LOVEFiLM's Conspiracy to Make Me Like Baseball and Other Musings

Boy, exams are fun.

So, due to a nice coincidence, when I hadn't been studying over the last month, I've been watching sports movies.  Call it an unplanned sports marathon.  I have a similar story to Stephen Fry regarding sports.  I couldn't be far enough away from them as a teen, but as I've grown older (wiser?), I regret not taking an interest sooner.  To be fair to my younger self, I still maintain a lot of the blame has to go on the PE department at my high school.  On my first day there, all of the new kids had to jog around one of the school fields.  After fifteen minutes, the head of the department shouted out letters while we finished our laps.  I was assigned to Group D (the worst).  I was wearing glasses.  A friend of mine was assigned to Group A (the best).  He had asthma, but he was tall.

Since time has gone on, I've learnt to appreciate the fine art of ice hockey and motorsports, but I can watch most sports now with a semblance of knowledge.  However, there are two sports that baffle me; cricket and baseball.  They're pretty equivalent sports; balls get chucked, balls get hit, people in the stands get drunk and the whole thing lasts an eternity, but there's just something about them that has never inspired my imagination.  So, what does LOVEFiLM decide to do?  In a four film run of sports, it sends me two baseball films.  Ah well, at least I'll be clued up on it before I go see Moneyball (stupid November UK release date).

To be fair, the selection of the films was quite well balanced.  There was a mixture of fiction and documentary, comedy and drama.  In order; Bull Durham, Slap Shot, the King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters and Eight Men Out.  Like I said, quite a good selection.  KoK is highly touted, Bull Durham was held on a very tall pedestal by a screenwriting book I own, Eight Men Out would be my first John Sayles and Slap Shot is about ice hockey - the greatest sport devised by mortal personage.  For the sheer sanity of anyone reading this, I'll quite these reviews brief.

Bull Durham:  Damn, that's a good opening line, but I don't think this is a great baseball movie.  That's not to say I don't rate it, but I never see why their only drive is the game.  You could replace baseball with nearly an art, craft or frivolity and this film would work just as well (hmm, the Wedding Planner meets Bull Durham - I think I need to call Fox).  Tim Robbins is pitch perfect (boom boom), Costner is...well...Costner, but he works well here.

Slap Shot:  This is quite an odd beast.  I've only ever heard about this film second hand; in news articles from hockey writers referencing a joke here and there when discussing current events.  From this I was expecting some silly farce in the vein of Airplane.  Sure, there's definitely a lot of humour in this film, but I feel that it plays out like an elegy to the working class aesthetics of that period.  Sure Paul Newman is very funny, but his far from being a "cool" character in this.  In fact, his inability to correctly place the anger caused by the loss of his livelihood (be it from financial collapse of the club, the evolution of the game or his wife) makes him incredibly pathetic in his impotency.  There's definitely a lot to love in this film (the chance to see a pre-Twin Peaks Michael Ontkean makes it well worth the rent) and I'd recommend it in a heartbeat.

King of Kong:  This is definitely the urgent of the four.  In fact, as soon as I finished watching it, I slapped it straight back into the DVD player and watched it all again.  It plays out very similar to another documentary I saw this year, Senna.  If you're at all familar with some of the "controversy" surrounding Senna, you'll instantly recognise the same issues with KoK, which hits on an interesting point.  How truthful should a documentary be?  Should it forgo honesty for an immersive narrative?  Either way, it's an incredibly well constructed film and I look forward to seeing what director Seth Gordon can do when he's finished with his "commercial comedy" phase.

Eight Men Out:  I can't believe I'd ever watch a film that made me nostalgic for a by-gone age of a sport I don't even like.  Maybe I'm just a sucker for rose-tinted history, but I thought this was a wonderful film.  This nearly had me excited about the World Series, nearly.  But I tell you what, unlike Bull Durham, the threat of never playing baseball again is very much more real in this film.  There's one shot especially that brings the thrill of the sport to life (you'd recognise it if you saw it, tracking shot around the diamond).

Maybe cricket just needs a good movie.

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Sorry this post is a bit disjointed, I think I need to get back into the swing of things a bit here.  Hopefully should be on top of posting once a week, maybe twice if I become incensed about something.

The BFI London Film Festival is on at the minute.  I'm five films out of six down right now, last one is on Tuesday.  Expect the next post to feature this heavily.

I received my first celebrity twitter follower t'other day - Sam Neill.  Maybe this is because I sent a pro-Event Horizon to my favourite film podcast.  He's quite big into his wine, I hope he doesn't find out that I often (read always) pick wine out by how cool the label looks.

I finally read the Great Gatsby.  Jeez, those last three chapters are sheer perfection.  Almost makes me too depressed to put pen to paper.

Yay!  New Jersey aren't doing as bad as last year!  I still think the playoffs are out of the question this year, but hopefully we'll be a better state next year.  Larsson is looking like a thorough-bred right now.

Excitement is picking up on the current project with Jonathan Hatfull (http://jonathanwriting.blogspot.com/).  Nothing of great interest to report yet, but it's all coming together rather nicely.

Evangelion 2.0, BFI LFF, Training Camp, Qualms with Revision and Other Musing

Another weekend spent studying.  Huzzah.  Don't worry, I shall spare you the exciting features of Moment Generating Functions of Probability Density Functions and talk about some of the other stuff I've been up to.

Let's start at a couple of hours ago.  After demolishing a solid 7 chapters of CT3 (and lightly tapping another 3), I decided to watch LOVEFiLM's latest offering, Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance.  I don't think I've documented this on the blog so far, but growing up the Neon Genesis Evangelion Saga was of huge importance to me.  Let me paint the scene, I was in Lower Sixth (so 16-17 years of age).  Hmm, how to put this kindly, I was an odd child.  So during primary school, I was a proper geek, hand up at every question, very eager and very much trying to be a teacher's pet.  Far from popular.  This changed when I got to high school.  I was still put in the "unpopular, smart kid" box in the first year, but then after that I started hanging round with some of the cooler, misfit kids.  Don't worry, my grades didn't dip, but I became more anonymous.  I disliked partaking in class, but I could fit in after-school study and some new found social status (including band practice!).  Fast forward a few years, I didn't need to worry about band practice and social life much any more, because my social circle pushed me out.  The band I was in kicked me and my brother out (without telling us).  The rest of our friends decided that hanging out with the rest of the band and me at the same time was not possible and thus I became persona non grata.  Also, my first girlfriend decided that this would be a good time to break up with me.  Context over, this was when I discovered Neon Genesis Evangelion.  This is the perfect time to discover Neon Genesis Evangelion, especially if you're studying English Literature and trying to force Freudian interpretations on every Tennyson poem you read, in a rather ham-fisted manner.

Assuming you know nothing about this TV show and its epic motion picture conclusion, let's get you up to speed.  Neon Genesis Evangelion was a Japanese anime TV show during the mid-nineties.  The plot breaks down as follows; it is the future!  Shinji Ikari is 14.  He arrives in Tokyo-3 having been called for by his estranged father Gendo Ikari (who rocks the Abe Lincoln beard).  Gendo is in charge of a Government organisation called Nerv who, get ready for it now, develop, prep and utilise giant mecha (called Evas) robots as Earth's last defence against a force of 'are they, aren't they aliens?' called Angels.  As well as having to deal with this threat, Shinji has to deal with this heavy burden that he has had reluctantly force upon him, which includes finding his place among the other 14 year old pilots and learning how to accept or reject the world around him. As far as I can tell, it had an instant audience due to its throwback, retro nature (giant robots fighting monsters was big in Japan in the eighties I'm told).  , but much akin to Watchmen in the comic book world, although there was a strongly featured central plot (monsters trying to destroy the world!), it really stood out by showing the internal struggles of the central characters and more over, how utterly fucked up they are.  Believe me, I mean it when I say fucked up.

You'd be fucked up too if you had to see this sort of stuff as part of your 9-5 job.

Anyway, it wasn't all blood and guts and phallic symbols, the show also did a great job of depicting the "teenage experience".  Unlike many shows set in high school, Neon Genesis accurate showed what it was like to be at that age and being unable to relate to the people around you, hell, being completely uninterested in relating to the people around you,.  Don't worry, there were still laughs and frolics on the way.  It was a good tale of growing up.  In many ways, what I feel toward this show is what I imagine a lot of people feel towards the Harry Potter series of films.  Beyond this, due to all the psychology/philosophical techno-babble was also a gateway for me in a great deal of other art (Nietzsche, Camus, etc), so it was quite the big deal for me at that age.   

A couple of years ago, Hideaki Anno decided to revisit his magnum opus and, something that George Lucas would appreciate, touch up his beloved series with the intention of making a few tweaks along the way.  The first film in this proposed teratology, Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone, was fairly tame.  Beyond a few visual tweaks, the plot stayed close to the original 6 episodes.  I enjoyed revisiting these characters that were integral to my teenage years, but despite the joy of seeing some of my favourite moments relived on a gloriously crisp Blu-Ray image, I had great reservations about this moving forward.  As you would imagine, a lot was cut out from the series, and what remained was still jam packed into the 98 minute running time.  What had been a show that interspersed brutal action with, sometimes, whole episodes of atmosphere and wandering around the wonderfully realised Tokyo-3 backdrop, had changed into a frantically edited, action fest.  In addition, some of the changes made resulted in very subtle changes that (in a similar manner to Zac Synder's Watchmen) betrayed the motivation of the characters.  Just to present an example of this; in the show, there is a scene between Shinji and a school bully.  The bully hits him because, during one of Shinji's battles with an Angel, his sister is injured.  However, his sister tells him off as, despite her injuries, without Shinji's intervention, she would have been killed.  The bully demands that Shinji punches him to even the score, but Shinji can't, highlighting both how passive and impotent he is a central protagonist, especially compared to the usual leads in mecha shows.  In the film, he has no such qualms.  He doesn't even pause to consider it.  I have no problems with a reimagining, but I was concerned that such subtle changes would falsify the ending if the remaining plot stayed true to the series.  Oh well, no worries of that.

Evangelion 2.0 takes a very sharp turn into left field from the opening shot.  New character, new Eva, new battle.  In fact, there's very little recognisable from the series in this film beyond the characters and part of the soundtrack.  Unfortunately, much like the first film, there is an awful lot stuffed into the running time that hinders the quality of the movie.  There a very nice segments, but currently the plot isn't tying up.  It's not just that character's motivations have changed from the series, but more that their motivations don't make sense.  I was disappointed, especially with the amount of techno babble during the climax and generally with the dialogue.  There are so many lines that are just too obvious with their intentions.  Also, there are a couple of filmic tricks aped from the original concluding film, but it seemed to rely on emotional attachment stemming from familiarity with this and therefore had not earned the emotional payoff it was seeking.  There is also the matter of "fan-service".  The original series featured plenty of nudity, however, none of it was erotic in the slightest, due to intense psychological trauma each of the characters were face.  In contrast, this film features an absolute tonne of almost glamour model poses from its female leads.  In the years since the original series, the merchandise of Evangelion has definitely focused on the stereotypical pervy Japanese figurine sector, however, these sorts of shots have no place in this film and to me highlight how far the people involved have grown away from the source material.  I'm still eagerly anticipating the next instalment, especially considering how brave the film-makers were in their deviation from the series, but I'd probably give it a 2/5.  

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Other Musings:

Interesting side note, my trip to Japan was rather Evangelion orientated.  It is still insanely popular over there.  I managed to pick up a mug and chopstick as souvenirs, plus I won an exclusive "not for sale" pocket watch in a Sega arcade machine.

The BFI London Film Festival has annouced its line up!  So many films!  So little time!  While I would love to see Shame and 50/50, I have to come to terms with the fact that they will probably sell out before I can buy tickets.  No loss, they'll both have theatrical releases sooner rather than later.  I'm definitely going to try and check out a couple of the smaller films.  I saw a couple of gems (Heartbeats, Elisa K) and a couple of stinkers (Love Like Poison, Special Treatment), so I have high and low hopes for this year.

I was feeling a bit meh earlier, thus while I was studying I defaulted to my iPod playlist of my favourite depressing songs.  I got bored of studying, so I decided to work out instead.  I didn't change the soundtrack.  Pull ups to Nick Cave's 'Where Do We Go Now (But Nowhere)?' is quite surreal.

I am not that familiar with Steven Soderbergh, however, LOVEFiLM has recently sent me the Girlfriend Experience and the Informant! in a row.  My interest is piqued.  Both have been much better than Traffic.

Here's a link to my old band's myspace page.  I'm pretty sure the recordings were made post my leaving, but I definitely played a couple of these songs live countless times.  http://www.myspace.com/zephoria

I miss the days when Green Day sounded like Elvis Costello instead of Elton John.

Training camps for the NHL have started today!  My first chance to read tweets and see photos of Adam Larsson playing hockey with the big kids!  Whatever happens, I'm hoping it can't be as bad as the start of last season for my beloved Devils.  In other league news, I am loving seeing Jagr in orange.

Laura found a flat!  She should be moving to London in mid-October, which is around when my exams finish!  Perfect timing!

The Return, Japan, DIY and Other Musings!

Howdy there!  Fancy seeing you here after all this time!  I can only apologise profusely for the complete lack of any contact for over a month, but there are good and valid reasons!  Reason one!  As documented here, I went to Japan for two weeks.  Reason two!  After returning from Japan, I had one week to pack and sort my stuff in order to move house.  Reason three!  The new house only started broadcasting internet yesterday.  Forgive me?  Come on, you know you can't stay mad at me.  I bought you a gift.  See, now you definitely can't be mad.

Despite there being such a huge gap between posts, not too much of interest or analysis has happened lately.  Japan, as you could imagine, was absolutely awesome.  If you are friends with me on the Facebook, you'll have no doubt seen my completely unedited super rush of photos.  If not, there are far too many highlights for me to dump on here.  I'll try setting up a tumblr or something (or alternatively, just add me on fb? http://www.facebook.com/bensheppard88 - or is that too forward?).

It wasn't all wine and roses, beer and pizzas however.  One problem with the Japan trip was that, despite it being a two week holiday, I came back completely exhausted.  I think I'm too old now to travel to several cities in two weeks and spend most days walking for 12 hours.  As a motley crew, we visited Tokyo, Nara, Shikoku, Naoshima, Hiroshima and Kyoto.  I bought a Hiroshima Carps cap, because, you know, baseball's where it's at right now (see other musings).

Hiroshima, as you'd expect, was a complete highlight.  An incredibly depressing highlight, but definitely a very worthwhile one.  I really should document the experiences I had there, but currently, I'm quite sleepy, so that can wait for another day.  Another day, where I am less busy.

Why am I so busy?  Because we're in full on exam season.  Hooray, hooray.  My actuarial exams start in 17 days.  That's incredibly depressing.  Time for one to pull one's socks up and all that.  I have CT1 on 27th September and CT3 on 7th October.  Fortunately, the NHL season starts in the evening of the 7th, so that's a nice reward for myself.

And with that I bid you adieu.  Just a brief message to tell you I'm alive, and then I leave you.  I leave you like all the warmth and comfort of a bath that you've just weed in.

What gift?

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Other Musings:

The new house is rather pleasant, if a tad out of the way.  Quite expensive too.  And unfurnished.  Unfurnished isn't a bad thing though.  It allows me to utilise my sick DIY skills.  Look at what I created!

Oh, how my Grandad would be proud.

I've seen a few films lately (what a surprise!).  The only one I can remember though was Kill List.  Really clever and original use of editing.  The acting was also superb.  Shame about the plot.

After my exams have finished, I'm focusing on a film project, with my good friend Jonathan Hatfull (him of http://jonathanwriting.blogspot.com/ and http://fohnhouse.blogspot.com/ fame).  I'm not willing to pass on details yet, but expect something fantastic and cheap.

Keeping on films though, I've become part way obsessed with Moneyball and its trailer.  I want to see this movie so much, that I'm even downloading retro Baseball Manager games.  I don't even think I'll be able to get them to work.

From one sport to another; like many ice hockey fans, I've been bummed out recently.  The passing of three enforcers over the offseason has been upsetting to see, but nothing has roused my anger and sadness quite like the Yaroslavl plane crash.  I'd like to save my spite and vitriol until further details have come to light, but I am less than impressed with Russian aviation right now.

The Suburbs, Jenny Owen Youngs, Holding My Tongue, Potential Marathons and Other Musings.

My, it's been a long time, hasn't it?  Let's blow off the cobwebs and try and maintain some sense of regular updating before my Oriental excursions!  How's going out there?  Good?  Good.  Here are some photos!

This is Nate P. Barker.  It were his houseparty I went to t'other weekend.  This is him obviously practising his tabloid pose - give it time and he'll be on them!

Look!  It's me!  The author!  

This is Nate P. Barker at his houseparty!  I took my camera, but didn't want to be that dick with the camera at a party.  So it was promptly put away.

On the right is a French man named Pierrrrrre.  

Finally, this is Jonny Hatfull, King of the Spag Bol, Earl of Spooky Stories, Duchy of Cowering behind a Kronenbourg.  

Good God, today has been stressful!  We're (me and my housemates minus Rob plus Laura II) in the process of looking for somewhere to move in September, which is very stressful at the best of times.  On top of that, I'm working a lot, not only studying but also fiddling around with Access at work.  I am a novice at Access.  I hate that program.  Grrr.  Other stressful things that have happened.  So I had cake and red wine for tea instead...because I rock.  So, anyway, point is that I need to de-stress.  Thank goodness that I have a nice bottle of red wine, a DVD of Howl (fresh from LOVEFiLM) and Jenny Owen Youngs' record Transmitter Failure on my speakers.  That is such an incredible record.  I used to be able to write record reviews, now I just fawn over the ones I like.  I definitely really like this record.

A record that I don't like as much is The Suburbs by the Arcade Fire.  I have an odd history with the Arcade Fire (well, not that odd, just up and down).  Like most people, I discovered them around the time Funeral came out.  I heard them on Later......With Jools Holland, they played Neighbourhood #3.  I was completely hooked.  One of my best gigging experiences was going to see them on that tour.  Owen Pallett sold me a t-shirt!  Then Neon Bible came out.  Shitttttttt, that is a dull record.  One of my housemates tells me that the record really comes alive on headphones.  Lots of random noises.  That doesn't stop the songs from being incredibly boring however.  I started listening to the Suburbs at work (via Grooveshark.com - try it, it's incredible!), both halves were better than Neon Bible, but one half was fantastic.  It didn't sound like the Arcade Fire, it sounded like Wolf Parade.  It then got me thinking about writing an article about inspiration and where that ends and ripping off begins, especially given the context of the success that the Arcade Fire have enjoyed.  Then I found out that the half I liked wasn't the Arcade Fire at all, but some band called Wildfire.  They were much better.  Here is a song:

Now to work out how to hear more of them.

As we've already touched upon several times, I like my films.  So, I've drawn up several potential marathons (so far, mostly genre stuff), but I've got a starter introduction type one designed to show her some great (not necessarily classic or favourite) films that encourage discussion and what to lead on to.  In order:
Pulp Fiction
Star Wars: A New Hope
Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
The Prestige
The Exorcist
Casablanca
Thoughts?

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Other Musings

Films watched recently - Wild Strawberries, The Haunting (original).  I think that's about it.  Been slacking some what lately.

Devils have a new coach.  What an intriguing decision!

I finally bought Portal 2 - my excuse was that it was less than half price (pre-owned £24).  Stephen Merchant doesn't annoy me as much as I thought he would.

How My Life Became Equal Parts Dull And Exciting, and Other Musings

Hello, it’s been a while, has it not?  This is mainly due to my life becoming equal parts very exciting and very dull. Shall we start with the dull parts first?  Well, the lack of sleep from Rome/Death Cab/Big Lebowski caught up with me in a big way.  Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday last week were completely written off through illness.  And instead of just trying to look after myself and enjoy the time off work, I tried to study!  Dear God, what have I become?  My life outside of work seems to have really hit study mode hard.  I had to turn down offers from distinguished writer Jonathan Hatfull (you can read his new blogging venture here: http://jonathanwriting.blogspot.com/) to see Tree of Life AND Hobo With A Shotgun.  Obviously something is wrong with me. 

So, what am I doing with most my time?  Reading through my notes very slowly.  Notes about statistics.  Statistics that I should already know and have no trouble with.  Oh actuarial exams, how you overestimate me.  The plan is to get through CT3 by Sunday and then I can hopefully get through CT6 before I go to Japan (two weeks on Friday).  This is almost do-able (I’m on Chapter 3 of 14, CT6 is a similar size).  Just have to knuckle down more, which is difficult considering my current social obligations.

So last weekend, I went to a houseparty.  As a result of said dinner party, I am now going on dinner date to Browns on Friday with a lady I’ve known for a while.  We left to party early to play Monopoly.  That is not a euphemism.  We stayed up until 6am playing Monopoly.  Because we are that cool.  So obviously, Sunday was spent recovering.  Monday was study day.  Monday was not productive.  I got through 1.5 chapters, but only starting seriously after 5pm.  Because I’m that special.  So the serious work started today.  Got to the office at 7:30am to do an hour and a half of study (so all of Chpt 3), armed with lots of fruit.  So you’d like to think that I’ll be getting home promptly from the office to do more tonight right?  If so, you’d like to be wrong.  Jonathan Hatfull is cooking spag bol for myself and Nate P. Barker (host of Saturday night houseparty).  I’m expecting lots of probing questions about Monopoly. 

Wednesday, Thursday are par for the course, lots of studying.  Friday is study in the morning, and then on to delightful company with a rather attractive lady in the presence of good food (seriously, don’t tell her, but I’m quite excited – our tastes are well suited, she’s a laughter riot and gorgeous).  Saturday isn’t study focused either.  Saturday is my buttnumbathon with Mr Hatfull.  Given how much I’ve been turning him down for the Cinema, we’ll be watching three to four films on the theme “rogues with a heart of gold”, because obviously, that’s how we live our lives.  Video game hockey may be involved.  Sunday then!  Surely I must be studying like some calculus hell demon on Sunday?  Eeeh, kinda.  Sunday is the only chance to combine my forces with my housemates with a good clean.  Hopefully though, with all of us working together, it should be done quickly.  It is important to clean the house because the letting agency want to take photos of the property. 

What else is there to comment on?  I watch Sherlock Jr and Fermat’s Room t’other day.  Sherlock Jr cemented how much I love Buster Keaton.  Guy had moves.  I seriously wish a tenth of the films released today were half as inventive as that film (ooh, fractions of fractions!).  Fermat’s Room was rather fun too!  Some clunky plot points and lines, but on the whole rather entertaining.  I must confess to never really appreciating Agatha Christie, but considering how much I enjoy films like this and Identity, I probably should give ‘And Then There Were None’ a go. 

So radio silence until I complete CT3 on Sunday? Deal?  Deal.  Just to sweeten it a bit more, I promise photos next post too. 

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Other Musings

I discovered the most amazing chocolate t’other day.  Green & Blacks dark chocolate with espresso infused type stuff.  Nom nom.  Would go well with a bottle of red and some Brahms.

I’ve curbed my drinking, but not as much as possible.  Last week there were drinks on Weds/Thurs/Fri/Sat.  This week, I’ll probably have a drink tonight and not another until Friday.  No drinking Saturday.  I find it odd when people cut things like alcohol out of their lives – surely moderation is a healthier and more productive ability than abstinence?

Another week, still no Devils coach.   Or Parise signing.  Thank goodness the Avs drafted Skog is what I say!

Roma, Death Cab, Big Lebowski & Other Musings

Hello again world!  I am very much still alive!  Both my flights took off and arrived in their destinations without a problem.  Though, to be fair, I was far too dazed to noticed anything on the return flight.  I think I totalled 6 and a half hours of sleep over four days.  Not much in the way of excitement to report I'm afraid.  If anything sordid happened (and I'm pretty sure it did), then it happened to someone else.  Here's a brief (haha) rundown of the trip:

Sunday 3rd: So I arrived at a colleague's flat (his name is Andrew and he's rather pleasant) in Teddington/Richmond in the hope that it would be easier to get a taxi as he lives fairly close to Heathrow.  The night was spent with two other colleagues (Nick 'the Shadow' Everritt and James Fielding) eating pizza and playing all manner of bizarre racing simulation games (definitely not arcade games).  It was very nice reminding myself which one the accelerator pedal was.  Anyway, it gets to midnight and we still haven't booked a taxi...for our 7:05am flight...which requires us to get there for 5:30am.  We try some numbers and it becomes painfully clear that we're not going to get a taxi.  On the plus side, it sounded like a couple of these taxi businesses were home run, so I was personally responsible for ruining a couple of people's Sunday night. We decide to forgo sleep in order to successfully get a night bus to Heathrow and therefore we played poker to stay awake.  I now owe Andrew £5.  Actually, I owe him a bit more for pizza as well.

Monday 4th:  Turns out Heathrow Terminal 5 is rather nice.  Very clean looking.  The flight was as comfy as a flight could be.  I was expecting a pleasant breakfast, but was severely disappointed.  A ham and mayonnaise roll does not a good breakfast make.  I was also expecting no one to leave chewing gum on the way were I was resting my leg by way of my rolled up jacket.  My black suit jacket is now a write off.  Huzzah.  Time for a new three piece?  The coffee was awful too, in fact the coffee was awful on the whole trip which caused me great pain given the amount I had to ingest to stay awake.  Anyway, a 2 hour chat to one of my managers and a half hour snooze later, we were there and the conference began.  Logistically, it was an absolute nightmare.  Trying to move 400 actuaries around several hotels and conference rooms is not easy, especially given the early flight and some speakers inconsiderately going over their allotted time, causing us to miss some shuttle buses (this was a frequent occurrence).  Grr.  Basically, the majority of the trip was spent listening to people talk in dark rooms.  On note of room, my room at the hotel was incredible (as evidenced by the following pictures - ooh, multimedia).  I wish I had spent more than twenty minutes conscious in it.

Compare this to my room currently:

The evening was spent at the Marriott (I drafted this on their stationary).  Terrible food but plenty of free drink.  Bed time at 3:30am.  

Tuesday 5th:  Wake up time 7:00am, 3 hours and a half sleep.  More talks.  Lunch was the previous night's dinner reheated.  Watered down coffee was hurriedly consumed between sessions and before you could blink, the evening's festivities were upon us.  We had been promised a two hour gap, but due to the previously mentioned speakers, this turned into half an hour, thus ruining my chances of using the gym and the swimming pool.  The dinner was much better than the night before, but the "networking" event planned was ruined by an incredibly loud band playing in the rather cramped social hall, so the majority of people stood outside in the heat than face that awful racket (gosh, I sound so old!).  The night then descended into the same sort of mess as the prior night, except I didn't drink as much.  That didn't stop me from being the last person standing.  5:30am, everyone else went to bed.  I decided that this was the perfect time to hit the gym (well, small exercise room - nice equipment though, even though I couldn't work out the treadmill) and then after that, the swimming pool.  Nothing like an early morning dip.  I went back to my room, packed and looked at my watch.  The time was 6:45.  I was elated.  An all nighter and I'll make the morning's first session.  That'll show my far drunker colleagues.  15 minutes until breakfast.  "I'll just sit down for a second" I remember thinking and probably saying to myself (my brain had more than likely turned to drool at this point).  Bam.  It's 10:30am.

Wednesday 6th:  Taxi across (no shuttle buses after 8am).  Nothing else worth commenting on except I wasn't the only late comer and I was far better dressed than some people (most of my shirts were wrecked from leaky mouth wash in transit - thankfully I'd saved my awesome fitted CK shirt, non iron and it makes me look like I work out far more than I do).  After seminars there was plenty of time for pool action (my flight departed Roma at 9:15pm, the seminars finished at 4pm).  I had a gelato at the airport.  Highlight of the trip.  One incredibly sleepy flight and one scary taxi later, I arrived home at 1am Thursday morning.

It's not like I got a good night's sleep on Thursday night either, I had tickets to Death Cab For Cutie!  Which I went to!  With my good friends Mike Hewitt and Iain McGibbon (both med students)!  And also Paul!  A colleague on secondment from Chicago!  I was a big Death Cab fan back in my High School/Sixth Form days, but after/during Plans, I kind of lost track with them.  The set list was a nice mix of stuff I knew and new stuff.  I'm tempted to pick up the albums I've missed after that show.  No Brothers On A Hotel Bed, but apart from that, there wasn't anything else missing that I was dying to hear.  So the show was good, only great because I knew all the words and was standing in the second row, centre stage.  It got me thinking about a conversation I had with a housemate about the band Feeder.  He said they were amazing live and I was skeptical.  I couldn't see them doing anything incredible that would make a great live show except be generally amiable and play a fan friendly set list, which is exactly what Death Cab did.  Not going to bring over any new converts, but not going to lose them fans.

The big surprise from the gig was actually the support band, the Head and the Heart.  I've usually had good experience with support bands.  Even if they're fantastic, there's a less than favourable chance of support bands making it big, so I like to jump in quick, grab some EPs and then these songs become staples of my mix tapes (well, back in the day, I don't go to so many shows these days).  I can honestly say, the Head and the Heart were one of the top two support bands I've seen (it's tight between them and Owen Pallet - he might edge it given he sold me a t-shirt personally in a flirty manner).  They reminded me why I enjoyed playing music so much.  I wish I could have joined them onstage so much!  Looked like they were having a whale of a time.  I'm a big fan of fuzzy lo-fi music, so seeing them battle against their road weary equipment added to the quality of the performance.  I shall be buying their records and t-shirts shortly, but in the mean time, enjoy this youtube video!

So, did I get a good night's sleep on Friday?  Well, yes, but not early by any stretch.  I had tickets to see the Big Lebowski at the BFI as part of their Jeff Bridges season!  So I went with Iain McGibbon (my medic friend), Jonny Hatfull (my writer friend) and his brother Nicholas Hatfull (my artist friend - remind me to put up a photo of his work for a gander soon).  Good times were had by all.  There really isn't much to say about Lebowski any more.  I remember finding the ending 5 minutes much sadder than previously.

So what does the next week bring?  Hopefully nothing as hectic.  My immune system couldn't cope.

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Other Musings

My jogging mixtape is finished!!!  Get in touch if you want a link to it.  I'm a huge geek so it's not like 30 tracks, it's two tracks 45 mins (roughly) each.  I usually add a load of film quotes and the like, but I struggled to find anything good on the concept of jogging.  Maybe when I get a new laptop, I'll get back into this mixtape malarky.

Look!  It's a letter!  It says that most of my road is being closed off for filming a film with an internationally known cast.  Quick research on t'interweb tells me that the cast includes Dakota Fanning and Paddy Considine.  In your face Hollywood.  Personalised letters!  I think I'll move one of my study days to that day and have a good perve on camera equipment.  Expect a report back.

British GP has just passed.  Was rather good.  Still don't understand the new track though.

Less than four weeks to Tokyo, less than eight weeks until moving to a new flat, less than nine weeks until exams.

Mini Update Pre-Death Defying Flight and Other Musings

Hi all!  Just a quick one today!  Today is Sunday, tomorrow is the day I jet off to Rome for a work conference for three days.  Not going to have much time to see the actual Rome, instead I'm spending much of my time in a (thankfully air conditioned) hotel room listening to people talk about regulatory necessities for insurance company.  Riveting.   Thankfully, I've visited Rome previously, so I don't feel like I'm missing out.  I'm taking my camera, so expect a post with pictures soon!

Personally, I dislike flying, but can stomach them so long as I have a nice selection of books.  For this trip, I've gone with the Moviegoer by Walker Percy, NHS Plc and Shepperton Babylon (haven't got them to hand right now, but will update with authors in a later post).  Only one fiction this time.  NHS Plc is about the privatisation occurring within the NHS (which interests me, big leftie that I am) and Shepperton Babylon is a brief history and "what-ever-happened-to" regarding the early British silent film industry.  Hopefully they can distract me sufficiently so I can forget I'm in a big metal tube, eight miles high.  Anyway, if I don't make it back, I feel happy to say that, if I had the chance, I'd do most things differently - makes it more interesting the second time round.

Not much has been going on, not much seen in the way of films (my LoveFilm delivery seems to have got lost in the post somewhere).  I wanted to enjoy some war, Michael Caine and glorious Welsh baritone in Zulu, but the internet connect has been somewhat sketchy here as of late, so online streaming is impossible.  Had to settle for Brief Encounter on DVD while I ironed some shirts last minute - first time I've seen it.  Relationships are a funny thing aren't they?  Sure, we want to be treated with romance and lavished with attention by someone we love, but surely the whole point of a relationship is that these sort of actions can be turned down without feeling insecure about your partner leaving?  I do sympathise (to an extent, I'd like to stress) with Laura's husband.  I've been in his position, but with the unhappy conclusion of my lady leaving (she now lives 10 mins down the road with her Dr Harvey - though I have to say, if he seemed as nice as Trevor Howard, perhaps I wouldn't have minded so much).  But on the other hand, love is love, and storybook love doesn't come around much.  But what is the etiquette in this situation?  Nothing seems binding any more, so I personal feel very pressured into lavishing people with dinners and attention.  Trust is a difficult concept.

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Other Musings

I've just sat down to watch the Wimbledon finals.  Prediction - Nadal in four sets.

Jogging mixtape is still unfinished - my non-work laptop and I are having disagreements.

Jagr in Philly is such a tantalising prospect.

Ah well, time for a bit of last minute packing and exercise before I'm off to Rome via Heathrow via Richmond.  Radio silence in 5...4...3...