The Sound Of Music

The other film on the top 20 list I have seen before is The Sound Of Music. My mum loved the film, and I used to watch it with her when I was younger.

I can't say I was looking forward to re-watching it. I remember it as being a bit boring, with a few good songs. And BT Vision told me it was 3 hours long...

So while the UK is voting a referendum on whether to move from a First Past The Post system to Alternative Vote, I am watching The Sound Of Music.

From the opening credits, I loved the film again. I can identify so much with Maria. When she is running over the hills, singing because her heart is full with happiness. That is, EXACTLY, what how I feel in the alps. You look to those majestic mountains and feel like your heart might burst. I also appreciate her ditziness!

I love the first part of the film, where she teaches them to sing, and they rebel and climb trees and swim in lakes. As a child it was my favourite bit. I was then amused to find that as the film heads to more adult themes such as love, my interest wandered and I updated this blog a bit, and dated some photographs. It was my intention to sit and really absorb every film, but I have just watched this one too many times.

I know why its in the classic film list, it tells a timeless story. And now, the Captain is singing Eidelwiess to the Austrians before he does a runner, and I'm only understanding now just how poignant that is.

I'm not sure quite when I'll get the desire to watch this film again, but I'm sure I will. And I think I'd better pretend the tear in my eye is because this was one of mums favourite films, and is nothing to do with sad ending!

Alien...

On my list of top 20 films is Alien. The first, and original. Its one of the few films on the top 20 list I have seen before, but a long time ago and I was looking forward to re-watching it.

It was made in 1979, which seems hardly believable, the film has hardly aged at all. Its not the space scenes, the alien bursting from the mans chest or the set that dates it, its the fact they are all smoking on their spacecraft which is heading home! It seems very odd now that we can't smoke on planes, or indeed anywhere public.

It had been so long since I had watched it, I'd forgotten a lot of it. I won't spoil it by saying what I had forgotten! But it was like I was watching for the first time. You can see why its considered a classic, it paved the way for all horror and suspense films that followed.

I now want to watch the rest of the trilogy!!

Duck!

I haven't blogged about all 12 recipes, but April (month 10 of the year of new recipes) is quite an exciting one, and more importantly Dan was around to take photos :)

I love duck, but have never cooked it before. It turned out to be as tricky as I expected. We bought duck breasts (about twice as expensive as chicken for reference) and we started pan frying them, which made the skin lovely and cripsy, and then the recipe said to transfer them to a roasting dish in a pre heated oven. They then cooked much slower than the recipe stated, and I kept checking them. It was hard to know when they done, as you can eat duck a bit rare, but these stayed bloody for ages and then suddenly cooked in 3 minutes!

I have to say, that with the wild rice and a side of chutney they were absolutely lovely. A bit pricy to eat regularly, but good as a treat I think. I shall look out some more duck recipes I think...

Only two more months to on my year of recipes. I want to cook lamb and fish cakes. I can't wait!

5k in under 40 minutes

When I set this task, I didn't really give a lot of thought to the time I wanted to run 5k in. I've done the distance a few times, and struggled to run the whole lot. The last time I can remember, I did a race for life in about 50 minutes, and had to walk the last 0.5k which was irritating.

After a few weeks of runs in the evening, I dragged Dan along to Parkrun with me. Parkrun is an interesting event, held at parks round England at 9.00am every Saturday morning with volunteers manning the route and giving you a time.

We went to the one in Hull (the nearest to where I live is an hour drive away and I'm not that committed!). I was really nervous and didn't know the route. I'd done 5k the week before one evening after work, just to check I could. I'd done it is 32 minutes and felt great, and wondered if I should be aiming for under 30 minute time.

For whatever reason, Parkrun was hard. Sometimes I find a rhythm when I run, sometimes I don't. Sometimes, it feels like I am running through treacle, and sometimes I find a natural pace. This day I couldn't get my act together. I tried to set pace with some people at the back, but got a bit overconfident and tried to keep up with runners too speedy for me. So I had to slow to a walk, so then when I began running again, I would sprint off determined to get a good time after all the course was flat so I knew I should be able to do it! Then minutes later, I'd be panting and out of breath and needing a walk.

I finished the course in an uninspiring 34 and a half minutes. For the record, Dan didn't stop and did it in 27 minutes.

So I passed the task, but I feel like I don't deserve to. I felt like I was pushing myself all the way round, and in a way I was, as every step I ran was a ridiculous battle. But in a way I can't have been pushing to limit, as I recovered my breath very quickly once I came to a stop.

So to this end I have just signed myself to do race for life, on home turf, to see if I can get a better time, plus cancer is still not cured. Given my genes, my preference is that this happens sooner rather than later...

Heres a link, in case you fancy sponsoring:
http://www.raceforlifesponsorme.org/stephstevens0503

Its a stepping stone on the way to a 10k!

Exporting Presents

Item 76 is also a present related one.

Two good friends emigrated to USA in the autumn of 2010, and I wanted to make sure they both got birthday presents (Nov/Dec) and that Christmas presents arrived in time.

Again, and mostly thanks to the power of the internet, I did achieve this :)

Birthday Present Quest 2010

Item 73 is a simple one, to buy my friend M a birthday present. This shouldn't have needed to be included on my Day Zero Project list, which is essentially a bucket list of experiences you want to do before you die. Or at least in the next 3 years.

However, despite M being one of my closet, nicest and most generous friends, I have spectacularly failed to buy him a birthday present for the last 3 years!

Each year I speak to his wife, find out what he wants, assure her I will purchase the present, and then I don't. I don't know why, I just have a blank spot around his birthday!

So, clearly it was time to rectify this. I was away visiting Dans family when his birthday fell, so I made Dan detour into Exeter on the day before his birthday to pick up the present I promised him a year ago. It was with much pride that we met on my return and I had a present to hand over. He seemed very pleased and his wife has reported that the present has been played with.

I am relieved to finally broken the bad habit. I don't know what will happen next year, lots of friends keep having children and this squeezes my present budget!

Snowboarding A Black Run!

Item 55 was to snowboard a black run.

You'll notice that I didn't specify how well I had to do it :) You might think that to count it, I needed to do it well, but personally I think it took so much guts that my attempts this winter counted!

My first ever black run was at Murren. Dan and I had the choice to turn down a red route or a black route. We noticed the black route was pretty short and thought we'd give it a go. The first bit was simply quite steep and so I simply took it slowly on my heel edge. Then we had to stop to see where the route went. It was off to the left, and it was narrower than my board... I was a little nervous so Dan went first to show me how to do it. And promptly fell over. I figured I could only do better and followed him down. It quickly widened to the most mogully slope ever, clearly a piste basher had never been near it. I edged over bumps, trees and bushes and was quite relieved to reach the red run and civilisation.

The photo above is taken at Birg on the last day where we had another go at an equally short black. It was fab! This time I attempted to do better than just slipping down on my heel edge so I bravely did a bit of falling leaf, until half way down, the slope flattened out and I quickly put two linked turns in before the route went over the edge of cliff and I had to get back under control. I got to the bottom feeling very proud of myself that I turned on a black slope. Wohooooo!