On Saturday we saw the Bodyworlds exhibition at the Museum of Science and Industry. It was a birthday outing for mum, who wanted to see it. Cool, ghoulish mother we have, huh?

The exhibition was fine. Blatantly sensationalist. Very informative. The comments in the visitor book focused on two things: the gorilla and the cocks. Good to know the great British public is as predictable as ever. I was not seized with an overwhelming urge to donate my body to plastination. However, I do like the word plastination. Very '60s sci-fi sort of word.

In the evening we came home, after not finding anything interesting to do in town by way of cinema showings or restaurants. We got takeaway curry and watched The History Boys, an Alan Bennett film. Which was entertaining, intelligent and funny. However, I did not like the central 'inspirational' character we were supposed to like and find inspirational. I found him tragic—not nobly tragic, not tragic as a flipside of greatness, not humanisingly tragic, just downright pitiful all round—and found the characters who turned out like him tragic.

Today I've read most of The City and the Stars, which I'll almost certainly finish tonight, and also watched the whole series so far of Ashes to Ashes (or all the ones we've managed to get on the PVR). Unfortunately, Ashes is suffering from generic sequel syndrome, which is a shame, because the original two series, called Life on Mars, were very good. The main character of Ashes is a canon_sues post waiting to happen; bloomin' ridiculous canon-warping skirt...

Name your top 10 most played bands on Last.fm:

(I'm not sure if this is my most played list or most tagged list. 0,o But it's some kind of list. And there are few surprises on it.)

1 Angra
2 Falconer
3 Blind Grauniad
4 Stratovarius
5 DragonForce
6 Rhapsody
7 Nightwish
8 Edguy
9 Sonata Arctica
10 Avantasia

read more...