Ultimate Force, is, well, an uncomplicated show (but, my gosh, look at the casting, so many went onto other noteworthy projects like Heroes, Battlestar Galactica and...Robin Hood? Okay, bad example) but fun, in a boys with their toys kinda way. It's a lot like the version of the Professionals I grew up with, which was edited down to just the fast cars and guns. Anyway, Foxy was playing an SAS recruit on a make of break hide and seek exercise (they called it something really butch, but basically it was just a game of hide and seek) with some embittered SAS wannabe offing the trainees, because he was a spolisport like that. That's pretty much the plot. Bonus points for nekkid Foxy during the interrogation scene (You call that an interrogation? You call that hard? Try a dressing down from my boss and you'd be weeping, you nancies).
Miss Marple was fun, so long as one remembers these are the lurid and very silly post modern versions, not the gentle sleep inducing doddles of yore. So we had Master Timmy Dalton chewing the scenery with gusto, as usual these days, James Murray being pretty but little else, as always, a cast of notable actresses including Horsey Hodge and Mel Smith, rounding, ahem, out the cast. Then there was Foxy, rolling about delightfully unkempt, ever present fag dangling from his lip, bow tie deliciously askew. He's very young in this, or at least gives the impression of being so. He's very cute, in a completely clueless kinda way (after all, Marple discounts him immediately as a suspect on account of his lack of the grey stuff). But cute, though.
Lewis. The last Lewis, well, the last one Seven are playing, in their own peculiar order, anyway. Bonus points for recycling that old chesnut, the perilously clad lone female staggering disoriented across the landscape (as I said before, a motif oft used by British tv writers). The show didn't step into any new territory either as we had the angry father, the used and abused little person who saw all, the amoral upper classes and businessmen (Daily Mail readers to a man) and a nice bit of Northerner bashing for good measure. The whole thing was very 80s in feel, and the long forgotten but ongoing arc of Lewis' missus got an airing, which lead to one of the few (alas cute scenes where Hathaway, despairing at an obsession that can go nowhere good, nevertheless gets down on his hands and knees to help. Wot a mate.
There was some Hathaway angst about winding up the angry Dad, but that sort of all worked out so it didn't really go anywhere (pity, because Hathaway has a habit of pushing suspects into chargeable action, almost more a Regan trait than Morse, and one of these days he should not get away with it). Okay, so I just want to see Hathaway drown in ex-priest angst - can you blame me?
So I enjoyed my Fox fest. But that was the only highlight.
It all started so well. The weekend, that is. Managed to leave ridiculously on time (Frau Bossy Boots was away) and it was actually a lone sunny patch in amongst the rain squalls, so I darted (okay, hobbled) through the yellowing park to the library to go see the Bligh exhibition along with the other stuff. Ran into the Peanut Gallery who was chasing up something or other and a grand time was had by all. Loved the ABBA exhibit, btw.
Saturday was dark and rainy and I learnt the hard way that I really couldn't get online and do the laundry at the same time (drier friendlies only) so I gave up and sorted recycling while dubbing stuff off the IQ and looking after the laundry and occassionally taking buckets to high maintenance plants around the garden (though in their defence, those lili pili trees do not let the rain through at all).
This is when it all started to go wronmg. Every second file on the IQ was corrupt and unplayable - grrr. Could not burn dvds on my PC (first it insisted I only had Nero 4 when I've never had anything but 7 installed, then it decided I had no dvd drive at all - hello, it's right there, you bastard, etc etc).
Then the roof started leaking heavily and, oh yeah, some rodents found one of Mum's secret stashes in the granny flat that we'd missed and made a nest in her jumpers, so the whole place had to be turned over, scrubbed, thrown out, trapped and baited. Peanut Gallery was in a state (and his cd player died) and my hormones made me worse than useless (aside from the lack of stiff upper lippiness I was dropping things all over the place, including lunch).
The only bright spot was the afternoon tea where we decided to dispose of treats we had about the place thoughtfully, lest they attract sugar-hyped rodents into the main domicile.
So that was it, it was basically of the suck. And I'm so not in the mood for this office today. It's such a creepy dictatorship. I mean, they won't let me access the BBC or The Times (or the Guardian). I hates them.
PM update: We're all sleepy and stupid. I swear it's the lack of decent air. I never used to be so off my game, not even when the buses used to fill the room with good old CO back in the old, lovely, place. Sadly this means I lack both alertness and patience to deal with people who can't get the date right (six attempts and counting).
At least I've bought a box of cupcakes (I know, but it was an emergency) and a blankie for miserable wee Peanut Gallery (and a 2gb flash drive for myself, heh heh heh....).
Also got bored and started testing the latest email form by seeing what would and wouldn't get through the iron curtain here. The lamest words get caught, yet others made it through. Typical IT, had no idea what a clitoris is, because that was ok. Am amused/bemused/baffled. Even the Herald weather page is firewalled. Dammit, I'd like to know what sort of weather I might expect on my long, long, long commute home. You bastards.
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2274384,00.html
The superheroes
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/7357515.stm
In pictures: Rome marks 'anniversary'
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/18/2221489.htm
10,000yo spruce is world's oldest tree
http://bellanut.livejournal.com/248769.html
20 Favourite Sam Winchesterisms
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/7354174.stm
Kaiser's north gigs divide fans
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/arts/design/20kenn.html?_r=1&th=&oref=slogin&emc=th&pagewanted=all
You Bet Your Tintype, Buckaroo
http://www.janeausten.co.uk/magazine/page.ihtml?pid=440&step=4
Georgian Ices
http://www.kickery.com/2008/03/regency-dancers.html
Real Regency Dancers Don't Turn Single: Ten Tips for Judging Authenticity
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,23559114-5013016,00.html
Naked cockatoo mimics Mick Jagger
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/relationships/article3736523.ece
Everything I know about women . . .
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/tv/2008/04/take_10_title_sequences.html
Take 10: TV title sequences
http://www.smh.com.au/multimedia/2008/national/100-years-of-herald-photography/main.html
Pics
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,23563932-5013016,00.html
Man guilty of staring at woman
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/why-flowers-have-lost-their-scent-812168.html
Why flowers have lost their scent
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/film-and-tv/features/indiana-jones-and-the-heap-of-old-junk-811846.html
Indiana Jones and the Heap of Old Junk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_pFTAY7MF8
I'm Fucking Ben Affleck
http://lil-chanteuse.livejournal.com/198088.html
The Superiority of English Fictional Forearms: A Pictorial Essay
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/movies/359295_tf117.html
New 'X-Files' movie gets a title
http://www.latimes.com/news/custom/scimedemail/la-sci-flu17apr17,0,7232268.story
Researchers chart how new flu strains travel
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/04/17/bapreraph117.xml
Pre-Raphaelites from Puerto Rico
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-spurlock17apr17,0,3995752.story?track=ntothtml
Morgan Spurlock in hot pursuit in 'Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden?'
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/arts/design/17phot.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
An Image Is a Mystery for Photo Detectives
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/04/21/ndrivers121.xml&DCMP=EMC-new_21042008
'Men drivers behave like cavemen'
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/jeremy_clarkson/
Jezza
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/21/workandcareers
I'm not a morning person, so getting up early is like exploring a new world - of rain, cold and misery
http://www.smh.com.au/news/news/oops-8-business-class-fare-blunder/2008/04/18/1208025430018.html
Airline seeks to cancel 'accidental' sale fare
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/mobile-users-the-new-smokers/2008/04/18/1208025428476.html
Are mobile users the new smokers?
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/fashion/article3765587.ece
Comfy shoes are cool again
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article3766004.ece
Support your local record shop on Britain’s first National Record Store Day
http://timesonline.typepad.com/faith/2008/04/post.html
No MacPope! Scotland holds out forever against imaginary Papal sons
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/gallery/2008/apr/16/heritage?picture=333577013
The herbarium at Kew Gardens
http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?MenuID=27&ContentID=68345
Spanish mothers in debt after nude fundraiser
http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?MenuID=182&ContentID=68311
New exhibition charts Bond man
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,23553333-5006003,00.html
Soapies distract Brazil from sex and babies, fertility rate downArticle
