Where’d the week go?

Forgive me, reader, for I have sinned. It's been four days since my last blog post...

It's been one of those weeks where not much seems to happen worthy of writing:

1. Watched a couple of movies (16 Blocks and le dîner de cons), so they'll make it over to Such As They Are sometime in the distant future. Latest review over there at the moment is the highly recommended Manon des Sources.

2. Been working -- same ol', same ol'.

3. Got the year's expenses receipts organized for the accountant.

4. Bought some jeans from The Gap for £13.59 ($27), which was a total bargain. They were discounted anyway, and then I had a further 20 per cent off for a missing button on the fly!

5. Heard some disappointing news from my brother in his bid to get on The X Factor: in short, he didn't make it.

6. Watched more episodes of Seinfeld. Wife and I are working through all the episodes on DVD in chronological order. It opens it up to a whole new level of brilliance, seeing how the storylines run through entire blocks of shows. Genius.

7. Bought an aerial lead so I could get the Freeview channels on our TV. That way we can now record one channel while watching another, a luxury we haven't been afforded for years. Sure, I know there's fuck all on TV, but you can guarantee that, like buses, two good shows always come along at once.

8. I haven't shaved.

So, that's it. A week in the life of a 30-something self-employed man who blogs.

What will next week bring? Well, among other things I have the series finale of Heroes to look forward to. That's on Monday night. Beyond that, friends and loved ones, it's a blank canvas. Wish me luck...

An update on the TV-less couple

So... It ain't so bad really. It's true that, on the whole, we wouldn't miss TV. Mostly we watch films and stuff on DVD anyway, but there are some good shows out there, such as tonight's Simon Schama show on the abolition of slavery. Hopefully they'll repeat it. And we get our new satellite receiver tomorrow, anyway, when the man from Sky will come a-knockin'.

Fortunately, last night we didn't have to resort to talking after all, especially since we'd IM'd each other during the latter part of the afternoon, so I'm really not sure what else we would have said to each other.


I opted to cook my famed, once-weekly chilli sin carne (recipe coming soon, for those who are interested), and we opened a bottle of Rioja, which went really nicely when we sat down to get our grub on.

And we watched an episode of Scrubs on DVD while eating, followed by the second episode of this US mini-series Kidnapped, which we had waiting for us on the DVR.

Red fell asleep in the middle of that, woke up for the end, declared her general lack of interest in it (neither of us is ever really satisfied by these mini-series, whether UK or US-made), and then made her way up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire, leaving me in the company of Naomi Watts and Laura Harring (see right). Lucky ladies!

I was soon hearing the call of father/son team Hypnos and Morpheus, so I turned off the DVD at about 75 minutes in. The trouble with Lynch films, though, is that mostly they don't have chapter breaks, and our cheap DVD player doesn't remember at what point the disc was stopped, so now I'll have to wind it forward for 75 minutes next time I sit down to finish the movie. Grrr.

Bye, Sky, bye

Oh, woe is me. And woe is the missus, too.

We woke up this morning to learn something of what it must be like to be Milla.

Yes, that's right, folks: the television-less one and we have that adjective in common. Kind of.

Our satellite receiver is dead, kaputt, extinct, no more, resting in peace, an ex-satellite receiver. It's beamed its last broadcast into our humble abode. And we are left ... having to talk to one another.

Keen viewers of this page will know that we mostly like to carry out our communications via blog comment boxes and the occasional IM session. But now we have to do what people used to do in the BC days (Before Computer). I'd forgotten what this lump of flabby stuff in my mouth was for and was wondering whether it was only used for far less bloggable pursuits. Get your mind out of the gutter: I meant licking envelopes. Jesus wept!

Fortunately, it wasn't long before we remembered... We can always watch DVDs. Phew. Thank the maker!