...streeeetch...

Not having slept particularly well on Sunday or Monday nights, I was craem-crackered come yesterday evening. I have to admit that I feel an awful lot better for having seven or so hours of sleep, having turned in just minutes before midnight.

Maybe I do it again tonight and build up a store of rest. Avoiding late night coffee for once may have been a fine idea, too. Normally I am not conscious of being handicapped by caffeine, but limiting myself to one coffee and a cup of tea yesterday night seems to have paid dividends.

Tiredness was probably a reason for getting wound up at imagined offence yesterday.

...streeeetch...

Not having slept particularly well on Sunday or Monday nights, I was craem-crackered come yesterday evening. I have to admit that I feel an awful lot better for having seven or so hours of sleep, having turned in just minutes before midnight.

Maybe I do it again tonight and build up a store of rest. Avoiding late night coffee for once may have been a fine idea, too. Normally I am not conscious of being handicapped by caffeine, but limiting myself to one coffee and a cup of tea yesterday night seems to have paid dividends.

Tiredness was probably a reason for getting wound up at imagined offence yesterday.

Excavate!!

trav28 found this story and I just had to include it here.

The world leaders in journalism, The Sun have found that a Dalek head has been discovered in a polluted pond near Beaulieu in Hampshire.



Apparently it bobbed to the surface while volunteers were clearing rubbish out of the pool. I wonder if anyone wet themselves as it broke surface?

Excavate!!

trav28 found this story and I just had to include it here.

The world leaders in journalism, The Sun have found that a Dalek head has been discovered in a polluted pond near Beaulieu in Hampshire.



Apparently it bobbed to the surface while volunteers were clearing rubbish out of the pool. I wonder if anyone wet themselves as it broke surface?

Young Victoria

I am trying to make fewer posts during the working day, since I am hoping that by showing a little additional diligence I might be able to make my temporary promotion permanent. Even if that doesn’t work, I can at least fall back on righteous indignation at being passed over again at some point. In the meantime, it never hurts to earn a little goodwill from time to time.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that I ban myself from LJing at lunchtime and I don’t see why it should, especially where there is fun to be had.

A few days ago, Furtle and I were discussing in a rather haphazard fashion, whether or not there were any forthcoming movies we wanted to shell out golden splonders on at the cinema. On the basis of encouraging rumours atop a twenty-year wait, I of course bagsied Watchmen. Furtle expressed a desire to see The Young Victoria the movie that purports to focus on the neglected early part of Victoria’s reign.

Julian Fellowes, the Oscar-winning scriptwriter of Gosford Park was hired to write the movie and he is quoted as saying “If I have made people realise that Victoria was not just a dumpy little woman in black with a handkerchief on her head then I’ve done something worthwhile.” By all accounts he’s succeeded. Prior to this film who knew that Prince Albert was an action hero in the Schwarzenegger mode?

Fellowes has ‘improved’ history. It wasn’t quite good enough, so he beefed it up. In the emotional climax of the movie, Victoria and Albert are in an open-topped coach when a gun man attacks. Seeing the danger, Prince Albert dives in front of his bride and takes the assassin’s bullet meant for her. This is the moment she realises the depths of his feeling for her and with true German British stoicism fights down the impulse to do a Jackie Kennedy and clamber out of the back of the carriage covered in her husband’s gore.

The scene is based upon an incident on Constitution Hill on 10 June 1840 when a chap called Edward Oxford tried to shoot the couple. His gun jammed or misfired and there were no casualties.

Of course, the home life of Queen Victoria wasn’t especially exciting so maybe history really does need improving. If so, they haven’t gone far enough:

Covered in her husband’s blood, the Monarch rises from the carriage and with a shout of “Amuse this, Mother F*ck*r” she pulls the cross from the top of the royal orb to reveal it to be an hand grenade. Hurling this at the would-be assassin, she rips her dress to allow her the freedom to run and commando-rolls onto the grass. (Crinolines are designed to absorb this kind of action). In a crouching run she makes for the trees in the park, whilst stripping down the sceptre and reassembling it as a repeating rifle.

“You don’t take down Saxe-Coburg and Gotha that easily, you anarchist bastard!”, a final roll, back to her feet and one precisely placed kill shot directly between the eyes.

Cut to tearful scene in hospital. Victoria paces up and down as Albert undergoes surgery. The news comes in from Baker Street that Sherlock Holmes has identified the assassin as a member of the Russian royal family. The camera zooms in on Florence Nightingale, bloodied rag in her hand: “As God is my witness, I shall take the troops to the Crimea and make the Czar pay for this!”

Next week: Vicky and Al: It’s Payback Time. Thrill as the young royals forge a global empire; a saga set against the sweeping plains of Africa, the soaring mountains of Asia and the tea plantations of Ceylon. Don’t miss the thundering climax as accompanied only by the Light Tank Brigade, Al storms the Russian guns at Sevastopol!

Young Victoria

I am trying to make fewer posts during the working day, since I am hoping that by showing a little additional diligence I might be able to make my temporary promotion permanent. Even if that doesn’t work, I can at least fall back on righteous indignation at being passed over again at some point. In the meantime, it never hurts to earn a little goodwill from time to time.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that I ban myself from LJing at lunchtime and I don’t see why it should, especially where there is fun to be had.

A few days ago, Furtle and I were discussing in a rather haphazard fashion, whether or not there were any forthcoming movies we wanted to shell out golden splonders on at the cinema. On the basis of encouraging rumours atop a twenty-year wait, I of course bagsied Watchmen. Furtle expressed a desire to see The Young Victoria the movie that purports to focus on the neglected early part of Victoria’s reign.

Julian Fellowes, the Oscar-winning scriptwriter of Gosford Park was hired to write the movie and he is quoted as saying “If I have made people realise that Victoria was not just a dumpy little woman in black with a handkerchief on her head then I’ve done something worthwhile.” By all accounts he’s succeeded. Prior to this film who knew that Prince Albert was an action hero in the Schwarzenegger mode?

Fellowes has ‘improved’ history. It wasn’t quite good enough, so he beefed it up. In the emotional climax of the movie, Victoria and Albert are in an open-topped coach when a gun man attacks. Seeing the danger, Prince Albert dives in front of his bride and takes the assassin’s bullet meant for her. This is the moment she realises the depths of his feeling for her and with true German British stoicism fights down the impulse to do a Jackie Kennedy and clamber out of the back of the carriage covered in her husband’s gore.

The scene is based upon an incident on Constitution Hill on 10 June 1840 when a chap called Edward Oxford tried to shoot the couple. His gun jammed or misfired and there were no casualties.

Of course, the home life of Queen Victoria wasn’t especially exciting so maybe history really does need improving. If so, they haven’t gone far enough:

Covered in her husband’s blood, the Monarch rises from the carriage and with a shout of “Amuse this, Mother F*ck*r” she pulls the cross from the top of the royal orb to reveal it to be an hand grenade. Hurling this at the would-be assassin, she rips her dress to allow her the freedom to run and commando-rolls onto the grass. (Crinolines are designed to absorb this kind of action). In a crouching run she makes for the trees in the park, whilst stripping down the sceptre and reassembling it as a repeating rifle.

“You don’t take down Saxe-Coburg and Gotha that easily, you anarchist bastard!”, a final roll, back to her feet and one precisely placed kill shot directly between the eyes.

Cut to tearful scene in hospital. Victoria paces up and down as Albert undergoes surgery. The news comes in from Baker Street that Sherlock Holmes has identified the assassin as a member of the Russian royal family. The camera zooms in on Florence Nightingale, bloodied rag in her hand: “As God is my witness, I shall take the troops to the Crimea and make the Czar pay for this!”

Next week: Vicky and Al: It’s Payback Time. Thrill as the young royals forge a global empire; a saga set against the sweeping plains of Africa, the soaring mountains of Asia and the tea plantations of Ceylon. Don’t miss the thundering climax as accompanied only by the Light Tank Brigade, Al storms the Russian guns at Sevastopol!