My wife has returned home from an office bash slightly the worse for wear. :-) She rarely goes out drinking and doesn't drink much at home, so I confidently predict she will be extremely unwell in the morning, unfortunately. :-( I think she had a good time, though.

While I'm here, there's a trailer for the U.S. remake of Life on Mars. I was open-minded about this series as it does feature Colm Meaney as Gene Hunt, but frankly it looks awful. I just can't get past the americanised Sam Tyler.

I also notice that Tom McRae has a spiffy new website replacing the crappy one he had previously. No new content but at least this one looks nice and works properly, although bizarrely it makes no mention of his most recent album King of Cards. I assume that'll be fixed. To compensate, you can now buy his live "Strongroom Sessions" EP on the site. There's a good interview with Tom from earlier this month here.

Yesterday we had no internet access.

We arrived home to find that some random contractor had dug metre-deep holes into the grass verge at intervals all the way down our street. For no obvious reason.

We went inside and discovered that we had no internet connection. Also the phones didn't work, but mainly we had no internet connection. Suspiciously, we went back outside and peered into the hole in front of our house. In the hole were several huge tree roots, a manky looking sewer pipe, and two frayed ends of telephone cable separated by a couple of centimetres.

Hmm.

Our neighbour had already reported the 'fault' to BT, so there was nothing more to do except curl up in a ball and wait for morning get on with our busy lives. Janet played Oblivion. I decided to use this opportunity to finally get around to watching my Transformers movie DVD.

During the following two hours and twenty minutes of hokey comedy, moronic plotting, tedious characterisation and gigantic robots repeatedly failing to kill Shia LaBeouf, I silently plotted the death of whoever dug that hole.

A day of excitement, thrills, gardening and wildlife.

Today was the annual ceremony of the removal of bubble-wrap from Janet's greenhouse. We use the bubble-wrap as added insulation when there's a threat of frost, but the greenhouse is a much lighter, airier place once it's gone. It takes quite a long time because everything in the greenhouse including all of Janet's carnivorous plants and the aluminium staging have to be moved onto the lawn, then moved back in again. Naturally we had cat help.

At lunchtime I was startled by a noise - let's call it a squeal of terror - from upstairs. Janet had been sitting on the toilet when a large black spider had crawled over the top of her bare leg. When I got there she was in some post-traumatic stress, not least because she could no longer see the spider. I eventually located it by turning her trousers inside out in the bath. It was fairly juicy-looking. You can only imagine what would have happened if she'd put them back on without checking. :-)

Later on this afternoon we were standing on our patio when a bird crashed very inelegantly into the top of the huge Leilandii tree next door. The tree is home to vast numbers of birds so we assumed that an enforcer for the local Pigeon Mafia had fumbled its approach, but then a bird of prey launched back out of the tree and flew right over our heads. It was speckled on its belly like a thrush, and about pigeon-sized. We reckon it must have been a Kestrel or a Sparrowhawk. It's really good to know that there's one patrolling somewhere near our house. Janet was so pleased about this it nearly made up for the Spider of Doom earlier. However she wishes me to be clear that nothing could ever make up for the HORROR.

We also found a couple of frogs in our pond a few nights ago. The newts are still there -- we've counted at least three of them anyway -- but we had a fine pair of yellow-brown frogs lurking under the surface. We've seen them a couple of times since then, always at night. I love the fact that we live in a suburban semi-detached house and yet we can see newts, frogs, toads, hedgehogs, bats, birds of prey, spiders and a wide variety of garden birds.

I'm certain I'm ambivalent.

( Spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 6: The Doctor's Daughter )

Yesterday we had a very nice barbeque with good food, good company and even some reasonably warm and sunny weather. As a result, no posting from me. Belatedly therefore, here comes the rambling...

( Spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 5: The Poison Sky )

Guillermo Del Toro will be filming not one but two Hobbit movies. The first to be based on a book by J.R.R.Tolkien called "The Hobbit". The second... less so. He states:

‘The Hobbit’, the book, is really one self-contained film, so for the second movie we sat down and worked it out. When we did this we got really excited because this second film is not a ‘tag on’, it’s not ‘filler’, it’s an integral part of telling the story of those 50 years of history lost in the narrative. There will be certain things that we will see from the first movie but from a different point of view, but it will feel like a volume, in the 5 volumes of the entire story. It will not feel like a bridge, I’ve been hearing it called ‘a bridge film’, it’s not, it’s an integral chapter of the story, and I think we’re all on the same page.

Which brings up the burning question: what will the second film be called? And burning questions call for polls. snowking has already suggested a few additional names which I've shamelessly tacked on the end.

Poll #1180320 Subtitling the unsubtitle-able
Open to: All, results viewable to: All

The Hobbit 2:

No you fool it will clearly be called:

This has the added advantage that if they use any of our titles we'll clearly be paid off with a fat settlement.

The X-Files 2 is now titled "The X-Files: I Want to Believe". Because that's not crap at all.

Apparently the Torchwood Season 2 finale was most appreciated by Welsh females aged 16-34. You just can't make it up.

There are some lovely new posters for The Dark Knight here. The Harvey Dent one is sublime.

Those are as nothing compared to this one which is both bold and breathtakingly risky given the 9/11 overtones.

Guillermo 'Pan's Labyrinth' 'Hellboy' Del Toro is officially signed on to direct The Hobbit (yay!) and The Hobbit 2: I Want To Believe. Del Toro says that Andy Serkis is on board, as is Sir Ian McKellen "all bureaucracy pending".

We have frogspawn in our garden pond! Not much, but it's there. More importantly, we were examining the pond today and saw not one but two newts swimming around in it... which may expain why the frogspawn is dwindling. Ahem.

Janet is over the moon. Getting either newts or frogs into the pond was one of the main reasons we built it. We knew we'd had newts in the garden at various points before installing the pond, but the pond has only been there since the middle of last year which is not long for it to naturalise in. Now not only are there the small snails we introduced but an entirely different species of snail, various insects, at least one itinerant frog who left the frogpsawn, and the newts we saw today.

CRAZY WIFE UPDATE: At Janet's insistence we just went out in a thunder storm with a torch to check on our newfound newts, and there were at least six in the pond, which has to be a thriving colony by anyone's standards. This is a rubbish photo of one. Then again it was dark, raining, thundering and lightning at the time.

We're very pleased.

I was far too busy last week to write anything about Doctor Who but I'm nothing if not a completist so here, out of sequence and entirely too late to be of any interest, are some brief thoughts. Assuming I can actually remember anything about the episode...

( Spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 3: Planet of the Ood )

On Thursday we drove up to Edinburgh to see the Hotel Cafe tour headlined by Tom McRae. We went to the Hotel Cafe tour in Newcastle in 2006 and we saw him solo in Edinburgh last year so this fused the two experiences. The Hotel Cafe concept is a fantastic idea which manages to highlight artists you may (or may not) like while never staying still for long enough that you get bored with any one singer.

( Cut for length )

The gig lasted about three hours all told, ending about 11.30. Overall it was a fantastic experience.

The night sky was so clear and brilliant I actually made a brief pit-stop on the way home just to stare at it. I can't remember the last time I saw so many stars away from light-pollution. The constellations were almost lost amidst the background stars. It was a truly gob-smacking sight, and a fine end to a fine evening.

Sontarans! Not much more I need to say, really. Oh, go on then.

( Spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 4: The Sontaran Stratagem )

To our great relief Pixie is feeling much better. I can tell this because she's resumed her customary practice of waking us an hour before we're due to get up and snuggling in next to us in the bed, and then miaowing when she feels enough time has passed that she probably ought to be fed. In Pixie's world there is a strict daily rota and we fall sadly short of her high standards. Janet was so delighted she's recovering that she didn't even complain about being woken up.

We really did think she might be on her way out if she didn't start eating and drinking soon.
The vet yesterday evening gave her a dose of antibiotics and that's what seems to have turned her around - within a few hours her appetite started coming back and when Janet let the tap run over her palm Pixie lapped thirstily at the running water for several minutes. Hardly surprising since she gets most of her water from her food and she hasn't been eating. She's still a bit picky and her appetite isn't fully back, but I think she's out of the woods.

Our part of the bargain is having to squirt antibiotics down her throat twice daily for a week, something that we more often have to do for Charcoal than Pixie. It was surprisingly easy this morning, but I suspect that's because she didn't know what we were up to. I'm expecting more of a struggle tonight.

(The vet told us that if we parted her gums and squirted the pipette through her clenched teeth this would work without needing to prise her jaws open; certainly it seemed to work and it's less traumatic).

Bit worried about our little three-legged cat Pixie who is uncharacteristically quiet at the moment. She's sleeping most of the time (nothing new there) but hasn't eaten much of anything since Sunday. She'll hardly nibble at tuna flakes from my hand, won't touch her favourite cat treats, and licks her lips a lot as if thirsty but won't drink water. She also seems a bit shaky, and won't go outside unless I carry her out, when she has a desultory scout around the flower bed and then returns to her bed indoors.

I've checked inside her mouth and can't see anything obviously wrong there. We're taking her to the vets tomorrow night to see what's up, but I hope it's nothing serious. (Plus our other cat, Charcy, has Cystitis again and is weeing small drops of blood all around the house, but these days that's a semi-regular occurrence which generally clears up on its own.)

Por cats.

There's lovely.

( Spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 2: The Fires of Pompeii )

I do believe there be a new, post writer's strike episode of CSI: Original Menthol Flavour on Channel 5 in a couple of minutes.

EDIT: Oh how I have come to hate those Kia Cee'd promotional ads with the car zooming in front of sentences to make banal and obvious changes to the meaning.

Today is the day on which the fact-free conspiracy theory that Prince Phillip had Diana assassinated (for a plethora of reasons that only exist in Mohamed Al Fayed's head) finally went up in smoke once and for all. Not that it will stop the conspiracyheads of course, but then conspiracy theories don't thrive on rigorous public examination anyway. They thrive on half-truths and insinuations that often make a seductive amount of sense until you take a single step backward and remember all the other facts that make them impossible. So, although it will make no difference and I stopped caring about Princess Diana's death approximately ten years ago, I do think it right to pause briefly and genuflect at the altar of rightheadedness.

In that vein, Charlie Brooker writes hilariously about the so called 'Brain Gym' for school-children [via badscience.net].

I arrived back today and let the cats out only to realise that our friendly neighbourhood rat was back again. Pixie took one look at it and charged headlong down the garden (no doubt thinking: Biggest. Mouse. Ever.) and astonishingly the rat didn't see her until she was almost upon it. It scurried off at lightning speed leaving both Pixie and, belatedly, Charcoal snuffling fruitlessly around that end of the garden in what, for a pair of dimwitted cats, passes for hunting. I was a bit concerned lest they get too close and get bitten by the rat, but realistically it's faster and smarter than they are.

We've found the local council's Pest Control site and they have a phone number and email address which look promising: "If you see any signs of rats in your house or garden, please contact the council as soon as possible. We offer a free survey and eradication service to all residents. We use poisoned bait, wherever possible away from children and pets."

I checked on the cats later only to see the tail of one of the local Toms disappear sharpish over the fence. We seem to have a couple of chunky-looking cats taking a sudden interest in the garden so I suspect it's the time of year when a young Tomcat's thoughts turn to miaowing tunelesly at Teh Ladies. Our two are neutered of course.

--

In other news, City Link still suck.

This morning Janet rang them to tell them we'd collect her parcel and was told they'd hold our package at the depot. This afternoon we went across to the depot and were told that, oops, whoever took that call hadn't actually stopped the package, which was now out with the van. Did we know who we'd spoken to? Grr. So they tried to ring the driver, who wasn't answering his phone. Finally we were told to come back at 5 p.m. when he'd definitely be back.

Before leaving we pointed out that no cards were left last week and were told: "Lots of people have said that. Apparently none of the drivers had any cards last week. I don't know if that's true".

*headdesk*

So we went home, and set off back to the depot at 5 p.m. (cunningly leaving them a bit more time) and as we turn the corner at the end of our street a City Link van passes us heading the other way. Suspiciously we turn around and lo! It stops at out house. Right at the time we were told to go and get it from the depot. We mention to him that his depot had tried to ring him and also that we'd had no cards left last week, and he looks blankly at his mobile phone and then says (in a moment of customer service genius) "This isn't my normal route you know. I'm just sticking up for myself, because no-one else will".

--

The package, by the way, contained off-cuts of coloured glass which Janet was very pleased to receive as she's taken several pieces to the glass-working course she's doing tonight (which has taken over from the silver-working one).

Yes it's snowing here too in big chaotic swirls of snowflakes. Sadly the flakes vanish into the tarmac as if continuing to fall unimpeded towards the centre of the globe. Even on the garden the snow is only able to cling on grimly for about half an hour before melting away into airy nothing. We're still seeing the odd flurry, in between bouts of brilliant sunshine when the damp grass looks startlingly green.

Since I went out to, ahem, party hearty immediately after last night's Doctor Who season premiere I haven't really had a chance to comment very much, but it's been thoroughly dissected here, here, here and here amongst other places.

( Belated spoilers for Doctor Who - Episode 1: Partners in Crime )

Next week's episode does look much better, but then I'm pre-disposed to like anything set in Pompeii.

We have a rat at the foot of our garden. It just scampered out in broad daylight looking friendly, healthy, brown and, well, like a rat. Further observation showed that it's stealing bread and bird seed and buggering off back into our compost bin. Where, no doubt, it's taken up residence.

Now we have a dilemma. It's cute, it's never been seen previously, and all things being equal I have no objection to it making a living. But I know that rats tend to carry infections which are dangerous for household pets like our two cats. Although I bear it no ill will I think I'd like it gone.

We're considering getting one of those "tumbler" compost bins on a frame and locating it on the drive, which just leaves the question of how to get rid of this one. I dread the thought that it has an unbearably cute family of small rat-lings living in there. We don't like the idea of poison for all manner of reasons, not least the cats, and I'm certainly not about to set about rat murder with garden tools.

We thought about prodding, shaking and generally disturbing the bin for a week to see if that causes the rats to seek another abode, and then I'm happy to empty the bin out and see what happens. But of course the rodent will only relocate somewhere else nearby. I'm just at a bit of a loss as to the best approach.

Any ratty experiences you'd like to share?

( EDIT: Now with ratty photos )

City Link suck.

Yet again we wait for a package that never turns up. Yet again the sender tells us that the courier has faithfully tried to deliver the parcel on several occasions. Yet again no-one rang to tell us when the delivery would be, and no cards were left telling us they'd tried to deliver.

I don't understand how this company stays in business. They're employed to do one thing and one thing only - deliver parcels. It's abundantly clear that they don't bother to do this unless you're standing on the doorstep with your arms outstretched as they pull up to the kerb. Since their staff can't be bothered to leave a card, this essentially generates an endless loop of failed deliveries until the parcel gets returned to sender. (Either that or they can't find our house; I'm not sure which is more damning).

Without a card we didn't even have the consignment number to track the parcel on their website. Having now got the consignment number from the sender by telephone, the website states that we were left a card twice in the last two days. Uh huh. Now we either have to pay another £6 for them to redeliver (fat chance) or collect it ourselves on Monday.

Grr. I know I should be used to this by now but it's that particular combination of incompetence, laziness and deceit that drives me crazy.