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Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008
beingme89
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8:36p
Last night I was watching an episode of That Mitchell and Webb Look, which I had seen before, but was still very funny. After that I was watching an episode of Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe, which is usually a kind of comedy show which analyses television, but this week was a special extended edition which was entirely devoted to interviews with TV writers, including Russell T. Davies (Doctor Who and Torchwood), Graham Linehan (Father Ted and The IT Crowd) and Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong (Peep Show). It was a really interesting show.
It was a fairly quiet and busy day at work. I'm really looking forward to my Christmas holiday, in a little over two weeks.
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(comment on this) Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008
beingme89
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8:35p
Last night was pretty quiet. I was watching a documentary about the novelist Jane Austen that was quite interesting, even though I've never read any of her books, but I usually do find documentaries about writers interesting.
Today was a fairly miserable day at work, and I was glad when I got back. It was really good to get back home. I finished writing the ghost story that I had been working on and so I will have to develop another project.
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(comment on this) Monday, December 1st, 2008
beingme89
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7:58p
It was a pretty quiet evening last night. I watched an episode of Mock the Week on TV. It's a popular comedy panel show that pokes fun at people and events in the news, and can be very funny. The episode I was watching was a repeat, though. I also watched a series of repeats of episodes of South Park, which was pretty funny.
I went along to work and it was a really quiet day again. Somebody had already started putting up Christmas decorations around their desk. My gas bill arrived in the mail today, it was kind of high because it has been freezing cold for the past few months.
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(comment on this) Sunday, November 30th, 2008
beingme89
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7:35p
Yesterday afternoon I was watching the Doctor Who story "The Five Doctors", which was first broadcast in 1983 as a 90 minute TV movie to celebrate the show's 20th anniversary. In the story, a mysterious figure is taking the Doctor's past incarnations out of time and space and taking them to a dangerous area of the Doctor's home planet, Gallifrey, known as the "Death Zone", which is dominated by a giant tower. The five Doctors, helped by a selection of their old companions, and hindered by a selection of old enemies, including a Dalek, the Cybermen and the Master, need to find their way to the tower to discover who brought them there and why. It is a fun episode, actually, although it does occasionally get bogged down by the need to include as many references and characters from past Doctor Who stories as possible. I remember seeing it when it was first broadcast.
In the evening I watched the Doctor Who story "The Curse of Fenric" which was first broadcast in 1989. In the story, the Seventh Doctor (played by Sylvester McCoy) and his companion Ace (Sophie Aldred) arrive at a top secret Naval Base in England during the Second World War, where a new type of computing machine is being developed to decode enemy ciphers. However, a squad of soldiers plan to steal the device, but the Doctor is far more interested in the local legends of an ancient Viking curse in the surrounding ocean. It is one of my favourite Doctor Who stories, and I remember seeing it when it was first broadcast. It is one of the darker and most complex stories, dealing with some fairly big themes, alongside Norse mythology, aliens and vampires.
I was also working on the ghost story that I started through the week. It's not really very scary, though. It's about someone who is researching a book on local myths and legends who goes to a small town, which he soon discovers is completely dominated by a powerful supernatual force.
Today I went along to my parent's house for lunch, which was tacos today, and the latest issue of Sight and Sound magazine had arrived, which this month featured fifty film critics choices of the best film of 2008.
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(comment on this) Saturday, November 29th, 2008
beingme89
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4:50p
Today I went out to pay in the cheque that my brother had sent me for his share of Dad's Christmas present. I looked around, but it was really busy, which I suppose is understandable enough for the time of year. I got a couple of DVDs in the sales (Doctor Who: The Five Doctors and Doctor Who: The Curse of Fenric). I was also looking for a book for my Mum's present, but I couldn't make up my mind, so I went back home, stopping along the way to pick up some groceries for the week.
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(comment on this) Friday, November 28th, 2008
beingme89
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9:40p
Today I had the day off work and headed out to meet my Mum at the bus station at half past ten. We got on the bus to Glasgow, which took about an hour and a quarter. When we got there we went along to Pizza Express for lunch. I had a Diavolo pizza which had the usual cheese and tomato but also spicy beef, pepperoni, hot green peppers and jalapeno peppers, with a dash of tabasco sauce. It was hot, but in a good way. Hot and spicy enough to give it a good kick but not enough so that it burnt the mouth. Afterwards I had a Chocolate Glory (which was vanilla ice-cream, with pieces of chocolate fudge cake and chocolate sauce) and a bottle of Peroni Nasturo beer. It was a really, really good meal.
Afterwards we split up and I had a look at the books in Borders. I got a book called Peep Show: Scripts and More by Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong, with a forward by Robert Webb and David Mitchell. It contains the scripts for every episode of all five seasons of the show to date complete with extra funny stuff such as school reports, e-mails, work memos, playlists. Then my Mum and I went along to have a coffee and a scone, and caught the four o'clock bus home.
I went to my parent's house for a bit and watched some TV and had a couple of cups of coffee and a glass of wine.
WHen I got back home I found out that my brother had sent me his share of the money for my Dad's Christmas present. It has been a good day.
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(2 comments | comment on this) Thursday, November 27th, 2008
beingme89
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7:40p
Last night I started a new writing project, which is kind of a ghost story.
Today was a fairly quiet day at work. We finally got an e-mail about the Christmas leave and apparently everyone is getting the leave that they asked for, so that is really good. Now at least, I can get stuff organised.
Also, I have tomorrow off work. I am planning on taking a day in Glasgow to celebrate completing the NaNoWriMo challenge.
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(comment on this) Wednesday, November 26th, 2008
beingme89
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7:47p
Last night was fairly quiet. I watched an episode of That Mitchell and Webb Look which was very funny, even though I'd seen it before.
Work was quiet. I spent most of the time writing notes on work procedures. I didn't really mind doing it because I found it quite relaxing, and it gave me time to think. Still no word about the Christmas leave yet, though.
It feels kind of strange now that NaNoWriMo is over, actually. Because I've got really used to doing all the writing. I had an idea actually, since it was nearing Christmas to try the traditional kind of MR James style ghost story.
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(2 comments | comment on this) Tuesday, November 25th, 2008
beingme89
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7:59p
Yesterday I managed to get to 50,318 words of NaNoWriMo, and finish my novel, so that means I have completed the challenge! I am planning to start a new project either next week or at the weekend, but for now I am going to have a few evenings of rest. Hopefully after a couple of weeks I will revise Beyond the Shores of Midnight, and expand it and fix it.
Also last night I was watching the third episode of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, a 1979 BBC series based on the John le Carre spy novel. The show lasted seven episodes and starred Alec Guinness as George Smiley, a retired British spy who is brought back from retirement when it turns out that there is a Soviet double agent in the upper echelons of the British Secret Service. It's a great show, very slow-moving but very suspenseful.
It was another slow day at work. I managed to get Friday off, so that should be fun. I still don't know about the Christmas holidays though, I know a lot of people are getting very angry about that. I was very glad to get home today.
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(2 comments | comment on this) Monday, November 24th, 2008
beingme89
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7:48p
Yesterday I managed to get to 48,180 words on NaNoWriMo, which means I have less than 2,000 words to write to complete the challenge. The story is already at it's climax.
Last night I was watching a 1987 film called The Monster Squad, directed by Fred Dekker. The film is a blend of comedy and horror and tells the story of Count Dracula (played by Duncan Regehr) arriving in 1980s California in search of a magical amulet, however a bunch of monster-obsessed kids (who call themselves "the Monster Squad") uncover Dracula's plan. Unfortunately for them, Dracula is being helped by The Mummy, Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolf-Man and the Gill-Man (from Creature from the Black Lagoon). The movie works as a homage to monster-movies (especially the famous Universal Studios monster movies of the 1930s through to the 1950s) and a teen comedy. It manages to zip along with a brief running time (about an hour and fifteen minutes) and is often very funny. In fact, it actually works a lot better than it may sound, and the special effects, although obviously dated, are pretty good, especially the monster make-up and fans of the old monster movies will probably really like it. I love those old monster movies.
Today was the first day back at work for the week. My video news thing was being played in the canteen. I haven't seen it yet, though. I've put in for Friday off. I thought it would be good to do something fun after completing the NaNoWriMo challenge. I still haven't got my leave for Friday signed off. My Christmas leave hasn't been approved either, for that matter, which I am quite annoyed about because I put in for two weeks off and it was submitted over a month ago. There are things that I want to do over the Christmas vacation, especially since my birthday falls during that time ,but I can't make any definite plans until I know for sure what days I have off.
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(2 comments | comment on this) Sunday, November 23rd, 2008
beingme89
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7:30p
Yesterday I managed to get to 46,224 words on my NaNoWriMo novel, which is really good. I'm definitely on target to finish it on time.
In the evening I was watching a TV movie called Einstein and Eddington, based on a true story set during the First World War when British astronomer Arthur Eddington (played by David Tennant) caused controversy when he corresponded with obscure German scientist Albert Einstein (played by Andy Serkis), whose groundbreaking theories threatened to unseat two hundred years of Newtonian physics. It was a good film and very well-acted, with really good production values. The way it was written, it moved between Eddington's and Einstein's stories.
Today I went along to my parent's house for lunch (which was roast chicken, roast potatoes and peas with a dessert of rhubarb and gooseberry crumble, and a glass of Stella Artois). During the rest of the afternoon I watched a couple of episodes of The X-Files on TV, one of which I had already seen, but it was still good to see it again.
Also today marks forty-five years since the first episode of Doctor Who was broadcast. Of course it's still going strong today, and probably more popular than ever.
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(comment on this) Saturday, November 22nd, 2008
beingme89
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4:25p
I managed to get to 44,183 words on the NaNoWriMo novel last night. The target is to get to 50,000 words by the end of the month, and if it goes the way that it has been going then I should make it okay. The plan is to get it finished early next week, then maybe leave it for a week or two and then try and improve the bad bits. Then I'll try and figure out what to do with it.
Last night I was watching the first episode of a new series of The I.T. Crowd, which was very funny. It's a sit-com set in an office I.T. department, a lot of the humour comes from taking the kind of annoyances of office life and taking them to an absurd extreme. It was another quiet night for the most part, and I got to bed at around four in the morning, which is the regular time for me when I don't have to work the following morning.
Today has so far been really quiet as well. I only went out once today and that was to get my groceries for the coming week.
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(comment on this) Friday, November 21st, 2008
beingme89
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8:25p
Last night was pretty quiet. I got up to 42,273 words on my NaNoWriMo story, so that was great. I watched the latest episode of Little Dorrit on the TV On Demand service, so that was quite good.
It was another very quiet day at work. One of the bosses had been to a meeting and had brought back some sandwiches.
I got home at around half past five.
I do realise that this is probably the most boring on-line diary on the face of the planet, but I do try and leave out the dull parts. The thing is that recently I haven't really done much except work and write my story. I tend not to post much about my thoughts, opinions and feeling because I don't want to annoy or alienate people.
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(3 comments | comment on this) Thursday, November 20th, 2008
beingme89
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8:15p
Last night was pretty quiet. I managed to get to 40,185 words on my NaNoWriMo novel, so that was really good. It has a title now as well: Beyond the Shores of Midnight.
It was another pretty uneventful day at work. This afternoon the people making the news video came down to the office to shoot a few seconds of background footage to the thing I did yesterday.
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(2 comments | comment on this)
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