Oh, for crying out loud.

So. I've been sick for the last seven weeks or so. Maybe eight; I don't remember. I had pleurisy, and then the pleural rub settled down but the pain stayed and got a bit worse, and I was told I had costochondritis, an inflammation of the rib cartilage.

On Sunday I woke up with a cold. It's a bastard one, with a bit of a cough and a sore throat that's like the aftermath of a broken-glass shot chased with barbed wire.

This is not freaking fair. All I want is a working immune system that doesn't behave like the stool pigeon in a Guy Ritchie film, always about to get the shit kicked out of it by someone new. OK, and muscles that didn't constantly seize up in a rictus of pain. But that has at least been a little better since last week.

REVIEWS! of stuff I've looked at lately

Frank Miller's Ronin:

I'm not sure I get the end. Also, why are you so obsessed with cannibals, Frank? Why?

Stardust, the movie:

I think I have to hand in my geek licence. I didn't like it. And the relationship between Tristan and the Star didn't work for me the way it did in the book. My jury's still out on Gay De Niro (though the justification for Shakespeare was cute). And I was way more pissed about Dionysus Mr. Bromios being omitted than I was about the Tree. Twats. And I missed the "two Mondays" bit.

In the end, I missed the earthiness of it; the farts and the scratches and the dying in the middle of copulation with a maid. That was my favourite part of the book, and the part that resonated most with me, a sort of awestruck You can do that?. Stardust-the-movie was too airy for me.

First episode of Firefly:

Meh, it was OK. The last twenty minutes or so was the best. (See? Geek licence revoked.)

And at least I finally know where the parasol icons come from. Still just as weird as when Tucker turned up as Warren in X3. Sometimes I wish I hadn't had the Disney Channel through some of my formative years. I still can't unwatch The Torkelsons or Almost Home (Oh, my god, Chuckie Lee grew up. No wonder Mouth looked familiar). And I still can't stand Queen's "It's a kind of magic".

First episode of Hex (which I received OK, thanks so much to Jaimie):

Thelma ("the lesbian") still best part of this. Very silly show, and strangely the fantasy was more believable than the behaviour of the students, teachers & school in general (but then I was never in a British school, private or otherwise for year 13/Upper sixth/whatever). Still want to smack Roxanne one. And main-character Cassie. Dude. Just because the popular people start being less mean it doesn't mean that they're your friends. Or even that you have anything in common with them.

Thank god Thelma remains beyond episode one. Cassie is a twit.