More Lonely Cities

Last night I wrote a review of EmiTown by Emi Lenox on Permanently Weird, wrote some more on my comic and watched an episode of The Wire and Alfred Hitchcock Presents.

It was another dull day at work. I got back at around six.

I actually think that I have nearly finished the script for the first issue of my comic. I know the look I want to go for on it. I'm going to try and write a few more issues this week and then at the weekend do some test drawings for the artwork.

Decorating

Last night I had a shot on my new games. Bayonetta seems like a fun shooting and beat-up game and Assassin's Creed II looks like it will be a really good game, with an interesting storyline. I also listened to the first part of The Honourable Schoolboy CD. The story is set after the British Secret Service has been ravaged by a traitor and spymaster George Smiley has been set in charge of repairing the damage, when he discovers that his arch-enemy, a Soviet spymaster code-named Karla is being financed by a Hong Kong gangster. In order to expose the link, Smiley sends a disreputable journalist and sometime spy into the Hong Kong underworld to investigate. It is pretty good. I also watched an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents about an alcoholic woman who wakes up in hospital with a badly injured hand and a bad hangover and tries to remember how she got there.

This morning my Dad called round and we went to the Gyle shopping centre. I had a cheese scone and a mocha coffee at the food court and then we went our seperate ways. I got a couple of books: Shoedog by George Pelecanos and Shame the Devil by George Pelecanos. Pelecanos is a crime author who sets all his books in and around Washington DC, he also had a lot of attention for writing several episodes of The Wire TV series.

We went along to my parent's house where the latest issue of Fortean Times had arrived. The main story this month concerned the idea that ancient mythology and religion could be explained by alien encounters. It was an idea that was very popular for awhile in the 1970s. We had roast chicken, stuffing, peas and diced roast potatoes in garlic butter for lunch followed by apple pie, which was really nice. In the afternoon I helped my Mom decorate their Christmas tree.

I'm planning on decorating my Christmas tree this evening.

Extras

Last night I was watching the whole of the second season of Extras on DVD. The show was a British sitcom created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, about a movie extra (basically one of the people hired to fill out the background in movies and TV shows) desperately trying to hit the big time. By the second season, Andy Millman (Gervais) is no longer an extra but has his own sitcom which he writes and stars in but, unfortunately for him, the BBC change his concept from a realistic, innovative sitcom to basically one relying on irritating catchphrases (such as "you 'aving a laugh? Is he having a laugh?"), sterotypes and comedy wigs and glasses. He also still has to deal with his friend Maggie (Ashley Jensen) and her disasterous love life and his idiotic agent Darren (Merchant) (when negotiating a deal for his client: "Does he still get paid even if his performance is crap?... He does? You've got more money than sense, mate".) Millman also manages to annoy almost everyone, including celebrities such as Orlando Bloom, Daniel Radcliffe, David Bowie, Ian McKellan and Robert DeNiro. I really like Ricky Gervais' stuff. I think that he is really funny.

It was the start of another week at work today. It was also really quiet, as it usually is.

I had an idea for something like a fantasy take on The Wire, and what I mean by that is that what I liked with The Wire was the way it created this deeply complex and detailed protrait of an American city, and I had the idea of doing the same thing except with a fictional city populated by supernatural creatures, I suppose something a bit like a supernatural soap opera in a way.

Feast Day

Last night I watched another episode from the second season of The Wire on DVD and a couple of episodes of South Park. I also collected a bunch of old DVDs and PC games and put them in the sack for the charity collection today.

I went along to work today and this time, luckily, the journey was without incident. They were having the annual "feast day" at work where the Team Leaders brought in food for everyone, and there was a lot of stuff. It was good, they had a selection of sandwiches, crisps, soft drinks, cakes, miniature sausages, sausage rolls, slices of pizza and various other bite size Chinese and Indian food. Despite a steady stream of people, there was still food left at the end of the day. lso on Friday it's the main office Christmas party. I'm not going to the party, but my friend Joe, who I have not seen in about seven months, is meeting some of his friends for a couple of hours before they go on to it, and so I should be going there. It should make a nice change.

My brother finally got in touch with me about what he wants for his Christmas. Apparently he wants either a book about King Charles spaniels or a book about the Lake District.

Morning Incident

Last night I was watching an episode from the second season of The Wire on DVD.

This morning as I was waiting at the bus stop on my way to work some drunk guy came up and asked for fifty pence, he wasn't really being aggressive or anything but he was kind of slightly tapping his finger on my jacket arm. I hate being touched so I was kind of really shocked by this, and this woman standing in front of me turned around and said to the guy: "Ah, leave him alone, you can tell there's something wrong with him!" The guy left, and I was left feeling totally humiliated and absolutely livid. I don't know what this woman thought was wrong with me. Most days I at least manage to get to work before I make a fool of myself.

The rest of the day was pretty much uneventful.

New Boots

Last night I was watching an episode of the second season of The Wire on DVD and followed it up with an episode of True Blood on TV. I've been really enjoying True Blood, and I really hope that they show the second season sometime. I think it's been pretty popular so they probably will.

It was another quiet day at work. I was wearing my new Dr Martens boots for the first time. They fit okay but they are kind of stiff, as always with new footwear, and hopefully it won't be long before they're broken in. On my way home I bought the Christmas and New Year double issue of Radio Times magazine. I remember when I was a kid, when my parents bought that magazine it was a sure time that Christmas was on the way. We'd look through and see if there were any good movies on, my Mum would get out the decorations and start giving Dad his orders and my Dad would pretend to fall asleep in front of the TV.

Games

Last night I was watching an hour long documentary on BBC Four about how to solve cryptic crosswords. It just seemed like a really odd thing to make a documentary out of, although it was pretty fun.

It was followed by the first part of a three part documentary called Games Britannia which basically traces the history of games in Britain. Many of the games survive in at least some form even to this day. Then I was watching another episode of The Wire on DVD. I was watching the second episode of the second season, which was dealing with murder and corruption on the Baltimore docks.

Today was another quiet day at work. I'm taking a day off work tomorrow which should be fun.

Masquerade

Last night was really quiet. I watched a couple more episodes of The Wire on DVD. It's kind of strange in a way that even though I have seen every episode of that show when it was on over the spring and summer I've still been really enjoying the DVDs, more so, perhaps, than I did when I first saw them. It's a very complex and involved show and it is very confusing until you really get into it. When you watch it again it's easier to get all the references and links to earlier and later episodes. The Wire has been described as a novel for television and it really is, with every episode being another chapter in the ongoing story. Later on I was watching a documentary called The Man Behind the Masquerade which was about the English artist Kit Williams who published an illustrated children's book in 1979 called Masquerade, which contained cryptic clues in it's illustrations which revealed the location of a jewelled golden hare which Williams had buried. The book was a huge sensation, but Williams eventually got sick of all the attention and retired from public view to work on his art in peace.

I was in work today and it was pretty busy so there was plenty to do. It's really hard for me to believe that I've been there for seven and a half years now. I got home at quarter to six.

My life is not wildly exciting.

Cold Lazarus

Last night I watched the first two episodes of Cold Lazarus, which was the last work by the writer Dennis Potter before his death of cancer in 1994. The show was broadcast in 1996 immediately after Karaoke, and the two shows kind of follow on from each other. In the 1990s writer Daniel Feeld (played by Arthur Finney, reprising his role from Karaoke) dies of cancer but, over 370 years later his cryogenically frozen head is reactivated by a team of scientists who want to study his memories. The future is depicted as a grim and violent world where Britain no longer exists as a country in it's own right and where the world is controlled by vast Virtual Reality entertainment companies who want to buy Feeld's memories to sell on their networks. However the scientists notice that Feeld seems to be attempting to edit and control the memories they can access, which makes them suspect that more of his brain than his memories have been accessed. It's a very dark and genuinely disturbing science-fiction piece but it does have plenty of wildly funny elements.

Today I took the day off work to celebrate finishing NaNoWriMo. In the morning I went off to the cinema and saw the movie Paranormal Activity, directed by Oren Peli. The film revolves around a young San Diego couple who seem to be plagued by unexplained phenomena, and so the guy, Micah (Micah Sloat), buys a video camera to record the events and, as with The Blair Witch Project, it's their home video footage that, allegedly, makes up the film. It's actually really quite scary, with most of the scares coming from strange noises and shadows in the dead of night.

After the movie I went out and did some shopping. I got the DVD of the TV serial Pennies From Heaven, which is another one of the Dennis Potter shows, and a book called The Wire: Truth Be Told by Rafael Alvarez, which is like a guidebook to The Wire TV series containing episode guides, interviews, behind the scenes pieces and essays.

The Word Count is Increasing

Yesterday I got to 12,418 words in my NaNoWriMo story. At least the word count is increasing (it has to be a minimum of 50,000 words by the end of November).

I watched the first three episodes of the first season of The Wire on DVD. It works really well on DVD. The Wire is one of those shows that you really need to see every episode in sequence and also pay a lot of attention because it's a very complex and intricate plot line. One of the good things with having the shows on DVD is that you're not really at the mercy of the TV schedulers.

Today I went along to the supermarket to get my groceries for the week.

More Words

It was another really busy night last night. I got up to 10,312 words with my NaNoWriMo novel, and I was so tired when I was finished that I almost immediately fell asleep on the sofa. I spent three hours working on it and I was so frustrated by the end that I really did feel like packing the whole thing in. I won't though. I'll keep on with it and win the challenge.

I was only in work for a half day today, which was really good. I stopped off and got the complete DVD box-set of The Wire TV series, so that should be really good.

The Chaser

Last night I listened to an episode of the radio series of The Twilight Zone called "The Chaser". The episode told the story of a young man who is madly in love with a woman who is oblivious to him, until he buys a love potion which turns out to work far too well. It was a pretty funny story and very enjoyable. After that I listened to a story being read in a series called Classic Tales of Horror. This one was called "Man in the Bell" and was about a man who is trapped at the top of a church bell tower as the bell is rung.

Then I finished reading the graphic novel of The Sandman - Volume Seven: Brief Lives written by Neil Gaiman. The comic book series of The Sandman ran from 1989 until 1996, and tells the story of Morpheus, more commonly known as Dream, and also known as The Sandman, the Master of Dreams. He is one of the Endless, a family of immortal beings, who also include Death, Delirium, Desire, Destiny, Despair and Destruction. In Brief Lives, Dream joins his sister Delirium as she searches for their brother Destruction who abandoned the family 300 years previously. It is a great book, and I really thnk that The Sandman is probably the greatest comic book series ever made, and probably one of the best fantasy stories ever published.

After that I finished reading A Most Wanted Man by John le Carre. The book is set in Hamburg and concerns Tommy Brue, the wealthy owner of a failing British bank based in the city. One night he gets a call from a young lawyer, Annabel Richter, whose new client is an illegal immigrant from Chechenya, who has the key and details for the largest account in Tommy's bank. Tommy has to find out how the man came by the information and also why he is being trailed by three of the world's most powerful intelligence agencies. It is a pretty good book, and a fairly exciting thriller, but not as good as the classic le Carre novels.

Today was a really quiet day at work. In the afternoon there was a meeting about a new rewards scheme being implemented at work, which involves giving people gift vouchers. The meeting itself could have just taken twenty minutes, but due to all the questions, comments and debate it ended up taking an hour and a half.

We also all got new chairs, and they have hired consultants to help teach people how to sit in them. Despite the fact that they are pretty much ordinary chairs, and I would have thought that most people would already know how to sit in chairs. On the way home I got a pack of blank VHS video cassettes.

There is also a vampire series starting on TV this week called True Blood, which I have heard of before but have never actually seen, and that is followed by a new series called Generation Kill, created by David Simon and Ed Burns (the creators of The Wire), so that should be a good night on TV.

Games and Check-Up

Last night, of course, I was watching the feature-length final episode of The Wire. It felt a real shame to kind of say goodbye to the series because it was so good. I'll have to get the DVD sets sometime.

Work was very quiet, as it usually is on a Friday, when most people take the day off. I left pretty early, at around half past two and went to the shops. I bought a couple of second hand PlayStation 3 games, Mirror's Edge and Prince of Persia. On my way home I stopped off at the doctor's surgery and dropped off my completed registration form, and showed them my passport and TV license as proof of identification and address. They want me to go for a New Patient check up at some point. I should call up to book it on Tuesday, because it takes two working days to get the details on the system.

Weekend Countdown

Last night I watched the latest episode of The Wire. The final, feature length episode of the show is on tonight. It will feel kind of strange when it's finished, just because I have been watching it so much. Apparently the show's creators were offered a lot of money to do a sixth season and a movie of the show, but they refused, because they felt that they had told the story that they wanted to tell.

It was another very quiet day at work. The main complainer was still going on and on, mostly about Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Eventually the boss had to tell him to shut up and stop shouting out his opinions to the entire room. At least there was work for pretty much the whole day today.

On my way home I bought a sausage supper to eat.

Complainers

Last night I was watching The Wire, which was another really good episode.

It was a really dull day at work again, and I was really tired again, for some reason. This morning there was the monthly staff meeting, in which basically they show us all a video produced by the management about what bright new ideas they've come up with this time and there is a chance to ask questions afterward. This time it almost ended up as a full scale of arguement, due to a bunch of people complaining over and over about changes to the employee evaluation system. I actually always get really sick to death of the people in the office, and there are several, who spend the whole time loudly moaning about every single thing. We also pretty much ran out of work by the middle of the afternoon, so there wasn't really anything much to do.

I got home at around ten to five this afternoon.

Mind Well the Tree

Last night I was listening to an episode of Fear on Four on the radio. The show was a series of half hour one-off horror dramas, which were originally broadcast on Radio Four in the UK, but they are now on Radio Seven. This week's episode was called "Mind Well the Tree" and told the story of a wealthy couple who inherit a large mansion from the husband's aunt. The husband who has always hated the place stays away from it as much as possible while the wife finds herself increasingly preoccupied by a ghostly presence surrounding an old, dead tree in the grounds. Later on I watched some of The Simpsons Movie which was pretty funny, and I kind of half-watched Taxi Driver, which is a really great film, but which I have seen many, many times.

Another week of work started today, of course, and it was fairly ordinary and very dull. I was looking forward to getting back, as usual. I musn't have slept very well last night because I was tired all day. Although I do always tend to feel much better once I get home.

The final three episodes of The Wire are being broadcast over this week. I do think it is one of the best shows that has ever been on TV. The show is a crime drama which ran for sixty episodes over five seasons, created by David Simon and Ed Burns. It's set in Baltimore and is initially about a police unit set up to investigate and gather evidence against drug dealing gangs in the city, using a variety of surveillance techniques including wiretaps. David Simon described the series as being a portrait of a major American city and the corruption in the various institutions. The first season deals with the drug trade, the second season deals with corruption on the docks, the third season deals with politics, the fourth season deals with the education system and the fifth season deals with the print media. Each episode is very complex and multi-layered dealing with a variety of plot-lines.

Registration

Last night I watched an episode of Mock the Week which was very funny. It's a comedy panel show where there are two teams of comedians who basically make jokes and generally poke fun at current events and public figures. It is really funny. Later on I watched the last of this week's episodes of The Wire.

Today started off pouring with rain. I was absolutely drenched by the time I got into work. Literally I was soaked to the skin, but it did brighten up later on. I left early, shortly before three. On my way home I stopped off at a nearby doctor's surgery in order to register. I've kept meaning to do it for ages. They're certainly thorough. There's about four pages of forms to fill in and I need to bring them along photo ID and a bill or something with my address on it.

Clockers

Last night I watched a movie from 2006 on DVD called Red Road, directed by Andrea Arnold. The film is set in Glasgow, and tells the story of a CCTV operator named Jackie (played by Kate Dickie) who spends her time monitoring the city and reporting anyone in distress or committing a crime to the authorities. One day she spots a man from her past on her monitor, the last man who she wants to see, and who she thought was in prison. Jackie becomes preoccupied with following the man's actions and eventually finds herself compelled to confront him and her own past. The film is intriguing and very well-made, although almost unrelentingly bleak and grim. The title comes from the name of a quite notorious area of Glasgow.

This morning I went out and got my groceries for the week. After I had had my lunch I headed out to the Filmhouse and met up with my friend Chris from work. We were there to see a special screening of the film Clockers. The movie was made in 1995, directed by Spike Lee and based on a novel by Richard Price. The film is set in the housing projects of New York and tells the story of Strike (Mekhi Phifer), who is a "clocker" - a low-level drug dealer. When a rival dealer is shot and killed, Strike's brother Victor (Isaiah Washington) confesses to the crime, however veteran homicide detective Rocco Klein (Harvey Keitel) smells a rat and determines to find the truth. The film is lurid but gripping. The film was followed by an audience question and answer session with Richard Price, moderated by crime novelist Ian Rankin.

Afterwards Chris and I went to look around at the record and DVD shops. I got a book called Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman. After that we went to the Edinburgh Book Festival and had a drink before going in to see David Simon, who has written a couple of non-fiction books and co-created the TV series The Wire. As would be expected from his work, Simon was very clever and funny. After the talk we managed to meet him and he signed my copy of Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets. Coincidentally, Richard Price also wrote for The Wire.

Finally, Chris and I went and had a whiskey and listened to a band play a couple of strange jazz style easy listening songs, before we went our seperate ways.

The Weekend is in Sight

Tonight was the last of this week's batch of episodes of The Wire. It's kind of funny to think that in a couple of weeks it'll all be over.

I've been enjoying my new mobile phone. So far it is a lot of fun. I've recently put on a couple of wallpapers and screensavers to personalise it a bit.

Today was another very quiet and pretty uneventful day at work. On my way in I stopped off to renew my bus pass for the next month.

At the moment I'm sitting here listening to a country music show on the radio.

You Have Been Watching

Last night I was watching a comedy panel show called You Have Been Watching in which basically, the host and a panel of comedians and TV presenters poke fun at the week's television. It can be very funny at times. Following that I saw the latest epsiode of The Wire, which was pretty good.

Today has been pretty quiet. It was a fairly dull day at work, and the work ran out about an hour before the end of the day, however at that time it was really too late to do much about it.

I'm still pretty much set on pretty much abandoning the whole idea of dating. To be honest I just find it depressing and pointless because it never actually has worked for me. Maybe if I get to Canada I might change my mind, but I honestly doubt it.