Steve Pugh
01 November 2009 @ 03:13 pm
November has arrived accompanied by wind and rain and cold (and indeed a cold). How to spend the month?

Well mostly Lettice and I will be spending it buying a house. Or trying to. The other day we took a tame civil engineer to have a look round the place we're hoping to buy (in a sort of "look for the massive faults before paying a surveyor" kind of way) and he could only see one potential problem. Fingers crossed that it isn't.

Like last year, I'll be taking part in NaBloPoMo as a form of half-hearted solidarity with the people who are attempting NoNoWriMo.



And I'll be growing a moustache. Some banter in the office on Friday has somehow led to me agreeing at the last minute to take part in Movember. Now, despite having a silly name and being an Australian import, this is a very good cause so please make a donation. I promise to only post very occasional photos of the mo's progress.

Finally I'll be hiding from the bad weather and watching telly, not least Doctor Who which is back for a special on the 15th.
 
 
 
Steve Pugh
07 July 2009 @ 10:10 pm
Quite a bit of nudity in that episode...

... but the prize goes to Jack, who technically was naked for very, very nearly the entire hour.

Not quite as good as yesterday. Just 8/10 instead of 9/10.

Oh, and did anyone else stop to wonder whether the out-of-the-way military base was the same place that Connie used to manage in Spooks?
 
 
Steve Pugh
06 July 2009 @ 10:22 pm
Torchwood was a bit good, wasn't it?
 
 
Steve Pugh
26 June 2009 @ 10:33 pm
Today was the 10th anniversary of my first date with Lettice. Back in 1999 we went to see The Matrix in Streatham. Today we had an adventure to celebrate.

Robot Grasshopper from the Robot ZooFirst up was the Robot Zoo at the Horniman Museum. Did you know that it took three people to drive a chameleon?

Then we did a bit of shopping. Lettice bought beads and I bought Doctor Who books.(About Time 3 2nd edition is 500 pages long and has an end note about the Chuckle Brothers, how can you not want it?)

If you missed James May's plasticine garden at Chelsea you can now see it at the Royal Festival Hall.

Then we went on the London Eye. Yes, we live in London. Yes, we work in London tourism. Yes, it's been open for nine years. No, we hadn't been on it before.

Then there was yarn shopping. Followed by Yo! Sushi (between you and me, the County Hall branch is always nice and quiet in the evenings and only a short walk from the heaving, 45 minute wait to be seated, restaurants along the Southbank).

Anyway, I'll do a proper image post either tomorrow or on Monday, in the meantime there are pictures on Flickr.

 
 
Very True Mood: content
 
 
Steve Pugh
23 May 2009 @ 07:32 pm
Ah, got it now. ARC team = the Doctor and Helen Cutter = Sabbath.

Bring on the Daleks, bugger can't use them, make something up quick, um, how about crystal men?

Which will make sense to the handful of other people in world who read the EDAs and watch Primeval.

 
 
Steve Pugh
05 April 2009 @ 10:03 pm
K-9  

I've just watched The Invisible Enemy for the first time. This is the story that added K-9 to Doctor Who and the tin dog comes across really well in his debut. The plot is as nonsensical as every review I've ever read says it is. There are some good ideas in there, Leela is great, the design and effects work - with the exception of the infamous prawn - are excellent. But the plot is all over the place and the technobabble is unconvincing not so much because a lack of basic science as a lack of basic common sense.

So next DVD to watch will be K-9 and Company for the first time since 1981...

Meanwhile. This is a teaser for the forthcoming K-9 series: )
 
 
Steve Pugh
01 April 2009 @ 09:17 pm
Spoilerphobe. Go on, I dare you. )

1 This isn't as daft as it seems. After all what else explains the popularity of Iris Wildthyme? Apart from the gin of course.

Just 10 days to go!

 
 
Steve Pugh
31 December 2008 @ 02:50 pm
Hey, all the cool kids in the [info]librarything community are doing this so let's join in. Here's a list of what I read this year. How many have of these you read (in any year)?
Books of 2008 )
 
 
Very True Mood: cheerful
 
 
Steve Pugh
25 December 2008 @ 03:30 pm
Turkey eaten? Presents opened? Queen done her bit?

Good, that means I scheduled this post correctly.

Is it time for Doctor Who yet?
 
 
Very True Mood: festive
 
 
Steve Pugh
25 December 2008 @ 10:09 am
For a little while the size of my LibraryThing has been on 999 books. I knew that the first book I unwrapped on Christmas day (betting that I wouldn't receive any books would have been a real long shot - I am married to a librarian after all) would be book number 1000. And so it was.

According to LT I've finished 49 books this year. I have twenty pages to go on another and there are a few more that have been more dipping in an out books than read from cover to cover books. So roughly one a week. Not too bad until you look at how many of them are picture books graphic novels.
 
 
Very True Mood: cheerful
 
 
Steve Pugh
14 November 2008 @ 09:46 pm
Well, no surprises there then.
How spoilerphobic are you? )

At the time of writing it can still be seen at http://www.bbc.co.uk/pudsey/ontv/.

Sigh, still spoilerphobic? )
 
 
Steve Pugh
01 November 2008 @ 11:39 am

It's November so some brave souls are embarking upon this year's NoNoWriMo. Good luck to you if you're one of them.

I'm in no way dedicated enough to try an entire novel in one month, but I do want to write more so I'm declaring November to be my NaBloPoMo - I will be endeavouring to post at least once a day for the next 30 days.

"Na No Wri Mo Na Blo Po Mo" - I think I know how RTD comes up with Judoon dialogue.

 
 
Very True Mood: cold
 
 
Steve Pugh
09 July 2008 @ 08:13 pm
Big  
Got my order from Big Finish today - £90 worth of books for £35 courtesy of their summer sale.

Nice use of Page 3 from the Daily Star as packing material...
 
 
Steve Pugh
05 July 2008 @ 08:02 pm
Last week I asked "Was that the most expensive piece of fanwank ever?" and [info]grahamsleight correctly pointed out "Yes, but it'll only hold that record for seven days" beacause on the fanwank scale adding Spoilers! ) adds quite a few points and on the cost scale an extra twenty minutes of explosions and CGI adds quite a few pounds.

RTD is a very evil man. In many ways parts of this could be seen as sticking two fingers up at Rose shippers, at the McGann TV movie and at Lawrence Miles. Work it out for yourself which bit is which. But as all three more or less deserve two fingers, that's okay.

In a lot of ways this was a distillation of the RTD years, which means that it was a second hand distillation of the New Adventures novels. Really BIG space opera scope, ambiguous Doctor, high emotion and companions getting shafted all over the place.

It was just too busy to get a grip on - there were several very good ideas that needed an episode each to properly explore. I honestly don't know whether I liked it or not.
 
 
Very True Mood: confused
 
 
Steve Pugh
28 June 2008 @ 08:17 pm
Was that the most expensive piece of fanwank ever?
 
 
Very True Mood: surprised
 
 
Steve Pugh
20 May 2008 @ 04:22 pm
Moffat to replace RTD in 2010.

Steven Moffat should be scared, very scared. If his Who is too much like RTD's he'll be damned, if it's too different he'll be damend, if every episiode isn't up to the standard of 'The Empty Child' he'll be damned. Some fans have built him as the solution to everything they dislike about the show that he can't possibly meet their expectations.

I'm looking forward to the remaining stories that RTD has to tell and hope he continues to write scripts for Moffat; and I'm also looking forward to seeing what Moffat brings to the show when the time comes.

Oh, and the news story above mentions "four specials to be shown in 2009". I think that's just sloppiness and counting the 2008 Christmas special as well, unless anyone knows differently.
Tags: ,
 
 
Steve Pugh
26 March 2008 @ 09:42 pm
Went to see 10,000 BC this afternoon. Oh boy, history, biology, geography, astronomy - they all get a hammering in this film. I can't be bothered to even start listing everything that was goofy here.

It was one of the most by-the-numbers renditions of (the easy to understand bits of) Joseph Campbell's monomyth that I'd seen in a while. I smiled at the bemusement when hunter-gatherers first came across the evidence of agriculture, but of course in Campbell's scheme there has to be a 'boon' to take back home at the end (sorry, that was a spoiler). There were also bits lifted from the Bible, Stargate, Conan and 300, just in case the mention of Campbell misled you into thinking there were highbrow sources being used.

The action and CGI were very good, the actors managed to keep straight face. It's not a bad movie in the sense that it's exciting and visual, but it's certainly one to watch with the brain switched off.

Oh, by the way, the Doctor Who and Star Trek trailers look amazing on the big screen.
 
 
Very True Mood: sleepy
 
 
Steve Pugh
02 January 2008 @ 01:14 pm
Number One reason why I don't think David Tennant is leaving Doctor Who -

David Tennant is, to the best of my knowledge, the only man to have snogged both Billie Piper and Kylie Minogue. You don't walk away from a job with that kind of benefits.
 
 
Very True Mood: silly
 
 
Steve Pugh
26 November 2007 @ 09:48 pm

Tooth and Claw By Chris PeersI've just updated the Dinosaurs in Miniature pages with the latest releases and re-releases.

Wargames Illustrated have finished re-releasing the DZ Miniatures prehistoric mammals. They're also selling a set of rules called Tooth and Claw to tie in with this range. Written by Chris "every other set of rules out there" Peers who has pedigree on this area with Saurian Safari. My copy is in the post, so with luck I'll be able to post a review soon.

There are also new rules out from Magister Militum called DinoMight and MM continue to expand their range of 10mm figures, now including some non-dinosaurs.

Finally on the pre-historic front Reaper have released a "Jungle Girl with Sabre Tooth Tiger" which is okay-ish except for the huge mold line in the photo and the fact that it's an idea that's been done several times before. Very nice cat though.


Meanwhile... It was only a matter of time... Pre-painted, collectible (i.e. random sealed boxes) miniatures for Doctor Who (via Forbidden Planet). They're by Character Options which is a good sign (they make the very nice DW action figures) and the price is the same as for the Star Wars minis. On the downside (apart from the collectible nature) is the scale, 35mm, and the lack of anything from the classic series. Will I be buying them? They're Doctor Who miniatures!

 
 
Very True Mood: excited
Very True Music: Slow Burn - Dvivd Bowie