Caption Competition

Hi,

I am now back in St.Albans after a 3 month absence - having been via Reading, York, Scarborough, Birmingham, Macclesfield, Buxton & Knutsford. (details will follow soon).

However, to keep you happy in the meantime, I thought I'd post this picture for you that I took at Alex & Ryoko's wedding.



Captions on a postcards/comment box, etc. :o)

Munchkin Marathon

On Monday 'morning', Steve & I headed for Birmingham to join Reg to celebrate his joining us in being 22. We got there about teatime, and after tea decided to play 'Super Munchkin'.

This is an excellent card game, which I discovered a couple of weeks ago when Tim C brought it over to play. To cut a long story slightly shorter, I went to bed about midnight and Reg & Steve apparently stopped playing at about 4am (having lost count of how many games they'd played).

The following morning, we got up, had brunch & decided to play again, to pass the time until Michael arrived 'about lunchtime', before going into town. He got there about 3pm, and didn't want to go straight out again, so we played another round (yes, really!). By this time, we'd all got the hang of it, and had figured out all sorts of ways of stopping people winning, so that particular round lasted until nearly 6pm, (with a short intermission for Reg to open his cards & presents), by which time it was dinner. Over dinner, we had conversation which seemed to be an antidote to Munchkin, about the situations in Israel/Palestine and Darfur/Sudan.

After dinner, we then played 'Scattergories' (Town, River, Country, Whatsit) briefly before heading off to the cinema "Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest...

Well, I think that was the one of the very silliest films I have ever seen. Superb fun, but it involved a selection of highly improbable rolling objects and some really quite ridiculous combinating of various nautical stories (Davy Jones, the Kraken, the Flying Dutchman...).



Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed it. The 'dual/trial' is hilarious, as is much of the film. However, the thing that (very nearly) spoiled it was that the CGI doesn't match up to the standard of the first. The underwater scenes in the original genuinely took my breath away the first time I saw them. Now, the CGI in the new one is still good - Davy Jones' crew are excellent and actually quite believable (within the scope of the film!).



But... the Kraken just looks like it's been stuck on. Plus, I just don't buy what Elizabeth does at the end (will not 'spoil' it).
All in all, those 2 things are a real shame, because as I said the film is otherwise very, very good and a good giggle. :o) And the final moments (before & after the credits) are just surreal!


After the film, we went home & played *another* game of Super Munchkin, before going to bed. Finally, we got up, had breakfast, played Scattergories (Michael somehow managed to play the whole round with the wrong letter...) & drove home by almost the right route. :o)

I'm sure that's more information than you probably ever wanted, but I'm bored and watching TV, so there! :oP

Coming Soon...
What happened in Birmingham...
And a review of "Pirates of the Caribbean - Dead Man's Chest".

Coming a bit later than that...
A summary/review of my year and my thoughts on leaving the Chaplaincy (& Reading!)

Long time, no blog

Apologies for the long delay in transmission... Not much has been happening, and yet I still seem to have no time. Odd.

So, in the past month I have:

Been on the Chaplaincy Centre End of Year Retreat - A very interesting and useful day on 'Taking Stock & Looking Forward'. The morning involved looking over the past 4 years and looking at what we were thankful for and what we want to put over into God's hands and leave behind. In the afternoon, we were 'looking forward' and had to write a letter to ourselves that will be posted to us 1 year from now. Quite difficult to work out what to write and I'm sure that it'll make interesting reading when I get it back!

Consumed far too much barbecue food - Including Heather's birthday BBQ, the Chaplaincy end of year BBQ & the Small World Cafe BBQ & Barn Dance (all within 24 hours); Alex's birthday BBQ (which included arriving at the usually deserted Thames Valley Park, to find the Reading Regatta going on with about 2,000 boats and canoes, so we all had to transfer to King's Meadow instead - Thank God for mobile phones!); Henrick's farewell BBQ... to date, I think that's it. But I will start to look like a hotdog before long, if I keep this up!

Been to Helen's "Pirates, Vegetables & Cows' Party - just a few of us, as most people were away that weekend, but a good time was had by all. Plus, we watched a lot of Dangermouse! :o)



Helped organise the SWC Weekend Away - Between a few of us (Rich, Annie, Michael & me) we organised a weekend to the Isle of Wight. Sadly, though, it didn't happen, as we only had 1 international student sign up. So, despite being on the team for 3.5 years, I've still never been on an int'l weekend away.

Had Chris & Rebecca come and stay - they were here for about a week. Originally for music making, Chris' PGCE interview & generally seeing people before everyone goes their separate ways. Well, the last one happened, and some of the first, and the second one happened but not in that week. :o) All in all, a good week though.

Attended Reg's surprise birthday party - He was totally shocked, which was great. And Fish provided a legendary (fairtrade, vegan, still warm!) chocolate & strawberry cake.

Attended Michael's graduation - After a lot of stress over Easter, it was far from certain that he'd make it to the end. But he did, and he got a well-deserved 2.i, so he'll be at York St.John next year for a PGCE (Upper Primary). :o) (Rumour has it, he got 68% on his dissertation!)
I also met his parents at the graduation, and they seem very nice. And are very good at making picnics. :o)


So, I think that's my life in a nutshell for the past few weeks. My foot's still sore too. It's been nearly 6 weeks, so it should be better. I may well go see the GP next week, when I get back from Reg's birthday bash in Birmingham, if it's still sore then. I should have gone sooner, but as I said, I don't really know where the past 4 weeks have gone!

In terms of the summer, when I think about everything I have to do and all the different places I have to be, I just want to curl up in a little ball and hide until July 2007. However, I can't do that, so I'll just have to get through the intermittent franticness that this summer is going to be! Oh well.