Film Reviews May

Spider-man 3

The highly anticipated third chapter of the popular Spider-Man series sees Peter and Mary Jane finally together, but three new enemies, the Sandman, Venom and Spidey's old enemy, the New Goblin, his best friend, Harry Osborn, threatens the lives of people close to Peter

Starring: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco

I was quite disappointed with this film, I wasn’t really holding out much hope as I didn’t really warm to the second spidy film. There were too many bad guys trying to get in on the lime light, and the scene with Peter struting down the street was a little cheesy. I think the Spiderman films are going from bad to worse and with another 3 in the pipeline, I think they are going to spoil it.

My Rating:

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

Captain Barbossa, Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann must sail off the edge of the map, navigate treachery and betrayal, and make their final alliances for one last decisive battle. Beckett, now with control of Jones' heart, forms a dark alliance with him in order to rule the seas and wipe out the last of the Pirates. Now, Jack, Barbossa, Will, Elizabeth, Tia Delma, and crew must call the Pirate Lords from the four corners of the globe, The Pirate Lords want to release the goddess Calypso, Davey Jones's damned lover, from the trap they sent her to out of fear, the Pirate Lords must combine the 9 pieces that bound her to undo it and release her. With this, all pirates will stand together and will make their final stand for freedom.

Starring: Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knighley, Geoffrey Rush

With this film I saw the trailer and thought oh my god it looks sooooo good, then when I got into the cinema and the film started I thought this is a bit drawn out. Although the plot is ok and follows on from the first two films, I didn't think it got anywhere, where was all the squashbuckling. Plus we get the open end of a possible sequel. I thought the graphics were really good and any film with Johnny and Orlando tickes the boxes in my book, but it will never be as good as the first film. All in all I think this has fallen into the trap of death of the 2nd sequel.

My Rating:

Electricity Update + Reviews

Well, it wasn't a faulty RCD trip it was the waterheater the element had gone in the thermastat which was causing it to trip. So the electrician turned off the side of the boiler that were tripping and everything is fine now, we still have hot water and heating, just need the builder to get a new element.

I have been to see 2 other films that I still need to write my reviews on plus within this month i've been to 3 music concerts so I will write a review on those soon.

Electricity Blues

The reason for me not keeping upto date with my blog, is the unfortunate events that have affected us at the moment. It all started about a month ago when we started to experience problems with our electricity, the switches for the sockets kept on tripping. We thought it was the new power supply that my partner had bought for his new computer, we thought it might be too powerful, so we took it back to Bolton at Scan computers as the power issue effected the motherboard, but Scan didn't find a problem, we came back home and everything worked ok. But it was still tripping when we boiled the kettle, we then went out to buy a new kettle, but that didn't work either still tripping. It was then time to speak to an elecrician he came over and checked all the sockets and moved the kitching socets on to the main board not the RCD side, which worked.

A week later it starts tripping again and this time it was tripping when only the phone was plugged in and at times when nothing was plugged in or switched on. so again another phone call and visit from the sparky, fortunatly he sent someone else who knew what he was doing, so the problem was the RCD trip it was tripping at 12mA rather than 30. So the sparky is coming back on Monday to fit the new RCD trip, thankfully he gave us power over the weekend so my partner didn't miss Eurovision.

Film Review Pt2

Music & Lyrics

A washed up singer (Grant) is given a couple days to compose a chart-topping hit for an aspiring teen sensation. Though he's never written lyrics in his life, he sparks with an offbeat younger woman (Barrymore) with a flair for words.

Starring: Hugh Grant & Drew Barrymore

I absolutely loved this film, Hugh and Drew play the perfect characters and the film is so easy to watch and really funny. Hugh Grant took singing and piano lessons to play the 80's pop character, and this really shows. His singing isn't great but seeing him dance is hilarious. The story is focused around a 80's pop star who was once part of the duo whose singing partner has gone onto better things loosely based on the story of Wham. Drew's character is a scatty plant waterer, who has a talent for writing lyrics. From then on in, it's the usual boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, boy and girl stuff it up, then boy public declares his feelings to get girl back and boy and girl live happily ever after.

My rating:

Film Review

Aside from my daily life ramblings I've decided to use my blog as a film and music review space, depending on what I'm listening too at the time and what films I've recently been to see at the cinema, I will share my findings with you all.

Just to provide a little background, both me and my partner and most of my immediate friends have monthly cinema passes for our local cinema which is Cineworld. These passes are £10.99 a month and you can go and see as many films as you like whenever you like, which at £5.50 for a adult ticket each time, you only have to go twice a month and you are quids in, specially if there are lots of films that you wanna see out. What I like about it though is that you can easily go and see that film that you would like to see, but wouldn't paid full price to see it, or you can just go and see anything and it doesn't really matter if it wasn't as good as you expected you haven't really lost out. If you are a avid film goer like we are, I fully recommend getting one.

Ok, background over. What I'm going to do is a round up of the month and what films I've seen and what music I'm listening too.

So I'll back track to the beginning of the year, please bear in mind I've not been an active cinema goer as much as I'd like this year.

Films Seen:

The Fountain

Spanning over one thousand years, and three parallel stories, The Fountain is a story of love, death, spirituality, and the fragility of our existence in this world.

Starring: Hugh Jackman & Rachel Weisz

This film has to be the weirdest film I've seen for a long time. For the first 30 mins I didn't know what the hell what happening, and I was really struggling to follow the plot of the three different stories that were being portrayed. It's one of those films that show you the ending at the beginning then the story unfolds and you end up thinking at the end, "oh yeah I understand now" but even at the end of the film I was really confused and it was a very mixed up mess in my head.
Hugh Jackman plays the centre character in all three of the stories which focuses around his Ill wife and the search for everlasting love and immortality. In one of the stories Hugh has completely shaved off his hair and looks very odd, but still attractive. Overall a decent and very intelligent film.

My rating:

Because I said so

A mother whose love knows no bounds or boundaries. She is the proud mom of three daughters: who, when it comes to men, is like psychotic flypaper. In order to prevent her youngest from making the same mistakes she did, Daphne decides to set Milly up with the perfect man.

Starring: Diane Keating, Mandy Moore, Gabriel Macht, Tom Everett Scott, Lauren Graham & Piper Perabo

A truly funny romantic comedy, a story about a single mother (Diane Keating - Daphne) who tries to do her best for her three daughters in particularly her youngest played by Mandy Moore (Milly). In order to find her the perfect man she places an ad on the Internet and vets them all before settling on a very wealthy architect. Meanwhile a musician (Johnny) who had been watching Daphne's vetting sweeps into Milly's life and proves the better choice. Through a battle between mother and daughter love prevails and the right man gets the girl, along with Daphne picking up a love interest in the form of Johnny's father. The only downside to this movie was the need to incorporate a song, I know Mandy Moore is a singer but she makes a better actress, I didn't think it warranted a sing-a-long.

My rating:


Music: Take That - Shine, The Kaiser Chiefs - Ruby, Mika - Grace Kelly

Valentines Day

I've not got a great fondness for Valentines Day, I just think it's just another day to spend x amount of money, saying that though I do like receiving presents.

This year I bought my fiance Da Vinci's Secret as he loves puzzle things. I got 2 Bad Taste Bear figurines the Red Hot Pussys, which I've been wanting for a while now, so now I only need the last 2 top complete the mini set.

I asked my Fiance what he was cooking me for a Valentines meal at home, the reply I got was did I want to be ill the next day? my answer was no I didn't, this is the reason why I do all the cooking in our house. Never mind, so then my next question was well if your not cooking, then where are you taking me? This then meant he had to find a table for 2 on Valentines day, which he did, The Boardwalk at Valley Centertainment in Sheffield at 9:15pm. So at 8:30 that evening we arrived and drove round for a while to find a car parking space, no luck it was all full, even the little bits of pavement had cars on them, it looked like it does when someone is playing at Sheffield Arena as people tend to park in the centertainment to avoid paying £5 parking in the arena.

So we had to abandon the Boardwalk and find somewhere else, luckily just down the road is a TGI Friday's, a place where I've not been before. So we tried there, they had loads of tables and space to park. I had a Cheese Burger and the fiance had a BBQ Burger, plus we shared Garlic Bread. The meal and service was very nice and the same price range as the Boardwalk.

You might be thinking that we could have got a burger anywhere but we aren't the type of people who order something they have never had for the fun of it, we tend to stick to things we know we like that isn't going to make us ill.

So a nice Valentines meal was had by all.

Sims 2 Life Stories

I know I've not really been updating this as often as I would like, but since Xmas I've not really had time to do anything. Apart from sort of catching up with the washing and ironing.

I'm totally addicted to the Sims 2, I have all the expansion packs and the ones for my Nintendo DS plus on Friday a new stand alone Sims package called Sims Life Stories came out, and as it is Laptop friendly I thought great have to buy that, which I did and it is laptop friendly. What it does is go through the life of two characters and you have to achieve certain goals and aspirations, which is like what you do in Sims but this has chapters that you follow what the story is about, as well as having the function of being able to play your own stories on endless play.

So I've not really been keeping to the new years resolution of buying stuff that I don't really need, but I do enjoying playing Sims, so I get my money's worth out of it, so in my book it's worth the £27.95 I paid for it.

Flickr

I just love Flickr, if you don't know what Flickr is, it is the best online photo management and sharing application in the world, what you can do is register for free and upload your photos and share them with the rest of the world. If you want more out of Flickr then you can subscribe for a year, which I have done and it's the best £13 i've spent this year. Check out my Photos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarah_pics/

The Year 2007

I just wanted to wish all the people that read my blog a Happy New Year and I hope that 2007 is a great year for achieving all your goals and wishes.

I have a tendency to not make new year resolutions as I can't keep them, but this year I would like to try, so my new years resolutions are as follows

1. To eat more healthy and not to snack on rubbish throughout the day
2. To not buy unnecessary items to try and save money, as I buy too many things that I don't really need.
3. To be more assertive both at work and at home

I will hopefully try and keep these, I've managed the first one so far, but we are only on day 3.

Xmas meal

As I mentioned in my last post, it's was our office's Xmas meal last night. We went to Cafe Rouge in Sheffield and had the 3 course Christmas meal. This is what I had:

Starter:
Soupe D’Hiver
A rich, honey roast parsnip and sweet potato soup
Main:
Dinde Rôtie de Noël
Roast turkey with a caramelised onion, chestnut & sage stuffing served with bacon wrapped sausages, Winter vegetables and roast potatoes
Dessert:
Tartelette aux Cerises
Warm griotte cherry & almond tart served with crème fraîche

It was all very nice, and I would recommend the place. The service was good and the price was excellent value for money.

This year we took part in Secret Santa, we were all told to buy something amusing and silly with the budget of £2.50. Secret Santa bought me a childrens shape ball, which is a large ball with different shapes cut out of it and you have to slot the correct coloured shapes through the correct shape hole. This proved hours of fun when highly toxicated.

D-Day Part 2

As from the title, and for people who are familiar with my blog, D-Day stands for Driving test day. Yes today I sat my driving test for the 2nd time, and I passed, big cheer for me Yippee!!!! I'm very happy about it and with only 6 days left till Xmas its a great present. I only got 2 minors, which is really good and the instructor said it was a great drive. I think what made it better is that I knew what to expect and wasn't at nervous this time round.

I decided to book the whole day off work, so I can finish off my Xmas shopping, and also get ready for tonight, as it's my works Christmas meal and silly secret Santa exchange. I will tell you all about it later.

Holiday's are coming, holiday's are coming etc etc

Christmas is only just round the corner, Yippeee!! I love christmas, it is really the only time of year that I can be a kid again and resaonably get away with it.

From past experience I do tend to leave the t'old xmas pressie shopping till the last minute, but this year both myself and my partner have started early and have just about got all those all inportant presents, big pat on the back for me. But in every family there is the one person that is a knightmare when it comes to buying for, this person in my family is my Grandad, at least when my Nan was alive I could get ideas from her, but sadly now this is not the case and my mum is in the same boat as me, we both do not know what to buy him. Every year I seem to buy him the same things, Gilette razor blades and shaving stuff, now this is all and well for about 2 years running but when it is both xmas and b'day I can imagine that you get a bit bored with the same stuff. So if you have any ideas what to get a 76 year old male suggestions please.

My partner and I always have a limit on how much we are spending on each other and this year set that limit of £100. I have gone over by £31 and I think my partner has gone over quite a bit. But I find this annoying that now this makes me feel that I should be spending more, so that he has more presents. But then it makes me feel that he should have stuck to the orginal plan. Oh well it just means I get more pressies. Yeah!!! But this didn't take into account the dilema of the Xbox 360. My partner is a techie and loves his gadgets, this is an expensive hobby, but don't really mind too much as my hobbies are quite expensive in their own right. But on his xmas list was an Xbox 360. I debated this for some weeks and decided against it as we really couldn't afford it, but after some deliberation I crummbled under pressure, and off we went to our shopping centre and bought aformentioned xbox. This is all and well, but my partner then had to get it out of the box and set it all up, just to make sure it worked. I wanted to wrap it up for xmas, but there isn't really the point now as it is in pride of place next to the tv. So now the money spent on my partner has ballooned over the said amount of £100. But I don't expect him to spend a further £300 on me as we really can't afford that.

Angel's & Demons

Firstly for those who haven't a clue what I'm talking about I'll give a little background to this event. Me and my partner collect Bad Taste Bears, these are little bear figurines with a Bad Taste persona. We are both collector members and each year they have an event where other collectors can get together and socialise. This year as well as the yearly event BTB have decided to hold mini events which the Angel and Demons is the first one.

I didn't get my different coloured shoes but a nice pair of silver sandals and a silver bag so they matched.

The event was in Blackpool so we set off about 11:45 and got there just after 2pm we couldn't check in till 2 anyway so we got there just about right, apart from having a detour round Blackpool looking for the hotel as I had the postcode wrong for TomTom, we stopped and called in at the travel information place, where the lady wasn't really that helpful, she seem to assume that I knew where all the roads were. Oh well we got there in plenty of time, the event didn't start till 5pm. So having had a bit to eat and sorting out our costumes it was time to call a taxi and head off. The weather was really not nice, there was a drizzle of rain and the winds were gale force, I had a few incidents with my costume wings. But safely inside everything was fine.

The event was really good and we got to meet a few collectors along the way, didn't speak to half as many people as we would like, but oh well next time we might have more chance. The event consisted of a quiz, the blood brothers, Pete (the creator) Underhill's questions and answers speech, buffet and Disco oh and the fancy dress contest. Didn't win but never mind I thought my costume was cool.

But overall we both had a great time and can't wait for the next one.

Bonfire Knightmare

Well, I was really looking forward to Bonfire night, with all the hotdogs and jacket potatos to eat. But sadly I didn't get to go to my uncles as I was really ill on Friday night which left me bed bound on Saturday, and still not 100% on the Sunday/Monday. So I missed all the lovely food and smells, luckly the house over the carpark from us was having a bonfire and fireworks so I got to watch theirs instead all from the comfort of my bedroom. The joys of fireworks you can watch everyone elses.So alas I will have to wait for another year.

We are off to sunny Blackpool on Saturday for an Angel's and Demons evening at the Pleasure beach. Both my partner and I are collectors of the Bad Taste Bears and they have events for the members, the A&D is one of there events, but it looks like a good time will be had by all, oh and it's fancy dress, I have my costume just about sorted just need shoes, my costume is half angel and half demon so the shoes have to be one white and one red, hopefully I can pick up a cheap pair of white strappy shoes and paint one red.

To do well and not Mock!!

My BF has decided it's a good idea to read my blog, and to make fun of me of what i've wrote. He needs to be aware that it's not nice to be made fun of, and should remember to not bite off the hand that feeds him. So if you are reading this then I would strongly think about not mocking me or you could find yourself in very deep waters.

On a nicer note, its bonfire night this weekend, and we are going to my uncles for a bonfire party tomorrow night. This should be fun, as my uncle has a quite small garden with little room for setting fireworks off at the recommended distance away from spectators. I'm not keen on the whole firework thing, you see I am quite a jumpy person, and loud bangs make me jump, (which is something else by BF has a good laugh about) so I tend to stay indoors, but what I do like about Bonfire night is the food and the nice warmly smells. If I could have that without the loud bangs then I would be happy.

Mid 20's

I was looking at this blog today and thinking that a) it's been a while since my last post and b) I am now over the mid point in my twenties ( I had my 26th Birthday a month ago). To me this a great milestone, but also now puts my life in perspective.

When I was younger at the age of about 16 I used to say to myself that by the time that I was 26 I would like to be in a stable relationship possibly married with a child or one on the way, own my own house and have a respectable career. Well here's the reality, yes I am in a very stable relationship, with the possibility of a not too distant wedding, no children or even the possibility of one (not planning on any just yet), yes I do own my own home with aforementioned partner, and as for the respectable career, I would say it was rather respectable, still learning things and getting to grips with the whole job.

So in a nut shell i'm nearly there with what I espired to be when I was 16. But it's only been in the last 3 years that this has all come together and I still sometimes feel the urge to think back to what if i didn't go on that Flash course in May 2004 and didn't meet the man of my dreams, how different my life would be. But I know that it wouldn't be as nice as it is now.

So much for holidays

Well the week i'd given myself for destressing before the new job didn't quite go as planned, you see my partner was rushed into hospital on the Thursday evening with acute pains in his side, unfortunatly for him it was 3 hours later before they gave him any pain relief, by this time it was 3am myself and his parents were very tired. I sent them home to get some rest whilst i stayed with my BF. They eventually got him a bed Friday lunchtime on the spinal injuries ward, where all his notes and doctor he sees are there. They let him out the following Thursday with a nice stash of antibiotics which have been making his memory worse. Thankfully he is ok now.

The new job is going really well and the people are really friendly and nice.

The W word

Friday the 11th Aug: My last day working for the training provider, i am so relieved. Don't get me wrong i loved my job, it's the people i couldn't stand, some of them were good friends and i will try to keep in touch with them, but the others i'm certanly not going to miss. The company knew Head Office had people problems, and were trying to boost moral by weekly quizzes and get this a bowling trip, but as with everything that you try and change you soon get the same click bowling together and being on the same team and leaving others out. You might as well just chuck money down the drain.

All that is behind me now, as i look forward to new pastures on the Work front. I've given myself a week off to recharge my batteries, before the long slog up to xmas in a new job role. Wish me well.

D-Day

Well today was my D-Day, (Driving Test Day), everything was going really well, then... the examiner told me to turn right up this big hill, bear in mind i've never even been up this hill before, either as a passenger or a driver. So i was mainly focusing on getting up the hill, didn't expect there to be a blind sharpe bend at the top, put it this was i was going a bit fast and cliped the curb, whilst trying to get round the corner. Then meeting a road sweeper so had to brake for that. I knew at that point that i had failed and guess what that's what the examiner failed me on.

At the end he asked me if i had taken the test before, and i hadn't this was my first time and he was quite suprised as i only got 7 minors. But never the less he still failed me, then thought it would be a good idea to say if you had slowed down when approaching the bend i would have passed. Nothing like kicking a gal down.

After my test i asked my partner if he would drive up the aformentioned hill and he did the same as me, plus there wasn't even a slow down sign on the floor.

Oh well better luck next time.

On the Sabbath Day.....

We got burgled, just because we have a ground floor apartment does not mean that little thieves can steal my stuff. The most annoying thing is that we were in the apartment at the time. Thankfully we were both ok, and all they stole were my handbag and my ipod, but that’s not the principle, people should not steal or enter properties uninvited. So I had a great Sunday afternoon stopping all my cards and a visit from the local plod, apart from taking a statement they had time to decide which takeaway they were going to be visiting for their dinner, I’m so glad they are dedicated to their jobs!!!!

Still a week later and locks changed etc, I’m slowly getting my cards back, I hate it when you go into a shop or even walk down the street and see things that you really want to buy, but you can't coz you have no money, well not directly true you have the money but don't have access to it coz the bank hasn't sent you your card back yet. They tease you by sending the pin number but you have to wait the whole week till you get the card.