Sunday, 18 October 2009

1814 Aspects of a week

I need to fill in the gaps between the long sessions reading and writing about the assassination of Kennedy, a subject which was least on my as I walked down to the health centre to see my GP about the aggravating skin condition and where I had tolerated the itchiness for several days, not taking the relief cream since it had become responsible for the extension of the rash to other parts of my body since starting at the back my neck within the hairline.

On my way home clutching a large bag contained a moisturising relief cream and two boxes of another intended to treat the complaint along with the Loratadine, I changed direction and headed for a voucher breakfast costing £1.99 and which covered two slices of bacon, two hash browns, an egg, a sausage, large mushroom slice and baked beans with a black coffee and a side of cold milk. As with the previous visit the meal was exceptional well cooked and arrived sooner than before so there only time to flip through the copy of the Daily Mail I had purchased while making the detour. It was mid morning by the time I return home and undertook further catch up work with set making, registration and photographing while working out the new regime of creams and the tablet, and changing clothes and bedding more frequently than before as a consequence.

It was that I came across Executive Action my interest in the Assassination of President Kennedy ignited.

I believe it was in the early 1980’s that I acquired a book written after the House Committee on Assassinations had published its final report and significant different from the Warren Commission and in so doing exposing it as cover up emanating at the highest levels. I had lent the book to a colleague at work and when he had died prematurely in his early sixties I decided not to ask the family for its return,

For many years I had believed that I was on a college trip to Sweden when the death of Kennedy was announced and only with the past five years did I work out that it could not have been, nor was it the speech Ich bin ein Berlinner which was made in June of that year, yet I retained the image of being out on a walking explore while staying at a Folk High School and we had been on a wooded hillside resting when the new of something dramatic reached us and we commiserated with a young American who was also staying at the High School at the time. Oh memory and its failure.

I have been again diverted from my writing, this time by a recording on Biography channel of a Mark Knofler concert (Dire Straits the former local band from Whitley Bay whose music I continue to play constantly followed by the Amy Whitehouse Performance at a French music Festival in 2007 when she was at the top of her form, looking great and singing her now well known numbers from the then recent album - Back to Back. She is rarely mentioned these days and only occasionally replayed. I also diverted myself to undertake the washing up reminding that there was more ironing to complete and the bed to remake as 4pm Thursday afternoon approached. It has remained a miserable weather day but the temperature good, approaching 60 degrees and the highest for October in this area and more generally although on the sixth over 60 degrees was reached in the midlands the mid west and on the coast south of London.

I commenced the ironing last night while watching the last English International in the World Cup preliminaries. It was not a great match but England won 3.0 and James Milner and David Beckham hit the woodwork on either side of the goal posts in the last seconds. England won 9 of its ten matches with the one loss on Saturday and of the 9 teams which immediately qualified from Europe after heading a group of 6, England came second to Spain who had a perfect 10 out 10 in their group which included Turkey, and ahead of Germany who although undefeated had 8 wins and 2 draws. Others already qualifying are Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Serbia Switzerland and Slovakia. Russia, Portugal, France and Norway are among the eight teams who will hold a two leg playoff to join the 9 already through.

Sunderland had a great win against Liverpool on Saturday afternoon. I listened on the watched part of the replay on Sky before switching over to the BBC for match of the day. It was the second following Aston Villa who beat Chelsea. Sunderland’s goal should have been technically disallowed because a Liverpool supporter having thrown a beach ball balloon on to the pitch which the goal keeper and the Liverpool players did not remove, a Sunderland play had the opportunity to score and the ball cannoned off the beach ball into the net with the goal keep appearing undecided where to go for the ball or the balloon. He appealed and the referee consulted the lineman and the goal was allowed although technically the rules state that if the ball hits a foreign object within the field of play the referee should then have stopped the game and restarted with both sides being given the opportunity to gain possession. However what happened was justice in the circumstance and If I was Liverpool I would ensure that the offending spectator caught on camera was banned from football grounds for life. Liverpool were in poor spirits because they had lost their two keys players and others were rested having got of the place from the Argentine after celebrating and unexpected qualification in the World Cup. However this does not take away from a significantly improved Sunderland side under Steve Bruce who had bought well and organised the team with new belief and resolve and at present they look like competing for a top six place which means they are playing to the level of Manchester United who they nearly beat at Old Trafford, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea and Man City and Aston Villa who are also doing well so far. The crowd was said to have 50000 just below the ground maximum for the first time in several seasons and on the overall play Sunderland should have won by a 2 or 3 goal margin, a view which everyone including the Liverpool manager agreed.

I have watched two of the 20 20 cricket games being held in the Indian competition fort eh most successful clubs side from the international world of cricket, including Sussex and Somerset from the UK. I have been unable to find the full score tables s on the competition site as the BBC is not providing the information on Teletex or the BBC sport’s site on the Internet. The games are being shown live on Euro sport and from the results so far Somerset will not progress from stage of four mini leagues but Sussex still have an outside chance. And now for a different dimension

Having recently viewed the film Troy I was intrigued to find a film called The Last Glory of Troy which centres on the arrival Aeneas and the Trojans after their wondering when Troy was sacked through the clever trick of the Wooden horse when a thousand ships were said to have been launched to reclaim the fair Helen. The film claimed that by defeating the ambitious, ruthless and cunning Turnus, King of the Retuli, before he was able to marry against her will, Lavina the daughter of Latinus, King of the Latins, Aeneas was able to bring peace to the area, marry Lavinia himself and help form Rome and its Empire. This version of the mythological legend was created by Virgil 70 to 29 BC in his epic poem the Aeneid. Julius Caesar and his family had created the legend that he was direct descendent of the mythical Prince who escaped the fall Troy. Titus Livius, known as Livy was a contemporary of Virgil 59BC to 17 AD and was responsible for the great work on the founding of the City. The myth. including the marriage of Aeneas with Lavinia is not mentioned. The film is a stock costume drama of this period but my search produced an amazing Wikipedia site guide which systematically makes references to the great Wars before 1775 and any films which are known to have been based on those taking place in the period, including reference to the literature or historical works on which the films are based,

I could not resist the umpteenth showing of Quo Vadis of Friday evening. The uncontested star performance is that of Peter Ustinov as Nero with his singing, fears and obsessions and a cuddly giant of a man who wrestles a voracious bull to save life of a former Princess, Deborah Kerr who has become a Christian when in the household of a former Roman General who has been asked to look after this hostage of Rome. She is the awarded to Robert Taylor the returning victorious commander of a Roman Legion as his reward but she escapes before he can claim her. Inevitable they fall in love and eventually he is converted, and in fairness he plays the role well with the help of an excellent script. I have always liked the inclusion of the eight beatitudes before the Commandments and the Christians singing as they faced a horrific death by the lions always leaves me moved.

The contrast between this film and Captain Hamilton could not have been greater although the story was not without interest, I may have the title wrong as I cannot find further trace of a man for TV film. The story, with one stopped but the other falling into the hands of is well worn, a soviet missile going astray, in fact two, one stopped and the other falling into the hands of a middle east Terrorist group, involving renegade USA special forces and a NATO hero from Sweden and second heroics. All too familiar but for once the hero came from a Nato allay.

However the film was streets ahead of one of the worst films I recall seeing. The film shown have been Narrow Escape also known as A thousand Men and a Baby about a Korean baby “adopted” by a ship’s crew and then by the naval medical officer and his wife at Christmas. This is a true story and he captain of ship disobeyed orders on allowing the baby on board and bring it back to the USA rather than transferring to a civilian cargo vessel back to Korea. The reason why the rescue happened is that the Captain had a extraordinary career as a pilot during World War II, and then involved with the development and dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan and then with the development of aircraft from carriers and then put in charge of a carrier with 1000 men John T Hayward and the medical officer Hugh Keenan and his adopted son Daniel who attended subsequent reunions of the ships’ crews.

Now that was the film billed and with credits at the beginning and end, However it was not the film in the middle. This is the story as far as I could work out. I small time sexist comedian loses his stars in the eyes girl friend to a Las Vegas mafia con man believing he is a film maker who will get her a deal. His best friend is a mixed race lawyer DA with a respectable mother. In the second half of the film the mother tells her son that his father is in fact a well know Los Vegas mafia boss with whom she had a casual relationship. She fails to mention that she had been a whore and a druggie but her former pimp arrives called Whitee because of his white hair although a black and demands money or he will reveal her background to the son and in public to affect the son’s career., Mother appeals to the son and the son contacts his father, as a good friend of his mother without admitting the man is his father. Father arranged for Whitee to be a place X with a car load of drugs, so the DA can arrange for the police to pick him up. There is a shoot out and Whitee is killed solving teh problem without teh problem of a court case and publicity. Son thanks his natural father and that should have been the end of that.

Meanwhile the two but sexist comedian has been fired from his job at a Las Vedas hotel owned by Lucky, the daughter of a, guess who, the father of the DA. She is supposed to have a close but competitive relationship with the father. Against father’s wishes she had married a man the same age as her father and another mafia hood all the way from Scilly and who has a villa in the South France. They have a son and live the highlife outside the USA so she has little contact with her father who against her wishes has married someone who lives most of the time in Los Angeles and their marriage ends through prolonged separations. Lucky’s husband has a daughter by his first wife who is she same age as his bride. She is an irresponsible, mindless, drink and drug play girl who on whim has married once with the man having to be paid off and this time married the big comic entertainer at one of the hotels where the then sexist comic was sacked all those years before. She takes him off to meet daddy and step mom at the villa in France where step mum’s daddy has also come to see his daughter. The recently big time comic soon realises that his father in law does not acknowledge his existence and his wife is immediately regretting her decision. He goes for a swim and climbs on an out to sea float where sunbathing, is guess who, his mother in law although neither knows who each other is and have an oblique heart to heart talk about their respective situations and strike a chord, yes could this be the real thing. but is impossible when they discover their legal relationship and circumstances.

These are immediately to change as the comedian is freed by his bride who goes back to Las Vegas to her former lover and his dodgy associate one of who it out for Lucky, who has also returned to Las Vegas after catching her husband with someone else and has returned to manage her hotel. The comedian and she get together but there is to be one final twist,

At the beginning of the account of the film mention is made that the comedian’s girlfriend was taken away by a crook and she is now tied to a man who is possessive and violent and who has a hatred for Lucky, kidnapping her son and takes him on his private jet plane to New York. However the ex girl friend spills the beans to her former friend and now internationally recognised comedian, who contacts the DA and they arrange to meet the jet plane as it arrives in New York and the DA’s as well as advising the child’s mother of the position who also get on another jet look alike with her daddy. The child is rescued, the villain warns his former girlfriend he will be out to get her, and she wishes she had the taken the advice of the DA and her former boyfriend and asks is it too late for them. He says it is and goes off to play happy families with the daughter of his best friend’s natural father. Wow isn’t fiction great. All those beautiful and talented bodies living the high life, but wait a moment are they not most dangerous criminals whose wealth is based on exploitation, corruption and naked crime? I wonder how many people other than me witnessed the experience of watching the film that was not, without a title.

It is Sunday morning and very cold, just above freezing and computer is playing up although I know the problem and do not know how to fix it. The security system advised that it had blocked two operating programmes which were causing instability and these would only become removed or deleted when the computer was closed. I forgot this aspect and to day when I attempt to play a game or internet visual, listening to Steve Bruce on the BBC sports site the mouse wireless or cable freezes. Fortunately I disabled the multiple weather windows to be able to complete this writing. Where I can upload to MY Space and Google is the next challenge.

I will leave mention of the impressive discussion in Parliament about Government policy in Afghanistan and towards Pakistan and much gnashing of teeth by Members of the House of Commons about the way the expenses has been handled. There has also been more bad news from within the extended family.

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