I saw King Kong. The best part was the Orange mobile network advert at the beginning where John Cleese is trying to sell a story to the Orange board.
They say “You English guys are soo funny” in a mock-British accent. And “Oh those Monty-Sneaky-Pythony guys” has to be an absolute beauty!!
You had to be there!

This is what Jonathon Ross of Film 2005 fame has to say about “The march of the penguins” (heavily paraphrased)

“They (Americans) haven’t been spoiled like we have by natural wildlife programs that are generally superior to this film”

As you know, I’m a big fan of the BBC and David Attenborough.

I heard this said of a car:- “It has more computing power than took man to the moon”. Which sounds great untill you realise what exactly the computing power that took man to the moon was. As I trawl google now, I see that nobody really has a clue either, but that’s not stopping them from using this phrase.

We had a nice dinner at Rusholme yesterday, Bingboula, Jessy, Shasha, Dmitri, Ioannis, Rayk and I. This Sanam sweet place was good enough, but I must say the food wasn’t upto Sangam standards. Ah, once you’ve had the best, it’s difficult to accept sub-standard fare. But we had a good laugh, and time just flew past us. Which led me to think of how I’ll miss some people when they’re not around. I managed to snap a few photos; I think a photo gallery might make its way onto this site soon (depending on how busy my I.T. Support team is).

Managed to get some shoes to replace my aging trainers yesterday with the help of my friends; that appears to be just about the extent of my Xmas shopping this year. Although I suspect I might slip in a cheeky little spree if anyone else is going round. Oh, and I got my first Xmas card yesterday as well, thank you!!

Going to play squash now; there’s three of us and we’ve booked two courts, so I guess there’ll be a lot of tomfoolery going on unless we find someone there to join in. Then we’ll cook a meal together and hit the cinemas. I fancy King Kong (the movie, not the bloke in the gorilla costume) /)

A heart-felt congratulations to everyone who graduated yesterday, it was wonderful seeing everybody proudly file up on stage, and it made me realise how many wonderful people I was privileged to meet over the course of this magical year at Manchester Business School.

I hope the poor guy who was knocked unconscious by the bus is ok. I really felt like I should stop and help in some way, but there was a free buffet at MBS, and I didn’t want to be late. I believe Johnny actually trampled over that guy’s prone body in his rush to get to the head of the table. Ah, but on the flipside the food wasn’t bad, and there was free beer to those who could get their mitts on it. Me. Every cloud, every cloud…

We did, however, feel more than slightly let down by the complete absence of any of our teachers, who presumably had more important things to do than watch their charges for a year step up and be honoured. It felt odd when some complete stranger shook my hand and congratulated me on my hard work, because anyone who knows me knows that I don’t even enter the building if hard work is knocking about in the vicinity. Hell, I try not to even say that too often, it simply tires me thinking about it. As J.K.J said, “I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.”

Another beef, of course was that Ioannis had to sit on his own, AND wasn’t awarded his certificate despite being our distinction student.

That’s a song by Chris Isaak, if you didn’t know. Tomorrow we will be wearing mortar bombs on our heads and long black gowns with double stripes, and.. what? Oh, it’s mortar boards, is it? Coz I was kinda wondering. I mean, I’m all for tradition and all that, you know, keep the torch burning and stuff, but not if it’s too painful, if you get me. Oh thank heavens for that.

And here’s another gem from the top comedy “Peep Show”. Adam (David Mitchell) on saying “I love you”:-

“Saying that is like shooting first in a duel; if you miss, you’re fucked!”

Been eating like a King recently. You know of the pizza of Thursday. Yesterday’s fare? Beef and spinach curry with cumin and onion rice, and a side dish of chickpeas and potatoes. Today, after a special dosa at Rusholme (an Indian pancake with spicy potato stuffing) I’m now at Ioannis’, waiting to eat a chicken curry we made.

I saw Narnia yesterday, after rushing to catch it from this great Italian restaurant which serves stonebaked pizzas just-a like-a Mamma used to make-a them-a. I was really bowled over, and although the service was slow, we had reason to believe it was because of the huge party they were preparing for at the adjacent tables. If you guys are good to me, I might let slip the name of this Findus Superbus. Heck, I might even take you there myself, so I can have another go.

Narnia, then. I really enjoyed it, because I had read the book so many moons ago that I was half-expecting to see a white rabbit with watch pop up. That kept the suspense factor alive for me, while the story was just predictable enough for me to pretend to remember stuff from the book (Och, the devious bugger!). It is very engrossing and believable, and top marks for acting go to the little girl who plays Lucy, although good child actors always worry me, as I might have mentioned earlier. Ok, I see I haven’t mentioned it earlier. To summarise; a good actor has to be a good phony, and it doesn’t seem right that a child should know how to switch a smile on and off at will. Or perhaps it’s the precocity of the little nippers that unsettles me.
The film is quite sanitized though; even with the obligatory CGI battle scene that all movie-going audiences demand today, there was nary a drop of blood to be seen.

First off, congratulations to Scotland…. the WORLD CHAMPIONS!!!
“Eh?”, I hear you ask. Scotland has claimed top spot in the World Elephant Polo championship in Nepal for the second time running.
The captain says “To win this is a mammoth task” 🙂

And boohoo for United fans, as the Mancunians failed to even secure a place in the UEFA tournament. Shame!!!

Am reading Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s ‘Long way around’. I’ve seen some of the telly series, and the book really blends in seamlessly. Both avid motorcyclists, Charley describes the first time he rode on a racetrack with words somewhat like this:

“Suddenly I felt sad. I knew what I wanted to do with my life. Unfortunately I was too old to do it”

He reminded me of how I used to feel as a kid when I saw bikes roar past, and why I was never able to throttle down if someone revved up next to me at the lights. Ah, Sweet Bitch-Goddess Adrenaline!! (To paraphrase D.H.Lawrence :P)
The book is amazing; I was reading it till 7:30 a.m. (but then, I have the luxury of being able to do so 😛 )

Other books I got were ‘A history of civilizations’ by Fernand Braudel and ‘African silences’ by Peter Matthiessen. I’m dabbling in both as well, so I’ll give you snippets as they come.

Peeves of the week:

I ordered a tub of Ben And Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie. The “tub” they brought me was a piddling little thing, a mouthful for a quail, a trifling affair. And they had the temerity to put the “spoon” (plastic mini-shovel) inside the “tub”, taking up more space!!!

On a more disconcerting note, I found out that our favourite ‘Champion for Freedom and Defender of the Free World’ nation America has 8 times more arms dealers than McDonald’s franchises. So I guess the term “McDonaldisation” must give way to a new one. Any suggestions?

I’m finally managing to chronicle the events of last weekend, after I vacuum-cleaned my house. I gets this call from Ana & Papitu, who were visiting their old stomping grounds in Manchester for 4 days from Valencia. I had to hook up with them. So I find myself at the Drop Inn (ha ha) at 8p.m on a Friday after a luxurious meal in Rusholme, greeting my old friends A & P as well as James & Louisa. Then, I noticed a couple of more Spanish faces, and soon the pub was bursting at the seams with Iberian comrades. Most of them were known to me through football, or more accurately through the auspices of A & P, who were like a cementing force in the Spanish community while they lived here. It was funny to note that a year had passed since I saw them, and yet nothing appeared more natural than for us to settle down in our old, familiar routines. Then followed a stint at Big Hands, which chucked us out at 2a.m. Not having had our fill, we decided to test Tony Blair’s new Britain by finding a 24 hour drinking hole. And find it we did. I crept home in the wee hours of the morning.
Saturday night was much of the same, only more so, if you know what I mean 😉 We ended up in a house party where the rules on Class As were a bit more relaxed, and I only made it home at 8 in t’morn’.