The Lust to Wander (Life)

Having last gone to England in 2010 and 2011, I have been anticipating this trip for the last six years and planning and day dreaming about it whenever I get a chance. I've literally done all the popular tourist attractions on these two trips or at least the ones I was interested in. Opinions may vary widely of course.

I've done, Oak Hill Park, Holland Park, Regent's Park, Millennium Eye, Science Museum, Madame Tussauds, Sherlock Holmes Museum, Lord's Cricket Ground, Sea Life Aquarium, Windsor Castle, Hampton Court Gardens, Natural History Museum, RAF Museum, National Maritime Museum, Royal Observatory, Tower of London, Tower Bridge, Edgewarebury Park, British Museum, Wimbledon, Virginia Waters, Bibury Trout Farm, Ripley's Believe It or Not Museum, Marlow, Oxford, British Museum, Southend (in no particular order) and they are quite a few places that didn't make this list I think.

This time, (later this year) it's time to explore some of the less popular attractions in London, as well as exploring further afield. 

Without any more preamble, here goes the list of things to do that I have compiled thus far, there is still some time to go, so I expect a few things to be added as I stumble across them in my crawl through researching the internet.

1. The view from The Shard - to see London from the top of the tallest tower in Western Europe, at 244 meters, I expect to get some great photographs of the view. Good thing I don't get vertigo...
2. V&A Museum of Childhood - I'm a child at heart, what could be more irresistible than the world’s finest collections of children’s toys, games and costumes? Now, if only I could drag along some of my nieces and nephews as an excuse to visit, so it wouldn't look as bad.
3. A minor bucket list item is to go on a cable car, oooh the danger! But getting some great views of London is a good payoff I would think - Cable Car Trip
4. I love ice-cream just as much as the next person, but the opportunity to see ice-cream is frozen to order amid billowing clouds of liquid nitrogen-generated steam, seems like something I should not miss Cool Icecream
5. Strangely enough I have not visited the London Zoo before, something to correct on this trip. 
6. While I have gone here before twice, I cannot resist going here again - Four floors of books, over 200,000 different titles, it's Foyles flagship store in Soho. As a book-lover, I have to control myself by saying I only have 23kg of luggage to take back to Trinidad. Sooooo many books, just imagine, you literally can spend the whole day here. 
7. I'm an animal lover since I can remember (not all animals though, icky snakes), and it's really time to visit an English Farm - Mudchute Park and Farm
8. While I am an animal lover, I am obsessed with dogs and wolves and I cannot miss going here - Wolf Conservation Trust, hoping to get at least one picture with a wolf to put on my Instagram.. the anticipation
9. Further along the wildlife chain - Cotswold Wildlife Park seems like an awesome day out.
10. Castles! The majesty, the mystery, Leeds Castle, the loveliest castle in the world. 
11. Mind numbing chocolate - a chance to visit the factory! Cadbury! Have I mentioned I'm a child at heart?
12. Being fascinated by books and the huge variety, it's staggering to see the high quality books at second hand bookshops I've gone to in England, (must trawl through all the second hand bookshops again) one of my favorites - The Cottage Book Shop
13. Actually go to a beach in London? It is possible! Ruislip Lido
14. One of the greatest things with London is the wonderful variety of parks - Syon Park is another one to check off.
15. London's highest public garden? Sounds like an offer I can't refuse - Sky Garden
16. I also think it'll be a good idea to take in a T20 match at the Kia Oval cause I have gone to Lords cricket ground twice already in 2010 and 2011, another cricket ground to check off. 
17. Hoping to sneak away to Paris for a couple nights as well. 
18. Must experience a movie in Imax London! (Again after 2011, I loved the experience of this Imax)

Goals for my trip to London

1) Take a picture of every ticket stub/ receipt.

2) Grab a call card/ menu/ branded napkin as a souvenir.

3) Must get at least one memorable picture from every place I go.

4) Must do at least one memorable different thing every day.

I'm only going for 20 days, not including flight days, and it's going to be an unbelievably packed trip to fit all this in, not to mention experiencing some fancy restaurants and dining with family and friends scattered over England. 

Goal before trip - lose ten pounds or more, cause of all the eating I'm going to do. 

I'm starting to think I may have to plan out what I'm doing each day before I actually go, cause this is starting to sound difficult to pack it all in. 

Another goal before trip - must plan out trip. 

It's likely that I'm starting off the trip right, by traveling not only by myself from Trinidad to Barbados and then onto London Gatwick, but I'm traveling by train to my final destination where I'll be staying for most of my trip. Hoping for something memorable, maybe it'll have a celebrity on my flight? 

I wonder how many Virgin Atlantic branded items I can walk away with from the plane? Must count them and take pictures! 

Curiously enough, the underlying unknown in the situation is the fact that I'm traveling via train for the final leg of my journey.

Can't wait! 

Lyric me this, Lyric me that (Even Angels Fall Lyrics)

At various points in my life I have been fascinated by different female vocalists from different bands I've listened to. 

I should put in a disclaimer at this point, 
1) I have not listened to every single female fronted band or bands with female members (to do that would just be madness, and who really has the time?) If I was getting paid to do that, that would be a totally different matter. 
2) This is my vision on how the song would be put together, if it ever makes it to the final version to be recorded and played live it's very likely the composition would be different. (yes I am open to a different arrangement)
3) Yes I understand that everyone would have their own preferences on who should play what in the super-group, but hey, every is entitled to their own opinion.

Super-groups in the past, have been quite a rare thing to happen, never quite all coming together, and never quite staying together. 

I've been struck by the idea that the following five vocalists would make an unbelievable mind-blowing female super-group. 

Without further ado, here are my following five women who would blend together exceptionally well.
So, from Evanescence, the lead singer - Amy Lynn Hartzler, otherwise known worldwide as Amy Lee on piano. (My favourite song - My Immortal)
Next comes from Halestorm, the lead singer - Elizabeth Mae Hale, better known as Lzzy Hale on rhythm guitar. (My favorite song - I Get Off) Unfortunately, the original music video was not available in my country so I linked this version instead). 
Third on the list is Orianthi Panagaris, aka just Orianthi, on lead guitar. (My favorite song - According To You) 
Next on the list is Emma Anzai from the band Sick Puppies on bass guitar. (My favorite song - All The Same) 
Finally and lastly, on drums, Jennifer Carole Ledger from the band Skillet, easier known as Jen Ledger to fans worldwide. (My favorite song - Hero)

I've sat on this idea and lyrics for the last 8 years and it hasn't done anyone anything good or bad. So today, I've decided to share it with the world, and see what happens. Yes, I'm putting myself out there being all vulnerable like etc etc. It actually may not be as far fetched as people would think, Amy Lee knows Lzzy Hale and Amy also knows Emma Anzai. We just have to get Jen Ledger and Orianthi on board. Doesn't sound too hard huh?

Now, if I started writing a blog post about each of these bands and each of these vocalists I might spend days writing, but the point of today's post is the dream of a super-group, and whether it can happen. Maybe that's an idea for a future blog post. 

Please, no one ask me what inspired the song lyrics, it's been so long I honestly don't remember, although I believe it was inspired from somewhere between Epica, Nightwish, Within Temptation and Tarja.

As a side note, Tarja has a beautiful name - Tarja Soile Susanna Turunen-Cabuli.

Apologies to Jen, I just didn't know where to fit her into the song, maybe someone can come up with a different idea?

I should also mention that my only claim to fame is the time I entered a song of mine "Higher" in the Lyrics only category in the UK Songwriting contest in 2015 and I came in as a semi-finalist, which isn't too shabby I think. 

Here's the song lyrics that I wrote. 

Even Angels Fall

(Lzzy Hale on vocals)
Cold
Blooded
Hate!!! (screamed)

(Amy Lee on vocals)
Frozen in the flames,
In hell I stay,
Whatever happens,
Our love never dies,
Future promises, future tears,
Future dreams, future fears,
Following my bleeding heart,
So cold.

(Orianthi on vocals)
Spoken
From the sky to the center of the earth, 
The deep calleth on the deep, 
So be it pain without love!
If the world perishes,
Let justice be done,
Though the heavens fall! 
He, whom God wishes to destroy, 
He's the punishment of what I am.
The death of my life, the death all things! 
Thy faith will be done!!! (Screamed)

(Lzzy Hale & Amy Lee on vocals)
Chorus
Even angels fall,
On broken wings,
Dying for what I've done,
Even angels fall,
From up on high,
Saving me for the pain,
I need you,
I won't survive,
Every night,
Without you.

(Amy Lee on vocals)
Bridge (Growled)
Governed by the weakness,
Written in anger,
Blinded with the pain,
Covered in jealousy,
Born in the darkness,
So blind.

(Emma Anzai on vocals)
Even angels fall. (Whispered)

(Orianthi on vocals)
Scared to death,
Knowing I might be wrong,
So unsure,
Come back to me,
My lost soul,
Come back to me,
I pictured us for eternity.

Chorus X 1
Bridge X 1
Chorus X 1

Bridge X 1

If Then Else (Person Of Interest Episode Review)

Some Spoilers follow...

Attracting near universal praise from critics and audiences alike, this episode will forever go down as one of the best scripted for television series ever. The episode was perfectly original, executed brilliantly (all in the space of 43 minutes), and with an unbelievably shocking ending, what more can a person want?

If Then Else, originally aired on January 6, 2015, on CBS, it has remained since to be my favorite episode of the series and of television since.

Why did I choose this episode to review?
This was the epitome of brilliant directing, producing, writing and acting of the entire series, if there was one episode to be synonymous with what Person Of Interest is, it's this episode. 
If you started with Season one, episode one and ended with this episode Season 4 Episode 11, the pay off in terms of entertainment value would be huge. 

Originally conceived and created by Jonathan Nolan (yes the brother of Christopher Nolan, who co-wrote and directed the best Batman Trilogy to date of Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises) it first aired on September 22nd 2011. Now, it seems to me anything that the Nolan brothers have touched creatively over the last 15 years have turned out to be critically acclaimed works, so first going into Person Of Interest in 2011, I was excited. 

Watching this episode, made me feel the 78 preceding episodes made the build up all worth my time. (There are 103 episodes in the entire series). Admittedly, each episode is so gorgeously slick that individually they are so much better than most of the movies that come out in cinema.

Setting the backstory slightly and Wikipedia does this as concisely as possible
Person of Interest centers on a mysterious reclusive billionaire computer programmer named Harold Finch (Michael Emerson), who develops a computer system (known as "The Machine") for the U.S. government that is capable of collating all sources of information to predict and identify in advance, people planning terrorist acts. He finds that the Machine also identifies other perpetrators and victims of deadly intentions, but being considered "irrelevant" this information is deleted each night, and he realizes the Machine has developed into a super-intelligent artificial intelligence, leaving him wrestling with the questions of human control and other moral and ethical issues resulting from the situation. His backdoor into the Machine allows him to act covertly on the non-terrorism cases, but to prevent abuse of information he directs the machine to provide no details beyond an identity to be investigated. He recruits John Reese (Jim Caviezel), a presumed-dead former CIA agent, and later others, to investigate and act on the information it provides.

Other key players in this episode are 
Kevin Chapman as Detective Lionel Fusco: a corrupt cop whom Reese blackmails into being a source inside the NYPD. Finch later arranges for Fusco to be transferred to Carter's precinct so that he works alongside her. Over time, Fusco becomes increasingly loyal to Finch and Reese, as he stops being a corrupt cop, although he continues to keep a secret regarding the death of a cop involved with HR. Fusco and Carter become aware of their mutual membership on Finch's team in the season 1 finale "Firewall". Fusco is not aware of the Machine's existence. Like Reese and Shaw, Fusco is now identified as a "primary asset".
Amy Acker as Root: a genius hacker obsessed with the Machine. Root has a highly keen interest in both Finch and the Machine. Her real name is Samantha "Sam" Groves. Initially introduced as a morally ambiguous hacker not afraid to kill, she becomes a crucial ally for the team with The Machine adopting her as its "analog interface" and using her as its agent for missions of unknown purposes, as well as an intermediary between itself and individuals with whom it wishes to communicate. Among her numerous false identities, she uses the name of Augusta King, the first programmer in the world. 

Sarah Shahi as Sameen Shaw: an ISA assassin who worked for Special Counsel. Shaw unknowingly deals with the "relevant" numbers from the Machine. She later becomes an ally of Reese and Finch. She claims that she has an Axis II personality disorder, making her unable to feel and/or express common human emotions like fear or sadness. The Machine identifies Shaw as one of its "primary assets". During the course of the series, she develops a close relationship with Root. 

Also of note to mention is the opening voice-over sequence - 
"We are being watched. The government has a secret system — a machine — that spies on you every hour of every day. I designed the Machine to detect acts of terror, but it sees everything. Violent crimes involving ordinary people. The government considers these people irrelevant. We don’t. Hunted by the authorities, we work in secret. You'll never find us. But victim or perpetrator, if your number’s up, we’ll find you."
Stunningly of so much relevance today with the many accusations by various intelligence organisations worldwide of monitoring all communications, it is surprising that it was ever actually allowed to air on Televisions in the USA. Initially set up as a Crime drama series in Season 1, it became one of the best science fiction (not to mention relevant science fiction) series on television in the last decade. 

The episode Synopsis on IMDB - 
Samaritan launches a cyber-attack on the stock exchange, leaving the team with no choice but to embark on a possible suicide mission in a desperate attempt to stop a global economic catastrophe.

Bear with me here, Samaritan is a rival artificial intelligence to the Machine, so this episode was as science fictiony as they come with two artificial intelligence's battling it out for supremacy, normal story of good versus evil etc etc, but this episode? Boy, was this good.

Samaritan's human operatives are protecting the Wall Street servers as the Machine's team of  John Reese, Harold Finch, Detective Lionel Fusco and Root tries to stop them.
Unusually, the Machine started a flash back simulation to 2003 at the 7 minute mark, when it's creator was teaching it how to play Chess, as a way to decide on possibilities of what to do next, living up to it's name of the episode If Then Else which is a programming language syntax. 

As a side note, the series episodes normally flashes back to relevant situations in the Machine's life to give greater context to the overall storytelling of the episode

It was at the minute 16 mark that the second simulation of the episode started, with another flashback to the chess game in 2003, after the first simulation failed with the primary goal failing and the secondary goal of its assets dying or being captured. The second simulation was another scenario that the Machine tried which again ultimately failed. 

Watching each lead character die in each simulation was heart-rending, not knowing where it will all end. 

The third simulation was at 28 minutes, and now I will mention that the last player in each simulation was Sameen Shaw, who is tasked with getting a security code to help out the Machine's team in the basement levels of Wall Street. She, in the first two episodes failed to talk down a guy with a suicide bomb vest on the train and shot him, and got arrested by a SWAT team. This time she was successful, as the Machine decides on a different path to guide the team through Samaritan's human minefield. The third simulation, was successful only to the extent of a 2% survival rate for the Machine's human assets.

Finally, the wrap up of the episode at the 36 minute mark, came with the Machine finally selecting an option to guide the team through, and switched to real time. 

The mournful, suspenseful music as the final seconds of the episode came to a close was terrific, coupled with the final sacrifice of one of the Machine's assets.

The closing sequence started with an epic kiss and that's all I'm going to say on that. 
You have to watch it! Really!

The humor in the episode was second to none, and perfectly matched the overall tone. The soundtrack for the episode was an orgasmic sensation on the ears with each simulation being matched with the appropriate background music.

Episode rating 10/10, five stars, 100%, it deserved the universal praise that it got. 

I was disappointed when the series ended on 21st June, 2016, but hey, all good things must come to an end right?

A Dog's Purpose (Movie Review)

Spoilers follow - 

unfortunately - cause everyone needs to see this movie and I have to spoil the film cause I just enjoyed it too god-damn much. 
But admittedly, you'll only enjoy it if you're an animal lover. 

Actually, that should be a warning to viewers - 
MUST BE AN ANIMAL LOVER TO ENJOY THIS FILM.

Let's see. 

What do you get when you put a 
Golden Retriever, 
German Shepherd,
Pembroke Welsh Corgi,
and a St. Bernard- Australian Shepherd mix 
together?

And, do this in a film?

You get a breath-taking, tear-jerking blend of comedy mixed in with some drama for an hour and 35 minutes. 

I should own up to something here, before I dive into the film. 
When it was in cinema, I totally over-looked it, as 
a) I had no idea that the film was made from a brilliant book of the same name (easily corrected via my wish list on Amazon, I've added all the books from the series by W. Bruce Cameron)
b) I spotted the film that was in cinema but I did not see any trailers/ previews/ synopsis for the film nor take it on, until I was told by someone in March, that she thinks I would enjoy the movie. 

Truthfully? I regretted not seeing this movie in cinema. Cause some movies are just meant to be seen in cinema. 

But, I would've come across it sooner rather than later cause a combination of loving dogs and loving movies, I doubt I would've missed it. 

As long as it's a good movie of course.

I saw this movie on Saturday 29th April, 2017 and during the movie I said to myself, no doubt about it, no question, this has to be a blog post. And here it is :)

The whole movie was centered on a dog being re-incarnated over the space of about five decades, interspersed with a fairly obvious love, hate, heartbreak, human story. 

The human element, needed to be there of course, cause that is the point of the whole movie, what is a dog's purpose in life.
There were some good moments, some outrageously funny moments, some sad moments, unfortunately it was a recipe all too familiar. 

I'll admit here, that I genuinely got all teary-eyed and choked up with each of the death scenes, if anyone had asked me what's wrong at that stage, I wouldn't have know what to say. Maybe dust went into my eye?

The first incarnation was with a lovely golden retriever named Bailey, the set-up of the story-line was intriguing with his birth to his death. This is the only incarnation that goes fairly deep into the background of who Bailey is, as a dog and as well the human owner who pops back up in Bailey's fourth incarnation. The problem was, is that this took up 50 minutes of screen time which left little time left for his journey through other incarnations. 

The incarnation with the German shepherd (named Ellie - curiously a female this time) was next, as a police dog, who gets shot in the line of duty after only ten minutes of screen time, a huge amount of unexplored potential with this dog in my opinion.

Next in line, the Corgi incarnation (named Tino, sounds like a typical Corgi name for some reason), ohhhhhh my god, I love Corgis sooooo much eek. Dang, now I'm starting to sound like a love-struck school girl. I've never met one to hug-up as yet. Bucket list checked! This is probably the only reason that I'm jealous of the Queen of England and her Pembroke Welsh Corgis, sigh wish I was her just so I could play with Corgis the whole day - Queen Elizabeths Corgis

Moving along, after another regretfully short incarnation - 12 minutes, we meet the last incarnation of Bailey, and his 5 decade journey back to his original master. A St. Bernard- Australian Shepherd mix (Named Buddy, a rather no-nonsense name for a dog), a curious mix but a delightfully shaggy drown your face in its fur kind of dog. The final incarnation of Bailey was the redemption moment of the film for the human owner from his first incarnation, Ethan Montgomery, Baily actually helped him find back his love from his high school days, awww.... heart strings being tugged kinda moment. 

Dang all this dust in my eye... sniff. 

My ratings
Dog element of story - 9/10
Human element of story - 4/10

Overall Rating - 6.5/10

Critical reactions as per the Rotten Tomatoes site - 34% - A Dog's Purpose offers an awkward blend of sugary sentiment and canine suffering that tugs at animal-loving audiences' heartstrings with shameless abandon. 
This is probably the perfect reaction to the film admittedly, it was good but some parts not so much. I wholeheartedly agree with this view.
However, audiences worldwide loved it to the extent that the Box office was $185M against a budget of $22M. 

Possibly affecting the box office take was the animal abuse allegations against the making of the film, not to go into much detail, the reports coming out from the people involved in making the film indicate that these accusations were completely unfounded. As a result it's quite likely that the campaigns against the film unfortunately worked to some degree for what was a great story to tell (no matter how fictional). It's likely however, that we'll never know what actually happened on set that day the so-called footage was shot. 

If we have to believe something though, hopefully this article has the whole truth and nothing but the truth - Third Party Investigation finds no animal injuries or cruelty. 

As long as you're prepared to overlook the poor character building for the individual lives of each dog as well as some poor acting performances from the human leads, you'll have a great time in the movie.

Overall, it's a movie that will not only make you think about why do you have a dog in your life, why does he love you so much, and if you don't have one, makes you wonder, why don't you have a dog in your life?

I suspect though, that there were some scenes cut that would've fleshed out the story better and be more tonally coherent, but that's the movie that the world has seen and we're left to wonder how much better the movie would've been.

It's a feel good movie for animal lovers (especially dog-lovers), you're going to enjoy yourself, some advice, try not to look for the deeper meaning into anything in the movie, or why did they do that or say this and you'll be good to go. 

Even though I have not read the book as yet, I highly recommend it as a gift for dog lovers, as it's generally understood that books are far better than the movies made of them.