Some Time in 2008 (March)

Well its been over 6 months since I last put anything on this blog. Time changes things. Ive drifted away from AR as we began not to have the same things in common.

I've completed a City & Guilds course which both of us enroled on in 2006. She went on 'The Journey' course in 2006 which I was due to go on but couldnt because I took a 6 month short term job. Her 'The Journey' course ended this year. Then I started a 3 day a week voluntary placement to keep up with my IT Admin skills.

I have taken part in a DVD and if I can obtain permission to upload it I will put it on this blog. Ah well 'Tempus Fugit'.

All the best to any reader and leave me a message if you like.

16th Sept 07 Extra, Extra read all about it: 'Grow Your Own' (Picture Benedict Wong)

I decided on the advice of my Boss, Jan Cameron, to go to a new and interesting film and support all my other workmates at the 'Walled Garden'. This is a film that Sandra de Mondoz, the 'Choose Life' Co-Ordinator for Edinburgh organised as part of the 'Suicide Prevention Week'. Did you know that about TWO young people a day under the age of 25 successfully commit suicide. The 'Walled Garden' is a new concept in RECOVERY from Mental Ill Health, and the film discusses how this concept works. I should add I am not a 'Gardener' Im an I.T. Administrator who supports Robert Sless the I.T. Supervisor. As it happens, Ive downloaded the 'Edinburgh FilmHouse' information clip just for you, my really interested readers and it reads:-

"Grow Your OwnSat 15 Sept only – Free EventRichard Laxton Britain 2007

1h37m 35mm PG – Contains mild language

Cast: Benedict Wong, Eddie Marsan, Omid Djalili, Olivia Colman, Philip Jackson, John Henshaw.

A warm, intelligent and charming British comedy, written by Michael Winterbottom's regular collaborator Frank Cottrell-Boyce, Grow Your Own is the story of what happens when some asylum seekers are given plots in a traditional English allotment.

It's actually based on a real-life project in Liverpool, where a psychiatrist working with victims of torture and persecution began using gardening as therapy, with impressive results. As part of Suicide Prevention Week this free screening is sponsored by the Community Planning Partners in Edinburgh who support the work of Choose Life locally within the city.

There are also some things that can be done to try to reduce suicide and in fact be seen to 'protect' us from it. These issues will be discussed following the film. We are also pleased that members of Redhall Walled Garden, an Edinburgh based project funded by the Scottish Association of Mental Health, will be participating in the discussion.
(Sponsored by Choose Life, and SAMH)"

This is a seriously funny film with a sensitive message contained within it. It had me weaping with laughter, and sadness as I recognised some of the issues. If the film ever comes to your area or you get the chance to hire it, please do it is well worth it.

1. I finally managed to get rid of that nasty cough. It still has a little rattle now and then but nothing like it was.
2. Ive been out and about and been on a couple of nice walks. Been to Balerno and walked in to Colinton, and went in the Station Bar for afternoon tea, with Anne.
3. I went to a Saturday night Fringe Festival show with a friend and saw a slide show demonstration which was put together by a Dundee artist called Stella Small.
4. This week I was at another NHS meeting and we discussed how we might work better as a committee. It is a voluntary body and has no Executive powers.
5. Ive been at my Volunteering I.T. work again this week, and its been good to get involved with the different people I help.
6. No luck on the Paid Job front as no offer of work has been forthcoming.
7. I went and saw another film at the Dominion Filmhouse. It was very funny, and was called: 'HAIRSPRAY'
8. Credits to Wikipedia, the Plot synopsis is as follows:
   May 3, 1962 begins the same as every other school day for Tracy Turnblad (Nikki Blonsky), an optimistic "pleasantly plump" high school student from the Highlandtown neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland. She endures a day's worth of boring classes so that she and her best friend Penny Pingleton (Amanda Bynes) can race home in order to catch their favorite television show, The Corny Collins Show. The program, a local teen dance show, is broadcast in the afternoons from station WYZT, sponsored by "Ultra-Clutch" brand hair spray.
   Some of the teenagers featured on the show also attend Tracy and Penny's school, in particular snooty rich girl Amber von Tussle (Brittany Snow) and her heart-throb boyfriend Link Larkin (Zac Efron), on whom Tracy has a large crush. Amber's mother Velma (Michelle Pfeiffer), a former teen beauty queen, is the manager of station WYZT, from which Corny Collins is broadcast. In true stage mother fashion, Velma goes out her way to make sure Amber is prominently featured on the program and that Corny Collins remains a segregated program. Corny Collins (James Marsden) and all of his "Council Kids" are white, and perform only conservative dances choreographed by Velma herself. Despite Corny's objections, black teens dancing with white ones is seen as taboo. Black kids are only allowed on Corny Collins on "Negro Day", held the last Thursday of each month and hosted by local R&B radio dee jay "Motormouth" Maybelle Stubbs (Queen Latifah).
   Neither Tracy's plus-sized shut-in laundress mother Edna (John Travolta) nor Penny's strict Catholic mother Prudy (Allison Janney) approve of their daughters basing their lives around a TV show, particularly one where teens dance to "race music". On one day's show, Corny Collins (James Marsden) announces that one of his "Council Kids" is going on a leave of absence and auditions for a replacement will be held the next morning - during school hours. However, Velma turns Tracy away at the audition for being overweight and supportive of integration. Tracy is sent to detention for skipping school, but finds that detention hall is where all the cool black kids (and several of the dancers from "Negro Day" on Corny's show) hang out and dance. Befriending the detention hall's best dancer, Motormouth Maybelle's son Seaweed (Elijah Kelley), Tracy learns R&B dance moves from Seaweed that get Tracy a spot on The Corny Collins Show when Corny sees her dancing at a school dance he is hosting.
   
   Tracy Turnblad (Nikki Blonsky, right) dreams of her crush Link Larkin (Zac Efron, left) during driver's education class at school during the "I Can Hear the Bells" musical number from Hairspray.
   Tracy quickly becomes one of Corny's most popular Council Kids, and a threat to Velma's quest to have Amber win the show's yearly "Miss Teenage Hairspray" pageant. In addition, Tracy also becomes a threat to Amber's courtship with Link as the boy becomes increasingly fond of Tracy and less so of Amber. Tracy's popularity earns her a sponsorship offer from clothes salesman Mr. Pinky (Jerry Stiller), who wants Tracy to be the spokesgirl for his "Hefty Hideaway" boutique for plus-size women. Tracy convinces Edna to accompany her to the Hefty Hideaway and act as her negotiating agent, and in the process brings her mother's days as an introverted shut-in to an end.
   At school, Tracy eventually introduces Seaweed to Penny, and the black boy and white girl are instantly smitten with each other. One afternoon, Seaweed invites the girls and Link to follow him and his little sister Inez (Taylor Parks) to a platter party at Motormouth Maybelle's record shop. Amber is shocked to see her boyfriend following Tracy and Maybelle's children to North Avenue, and prevails upon her mother for help. Velma prepares to pay a visit to Tracy's father Wilbur (Christopher Walken), while Amber gets Edna out of the way by alerting her that Tracy has slipped over to the black section of town. Edna turns up at Maybelle's shop to retrieve her daughter, but ends up staying for the party, particularly when she catches sight of the soul food spread.
   It turns out that Maybelle threw the party to soften the blow of telling everyone that Velma has unceremoniously canceled Negro Day. Tracy suggests that Maybelle and the others stage a protest march, which they plan for tomorrow afternoon, the day before the Miss Hairspray pageant. Link, scheduled to sing at the pageant and worried about his budding career, backs out of the demonstration and accidentally offends Tracy in the process. A crying Tracy returns home with Edna, who finds Velma downstairs in Wilbur's "Hardy-Har Hut" joke shop attempting to seduce Wilbur (what Edna does not see, however, is that Wilbur is completely oblivious to Velma's sexual advances). The distraught Edna puts Wilbur out and bans Tracy from the Corny Collins set. Tracy helps her father sneak back into the house, and Wilbur is able to apologize to Edna and win her heart back.
   The next morning, Tracy sneaks out of the house to join the demonstrators in their march on the WYZT studio, where Velma has had the police set up a roadblock. Edna shows up at the protest looking for Tracy, but finds herself under arrest along with Tracy and the other protesters. Edna manages to help Tracy escape, and Tracy flees for Penny's house. Wilbur posts bail for Edna, Maybelle, Seaweed, and Maybelle's dancers, but no one knows of Tracy's whereabouts. Link, who saw the whole drama unfold on the TV news, turns up at the Turnblads' apartment hoping to apologize to Tracy, but no one knows where she is.
   Penny offers to let Tracy hide out in a basement shelter Prudy has designed to protect herself from Communists. However, Prudy discovers Tracy and calls the police, locking Tracy in the shelter and tying Penny up in her room with a jump rope. Seaweed and a few of Maybelle's dancers arrive and help Tracy and Penny escape to Maybelle's record shop, where the kids concoct a plan to crash the Miss Teenage Hairspray pageant.
   With the pageant underway the next afternoon, Velma, leaving nothing to chance, places policemen around and inside of station WYZT in order to prevent Tracy from entering the sound stage. In addition, Velma switches the tallies from the pageant's phone lines so that Amber is guaranteed to win. Penny arrives at the pageant with an incognito Edna, while Wilbur, Seaweed, and Maybelle's dancers help Tracy sneak past the police and into the studio in time to participate in the Miss Hairspray dance-off. Link breaks away from Amber's side to dance with Tracy, further demonstrating that he has changed by bringing Inez, who has just arrived at WYZT with Maybelle, to the stage to dance for the pageant. Seaweed and Penny take to the dance floor as well.
   Against all expectations, Inez receives the most votes and wins the pageant, officially integrating The Corny Collins Show. A perturbed Velma loudly declares her frustration, informing her daughter that "I switched the damn tallies!" Unknown to Velma, however, Edna has trained a camera on her, and Velma's outburst is broadcast over the air, getting her fired. Meanwhile, The Corny Collins Show set explodes into a celebration as everyone - even Edna - is invited to the stage to dance on TV. Corny and Maybelle combine their dancers into one team and begin co-hosting the show together, and Tracy and Link finally kiss.
9. Ratings, this is a truly excellent film. Great laugh, and has a message.

Saturday 4th Aug

• Hi everyone,hope your week went well. My cold has been hard to shift but now seems to be going away. I still have an awful cough.
• On Wednesday I went to see Anne and we had a relaxing time together. That was ok and her daughter popped in.
• On Thursday I stayed in. But on Friday I ventured out on the worst day of my cough.
• On Saturday I went to the Library to help a friend with e-mail problems, and coffee after. Then off to the Traverse Theatre to have afternoon tea with Anne. We then went off to the Bruntsfield Links and sat talking about the 'Fall' of Adam and Eve and how the snake tempted Eve with an Apple from the tree of Knowledge.

Saturday to Tuesday
Its been a funny start to the week. Over the week-end Anne and I went to a Barbi-Q and we had some GREAT sausages, and hamburgers on Saturday 29th July. We also had some blackberry and strawberry sweat with lashings of cream. We talked about how the Bible Study as it was all of my Bible Study Group, had gone last year 06/ 07 and when the new Bible Study will be starting at our Church (31st August).

Anne belongs to another Presbyterian Church and so I will probably talk at some other time about the things she has on, and I might go to. She did invite me to the Barclay Church on Sunday for a Mission Twinning service in the evening on Sunday but I was unable to go as I had a bad cold.

On Monday I went to a NHS meeting that I belong to as a Committee Member. On Tuesday I went to my do some Volunteering (I do this 3 days a week) and we had one or two discussions about the future. We always do this, and I actually loaded up 2 learning programs and checked what they do. I also was guiding someone with their Word learning.

Anne went to a job interview today (Tuesday). She said it went quite well, however it can be difficult to say as there were other candidates. However we ask for a prayer so that she may be successful. I will write soon.

Transformers Film Friday 28th July 07
Me and my girl friend went to see a film today called Transformers and I have copied a review for the film from the

Dominion, Cinema

Both Annne and myself enjoyed the film very much, as it was full of action, loud bangs and very funny bits. Out of 10,I give it= (8).

Transformers
Whereas the Earth is the home of a variety of organic-based lifeforms, the planet of Cybertron is the homeworld of a race of robots which have the ability to transform into other mechanisms, with each Transformer having its own unique disguise.


The Transformers are divided into two separate camps: the good and just Autobots, who are led by Optimus Prime (whose disguise is a red 18-wheel semi truck); and the evil Decepticons, who are led by Megatron (who transforms into a gun; there's a good deal of size-shifting involved with Megatron as well).

Decepticon Attack in Desert

With fuel supplies (called Energon Cubes) on Cybertron running low, both forces travel through space looking for a new source, which leads them to Earth, which from their perspective is rich in the minerals and chemicals they need.

Hero & Heroine

Disguising themselves as cars, airplanes, boats, etc. easily recognizable to humans, the Transformers engage in a secret war for control of Earth's bountiful natural resources...

Genre: Action / Adventure
Starring: Shia Labeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel
Directed by: Michael Bay
OFFICIAL WEBSITE:-
http://www.transformersmovie.com/

This is just a diary note for me and my friends. I went to Falkland Palace today with my Girl Friend Anne. We had a really nice day with the Eric Liddell Ca(i)re Project. I loved the talk and the grounds and found out a lot about Scottish History. We were told about James the VI of Scotland and I of England, Mary Queen of Scots, Queen Margaret and Malcolm the III and the many Cathedrals Margaret had built. We also saw many lovely paintings and stories about them. There was also talk of the early Christianisation of Scotland and how the Romans left their imprint on Cramond. Also talk of how the Second WW affected us Scots and the Bombing of the Firth of Fourth. Maybe I will write a much longer storey with more information in it when I do more reading on the subject.