herons

A recent walk back from a pub included a random conversation along the lines of did we ever see any herons around here? I said "Yes, every week or two". Actually, if I'm out cycling then there could be more frequent sightings.

Then today I saw four different ones.

Unless they were stalking me for circa 20 miles, then I'm pretty sure they were different birds. All flying and quite close by. It had me wondering what they knew, that meant an unexpected number of them breaking cover. This isn't Florida and they normally keep themselves to the more countryside areas.

Its like a couple of weeks ago when the local deer that usually hide in the woods became disorientated in the snow and started wandering around various neighbourhood gardens.

Of course, by this evening, there's a possible explanation that the herons could sense the impending weather and were doing something secretively heron-like in advance.

Anyway, its snowing around here at the moment. Quite a lot.

the road

Back to work today, with lots of people in the office, restocking with pencils and other useful stationery. I arrived early, to bag a good hot-desk and then join in a few meetings as we get 2010 on the road.

Actually, I'm reading a book called 'The Road' at the moment, by Cormac McCarthy. Its a dystopian story of a father and son looking for somewhere to go in a post apocalyptic world, where everything is covered in grey ash flakes that have killed the ecosphere. Maybe they should have handed out some copies in Copenhagen last month.

Truth is, its quite a tough read. Not the writing, which streams along, but the subject matter, which includes ideas that once you've read them, can't be uninvented. I won't say more, but there's a relentless end of the world theme. Despite the faith and hope imbued in the principle characters, I can't imagine how this is going to turn out well.

It's a quick read, with some fast simple conversations to power it along. I also noticed its just been made into a movie although I think it will be difficult to capture the same sentiments on film.

I only started it Sunday, but I'll finish it tonight. Gripping.

division of labour

Almost back to normal stuff today. We've still got some snow on the ground here at the moment, but I've enough household chores to keep me away from the ice.

There's packing away various seasonal entertainments, repairing a few minor domestic damages and broken light bulbs. Determining whether any of the extra festive cheeses have gone critical. Arranging sundry empty wine bottles to not look too copious when the collectors arrive to take them away. Wondering how so many clothes have entered the laundry basket. Finding a new place to hang the Swiss triclimate fusion jackets. Trying to invent a meal from the spectacularly unusual remnants of the food in the fridge. Emptying excess chains, folding spades and telescopic sticks from the boot of the car. Re-assembling a collection of work equipment for tomorrow. Stacking a few new books on the reading pile.

The sun is shining. Maybe I will go out instead.

nine

At the best cinema in London this evening - The Electric in Portobello Road - to see Rob Marshall's 'Nine'. We'd booked armchairs with footstools and grabbed some suitably Italian drinks before the show started. It's the movie musical that parallels Fellini's 8 1/2 about the trials and tribulations of a director with writer's block attempting the ninth movie.

Stylishly 60's Italian, with little Alfa sports cars, perpetual sun-glasses and glamour the Sartorialist would envy, this was a cinema spectacle. I didn't know what I was getting in advance, and about a third of the way through realised it was a series of cameos by the women connected with Daniel Day-Lewis as the enigmatic and conflicted maestro Guido. At around the same moment I decided it wasn't so much a musical as a modern-day opera. Art house opera marketed as big screen musical, maybe?

All new songs (I think) and flashily sassily directed choreography which sometimes tips more than a wink to Bob Fosse. My sense was that the songs need to be heard a couple of times to really sink in, maybe because they are new rather than Moulin Rouge or Mamma Mia style implants of existing pop.

I'll be one of the people who enjoyed this show, although my sense is it will be divided. I liked the homage to 60's cinema, the graininess of some of the film, the wide open lenses with liquid backgrounds. The way that Daniel Day-Lewis played the director without a script or any ideas, but who could function charmingly on auto-pilot through the press calls.

There's a roll call of well-known actresses as the women in his life, from Marion Cotillard as his wife, Penelope Cruz his mistress, Nicole Kidman as his muse, Sophia Loren as his mother, through Fergie, Kate Hudson and even Judy Dench as the wardrobe person.

This may have been a simple storyline, modest dialogue and some flashy set pieces. I'd put it closer to art house homage than the way it seems to have been marketed. On that level I think it works well.

Trailer here

iSlate

We received some secret samples of the still in development handheld graphically enabled PDA with built in memory, text and reader support. They appeared from within innovative packaging akin to tinsel covered crackers. Along with a supply of apples and peppermints, we took them for a test run today.

There were a few teething troubles, mainly because of the ability to fold the device, and then to find new lines appearing in the text.

This would be okay for a mystery novel, but less so for a more factual account. It may rekindle writing ideas for some, but we wondered if a more permanent form of memory might be better, perhaps supplied in larger quantities. We hear the code name for these under development memory units is 'Pages'.

ring out, wild bells

We didn't start the first day of 2010 too early. I think the previous evening had slowed us down somewhat.

We did make it to the pub in the afternoon, though, and changed our dining plans to ones involving pub food. The previous evening we'd rang out the wild bells, to the wild sky.

There'd been flying cloud and frosty light. We'd seen the year going and decided to let him go. Then the new, happy bells, beckoned the nobler modes of life, with sweeter manners and purer laws.

We've decided to make the fresh, new sparkling 2010 excellent.

Happy New Year.

rashbre central rehearses auld lang syne

Okay, maybe the Buck's Fizz was a trifle strong and maybe we do have cloth ears, but we accidentally leaned on the iPhone record button during the practice session for Auld Lang Syne. We'll need to download the words if we are to sing more than the first verse later.

Of course, its also a fine full moon to enter the new decade, which may explain some of the madness.

Press here for our bad singing. It will be worse by midnight.

Triffids

Something of dilemma about whether to watch the second part of the new Day of the Triffids show, having missed Part 1.

Normally I'd be iPlayering my way through the first episode, but I was sort of intrigued to see what they'd done with the plotline and London scenes, so shamefully I skipped straight into Part 2.

I noticed the opening credits said 'Written by' someone that wasn't John Wyndham, and then referenced his book a little later. I did think that was a little bit 'the wrong way around' for something so iconic. But then the plot modernisation was a bit odd too.

Wyndham (to my recollection) doesn't explain how the plants originated, except that it could have been some form of off world experimentation. A good device.

In this one, we have scientists (I assume in Part 1) creating plants to be used as bio-fuel. Except they are carnivorous. Oops. A bit of a blooper there. Wouldn't it be better to use the plants to do what they are good at? Use sunlight and CO2 to grow? No, let's chuck them a few cows to eat before we turn them into fuel.

I get the idea of modernising the story, but not if the end result has a flaw that makes the rest of the story like a few Survivors offcuts.

I did like the scenes in the Abbey, with Vanessa Redgrave dispatching various sacrifices to the woods. There was enough creepiness around this to create some proper darkness. Eddie Izzard made a suitably insane villain and I suppose reminded us that this was wholesome ensemble Sci-Fi rather than a dark tale of apocalypse.

A circular reference here could be that this was the planet that first messed with the plants. After they have taken over they could shoot off to invade somewhere else where Wyndham's original story can play with greater authenticity.

In which Petite France offers festive delights

There's a subtle sales role within La Cure Gourmande. They ever so gently offer you a modest bon-bon or biscuit and maybe a basket to make carrying things easier.

Let's just say we now have enough biscuits for any amount of New Year celebrations. Oh, and chocolate.

Strasbourg's old town has many small alleys, twists and turns and knows how to decorate stylishly for Noel. In one area, the lighting across the middle of the cobbled street was chandeliers.

We visited the Russian Market, the various Christmas fairs and even the local co-op for those last few wine bottles to supplement a planned festive fondue during the New Year season.

twisting the day away

Back along the twisty roads on the North side of Lake Thun. Complete with those tunnels like the ones on the Corniche in Italy and made famous by various James Bond movies.

Later we'd be going through some of the urban tunnels cutting through Basel. They remind me of some kind of club lighting scene, with their lime green verticals and pulsing white lights.

Our destination is the old part of Strasbourg, as a stopping off point on the way back to the UK.

mountains, snow, lakes, sunshine

Early morning drinking on the side balcony as the sun begins to rise from behind the mountains. Our day filled with joys of the slopes rounded off as we see the sun setting behind the Jungfrau.

We'll be heading to the lakes next, where there will still be sights of the mountains although no snow on the ground, but hopefully sunshine. Then we will plot our course across to Strasbourg for some time in Petite France, before beginning the journey back to the UK.

Boxing Day on a Glacier

Well, we managed to get ourselves up in amongst the mountains today. This is around Jungfrau, Monch and Eiger and there's part of the Eigergletscher in the foreground.

As predicted, today had mainly sunshine, so although the temperature was minus 12 degrees Centigrade, it really didn't feel cold. Maybe the schnapps in the coffee helped later on.

The pictures are pretty random at the moment, as I don't have any of my usual technology to sort and sift, instead making do with a USB cable and an iPhone.