Remembering the Brig

I'm back from Brazil now. Had a lovely time, even if I didn't get as much of a tan as I'd hoped...! Always a shock coming back to cold Blightey, though fortunately it wasn't snowing...never very pleasant having to get back into work mode though. I just want to crawl into bed and stay there instead of facing hordes of marauding students!

Anyway just a quick note to mark the sad passing of actor Nicholas Courtney, best known for playing long-running character/companion Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart in "Dr Who". Nick C appeared alongside several incarnations of the Doc in the role of the Brig (Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Sylvester McCoy) and prior to that, made his Who debut as space agent Bret Vyon in an epic William Hartnell adventure, "The Dalek Masterplan"! He also popped up again in "The Sarah Jane Adventures" very recently, reunited with Liz Sladen.

I couldn't quite believe it when I heard he'd gone...you sometimes think these people will be around for ever. RIP Mr Courtney / Brigadier.

Tomorrow....

...I'm going on holiday to the country wot has this as their flag...


.... and I can't bloody wait!!

Disco Darth

And - what about this??



Oddly enough, I'm actually planning a sci-fi themed fancy dress party for my birthday this March. I'm sure that comes as a great surprise to all of you...

He is the Disco Doctor

I was at Duckie last night and the first thing I heard as I walked through the door was this:



Ring any bells with any of you?? Fab!!

Rip off merchants and cheating b*stards

I feel compelled to write a post today, even though I hadn't planned on doing so this weekend (sorry folks, again you will have gathered I'm very much a part time blogger at present....but still here though!!)

Today Gustavo and his cousin were out shopping in Camden whilst I stayed at home doing my usual Sunday college work. Whilst they were looking round the market, Gustavo's cousin had her bag - containing purse, credit cards, mobile and brand new digital camera - stolen. One minute she was walking round the stalls and shops with Gustavo enjoying herself, the next it had totally vanished. Some thieving personage obviously whipped it off her shoulder when she wasn't looking. I don't think she was being particularly inattentive, but it still happened. Naturally she was majorly upset and in floods of tears afterwards. An awful thing to happen and her weekend has now been ruined. What kind of ar*eholes get a kick out of doing this kind of thing?

I mentioned on a previous post that I've bought a brand new car and sold my old model. What I didn't mention was the rigmarole I went through in flogging it (but after what happened to Gu's cousin today I feel extremely angry and the need to do some serious venting, all of which is related to the above). I eventually ended up getting a pretty good deal from a buyer who paid me cash up front for the car; this was only after I'd received a number of scam emails from "buyers" who said they wanted to purchase the car through PayPal (an online payment merchant) without even coming to view it and giving me various "explanations" as to why they preferred this method. One such "buyer" nearly got the better of me.

Now, I'm definitely not what you'd call naive, but I'm not always wise to every one's tricks...well, who is in this life? The "buyer", who called themselves Maria, emailed me to say that they had seen my ad on Autotrader and wanted to purchase the car for their son as a surprise birthday present - they claimed they were at an industry exhibition and didn't have the time to come and view it. I guess I thought that was odd, and given the amount I was asking for the car, an awful lot of money to pay without even wanting to check it out! I said as much to the "buyer" in my reply, but they then came back saying they were happy to buy the car, were very keen etc and just wanted me to email my PayPal details so they could send through the payment asap. This was when slight alarm bells went off in my head...I'd heard stories that you should never send your personal/financial details to strangers.

So, instead I emailed the buyer back to say I would send them an invoice from my Paypal account asking for the payment to be made; that way I could safely wait for the money to be sent to me and if they were genuine then I would receive the payment. I completed the invoice with the amount owed and emailed it to the buyer.

The next day, I received a message from "Maria" saying she had sent the money through to my PayPal account, however, when I checked there was nothing there. 0.00. "Maria" then emailed me again to say that for the funds to be released to my Paypal account, I needed to make a payment of £500 to Western Union first, as the car was going to be shipped to them - they were not currently living in London. They assured me that the shipping fee would be refunded in the amount that had been sent through to my PayPal account, once I had sent the money to Western Union. This was the alarm bells started to ring even louder. There had been absolutely no mention of shipping and additional costs before and things were now becoming far too complicated. I emailed the buyer back to say thank you, but no, I no longer wished to proceed with the purchase as a) Nothing about shipping fees had been discussed before and this hadn't been part of the deal b) I hadn't even received payment from the buyer.

"Maria" then came back again, then saying that they had sent through the payment already from their account and what were they supposed to do now, as the money couldn't be "recalled". They said I was reneging on the deal, this was unfair, etc and they wanted to discuss the matter with me, or ... they would take legal action. They left a phone number.

If I'd stopped to think about this properly I would have realised the contradiction - that the money had been apparently sent to my account yet couldn't be released until I made the shipping fee payment - this was really just a load of baloney. However by this stage I still had the very positive feeling that I was dealing with someone dishonest and dodgy.

Being the fair person I am, I actually rang them up. The person that answered the phone was definitely not "Maria", but a foreign-sounding man who said his wife Maria was away at present and he was speaking on her behalf. He kept insisting that the money had been sent to me and so I couldn't pull out of the deal. I kept saying that I was sorry but nothing to do with shipping costs had been mentioned before and I wanted to sell the car in a straightforward transaction, rather than this method. They kept talking and talking and ignoring what I was saying and insisting I pay Western Union or they would take legal action. Whatever I said would not dissuade them. In the end I had to say goodbye and hung up.

Cut to a few hours later. I'd gone into work and was sitting at my desk checking my emails. Suddenly I receive a "legal action" email from PayPal saying I had two hours to make payment to the client or I would be reported to the FBI. I admit, a horrible chill went through me when I read this. Oh my God. I actually felt incredibly nervous and frightened at this point. Was it for real?

I then thought, I have to get this all properly checked out. I rang up Paypal and explained about the email that I'd just received. They almost immediately verified that no such email had been sent by them and it was very likely a scam. The relief I felt was immense. I forwarded the email to their "spoof" dept and they were able to back this up - the email had been sent by a fake buyer who was trying to embezzle funds and I should ignore any further communication from them. Again, massive relief.

Nevertheless, I was also left feeling extremely angry and incensed by what I'd been put through, wasting my time dealing with someone who wasn't remotely interested in buying my car but just wanted to take my money. And judging by the other emails I'd received from "buyers" similar to "Maria", there were a hell of a lot of people out there doing similar things.

I guess I shouldn't have done it but I couldn't resist emailing "Maria" back again and telling her: "I now know that you are a fake buyer and you have no intention of buying my car. I think you are disgusting. Now go away." They replied saying: "Don't hang that "checked with PayPal stuff" on me, that won't work. We are sending the FBI to your address tomorrow afternoon, so you will be sorry, swear down". Unbelievable. Of course nothing happened the next day, but it just proves that there are no limits to the depths to which some desperate people will go...I felt sorely tempted to send another response, but this would of course have added further fuel to the fire, and probably have made me as bad as them. So I left it at that.

The point I'm getting to here is just how terrible it is to know that there are so many rotten, cheating b*stards out there that will willingly and knowingly try to rip people off, one way or another, whether it be through stealing people's bags or embezzling their money over the internet. What kind of sad existences do these people live? How can they actually live with themselves? It's very obvious and cliched, but I honestly think this planet we live on is getting worse and the people who inhabit it more and more unpleasant, selfish and acquisitive. Some people, anyway.

I hope you have all had a better weekend!

OC x

Go into the garden, go under the ivy...

I'm a big Kate Bush fan. And one of my Crimbo pressies was a brand new biography of Ms Bush, "Under The Ivy, by Graeme Thomson. I've only just finished it, but it's recommended reading, especially for KB fans. There've been several past attempts at cataloguing the events of Kate's life but generally these literary endeavours were deemed duds - Thomson's offering, however, is far more extensive and provides a wealth of information regarding the weird but wonderful songstress (especially the periods when she's working on her latest albums...) Okay, it does go a little overboard with certain details but you get lots of insights into a) Kate's wonderfully bohemian and hippy-dippy family and their influence on her (I wish I could think of a better term than "hippy", it's so....reductive. Anyone care to help out?) b) The painstaking process by which she produces her music (demanding that musicians perform 20+ takes of a particular instrument "bit", for instance) c) Her growing demand for privacy as the years go on d) The paradox of having to do the whole publicity thing at the expense of c). I kind of wished the book had lifted the lid a little more on the "inner Kate" but this is probably as close as we're going to get.

And reading all about Kate and her music made me want to dig out all my old KB CDs again and give them a (long delayed) play. "The Dreaming" in particular, an album that never makes an easy listen, surprised me with its craziness and creativity (it was, in many ways, a landmark album that marked a breakaway from the "old style" Kate). But "Hounds of Love" will always be, for me, Kate's complete and utter opus, when her voice and songwriting powers were at their zenith. Sheer brilliance.

And...stop the press! There's rumours of some new Kate stuff this year!

Nina, schizo ballerina

A belated Happy New Year, everybody. I'm back!

Boy, am I finding this month hard to get through financially. I'm willing to bet a lot of you are in exactly the same situation. Xmas shopping did drain the old cofffers although not as much as I thought it would; nevertheless it's still been a bit tight until pay day. Ho hum. Not as bad as all that. I guess the brand new car I purchased just before Crimbo might have had something to do with it...I figured it was time I traded in my old model for a new one and it was money well spent (I sold my Ford Focus and bought a Ford Fiesta Zetec, in case you're wondering....it's in hot magenta and has ambient lighting!! Ooer. I love it).

Anyhow, even though spending has had to be reigned in, I managed to go to the pictures last night to see "Black Swan". I wanted to see what all the hype was about.

Very good and very creepy would be my summation. Admittedly it does take a while to get going and the real "horror" aspect doesn't kick in until about 2/3 of the way through....but worth seeing. For those of you not in the know, the movie concerns a production of "Swan Lake" by New York City ballet company. The production requires a ballerina to play both the innocent White Swan and the sensual Black Swan. One dancer, Nina (Portman), is a perfect fit for the White Swan, while Lily (Mila Kunis) has a personality that matches the Black Swan. When the two compete for the parts, Nina finds a dark side to herself and starts to experience elaborate hallucinations and delusions about other people and their behaviour. From thereon, things spiral drastically downwards...

Natalie Portman was excellent as Nina, doing the whole "driven but repressed ballet dancer" bit convincingly, hardly surprising, given the presence of her overbearing and controlling mother, played by Barbara Hershey (an actress you don't see much of these days but who I used to love in films like "Hannah and Her Sisters". Good to see her back, but what has she done to her teeth? Huge overbite or what...) Kunis, an actress I haven't seen in anything else, made a good foil for Portman's uptight Nina as her sassy ballet dancing colleague and the scenes where she takes her out to get her p*ssed, then drugs her drink, are entertaining (and then there's the raunchy shenanigans that follow...)

The horror aspect was well conveyed with several genuinely disturbing and unsettling moments e.g. the part when Nina's mothers' paintings all start talking to and mocking her and her eyes turn swan red. Not to mention the strange barbed black things that start poking up out of Nina's skin. Ugggh! I won't say any more otherwise there won't be any surprising nasty bits left, for those of you that are planning on seeing it. The psychological angle - are all of these things genuinely happening or are they in Nina's mind? - made the film gripping for me, and put me in mind of old movies like "Repulsion", "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Stepford Wives", even if the final revelation was kind of obvious.

My criticisms would be that the film has a rather unrelentingly "dour" feel about it and there's not much humour in evidence. The muted visuals/cinematography (there's little colour in there) reinforce this atmosphere but that's kind of deliberate I think - emphasising the harshness and claustrophobia of Nina's world. Every now and then colour breaks through e.g. the scene when a drugged-up/p*ssed Nina goes to the club and is bathed in red whilst a strobed light flashes - all very symbolic.

The dance sequences, in particular the final realisation of "Swan Lake" at the end - are pretty amazing and it's clear that Portman can do ballet (although apparently she's replaced in some long shots - still not as bad as Jennifer Beales in "Flashdance" who didn't dance properly atall. Pah!).

It really creeped me out and I want to see it again!

And it's made me want to go out and buy the soundtrack to the real "Swan Lake". Truly moving and beautiful music. Erm...oh yeah. When I've got some money.

4 out of 5.