Saturday, December 24, 2005

"Very nice, but far too young"

Lunch with the very lovely Sophie Aldred yesterday, again for the thing we will not speak of here. Amongst everything else, we chatted about New Show and is it too scary for her boys.

The previous night, I’d been struck watching Devil's Backbone by its similarities in feel to The Empty Child. There’s something really troubling about freaky, ghostly kids, but it seems to be something that affects adults more than it does children.

Maybe that's 'cos kids, who don’t think they're necessarily special, innocent or anything, are fine with the idea of kids being monstrous and scary. That’s just what it’s like going to school. In many ways it’s empowering for them to see a kid with power to scare their parents. But for adults it triggers all kinds of primal, protective urges…

Had a mail from the best mate, out doing anthropological things in Papua New Guinea. He makes it sound a bit like Eastleigh.

Also been sent a Time Travellers review by Hugh Sturgess, which I’d not seen before. Hugh is apparently “just like me”, poor bloke. But he says some nice things.
"One thing I don't get though: what's the importance of that weird traffic light tree on the cover?"
A few people have asked this one – Cornell on Tuesday asked, “Was it what you wanted?” Yes, it’s just what I asked for, only better. And as well as appearing literally in chapter one, it’s also a bit similar to what the Doctor draws in chapter nine. Do you see? Aaaah…

Am going to try and finish the short story today, in time for pubbing tonight. And a festive top fact to conclude with:

Issue 473 of Michael Quinnion’s weekly “World Wide Words” mail reveals that the unrestrained licence of Saturnalia is an anagram of Australian.

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