Entertainment

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Towards Progress

Leave a comment Posted on by Snoskred

Surprisingly this does not refer to progress on the chicken coop we are building, but to Take That and the re-uniting of Robbie Williams to the band..

I was always a huge fan of Take That from the early days, in fact I had virtually every inch of my bedroom covered in posters, I had every video and cd and even some of the Take That dolls. I never did that when I was younger – I waited until I was almost not a teenager anymore to go through my band fan phase.

In January I was channel surfing when I found “Look back, don’t stare” – a documentary on the making of Progress which was the cd they created together. Somehow I had completely missed this entire process. I knew they were back together but I had no idea they had put the cd out yet. So color me shocked, I spent some time watching their videos on youtube and raced off to the nearest CD store the very next day to grab the cd.

I’ve got a lot to say about it and not a great deal of time right now, so this is why I am saying towards progress and not actually progress, because I will write about the album another day.

In the meantime I will like to leave you with my favourite song from the Take That foursome days. They have always done excellent sing along type songs (and so has Robbie while on his own) and this one is no exception. I firmly believe that Gary Barlow is the Elton John of our generation – an incredible song writer and singer who makes music that is unforgettable. When you team him up with the rest of the band the harmonies are very awesome indeed.

If you don’t know it, click below to see Rule The World. It is an extremely popular song for weddings in the UK for somewhat obvious reasons – however it is not the only popular wedding song belonging to them. :) Enjoy!

Take That – Rule The World

music, Take That

Ground Control To….

2 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

you? :) Is there anybody out there? Delurk and leave a comment if so. :)

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Diamond Head at Sunset.

Since February I have been using a service called Quickflix. And no, they’re not paying me to say this. I’m saying this because I like it.

You can hire DVDs over the internet and they post them to you. My DVD purchasing was getting a bit on the high side and there was a two month free trial for $1 voucher on one of those group buying websites so I decided to give it a try.

Just quietly, I enjoy it enormously. There are so many good parts to it I needed to make a list for you..

– Making your personal queue of movies that you want to see. You can choose regular movies or box sets of TV shows. I have a good mix of both on my list.

– The email from Quickflix saying we have sent you XX.

– The anticipation of waiting for XX to arrive in your mailbox.

– XX actually arriving in your letterbox.

– Watching XX at your leisure.

– Putting XX back in the envelope & returning it.

– Marking that DVD as returned on the website.

– Getting an email from Quickflix that same day saying we have sent you XX.

– Repeating the above, over and over!

Another good thing about it is because you are not buying the DVDs you can put titles on your list that you would never pick up in a DVD store. I found a great little fun show called Drop Dead Diva which I never would have bought but it turned out to be a blast, it reminds me a bit of Ally Mcbeal only the main star is not a stick thin plank.

Currently I am in the midst of The House Of Elliott Season one & In Treatment Season two. Loving both of them. The House Of Elliott is one I always wanted to see but over here it is on the Ovation channel and it costs extra money on the Austar, and to buy the DVD set was hugely expensive!

I put a few titles on my list for the other half and I loved both of them. How to train your dragon.. wow was that dragon cute. Brilliant movie.

The second choice forced me to sit through one of the most dodgy movies of all time in order to be able to watch it – the original Tron movie. That explains a lot about my other half and his brain stem. That movie I pretty much hated, but the Tron Legacy movie was a different story. I was surprised to find I loved it.

On the non-rental movie front, I went to see Water for Elephants recently. I’d read the book and the movie did an excellent job of bringing the book to life. However bookending it with the old guy made it mildly depressing – I kind of wish they hadn’t done that. I loved the rest of the movie and the circus was especially great but the real star was 100% the elephant. And RPattz was excellent too. :)

So what have you been watching?

Movie Reviews, movies

More on Twilight

Leave a comment Posted on by Snoskred

So. I liked the movie. I saw New Moon, and I liked that too.

The first time I read the books, I skim-read them – as in I did not spend a lot of time absorbing the deeper meanings of what I was reading. I just wanted to know what happened and how it happened. Reading them that way, I thought that I liked the books.

On second read.. turns out I actually don’t like them so much. In the books, I am not a fan of Jacob at all. Actually all the characters as written in the books are pretty sucky. Bella is whiny and needy, Edward is stalkerish and overprotective, even the high school friends become awful – other than Angela, who just may be the sanest person in the books other than Charlie, and he even lost his mind in the last book – as if he’s just gonna pretend like there are things he shouldn’t know! He is a police officer, fer chrissake! The only characters in the books who are not sucky are the Cullens – other than Edward.

I know that by typing this out loud I run the risk of many screaming twi-hards arriving here and commenting nastily. So be it.

Twilight is not really about vampires or werewolves. At the heart of the story is a love story and as far as love stories go, it is an ok one. But the vampires and werewolves get in the way of the love story in the books in a way they do not get in the way in the movies – at least in the two I have seen so far.

So, that is my overall thoughts on the books. Does anyone else have any thoughts? ;)

books, movies, Twilight

The Danger Of Flicking..

1 Comment Posted on by Snoskred

So there I was innocently flicking around on the teevee last week and I ran into a movie known as Twilight..

What I knew about Twilight before watching it – not a lot. Three things, to be exact –

– that the other half said vampires do not sparkle in the sun and how stupid that means it all is (he is a big Anne Rice fan).

– that the cast are very pretty.

– that Kristen Stewart really does not love being on the red carpet.

I did not reckon on

– Robert Pattinson being like a car accident you just cannot look away from and at the same time incredibly charming.

– Kristen Stewart being equally compelling and by the look of it an excellent actress.

– that they would use part of the movie like an advertisement for a very fascinatory Volvo that I recently looked at in a car yard and after investigation happens to contain the exact same motor which is in our XR-5 Turbo.

– that it would be so.. green and involve so many trees.

So I was surprised to find that I liked it – in fact that I liked it so much, I watched it a second time when it was on the +2 channel.

I then went off and spoiled myself for the future books because I wanted to know what happened next. Just a couple of days later, I decided it was time to get the e-books and read them. More on Twilight at a later time, I am still processing.

I do want to type about my stunning ebooky thingy. The other half got this gadget a while back mainly as a gps however you can use it for so many other things. He has since moved on to other gadgets and I have inherited the awesomeness as an e-book reader.

I have always been a huge book reader ever since I was a kid and I was not sure that I would like an e-book reader. However it turns out I adore it for the following reasons –

– percentage thingy – it tells me at the bottom of the screen what percentage of the book I have read.

– touch screen to turn the page – absolutely silent! this does not wake the other half up yay.

– can read it in the dark.

– can carry around a whole bunch of books in the one small unit.

– do not have to hold up a heavy book – the unit is very light.

– can download a bunch of free ebooks from places like project gutenberg.

I think it is pretty reasonable at just under $166 considering you can use it as a GPS also – and having used tomtom and navman, this is actually the best GPS we’ve used. So if you are looking for either a GPS or an e-booky-reader thingy, then this could be your answer.

I will leave you with a link to one of my favourite Volvo scenes from Twilight. Enjoy!

Volvo

books, e-reader, movies, Twilight

Bring Your A Game..

5 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

Dexter season 3 begins today on Showtime in the USA. As a result there has been a fair few media interviews with Michael C Hall. I’ve seen him on various TV shows and there’s a few excellent interviews around the place.

And then, there are some like this.

The worst Michael C Hall interview, ever.

Even Michael C Hall wondered what the point of the interview was, asking at one point “Can I ask you a question? What is this article focusing on?”

Honestly, that reporter was not prepared and should not have wasted Michael’s time. I could have gone there with a thousand *excellent* questions. Like really good ones. Like stuff that would have produced interesting answers.

Here is one of the better interviews I have seen – warning these may contain spoilers if you have not seen Season 2 of Dexter.

Michael C. Hall: Dial C for Carnarge

Don’t forget – Michael C Hall Online – for all your Michael C Hall info and excellent pictures. ;)

Dexter, television shows

Think you had a bad day at work?

4 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

The Deadliest Catch puts our work days in proper perspective. For those not familiar with the show, it follows the crab fishing season in the Bering Sea. People often die doing this job. It is physically demanding and very dangerous. Here’s a clip for you.

I am quite crazy about this show. I also am quite crazy about the boats. If The Other Half were building a boat, it would look like this.

The Wizard

They even got the name right. That is exactly what he would name a boat. Wizard. Mine might look a bit like this (only probably with this color instead of the blue. Or maybe pink).

The Cornelia Marie

I have no idea what I would name a boat, but I like the name Cornelia Marie. It’s unusual.

television shows

Dexter arrives a little early..

3 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

Someone has leaked Season 3 episode 1 – Our Father..

I will leave it up to you to decide whether Snoskred, Dexter’s number one fan, and Sephyroth, Dexter’s number two fan, chose to *ahem* download the episode and watch it, separated by oceans yet still able to pause the show at the exact right moment to make sure lines, plot points and goings on were seen at the same time.

Because of course downloading something like that would be somewhat dodgy and a bit naughty. But those who know where to look will be able to find it fairly easily.

All I will tell you is I am looking forward to this season of Dexter.

And on another slightly different topic, the show airing in Dexter’s time slot currently is Breaking Bad which is excellent. It is no surprise to me that Michael C Hall and Bryan Cranston are both up for Emmys this year.

Perhaps Sephy and I will liveblog the Emmys, too..

Back to your previously scheduled Sunday!

Dexter, television shows

21 Jumpstreet

1 Comment Posted on by Snoskred

Fans of the original 21 Jumpstreet will be interested to hear that a movie version has been announced, set for release sometime in 2010. The movie has not been cast as yet but here’s hoping some of the original cast will be involved with the project. It is doubtful that Johnny Depp will be involved but one can dream, right?

I personally credit 21 Jumpstreet and Degrassi with teaching me to be a sane and decent person – ie no drugs, no teenage pregnancy, no bad behaviour in general. I just got seasons 1-4 of 21 Jumpstreet on DVD this week.

One thing that I adored about this show was how they always took on a character when they went into the schools, so it was basically an actor playing a cop playing a character to arrest people. This allowed them to have a lot of fun with clothes and hair and stuff.

If not for the 80’s outfits and hair, this show could easily be put on tv shows today and still work. The storylines were always excellent.

television shows, yay

Two can keep a secret..

1 Comment Posted on by Snoskred

If one of them is dead.. :)

Dexter Season 3 is coming soon. In fact, in exactly –

So there have been some fantastic ads put together, the majority of which do not give away anything. Here is my favourite one which does not give any hints or spoilers about what is to come, but does feature a brilliant piece of music – Secret by The Pierces. The song was also featured on Gossip Girl which often has excellent music. Enjoy!

So nobody knows yet if Australia will be getting Dexter at the same time as the US. I can’t see why Showcase would delay it – if they do that they will be forcing people to download it. And yes, I absolutely will be downloading it if they choose not to play it at the same time as the US. Why should we be punished because of which country we live in? :(

Now, if you *do* want a hint of what is coming up in Season 3.. here is a youtube clip for you. :) with our first view of Jimmy Smits in the show.

Dexter