In my last year of Junior school, we talked too much, so to try and stop us our teacher sat us all boy-girl-boy-girl. I ended up next to Wade Elliott, who on Monday scored the goal that took his team into the Premiership. Mrs Rogers, you chose your punishment well. :)

I spent a blissful bank holiday weekend with friends in Newark. We went to a beer festival (the beer was mostly gone. But there were bagpipes, which pretty much hit the same spot). Summer was officially launched with my first barbecue of the year (in fact, officially, summer begins when you're at a barbecue and Will Smith in the back of your head is wondering how the smell from a grill can spark off nostalgia). And we went on a boat trip (this weekend was brought to you by the letter B. Did I mention that we were staying in a bed & breakfast?).

( I bring pictures )

In TV news, Ashes to Ashes is so easily my favourite thing on at the moment that I am having to stop myself reporting my scene-by-scene reaction each episode. And there are only two more episodes to go! I wrote what is really a sloppy essay recording my love for the Gene/Alex dynamic this series cunningly disguised as drunk!fic. (I should clarify, it was not me that was drunk. I do admit to shameless use of alcohol as a plot device/excuse for ham-handed writing though.) I am too embarrassed to post it here, but here's a blink-and-you'll miss it link: Postscript.

Tags: ashes to ashes, picspam
Current Mood: relaxed

( ER )

( Ashes to Ashes )

Episode 5 starts in minutes, so I must run. But I can't go without wishing the most wonderful of birthdays to dear wisteria_. I'm always so glad you're here, and I hope you have a happy day!

Tags: ashes to ashes, er

It doesn't take much: a Wispa bar and pink lemonade and I am anyone's bitch. Or at least, I am strangely susceptible where trashy, culty teen vampire films are concerned. Somewhere between my first and third viewing I went from being all objective and coat-discerning to out-and-out fangirly.

( ♥ )

I shall conquer this. I shall!

::cackles::

Two weeks into ( Ashes to Ashes )

And finally, the thought of Toby Stephens out-camping the rest of the cast on Robin Hood is almost enough to make me watch it. Almost. :)

Tags: ashes to ashes, twilight
Current Mood: cheerful
Current Music: pas de deux - nutcracker suite

Olives was the wrong snack. I spent the opening scenes of ( Twilight: the movie )

Anyway, tonight I am better equipped. I have pink lemonade and a Wispa bar. I have to get my money's/public humiliation's worth, so I am off to re-watch. :)

There, I'm done. Gene Hunt returns to my life on Monday. We'll pretend like this never happened. ;)

Tags: twilight
Current Mood: silly

( Doctor Who )

In other news, I am Anna, and I am still sharing. I'll stop! I will. :) Next time.

( Book Four )

Ha! Who cares? I have olives. It's Friday. I have two hours of unabashed teen fantasy to look forward to. It's all good. :)

I am a week late here, but the very best of belated birthday wishes to annamir! I hope you had a wonderful day. And almost-on-time birthday wishes to poshcat and moscow_watcher! I hope you had the happiest of days!

Tags: twilight
Current Mood: refreshed

Last winter, or possibly the winter before, I posted the first two parts of my Buffy/Rainbow extravaganza, Over the Rainbow. Having hunted out exactly when and where, I've discovered it was in fact 2004. Whoops! The final two parts have been sitting half-done on my PC for just about ever, so I have been working hard to make them ship-shape, and this is Part 3.

Back in 2004, I promised: Next time, Buffy arrives at the Rainbow House! Can she stop Spike having his wicked way? Wacky hijinks ensue!

Which is roughly what you get. :) Although is "hijinks" a word? Should it be "high jinks"?

It helps if you've watched Buffy, but you could, I suspect, get away without knowing the first thing about Rainbow.

Catch up: Part 1; Part 2

( Over the Rainbow, Part 3 )

Hopefully I'll get the last part posted before another four-and-a-half years are up!

Today the very best of birthday wishes go to jonesiexxx! Have a lovely day, and may the snow hold off! Or hold back, at least. Also, the happiest of birthdays tomorrow to mistakency! Have a wonderful day. ::sends scones::

Tags: buffy/spike, fic: btvs

I have spent all day configurating, and to no avail. I like grappling with technology, but I like it more when I come out on top. Today I drowned in user manuals.

Yesterday my copy of New Moon arrived. It was a warehouse damaged copy from Amazon that cost 1p, so you can see that I had to intervene. It might have been pulped! My motives are heroic, practically.

( I am not done with the sparkling )

Now, some links.

My Little Pony Jack Sparrow! Hee! Most of these are quite disturbing actually.

Writing for a living: a joy or a chore? Whingeing about writing, which I can always relate to. Of course, what they all need to do is listen to more Linkin Park. :)

I can't stop listening to Take That's The Garden. I love the way Mark fumbles emotionally around the notes and Gary comes in three octaves higher. In knitwear! Also, I only have five songs saved on my laptop, so I have no choice.

I am slow here, but happy belated birthday to my very dear pocketmate lynnb! I hope you had a lovely day.

Anyway, I must go and do useful things. Youth Club accounts and Yellowstone are calling. Not to mention yachting, yo-yoing, and yeti hunting.

If I can stop making Spike sound like Gene Hunt, I'll be back in a day or two with long-neglected fic. Don't get too excited though.

Tags: twilight
Current Mood: silly

I fear that sometimes I treat LJ a little like a confessional. It's such a nice place to come and unburden one's conscience. There's been something sinking its teeth into mine all week, so I am going to share.

( A confession. Beware! Some sparkling. )

There. You can point and laugh now.

Tags: twilight
Current Mood: guilty

Happy Valentines Day! Sorry, I got that wrong. Happy Bolero's Silver Wedding!

I'm watching a programme called "The story of Bolero with Torvill and Dean". Yes, it is possible to make an entire TV programme about one skating routine, and there are willing volunteers to watch it, namely me. Sechs-komma-null! Good times. That, Philip Schofield and Tears for Fears. What more could you want on a Saturday night?

It was just lovely to have a spuffy reunion on my Snow Day, and I am so sorry to be slow replying to comments. The snow melted all too quickly. But I'll get there tomorrow.

( Fandom things )

Sleeping is called for. I ramble.

Sweet dreams!

Tags: er
Current Mood: nostalgic
Current Music: dummm da-da-da-da-da-da dum da-da-dum

Snow Day 2! You don't get days gifted to you very often, and this one was an opportunity too good to let pass by. I have indulged, big time, and enjoyed myself enormously.

There's nothing new in this, but I love how hindsight and a few years' distance lets you experience something all over again, the same and yet not the same. And there are some things that are always worth revisiting.

( It wouldn't be you, Spike. It would never be you. You're beneath me. )

Tags: buffy/spike
Current Mood: satisfied
Current Music: elbow - something about curtains

Snow day! The last time I remember this happening I was in infant school. I'm not convinced I was risking life and limb to get into work this morning, but I did have to put on my wellies, which is probably almost as serious. Wellies always make me feel slightly like I have superpowers. You can slosh through puddles, and mud, and even snow – yes, snow! – and live to tell the tale.

When I did arrive it turned out that the college was closed, although strangely still visible through the half an inch of snow in which it was buried, and since the chief source of heating seemed to be tea, and no-one else was hanging around, I set out across the arctic wasteland once more and returned home.

Hee! We are absolutely allowed to come to a standstill over a wee smattering of snow, since the next opportunity to get trays out and slide down hills might be in another twenty years' time. Case in point: I had padded myself amply against being caught by wayward snowballs today, but in the event risked only being dusted by handfuls of snow, because there was a whole generation of children out there today with only the thinnest of concepts of what a snowball might be.

The local news reported that "snowmen, staff and pupils struggled to make it into school today," which seemed slightly loopy even for local news gone snow-happy. It turned out that it was actually "snow meant staff and pupils struggled to make it into school today." More logical, but less visually appealing. ;)

I have been trying to coax birds into the garden to have their photos taken in the snow, but they have been unwilling to oblige. And I couldn't go outdoors without scaring them away, so these are taken through the window and lacking pristine sparkliness.

( Snow ho ho ho )


February is probably too late to wish you a Happy New Year, but I hope all of you are having one, all the same!

And a very happy birthday to soundingsea! I hope you have a lovely day.

Tags: picspam
Current Mood: cheerful

I knew there was only so long I could be the last remaining person on earth without a cold, and sure enough, here I am on Christmas day with limbs of lead and a throat that feels like someone's been at it with a chisel. Nice. :) Still, all is not lost! I have David Morrissey and a Matthew & Alesha reprise to look forward to, and a blanket and a cup of tea.

I will be back before long, but in the mean time, the happiest of holidays to all of you! Take care. xxxx

Current Mood: sick

Finally, and not before time, I find myself in a week with bits of free time spread happily all the way through it. So this weekend I go into my local Blockbuster Video for the first time in ten years, and find a shiny, new box set of BSG Season 4 waiting just for me. And of course, by Monday night I have seen it all and now there are no new, shiny episodes left in the world until January.

This is probably a good thing. Maybe I deliberately ration my free time to keep a lid on my compulsive viewing habit. ;)

Hee. I don't think my journal represents this very well, but actually, I don't watch much TV.

Anyway.

( BSG 4.1-10 )

Children in Need this Friday is promising me Gene Hunt on Top Gear and David Morrissey in Doctor Who. My wishes may not always be granted, but there are times when they come pretty close. :)

Tags: battlestar galactica
Current Mood: excited
Current Music: Motorcade - Goldspot

I seem to have been on summer hiatus, which was not intended. Time got away from me, and the million-and-one-things I would have liked to do went with it. I think there are independent life forms growing on my keyboard, which gives you some idea. But I did have some wonderful, happy days, and it's lovely to be back.

TV has also been on summer hiatus, although I did watch a lot of Olympics during a soggy summer break, Matt Baker's gymnastics commentary being my personal highlight. With the return of socks to my life signalling autumn sniffing around the corner, though, TV is back in action. And hence so am I. :)

The first two episodes of ( Lost in Austen )

Talking of Jane Austen, Chawton House are holding a Jane Austen FanFic Competition. That's not quite how they phrase it. ;)

I have an ulterior motive for watching ( Tess of the D'Urbervilles )

In other TV news, the Battlestar Galactica DVD out next month will give me a chance to catch up on season 4 so far, which I'm muchly looking forward to. Strictly Come Dancing will, as always, get me through the winter, and every now and again I find myself with a great big grin thinking about the new series of Ashes to Ashes next year.

Oh, asta77! I had a week of free evenings in the summer and meant to listen to Brideshead Revisited in bits, but ended up staying up half the night to hear the whole thing all at once. Jamie was brilliantly cast, and compelling enough to hold my attention for hours. You'd know all about that, I think. :)

Anyway, I have to head off to youth club shortly, but I will be back sooner next time!

ETA: The first Buffy quote that popped into my head:
BUFFY "Also? I think you're drunk."

Oh, show.

Current Mood: hopeful

I am sitting in my spare room with the window open, being cooed at by a collared dove, with a summer evening breeze wafting lacy curtains in my direction. And I'm eating a cake that matches my skirt (cherry bakewell). It's all very pleasant. Summer is - in my world - always worth the time it takes to get here.

( Doctors Who and Horrible )

The weekend before last I got to spend with mistakency, who is entirely lovely in both written and human forms. mistakency, it was wonderful to meet you, and I wish you the happiest of rest-of-trips! The pigs miss you already. :)

Tags: doctor who, dr horrible
Current Mood: content
Current Music: Feeder - Guided by voices

I meant to do all sorts of useful things this morning, but some opportunities are just too good to pass up, so I read a book in the garden and watched a blackbird having a bath.

I always enjoy the Steven Moffat Who episodes, and while I can't say I loved this without reservation as I did the Doctor Dances and Blink, I did love all of these:

( Forest of the Dead )

Tags: doctor who

Yesterday was a day of beautiful sunshine, and a Michael Vaughan century. They come not better, I tell you. :)

It was also wisteria_'s birthday, and I hope it was wonderful, and that the year ahead brings you much happiness. And happy birthday treacle_a!

I've made it to the end of ( Life on Mars )

In furniture news, I'd been looking everywhere for something to store my CDs in, since they'd outgrown their previous home. Everything was overpriced and space-squandering, until finally I found a flat-pack unit for a tenner on Ebay. I put it together yesterday and look! Isn't it darling? It fits comfortably into an awkward space under my cupboard door, and you can pile the CDs up the other way and squeeze a lot more of them in if you need to, and it even matches my bookcase.

( See?  )

I've just seen the time, and must go and get dressed. Oops! I'll be back. :)

Tags: life on mars

After about nineteen attempts and more-or-less as many email addresses I finally managed to download the new Coldplay single. It didn't make me cry, the way Politik did when I first heard it. It sounds a bit like the OC theme tune. With beers. And bronchitis. I think it might be a grower. :)

( Ashes to Ashes, Life on Mars )

( Doctor Who )

Eeek, I have ten minutes to pack and catch a train. I'm behind on comment replies, but will get there before too long! In the mean time, love to you all.

Tags: ashes to ashes, doctor who, life on mars
Current Music: Vienna - Ultravox

As ever, click on the pictures if you want the full-sized versions, since these are a wee bit jaggedy.

( Italy, prettily )

Tags: picspam

I've just got back from a week in the Italian lakes (technically, not "in"), which were jaw-droppingly lovely. We had three days' glorious sunshine and three days' solid rain (technically, liquid), which is a combination that brings such an abundance of camellias and azaleas and rhododendrons my eyes positively ache. When I get myself organised (Friday?) I will post some pictures, although now I kind of wish I'd set the expectation of prettiness a little lower.

My TV guide a week or so back had an article pitting Doctor Who against Battlestar Galactica, which seems to me a bit like asking whether you prefer ice cream or soup. They fulfil entirely different needs.

Somewhere on a TV not far from me the new season of BSG is showing, but since it's not my TV (ah, Sky, you mysterious satellite channel you) I am pretending to myself that I am not actually sneaking looks at people's post-episode thoughts. The spoiler whore in me is being firmly suppressed where BSG is concerned. Its chief joy, I think, is not in discovering what the plot twists are but in watching them unravel, and so for now I'm biding my time. I did watch Razor a little while back though, which was easily the best TV I'd seen in months. BSG is particularly polished TV. I'd forgotten how beautiful it is to look at, and the music is gorgeous, and the attention to detail immensely rewarding. But scrape away the polish and the story has a brick-by-brick trueness to it. It's so carefully crafted.

Doctor Who, meanwhile, is making me beam happily rather than think at this point, which is all good. I did have a moment in the first episode where I was starting to become a bit anxious about the wisdom of leaving car keys in a bin, and then of all things going and telling some random blonde woman where to find them, and I was just thinking I was going to worry about it for the rest of the series when my actual brain kicked in and I keeled over sideways in a kind of wordless heap. EEEEEEE!

I was staying with my sister Saturday night, and we watched Doctor Who followed by Jeeves and Wooster, which caused my sister to come up with the most inspired companion in the history of the known universe.

Doctor: [holds out hand, mid important plot-solving bit of techno-fixery] Screwdriver?
Jeeves: [clears throat] If you'll pardon me, sir, I have already attended to that.

Anyway I like it here, and I always have to tear myself away too soon, but I must run as I have a hot (if woefully underused) date. Nathan Fillion on Desperate Housewives may not be everyone's idea of a good time, but it works for me. :)

I'll be back with photos and news of my latest all-consuming TV crush. Stop me if you've heard that one before. ;)

Tags: battlestar galactica, doctor who