OK. I think I understand Donnie Darko now. It’s taken three viewings to get it, largely on account of the fact I didn’t notice the last black screen said 2nd October on it. I’d worked out he went back in time, of course, but then didn’t connect that with the last few scenes.

Hmmm…

Anyhow, I feel at least partly gratified that this allowed me to explain it to Mark and Ja when we finished watching it last night, as usually it’s Mark explaining films to the rest of us. Being a decidedly non-private environment I won’t write my theory here for fear of offending eyes that haven’t yet seen it, but I am at least less confused now, and don’t feel the need to what it again for a while, by which point it will be incomprehensible again.

So last night was a good night. The food turned out well, and I had a hard time convincing them I’d made it and cooked it myself rather than slamming in a Sainsbury’s packet job. We spend the rest of the night mooching around in the lounge and largely watching QVC for some incomprehensible reason.

The tasteless jumpers they were selling were available from medium to 2XL size, which perhaps explains a lot about QVC’s demographics. Switching over to the Travel Channel, they were desperately trying to sell holidays by showing film of people line dancing by a swimming pool, which is surely enough to put anyone off.

Somehow we always end up watching crap when they come around. We used to watch hours of distorted singing in the films on Asianet, not understanding a word of us. Then they axed the channel (at least on my package) and so we’re stuck with camp old men selling jewellery until most of the cable stations switch to hardcore porn and encrypt themselves.

Today: a bit of a drifter. Devoted it to doing very little in light of what I expect next week will be like, so spent the afternoon finishing the initial redesign on the homepage. Switched from blue to orange, and built in little buttons in the left-hand margin for changing the font size to glasses-friendly proportions for those who need them.

I’ll see how it holds up before changing the rest of the site to match.

Mum and Andrew around for pancakes this evening - their traditional annual visit. I don’t know when they were last here but it seems everything was new since the last time, so it has to be six months at the very least. Minor cock-up on the mixing front, though, when I made up enough batter to feed the whole of Chelmsford.

As a result: feeling full.

1. Food food food food food
   A very sociable weekend, all told. After Friday night's evening of Yorkshire films, Nigerian TV and Spanish song competitions, Saturday was a walk into town...
   
   
2. In bed with the biro
   Spent the whole morning in bed. Slept eleven hours of it, and spent the other hour going through the Radio Times with a biro marking...
   
   
3. There at the birth
   I witnessed a birth today. A very beautiful thing. It was just as we were leaving work. Jason and Leo had already headed on over...