. It didn't go all that badly. I only saw my boss for a few minutes and then she was off in meetings all day and away for the rest of the week. I mostly spent the day sifting through the few hundred emails that had arrived in my absence and doing loads of filing. We also established my work pattern that morning and I'm going to be in doing short days Monday-Thursday now with Fridays off. After work I went to the pub to congratulate myself and try a few ales from Wetherspoon's autumn real ale festival. I liked the three that I had, but my favourite was probably one called Boss Hogg which was slightly citrusy and far too easy to drink. In the evening Allie and I went to see Michael Jackson's This is It which turned out to be far better than I expected. Jackson could still move and, despite a number of supremely cheesy moments, it looks like the concert was going to be a hell of a spectacle if he'd managed to pull it off.

Last Wednesday I had counselling in the afternoon, Allie and I watched more of the Making of Modern Britain show and we made a cheesy potato layer dish. This last bit was the real highlight of the day for me as we've not made it in years. I once tried to make it myself several years ago and made a disastrously gloopy mistake with the recipe and we've tried it few times since. This time around it worked perfectly and, much to my surprise, worked well with a bit of whole grain mustard to dip it in as well.

Thursday amounted to little apart from making the cheerful discovery that if you register an old copy of the original Half-Life with Steam then you get a bunch of freebies including a couple of expansion packs that I'd vaguely thought about buying. That made my day.

As I said before, Friday is now my day off. I didn't do much that day apart from help my friend from Open House with his computer again (I think we're getting close to fixing the problem), watching some Star Trek and finishing off the Half-Life 2 series. Another thing of note from the day was Allie bringing home a copy of The Sun that she'd picked up after seeing a guy she knows reading it. Tying in with the upcoming Jamie Oliver series, they had a two page spread talking about Hillbilly Hotdogs, which is where we went for my 30th birthday last year. I was expecting it to be really negative - they like to talk about fat Americans over here - but it wasn't quite as bad as I thought it would be from a tabloid like The Sun either.

I had my ankle MRI on Saturday morning. It all went rather quickly and I was off to the pub before I knew it. I made a mistake at the pub though and started my sampling with a half pint of a dangerously drinkable 8% Belgian ale before moving on to a couple others including my personal favourite of the seven I had in this festival, Cains Fine Raisin Beer. I was pretty disappointed not to be able to find Titanic's Another Pint in the Wall as I really like their ales, but... Maybe next time.

After the pub I went home via Willesden Green Tube which was novel as they've recently opened up some Metropolitan line platforms that are usually closed since the Jubilee line (the usual one for that station) has been under constant construction at weekends this year. I've always wanted to get off on those closed platforms and it probably pleased me more than it should to do so. Once I got home I started playing Portal and got about fifteen levels in before my poor fuzzy brain gave up. I'm a bit ashamed of myself now that I looked up the solution of the problem I was stuck on as I know I'd have been able to work out the physics of the angles of I'd been sober, but... Oh, well. It's been a great game (if a little short) with a wonderful sense of humour and one I think my father would really like if he can ever lay his hands on it.

In the evening that night Bill came over for chips and a film. I didn't see the film. I fell asleep. And I slept for fifteen hours. I got up on Sunday, was up for a few hours and went back to sleep for a few hours before repeating the pattern and sleeping through the night. No idea what was going on there, but I've lost Sunday and shot straight back into work today which was... Well... Good. I felt better than I have at work in ages and hope I can keep it up.

I can't get enough of this. Thanks to toomany2choose for the link! :op

Thursday started with a visit to the rheumatologist. I wish I could say she had really good news for me, but she didn't. The short version of the visit is with my predisposition to arthritis and with my joints being hypermobile there's a good chance that the arthritis won't be going away and will be a chronic thing.  I'm less than pleased about that to say the least, but a lot of the inflammation and pain is controlled now so I think I can live with it. The thing that bothers me most about it, truth told, is the idea of having to be on medication for it long term. I don't like needing to put toxic chemicals into my body without the option to stop. But... I'm not willing to live with the pain of not doing so. At the moment I'm still getting pretty bad flare-ups if I'm fighting off an infection and may have a new problem with my right ankle developing, but day to day it's generally manageable and if I have to take drugs to keep it that way then take drugs I must.

Speaking of flare-ups, yesterday was a bad one. I had the swine flu jab on Wednesday and by Thursday afternoon I was feeling its wrath as every joint that has ever had pain in it decided to start hurting all at once. I spent a good part of the afternoon on the couch once I got back and or sitting at the computer playing bit more of Half-Life 2. The game is, by the way, all kinds of awesome. I loved the first one when I played it years ago, so I don't know why on earth I waited for five years after the sequel was released to play it. It's miles better than the first one and is a bit of a comedown every time I have to stop playing.

Last night I got myself a lovely takeaway dinner of roast chicken and chips and settled down to watch the final film in my little film festival, Crash. I appreciated the film for its style and examination of sexual obsession, but I'm not sure it's the kind of film one can enjoy as such.

Today's been okay. I've not done a whole lot apart from watch Star Trek, play my game a bit more and help a friend from Open House (again) try to figure out how to transfer some videos to his computer. I failed horribly on the last count as I don't really know Macs, but at least I learned a few new things.

And... That's about it. I doubt I'm going to Open House tonight as I'm still feeling a bit rough so I'll probably just spend the evening with Allie.

Last Friday I continued my Cronenberg film festival with Scanners. It was a little more straight forward than some of his other films that I've been watching lately, but I still enjoyed it for what it was. I also went to Open House that night and ended up playing around with a guitar and being asked if I would want to get involved with the choir as a guitarist. I'm not really that good, but I think I could handle it and I'm considering it.

Saturday was Hallowe'en. Allie, Bill and I went over to Nat's and were treated to pizza and watched The Ninth Gate. Parts of the film were entertaining and it felt like it could be leading somewhere interesting, but in the end it just kinda faltered and went nowhere. I still really enjoyed the evening though. Or most of it anyway... Getting back was a nightmare that took over two hours between a sleeping drunk guy delaying the tube, our own Tube line being out and buses not showing up. It makes me wonder what I'm giving Transport for London £100/mo for exactly.

Allie and I had a quiet day together on Sunday. She'd had several busy days running and needed a rest and I was all for it as well. We finished watching season three of The Wire which had a big surprise toward the end, got through the last of Emma and watched the first part of an interesting series about The Making of Modern Britain.

On Monday I watched (and didn't even remotely understand) Naked Lunch. I was having a bit of a down day physically, so Allie made a really good dinner of shepherd's pie and veggies and pickled beets and we just kinda rested for the remainder of the evening and started on the second season of The Waltons.

Tuesday was a kinda frustrating day on the games front. I've been waiting for a second hand copy of Half-Life 2 to turn up in the post. Postal strikes have held it up, but it finally turned up that morning. I giddily rushed down stairs to get it and booted up the computer. After I'd installed the game, however, it asked me for an access key. I entered it and was told it was already in use. Apparently the game uses a content management system called Steam that prohibits a game from being used by more than one player or sold on as once it's registered to a user the license can't be transferred. This irritates me for a couple of reasons. First of all, if I want to share a game with a friend surely that's my right. I'm not talking about pirating a copy. I'm talking about just loaning it out. Secondly, if I buy a game and decide I don't like it or finish it and don't want it anymore I should have the right to sell it on. The way games are getting now you're more or less just renting them from the game company and have no control whatsoever over the discs you've just purchased. That seems wrong to me. And, finally, the company I bought it from second hand should have known better than to sell something like that in the first place. I don't play new games that often and had no idea that things were taking this kind of ridiculous direction, but they should know it and warn about it. I know the game was so old as to only be £2, but it's the principle of the thing. Argh... At any rate after a while of trying to find a crack for the game I just broke down in the end and bought a copy of The Orange Box for £17. It's a good price and includes the game I'm after plus a few extras, but the whole experience has left a bad taste in my... um... wallet.

Tuesday evening was much better... After a couple hours of playing with my new toy Allie came home and we had a chilled out evening together. We had leftovers from the night before (yay!) and watched St Elmo's Fire which more or less washed away some of the day's frustration.

And today. Allie's off, but has been out most of the day starting on her Christmas shopping. I've done housework, cleaned, read, played my game a bit more, watched some Star Trek and gone out to get a swine flu shot. No idea about this evening, but tomorrow I'm watching Crash and seeing my rheumatologist. I'm a bit nervous about that last bit as I'm planning to ask about my long-term prognosis, but... I'm sure it'll be okay. And either way there'll be chicken and chips for dinner to calm me down. ;o)

Catching up...

Tuesday of last week I made another trip to Portabello Market to pick up some more Jerusalem artichokes. Little else happened that day apart from Allie and I ordering pizza (a rarity) and watching a copy of The 40-Year-Old Virgin that I picked up cheap a while back after hearing good reviews. I enjoyed both, but I probably enjoyed the pizza more as I've never been much of a fan of sex comedies.

On Wednesday I used the artichokes making another helping of the baked artichoke dish we'd had the week before. I did it myself this time just to see if I could as I usually don't make anything even remotely complicated without Allie's involvement. I'm very pleased to say that the artichokes came out perfectly. That evening Allie and I watched Ratatouille.

Thursday started well with Allie making us a tasty breakfast of pancakes topped with pomegranate, apple and honey. I pottered around the house most of the day and then in the evening we watched a slightly too glossy show about what's in our food, an episode of Scrubs featuring characters from Sesame Street and an episode of Question Time in which was largely about grilling the asshole BNP leader Nick Griffin about his views. The show was controversial and painful to watch, but has resulted in people calling for Griffin to be removed... If only we could just remove the rest of the party too. Freedom of speech is one thing, fascism is another thing entirely.

Friday didn't amount to much apart from getting another visit from my friend from Open House to help him with transferring some stuff to his laptop and starting to watch season three of The Wire with Allie. We're most of the way through the series now and it's still as good as ever.

Allie was working on Saturday so I spent the day largely by myself again. The main thing I did was watch David Cronenberg's eXistenZ which falls firmly into the films-that-mess-with-your-head category and which I thoroughly enjoyed. That evening Allie and I went on on mini-date that involved going for a bit of food at a Turkish place called the Woody Grill and having a nice long chat. I really like doing things like that - just getting out and having a good talk over food - and we don't do it enough these days. I think I may have had a good long phone chat with Heather that night, too, but it could have been another night around then.

Sunday saw Allie doing a lot of cleaning and me completely crashing and spending a good chunk of the day when I wasn't at church in bed asleep. In the evening it was more Wire.

Monday I spent mostly worn out. I finished off replaying Half-Life which I'd been working on off and on for a while.

I spent a good part of this past Tuesday cleaning in preparation for Allie's parents visiting and also made a trip to catch up with my GP. In the evening Allie, Bill and I had chips and went to see Up at our local cinema. We all really liked it even if there were parts of it that were more than a little depressing. The beginning kinda put me in mind of Raymond Briggs' Ethel and Ernest, but with a much happier conclusion. Definitely a film I'll be wanting to pick up on DVD.

Allie's parents came to visit for the day on Wednesday. It was great to have them (it's only the second time they've come down) and we had a big pot of carrot and coriander soup Allie had made for lunch. Then they and Allie went to the Imperial War Museum while I stayed home and went to counselling. In the evening they treated us all to dinner at a local restaurant called Little Star before they left.

And today... Again, not much to it. I watched another Cronenberg film, Videodrome this time, and again really enjoyed it despite it being more than a little bit disturbing. I've now had Allie pick up a couple more for me to watch in the next few days. Thanks again to ogrevi for the recommendations! Allie's been out this evening so I've been knocking around the flat by myself watching Star Trek, napping and eating roast chicken/chips. The excitement's killing me.

EDIT 02/11/2009: We also watched Lantana in there somewhere, possibly on Sunday, and really enjoyed it. It changed a few things around from the play and made it all very straight-forward, but it was still a very thoughtful piece of work.

Another counselling appointment last Wednesday. I didn't have any sparkly moments of self-realisation this time, but the counsellor did suggest that she'd like to refer me for psychotherapy which is interesting in itself. I think I'm going to take her up on it and see what the council is willing to offer. That afternoon Allie and I cooked up a huge pot of sweet & sour red cabbage and some sausage casserole which went perfectly together and which we ate whilst watching Fried Green Tomatoes.

I went to see the POTS specialist on Thursday afternoon. The good news is that (surprise!) he does think I have POTS. The bad news is that the tests show that the beta blockers I'm on are keeping my tachycardia/blood pressure more or less under control. So... What's causing me to be so tired and dizzy and how can that be resolved? To investigate further I'm being sent to another specialist in joint hypermobility which I seem to have and which has also been linked recently to things like CFS and POTS. I'll be seeing the specialist again in a few months time and hopefully by that time the arthritis will be under a little better control and I'll have results from the hypermobility specialist to work with.

Later that afternoon Allie and I made a large pot of broth which we'd been meaning to make for ages and which we ate from for a couple of days. The only other real thing of note from the day was that I finally finished reading The Prisoner of Zenda which I started reading back when we went to Paris and have only now finished. I'm now getting back on to some of my Bible reading (I stalled in Psalms) and I'm working on the very enlightening Lies My Teacher Told Me.

I ran a few errands on Friday and made a trip out to Portobello Road where I had a browse around a bookshop I like and bought some Jerusalem artichokes. I also had a brief visit from a from a friend from Open House to help him transfer some pictures to a thumbdrive he had before heading out to Open House myself.

On Saturday, Bill came over in the late afternoon and he, Allie and I went to the French Market that was being held outside the Willesden Green library centre and bought a selection of sausage, cheeses and other goodies which we retreated back to our house and shared around. We also watched the mildly entertaining Muppets from Space. We'd been planning to see Up at the cinema that evening, but we messed up the date that it opens locally so will be seeing it later on.

And Sunday... We made use of the Jerusalem artichokes using a recipe I found a while back and had been wanting to try out. I'm pleased to say that it worked perfectly and I would wholly recommend trying it out. We had big chunks of cheese and bread and a salad as a side to the artichokes and washed it down with a bit of red wine whilst watching Emma. Oh, and there were fireworks. The Hindu festival Diwali was this weekend and somewhere in the near distance people were setting off a large display of fireworks. Conveniently they were doing it directly in line with our front window so we could sit and enjoy it from our couch. Not a bad way to end the weekend overall... :o)

I won a copy of the first game last year and played a big chunk of it with Da when I visited home. I don't know that I'll get around to this one, but the trailer's entertaining...

Also, I'll be looking forward to seeing more of the game below it, too. There's been something of a revival of the adventure game genre recently and Lost Horizon looks like it could be a welcome entry.

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Allie and I went to the theatre to see Speaking in Tongues on Saturday afternoon. It was bizarre and more than a little bleak, but worth seeing. Now I need to find the film Lantana that's based on it.

After the play we came home and had chips for dinner with Nat and Bill. I tried our new chippy's curry sauce (very good!) and Allie tried out their gravy (also very good!). I was particularly surprised by the latter as gravy on chips is more of a northern thing and the only time we've found it in London before it was terrible, runny, instant gravy. We'll be having it again. :o)

We also watched Dylan Moran's Monster DVD (again) that night and Nat gave me a lovely birthday present in the form of a copy of the Who Killed Amanda Palmer? book signed by Neil Gaiman.

Allie and I watched a Nigel Slater cooking show on Sunday afternoon and were inspired to have chicken for dinner. The dish, which I made myself minus the parsley/preserved lemon/olive part, came out really well and we had it whilst watching the first couple parts of the BBC's new production of Emma. Now might be a good time to mention that I also made my first bread & butter pudding late last week, too. I was really pleased with how it came out and have decided to try to make it when I visit home in December.

I went for a flu shot on Monday afternoon and did little else that day. In the evening I made a pizza, salad and corn on the cob for Allie and made sure she had a nice restful evening as she'd had a worrying day wrangling 120 schoolchildren. Once again, I was really pleased with the pizza. It was just a frozen base piled high with mushroom, tomato, cheese and oregano, but it came out really well and I enjoyed drinking my can of Mountain Dew: Voltage with it. We also watched a Young Indiana Jones Chronicles film and watched an episode of HBO's fascinating In Treatment. We'll probably watch another episode of the latter tonight, though I think I'd prefer to wait until it turns up on HBO OnDemand so I can see it from the beginning and at will.

Today I've been paying for the flu shot. I expected mild flu symptoms, but silly me didn't anticipate it making my arthritis flare up. As a result I've spent a good part of the day on the couch napping. I had a GP appointment this morning, too, which went well enough. She's increased my citalopram as we discussed and also wrote me off work for a further four weeks until they can kick in, I can visit my rheumatologist and I get to see the POTS specialist. I'm not thrilled by being off longer, but I'm not in a shape that I'd like to go back to work in either. So be it.

In other news...

I was surprised to learn last week that there's a new Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy novel called And Another Thing... out, this time written by Eoin Colfer in place of the late Douglas Adams. I was more than a bit dubious about this when I first saw the poster, but a number of the reviews have been quite good and I enjoyed the first couple books in Colfer's Artemis Fowl series so I think I'll definitely be giving it a shot. For those interested it's been abridged and is being read in serial format for the BBC's Book at Bedtime. I listened to the first episode, but don't think I want to go any further as it will spoil all of the surprises when I actually get around to reading it myself.

When I was little cartoons were my raison d'etre. I'd take anything you had. Smurfs. Thundercats. Mr T and the All-Stars. He-Man. If it was made up of lines and bright colours I would watch it.

It used to be a sort of ritual for me on Saturday mornings to get up, pour a bowl of cereal and plop down in my y-fronts with bleary eyes to take in a few hours of cartoons. I looked forward to those hours all week. To put it another way... I've was never much of a morning person even when I was young and had energy. But getting up early to watch Dennis the Menace after the programmers at WVAH were cruel enough to run it before 8am was the reason for me getting my very fist alarm clock. It was really that serious.

The other main time that I got to watch cartoons was on weekday afternoons. After school I would almost always to my grandparents' house and sit in front of the TV watching Scooby-Doo on WVAH and, afterward, Mr Cartoon on WSAZ and, in later years, these were replaced by shows like Ducktales and Animaniacs.

Even when I was young I had an awareness that childhood would end one day. On the one hand I wanted to be bigger and learn how to drive and have more independence. And, on the other hand, I didn't want to give up one of my favourite activities. It never occurred to me that cartoons would simply lose their appeal and I couldn't understand why a cousin who was about five years older than me said one day that he was too old to be watching. I was both astonished and saddened by this and hoped that I wouldn't become the same way.

I'm glad to say that I never did and still love watching cartoons almost as much as I ever have. My tastes have changed, of course, but I've had the good fortune of having animation grow up with me as well. They still make plenty of mindless stuff, but there's also plenty of material for those of us who are just a bit older and want more wit and less moralising.

Despite still wanting to tune in, I sometimes miss the ritual in a way. I also feel a bit sorry for today's children who more or less have their cartoons on tap through DVDs and channels like the Cartoon Network. I can't imagine it's the same without that sense that there will be a golden few hours when you just have to be in front of the television or that'll be it for the day. To today's kids it's just another distraction in a media saturated world and I find that sad. Also, as much as I hate to say it, I do kinda miss some of the moralising that we used to get from our cartoons. I don't know that they do that much anymore, but maybe I'm wrong. If they do, it's certainly not in the 'knowing is half the battle' sense that I learned so much from.

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Just a few asides...

I recently came across this Where are they now? piece about Jule Huffmann (aka Mr Cartoon). It's good to hear that he's still doing well. I still wish I'd managed to get on his show properly and not just in some bleachers at a fair.

I've found this to be an interesting resource for info on old shows. I recently managed to find the original Snorks theme there after looking for it for many years. I was beginning to think I had simply imagined it after only ever being able to find a later version.

And, finally, the video below made me laugh. The scary thing is, I hear there's talk of a live action Smurfs film. I fear that it might end up something like the one in this clip.

Toy Movies

This week's been fairly dull for the most part. Tuesday was nothing much. Wednesday was watching Gattaca in the afternoon, cleaning the hamster cage, making a big pot of corned beef hash, watching Some Kind of Wonderful and developing a bit of a crush on the young Mary Stuart Masterson. The only time I've really left the house at all since Monday was on Thursday afternoon when I went down to the PCC to see The Godfather.

Mostly I've not left the house because I've been sore, tired and generally a bit grumpy. I've heard from my rheumatology nurse this afternoon though and he said that I can switch back to my old anti-inflammatories that I dropped a couple weeks ago and I'm optimistic that this will help. He also said I'm fine to go get a flu shot so I may be doing that next week as well as they're running a special clinic for them at my doctor's office.

Apart from this... Meh. I've been bored sitting around. I've watched more Star Trek TNG than is probably healthy (working on the third season now!) and various other bits of stuff on TV. I've been trying to convince myself to read or listen to some audio dramas, too, just to break things up, but I never seem to be able to convince myself to do it. Maybe next week...

Yesterday was a pretty good day. It started out with Allie and I making a trip to the Back Show. The show was a mix of various companies (some a bit quacky, others not) all selling services or items related to back care. I saw a number of thing of interest there, but didn't actually buy anything. I did get a fifteen minute free massage though which made the trip completely worth it. I worry that going at all is a sign of getting old despite the number of young people there though. As Allie put it, we should have been spending Sunday afternoon having a nice long lunch somewhere instead of hanging around looking for things to help hold our bodies together.

After we got home we made cheesy crumpets and got out some roasted squash seeds we made earlier before sitting down to watch Jamie's America. We've seen most of the episodes of this and it's been an entertaining if slightly embarrassing series about Jamie Oliver exploring American cuisine. He seems to think he's this great social commentator, but he's just coming across as sheltered and clueless. I've read recently that he's looking at doing another show in the States soon featuring Huntington, WV, as he thinks it's one of the unhealthiest places in the country. He's made great strides in getting schools to improve their nutrition here and a little less success in efforts to get communities cooking from scratch again. The tri-state's not exactly a healthy eating hotspot and it might do some good to pay attention to him, but I have a feeling that if he tries this he may be run out of town on a rail.

I went to the evening service at church after this and it ended up being a really good service. I don't usually go in the evenings, but I felt like it yesterday as I'd missed in the morning and have missed a couple other weeks recently as well. Oddly, I seem to have made a new friend at this service in the form of a small girl who thought my arm would be a nice thing to hug for about twenty minutes after I smiled at her. I don't usually like small children much, but that was a bit... heartwarming. Everybody say 'Awwww!'.

Allie and I made fried rice and fishcakes after I got back from church. The fishcakes were shop bought. The fried rice was not. And I was very pleased with the rice. It was one of my favourite dishes that Nanny makes, but we usually get it from the local Chinese if we have it at all. It was really good to have it home made again and Allie did a great job with it.

I also washed down the rice with one of the cans of Mountain Dew that Allie picked up for me. This one being the strawberry flavoured 'Supernova' variety. Now might be a good time to include a website I came across recently. I used to collect soda cans when I was young and this website has photos of loads of old cans, some of which I had. Some of these cans, like New Coke, really take me back to my childhood.

Whilst we ate dinner we started watching The Third Man, but didn't quite get to the end before going to bed. I expect we'll be finishing it this evening.

Today's been okay, I guess. I went to the doctor early on to top up my anti-depressants (and found out I'd accidentally double booked), ran a few errands did little else until evening when I met Allie at the British Library to go to their We Were Young and at War event. The event was really interesting and involved several readings by different actors from the recently published book of the same name. The book takes a look at WWII through the journals of teenagers from different sides of the war including Britain, Germany, France, Russia and Japan. I'd like to try to read it at some point, but who knows when that will be...

Right. Gotta go make dinner now.

It's Banned Books Week again. I wish I had the patience of the person who wrote this letter last year. Hooray for free speech! And thanks to Neil Gaiman for pointing me to the letter via his blog.

Went out to help Allie with a couple computer problems at work the Thursday before last. She'd worked it out by the time I got there, but it was still nice to go for lunch with her and pick out a few films to watch in my time off. And watching films and TV is, honestly, most of what I've been doing.

The next day I watched Nosferatu which I'd picked up at the library the day before and, apart from Open House, I can't recall doing much else.

Saturday, my birthday, I've already detailed here.

The next day, Sunday, Allie went out to the theatre to see the stage adaptation of Prick Up Your Ears whilst I stayed home and watched the gloriously violent The Wild Bunch. Many thanks to ogrevi for recommending it after I watched Once Upon a Time in the West.

Monday of last week I went over to Angel for a physio session and stopped to have lunch with Allie again before taking a trip up to Wood Green. The CeX up there claimed to have a copy of Half Life 2 in stock, but couldn't find it when I got there so it was a bit of a wasted journey. In the evening I watched Vampyr: The Strange Adventure of Allan Gray and Werner Herzog's 1979 adaptation of Woyzeck, both of which I enjoyed.

I also got a gift in the post from my dear sister that day in the form of the wonderful a t-shirt that I'm modelling below. Thanks, Heather! :o)



On Tuesday Allie and I watched Woody Allen's Melinda & Melinda which was an entertaining experiment in storytelling. I liked it, but I'm not much of a fan of Will Ferrell. It was interesting hearing all of the lines that were clearly meant for Woody Allen coming out of his mouth though.

Allie and I watched Pretty in Pink on Wednesday. I'd not seen it in years so it was great to see it again, and it was Allie's first time so she's now found a new film to love.

I had a rheumatology appointment early last Thursday morning. It was just an appointment with the nurse, but I was told that my liver function is elevated so it's time to play around with my drugs again to make sure it doesn't get worse. So down came the steroid levels, away went my diclofenac (replaced with naproxin) and my methotrexate is holding steady for the time being until we see what my latest blood tests show. They want to raise the methotrexate again, but it may not be safe to do at the moment. I just wish we could figure this thing out and that my body would stop being so damned stubborn. On the way home from the hospital I ran a couple of errands in Kilburn and stopped in a second hand shop in Willesden Green where I picked up a stack of films (5 for £7.50) to cheer myself up.

Friday was another quiet day. I spent part of it replaying part of Jedi Knight II which I started replaying for the first time in years back in February and then promptly dropped again. And, of course, there was Open House in the evening. I didn't stay for the whole time because playing switcheroo with my meds had left me pretty sore and wiped out.

Allie and I started making a big pot of squash soup Saturday afternoon using a nine pound squash that one of her colleagues gave us. I fell asleep watching Star Trek whilst it was cooking though and she left me to sleep whilst she finished it off. Then in the evening Bill came over and we all had soup and watched The Italian Job which I've been meaning to watch for years but have only now got around to. I can see why the film is so beloved. :o)

Sunday was quiet again. I had a meal at church in honour of a youth pastor who's leaving and ended up quite full. I do like it when they do those meals. Our congregation is largely African and Afro-Caribbean so when they cook I get to try lots of things I wouldn't ordinarily eat. Sometimes it's not always to my taste, but often it's great. In the evening Allie and I somewhat shamefully watched Three Men and a Baby and had round two with the squash soup and this time we bulked it out with orzo and corn. I liked it the first way, but loved it the second and had another great big bowl for lunch this afternoon.

And today... I visited my GP again today. I told her that I'm feeling much calmer about going back to work now, but I've still been having trouble with insomnia so I now have some more sleeping pills to aid me this week. I'm still feeling very nervous about the whole thing as I've not been there in a month and haven't seen my boss in even longer, but I think I'll be okay. Now I'm going to go help Allie finish off dinner (our squash, potato and chickpea stew - need to use up the monster squash!) and then we're watching Some Kind of Wonderful before bed. *fingers crossed for tomorrow*

EDIT 29/09/09: Didn't watch Some Kind of Wonderful as stew took longer than expected to... well... stew. Ended up watching some Eddie Izzard instead.

Yesterday it was my birthday
I hung one more year on the line
I should be depressed
My life’s a mess
But I’m having a good time

Paul Simon - 'Have a Good Time'


Yesterday was the best day I've had in ages. It started by having a nice lie in and getting out of bed to open presents around 10am. I got lots of fun stuff, but perhaps the biggest was all seven seasons of Star Trek: TNG which various family members chipped in on. Allie let me have the first one early a month or so ago, but I got the other six yesterday and I've already watched a few episodes of season two. I also got a few CDs and other DVDs, some vintage music poster notecards, a purple leather travelcard holder, peanut brittle, some imported limited edition Mountain Dew, a Paddington mug and a few other things and more surprises on the way.

After I opened presents Allie cooked a big breakfast with bacon (proper crispy bacon!), egg, tomatoes, mushrooms, pancakes with syrup, corn bread, orange juice and coffee and we listened to the Juno soundtrack that I'd just been given.

In the (gorgeously sunny) afternoon we went out to see Othello with Lenny Henry which was very good even if Conrad Nelson's Iago was a bit difficult to understand at times. After the play we went to the pub for a while and, as it was Talk Like a Pirate Day, I had a pint of Wooden Hand brewery's 'Black Pearl' whilst I ate my first of the recently re-issued Wispa Gold.

In the evening Allie and I came home, watched Secretary and ate food leftover from breakfast plus a small raspberry sponge birthday cake. And, finally, I spoke to my family on the phone for a while and Allie and I went after some Chinese takeaway which I ate with some Mountain Dew in front of some mindless TV.

All in all the day was pretty much everything I could have hoped it would be which, given how things have been lately, is something I feel the universe owed to me. Many, many thanks to Allie for making it all go so well and also to my friends and family who have sent presents and/or birthday wishes.

Now let's see if I can make being 31 better than being 30 was. It's already started miles better as I've not spent the day with a screaming hangover! ;o)

It's an odd time at the moment. I'll be writing about the main events here, I guess, but I've been spending a lot of time at home doing a whole lot of nothing, as I'm on sick leave and feeling quite tired and fed up.

Thursday's doctor's appointment didn't go too badly. I more or less just explained how sleepy I've been over the past couple weeks and he agreed to change my medication over from mirtazapine to citalopram. He thought that it should start to work relatively quickly as I've already had mirtazapine in my system for a couple weeks, but... We'll see. So far all I've noticed since changing over is an increase in anxiety, insomnia, muscle tension, headaches and chattering teeth.

Anyway... That day, I made myself a lunch of toasted bagels topped with a tuna/bean salad and melted cheese. I don't ordinarily branch out far beyond ham sandwiches for lunch so it was nice to do something a little different. I should try that more often. Allie was surprised by me, to say the least. :o)

In the evening Allie and I went over to Bill's and had dinner with him and one of his other friends at the Stingray Cafe to celebrate Bill's birthday. He treated (very kind!) and I had their house specialty, a salmon and avocado pizza. Mmmm... Afterward we popped up to the Pineapple for a chat. I had an interesting pint of something called Daleside Autumn Leaves which, at 3.4%, was a lovely mild ale and just right for the weather.

Friday was the autumn start of Open House and there was a good turnout which made it fun. I'm often a little worn out and ready for a rest by the time the break comes in summer, but it's always nice to get things started back up again and see all the old familiar faces.

Allie was working on Saturday and for me the day didn't amount to much apart from watching endless episodes of Star Trek. I'm spending a lot of time on the sofa lately. In the evening when Bill came over and we had chips for dinner and watched the ever funny Big Lebowski. Sunday was me staying in bed for most of the day listening to radio plays for most of the day and more television in the evening with Allie and I finishing off The Waltons.

Allie and I watched October Sky on Monday night. I'd seen it a few years ago and had been meaning to revisit it and now seemed as good a time as any. I can't say it helped much with the feelings of failure I've had lately, but it was good to watch something inspirational. I also watched a good chunk of a Sapphire & Steel boxed set that Bill loaned me a while back that day. I've enjoyed what I've seen of it so far, but it's certainly not very happy stuff. :o)

I went to the doctor on Tuesday. I talked to her about the side-effects I've been having from the citalopram and about how things are going in general with my anxiety. As a result she's signed me off work for a couple more weeks until the new pills have had a little more time and so I can continue to rest. I'd hoped to have a had a little more result by now, but I know these things take time and that I need to be patient.

And today... Today I went in to my GP surgery for a counselling session. I've not had one of those since I was a teenager and never thought much of them then, but I'm getting desperate and when my GP suggested counselling I jumped at it. I think I really need somebody impartial that will just listen and let me vent a bit and I don't really have any friends here that I can sit down and do that with. The counsellor seemed very good and brought up a few interesting points in the time that we were together. Chief among these was that I've never really learned how to deal with anger and frustration. I try to ignore it and push it down and hope that it'll go away, but it never really does. And the result - combined with being tired and all of the other stuff going on - is that it makes me very moody. For the most part I've just lived with it, but with all the trouble this year it's just made things worse. So I suppose I need to find some sort of outlet. Hmm... I still have another five sessions with her and I'm kinda looking forward to it now. I think I've needed to talk a few things out for a very long time.

This evening, we went to the pub. Allie's trying to get me out of the house more, so we met Bill and Nat for a bit of food to celebrate my upcoming birthday. Bill gave me books - three Charles Stross novels - and an old Indiana Jones comic and I got to try a Titanic brewery ale (Triple Screw) that I hadn't had before. We had a good evening, though Allie and Bill are trying to compile a list of the worst films (in their opinions) that they've ever inflicted on each other. It seems that the matter at stake is a viewing of Dirty Dancing...

Last night I spent a lot of time lying in bed poring over my photo albums and stopping to think about various pictures. Several times I came across photos of Nanny and was finding it a bit weird to think that when I was little she was younger than my mother is now as I don't consider that old at all. It makes me happy to know that there's another generation of grandkids getting to grow up with her around as I think she's just about the best grandmother a person could ask for. Not that I'm a little bit biased or anything.

The thing that bothered me most in the albums was the photo below.



I stared at it for a really long time trying to figure out why it was bothering me. Then it hit me. This photo was taken in April 1980. My father was 28 years old. That's a couple years younger than I am now. He had one kid with another on the way and was busy building a house with his own hands. I'm not saying that we want children or even, at the moment, a house. Far from it. But... I suppose I'm feeling a bit inadequate. I'm 31 years old and I have no idea what I want to do with my life and as a result haven't been doing anything significant for a number of years. And now between my work and my health it feel like I'm approaching some sort of crossroad and I have no idea which way to go. I've been trying to figure this out for a while now and answers haven't exactly been forthcoming. Allie and I have discussed things a few times and had a good long talk about it this afternoon, but it's still just as confusing as ever. I suppose for the time being I just have to concentrate on getting better and pray that I can see the right path forward when it's in front of me. I've never been very good at that kind of thing before, but there's a first time for everything I suppose...

As prescribed, things have been relatively restful over the past few days.

I didn't do much on Thursday or Friday until Friday evening when I met Allie, Nat and Bill for dinner at a Wetherspoon's in Angel before going to the King's Head to see a production of The Duchess of Malfi. This production of the show was set in the 1980s and seemed to work fairly well in that setting. Well enough to enjoy it anyway.

The weekend was fairly quiet. Up until the evening, the only thing of note on Saturday was a pretty big building fire a few blocks away that Allie and I took a walk to investigate. Fortunately it seems like the builing was vacant so it's likely nobody was hurt. In the evening Bill and Nat came over and we played Trivial Pursuit (Bill won) and Bill tried to teach us a few variations of poker. Allie kept winning without developing much grasp of the rules. :o)

On Sunday I spent the afternoon in bed reading some McCartney and Dylan interviews from Mojo that I'd been meaning to get around to and listening to a few CDs (including Kula Shaker and Ray Charles) that I'd not listened to in a while. In the evening Allie and I made a lovely cottage pie using minced pork (sty pie?) with sides of peas and pickled beets/cabbage that was perfect for last weekend's autumnal weather before settling down to watch Uncle Buck.

Allie brought home Che, Pt II - Guerilla for me on Monday night and I spent the evening watching it whilst Allie worked. I enjoyed the film. Or I enjoyed the film as much as you can enjoy a very well acted and photographed film about someone's downfall and execution anyway.

Yesterday afternoon I went to Allie's library to see an exhibition on suffragettes that Allie wrote/organised (very impressed!) before going for chips and a nice chat in a nearby park.

Allie's been off work but today's not amounted to much apart from watching some Trek and Waltons. We have a spaghetti squash baking in the oven at the moment though so I'm optimistic that dinner's going to be nice. We're having it with pesto-crusted salmon and bulgur wheat.

Tomorrow... I have a doctor's appointment first thing in the morning. I'm dreading it a little since I have no idea what I'm going to say apart from that I'm tired. But we'll see. Then, tomorrow evening, as it's his birthday, Bill's treating us and a few of his other friends to dinner at a pizza place that we all like. I'm really looking forward to that. :op

Mum just posted this article from the Herald-Dispatch on Facebook and I thought I'd share it. The little girl in the photo is my first cousin once removed, the lady sitting behind her and just to the right is my aunt and the woman in the centre wearing black slacks is my lovely grandmother, Doris Mae (aka Nanny). :o)

Just wanted to share these...

The first is a short series of short stories based on Tom Waits songs that have been read out on Radio 4 this week. Specifically, 'Come On Up To The House', 'Muriel' and 'Step Right Up'. I think they're only up for a couple more days though so if you'd like to have a listen you should do it soon.

The second if a video for Waits' 'What's He Building in There' that I never knew existed until it was mentioned in Mojo this month. Enjoy!

Last week started with Allie getting back on Sunday evening. She brought with her a boxed set of Waltons DVDs borrowed from her parents that we've been working our way through over the past couple weeks. The show's a bit cloying and perhaps not entirely based in reality, but I've really been enjoying the slow pace and simplicity of it.

I was at the hospital for POTS testing on Monday morning and Wednesday morning last week. The testing was a bit unpleasant, but far more thorough than the ones the cardiology department did on me last spring. I don't know the results of the tests yet, but I'm hoping that between them and seeing the specialist in mid-October we'll soon be able to get to the bottom of why my POTS is playing up again.

Thursday of last week was my last day in the membership department at work. I was a little sad to be done with it, but it also was a bit of a relief to know that I can slow down and just concentrate on the one job now. To celebrate, Allie and I had a lovely picnic of sushi in Leicester Square and then went over to the PCC to watch Moon which we both enjoyed. It was an interesting blend of 2001, Blade Runner and a few original ideas and was just what I needed that night. That was also the first time we'd tried the new upstairs screen at the PCC. I quite liked it, but I think Allie found the seats a little less than comfortable as she gets sore easily.

Last Saturday started with a trip to the doctor. I've been having trouble eating and sleeping lately due to stress and work and just my general situation. Allie made me go to the doctor and he started me on anti-depressants (specifically mirtazapine) which is something I've been trying to avoid, but... I think it's time. Unfortunately, I've been feeling very sleepy ever since starting them, but I'm told that will wear off.

After the doctor Allie went on to work so I spent the day at home alone doing very little apart from watching Cloverfield which was just as bad as I thought it would be. In the evening, Allie came home and Bill came over for a chat. We ended up watching Futurama:_Into the Wild Green Yonder which I thought was a decidedly mixed bag. It still had plenty of good jokes though.

Allie and I went to Greenwich on Sunday to have a picnic in the park with Katie and Nat to celebrate Katie's birthday before heading to the pub for a short while and then home. It was a really nice afternoon despite feeling sleepy and despite the wind and cool weather. The food Katie brought along was lovely, particularly the flapjacks.

This past Monday was a bank holiday. Allie went out to visit with Elara who was in town and I stayed home to rest. I also called home that night and let everyone know that Allie and I will be in for Christmas. Heather's known this for a little while now, but I was trying to save telling everyone else until Thanksgiving so I could surprise them. I thought better of it after hearing how some of the rooms at Da's house have been rearranged and now imagine it'll probably best to let them have time to get things in order before we arrive.

Tuesday was back to work. Tuesday night, which was also Nanny's birthday, I spent in a stressed out mess. Allie and I had a long talk and as a result, I took yesterday off and we went to the doctor together again. I told the doctor how I've been feeling and about starting the mirtazpine and... well... lots of things. And so she's written me off work with depression for two weeks until the drugs kick in. In the meantime I'm meant to be resting and getting my head together a bit and we'll review how I'm feeling in a couple weeks. I'm not particularly happy with this solution, but at the moment I can't see what else to do.

So...

Not that I'm complaining.

My Political Views
I am a left moderate social libertarian
Left: 7.04, Libertarian: 2.86

Political Spectrum Quiz

It's been a relatively quiet few days since Allie's been gone. I've kept myself busy in some ways and not nearly as busy as I would have liked to have been in others; specifically on the catching up of the email.

On Tuesday after I saw Allie off on the train I went down to the PCC to watch Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I've probably seen the film a few dozen times, but it was great to watch it with an audience that was so into it. They were laughing at all the jokes and gave a big cheer when John Hughes' name came up in the opening credits. I wish I'd been around for Planes, Trains & Automobiles earlier in the evening, too.

I did a whole lot of nothing on Wednesday apart from watch the Star Trek: TNG box set that Allie gave me just before she left and browse the web. I've been enjoying the hell out of that box set so far. The first season certainly wasn't the best of the series, but I've not seen quite a few of the episodes and the ones I have seen I haven't seen in years. I've also been entertained by reading some of Wil Wheaton's reviews of the season as I've been watching. Finally, I'd like to share the video below which I just found on YouTube. Sombody's put some time and effort in there. :o)



On Thursday I popped out to the doctor's office to pick up a letter for occupation health (which they've completely screwed up!), dropped off some stuff at a local charity shop and took a trip to the Docklands just to get out of the house. I probably walked far too much that afternoon, but it was fun. I had a good wander around Greenwich, pretended to drive the DLR, sat down in a pub for a pint and a read, looked around the market, walked through a tunnel under the river and said hello to some of the animals in the city farm near Mudchute. The only really disappointing thing about the trip was learning that Goddard's Pie House is no longer around.



After getting a little rest I went to a fellowship meeting at the house of a friend from church where we had dinner and ended up talking about nothing very important for most of the evening. It wasn't quite what I was expecting, but it did help to alleviate some of the loneliness that's set in now that Allie's been gone for more than a few days.

Yesterday was a bit of a nothing day again. Today's been okay, but slow. I guess the most exciting things I've done have been going to a library book sale, picking up piri-piri chicken and chips for lunch and settling down with a bottle of ale to watch some more Trek. This evening I think it'll cook some pork loin and potatoes, have some more beer and watch Excalibur which I've been meaning to get around to for ages and also work on some blog posts I've been planning for a while.

And tomorrow... Allie's back. I honestly can't wait.