Cheer up bastards it's only winter not the end of the world.

And my god has winter started to bite with temperatures dropping all over the place. Apparently tonight's meant to be the coldest of the season with the night air hitting a record low of about -5C - it's got so bad I'm no longer able to stand outside in nothing but a T-shirt, our Canadian cousins must be in a state of absolute horror!

So what have I been up too since my last post? Wednesday I made my only trip to the gym of the week and then had dinner with my mum who seems to be doing very well. She's managed to get herself an allotment in what must be record time and apparently I must absolutely "come around and see it very soon". Needless to say at the moment it's thigh high in weeds and brambles and there's a shed that needs that last little bit of encouragement before it falls down.

Thursday was Valentines Day so after the traditional Thursday night roast with my gran it was time to drag my terminally single arse out into the night to drink and drink and drink until all hope was extinguished and my cynicism was fully refuelled for another year. Sadly though the weather was too cold and the pubs were too empty for me to get drunk and achieve my goals so when I got home I had to drink, drink and drink some more.

Needless to say most of Friday was then taken up with a hangover but I did manage to cook my first ever cottage pie and I have to say it went rather well. In the recipe book it gives you a little history of the dish telling you that in the old days it was the tradition to make cottage pie after the Sunday roast because it allows you to mince up the leftover meat, stick it in with the leftover veg and cover it with some potatoes giving you a very cheap meal for the rest of the week. The book did however that in today’s hectic life of 24 hour supermarkets you'd probably just want to start with pre-prepared mince. Not so in my world because as soon as I mentioned I was making it to my gran she instantly looked at the meat leftover from Thursday's dinner, reached for her counter-top mincer and spent most of the day grinding out the mince by hand.
Armed with my traditionally hand prepared ingredients I set about the business of getting the dish together and I have to admit that is actually a little bit fiddly, so fiddly in fact that the atmosphere in the kitchen dropped to the level where my normally very nose orientated cat decided that what ever was being cooked probably wasn't worth the risk of begging for.

That brings me on to today which despite the early insult of seeing a Bristol team win and the quality of the competition drop accordingly was saved by watching one of those films that came as part of the amazing gangster Christmas. The one I watched was The Long Good Friday which is an oldie but a fucking goodie.

If you're not familiar with the plot, which I wasn't having never bothered to find the time to watch it on the numerous occasions it's been on TV, I'll try my best not to spoil it for you but it's about a high level London gangster who's just on eve of doing the biggest deal of his career. As his prospective partners turn up to seal the deal a rival gang who his corporation has upset starts targeting the people who are closest to him. First they try to blow up his mother then they murder his best friend before blowing up some of his business interests and put the fear of god up him, his girlfriend and his prospective partners who threaten to pull out of the deal. Over the space of just one day, right near Easter strangely enough, he embarks on a mission to find out who's causing all this trouble tries to stop the rot leaving the viewer with a very violent and atmospheric if dated film with has the added advantage that every so often you get to look at the screen and go "Oh it's James Bond.", "Oh it's Denzil from only fools and horses.", "Oh it's the Queen." and "Oh it's the fat bastard from the BT adverts.".

Now I'm sitting here watching the football with a rising desire to tell that J18 story in all its gory detail but I know that might embarrass some people so I'll leave it alone and look on the Brightside that at least I'm not an Arsenal fan.