| Author | Message | ||
     Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 8768 Registered: 05-2005 |
And all the best for the coming year. I hope the government shutdown is not affecting any of our US correspondents. | ||
| Simon Withers Member Username: Sfwithers Post Number: 574 Registered: 08-2005 |
Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year from what is presently a very grey and dreary south-west England. And here's to seeing Robert Forster in Bristol next May - happy to meet any of you for a pizza (or other food) first if you want. I work in central Bristol and there are some decent eateries in the area. | ||
| Rob Brookman Member Username: Rob_b Post Number: 1935 Registered: 08-2006 |
All the best to all y'all. Another fun, interesting, educational year around these parts. Thanks for that - and enjoy the season! (And Padraig, all's well as of right now, shutdown-wise. I'm sure there are lots of federal employees who would disagree, however.) | ||
| Jerry Clark Member Username: Jerry Post Number: 1258 Registered: 08-2004 |
Happy Christmas to all those who celebrate it. Everyone else, enjoy your Tuesday. | ||
| Jerry Clark Member Username: Jerry Post Number: 1259 Registered: 08-2004 |
Happy Christmas to all those who celebrate it. Everyone else, enjoy your Tuesday. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4029 Registered: 03-2005 |
Merry Christmas everybody, as Jerry says for all those who celebrate it. (I think of it as an approximately Winter Solstice holiday.) | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1510 Registered: 10-2006 |
I went from one Big Chrismassy family into another, although things have quietened down over the past few years as kids get married, produce other kids, and splinter off into their own little domestic universes. So the huge noisy Italian dinner, Christmas Eve present frenzy (Italians can never wait until Christmas morning in the proper fashion) and spumante-fuelled card playing with weird Neapolitan cards until around 4 am are things of the past. Still fun, though. One nephew got one of those fidget spinner things. “What is that useless flashing thing for?” I demanded testily. “It’s to help me relax, uncle,” he said solemnly. “You’re 12-years old, for god’s sake! What do you need to relax for? Now, go outside and kick a ball around in the street.” Instead, of course, he sauntered off to a pal’s house to play “War Horror 5: Back in the Kill Zone” or something similar. Anyway, I had my complete new fragrant Smiley collection to leaf through and caress, having only ever read The Spy Who Came in From the Cold. Will start on Call for the dead later today. Merry Boxing Day everyone. | ||
| Simon Withers Member Username: Sfwithers Post Number: 576 Registered: 08-2005 |
Stuart, enjoy the Smiley collection. I don't think you'll be disappointed. It's also worth watching the film of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, which is on rotation on one of the British freesat stations (Talking Pictures, I think). It's a very fine, exceeding grim and gritty film - the anti-James Bond. (I treated myself to a signed limited edition of The Mission Song for Christmas, because I could! | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1511 Registered: 10-2006 |
That the Burton version, Simon? I've seen it a couple of times, maybe. Wouldn't mind seeing it again. His best work on film, possibly. I didn't remember that Martin Ritt directed it, thinking it was Lumet. I'd also like to see the film version of Call from the dead again, with James Mason as the Smiley character. Which, it turns out, really was by Lumet, and also featured the wonderful Harriet Andersson, who was so impressive to my teenage sensibility in Bergman's Summer with Monika. I'm getting the feeling that, after a certain age, everything starts to connect up, in one way or another. |