Eleven!

Today I met Matt Smith. And Karen Gillan and the incredible Steven Moffat. If you look at my previous entry, I mention Matt Smith coming to Inverness. That was today. I went, I enjoyed. I was surprised at how quiet it all was. Hardly anyone showed up (who wasn't invited to the screening) but it wasn't greatly advertised. They let those of us who just turned up on the off chance mull around a bit whilst the Tardis Team were otherwise engaged. Anyway, eventually they came out. There was no time for posed photos (they had to catch a plane afterall.) Mr. Smith was very apologetic to everyone about this - he seems like a really nice guy. Hopefully one day I'll get more of a chance to chat to him. Anyhoo, he signed autographs - I got two, as I do with Doctors. Also managed to get an 8x10 of "Amy" signed by Karen and Steven Moffat signed my Whographs book. It was all very brief, but no less awesome for it. There was obviously a bit of a crowd (just not as many as I expected) so even getting a photo of the crew was dissicult. I got a couple of the top of Matt Smiths head though...
It was awesome.

The Pain, The Pain Of It All

Yesterday. The Gym. Today. The Gym. I've been putting my all into exercising and I'm left in agony. That's good though, means I'm getting somewhere. I'm off again today to punish myself for getting into this state.

I find going to the gym an odd thing. Before I go I hate the idea of it, I detest the concept of going to the gym and doing all the pulling and pushing and lifting and moving. But when I get there I enjoy it. I love it, in fact... but come my next visit I've gone back to hating the idea. Oh well.

So I just read Shutter Island for the first time. The trailer for the film looked interesting (haven't seen it yet) and so when I saw the book at a decent enough price I grabbed it. I read it in a day, inbetween visits to the gym. I loved it. It's the first book recently that has actually captured my imagination and made me want to keep reading - this Dennis LeHane guy is a genius. Unfortunatly I've heard the movie doesn't even nearly live up to the book... but I'll give it a look see anyway and form my own opinion.

Matt Smith is coming to Inverness! That's like an hour away from where I live and I hope I might get to meet the man. There's a lot of sketchy and conflicting information floating around, nothing seems to be certain yet. Some say it's in the city, some a small town nearby. Some say it's children only, some say it's only the screening of the first episode that is limited to children.

Regardless, I'll be there on the off chance that I get to meet the guy. I've met Doctors in the past, but never the 'current Doctor'. Oh, it's exciting. Get an autograph and a quick photo - I've had 8x10's professionally printed just in case.

Exciting.

Off to the gym now, oh dear...

Sundays...

Ah sundays. Best day of the week Sundays. The runaround of the week is over, no Six AM wake-up on a Sunday. Nope, not for me. No 9.5 hour shift today, just messing around the house with only minimal responsiblities. Huzzah.

So I've started my day with two slices of wheat toast. More importantly I'm watching The Ipcress File as soon as I'm done with this. Very much looking forward to it. Now that the first two films in the series have finally arrived I can finally get in to them.

What a mess the UK distribution rights for these films must be in. The first released by Network, second by Paramount, the third by MGM and the two TV movies released by Anchor Bay (Ah, Anchor Bay... I remember when you were a horror movie fans best friend. Whatever happened to you?)

So anyway I'm going to see the new Alice In Wonderland film on Tuesday, could have seen it yesterday but I want to see the 3D version of the fick. Despite not liking 3D very much - fact is they're showing a 3D Doctor Who trailer before it. I want to see that. It's a complete waste of money and time, but I'm a Doctor Who fan... I NEED to see it.

So yesterday I did it again. I spent too much money and picked myself up a few seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Previously I only owned Seasons 1 & 7 (due to them being on special offer in a local shop) and the movies. Despite my love of TNG as a youngster I much prefer the Original Series now. Anyway, they were at a price that I considered too good to resist. This leaves me now in need of two seasons of the show. Hopefully the shop keeps them at the special price until I can afford them.

Stuff!

First blog on the new set-up. Huzzah. I have no followers - and the old blog only managed to get one in all it's time online (and I'm pretty sure that was because of my scathing review of the 2009 version of Halloween II)

Not been up to much lately. Despite my best efforts I've been unable to see 'The Wolfman', which kinda sucks but there's much worse things in the world than not being able to see a movie.

I'm still on my diet and exercise regeime. Going pretty well, the weight is dropping at a safe and steady pace. Pretty happy with that.

I'm still studying. That'll be done soon, thankfully. Then I move on to what I really want to do - Journalism training.

Work is still 'very part time' which means I'm in a difficult financial situation at the moment... I'm not helping myself though. See...

...I've been hoarding again. Spending money I don't have - oops. First off I overpaid for the new Doctor Who DVD release, as seen on the left. Two stories from the Hartnell/First Doctor era. Haven't got round to watching them yet - I tend to wait a while after purchase.

Had a look at the special features though - some pretty good stuff on these discs. Particularly the Daleks beyond the screen docu that looks at different versions of the Daleks beyond the TV show itself - they cover everything from toys to books to comics. Good stuff.

I pai £24.99 at HMV, which is pretty expensive compared to most places online and the supermarkets. Unfortunately I feel I have to buy these things the day they come out - I didn't preorder it anywhere and HMV was the only place I could get to. Oh well, they're worth that price anyway.

I also bought all five Harry Palmer movies. I've been a casual fan of Michael Caine for years but last years Harry Brown really showed me how utterly brilliant the man truly is. I'm also a big fan of spy movies - so I decided to pick up the trilogy. Then I saw that there were two Made-For-TV movies in the mid 1990's - so decided I had to get them too.

I bought them all online and annoying the first two have not arrived yet, so I can't really get started. All in all I only spent around £20 on the whole lot. Which isn't bad going for five flicks. I'll be reviewing them on the main site as I watch them through. I'm also hoping to find the books at a decent price and give them a read through too. I believe there are four books featuring the nameless character that would become 'Harry Palmer' on film.

My last big purchase was the six original cast Star Trek movies. I love Star Trek, and the original cast especially (growing up I was more of a Next-Gen geek) and have all of these already on DVD. Part of the draw was the fact that these Blu-Ray discs contain the original versions of the movie - and in most cases I prefer to watch original versions.

Directors Cuts and Special Editions are all very well and good, and I enjoy owning them and watching them - but I like to have the original on hand too. In the cases of the DVD's I was only able to find the special remastered jiggery-pokified editions. So it's quite nice to see them in their original form here.

From what I've watched so far the picture is great - although there is some very noticable dirt they didn't clean. Shame, as it does affect the enjoyment, but not too much.

There are a couple more items, but I'll probably talk about them at a later date once I've got a couple of things set up. Ah, six am start tomorrow. That means another night of not sleeping, worrying that my alarm won't go off. Unbounded joy.

Better scoot.

Byeee.