A random bunch of stuff all chucked into one blog post

I haven't blogged all that much over the last few weeks, because I feel like I haven't been doing much that was noteworthy.

Mum has kind of plateaued at a medium level of crazy for the moment, so I haven't even felt there was much to write about her either. She's still ill of course, and she's still subject to their bizarre gypsy curse and its associated mishaps (the thermostat is still kind of broken, and this week their kitchen sink decided to overflow), but she hasn't had anything major to bang on at me about for a while.

So this is just an odds and sods post really to distract me from my work for a little while.

We went to a friend's house last night for an Indian take away and to watch Slumdog Millionaire on Channel 4. I hadn't seen it before, but obviously I've heard quite a lot about it after it won lots of different awards. I have to say that I quite enjoyed it, but I didn't think it was amazing or anything. I often get that with 'big' films though, they end up rather over-hyped and then you can't help but be disappointed.

I thought it was a good story, but it was essentially an episode of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire with some padding. Yes it gave an apparently realistic and compelling portrayal of life in the slums of Mumbai, and it had a very authentic feel given its use of real people from the slums as actors. So it was good definitely, but parts of it were a bit predictable and I wasn't left thinking "wow that was a best thing I've ever seen".

I've also watched the first three episodes of the new season of Heroes recently. Almost immediately it managed to annoy me, and although it is refreshing to have some new characters I do feel like it has gone off the boil a bit. Why is Sylar STILL in it as one of the main villains? Why? Why would you do this? That's FOUR seasons now where he's been running around, talking with his mouth half closed and having practically limitless powers. It just seems a bit lazy not to have written him out.

I'm also fed up with the way Matt Parkman does a weird squinty head twitch every time he uses his powers. Surely he would be more effective if it weren't so obvious he was poking around in your head?

And of course Claire Bennet is still trying to live a normal life, but failing miserably to be at all discreet about her powers, and her Dad is interfering in the name of protecting her, and Hiro's powers don't work properly, and blah blah blah. You could be describing practically any season of the show.

So anyway, I'm sure I'll end up still watching it, but I'll frequently tut the whole way through, and let out an exasperated sigh at the end of each episode. It's such a shame, because the first two seasons were excellent.

Other than that, work is the same as usual: pretty dull and filled mostly with Facebook and Twitter. I've had quite a few days off due to the snow, which has been nice and has helped the weeks to flick by more quickly. I had someone ask me YET AGAIN the other day "wouldn't you rather be doing a job that uses your languages". ARRRRGH! Yes I probably would, but I'm just not, alright?? There aren't that many jobs 'using your languages' in Brighton, and if I learnt one thing from the job in the tour operators which I hated, it's that just using your languages isn't enough to make you like your job. You have to like the actual job in the first place - doing it in French or Italian makes very little difference.

So yes, I still have my vaguely-unfulfilled feeling from time to time, and would quite like to be doing something more challenging. But as I have no idea what that would be, this job is fine: it pays well (considering I have hardly any work to do), I like the bits of work that I DO do, the people are nice, and I get left alone and not stressed out. If a bit of boredom is the price I pay for that, it could be a lot worse.

Right, I've been banging on for ages now, so I'd better do some work/Twitter. We're meant to be going to Pop Kraft this weekend, so maybe that will give me an opportunity to take some photos and write about some actual events instead of general ramblings!