The Country Boy Visits The City

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Johan, Freya’s cousin, went back home today, after spending the week with us while he did some work experience.

Jo had asked Linda, a film producer and friend of ours, for the placement, and she kindly took Johan under her wing. She let Johan produce his own three-minute film, which he did by himself (from the initial idea to the editing). Not a bad placement really; better than cleaning the toilets at McDonalds.

This was his first time alone away from his home tract. He seemed to take to it easily, spending the evenings out with his “friend”, Victoria. Freya didn’t get to see Johan much because of this, but still talked often about him, and even proclaimed her love for him.

It was nice to spend a little more time with him. He is quite a quiet person, and I didn’t really get so much out of him, though he seems to know the lyrics to many of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest (the final being tonight).

To Chris And Tanya’s

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We were all invited to Chris and Tanya’s last night, for a meal and film showing of Office Space, which Chris had suggested would be a worthwhile watch.

Freya made herself at home very quickly, and had no problem in involving our hosts in her activities. She has always had a soft-spot for Tanya, and has recently warmed to Chris, which is a nice development in her relationship with him.

During the preparatory phase of the meal I sidled to the computer to have my first proper exploration of World of Warcraft. They had shown me around the basics of the game before, chaperoning me through the on-screen menus more than the world of Azeroth. This time, though, I was truly on my lonesome, and enjoyed it as much as I had expected to.

The first levels involve the standard “kill/return” type of sub-quests, all the while unfolding the overall plot related to the Undead character I’d chosen. While it was unexceptional in its incipiency, the lush environment and “liveliness” of Undercity made for a different experience than Neverwinter Nights.

After WoWing, eating, WoWing a bit more, and eating dessert, Freya collapsed from 16 hours of being awake. Despite her desperate moanings of wanting to sleep at home, she passed out with ease, leaving the adults alone to continue the evening’s mirth.

Having watched Office Space (a decent enough film, by the way), Jo spotted an unwrapped Borat. Why they had kept it unseen is witless enough, but it had been in their possession for a couple of weeks. Unopened. Unseen.

We corrected this oversight by demanding asking for a showing. I have been planning on purchasing the DVD at some point (i.e when it comes down in price), so we were rather happy to have the to see it earlier than we’d anticipated. Suffice to say it rocked, and I have full respect for Sacha Baron Cohen for creating the character and to have the balls to put himself in peril for entertainment.

The rest of the evening (being early morning by that time) was spent chatting about all manner of things. I had succeeded in not becoming drunk (which aided sociability on my part, and the ability to wake up with Freya four hours later without feeling the effects of a hangover), leaving their place at a respectable 4.15am.

I’ll Drink To That

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Apart from the occasional, hypocritical moaning, I don’t really care that my t-shirts may well have been made by some 7-year old girl in Pakistan. Earning a risible wage, Bob (not her real name) prostitutes herself during the hour a day free time she gets, probably and pathetically to the kind of people who own the sweat-shop she calls work.

While far away echoes of “Come on Bob, just do it!” ripple over the continents, I’m quite willing to support the regime if it gives me a good feeling in my wallet. I support this type of injustice, not because I’m callous, but because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t buy the product.

It was a nice surprise, then, when Jo turned up this afternoon with our usual bag-in-box red wine, Ecologica. Not only has it been one of the very cheapest three-litre boxes one can find in Sweden, but, as its name implies, it’s made from organically-grown grapes.

Now the wine has become one even more of a bad-conscience mollifier, since the new packaging also displays the Fair Trade moniker, meaning untold riches to the Argentinian workers involved in giving us (almost) daily pleasure and the occasional headache/temporary regret.

So, with the balance redressed I can finally get those Nike trainers I’ve had my eye on.

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A Feeling Of Eruditeness

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I was recently asked by a colleague at work to look through his first, very rough, draft of a piece he had written in English. I’m still not sure exactly what it was, but he mentioned something about it being a film review, being seen by his class, and for the parents of the pupils. Or something.

Anyway, it was incredibly basic, and caused me to giggle a fair number of times. The layout and, in particular, the spelling were atrocious, giving me a tittle of an ego boost.

I had a few minutes today to give the text another quick look, when I came across a mistake neither I nor the other “qualified” English teacher had seen at the first reading. The first sentence recounted the basic situation of the film, revolving around the “horrifying” lives of some school students.

Whilst I have never given it much though before, probably because I, like many others, use this word incorrectly, it suddenly occurred to me that horrify is a transitive verb. Transitive verbs need an object (e.g. I am horrifying the children at school with my outlandish behaviour), and there was no object in the text to be horrified.

What is needed here is the adjectival form of horrifying, which is “horrific”.

The film is about the horrific lives of some children…

is now how the text is formulated. I cannot say just how much joy I experienced by realising this mistake and rectifying it so that it is without error.

I apperceive that I am far from becoming an aptitudinal proof-reader, as I flounder often in the face of correct grammar, but it really felt an accomplishment to experience such an epiphany.

Now I think about it, can horrifying be used as an adjective? Nuts! I am befuddled. Oh, well, it’s back to my usual state of confusion until I can find out the correct answer to this conundrum.

Two Scrumptious New Words

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I came across these fantastic words today. One of them is very useable, the other will only ever be presented for its nerd-value, but both are worthy of being added to the long list of words (and their definitions) that appear in the banner of this blog:

Tittle: the dot over the letter “i”; the tiniest bit.

Lethologica: the inability to remember the right word.

At present there are just over 200 words that can be chosen from to randomly appear every time the blog is refreshed/entered. When I came up with the idea to include this “word of the day” style function I didn’t think I’d find so many that I really liked. I know, from scouring a dictionary of difficult words I have by my bed, there are a myriad words that are of little or no use (to me, anyway). I am pleased to be proven wrong, and procure great pleasure from the acquisition of a broader vocabulary, although lethologica is commonplace.

Though not in the case of lethologica, it seems.