My brother Andrew is playing the guitar second from the right (in the white t shirt) Chris and I missed his gig with the Alarm ( I was working nights) but my sisters went (and can be heard shouting from the audience!)
A small victory
With the fire lit and the dogs in their usual place on my lap, it has been a relaxing and quiet day. Chris made a tasty chicken stew AND a syrup sponge pudding, so the order of the afternoon was having a doze and that was it!Half way through the gloriously camp tv programme 60 Minute Makeover , Albert could be heard banging around the kitchen, and on checking he was battering a small beautiful blue tit between his paws and the remains of our chicken dinners!
The tiny bird looked quite dead when I found it covered in chicken gravy, but as I prised it off a growling Albert, it gave a shallow gasp.
Blue tits are amazingly pretty things, but like all wild birds that have been attacked, they die so easily through a combination of rough handling and shock, so I hid the bird in my palm and sat in the living room in the hope that the warmth of my hand would revive it.
The dogs all clambered on top of me, in the full realisation that something was afoot, but I managed to keep them away from the blue tit until I could feel a little more movement from the tiny animal and after another 20 minutes I sneaked out of the house to set the bird down on the wall before it flew unsteadily away still covered with big blobs of bisto.
I told you nothing much has happened today.. but this "little" victory was rather satisfying
Mockingbird Review
Gwyn Vaughan Jones as Atticus Finch
To Kill A Mockingbird, is one of those novels that most (!) people remember with great affection from their schooldays. Harper Lee's warm and affectionate story of the coming of age of "Scout" Finch, the daughter of a small town lawyer, amid the racism of the American deep south, has a resonance with most people, even though they may not have read or reread the novel for years, and I really feel that this nostalgia for Lee's novel sometimes camouflages the brutality within the story....such as child abuse,the abysmal treatment of the mentally ill, alcohol addiction, and of course the horrendous racial divide within a rural community.
This stage version is beautifully set by Mark Bailey on a simple dirt road square of stage. Silhouette's of the tired folk of Maycomb are placed against a "Gone with the Wind" sky before Scout (an excellent Amy Morgan) starts her narration through the eyes of the eight year old tomboy.
The racial and economic tensions of 1935 Alabama grow steadily, until the cracking courtroom scene ( played cleverly still on the dirt road) bats to and fro between the dirt poor white trash Ewells and Atticus Finch who is defending defendant Tom Robinson. This scene is the best thing in the play , and Rhian Blyth ( as the abused Myella Ewell) is a standout, but having said all that, not everything works as well in this stage play as it does in the 1962 movie version.
The climax where the Finch Children are pursued by the abusive Bob Ewell is rather rushed and trivialised, and is absolutely lacking in the nail biting tension we witnessed as James Anderson stalked the terrified Mary Badham in the movie, but I guess it is a small complaint in a generally superior and enjoyable stage production .
8/10
Off to bed.... working an early shift tomorrow
To Kill A Mockingbird
Off to see the Theatre Clwyd Production of To Kill A Mockingbird this evening...review later!New Oscar catagory
Now the Oscars nominations are out, and as usual the bun fight is uneven, manipulated and unfair!
Many years ago Elizabeth Taylor only won the statue for best actress because she had just had a tracheostomy!
Anyhow, I will not rant on about it all, but I would suggest that the academy would give an oscar for BEST MOVIE TRAILER!
These frantically edited snippets, are often little works of art in themselves, and although many of them bare no real connection to the main movie , the resulting "minifilm" is often a wonderful romp to be enjoyed....
my favourites are:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCqYuBIFE5I
(Dinosaur)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ot3UCHHZmvc
(Australia)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBitOl11VnY
(All about my mother-) camp as christmas
I could go on and on and on.......sorry anout the links interested parties will need to cut and paste.....anyhow just sit back and enjoy CLIFFHANGER
Lilly
Well the plethera of videos continue ( and will stop for a while I promise you) with a brief introduction to my favourite hen on the field. the gentle natured Lilly.
Now the "voice over" was a little muted as I was mindful that the gravediggers are in to prepare for my neighbour's funeral later today.
Steve, the village elder (as I call him) is overseeing the work and is using the digger to scrape out the Church wall (which I am repairing) and to dredge out the ditch on the border of the field. Now all this work is his idea, so I am letting him get on with it as itis easier to do that rather than to discuss the whys and whatnots in any detail.....I feel a little like a spare wheel though ,so I will go and busy myself elsewhere
The Cottage and Church
I Know it is lazy blogging but I seem to be on a roll!
I will make one more "video" this afternoon then will get back to typing at the keyboard
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