Tea and Cakes

I missed the last train tonight, so had to get the bus home, which is ok as there’s less of a walk the other end, but takes longer, so I was home about half an hour later for the sake of the 5 minutes extra I was stuck in the office that made me miss the train, but anyway, that’s off the point.

I was sitting on the top deck, left hand side, about half way down the bus.
The guy on the seat in front of me was eating an apple.
As we were driving along the quays, he finished the apple, and threw the core out of the window.

Now, I’m all for disposing of apple cores somewhere they can break down naturally. I’ve been known to throw them in bushes, leave them in flowerbeds and throw them out of car windows into fields. However. From the top deck of the bus? Dropped on to the road? What about cyclists? I’d be pretty pissed off if an apple core dropped on my head as I was cycling home. (not that I do actually cycle anywhere you understand, but I could if I wanted to).

We went to see King Kong last night and it was fantastic. Peter Jackson really knows how to make a good movie. I loved how everything was of its time – he didn’t modernise it in any way.

Anyway, it was rated 12A, which means that kids under 12 should have an adult with them, but it’s recommended for people 12 and older.

To me, a film about a woman and her love for a large monkey screams ‘adult content’ and it’s not something I’d take a young child along to. Narnia was on in the screen next door, which has the same rating but is made by Disney, and therefore contains little scariness and no blood (see Elimare for more details). Much more suitable for a young child. Basically, King Kong features an emotional storyline that’s waaay too boring for kids, and scary monsters, like giant insects and killer worms with teeth. So, when the person sat behind us with her 6 year old, or the guy a few seats back with 3 kids that cannot have been older than 5, went to buy their tickets, would it not have been prudent for the ticket seller so say to them: “Actually, you know sir/madam, this movie isn’t really suitable for such young children. Instead, I could recommend …., now showing in screen 4”

I get so tired of going to see films and seeing tiny kids there, either dumped by their parents or brought along with them. Not only is in not fair on the kids (I know that at least one child must have woken up screaming last night at 1am having dreamed they were being eaten by bugs), but it’s not fair on me, the adult cinema goer. Kids get scared, they get tired, they get bored, and they need to go out to pee. The 6 year old behind us was terrified, so his mother had to keep making light of everything with a cheery voice giving commentary. “There now, it’s just like Halloween, isn’t it.” etc. That got really, really annoying.

I think parents need to cop the fuck on about what they’re taking their kids to, but I also think that cinemas need to take some responsibility for the business they run. It’s not like there aren’t enough kids films out there to keep the small ones amused. Plus I’m sure kids eat more sweet crap when they’re not scared shitless.

/rant.

It’s very exciting. I didn’t used to like Christmas, for various reasons that I’m not going to go into. I kind of do now most of the time. I don’t this afternoon, but that’s mainly for similar reasons to not liking it before, so I’m not getting into those either.

Anyway, we have our tree, and I’m delighted with it.

This is the fairy on the top. I think she’s great. She was a Christmas present.

These are the pom poms I randomly decided to make from embroidery thread the other day. I’m not sure why, I just had a sudden craving to make pom poms, and some thread handy. I wasn’t sure what to do with them so I’ve made them into decorations. I’ve been humoured for them, and laughed at for them, but I like them.

Tea, from Harrods. Because I’m posh really.

I wanted to write a review of this, as it was fantastic, but I’m hopeless at reviewing books. I like reading them too much. I used to get in trouble at school for that – we had these books where we were supposed to read a story then answer questions about it, and I never answered the questions, just read the stories. I seem to remember my mum being called in over that one, but it might have been part of my general attitude problems that year. I was told off for reading the Trebizon books as they were apparantly too old and not suitable for a 9-10 year old. Im not quite sure what’s not suitable about tea and crumpets but I think there may have been boys in these too. Instead I was supposed to read Danny the Champion of the World. Don’t get me wrong, that’s an excellent book. However, at that point I’d read it many, many times and could practically recite it from memory. I was just a precocious reader I guess, and boarding school books offered valuable escapism.

Anyway, I digress. I was thinking about reviewing books on here, as I read a lot, and I’d like to keep track of what I’ve read. However, as I’m not good at actual useful proper reviews, I think I shall write very short, uninformative reviews, just stating what I thought of the book for the record.

This book: Excellent, engaging, interesting, well written, great characters. My only complaint is that the damn thing was so heavy. It hurt my (weak, girly) wrists to read it for too long, especially in the bath when I had to hold it out of the water.