Now I will come on to what Helen gave me. The presents were all connected, but she wouldn't tell me how, I had to guess and could only have one guess per present.

• Jelly
  
• A Slinky
  
• Nesquik
  
• Spam
  
• Bubble gum
  
• Pez!
  
• A Kinetic Wheel
  
• A Magic 8 ball (actually my one is called a mystic ball and is purple)
  
• Mr. Potato Head
  

I guessed after the Nesquik. That was the 3rd thing I opened. The answer of course is The Pretender.

Anyway, what else to talk about? I don't know, it's been ages since I blogged, so stuff has obviously happened. John came up for a while. He and Helen have gone back home now leaving me alone in the house :-( never mind. I'm getting stuff done. Some secret projects, actually they're not very secret, Helen knows what I'm doing, I just can't mention it here on the off chance that Julie visits my blog, 'cos it's for her birthday.

Oddly I just went to Stephanie's blog to see what she's been up to and discovered that she's fallen in love with the novel of The Princess Bride and likes it even more than the film. Why is that at all odd you ask? Well the odd thing is that I read the novel the day before yesterday, having reserved it in my library. See, what a coincidence. Anyway, I came to the opposite opinion. I decided that I liked the book, but that the film had taken all the best bits and made it even better. I don't know if I'd have liked the book as much if I didn't love the film. Then again maybe it's only that I've loved the film for so long that I can't love the book, I don't know.

Right, now I shall discuss The Two Towers 'cos I went to see it on Friday. There seems to be mixed reaction. Helen informs me that people in chat on Saturday who had seen it thought it was fantastic. I didn't. I can't really think of any better way to sum it up than in the words of one of my companions, he said "I feel betrayed". It wasn't an awful film. It had many good points. As fantasy films go you could probably say it was fantastic. The problem is what it wasn't. It wasn't Tolkein's Lord of the Rings. It was someone else's Lord of the Rings. I can understand the need to make a few minor changes, to miss bits out or whatever, but I don't see the need to alter plots, to add in things that never happened and to totally change the personality of characters. I'm remaining vague, 'cos I don't really want to bother with hiding the writing so that people who haven't seen the film don't get spoiled. Anyway, I went to see the film with 3 guys who'd read the books too, they all felt pretty much the same as me, we didn't really mind the beginning, it was later that it got too off track and the battle at Helmsdeep seemed to take up a lot of screentime. I have spoken to other people who liked the film, but mostly they hadn't read the books. IRL I've only spoken to one person who liked the books and the film. He is a fan of the whole fantasy genre and is able somehow to separate the books from the film, he treated the film as a completely separate thing and therefore liked it. I guess that's what you've got to do, if you look at it as just a fantasy film, then it is very good, it has excellent details and a good plot, but the problem is it takes Tolkein's story and changes it, that seems wrong.

I'll stop ranting now. I'm reading Lord of the Rings again now. I also watched The Fellowship of the Ring again on Saturday just to check that it was better than The Two Towers and it was.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a great Christmas. I'm off home tonight, I have to work this afternoon, so I can't go home till late tonight, I'll be back in Leicester on Boxing day, so not much time with the family.