Hello.

It’s been a while, I know. I was reminded of the existence of this site when I received, um, an invoice asking me to pay thirty pounds so it could continue to exist for another year. I considered not bothering, but largely for sentimental reasons I decided to find the cash.

However… I admit, I am largely coming back to this site so I can post an admission that I may not update it much in the future. Unfortunately I’ve now made such ridiculous commitments of content to Behatted that just getting that up there takes up a ridiculous chunk of my creative free time. The novel editing has more or less ground to a halt as a result of the above-mentioned.

So… If you want to see me rambling about recent events in the real world or on TV, I now have a weekly mega-dump of material, called The Weekly Hat, styled after a magazine of some kind. I think some of it is quite good; I especially recommend the Choose Your Own Adventure piece on the RMT strikes.

If you miss the inane ramblings about what I’ve been doing recently, that’s more or less what my Twitter account is for. And it has the advantage of limiting each update to only 140 characters, rather than the short essays about saucepans you can find in my archives here.

And… if you just like strange comics about hats, Behatted itself is still going. We’re about to start a short run of Wimbledon-related stories, inspired by a small hat my mother has sent me in Wimbledon colours. (You can see it in the banner of the site right now, or in this picture.)

Anyway, we’re getting towards the second half of the week, which is about when I start getting nervous about just what the hell I’m going to put in The Weekly Hat this week. Good times. I have been reading a collection of columns by Charlie Brooker in an attempt to inspire me, although since it consists entirely of television reviews published between 2001 and 2004, it’s perhaps not the most cutting edge material I could have chosen.

But. I’m sure there will be more here at some stage. I’m just… not sure exactly when. Hopefully see you over at one of the above-advertised locations though, I think the material’s pretty decent. (Alright, some of my Twitter messages are pretty inane, but at least there’s a funny link occasionally…)

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I’ve been suffering from… general block of late. Not just writer’s block, although that has been happening, but a general sense of having great difficulty producing anything of worth. I’ve made up a couple of Behatteds, but work on The Novel has come to a virtual standstil, and even my continuous vomit forth of material on Twitter/this blog/Facebook/other websites has run dry.

Why has this happened?

Well, first the internet broke in my house. I believe I mentioned this in yesterday’s entry, and happily it has now recovered itself. It could be better, I admit, but the information is definitely flowing, and I love it. When I’m stuck, in my room, with no connection to the outside world, it feels annoyingly lonesome.

Even if I’m not actually using the internet and am lying down and reading, I find myself wishing it was working. These are some sad levels of addiction I’m plumbing now. Tonight, I finally edited a chapter of the book, and spent about an hour playing a stupid internet game and joined a new silly social networking site.

(The username ‘NickMB’ was taken on that site. I’m really quite bitter about that. So I am ‘NicholasMB’ on there. So be it.)

Ho-hum. At least I’ve done something. Maybe the internet will keep working for a while and I’ll achieve equilibrium or something. That’ll do.

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Apologies for the lack of blogging in the past few days. My internet at home was struck down and has not functioned since last Friday, which meant my ability to churn off a quick blog between tasks was somewhat diminished. (I’m really hoping it gets fixed soon, as having no internet at home really does feel like I’m missing some kind of non-physical limb.)

Anyway, what’s been happening? Well, the US television industry is announcing its renewals and so forth. A few shows have been suddenly cancelled (Goodbye ‘My Name Is Earl’, I never watched thee.) and some have been renewed with equal surprise.

Firstly, Scrubs is back for an incredible ninth season. The current eighth was generally presumed to be the last, and I hear word that it had a very fitting and pleasant finale, writing out many of the main characters. But still it returns for another go round, presumably with a ‘next generation’ of cast. (I gather a new group of interns have been introduced in the eighth season, but I’ve not seen any of that.)

Indeed, the eighth run is regarded by some as being a bit of a return to form after a few years of slightly lacklustre episodes, during which I more or less gave up on the series. It always reliably provided some chuckles, but it never married comedy, drama and surrealism quite as deftly as it did in the first few years, and the character of J.D. (the main guy) really started to become annoying. So part of me is a bit annoyed at this renewal, but if it really has got its mojo back then good luck to it. New characters sounds like a good way to go, although the lead writer also leaving is a worrying sign.

The other kinda surprising renewal (that I actually care about) was Dollhouse. The new Joss Whedon show, which I wrote briefly about a while back, has suffered from poor ratings, allegedly extensive network interference and an odd willingness by the cast and crew to admit that it only really gets good with the sixth episode. I have just seen that sixth episode, and it was indeed excellent, and a huge improvement on most of the previous ones, but it’s still an odd way to promote your show.

Still, if it keeps up that level of quality then it probably serves its renewal. I’m just surprised, as I gather viewing figures were in the toilet. Maybe the extensive internet campaign worked. (Joke.)

Anyhow, this was going to be longer, but my sister called as I was in the middle of typing it and I’ve now rambled through my typing time. In fact, I’m now going to be slightly late meeting my girlfriend as a result of staying to finish this entry off. I hope you’re grateful. Read Behatted. And vote for it too.

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I’ve now seen the entire of the fourth volume of Heroes, which completes the third season, a system which makes complete sense. Anyway, the third volume (the first half of the season) was widely criticised for being incomprehensible, garbled and a bit silly. It was, in fact, all of those things.

Ratings had dropped into the toilet and, more concerningly, the reaction of most of the fanbase was “Yeah, they deserved it”. So a recovery was needed, and they did at least try.

Volume four wasn’t perfect by any means, but it had a hell of a lot less wrong with it than the previous volume. In fact, in the middle, it was on the verge of being a staggering return to form. There were some great episodes in there, especially the one where Rebel first appeared and the few around that. The early ones were a  bit slow, but watchable. And sadly the ending didn’t satsify me as much as I wanted it to. Why must they spend whole seasons building up these plotlines, then ignore them in the finale in favour of “Hey, let’s fight Sylar! Again!”?

And speaking of serial Sy, his plotline in the first half of the volume was a bit of a waste of time wasn’t it? The actual episode where he confronted his dad was fun, but the huge chunk of time spent building up to it was a bit silly. Considering they “killed” him at the end of volume three, wouldn’t his return have had a bit more impact if they’d only brought him back for his role in the last half of the volume?

(Actually, that’s not entirely their fault, as I gather Sylar’s dad was originally going to be the main villain in the final episodes, but that was changed mid-way after they realised that was almost identical to the “twist” last year where they brought in the Petrelli brothers’ father as big villain.)

But let’s not over-look the good parts. Hiro and Ando are still fun, the Petrelli brothers were surprisingly tolerable and the twist in the final episode was certainly unpredictable and a nice spin on the usual Heroes “death is meaningless” ethos. Noah Bennett remains one of the best bits of the show, and Matt Parkman wasn’t bad either. In short, aside from a few ridiculous moments, lots of fun to be had here.

I do start to wonder about the wisdom of keeping certain characters around though. Mohinder Suresh doesn’t seem to have much to do these days, and I kinda feel that having Sylar in nearly every episode isn’t doing the character any favours. In fact, the character who actually did “die” in the finale probably had a lot more mileage in him than many of the others.

Never mind. For the most part, Heroes is at least entertaining again, which it hadn’t been for a while. I can at least find it in me to be excited in where they go next year, which I didn’t think I would be.

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As I believed I mentioned on yesterday’s bullet point pun-fest, I recently finished watching the second season of Dexter, the US drama series about a serial killer who only kills other killers, and it was… pretty good. It started from the disadvantage of quite high standards, as the first season of Dexter is among the best runs of TV I’ve seen lately, and it probably wasn’t quite as in-your-face awesome as that, but it was a lot of fun. Primarily, I think, because it remained ambitious. After setting up the house of cards that Dexter lives in during the previous season, they’re surprisingly keen to knock large parts of it over. There are plots pulled out here that I didn’t expect to see until the last couple of seasons, and some that I just plain didn’t expect at all. (Because they’re nuts.)

It’s very much a continuation of that first season, though. I can’t say I’d really endorse starting with the beginning of the second, even though technically all the plot information is there. You’ll know what’s happening, but you probably won’t care quite as much. Like many of the really good TV shows, it’s best watched from the very beginning. But for those who do immerse themselves, it’s great. Some of the plot twists towards the end are just ludicrous, and what’s great is that they actually pull these things off, and follow them through to their logical conclusions. Love it.

Weak points? Hm. Well, after setting up a pile of plot threads throughout the season, the last few episodes attempt to yank them together in a tight knot, and it’s questionable how much they succeed. In practise, although there is some crossover, there are a couple of major plots that just remain completely seperate. I don’t know if that’s really a criticism, but it doesn’t feel as seamless in its ending as the previous year. And, although Dexter himself is a great creation and Micheal C. Hall is fantastic in the part, the bits where Dexter isn’t on-screen can seem a little off, perhaps because it’s just plain odd seeing the characters without the benefit of Dexter’s wry commentary. Luckily, those are usually pretty short-lived. And there are a few mid-run episodes which perhaps get a bit excessively soapy and neglect the bits we actually like about Dexter.

But yeah, I enjoyed it. Definitely a good show for DVDs, I think, as I’d be fairly frustrated with only one episode a week. The only irritating part here is that I probably now have to wait about a year for the third season, even though it finished airing in the States in December and is on the FX channel here right now. Because I don’t get FX, and apparently I won’t get to buy my DVD set until ITV have been allowed their pointless token airing. What bollocks.

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The title seemed funnier in my head.

Anyway, it’s getting towards 11:20, I’m fairly tired, but I thought I may as well blog today. Here’s some bullet points, none of which seemed quite interesting enough to warrant a whole entry…

• Earlier tonight, my housemates decided to amuse themselves by hurling water balloons over the garden wall and bombarding the people of Peckham with liquid fun. Since I value my life, and have heard the people around here can get a bit stabby, I decided to stay indoors. Behind my locked door. Cowering.
• Tried to watch last two Heroes episodes of this series tonight so I could review them for the pleasure of you all, but then the iPlayer broke. That’s pretty upsetting. I had stuff to watch.
• Have nearly re-written a whole novel chapter tonight, which is progress at least. I may soon have to ditch off the book for a bit to make more Behatted strips, as I’m dipping towards a lead of only thirty or so, and I promised myself I’d keep it a bit higher than that. Nonetheless, at least something is going on. Oh, and vote Behatted for bestest webcomic ever, obviously.
• Apparently you can no longer smoke in pubs (as you probably know), but you can if your local pub transforms itself into a smoking research centre. Go tell them!
• The fifth season of good old House starts on Sky1 on May 31st. I don’t have Sky1, so that just pisses me off.
• I also finished watching the second season of Dexter last night, but I’m still hoping to get a whole other blog out of that.
• Okay, think I’ve done this.

That was today. Coming soon: Tomorrow. (And the hopeful finishing of this novel chapter.) Bye bye.

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Went to see Star Trek last night. I missed out on the last big nerd movie (Wolverine) because it looked rubbish, but I’ve seen this one within a few days of release. Hopefully this puts me at least a few places up the nerd blog list. (Like, somewhere into the low 10000000s?)

Anyway, yes, it was pretty damn good. It has a lot in common with the recent successful revivals of Doctor Who and the Batman movie franchise, in that it keeps the things most people liked about the originals and manages to successfully identify and ditch the bits that were only liked by the hardcore, or stuck around because they were amusing and/or camp. It’s not an easy thing to do, many have failed. (Like a large amount of recent superhero films.)

But they nailed it, for the most part. It blasts along at a high speed (which is probably one of its biggest departures from a lot of Trek movies, which tend to be pretty leisurely) in its bid to set up all the original characters, give them their hook and still advance an actual plot. Some characters get a bit under-used as a result (Simon Pegg isn’t in it much as Scotty), but I think that’s one of the necessary sacrifices to create a coherent film that lots of people will like, rather than a lengthy tribute to Star-Trek-loving childhoods. (Or “fan-wank”, to use the less kind term.)

I didn’t have a Star-Trek-loving childhood, in case you were wondering. Generally, I’m not a big fan of the space-faring geek fodder, although I still enjoy the good ones. (Like Wrath Of Khan or First Contact.)  But generally whenever I try to follow one of the TV series, I lose interest after a few weeks. So I’m not an impossible sell, but it had to at least be good.

Fortunately, it is. Not perfect, no. If one wanted to pick holes in the plot, especially the many suspisciously convenient events, one would probably have little trouble. And it looks a bit visually odd to me that ‘Captain’ Kirk here appeears about five years younger than every other crew member. But as an experience, it’s good. It realises that what most people liked about original Star Trek were the characters, so focuses on them rather than lots of scifi babble.

Although it’s generally good to head away from the fan masses in making these things, I was surprised how much of the film they actually spent tying it into the old series so that it could still work, and without alienating the existing audience. It was quite a clever little balancing act, and the fact they pulled it off and still made a film the rest of us could understand deserves much respect.

So, this is one of the better action films I’ve seen lately. If you think you might enjoy it, you very very probably will. Go see.

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Crappy day, for various reasons, none of which need venting here as I’m determined not to let this become a personal angst blog. So instead I’m going to focus my irritation on a public figure, namely British Formula 1 racing driver Lewis Hamilton.

Basically, I have a long-standing mild annoyance with Hamilton. His success may be deserved, he clearly has talent, but he also manages to irk me with nearly every decision he makes in his public life. Seeing his pouting face in relentless advertisements just gets me down after a while.

And last year, of course, he was winning, so was able to make gracious statements about how well he was doing and how it was a team effort and how happy he was. And all this works quite well with smugness.

Until, of course, he started losing. This year, due to whatever technical reasons, the Mclaren car is not especially competitive and Hamilton is suddenly trailing off the pace, barely scraping the top six in most races.

His quotation, as pasted from the BBC News, after he finished a staggering ninth in today’s Grand Prix: “Everyone is wondering what’s going on, but the car is that bad. I am driving the socks off it but… There’s just no hope.”

Now, I’m aware there could be some content removed here, especially in the conspicuous treble-dot in the middle, but that’s hardly sporting conduct, to me. Going out there and saying “Yeah, the car is crap,” is hardly professional. Seems a bit inconsiderate to the people who work hard to put you and that car on the track.

I think it’s just the phrasing which annoys me. I’m aware that drivers have made public comments along the lines of “Yeah, we’re just off the pace this year.” before without me feeling the need to write 300 words about it. So perhaps I’m just biased. But yes, that’s just another in a list of things that Lewis Hamilton has said and done off the track which come dangerously close to tarnishing his acheivments on it, at least for me.

But as I say, I’m in a pretty pissy mood. So maybe this is a staggering over-reaction. Read Behatted.

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Today’s blog entry will be a story about my laundry schedule. It doesn’t get much more exciting than this, I think you’ll agree. (Unless you’re reading Behatted. Or voting for it as best webcomic ever!)

So, last weekend I attempted to do some washing, only to find the washing machine was broken. I didn’t notice this right away of course. No, first I left it for an hour like a fool, before coming back downstairs and noticing nothing had changed. Then I had the beautiful experience of forcing it to unlock itself midcycle so I could get my damn clothes back, as I had to go out.

(I also lost a pound coin, which I don’t think I’ll ever get back. Oddly, although all over bills are included in my rent, the washing machine is coin-operated.)

I eventually prised the door open and threw my clothes out (some of them were a bit damp, which suggests mould to me), resigning myself to a spell with no clean clothes. Which means more wear than average for my amazing homeless-looking sweatshirt, where the main body of the thing has come entirely away from the collar on one side. Seriously, it’s hideous. Nearly everyone in the world disapproves of it, and that’s probably the only reason I haven’t thrown it away or made any effort to get it repaired.

I also have a pair of jeans which shrank in the wash and don’t entirely reach down to my ankles, specially for such occasions.

So I toddled around all week, clad in these dubious-looking garments and a range of increasingly swiss-cheese-like socks, until on Thursday night, I noticed we had a new washing machine! Clearly, our landlady had taken heed of my plight and purchased us an entirely new thing, complete with a digital display and looking a bit scifi.

So I shoved all my clothes into it, wandered off to fiddle with my hats and came back 90 minutes later, as instructed by the disturbing all-knowing digital display. (Like the one in Studio 60.)

Good news: Washing completed.

Bad news: Kitchen flooded.

Half an hour of fervent mopping followed. I start to wonder if the divine beings just don’t want me to have clean clothes, and would rather I just wandered around in my tramp fancy dress. Because if I have to mop the floor every time I do washing, that is what will end up happening.

Storyline ongoing. Hopefully it will end with someone fixing the damn thing. Vote Behatted! And if you’re really lovely, you can go back and vote every 24 hours. Also, for aptness purposes, here’s a Spotify link to the Divine Comedy song ‘Here Comes The Flood’.

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So, as I think I blogged last night, I went to see Simon Amstell do a warm-up gig in a theatre in Camden, trying out some new material and generally messing around. It was a good show, from what I can remember of it.

Unfortunately, I had been out the previous night, woken at 5:30 and been unable to get back to sleep. So I was pretty tired, a state that was only driven harder into the ground by the subsequent pints of beer (yeah, that may have been a stupid idea) and the nice warm, dark, cosy theatre seat. As you can probably guess, this is leading up nicely to “…and then I fell asleep during the gig”.

Apparently Mister Amstell has a reputation for verbally assaulting latecomers, so I’m pleasantly surprised I wasn’t lulled gently into wakefulness by the mocking laughter of the entire audience. There was just the mocking laughter of my workmates to contend with afterwards. Anyway, he was pretty good. I may go again some time just to stay awake the whole time.

I’ve never seen him on Buzzcocks or anything, by the way, I just went along because other people said he was funny. I am a simple soul at heart. Also, the Buzzcocks fans at the gig didn’t exactly paint a good picture of the show. I was amazed he threw out an open Q&A at the end, because he must have known he’d get some ridiculously confrontational questions trying to rake up dirt on his recent departure from that series. And so he did. Never mind. Those people, happily, he mocked quite readily.

If nothing else, this serves to remind me I should go see more stand-up comedy, as it’s high on the list of things I enjoy doing, yet never do. I’m not sure I’d done it at all since… God, my last visit to Edinburgh festival, the summer before last? Owch. Oh, and I probably shouldn’t turn up utterly shattered and fall asleep either.

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