Reunited, and it feels so good

Mark just called from Heathrow to let me know that our cats, Jerry and Josie, have passed inspection and are now UK citizens. Having gone 3 months without our feline friends, I can’t wait to see them again!

Their uncles have taken excellent care of them. Josie in particular must have thrived as she has ballooned to a whopping 16.5 pounds. Rubenesque, you might say.

Apparently while both have emerged from the red eye flight unscathed, Jerry is giving a little attitude, refusing both treats and eye contact. How does one win back a cat’s affections?

Mark#21 – Charley Says…

For anyone born in the 80’s, this is nostalgia at its most nostalgic.

And for anyone born in the 90’s, think ‘The Prodigy’.

You can see all six of the ‘Charley Says…’ public information films by clicking here. They are way better quality than the Youtube versions too. The one called ‘Strangers‘ is both alarming and hilarious.

In fact, the site that hosts all these clips is the archive for loads of British public information films through the years. It’s quite cool just to scan through there, there’s tons you’ll recognise.

I was looking for the one where the kid burns his hand on a sparkler. You know the one, they used to peddle it out every time bonfire night came around. I couldn’t find it, but what I could find was the insanely lame Hale and Pace doing their ‘The Management’ skit for fireworks safety.

Apply now!

Mark and I loooove Entourage - in fact we just finished watching Season 2 (to find out how, please refer to Mark’s posting below about programming the DVD player…) anyway, we highly recommend.

If you’ve not yet seen the show, you can get acquainted with one of the main characters, agent extraordinaire Ari Gold, by completing this online “job application”… it’s a great way to kill a few minutes.

Just don’t forget to hug it out when you’re done!

Mark#20 – Henry’s Cat

Our cats, Jer-Bear and Jo-Bot, are scheduled to arrive in England on Friday. Poor little things, being separated from us for 3 months must have been pretty stressful for them, but our friends Eric and Brian have done an admirable job as surrogate parents.

In honour of their arrival, here’s another fantastic feline, Henry’s Cat. My favourite thing about this show was the brilliantly named villain – a pathological sheep called Rum Baa Baa.

Meow.

Mark#19 – Everton 3 – 0 Liverpool

I’m getting married in less than two weeks, the sun is shining, and Everton have just stuffed Liverpool three nil.

Life is good.

Mark#18 – Trumpton

I used to watch Trumpton (and Chigley, and Camberwick Green) religiously when I was about 5 years old. My Grandad would pick me up from school, we’d get the bus down to his house together, and then I’d watch Trumpton before having a game of scrabble against my Grandma. 

Although it’s not nearly as memorable or catchy as the opening to Bertha, I decided to post the opening to Trumpton because it’s the earliest TV show I can remember watching.

I remember that I used to love the noise of Windy Millers windmill as it turned. And the legendary roll call taken at the firestation “Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub“.

There was something about the show, however, that I always found kind of haunting and a bit spooky. Even watching the opening sequence again today just freaked me out a bit, but I really can’t put my finger on why.

Mark#17 – Bertha

I love to reminisce about 80’s TV shows with my pals, especially when the conversation ends with a rousing group chorus of the theme tune of one of the programmes under discussion.

So I figure that, every once in a while when I have nothing better to blog about, I’m going to let YouTube do the work for me, and simply post videos of my favourite theme tunes.

I decided to open the series with the title credits from ‘Bertha’ Partly because it’s just so catchy that anyone who lived in the 80’s can likely still recite it, but mainly because I find the name of the series creator / director utterly hilarious. If you don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, just watch for his name in the credits.

Mark#16 – Let’s Get Quizzical

We took part in the Turks Head pub quiz last night. Although we improved on our last outing (a paltry 14 out of 30), we clearly still have room for improvement, having scored just 19.5 out of 30.

Our team, The Wernham-Hoggs, got off to a promising start. But we must have either lost concentration or just got too drunk during the mid-game drinks break, because everything fell apart after half-time.

Next week we aim to break the 20 barrier. But don’t hold your breath, we may very well have peaked.

Mark#15 – Movie Magic

As an avid DVD collector, the past 3 months have been torturous for me because I’ve been unable to play my Canadian Region 1 DVDs on these pesky British Region 2 DVD players.

I’ve been psyching myself up to buy a multi-region, HDMI compatible, progressive scan player, but a moment of inspiration about half an hour ago has just rendered that unnecessary…and saved me the £200-£300 outlay in the process.

Realising that most electrical devices can be hacked these days, I did a bit of speculative digging online and, lo and behold, within seconds I had found a code that enabled me to hack into my Mum and Dad’s old Philips 634 DVD player and enable the multi-region capability.

Now we can FINALLY watch Entourage Season 2, Deadwood Season 2, and all those other Canadian DVDs we bought just before we moved out here.

I’m so proud of myself!

Mark#14 – Ciao ed Bienvenute a Firenze

During our upcoming honeymoon in Italy, we’ll be taking in the sights, sounds, food, wine, culture and, most importantly, romance of Rome, Florence and Venice. And in preparation for our trip, I’m desperately trying to grasp the basics of the Italian language.

So far, the only sentence I have mastered is the one in the title of this posting. But given it translates to “Hello and welcome to Florence”, I can’t imagine a scenario where this will be of any use to us. Well, except I suppose I’ll understand if the concierge offers it up as a greeting when we arrive at our hotel in Florence.  

Originally we were intending to stay in small, boutique hotels so that we could get as authentic an experience as possible. However, we quickly found out that leaving our reservations until just a month before the trip mean most half-decent boutique hotels were fully-booked.

So we changed plan and have instead decided to go for the four-star luxury of the Sofitel Roma and the Sofitel Venezia. Except, that is, in Florence, where we have taken a bit of a gamble on the Hermitage Hotel - a little place just around the corner from the Uffizi Art Gallery. 

Rooftop Terrace at the Sofitel Roma

I’ve just realised that, remarkably, this will be the first holiday that April and I have ever taken alone together. All our previous jaunts have been either to visit April’s family in Nanaimo, or to visit my family in Thornham, or meeting my family in Florida or the Caribbean.

Having already moved in, rescued pets, bought property (twice) and moved countries together, it’s reassuring to know we’ve at least left something until after we get wed!