Wednesday 7 January 2015

Back! Happy New Year!

Wow.

This must be my longest non-blog ever!

I blame Number One Son.  This Christmas he travelled light, so instead of bringing one of his desktop PCs with him he said he would just borrow my laptop when he needed to.

Sounds fair, I said.

As it turned out, I never got a look in.  He had an assignment that he was working on, and when he was not working on that he was doing some programming for relaxation, and when he wasn't doing that we were all doing something together and when that wasn't happening we were sleeping off all the fun, food and excitement!

So it is his fault that I have not been around.

I have managed to do a bit of FB on my phone, and did drop in on the occasional blog with it, but commenting is just a nightmare so I have taken to just lurking if restricted to the phone.

Anyway, enought feeble excuses!

We had a really good Christmas, one of the best for a long time I think.  Everyone was happy with their presents, and we didn't break the bank either.  In fact, given that the kids were all feeling a bit poor this year (Number One Son is poor during the Autumn term, our daughter does not start her job until Monday and Younger Son is still at school) we decided that all of the after dinner presents should be bought from Pound Shops.  Yes, no afternoon presents were to cost more than one Pound, but had to be carefully chosen for that person.  And it was hilarious!  We found some great stuff and had a hoot opening them all.

We got lazy with Christmas dinner, though.  Given that 2 of us no longer eat meat, we thought that a massive turkey would be a waste, so the meat eaters were treated to some wonderful steaks, while Mrs RC produced a very interesting looking nut roast for her and our daughter.  My mum and Spot were with us for the day, having steak too (mum shared hers with Spot, as we knew she would) and a fabulous dinner was had anyway, without 30 years worth of left over turkey to deal with!

Mrs RC and I did spend a good amount of time lounging in front of the TV, resting our tired bones and watching some real trash.  It was heaven. 

One show that we stumbled on was Utopia US.  Did anyone catch this during its 2 month showing in the US late last year?  From the write up and watching the first show I was convinced that it was a spoof.  It was hypnotic!  The premise was that they were setting up a commune 15 people who would have to create a mini society and survive for a year.  The characters were so amazing that it had to be a spoof. There was a toothless redneck called "Red", and a young black guy from Harlem who was just out of prison.  And they made friends!  There was a hippy who believed in the magical healing power of sex, and they showed her saying goodbye to her 2 boy friends and her girl friend.  There was a tall woman who called herself a Hunteress, who brought a hunting bow with her, but even when they were trying to survive on less than 1000 calories a day and there were deer roaming across their land, she did not even try to shoot one!

And I won't even start on how dysfunctional they all were!

It had to be a spoof!  Surely?

But no, after the 2nd episode Mrs RC was sure it was real.  I googled it to find out the truth, and she was right!  It was real!  These were real people!  For some reason it was cancelled after 2 months.  Might have to watch the rest to find out why.  Did they starve?  Did they kill each other?  Could the Hunteress actually use her bow?

Anyway, it is great to be back!  See you again soon!

10 comments:

Shammickite said...

Haven't heard of that Utopia show, but perhaps it wasn't shown in Canada, or possibly I didn't get that channel.... I don't have cable TV, I just have a antenna on the roof. Too mean to pay the cable fees. Happy New Year to you and the family. I have been laid out by a horrible fluey cold ever since the day after Boxing Day, still feeling rather poorly.

Rock Chef said...

Shammickite - Sounds nasty - hope you are back to normal soon! I think Utopia was on FOX, so I doubt it was free.

Abby said...

Welcome back, and Happy New Year! I had similar computer issues when Chaco was home. He brought his computer, but forgot his keyboard and mouse, so mine were hijacked. It was only for a couple of days. I doubt anyone noticed.
Sounds like a nice holiday. What is a nut roast?!?
I've not heard of Utopia, but it sounds totally believable. Sadly.

Rock Chef said...

Abby - Nut roast is a vegetarian meat loaf, usually featuring smashed nuts to provide protein. This one was very tasty, we were told - there were no leftovers for the carnivores to try.

terri said...

Welcome back. So glad to hear you had such a great Christmas and break! I'd say it felt quiet around here without you, but I wasn't exactly around enough to notice! Hoping to get back into routine with the new year.

ShadowRun300 said...

Happy New Year! Sounds like your holidays were great fun. Don't you just love having the whole family together again?
I'm wondering if I may have seen bits and pieces of Utopia. If so, it wasn't something that made me want to stick around. Should I give it another try?

Rock Chef said...

Terri - Me too, it all went out of the window over the holidays, but that is what holidays are for, is in not?

ShadowRun300 - Probably not, unless it is just to how ridiculous people can be. They don't seem to have had many viewers - according to Wikipedia they seem to have averaged about 1.75 million, which is pretty poor for a country the size of the USA!

Riot Kitty said...

Tip for the uninitiated: reality shows aren't real!

Nut loaf, you say? I'm mostly vegan but that still sounds scary to me.

Rock Chef said...

Riot Kitty - Yes, I know that they have varying degrees of scripting and direction, but even so Utopia was really bad.

agg79 said...

Welcome back! Glad to hear you had a quiet, restful holiday. I've been MIA as well trying to get back to a normal pattern. Way too many distractions over the holidays to get anything productive done. I never watched Utopia (I normally don't watch reality shows) although the Amazing Race is fun sometimes. I will admit I lost a few days over the holidays due to a Dr Who Marathon.