It's a Mystery...

I hope you've all had a productive and good week at home and if you work - there too. I am really looking forward to the weekend as I do all weekends with a view of getting into the garden and continuing what I managed to start last week at last - pruning and tidying. Well I was.

I was on the treadmill last night and half way into the routine, I felt a tremendous stabbing pain in my knee which immediately stopped me in my tracks. Fortunately, there's a sturdy handrail so I was able to lift my feet off the conveyor belt and onto the side boards until I could switch it off. I continued to walk but at a slower pace and on the flat for the last twenty minutes, but I realise now, after consulting doctor Internet, that I may have damaged my cruciate ligaments.

My own doctor is on holiday but I can ring up on Monday for an appointment for later next week, so it's ice packs and rest; it is really painful when I walk.

I broke my last abs machine which I bought to help me get rid of the handles that surround the middle bit of my pudgy body and I need to take that back on Saturday morning to Argos because it's still in guarantee. A replacement arrived on the back of a van today, so I can use that to keep the exercise going - if I stop exercise, it could spell disaster for the old diet.

Ah well, the best laid plans of mice and men!

Depressingly, I notice on the Met Office website that there's an early warning of snow next week causing disruption and I can see by the news that parts of the UK have been suffering from snow this week, the Midlands and parts of Scotland particularly. I love snow and winter, but it seems to have been a long one this year and for a change, I'm looking forward to an early spring and more daylight and more sun! PLEEEEEASE!

It's ages since I did a list, so I thought we'd have a look at life's imponderable mysteries; answers on a postcard please...

How do you tell when you've run out of invisible ink?
Whose cruel idea was it to put an 's' in the word 'lisp?'
If people from Poland are called 'Poles,' why aren't people from Holland called 'Holes?'
How come you never hear about gruntled employees?
Can atheists get insurance for an 'act of God?'
Why does your nose run and your feet smell?
Why don't you ever see a toad on a toadstool?
If the speed of light is 186,000 miles per second, what is the speed of dark?
Does that screwdriver really belong to Phillip?
How do 'Do not walk on the grass' signs get there?

Chat soon

Ta-ra

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Next blog is a century! Wow, might have to think of something special, but I never do as you have read, just something that tickles my fancy on the day.

Time to be a film critic again, this time with one of my favourite subjects either in book form or on celluloid, Harry Potter that I saw today with my youngest son. Like my crossroads, this film reaches a crossroads in the story of the young magician haunted by his past. This film has fewer magic spells but greater special effects which frankly are stunning in their simplicity. They don't over-awe what is a very important transition between children under threat from the Dark Lord to where battle begins in earnest with the most serious of consequences and the movement between childhood and the complexity of adulthood. I'm not going to include any plot spoilers here and if you have read the book, you know what happens.

Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grinch as the three pupil friends at Hogwarts College of Witchcraft and Wizardry, (Harry Potter, Hermione Grainger and Ron Weasley respectively) are growing fast and learning that relationships are anything but straightforward, but the director attacks this with humour and affection without at any time being a cringe worthy experience.

What is a delight however is more screen time for some most interesting characters of the series, Severus Snape subtly underplayed by the brilliant Alan Rickman, Draco Malfoy, Harry's main school rival well played by Tom Felton and Bellatrix Lestrange played seductively and fatalistically by Helena Bonham Carter - the epitome of evil itself.

Rickman has the knack, indeed skill of playing everything through his face and voice (like Michael Caine). His ability to keep still, not ham it out with facial ticks, odd voices or eccentric behaviour makes him both fascinating and the most dangerous of all men; can he be trusted? Will Harry Potter rue the one time that he trusts the sly, secretive and perhaps double dealing Professor Severus Snape?

The introduction of a new character, Professor Slughorn played by Jim Broadbent is the undoubted jewel in the crown of this excellent production. Old favourites, Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith and Robbie Coltrane still lend their gravitas to the Potter franchise.

The film is still a gentle stroll with easy sets (at great locations), great atmospheric lighting, and swear free dialogue that is easy to follow. Emotion is abundant and pitched at the right level - never over exaggerated. But a word about the special effects. They've always been impressive and an improvement on early Potter films, this indeed is what makes the magic. Flames in abundance, rebuilding of a trashed room, appearances and disappearances, yet all within context and never, not once overdone or intrusive.

There is no doubt that the film is now reaching a darker stage and that's as much about the gathering storm that is around the corner, whispers of dark-doings ahead than it is about the this film setting of the scene. The 12A rating is entirely appropriate and this is not one for little kids any more. Indeed there is one part of the film that can make you jump if you are not concentrating, indeed the woman next to me nearly lost all sense of dignity when she got the shock.

Whilst it's no secret who the 'Chosen One' is, Potter himself, the identity of the Half Blood Prince may come as a big surprise. If you want to know who it is - go and see the film.

This is a longish film, it needed to be, I think I measured it at about two and a half hours, but it's British cinema at its spectacular best, made by talented people behind the camera as well as in front of it. This is a must-see film.

The weekend is upon us and it's list time. This time, like Harry Potter, let's ponder the mysteries of life and ask some interesting questions to which there are few answers.

• If you choke a Smurf, what colour does it turn?
• What happens if you get half scared to death twice?
• Why did Kamikaze pilots wear helmets?
• What's a free gift? Aren't all gifts free?
• What the hell do you do if you see an endangered animal eating an endangered plant?
• What do you plant to grow a seedless watermelon?
• If a tin whistle is made of tin, what's a foghorn made of? (thanks to Lonnie Donegan)
• Why is it so hard to remember how to spell 'Mnemonic?'
• Why is a Wise Man and a Wise Guy exactly the opposite?
• and finally... Why did God give men nipples?

Have a great weekend!

Chat soon

Ta-ra.