A Friday Baker's Dozen

[danieldwilliam]

 

1) It is work's Christmas dinner tonight. I generally enjoy these things and I'm looking forward to it. MLW enjoys them less. They are more like work for her as she doens't know many people.

2) Talking of Christmas, my family are preparing for Christmas and Hogmanay. Visiting Edinburgh this year are my niece, my sister and brother-in-law, my aunt and aunt, probably my youngest brother and MLW's goddaughter along with dad and at least one of my step-mothers. I shall be roasting a gammon for Christmas Eve. Christmas Day shall be brunch and cheese. Turkey on Boxing Day and we're saving Lithmas for New Year's Eve and rebranding it Lithmanay.

3) The Captain is in fine form. He loves Christmas and can be heard singing to himself when he wakes up.

4) BB is making great progress with her under-graduate dissertation. She's finished the first part of writing and done as much data gathering as she needs to do. I think she'll be in a postion to hand it in before Christmas.

5) I have a week off work next week. MLW is in Boston with work and I have been tasked with cleaning the flat from top to bottom.  Mostly I was hoping to have a week long nap but instead I have jobs to do.

6) Apparantly Ashley Roberts is too good at dancing to be on Strictly. That doesn't stop her being my favourite person left in the competition. I think she's unlikely to win but she ought to make the final having beaten 4 people in dance offs.

7) Brexit is all terribly exciting, what with the votes on the vote, the ECJ Scottish Case and the vote itself next week and the prospect of second referendums and general elections and votes of no confidence and all that. In some ways I am hoping that the Ultra-Brexiteers do riot and that their insurrection is put down with tanks as the first act of the Starmer government. In many other ways, I don't want that.

8) I have purchased Gettysburg, the very, very, very long film about the Battle of Gettysburg. I intend to watch this over the course of my holiday next week. I have been looking forward to seeing it for about ten years.

9) I shall be spending some of next week doing something with the Captain. Perhaps playing video games on the Play Station. We'll see what sort of mood he's in.

10) In other US Civil War related news I recognised a statue of Robert E Lee and helped MLW to get an answer right on Only Connect.

11) Board game this week have included two secret knowledge games, Deadwood 1876 and Call of Chthullu. Good fun. I've been thinking about my own board game and I think I have an architecture for it. It needs a better name than it currently has.

12) I have not made any eight year old cry at rugby and instead am very proud of my eight year olds.

13) Holiday reply is set to On. Beer anticipation is set to high. Time for the Christmas party to begin.

Comments

[mountainkiss]

You’re off work already? Amazing!

[danieldwilliam]

For a week. Then I'm back in for a week.

[mountainkiss]

Ah, gotcha.

[mountainkiss]

I don’t think Ashley has beaten four people. I think she’s beaten two so far (Graeme and Charles), and might beat someone on Saturday. Am I missing someone?

[danieldwilliam]

Is there only one week to go till the final?

In which case she'll get the final after beating three people in the dance off.

[mountainkiss]

I think that’s likely to be the case. Faye might just beat her but I think it’s unlikely, unless she is very thrown by the lack of love.

[danieldwilliam]

I think she has experience of being unloved.

[mountainkiss]

Well, she lost her father this year. This won’t be as bad as that.

[alithea]

Yep, looks like you were right about her making it to the final. I do like her and I feel a bit sorry for her because I realise that experience or not, she's working very hard, but I also understand why people aren't voting for her. Personally I probably want Stacey and Kevin to win but in previous years I've found a particularly fabulous dance in the final can convince me to vote differently.

[mountainkiss]

What is the attraction of a very, very long film about a battle? (serious q)

[danieldwilliam]

Most war films are micro in scale. They either focus on special forces, a specific incident or place, or a small unit used as some sort of analog for the wider conflict. Guns of Navarone, Dirty Dozen or Enemy at the Gate for special forces. Zulu, The Great Escape or Empire of the Sun for events. Saving Private Ryan, The Cruel Sea, M*A*S*H, and Fury for the last type.

It's rare to get a film that focuses on the size of the conflict from commanding generals to private soldiers and also has the space to explore the relationships and decision making processes of the commanders through conversation and can portray the character of the people involved in the decisions rather than just a sketch or cliché.

The scenes between Lee and Longstreet where they argue over the 5 days of the battle what they should do and why take up about an hour. Lee eventually comes out looking like a deluded maniac and Longstreet a man who knows too late that he's doomed. Then the result of that discussion in real time.

(The scene where Lee tells off JEB Stuart is brilliant for the exposure of Southron hypocrisy.)

[mountainkiss]

Thank you for this thoughtful answer.

[andrewducker]

I spent this afternoon on a train frantically hitting refresh on Twitter to see what stupid thing the government had done in the last 30 seconds.

I was rarely disappointed.