About a month ago Becky suggested that we all go to a concert featuring the music from Doctor Who as performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and the BBC National Chorus of Wales. Doctor Who, and the spin-off series Torchwood, are filmed in Cardiff which also played host to the concert at the impressive Cardiff Millennium Centre.

Tickets for the concert sold out within two hours of going on sale. Becky was lucky to get us tickets at all. We ended up sitting at the back of the upper circle, as high up as you can possibly get. However we did have a very good view of the whole stage. Unfortunately a representative of some sort of Doctor Who fan club was seated next to James. The fan then proceeded to chat incessantly with James about the cast, crew, and all the various writers who were wandering about, expecting James to know everything about everybody.

The show was compered by the current Doctor, David Tennant, and included live performances by some of the Doctor’s many enemies from the last two series. This included cybermen and a dalek. Each piece of music was accompanied by video clips from the TV show shown on a giant screen. We also got to see a preview of the Christmas episode which is due to be broadcast on Christmas day.

After the show Becky insisted on having her photo taken on top of the ‘Torchwood elevator’.

On Saturday James, Roz, Becky, Dave and I went to Exeter’s new Wagamama for lunch, I had the yaki soba, before going to see the new James Bond film Casino Royale at the Picture House.

Casino Royale, published in 1953, was the first in the series of Bond books by author Ian Flemming. The film stars Daniel Craig who takes over from previous Bond, Pierce Brosnan.

It took me a while to recognise him as Bond but once that was out the way the film became very enjoyable. I wasn’t sure if he would make a good Bond however by the end of the film I was fully convinced.

The film was less based on action and explosions and more on Bond’s interaction with the other charactors. However I am still upset about what they did to the brand new Aston Martin.

My overall impression was that this has reenergised the otherwise flagging Bond brand and should set the scene for future Bond films.

In the evening Roz and Becky cooked a fantastic roast chicken. Damo and Dave B came round for dinner and then we played many rounds of Scrabble ending with ‘rude word’ Scrabble at two in the morning.

I took a half day off work on Friday so that I could drive Dave and Becky down to Exeter in time to see a Queen tribute band called Ga Ga. They were playing at St George’s hall which is almost opposite where James and Roz live. We met up with Trina, Wayne, James, Roz and Jen outside the venue and a little later on Fairy and her boyfriend Kev found us.

The show itself started fairly poorly but warmed up toward the end of the first half. Not exactly the best tribute band I have ever seen but it was still a good night.

After the show we all went to the Wetherspoon’s pub round the corner for a few drinks before heading off to James and Roz’s flat for bed.

A lady studying for a postgrad at Manchester University is doing a survey into the provacy attitudes and expectations of bloggers. The survey takes only about five minutes to complete and is pretty easy. I am sure she would find it useful if you fill out her survey:

http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/privacysurvey/

Fog fog and more fog on the roads today. Sat on the M32 for an hour while three accidents were cleared off the road. The fog got worse throughout the day and by the time I was driving home it was a pea-souper all the way back to Bristol.

Things that annoyed me:

• People driving along without fully working tail-lights
• People driving along without their fog lights turned on
• A cyclist riding toward me on the wrong side of the road
• A cyclist without any lights or reflectors on his bike

Do these people have a death wish?

This weekend I drove down to Exeter with Becky and Dave for Roz’s fireworks night and birthday meal. We arrived on Saturday evening just in time for fireworks and sparklers at Damo’s house. More often than not the rockets went over the house so it was difficult to see them. I was a little worried that we would get back to the car to find one of the wooden rods from the rockets imbedded into the bonet of my car.

Roz served us home made parkin and chocolate brownies which were both very nice. I gave Roz some soaps and things from Lush while Becky and Dave gave her the board game Scrabble.

After the fireworks were over we headed into the city centre for dinner at Tyepyedong. I had the chicken yakisoba which was very nice.

Photos are on my gallery.

Was watching tv on Tuesday night and happened to see this sketch from Amnesty International’s Secret Policeman’s Ball:

YouTube video of the sketch

Very highly amusing, especially when Ms Imbruglia joined in at the end.

Last night Rosie came round to watch the third episode of Torchwood which was being repeated on BBC2.

I created the most amazing cottage pie I have ever made. It really was the best. I used my standard cottage pie recipe but for some reason it just worked better than ever before. It really was the best. I even added diced carrots to the mixture and the mash was all cheesy and crispy on top. Tesco had a special offer on 800g punnets of mince so even after having fed both Rosie and myself I still had enough to freeze that will last me four more meals.

For desert we had Gü Chocolate and Vanilla cheesecakes.

I love cottage pie, hadn’t made it for months.

You may recall that back in August I was involved in a car accident. The third party, a canadian driving a rental car, drove into the back of my car. The back of my car was bent inward and eventually written-off by my insurance company.

My insurance company appointed an uninsured loss recovery company to help me claim back my policy excess. The ULR company contacted the rental company that the third party was using to make a claim. The rental car company contacted my ULR company yesterday to say:

“We do not accept liability for the accident since it was Mr Durrans who drove into the back of our vehicle”

Sounds like someone has got their wires crossed. Especially since it was my vehicle that has the rear damage, not theirs.

Looks like I might not be getting my policy excess back any time soon.

cus·to·dy

1. The act or right of guarding, especially such a right granted by a court: an adult who was given custody of the child.
2. Care, supervision, and control exerted by one in charge.
3. The state of being detained or held under guard, especially by the police: took the robbery suspect into custody.
4. Being covered from head to toe in custard.