Mr. Denton on Doomsday

Last night I listened to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle called "The Blanched Soldier" in which Sherlock Holmes helps an ex-soldier track down his missing friend, while Dr. Watson is away enjoying his honeymoon. It wasn't a bad story at all. Later on I watched an episode of The Twilight Zone called "Mr. Denton on Doomsday", with the audio commentary on which featured Martin Landau (who is probably best known for playing Bela Lugosi in the film Ed Wood). It was an interesting commentary, where Landau revealed that in his early days in Hollywood he appeared in so many Westerns that he developed a very painful rash between his legs from having to sit on horseback in saddles for so much time, he also said that during the early days of television the sets were so flimsy that it was a genuine worry for actors that the sets could fall down on top of them. I always think the best audio commentaries are ones where the speakers do have genuine affection for the show or movie, but at the same time are not blind to the flaws. Later on I watched another episode of True Blood on DVD.

It was another quiet day at work today. One of the team leaders had brought in food for one of the other teams and about two tables were full of four or five pizzas, platters of sandwiches, crisps, tortilla chips, miniature sausages, scotch eggs, dips, spicy chicken, cakes and so on as well as about six large bottles of fizzy drink. Most food at work, after about an hour, looks like it has been attacked by a plague of locusts, but because there was so much there was actually still a lot left and so a few of us who were staying in a bit later managed to have a couple of platefuls each, which was nice. I've taken tomorrow and Thursday off work for no real reason, but I think it'll be nice.

It's my Dad's birthday today and he phoned me up before I left for work this morning to thank me for his present, so I'm glad that he liked it.

A Terribly Strange Bed

Last night I was listening to a show on the radio called Classic Tales of Horror, which was a reading of a story called "A Terribly Strange Bed" by Wilkie Collins about an English tourist in Paris who wins big at a disreputable gambling den and unwisely accepts the hospitality of a complete stranger. I also listened to the first part of a radio dramatisation of Murder on the Orient Express based on the novel by Agatha Christie. I also listened to a couple of radio adaptations of Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In the first one Holmes is called in to investigate when a dead man is found with some plans for a top secret submarine, and in the second Holmes appears to be dying of a fatal tropical illness.

Much later on I listened to a radio adaptation of a 1963 episode of The Twilight Zone called "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" by Richard Matheson, in which a nervous flyer, on a turbulant plane journey, is horrified to see a monsterous creature on the wing of the plane messing around with the engine. To make matters worse, he is the only one who can see it. The show was one of the most famous episodes of the original TV series with William Shatner as the frightened flyer, and was also adapted as a segment of the 1982 Twilight Zone movie. The show worked really well on the radio, partly because you did't have the unconvincing monster from the TV version which, according to Matheson, looked like "a surly teddy bear."

It was another really dull and ordinary day at work today. I got a steak pie and chips on my way back home today, so that was quite nice.

Shout!

Last night I listened to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story called "The Three Students" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this story, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are called in to investigate the theft of exam papers from a respected college. It wasn't one of the best but it was okay.

I also finished reading Shout!: The True Story of The Beatles by Philip Norman. The book was published originally in 1981 but was brought up to date and reissued in 2004. It pretty much tells you pretty much anything you'd ever want to know about the Fab Four and is full of interesting information, although it might reveal more about the personalities of the band than some fans would want to know.

I started reading another music biography last night Touching from a Distance by Deborah Curtis, about the life of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of Joy Division.

It was another quiet day at work today, as usual.

The Six Napoleans

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of a 1903 Sherlock Holmes story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle called "The Six Napoleans", in this one Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are presented with the seemingly trivial case of a man who seems to be obsessed with smashing cheap plaster busts of Napolean Bonaparte, even resorting to breaking and entering to achieve his goal. However, Holmes soon learns that the seemingly straightforward case has a far more sinister side. It was really pretty good.

I was reading more of The Beatles biography. I've almost finished it, actually. It is really interesting and they did have an incredible career. Personally I was always a big fan of John Lennon.

The Ricky Gervais Show

Last night I was watching an episode of The Ricky Gervais Show on TV. Basically, a few years ago writers, actors and directors Ricky Gervias and Stephen Merchant (who created The Office and Extras) and producer Karl Pilkington did a series of radio shows and podcasts where basically they just chat about anything that comes to mind, and they've been turned into an animated TV series by HBO. The show is really funny, mostly consisting of Pilkington coming up with various bizarre or naive theories while being prompted, mocked and laughed at by Gervais and Merchant.

I also listened to another radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes short story by Arthur Conan Doyle, in this one Holmes and Watson are pitted against a particularly evil blackmailer. In the end Conan Doyle wrote fifty-six Sherlock Holmes short stories and four novels, but apparently he really resented his own creation and it's massive fame because he thought it was taking his time away from his more "important" works (i.e. his historical novels).

I went to get my groceries this morning along with the latest issue of Empire magazine which had an interesting article about the history of the Three Stooges comedy team. I do remember I used to like the old Three Stooges short films when they were on TV, even though they never seemed to catch on as much outside the US.

Regular Office

Last night was fairly quiet. I was listening to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in which Holmes and Dr. Watson are called in to investigate when a brutal retired whaling ship's captain is gruesomely killed with his own harpoon. It was a pretty good story.

I was back in the regular office today at work after the training course. It was a pretty quiet day and I got back home at around half past seven and had a microwaved spaghetti bolognese ready meal.

The Solitary Cyclist

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of a 1903 Sherlock Holmes story called "The Solitary Cyclist" about a young music teacher who enjoys cycling in the country on her own, but decides to call Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson when she realises that someone has started following her on her expeditions. It was a pretty good story.

It was another day on the training course, which meant that I managed to get home early, so that was good.

The Dancing Men

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story from 1903 called "The Dancing Men" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this episode Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson discover that a seemingly innocent drawing of dancing stick figures could hold the key to a murder. It was a good story and pretty dark.

Today was the second day on the training course, and it went fairly well. It was kind of good that I managed to get out early again.

I have been trying to do some more of the writing recently, but it's not been coming as easily as it sometimes does. I haven't been able to think of any ideas that I actually like.

The Naval Treaty

Last night I was watching a pretty good ice hockey game between the Vancouver Canucks and the Los Angeles Kings on TV. Later on I was listening to a radio adaptation of an 1893 Sherlock Holmes story called "The Naval Treaty", in this one an old schoolfriend of Dr. Watson's, now a clerk at the Foreign Office, calls in Holmes when some vitally important documents he was supposed to be looking after go missing. It was a pretty good story, and apparently is often classed as one of the very first spy stories.

It was another quiet day at work. I'm on a training course next week, which is pretty good, because it means that for one thing, it's a change from the regular work and or another thing, I can leave a bit earlier than usual.

I decided to get a steak pie and chips on my way back home, which was nice and not quite as heavy as it was last time I had one.

The Man with the Twisted Lip

Last night I listened to another radio drama based on a Sherlock Holmes short story. This was based on the 1891 story called "The Man with the Twisted Lip" in which Dr Watson is summoned to find the husband of his wife's friend, who is indulging a lengthy drug binge in a dangerous opium den. While he's there he meets Sherlock Holmes in disguise and becomes involved in Holmes' search for a missing person who he believes could have met at a bad end at the hands of the opium den owner and a mysterious beggar. It was a pretty good story and it worked really well on the radio.

I was also watching another couple of episodes of Twin Peaks. I read an interview with David Lynch a week ago where he said that he really doubts that there will ever be any more Twin Peaks, but he didn't totally rule it out. The movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me really didn't do very well, although I really liked it, even if it doesn't really make much sense unless you've seen the series.

Even though it was Good Friday today I still went to work. I usualy take a couple of days off over the Easter period, but since I have had so much time off recently I just went into work. The place was pretty much empty, but they brought some cakes round and I had a slice of cherry pie.

April Fool's Day

Last night I was listening to another Sherlock Holmes radio play based on an 1891 story called "The Five Orange Pips" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The story concerns a young man whose grandfather and his father had died seperately under mysterious circumstances days after each receiving letters containing five orange pips. When the man also receives a letter containing five orange pips he decides to seek the advice of Sherlock Holmes, who immediately recognises it as the work of a murderous secret society. It was a good story and pretty dark. Conan Doyle ranked it as seventh on a list of his twelve favourite Sherlock Holmes stories.

I was also watching another couple of episodes of Twin Peaks. Despite what I'd heard about the second half of the second series (the ones after the Laura Palmer mystery is solved) I think they've been really good, even if they lack the main story thrust which came with the central mystery.

It was a dull and quiet day at work, although it was enlivened a bit by the fact taht I did manage to play a bit of an April Fool's Day joke on a couple of people by convincing them that there was an island off the coast of Scotland that, due to a legal loophole and thae fact that it was too samll for anyone to live there, was completely outside the rule of law and that basincally you could do whatever you wanted. They were trying to find out how you got there when I let them in on the fact that the place doesn't exist.

The Engineer's Thumb

Last night I was watching another couple of episodes of Twin Peaks. One of them had a very amusing guest appearance from David Duchovny (from The X-Files) as a cross-dressing FBI agent.

I was also listening to a radio play based on an 1892 Sherlock Holmes short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle called "The Engineer's Thumb", in which Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson investigate the circumstances in which a hydraulic engineer had his thumb severed. It was a pretty good one.

Today I went to work and it was pretty much another quiet and fairly dull day. The pain in my teeth from the filling seems to have gone now.

The Final Problem

Yesterday evening I was half-watching the movie Twilight, directed by Catherine Hardwicke, and based on the novel by Stephanie Meyer. The movie is about a teenage girl (played by Kristen Stewart) who moves to a small town in Washington, where she falls for a local guy (Robert Pattinson) who happens to be a 108 year old vampire. The movie was hugely popular and so were the books. Despite being a vampire story it's much more of a teen romance than a horror film, and the vampires have very little to do with pretty much any other interpretation of them (Meyer has said that she knew nothing about vampire stories when she started writing the books). I've never read any of the books but I thought the film was okay, though not great.

Later on at night I was listening to an episode of Weird Tales, which is a short series of one off radio horror plays inspired by the stories of H.P. Lovecraft. They are all original stories, not adaptations of Lovecraft's stories, but they deal with similar themes. In this story a man who has recently lost his job moves with his wife and daughter to a new house, however there are strange smells around the building and the constant sounds of rats scratching in the walls, and the house's last occupant vanished under mysterious circumstances. It was a pretty good story.

I also listened to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story. This episode was called "The Final Problem" based on a short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this episode Sherlock Holmes is on the verge of making the biggest case of his career against Professor Moriarty, the most dangerous criminal in London, however it's three days before Moriarty can be arrested, and so Homes and Watson set off on a journey across Europe with their deadly enemy in hot pursuit. It was a really good story. Conan Doyle had apparently got fed up of writing the Sherlock Holmes stories, because he thought they were distracting him from writing more "serious" literature, and so he intended this to be the last of them (hence the title) but, due to popular demand, he was more or less forced to write more.

It was another very dull day at the office, but apparently they are going to increse the heating slightly. My writing has been going pretty slowly recently, basically I'm kind of stuck with the story and don't really know how to move on with it. It feels like pretty much everything has already been done.

The Crooked Man

Last night I was listening to another radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story called "The Crooked Man", based on the short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this story Sherlock Holmes is assigned to investigate the case of a woman who is accused of murdering her husband, but uncovers a dark story of jealosy and treachery stretching back over thirty years. It was a really good story.

It was another very quiet and dull day at work. There was a petition going around the office to try and get them to put up the heating.

I'm really looking forward to seeing the film of The Wolf-Man when it come out. I do find it interesting just how popular vampires are at the moment. In recent years it just seems like they've really taken off.

Soul Circus

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story called "The Boscombe Valley Mystery" based on the story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this story a young man is accused of murdering his own father, but Sherlock Holmes believes that he is innocent, and determines to track down the real killer. It was a really good story, and one of the earliest of the Sherlock Holmes stories.

I also finished reading the novel Soul Circus by George Pelecanos. It's a crime novel, set in Washington DC, where private investigator Derek Strange is determined to protect a particularly violent drug dealer from getting the death penalty, not because Strange believes that he is innocent but because he doesn't believe in capital punishment, however as the tril progresses so does the tensions between rival street gangs. Added to that, Strange and his partner Terry Quinn discover that one of their clients has brutally murdered the woman that he paid them to find. It's a really good, tense and gritty novel, full of action, witty dialogue and laced with dark humour. Pelecanos wrote scripts for the TV series The Wire, and definitely if you like the show (which is awesome) then you should like the novel.

Later on I watched the 1992 movie Bram Stoker's Dracula, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, and based on the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker. In 1897 a young English lawyer (played by Keanu Reeves) heads to the remote Castle Dracula in Transylvania to oversee a property purchase by the mysterious Count Dracula (Gary Oldman) who is planning to move to England. However while in the castle the lawyer discovers that Dracula is a vampire, a dead creature that has existed for hundreds of years feeding on human blood, and that Dracula has set his sights on the lawyer's fiancee (Winona Ryder) believing her to be the reincarnation of his long-dead wife. Despite some major changes the film is relatively faithful to the book. Visually it's very impressive and stylish and filled with visual tricks, for example in one scene where a character has to step through a doorway, they actually had to step over the doorway backwards and then it was played in reverse ro give it added strangeness.

It was another very quiet day at work and pretty dull. I left at five and got a suasage supper on my way home, which was quite nice.

Endless Nights

Last night I was listening to another of the Sherlock Holmes stories on the radio. This one was called "The Retired Colourman", based on the 1926 short story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and told the story of a retired art supply dealer who enlists the aid of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson when his younger wife runs off with another man, taking a large amount of his money with them. However Holmes soon suspects that the truth is far more sinister. A 'colourman', by the way, is an old term for a man who makes or sells paint. It wasn't one of the best of them, but it was pretty good. That's the last in the series, apparently. I wish I could find those Sherlock Holmes tapes that I used to have, but I think they've gone, and I've never been able to find them either in the shops or online. It often seems to be the case that you don't even look at something for years, and then as soon as you've thrown it out you suddenly realise you want it again.

I did some more of my writing and then I watched some of the sixth season of Red Dwarf on DVD, which was really funny.

Today I went out and had a look at the shops. I got the soundtrack CD of True Blood, the movie Antichrist on DVD and the graphic novel of The Sandman: Endless Nights by Neil Gaiman. That's me got the complete set of The Sandman now! I went along to American Express to get some information about my planned holiday, but it looks like the flights will be too expensive so I might have to rethink it.

Guards! Guards!

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of a Sherlock Holmes story called "The Three Gables" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this story a woman is offered a large amount of money to sell her house to a wealthy buyer who also wants all of her personal possessions. When the woman refuses the would-be buyer starts to use threats and intimidation to force her to sell, and so she hires Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson to investigate. It was quite a good story.

Following that I listened to the first of a six part radio adaptation of Guards! Guards!, based on the novel by Terry Pratchett. It was one of the Discworld series of comedy fantasy stories and concerned the inept City Guards who, worried that they have become little more than a joke, decide to summon up a dragon to terrorise the populace so they can banish it and become heroes. It was very funny.

I did some more writing last night and it seems to be going quite well so far.

It was another dull day at work, and I was feeling kind of tense all day. At least it's the weekend now, anyway.

The Red-Headed League

Last night I was listening to a radio adaptation of one of the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This one was called "The Red-Headed League", which was first published in 1891, and basically it concerns a red haired pawnbroker whose assistant shows him an advert for an organzation called 'The Red-Headed League', which apparently offers easy well-paid jobs to people with red hair, and the pawnbroker ends up getting a part-time job with the League which involves spending four hours every morning copying out the Encyclopedia Britannica. However when the League unexpectedly disbands, the pawnbroker decides to hire Sherlock Holmes to investigate. It's a really good story, and was apparently Conan Doyle's second favourite Sherlock Holmes story.

I wrote some more of my story last night. It's a kind of fantasy, horror thing which opens with a guy waking up on an empty road with no memory and finds himself followed by a powerful demon.

It was another really dull day at work. I was glad to get home again, at around six.

Radio

I got in pretty late last night after the movie. I listened to a couple of episodes of the radio series of Sherlock Holmes while I was on the computer, they were really good productions and very faithful to the original stories. I managed to write about four hundred words of my new story last night, which wasn't much but I was quite happy about doing it.

It was another very ordinary day at work, and it was one of those days that just seemed to go on forever. I got home at around six.

New Writing

Last night I was listening to a radio dramatisation of a Sherlock Holmes short story which was really good. I used to have a set of audio tapes of those dramatisations ages ago but somewhere along the line they've vanished, presumably thrown out at some point.

After writing my post last night I did start writing something. It's a kind of dark-fantasy horror thing. I'm hoping that it will get to be a book at some point and I am also planning it to be the first volume in a series.

Today was another really dull day at work. The only thing slighlty notable was they showed the monthly business news video thing. I left work quite early and headed up to the Cineworld cinema to meet my parents. We saw the movie Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, directed by Mat Whitecross. The film tells the true story of British singer and songwriter Ian Dury (played in the film by Andy Serkis) who rose to fame in the late 1970s - early '80s as lead singer of Ian Dury and the Blockheads, with songs such as "Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick", "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll" and "Reasons to be Cheerful, Part Three". Left disabled after contracting polio as a child, Dury was known for his sometimes brilliant and frequently controversial lyrics and for his flamboyant on-stage persona. The film moves back and forth in time from Dury's childhood, abandoned by his father in an austere school for the disabled, to his rise to fame in the seventies and eighties, and his troubled and complex relationships with his own family. It's very well-made with some great performances, and it certainly never gets dull.

After the film I went to my parent's house for something to eat before returning home.