Piano in the House

Last night I listened to a radio adaptation of The Twilight Zone, it was presenting a story called "Piano in the House", about a bitter theatre critic who buys a player piano for his wife's birthday, however the piano has the power to make people admit their deepest secrets, and the critic's plan to use it to humiliate his friends at his wife's birthday party very quickly backfires. It was pretty good, and it was a very faithful adaptation of the TV episode.

Later on I was rearranging the posters that I got on Sunday on my walls, and I came across some old catalogue that was stuck between the radiator and the wall and which had obviously been there since before I moved into this place four years ago. It was just kind of odd to find. I watched a pretty good documentary about the writer Douglas Adams (who created The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy).

Today it was a really dull day at work, as usual. However, there was a meeting of the trade union about proposed cuts in pay. The meeting took about an hour.

Empty Meeting

Last night I was really, really tired. I didn't really do any writing at all, aside from a few sentences, because I could barely see straight. Later in the evening I watched an episode of The Wire and that made things better.

It was another busy day at work. One good thing was that someone brought in ice-cream for everyone at the table. They were those Magnum choc-ices and they were really nice. In the afternoon I went to a Union meeting in the office cafeteria. There were only about seventeen people there, so it was a very low turn-out. Maybe because it was held during the late afternoon on a nice, sunny afternoon. There was a sheet passed around for people to fill in when they were going to be taking holidays during the next four months. I didn't fill the sheet in because I have no idea when I might be going on holiday.

After having such a long day at work yesterday I left pretty early today. I am going to try and do more writing this evening though.

Smoke Alarm

Last night I was listening to the third part of The Woman in Black, based on the Susan Hill novel, in this episode the young lawyer ends up spending a night in the haunted house, searching for the identity of the mysterious woman in black. I also listened to the third part of Ancient Sorceries, based on the Algernon Blackwood story, in this episode the shy English clerk discovers the monsterous truth behind the hotel landlady and her daughter, and finds out that they have their own plans for him. They've been really good. The Woman in Black is a full cast radio play, but Ancient Sorceries is just a reading of the story by actor Philip Madoc. It's good though. He does it very well.

I was in work late today, and the reason I was late was because I was fixing my smoke alarm, which had been beeping intermittently for the past couple of days, meaning the batteries are low and need to be changed. It's silent at the moment, but I don't know how long that will last. I won't be able to get any new batteries until the weekend anyway, so I'll just have to live with it until then.

Work was really dull again today. There was an Annual General Meeting for the Union, but I didn't go along. The meetings are always really dull and nothing ever gets decided, also I'm pretty sick of the union anyway. By all accounts the meeting was pretty much true to form and I didn't miss anything.

Tomorrow is my last day at work before my two week holiday.

Some Random Thoughts

Today at work there was an e-mail going around that there was to be another Union meeting tomorrow morning about the pay issue, despite the fact that this year's pay deal has already gone through. The thing is that we're not getting any time credited to attend the meeting, which would mean anyone attending would lose an about an hour at least. I'm not going to go along. I don't want to lose the time. Also, to be honest, I'm getting kind of sick of the thing. They've been doing exactly the same things for the past four years, and never really make any progress. Also everyone is getting absolutely sick of the whole thing, especially after having two strikes inside of one month.

Aside from that it was a fairly quiet day. I was listening to my iPod in the afternoon again and eating extra-strong mints. I like them actually. They are quite refreshing.

The original version of The Omen was on TV last night, but I didn't watch it. I've got it on DVD and I've seen it loads of times before anyway. I was reading an entertaining essay by Harlan Ellison a couple of weeks ago, heavily criticising the level of violence in horror movies of the late '70s and early '80s and The Omen was cited as the main example of gratuitous violence especially one particular scene (which I won't mention in case anyone hasn't seen it).

In our office there are some people who talk endlessly about pretty much anything that comes into their minds, even to complete strangers, or people who have absolutely no interest in what they are talking about. It was sound weird, but I really kind of envy people that can do that. I find it extremely to speak to people one on one, because I get extremely shy and kind of clam up, however I am very good at speaking in public. I just find it really difficult having a conversation, and I often wish I was better at it.

I've been trying to experiment recently in opening up more in this journal and writing more about thoughts, feelings and opinions and so on.