This week I have been acting as if I'm not ill. So now I am regretting it. There went my weekend of actually getting things done.

But on Tuesday I went to see Harry Potter. It was good and I was very glad I hadn't read the book since it came out because I remembered quite a bit of it. Although it was quite surreal watching it, having played Lego Harry Potter. I kept recognising bits of Hogwarts.

Today I posted my Sci-Fi Big Bang story: The Atlantis Sacrifice, which turned into a massive pain in the arse. First I discovered that the plugin I have that automatically posts links between all parts of your fic broke a few WP versions ago. There are alternatives, but they just create new taxonomies, and I can do that myself.

Then uploading multiple chapters to A03 was really hard. I didn't look at the help because I expected it to be obvious. I ended up with chapters in the wrong order and some of them repeated. And I thought it was all draft, but it wasn't.

And then LJ decided not to let me read the comm. It still isn't, but I can still open individual posts and the RSS feed is definitely updating, so I don't know what its problem is.

The word count on this Big Bang was 25,000, but I only managed 24,100. It took enough effort to add in the last 3000, I wasn't going to manage another 900. And annoyingly, it's still not the longest thing I've ever written. The last Big Bang I did had a word count of 20,000 and I wrote 26,000.

But now it's all finished and posted and I really have no excuse to not start of my femgenficathon fic.

Back when I wrote some LOTR drabbles for my drabble a day month, I thought about how much of the whole universe I've forgotten. I thought a bank holiday weekend would be good for watching all three films, one a day because it's been years since I saw them. I didn't quite make it for the May ones, but I did manage it this weekend.

And it's not just facts I've forgotten either. I'd forgotten how funny and brave Pippin was, how loyal Sam was, how pretty Anduril was. And Elrond. I don't think he was right in the film, in terms of looks -he was too old and not pretty enough. But he spends most of the last two angsting over Arwen, and for that, I can forgive a lot.

I stopped writing in the fandom because I thought I've said everything I could about Elrond and Estel. Well, Elrond in general, but those two especially. And now I'm thinking there are loads of things I didn't write. Which could have been because I read them instead, but, that was years ago anyway.

I am currently re-reading Nilmandra's History Lessons because it's good and has lots of Elrond, but also because I've forgotten a lot and if LOTR is hard to get through (and it is - I hate description, Tolkien loves it...), The Silmarillion is worse.

I did, however, manage to write a drabble: My Heart and in the words of Samwise Gamgee: I'm back. Or at least, I intend to be.

And I leave you with my new found screen capping ability of one of my favourite scenes (despite not being in the book) as it features Elrond, Aragorn and an exceedingly pretty sword.
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I couldn't decide whether or not to go and see the new Alice in Wonderland film. I'd seen pictures and knew it was Tim Burton, so I knew it was going to be weird. Given that Alice in Wonderland is my favourite book, I was either going to love it or hate it. My sister thought it was "alright", so I thought I'd go and see it this afternoon.

The cinema was nice and empty. The 3D glasses cost me 80p(!) and say on them that you should only wear them in theatres. So I shouldn't have been wearing them in the cinema... The thing with 3D glasses is they used to be cardboard with red and green coloured eyes. Now they're proper plastic glasses, which don't work well over glasses. So my nose really hurt. And the 3D didn't add anything - it was completely pointless, but there wasn't an option of seeing it in 2D.

The film itself was a bit of a case of spot-the-actor. Alice's mum was Lindsay Duncan. I spent the film trying to work out why I recognised Hamish - it turns out he was in the first series of Ashes to Ashes, which I watched recently. And I eventually worked out that Alice's brother-in-law was a copper, but I had to look it up to discover he was one of the Sergeants in Midsomer Murders.

I liked it more than the SyFy version - although that did turn Alice into an American, which I object to in principle. They both used the same bits of the books and missed out some of the best bits - like The Walrus and the Carpenter for instance.

My two complaints with it were that the young Alice looked like a doll and they kept calling the Jobberwock the Jabberwocky. To the extent where I thought maybe I was wrong, but I looked it up when I got home and it is the poem that is called Jabberwocky, the creature in it is a Jabberwock. That's quite hard to get wrong if they'd just read the books!

All in all it was alright, but they took a lot of the childish mystery out of it. They turned croquet into a horrible sport that hurt the hedgehog and that's not what it's all about. I'd say that the books are much better, but that's always going to be the case, really.

It's been a bit of a dramatic week this week. First my landlord delivered my new washing machine last Saturday. Except when I did some washing when it spun it made loud noises and moved around - so much so that it came out from under the side and the pipe taking waste water away came out, so there was soapy horrible water all over the cupboard under the sink. I looked in the manual and on the internet about what it could be and found it must be something to do with it not being level. Read more...

This weekend couldn't be more of a contrast to last weekend: Last Sunday I spent freezing and wishing I could go back in time to the day before to turn the heating on. This Sunday was boiling and I had all the windows open. Today at least there's more of a breeze and no sun. But I do have to close the windows in the lounge to hear the telly over the trains...

I tidied and my lounge feels so much bigger, even though pretty much all I did was sort out all the piles of paper I had on my dining room table and coffee table. I also rearranged it a bit. I realised, after coming back from being at home, that the telly wasn't really in the best place to see it from the sofa. And because I'd pulled it out of the corner a bit, there was a whole load of wasted space in the corner. So I rearranged my desks and telly a bit. And even took photos: Before 1, Before 2, After 1, After 2. Spot the magically moving pictures above my desk and amazing disappearing balloon!

Friday I saw In the Loop, which was really good. It was nicer to see it on a smaller screen than the one I saw Star Trek on. But I did spend the whole thing trying to work out where I recognised Simon Foster from and it was only when I looked it up that I discovered he was Guy Burgess in Cambridge Spies. One of the funny bits in it was when Malcolm Tucker (who's Scottish) told the American General not to call him English, and the General just look bewildered as to why! In an interview with Armando Iannucci he says that he's doing a second series of The Thick of It, which will be good.

I've also signed up for who_remix, partly on the basis that if I don't have to write anything I never will while I'm still ill.

I went to see Star Trek yesterday. It's been tradition, starting with Insurrection to go and see it on the opening day. Even if it didn't, technically speaking, open until today...

I enjoyed it, specifics below (needless to say, with spoilers). Read more...

I went to see Prince Caspian last night and it was really good. I really want Peter's sword, which I think I thought when I saw The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe. I've been working on getting the books in the same version my sister had when we were kids, because I remember so little about the series.

The only thing was I spent a lot of time feeling sorry for Peter because he was having to make all these really hard decisions, just because he was the eldest. Possibly this has something to do with me being the eldest and possibly it has something to do with my mood not really having improved at all.

Today I had the day off and I'm not going back to work till Wednesday. So I don't have to worry about the project that loses me the will to live on a daily basis. When I eventually managed to wake myself up I spring cleaned the kitchen. It took two hours and I didn't half ache afterwards (and sweating in rubber gloves really isn't pleasant) but it looks so much better now. I will definitely be moving the microwave and cleaning under and behind it more often. It's amazing how little stuff I actually got rid of, yet how much more space I have. Not that I'm complaining. I did manage to fill my recycling box with carrier bags, though. They must have been breeding.

Tomorrow I'm off to a windmill in Somerset for the weekend with some people from uni, which I am looking forward to. Then I'm coming back to do more spring cleaning and see if I can get it done before my parents come to visit (then I might have space to put the router).

I finally got round to seeing Pirates of the Caribbean 3 by renting it from amazon rentals. And I have to say: what happened in it? I don't remember the second film, which doesn't help, so I was confused from the start, but even at the end I was confused by who was alive and who was dead.

I thought I was being really good in actually making an appointment to go to the dentist. I think it was a year ago they sent me a reminder to go. It had been long enough that I'd forgotten how much I hate it. And how much my bank balance hates it (you can't get NHS dentists round here). For once I didn't get the usual lecture about how badly I clean my teeth. I'd have preferred it, though, because I have a wisdom tooth decaying, so it needs to come out.

I can at least get it done under general anaesthetic - it's interesting how quickly my dentists work out how much of a good idea that is with me. The most annoying thing about it is that that tooth was a complete bugger coming up and it took years for it to do it too. I can totally understand why teething babies scream - it's bloody painful!

I got my Ian/Barbara ficathon assignment today. I've got as far as working out the setting, I just need some sort of plot so I can write it this weekend.

I went to see St Trinian's this evening, which was really funny. It wasn't filmed at the place where I've been to a ball - I think the cinema got confused on their leaflet (they had the right town, wrong posh place). Needless to say, as there are only four actors in Britain (all of whom have been in The Bill and Doctor Who), I recognised quite a few of them. And the head cameraman is my friend's neighbour. And his wife is a script editor, apparently.

I kind of feel like I've not been updating this much recently. I've been making an effort to get the first draft of my TARDIS Big Bang done. So far I've written 17 chapters of 26, for the best part of 13,000 words. I've been writing a chapter or two a night and I have to fit it round my back and the other things I have to do that involve the computer.

Last night was Burns Supper - albeit a week after Burns Night. Which was good, although it got a bit confusing with women pretending to be men in the celidh. Mind you, we were confused enough as it was, but then that's half the fun. I just wish I could still eat the haggis - it's very nice, as long as you don't think about what it is. I've remembered why I hate driving in High Wycombe - we got confused with two of us, navigating and my sat nav.

I'm quite liking the new printer. It does actually have a paper-out tray - it's the same as the paper-in tray, but has a divider in between so they don't get mixed up. Despite what I said I ended up getting one that's also a scanner, since it was only £30 and had good reviews. I'm still getting used to how to use it, but I like the way it does back to back printing.

I got Hot Fuzz from Amazon rentals because it seems like everyone at work has seen it. I think it's supposed to be funny. But it's just a bit of a bad parody really. So now I'm doing other things while it finishes, and I'm getting the gist.

I've been meaning to write a post about this for ages. With the stuff I watch or read, I keep finding parent & child relationships where they're not actually related (or at least, don't have that direct relationship) fascinating. I've got a perfectly normal family going on, so there's no psychological reason like that, I just like it.

melliyna asked:
1. In your fandom(s), what are your favourite parent/child relationships? (biological or non biological parents and children) Why?
so I thought I'd answer here, rather than in a comment.
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Happy Birthday just-ann-now! I assume it's today as I've only seen messages on other people's LJs today.

This afternoon I watched Pirates of the Caribbean with a friend who hadn't seen it before. It's been ages since I saw it and I'd forgotten how good it was.

I was good and did some prompts. For Ian and Jo it was just thetenspot, Harry it was ROTM as usual (I like their prompts) and I wrote something long for alt!Harry that wasn't angsty. But did involve him and women as per usual.

And I was much more coherent earlier, but I need more sleep. Specially as I have to get up early on Friday to collect for Children in Need before work.

I've just been to see Stardust. It's terrible, I keep meaning to read some Neil Gaiman books. I've read Good Omens, seen Neverworld and read his blog, but that's it. So I thought I'd see the film. I was slightly worried that it was a love story so was going to be soppy. I thought Neil Gaiman must be mad to describe it as being like The Princess Bride, because that's a fencing film.

But it was ok, because it was good and I really enjoyed it. The best bit by far was swordfighting to the Can Can. There were lots of other good bits, but nothing so great as swordfighting to the Can Can.

The only trouble was that it was a British film, so I spent most of the time trying to work out who everyone was. I failed to recognise Robert De Niro was Robert De Niro. I was distracted by Dishwater Sal, who eventually turned out (courtesy of imdb) to be Marie Carver in The Bill, and Hazel in Auf Weidersehen, Pet. I recognised Ricky Gervais, unfortunately. He stands out so much because he can't act. I also recognised Billy the goat who played Arthur Weasley and was in Red Dwarf.

The one person who is driving me mad, though, is the main pirate on Captain Shakespeare's ship. The imdb just lists pirates and none of them clicked. Anyone any idea who he is to put me out of my misery?

I decided today to go to Tesco in Abingdon, since I was about to run out of bread mix and, thanks to Harry Pearce, I needed some chocolate buttons. Since the bridge is closed I went the long way round, in a bit of mist only to find, when I got there that:
a) they've moved things around
b) they labelled their red grapefruit pink (doesn't make it pink, Tescos!)
c) they've got rid of the chocolate buttons. They don't even have a space for them. They were the only place round here that sold them. What am I supposed to do now?

I went back via Sainsburys, which was actually a quicker route, and found that they weren't too keen on the pink grapefruit idea either. Fortunately, I am going to London tomorrow.

I went for a roller skate after lunch. The tennis courts were great for it - slight incline, not too many nets in the way (nets on tennis courts, what a novel idea). The only trouble was that there were leaves all over the place.

After wearing myself out doing that, I lay down and watched Miss Potter. I wanted to see it at the cinema because it had Ewan McGregor in it. Although I was less convinced about his fake moustache in it, even if it was set a hundred years ago. And I'm not a Beatrix Potter fan at all. Even though there are rabbits in it. But I actually really enjoyed the film, I was pleasantly surprised.

I haven't done any writing today at all, but I am hoping I will wake up tomorrow in plenty of time before I have to leave, but not early, so might get some in in the morning. I did watch next week's Spooks and was quite excited that Lance from The Bill was in it. Again.

It's nice being home. Although the cat draped himself over my lap this morning, making my nighty muddy and putting holes in it (and my leg). And dribbled on it. Now he's using my right leg as a pillow, so my computer is balanced mostly on my left leg. My legs are warm. My feet are cold but I can't get up to shut the lounge door because the cat will get upset.

I saw the new Harry Potter film yesterday. I am really looking forward to the book now. I felt like some of the characters didn't really have much to do, but then there are so many characters and they only had two hours to tell the story in. The girl who played Luna Lovegood was very good - she definitely sounded like she wasn't quite all there. And I loved the witching world's equivalent of a crazy cat lady.

Only thing now is I have to drive back - although at least it's not sunny. And I have Blakes 7 to listen to on the way back up.

I have finally watched the whole series (all three episodes of them) of Lewis, which was show at the end of February/start of March. I might be a bit behind. Although now I only have four episodes of Midsomer Murders to go. There'll be a whole lot more when I get back though.

The adverts in it were 4 minutes and 20 second long. I imagine the extra 20 seconds (The Last Detective has 4 minute advert breaks) are the Sainsburys things. Now I have a handy thing on my PVR for skipping forward (3 mins, 1 min, 30 secs, 10 secs back) I can tell these sort of things. I does mean that although The Last Detective starts at 9pm and finishes at 10.30, it actually only takes an hour to watch. Which annoys me. The beginning credits in Doctor Who are 30 seconds long exactly, which is handy.

I saw Spiderman 3 at the new cinema in Didcot last night. It was nice and empty because everyone else was going to see POTC3. Handily, it does films at £4 on a Tuesday, as opposed to £6.50, which is a much more reasonable price. However, the toilets are too high for my feet to reach the floor and the seats are too big so that I can't sit back in them. But they're also really wide, so I did curl up in it and it was quite comfy.

I didn't know, or had heard and forgotten that they're doing His Dark Materials in films. Which will be something to see at Christmas again! My daemon is apparently a wildcat called Romulus. Which I could live with (er, apart from being allergic to his fur...). I've just finished the first book in the trilogy, so I think I'll have managed them all by the time the film comes out.

Annoyingly, I bent my glasses last night. I have bendy glasses but they're not as great as they make out - I am on my spare pair since I bent the originals and they couldn't quite get it to be perfect again. They're good enough for a spare pair, but when I need new glasses I'm not going to be able to get away with just replacing the lenses. The bendiness is good enough when I walk into doors, which is handy since I do that quite frequently. But last night I hit my glasses into the shelf in the kitchen when I was emptying the bin. The opticians were able to fix them though, which is good.

I have to find 80s fancy dress for Conference the weekend after next. I could do the Ace costume again, but I did that two years ago when the District's theme was Doctor Who. And I really want to wear my pink bunny ears headband that I bought in Walmart. So what can I wear with them that could be 80s?

Just been to see Casino Royale and I really enjoyed it. Even though there was no Moneypenny or Q. But I liked the technology in it and the chase sequence at the beginning had me biting my fingernails. I wish Craig Daniel had kept his clothes on more often, though, that was not a pretty sight. But then he's generally not a pretty site. I hope they go back to dark haired handsome men next time. The part I didn't like was when I left and my car was not only steamed up but trying to ice up as well. And the water I left in there nearly froze my tongue off.

I did discover though that Ewan McGregor is in that film about Beatrix Potter. With a dodgy moustache. So I might have to see it. Contrary to all expectations, I don't like Peter Rabbit. I don't know why, so I'm not that excited about seeing a film about her. Or Ewan McGregor in a moustache. But then I saw two Star Wars films with him with long hair, a beard and doing a dodgy accent, so I expect I'll cope. I'm just glad his wife is sensible and prefers him clean-shaven.

I really enjoyed last night's Torchwood. So I was really surprised to read all the posts this morning from people hating it. It was a bit different because it didn't involve most of the Torchwood people but it was an excellent whodunnit. There were some things that didn't quite make sense but it was really interesting. And I'm reliably informed by my dad that the answer is a parabola; I didn't hear the question.

I went to get my post redirected this lunchtime. Which involved queueing in the post office for 10 minutes to get a form, then I joined the back of it again while I filled it in, then handed it in. I almost decided to come back later but it's not going to get better till after Christmas. I took a stack of things into work to phone to tell people I'm moving but only managed my car insurance (which doesn't change price, unlike my house insurance which saves me 64p). I know what I'm doing every lunchtime this week.

And lastly, I posted my entry to the SG Rare Pairings Ficathon: Never Easy, which is Jack/Elizabeth. There looks like being loads of interesting pairings there, I just need to find the time to read them.

Thursday I had tickets to see the English National Ballet performing Alice in Wonderland. I've never been to the ballet before (I'm amazed at the number of people I know who have) and since I like Alice that seemed like a good combination. I did realise just how many people there were in the strings section, violin is definitely the instrument to learn. I did like the way they used the props with the doors moving about, the table that grew and the massive bottle that swung from the ceiling with a note on it saying 'Drink me'. The actual dancing was boring though. It just seemed like they'd go into a scene, go here are some characters, thean randomly dance around for ages after I'd got bored. It probably doesn't help that half the appeal of Alice is in the words but all the dancing just seemed to consist of spinning and jumping, and how is that interesting?

The evening didn't start off well because I was talking to someone at work about work, so was late for the bus the one time it was on time. So I was planning to go to Borders and The Noodle Bar as I know I can eat there. I did try to get some beans and jacket potato but that meant relying on Waitrose for some decent potatoes, which was a bit of a vain hope. Instead I got Chinese from the new take-away, which turned out to be a bad idea because they put some disgusting sauce on their chicken and cashew nuts, which I discovered on Friday, had wheat/gluten in.

I went to work Friday morning anyway as there was work to do, but I didn't attempt breakfast. I went home not long after lunch once I'd pretty much done everything. Just that morning Doctor Who series 2 arrived, so I opened that up and watched the Deleted Scenes and Outtakes. It was just as well I'd already asked how to get to this stuff on the series 1 disks, since these had the same menus and I couldn't be bothered to plug my DVD writer in. Then I watched the School Reunion commentary, which did have a bit of David Tennant squee, and Julie Gardner complaining about how good Lis Sladen looked.

This weekend I went to Emma's. I definitely don't want to get the bus to Reading anymore cos it's horrendously busy. As was the train station. And I'm still annoyed I couldn't get a return - why can't you get a non-day return for somewhere close to, it doesn't make sense. We watched The Pillow Book which had a fair bit of Ewan McGregor naked in it, but was in general a very weird film. We discovered Sainsburys shut at 8pm on a Saturday, which is just not on when you need chocolate at 8.30.

We also went for a bit of Moulin Rouge and watched half a dozen episodes of Smallville, finishing off series 5, which was rather like torture. They rip off films, hit you over the head with the plot and you need a sick bucket for most scenes with Lana in. It all ended on a cliffhanger, but frankly, I don't care any more. I only watched it till the end cos I wanted to get to a good point to stop.

I have posted the latest chapter of Doctor Who: The Soap Opera but mostly I just really, really need to sleep.

I am so tired, I'm going to have to go to bed after I've posted this. I have to get up early tomorrow for a societies fair and I'm going to a Halloween thing tomorrow night, so I'm quite glad the clocks go back. Except that I'll be completely confused and it means today was the last day of leaving work in the light

I ushered at the cinema tonight for Little Miss Sunshine, which isn't the sort of film I'd pick out as something I'd have to see but I really enjoyed it. I love the music in it and it's quite clever the way you start off by not caring about the characters because none of them are particularly likeable, except you like them all by the end. And I realised that also they're not all pretty. It almost looks like it could be a British film it that respect.

I drove and I was quite impressed at my parking and ability to stop it from stalling. I got quite excited that dad had put some kitchen towel in the door, so I could use it to wipe the windows, as they were steamed up on the outside.