Holiday and a return to West Wing

I’ve just emerged from a week’s holiday and compared to the usual pace of life it was chilled and consequently restful. Good food, meeting with friends, music and films were the main ingredients. Add to this a spot of gardening which surprisingly I enjoyed, and a trip to Oxford which unsurprisingly I also enjoyed. This included my first experience of the chapel at New College, which is like a cathedral chancel and not much more – beautiful yet slightly odd.

Films included Charlie Wilson’s War, which has just come out on DVD and has been at the top of my ‘must see’ list. With a screenplay by Aaron Sorkin (West Wing) this was not disappointing. In fact it was so good we watched it twice in 24 hours and could have seen it again.

This in turn inspired us to start watching the West Wing series again (for the third time). You could deduce a certain obsessiveness in this and you wouldn’t be wrong, but I have to say it gets better, and for me there’s nothing that touches it. I’m gripped by the dialogue - much of it on the move (Sorkin’s ‘walk and talk’) - together with brilliant characterisation, compelling plot, gentle humour and at times deeply moving emotional content. So, ‘what shall we watch?’ isn’t a question that will be asked for a few months at least.

We spent an evening at the cinema to see the new Indiana Jones and had a great time. The film was fun yet predictable and nothing like the white knuckle ride of the first three, especially the first.

Despite not great weather, I managed to cycle every day but one, so I’ve justified the slight excess of good food. Now it’s a return to the more usual pace!