Alien Spouse

Watching the Academy Awards at Home.

It's Oscar night.

We have pizza. We have beer.  We have a big TV.

Sorted.

Alien Edith.

The box that Edith has been using as a climbing frame slash play house is looking very shabby now after several months of being jumped on.  Today Edith finally burst through the base, it was very birth of an alien.

Then she turned round and started gnawing the hole she'd just forced her way through.

Because she is a nutter.

Coraline (2009) - Freaking Finally!

Since Friday I have watched my "Coraline" DVD (Thanks again for that Mum!  Love you!) three times, twice in 2D and once in exciting 3D.  I'm not being sarcastic there, the 3D really rocked.

I actually really want to watch it for a fourth time, with the director's commentary playing, but I don't think Doc would want to do that.  Particularly as I'd want to double check if the commentary is different on the 2D and the 3D versions, and if they are?  I want to watch both.

This may be one of the best film adaptations of a book ever.  And as "Coraline" is one of my favourite books, this makes me very happy.  Also I want all of the merchandising even more than I did before - which was already a lot.  At the very least, when I replace my wellies (which sprung a leak today just as I was splashing in a huge puddle of melted snow - Fabulous timing there wellies) I shall be looking for a bright yellow pair.  Just like Coraline.  OMG! Coraline could be my Halloween '10 costume!  Oooh!

Happy New Year's Eve!

It's snowing in Boston, and so our only trip out today was to the cinema to see "Young Victoria" (Emily Blunt was very good as the Queen, and Mark Strong is apparently set on cornering the market for Victorian/Edwardian villains this week) as we are staying at our friend Bob's house, we have made plans to stay in this evening.  We have bought hummus, pita bread, cake and wine, ordered Thai food and sourced a deck of cards.

Texas Hold 'Em and a fine selection of carbs shall ring in 2010.

Oh, what a world! What a world!

Today has not been good, not for any reasons that I couldn't have seen coming; but I was quite happy with my blinkers on pretending not to notice. Suffice to say this whole Mono thing is just totally messing all sorts of things up, and there is not a damned thing I can do about it.  

La lalalalalalala LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!

So my day consisted of going to work, where I sat at my desk and cried and cried and cried until Doc swooped in to give me a big hug and take me home.  Then I climbed into bed, drank a huge cup of tea, spoke to my Mum (Love you Mum!) and settled down to sleep with both cats purring away on me.

When I woke up Doc put the DVD of "The Wizard of Oz" on, which isn't honestly my favourite Judy Garland film, but sometimes it's really soothing to see things go from black-and-white to Technicolor, with some over the top musical numbers.

Whip It! (2009)

We just got back from seeing "Whip It!", which is SO much fun!  It's Drew Barrymore's directorial debut and it's about Ellen Page's Bliss Cavendar discovering a roller derby league in Austin, Texas.

You have got to give it to Drew, she can pick a project and the casting was spot on for every single role.  On the track Drew herself is a charming maniac, Juliette Lewis was particularly inspired as the bitchy "Iron Maven", and Andrew Wilson (who will always be Beef Supreme in the Alien Spouse house) is just the most patient coach ever. Off the track Cavendar's parents are played by Marcia Gay Harden and Daniel Stern, do I even need to say how great they are?  I thought not.  Plus Alia Shawkat as Bliss' best friend Pasha is so sweetly rebellious and fun, she's so great at running good girl interference to help her friend do what she wants.

I loved Ellen Page in this, and her journey from a reluctant beauty pageant queen to a rough tough roller derby jammer via a pair of Barbie rollerboots is really enjoyable to watch and oddly touching.

Mainly it was a well constructed film about a group of strong women having a great time on their own terms and covered in great tattoos, fishnets and attitude.  What is not to love?

Oh, and the sound track was rocking!

Yeah, I kind of liked it.  I s'pose, it was alright.  (Squeee!)

A Very Quiet Halloween.

Halloween was really quiet around here.  Doc left the front door open (The screen door kept the cats in and the bugs out), and set up a bowl of sweets on our wooden footstool with the small pumpkin.  He put his wig on whilst he was in the front room working on lectures and kept telling me to keep an ear out for trick-or-treaters.

But nobody came.  sigh.

The Doc was visibly disappointed.  I don't think there are that many families with kids of the right age around here.  Actually that's probably not a bad thing anyway, because Doc had taken the massive bowl of sweets into one of his lessons and the gannets had eaten everything except the tootsie rolls and the candy corn; so if there had been trick-or-treaters we wouldn't have had much to offer them. Instead we turned off all the lights to watch a couple of the cheesy movies I bought in Walgreen's.  I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed them both, but Doc felt they were lacking in actual horror.  Which is probably why they suited me down to the ground.

The spookiest thing that happened was that neither of us realised that today was daylight savings, so some of our clocks changed automatically and some didn't and that is always somewhat disconcerting. Well that, and two different birds have flown against the living room window today.  What is that about?  Birds flying into stuff is never a good omen, but atleast both of them survived the collision and the cats are having a lovely time waiting for one to actually make it through the glass into the room.

House on Haunted Hill (1959)

So far this week I've watched the re-make and the sequel to the remake, but I saved the original "House On Haunted Hill" (1959) for Halloween itself.  You've got to spend time with Vincent Price on October 31st.

House Work and Horror Movies.

Doc C gets home from Denver this evening! I have been tidying up the house so it all looks nice when he gets back.  I'm putting off the vacuuming until sun has moved round, because right now it's streaming in through the living room windows creating optimum sun-bathing conditions for Nancy and she looks so very sweet. If it were Edith rolling around in sun beams I would just get the hoover out right now, because Edith has worked against my whole plan, by peeing on the bathroom floor just after I'd cleaned it.  This is not as helpful as you might imagine.

When I'm tidying up I like to have a film on TV in the background, to keep me entertained whilst I potter about.  This afternoon the schedulers in their infinite wisdom gave me "The Cell".  Who on earth decided that 1 in the afternoon was the perfect time to screen that?  I wouldn't say it's a particularly good film, but the visuals in the dream world are amazing and Vincent D'Onofrio can be so frightening when he puts his mind to it!  And he seems so nice in "Law and Order: Criminal Intent"... To be fair a nice sunny afternoon is my preferred time to watch a scary film, the TV screen gets washed out a bit so you can't really see what horrible things the bad guy is doing and that then makes it SO much easier for me not to get over-involved and freaked out. Why do I even bother watching scary films then?  I really don't know, but for some reason I seem to actually like being scared in small semi-controllable doses.  Usually whilst I'm watching the film, or reading the story, or riding the ghost train, I'm jumpy but laughing at it all.  It's later when my brain starts analysing the scary stuff that I get myself freaked out. 

Which is all a long winded way of saying that I may possibly have, maybe, watched too many gory murder mysteries and spooky Halloween stuff whilst Doc has been away. And OK, yes, I've been sleeping with the light on in the hall whilst Doc's been away, and I am really looking forward to him getting back.

WWZD?

I was feeling a bit sorry for myself frankly.  Yesterday we cancelled my flight to Denver (Doc has a conference there, so he's still going), decided I have really got to pull out of the MA program for the rest of this semester and we were even discussing not going to the Ghost Train this year.  So that's very frustrating and upsetting, I got myself so worked up about it that I didn't sleep at all yesterday, which is not good.

Today I pretty much slept through the whole day, and when I woke up Doc C put "Murderball" on.  He's screening it for a class next week, and he just needs to check the disc is playing properly.

"Murderball" is a fantastic documentary about paraplegics playing full-contact rugby in these unbelivably intimidating wheel chairs, and the American Quad-Rugby team preparing for the 2004 Paralympics.  It's an amazing documentary.  It's also the perfect anti-dote to feeling sorry for yourself when you are having a disppointing few weeks, because you know Mark Zupan would think you were being totally pathetic (And he wouldn't phrase it quite that politely either). 

My new motto for the remainder of this crappy virus is "What Would Zupan Do?"

Science Fiction - Double Feature, Dr X Will Build a Creature.

We went to feed friends' cats whilst they are away, and stopped at the chemist (American Translation: Drug Store) to get some vitamin A and Zinc, because I read they can be helpful with Mono.

They have a great range of Halloween stuff there, so we browsed that as well.  I had noticed last time they had some cheesy looking CDs and DVDs on offer at $3-for-2, but I hadn't really looked at them because how good could they be?  Um, AMAZING!

I am now the proud owner of the following classic B movie horror double-bills;

• Monsters and Madmen - Featuring "The Brain That Wouldn't Die" (1962 and the title that really drew my attention!) and "Beast of Yucca Falls" (1961 film in which Tor Johnson is accidentally mutated by an atomic test)
• Threshold of Terror - Featuring "Bluebeard" (1944 film starring John Carradine) and "House on Haunted Hill" (The 1959 film, directed by William Castle and starring Vincent Price)
• Chills - Featuring "Dead Men Walk" (Made in 1943 and featuring the classic evil identical twin storyline) and "The Monster Maker" (1944 film which I'm given to understand co-stars a man in a gorilla suit)
• Tales of the Undead - Featuring "Atom Age Vampire" (No clue! Apparently it's a dubbed Italian film from the 60s) and "Revolt of the Zombies" (No idea! Zombies from 1936 have got to be worth a look though)

So that is 8 fabulously tacky creature features for $6, and all of the DVDs also have a cartoon too.

Jens Of The World Unite!

You know how there are trends in baby names, and there are noticeable fashions and trends?   I am personally aware of this because I'm called Jen and so are thousands of other women.  This has lead, at different points in my Jen career, to the only two real nicknames I've ever been given - "The Bond Blonde" and "Frank".

This is clearly because Jennifer, and variations of Jennifer, has been a very popular girls name for decades. Look, I have facts to back this up:

Popularity. (Data relate to England and Wales) Although no longer in the top ten girls' names, Jennifer is one of only seven names to have been in the top hundred every year between 1944 and 1994, the others being Sarah, Elizabeth, Catherine, Heather, Helen and Maria. The ten year rankings are:

	1994	1984	1974	1964	1954	1944
Jennifer	Rank: 42 (1 in 214)	Rank: 11 (1 in 67)	Rank: 34 (1 in 147)	Rank: 45 (1 in 162)	Rank: 23 (1 in 109)	Rank: 18 (1 in 66)
Source: First Names. The Definitive Guide to Popular Names in England and Wales 1944-1994, and in the Regions 1994 by Emma Merry with support from Kay Callaghan and Chris Cotton. HMSO, London. 1995

Fascinating, right?

This has a particularly satisfying knock-on effect, which is that listed on the International Rollergirl's Master Roster there are some fantastic Roller Derby sobriquets for Jens, Jennies, Jennifers and Jennys.  It's hard to chose a favourite, but I really like Jenniferocious, because it's the only one that uses Jennifer in it's entirety, but I also really like Jen X, because it's punchy.

And now we've segued over to Roller Derby, yes, I am SO looking forward to Drew Barrymore's directorial debut "Whip It".  I cannot wait!

Picnic Post Mortem

The picnic went well, but it's surprising how exhausting it is standing around watching 400 people eating fried chicken and wondering why no-one seems to like the hot-dogs.  I did eat a fairly nice black bean burger, some crisps and a brownie, with the sweetest lemonade I have ever drunk.  Ever.

When organising a meal for 400 odd people the thing is that you have to order the food a few weeks in advance and confirm final numbers at least three days in advance.  This is why I sent out a reminder e-mail the Monday before, because getting a prompt response to my invitation was key. So you can imagine that when,  in the words of Cher Horowitz,  "...people came that, like, did not R.S.V.P. So I was, like, totally buggin'."

I shouldn't have worried, because for every student that turned up unannounced with their family, there was another that hadn't put in an appearance.  So it was all fine really, we had enough food, and the only things we ran out of were rice crispie treats and iced tea.  It could have been worse.

Wig/Hat A. or Wig/Hat B.?

I'm torn between two crochet wig/hat ideas.

Clearly there is going to be some bouffant action either way.

poll by twiigs.com

Unfortunately Named Film.

Note to Film Makers: When naming a film, I would avoid having it be too close to a popular turn of phrase with a negative connotation.

I'm looking at you in particular Brandon Camp, writer/director of "Love Happens".  Because, frankly, "Love Happens" is a terrible title.  Does Jennifer Anniston's film career really need to have the inevitably titled reviews this will generate?  Poor woman, it won't make any difference if she's any good in the film or not.

Can Team Aniston, if there still is one, please get her an assitant who will at least read the titles, if not the scripts themselves?

The Cat Piano

I found an animation on-line today, it's a film noir set in a city of cat musicians and it's amazingly well done.  I particularly love the narration by Nick Cave, and that certainly helps it maintain a creepy tension.

The Cat Piano from PRA on Vimeo.

Happy Monday.

Long weekends.  Aren't they just lovely?  And somehow a long weekend's Monday doesn't have that quality of dread to it, so it really feels like a totally different day. 

Do you think Monday has an inferiority complex?  I mean it must be tough at parties when everyone wants to meet Friday, or asks Monday to introduce them to Saturday.  Even Wednesday and Thursday are more popular, although to be frank I've always had issues with Wednesday myself.  Double Latin, double lacrosse, double music, double physics?  Time table from hell when I was 14.  I imagine, again at parties, that Monday and Tuesday tend to sit on the stairs and get completely off their faces on vodka, whilst everyone else is in the living room dancing.

Anyway...

This Monday was very pleasant.  I cleaned the bathroom (although, don't tell Doc C, but Edith already done something dreadful in there.  sigh), and tidied my side of the bedroom, before going to see "(500) Days of Summer" with Doc.  Romantic comedies are always a gamble with the Doc, but fortunately this was more of an anti-romantic comedy, so it went over very well.  I adore Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, so it was an excellent date movie all round.  To give you an idea of how good it was there is a dance sequence in it, and the Doc actually enjoyed it.  Unprecedented. Then we went to get ice cream, yum!

All in all a pretty splendid Monday really.

Feline Film Critic.

Nancy is so adorable, and she is utterly besotted with Doc C at the moment.  I can't blame her, the cat has good taste clearly, but I am slightly jealous of the attention she lavishes on him.

Fortunately I am the main source of one of her favourite toys: Cinema Tickets!

I don't know what it is about them, but all you have to do is wave one at her and she becomes all teeth and claws.  This looks pretty impressive, but actually she's always careful to be gentle when she takes the ticket from me, and reserves her ire for the offending bit of paper.  She wouldn't pose for my photo, but I'll try and get her at her most fearsome.  It's so cute!

This particular ticket was for "The Hangover" and it's actually stood up quite well to a sustained Nancy attack, it is still possible to read most of it.  You should see what she did to the ticket for "Night at the Museum 2: Battle of the Smithsonian".  I have no idea what she had against that particular film, unless she really just can't bear Ben Stiller I suppose.

Afternoon Horror Festival.

One of the things that I will never quite understand about American television scheduling is why it is completely alright to show both "Saw" and "Saw II" at 3 in the afternoon, and retain all of the gore and nasty people doing horrible things to each other, but bleep all the swearing out.  It's totally bizarre!  I'd be more concerned that an impressionable young mind would accidentally stumble across the gallons of blood, than the perfectly justified bad language.

Well, that and I'd worry that they would think the "Saw" franchise was scary, rather than sort of like watching unpleasant paint dry to not quite the colour you were planning.

John Hughes.

I put together a playlist on 8tracks from sound tracks to some of his classic eighties teen movies.

And yes that is a picture of Anthony Michael Hall with a pen up his nose.  I think John Hughes would have liked that actually.

Asheville Sunday.

Yeah, well I don't think I'll be going to the gym today.

For one thing I can't work out where the hell it is, this hotel is in three buildings and the signage is terrible, and I just don't fancy wandering around aimlessly in my gym gear in a strange place.  Call me picky.

Besides, we have got a lot to fit in today.  We are going to the eleven o'clock showing of H.P., so that we get out by 2 and have plenty of time in Asheville.  I need to buy craft supplies, sports gear and maybe some new clothes that actually, you know, fit.

Last night we went out for curry, I had this amazing lentil crepe filled with spiced potato and crab and Doc had a lamb korma.  Then we caught a few minutes of a free open air screening of "Tarzan" with Johnny Weismuller, before going to see "Moon". I've been studiously avoiding reading anything about it to avoid spoilers, so no IMDB link for you, suffice to say it is good.  Sam Rockwell on the Moon for 90 odd minutes is a good evening's entertainment, if you like paranoia driven sci-fi thrillers.  Which I do.

The Coraline.

I'm beginning to think that "Coraline" is destined to take the place of "The Women" (1939), in that I desperately want to see it, feel fairly confident I will love it and find myself repeatedly prevented from seeing it. "Coraline" was being screened tonight at the University, for free, and we were planning on going.  Then I fell asleep and and woke up an hour too late.

At this point I think the only solution is to buy the DVD sight unseen, and lock myself in the house until the closing credits.  It's either that, or I wait for an ill conceived and poorly cast remake before I finally get to see the original on TCM.

Agatha: Novel (1978), Film (1979).

When I was 9 I suddenly developed a taste for Agatha Christie novels.  I'm fairly certain the first one I owned was "At Bertram's Hotel", but I don't remember if I got that before or after seeing the BBC adaptations of the Miss Marple stories.  I could still hum you that theme tune, and for me Joan Hickson is the definitive Marple.

I must have been about 12 when the film "Agatha" (1979) was shown on TV, but I was thrilled to be allowed to stay up and watch it with my parents because I was fascinated by Agatha Christie's 11 day disappearance in 1926, which she never really gave a proper explanation for.  Dad teased me that there was bound to be a sex scene in the film because it starred Vanessa Redgrave and Dustin Hoffman, and, as I was a very pure minded 12 year old, the mere suggestion was completely outrageous to me!  I don't actually remember much about the film now, except for the main plot twist, and it being the main reason I developed a distaste for Timothy Dalton that I've never quite got over.  He's probably very nice in real life, but as Archie Christie he was a cad and a bounder so I could never buy into him being a romantic lead after this.

Last week I spotted the book that the film was based on.  It was published two years after Agatha's death, so she didn't have a chance to respond to the solution posed by Kathleen Tynan.  I'm only on chapter three, so she's only just vanished mysteriously and there isn't any indication of where she might have gone.

The art work on this is particularly 70's film tie-in, isn't it?  Hideous, yet intriguing.  Those are great portraits of Redgrave and Hoffman, but it's a weirdly composed image and I have no idea why they are peering off in different directions through wet glass.  I'm pretty sure that doesn't end up being a plot point, but I could be wrong there.

Parcel Post.

After the gym today I went to my office, and Doc went to the post office.  He came back to my office with two parcels.

One was from Threadless, and it was our newest additions to our T-shirt collection.  Hoorah!

Even better we had a parcel from my Mum, and it was very exciting!  Doc gleefully ran off home with his beloved "Star Trek" DVD box set, so he could watch "The Empire Strikes Back" on our big telly.  My share of the parcel was a new pair of really nice linen trousers and some proper M&S undies; the best part about it for me though was that the clothes were size smaller than all of the stuff I brought over with me!  Yay!  I couldn't wait to get home this evening, so I could try things on to really confirm I'm now back to a UK size 14.  And I am!

I also have a packet of Iced Gems, which Mum tells me are not as good as they used to be.  I will probably hoard those for a few days, so I can give them my undivided attention at the weekend.

Night at the Cinema

This evening was the last chance to catch "Night at the Museum: Battle if the Smithsonian", which I wanted to see and had discovered Laura and Jasmine also wanted to see. Doc really didn't so, instead he went with Randy to see "Year Zero" which I had no interest in seeing. My top relationship tip is that it is usually best not to force someone you care about to see a film they really don't want to, so this arrangement was perfect! I'm also fairly confident I got to see the better film, or the very least the film with the best dramatic use of an Einstein bobble head doll.

Actually it was sort of research because Doc is writing a paper on historical inaccuracy in fiction films, mainly because I have been known to get really quite annoyed at that. So the films tonight were interesting case studies in some ways, again I'm pretty sure mine had more hard facts in it. If one discounts the waxworks coming to life aspect clearly.

Mystery Seedling

Doc C has been carefully tending to his seedlings, and he's very proud of them.

This was the only one of the Rosemary seeds he planted that made it to the seedling stage, having been the lone survivor of the Great Edith-Has-A-Nap-On-Top-Of-The-Seedlings catastrophe of 2009.

However, Doc suspects further foul play because this particular seedling doesn't appear to actually be Rosemary; despite the seed having come from this packet clearly marked "Rosemary".

It is our Mystery Seedling, which is pleasantly entertaining, until you remember that is exactly how both "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and "Little Shop of Horrors" started.  If I start acting out of character, or get eaten by a Mean Green Mother from Outer Space, you'll know what to look out for yourselves.

Big Edith and Little Edie.

For dinner I made Aubergine Parmesan (American Translation: Eggplant Parmesan) and played with our very own Big Edith (Nancy still won't leave my suitcase unless she wants food), whilst we watched the documentary "Grey Gardens" (1975).  I decided to watch it again, because it's been years since I saw it, and I wanted to refresh my memory before I see the fictional version with Jessica Lange and Drew Barrymore.

It's hard to make sense of a lot of what is happening, because it often seems that the film makers turned the camera on and tried to simply record the Bouvier Beale stream of consciousness.  Something I'm not sure even the women themselves can follow at some points.

Doc C hadn't heard of this film before we went to P-Town and saw Little Edie portrayed by the fabulous Thirsty Burlington.  She was singing a number which, I assume, must have been taken from the musical version of "Grey Gardens".

Now we've watched it, Doc can't really articulate why, but he has said several times now that he found this documentary terrifying.

Another Vegas Movie.

This evening we went to dinner straight from work with Jasmine, Laura and Randy; then we met David to see "The Hangover" which was funny.  Don't go in expecting Ibsen, or substance of any sort though, just regress to being 9 and watching "Airplane" for the first time.  It's perfect for switching your brain off after a day in the office.

I did think that Heather Graham, who hasn't visibly aged a day in the past 15 years, had a surprisingly small role and I felt like they could have done more with her.  I like Heather Graham!  Why is Katherine Heigl getting the lead in rom-coms, and not Heather?  What is that about? 

Anyway...

So that's where I've been this evening.  How are you?

The Force is Strong with Threadless.

This T is on my way to me now!  Or will be in the morning, anyway!

Not only is this my very first "Star Wars" T-shirt, but I love how happy Princess Leia looks, and the long suffering expression on Chewbacca's face under those rollers.

Saturday Night at the Movies.

So it turned out Doc had never seen Tim Burton's "Sleepy Hollow" (1999). I know.   

Netflix shipped it to us earlier this week, and we'll probably watch either that or "No Country for Old Men" (2007) tonight.  Depending on whether Doc once to be amusingly grossed out, or seriously depressed before we go to bed.

Smoggy Old London.

In the comments of my last fascinating post on the weather, Miss Joules (Hello!) mentioned that when she tried telling her family in America that "...England gets only a bit more rain than they do, only they get it over three weeks instead of three days, but their preconceived notions are stronger than my factual information."

OMG!  I know exactly what you mean!

Have you ever tried telling an American that London is not foggy?  They will look at you as though you are pathological liar.  They have seen Sherlock Holmes movies, thank you very much, which means they are well aware that London is foggy, so why would I say any different?  Well, because London really does not get "Pea Soupers" any more.  The thing is that actually what London used to get is smog, and  there is much less coal smoke in London, which means that you don't get the same impenetrable fogs in contemporary London. Sorry, I know that is slightly less romantic but it's also a lot better for your health, so there is that.

When I started writing this post I was intending to include a finale in the form of a hilarious anecdote about my lovely Mother-in-Law, but it has been vetoed by Doc C.  This leaves me without a big finish to this post, but trust me it was comedy gold.

"Ooh, and Here's A Treasure! You Want's That, Don't You, Dearie?"

We went to walk dogs and fuss cats today, it was very fun as always and once again we fell in love with a dog that we cannot have because we're renting a house. sigh.  Oh well, one day...

On the way back home we dropped off our recycling.  Boring.

Except!  They have a small table covered with stuff people have brought to swap, so it's essentially a free jumble sale.  It was pretty much as you would expect, and I could started quite a collection of steamy romance novels should I have been so inclined.  Just as I was about to walk away, I noticed a small binder that had a really ugly cover design, you know Beethoven wrote some quite beautiful music, but a pin-up he is not, nor did he ever claim to be as far as I'm aware.  Anyway, Beethoven was there to reinforce the small binders claim to be the A to Z of music and that is quite an assertion for something that's only slightly bigger than your hand, so I had a look at it.  Inside wasn't anything to do with music at all, in fact it was a transcript of the novelisation of the film "Labyrinth".

Squeee!  That is brilliant!  I particularly love the title done in that classic 80's style of large letters made out of typeface.

So naturally, I took the transcript out of the ugly binder (hey, someone else might want it.  I am just not that person.), and brought it home with me.  I shall treasure it, not least because an actual copy of the novelisation goes for $40 on Amazon.  I haven't started reading it yet, but rest assured I'll report back if there is anything really special in it.

My Predictions.

We saw "Terminator Salvation" this evening, and "Star Trek" in Boston last week.  I'm sure you'll agree that that places me in an excellent position to anticipate the near future of mankind.  

What I've learned is that Anton Yelchin will be around almost as much as Former Aussie Soap Stars, and that there will be a lot of explosions.  I've also ascertained, from close observation of the women of the future, that there will be huge strides in both lip gloss, false eyelash and hair care technology, although eyeshadow seems to be regressing somewhat.

You heard it here first.

Sleep! Slleeeeeeeppppp!!!!!!

You know yesterday when I said all I intended to do was sleep this weekend?  I was really not joking.

True, I stayed up well past my bedtime watching the film version of "Aeon Flux", which I did not see through to the bitter end; oh, and I'd forgotten to switch my alarm off so I was woken up at 6, which meant the cats were fed and happy.

However after that I went back to bed and slept until 10:30, then I got up and had some porridge.  Then I went back to bed and slept until 2:45, then I got up and ate the freshly cooked crumpets Doc was making me to lure me downstairs.

I've made it to the sofa now, but I'm still in my pyjamas.  I might go and have a shower in a bit, I'll see how I feel.

Friday Night In.

It's Friday night, I am at home with a cat at my feet, a glass of wine to my side, we've just watched the season finale of "Dollhouse" and a film on the telly. 

• The cat is Nancy, and she's curled up on the ottoman.
• The wine is a nice Cab Sauv.
• "Dollhouse" is excellent.  I require another season please Fox. It was particularly good to see Alan Tudyk being a total psycho.
• The film is "RocknRolla" from Netflix, and it's fun; but can Guy Ritchie make anything other than gangster flicks?  Still Tom Wilkinson! Mark Strong! Idris Elba! Gerard Butler! Thandie Newton! Jeremy Piven! Jimi Mistry! Gemma Arterton! Ludacris! Matt King! The scenary is just there to be chewed frankly.  Love it.

Tomorrow?  I sleep.  That is all.

Amost Rorschach.

I finished the hat this evening, and put the black ink blots on to the mask.  I still need to add buttons, a belt and a scarf. 

Of course then I'll probably want to re-do the mask, which will be tricky now that I've deployed hot glue to attach the hat.

Proto-Rorschach.

I made Rorschach's trench coat this evening (whilst Meryl Streep was suffering because of her beauty during the Holocaust.  Wow, "Sophie's Choice" is unrelenting isn't it?).  I'm really pleased with how the coat came out, although I forgot to put on the buttons before sewing it on.  Whoops!

The tricky bits are coming up next.  I'm still not sure how I'm going to do the hat, but I just winged the coat together, so I'm sure I'll work something out.  The face needs to be symmetrical, so I'll need to be very methodical and careful.  Not as much fun as just charging full steam ahead, but it is the most important detail if I want anyone to actually recognise Rorschach once he's finished.  I mean right now I could tell you it was supposed to be Claude Rains in "The Invisible Man" and that's wouldn't seem unlikely.

Like The Darkside, It's More Efficient. sigh.

This afternoon I went to see my Doctor about this cough I've had since February.  That sounds really dramatic, doesn't it?  I'm fine most of the time, but I wake myself up in the middle of the night because I'm coughing, then I have to go and take some cough syrup which wakes up the cats, then they start zooming all over the place and wake up Doc C.  It's a domino effect.

Anyway, my Doctor looked at my throat and listened to my chest, but she didn't find anything so she sent me for a chest x-ray.  On the NHS I'd have been sent back home to wait for a letter giving me an appointment, which would be in a couple of weeks time and at a completely inconvenient time,  Then I'd have had to change that appointment, which would have delayed it for three more weeks and by the I finally had the x-rays taken I would have been totally fine.
Today I left my Doctor's office with a referral letter, drove five minutes down the road and walked into the outpatients imaging lab.  I waited about twenty minutes, put on an extremely flattering hospital gown, had my x-rays taken, changed out of the gown and was on my way home ten minutes later.

When we got in we made a cup of tea and watched "Sophie's Choice".

Like you do on a Monday.

"X-Men Origins: Wolverine" (2009)

How much did I enjoy "X-Men Origins: Wolverine"?  A lot!  It was really fun!

We went on opening night, the cinema was almost full, and people would not stop talking; usually that would drive me crazy.  I was so caught up with the film that I could tune out the chattering for the most part.  There was one guy who had clearly seen the pirate copy and kept saying things like "I'd forgotten that bit" or "It's so much better seeing it like this!", but what can you do?  I just kept eating my smuggled in honey popcorn, and thinking "Wow!  Hugh Jackman / Leiv Schreiber / Danny Huston / Ryan Reynolds / Will.I.Am is really good in this role!"  Of course I knew going in I would love the Jackman and Schreiber dynamic, but I was surprised by Will.I.Am I must admit.  That's mainly because I never liked the Black Eyed Peas, and I wasn't expecting him to really charasmatic as John Wraith.

By the way, after some experimentation with the popcorn I've come to realise that you just have to do things properly, you really must melt a spoonful of honey with a spoonful of butter and then pour it over the freshly popped corn.  It's just delicious!

Dance Amigurumi Dance!

This is the cigar box I bought on Saturday, doesn't it make a perfect theatre for Amigurumi?  I think that's what it will probably end up being, because it is exactly the right size for it.

In other news, I am a very bad friend and have still not sent Ferret his Victoria Page.  I think it's because I'm not a hundred percent happy with the hair, but I'm not sure what to do about that.  In this scene in the film Miss Page has her hair in one of those odd looking side up-do's from the late forties; the sort I suspect you can only get away with them if you have post-war facial features and my Amigurumi just doesn't.

Anyway, I keep thinking inspiration will strike and I'll work out a way to make her appropriately beautiful.  We shall see.

In the mean time she is very much enjoying being the prima ballerina in the ballet recital currently at the Partagas Theatre (just off Shaftsbury Ave., at the Piccadilly Circus end).

A Most Varied Saturday.

 This morning when I came down to feed the cats I immediately noticed that the cat tower had been knocked over, because I am perceptive like that.  What I don't understand is how the thing fell on it's side without waking me or The Doc up.  I mean it's pretty big, wouldn't it have made some noise?

Anyway, then Doc made me crumpets for breakfast.  This time I had jam on mine.  It was nice.

Then we went food shopping and on the way we stopped off at the pet shop.  We wanted a food container, but they had none in stock.  However they did have cat harnesses and leads.  More of that later...

On the way to the supermarket we were walking passed a small bookshop and I spotted Tori Spelling's autobiography "Stori Telling" on the sale table.  It is now mine.  It turned out that it was actually a bookshop, newsagents and cigar shop.  We browsed the magazines, and Doc asked me who the little old lady sitting outside was doing out there; on the way in I'd seen that she had a stack of books and a sign saying she was doing a signing.  Doc went back outside to chat with her, whilst I was asking about the empty cigar boxes they had on top of the shelves.  It turned out they were all for sale, and I have found a fantastic square box with a open front to it for $3.  I have no idea what I'll do with it, but it just looks really useful for something.  When I went back out, Doc had decided to buy two books from the author outside, she was a Russian emigre who had moved to the US when she was 8.  Her first book was about that experience, and the second book was a collection of the letters she and her husband wrote to each other before they married.  Doc asked her to sign the second book and bought it for me; she also gave him a copy of her husband's poetry, I think just because he was interested in it.

After doing the food shopping we came home, and put the harness on the cats one at a time.  They had no idea what the hell was going on, and as you can see Nancy looked particularly comfortable in it.  Poor Nance liked the going outside part, but hated the harness, so she kept walking backwards to try and get out of it.  Edith mainly just rolled around on the front path.

Then I came back in for my movie marathon.  "I Married A Monster from Outer Space" was fun, Doc went so far as to say it was "Rocking", mainly because of the surprisingly good special effects and some good solid performances.  As planned I then watched "Cheaper by the Dozen" which Doc wasn't interested in, so he cooked and just caught the odd scene.  Straight after that on TCM was "Funny Girl" OMG!  Doc lasted about 15 minutes before declaring he had enough.  I can't think why.  I mean I'm not a huge Barbra fan, but her early movie career was pretty good, so I watched the start and end around the "Ashes to Ashes" finale.  It was a very good evening for film and TV.

Oh, That picture in the bottom left hand corner?  That would be Edith killing her crinkly shiny ball toy, because I think it's hilarious when she does that.  She takes it so seriously!

Crocheted Rorschach Progressing Nicely.

I am progressing with Rorschach, so far I've made the head and half of the body; which are the easy parts!  I have a pattern for a crocheted top hat, so I think I'll use that and then squash in the middle.  That will work perfectly, I'm sure. 

Yep. 

I'm totally positive that will look like a fedora, not a squashed beige topper.

Very very confident about that.

Nancy Thinks - "I Shall Kill It!"

I was trying to get a photo of Edith doing one of her spectacular leaps to catch a ball, although for the first time ever she was uncharacteristically camera shy.  So with Doc's help I tried filming it, and I did get her mid-leap, but I was too close really and you couldn't really appreciate the height.

Anyway, then Nancy started playing with the feather duster thingy, and I began filming her instead.  Both cats find the combination of the duster and the foot-stool absolutely fascinating, so Edith joined in and I got the whole thing on video.

It's only about two minutes long, and I've added a soundtrack so you don't have to listen to me and Doc giggling.  I really like how Nancy is getting a teeny tiny bit feistier, but Edith is always going to be the bigger cat.

I Shall Kill It! from Jen Alien-Spouse on Vimeo.

Administrative? Kinda. Professional? Ummm... Sure!

As you probably know this is Administrative Professional's Week...  Yeah, I had no idea either; until today when I was given a card and a present at the weekly departmental meeting.

The gift was a laminated mini poster for "I Married a Monster from Outer Space"!   It's scary how well do these people know me, isn't it?  The film is an alien body-snatcher-esque B-movie from 1958, which looks really fun.  So yes, of course, I immediately added "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" to our Netflix queue, but it actually is scheduled to be screened on TCM on Saturday afternoon.  How weird is that?

My plans for Saturday are simple, whilst Doc is writing or grading or something, I intend to make popcorn, snuggle up with the cats under a blanket on the sofa and watch what promises to be schlocky fun.  Clearly that sounds like a fun afternoon by itself, but immediately after "I Married a Monster from Outer Space" TCM will be showing the 1950 Myrna Loy and Clifton Webb sentimental classic "Cheaper by the Dozen".

Hoorah!  Movie marathon at my house!

Accentuate the Positive.

I am watching a very touchy-feely documentary about positive thinking, I was lent the DVD by a faculty member who is teaching a course on life coaching.  I choose to watch it this evening because Doc is out with some friends, and I know that if we were watching this together he would be harrumphing at all the stuff about the power of positive visualisation.  I would find this annoying, because, honestly, I quite like it. 

Personally I prefer having happy thoughts to miserable ones, but that can be really difficult sometimes.  By which I mean that occasionally I do need to go onto anti-depressants, because in my experience they help my brain re-train to be nice to itself and sometimes it just needs to be reminded about that.  In the most basic terms, life is really so much better when my brain isn't trying to sabotage itself all the time with horrible and repetitive trains of thought!

I've mentioned before that when I started this blog I decided that it would have an upbeat tone at all times; so even if I have a bad day, I really try to find one thing about it that was funny, or interesting, or even find something else to write about, damn it!  Part of this decision was because I am writing this with my lovely Mum in mind, and I simply never want her to worry about me; but I also wanted to purposely make myself think positively every day, even if only for an hour or so, just to reinforce that habit.

I started trying this when I was at university towards the end of my second year, when I was really unhappy.  I was walking home after a lecture one day, allowing myself to wallow in whatever was bothering me at the time.  I honestly cannot remember what that was, but I do remember giving myself a little mental shake and making myself look around to really pay attention to where I was.  I had been about to just march past a really beautiful tree with blossom on it, so I stopped and made myself notice how the colours of the flowers looked against the blue.  It's such a clear memory, and it's simply of my noticing a sad thought in my head, then purposely working to change it to a good thought.

Anyway, it's an interesting film and I fully intend to visualise a whole bunch of lovely things from now on.  I think I shall start with a nice day tomorrow so I can wear a fun skirt.  Maybe with boots.

Sneaky Snacks.

I'm just about to go out to the cinema, to see a film I suspect will be really, really, really bad. 

I cannot wait! 

It's been ages since I went to see a film I was anticipating being this awful.  Squeee!

Even better I have just enough time to make some sweet popcorn to sneak in with me, I might even go the whole hog and treat myself to a cup of tea in my lovely new tea tumbler.

A bad movie, with illicit snacks and a proper cup of tea?  Bliss!

The Crochet of Dorian Gray.

I've nearly finished another amigurumi, and I have spent pretty much all day working on that.  All I have to do tomorrow is the face, which I'm not going to start this evening because I'm tired and I'll just mess it up if I try now.

This is a birthday present for my friend Jill, she asked me to make her something when she saw Yoda.  I asked what she would like, and her first suggestion was Jane Eyre, but we couldn't think of how to make her interesting because the whole point is that Jane is supposed to be mousy and unremarkable; which is, of course, why she was played by the famously plain Joan Fontaine in the forties adaptation.

Jill's next suggestion was Dorian Gray, which I thought was a fantastic idea.  I could see how I would make Dorian, but I had no idea how to do the portrait, but then we went to Philadelphia and the answer to that question dropped into my shopping basket.  I haven't started that bit yet, so I'll let you see it when it's finished.

The cats have been very helpful with this project.  Nancy pounced on the yarn, and gave the crochet needle a good chew to make sure it was thoroughly inanimate.  On the other hand, Edith padded all over my shoulders and even gave me a head massage, although personally I could have done with fewer claws and perhaps less biting (that sounds like she was attacking my head, but she was just being really over affectionate today; so I think this was her deranged attempt to act like a human and fuss me with her paws, then she gave up and started grooming me instead).

My plan is to make one more amigurumi for the Doc, and then I'll be running another contest!  This is going to be slightly different to the last one, and I think it will be really fun.

It's The Weekend! W00t! Let's Crunch Numbers!

Hey, it's Friday!  I just watched a great episode of "Dollhouse"!  Olivia Williams rocks in this show!  I love her character's wardobe! I have a glass of wine!  I just ate a salad for tea!  My legs are aching slightly from my cardio this morning!  And I have brought all of my department's financial records home with me!  So I can pull together a budget report for Monday!  Because my work phone never stops ringing long enough for me to be able to concentrate on the figures!  I caught myself skipping today, because I was so happy to cross an item off my To-Do list!  OhMyGod!  Is this how it starts?!?  Is this the route to becoming a corporate zombie, or am I just finally developing a "work ethic"?!?

Scary thought - Have I been replaced by a body snatching pod person?  How does one check that?

Anyway, so far this evening I've also discovered that it's much easier to re-categorise successful candidates at home because I can watch TV and use the touch screen on my work laptop, which is roughly a billion times easier and more fun then sitting at my desk and using the mouse to navigate.

Plus I am going to rack up the overtime this weekend, which is paid back in the form of time off calculated as time and a half.  As I currently have no comp time stored up, and I AM going to Philadelphia on Thursday, it seems sensible to start showing some willing to offset that.

Classic Movie Amigurumi.

During the inaugural crochet contest Ferret guessed that the Mystery Amigurumi was the radiant Moira Shearer in her most famous role of Victoria Page in "The Red Shoes", and further hypothesised that I would also be crocheting a train to re-inact the final scene.  Which was wrong in this instance, but a brilliant idea none the less.

I kept thinking about making a Victoria Page amigurumi, except I wanted to recreate the scene where she goes to meet Lermontov at his cliff top mansion.  This meeting is a combination of dinner party, job interview and ballet audition, so naturally Victoria wears a full length aqua silk ballgown with a matching cape and colour co-ordinated coronet for crying out loud.

It took me forever to track down a photo of the costume on-line, but I finally did it.  Then I crocheted like a mad woman.

Miss Page will be on her way to Scotland at the weekend.

Now this has given me an idea for another contest, which I think I'll be unveiling next month.  Stay tuned small crochet creature fans!

Crochet or Crochet Not, There is No Try.

This season Yoda is wearing a cotton crochet robe, with a hood, and is favouring crazy white acrylic hair, with no product in it.  Master Yoda lives on the planet of Dagoba in a small round hut; represented in our picture by the Royal Albert Hall and wooden trees of the Muji London set, which we can highly recommend for all of your Amigurumi photo shoot needs.

I spent most of the weekend on this and I'm most pleased with the way he has turned out.  Doc C really likes him too, which is what I was aiming for.  The bit I was most worried about was the hooded robe, because I was cobbling it together from two completely different patterns, and I had never tried the hood pattern before.  It was easier than I was anticipating, and the hood actually fits on his head, which is extremely satisfying.  Nerdy, but extremely satisfying none the less.