Have I told you lately that I'm Busy?

As someone hopefully has noticed, I've been mega-busy lately and as a result haven't posted much on the blog. As I think I've mentioned, I was made redundant at the end of July and - in a Victor Kayam sort of way - took over part of the company. At the same time, in a fit of nepotism gone mad, I was offered a short-term contract in IT which I also took up, thinking that the whole 'made redundant because the copany wasn't making enough money' thing meant that the company I took over...wouldn't make enough money (if you followed that, well done).

But, on the contrary, we're raking in the orders (on chocpics.com for those who fancy putting their faces on a bar of chocolate) which means I basically have two full-time jobs and work from nine in the morning until about two or three the following morning every day. It's quite tiring.

Other than that, life has been pretty quiet :)

I was called up for Jury Service two days after starting my new contract and - in spite of the Clerk of the Court hinting that it was a 'juicy case' - asked, and was allowed, to be excused.

I went to see Hearts play in the UEFA Champions League at Murrayfield against AEK Athens and left with five minutes to go to get back to work - and therefore missed the two late goals which condemned us to a 2-1 defeat (we've now parachuted into the UEFA Cup but due to the 'Lithuanians and Free Transfers Only' signing policy of our clownish owner, Vladimir Romanov, look likely to go out of that competition at the first serious hurdle too).

Our dog, Sandy, ate my copy of Vampire Science which is a shame, because it's a good book even if, as I recently heard it described, it "fellates the TV Movie in a fairly distasteful manner".

I've (very occasionally) been trying to watch West Wing - now on Season 4 and Rob Lowe as Sam Seaborn appears to have been sacked from the show or something - certainly he's disappeared from ther titles without warning. The writing remains exceptionally good however - Inauguration is the best double episode of TV I've seen in years - the acting is great (why is it that US TV programmes seem to have an inexhaustible supply of superb actors who you never seem to see in anything else?) and I'm not looking forward to Aaron Sorkin leaving at all.

What else?

Collected Works comes out at the end of the month and is apparently as good as Wildthyme on Top and Life During Wartime (another question - why do Big Finish do better spin-off collections than standard Doctor Who ones?)

About Time 1 is as enjoyable a read as the other sin the series, but it's a little off-putting to read Lawrence Miles of all people witter on about 'pro level fan fiction' when talking about the BBC book series, given that he owes his career pretty much to the same range.

I was supposed to be meeting Paul Magrs and Steve Cole for a drink during the Festival (which might be shameless name-dropping except (a) I've never met either before and didn't this time and (b) Doctor Who fiction is a pretty small world so everybody seems to know everybody else). As it turned out I was stuck working so I couldn't make it, which is a bit of a bummer.

Paul has a new book out though - Never the Bride - which I'll review if Amazon ever get round to sending me my copy.

I think that's about it in what passes for my life at the moment - and I have to go back to work now anyway (on a Saturday - 'the dedication', I hear you all cry!)...