Author: Seb Palmer

We woke up in Ely today.

We’re staying in a very nice AirB&B place, on Lynn Rd, Ely. First time I’ve ever done this, I think? A local night away, on me birthday. Very pleasant!

Many AirB&Bs don’t deserve their second B at all, as they don’t provide breakfast. They do here. And it’s all the better for it.

It’s sooo nice to just be laying here, on a big comfy bed, relaxing. Doing nothing.

We have plans to mooch about Ely, visiting the Cathedral, Topping (poss’ Oxfam, if it’s open? Ditto the model shop), Waterside Antiques, and Teacock’s Pearoom. Oh, and lunch, or brunch, at the Piccolo Lounge!

Lunch at The Piccolo Lounge was fab. The only think I was less keen on is their ‘self serve via app’ m.o. But the food was great. So never mind.

We had Nazi Goering, er, sorry… Nasi Goreng, an Indonesian fried-rice dish, with chicken, prawn and chilli, etc. Yummy. Rhubarb fizzy drink, no booze!

After a lovely leisurely lunch, we dropped off my pressies in the car, and headed to Ely Cathedral…

Sadly, Ely Cathedral was the only real disappointment of the day. It’s no longer free entry on Sundays! Unless you’re local. And March, it seems, isn’t local enough. Holy Bummer, Batfreaks.

After the frustration of not being allowed to visit God’s House, it was a middling trot to Waterside Antiques, for a bit of a browse…

As ever, I saw many things I’d love to buy. But the fundage just ain’t there. I think they’re often a bit overpriced as well.

From the Antiques place we went to Peacock’s…

Peacock’s Tea Rooms turned out to be our last port of call. I had been thinking of Italian, at Pizza Express. But money and energy were in short supply!

Day two in London. Feeling a little bit less flat-out exhausted than yesterday. Just installed a solar motion activated light outside Jean’s back door.

We’ll be heading home shortly, I assume? We may or may not visit Bentley Priory/Stanmore Common.

I’m enjoying a bit of a Bronson fest’! I tried watching Maniac Cop, but it was just too crap. So we watched this instead.

Bronson plays a man living a good life on the Côte d’Azur, whose happiness is disturbed when his unfortunate past catches up with him. He has to protect his wife and daughter from vengeful criminals who have a grudge against him.

The plot’s not exactly brilliant. But it serves as a vehicle for Terence Young (Dr No, (?), Thunderball, etc.) to serve up a fun Franco-Italian production, set in a great location (Beaulieu-Sur-Mer), that’s enjoyable to watch.

Jill Ireland, Bronson’s wife, plays Moira, a dippy hippie chick who is hanging out with the villains. James Mason is the ringleader of these nasty goons. Liv Ullman is Bronson’s on-screen wife…

Fab skies out delivering this evening.

Had to sort Flo’s lightbulbs out, again.

I had a delivery shift this afternoon. It was dotted all over the place, east of Peterborough.

The evening light was really rather pretty.

I’ve stopped stopping to look at churches. I tried to visit this one, below. But it was locked. Bummer!

I went to bed about 8.30 pm last night. It’s past 12.30 pm today. I’ve been in bed nearly all that time. And a lot of it asleep.

I’ve also been constantly tapping ‘refresh’, during my wakeful moments, in Amazon Flex. Trying to book work shifts.

What worries me most is my total lack of energy; overwhelming feelings of utter exhaustion. Not just feeling pooped. But being able to sleep almost constantly.

Oh, except when I go to bed, that is!

Even stuff like watching TV, YouTube, or reading, is too much. I just want to sleep. End of…

It’s freezing, out. But last night there was fire on Creek Road. Poss’ arson:

We were coming home from family visitations at the time we got a call shortly after 6 pm from our neighbour, Mel. She thought at the time a house was on fire.

Turns out it was ‘only’ a shed. But it spread to two, poss’ three sheds, in total. Looking at our garden from the upstairs bedroom window, our sheds, and those of our immediate neighbours all appear to be ok.

Phew!

But it’s very worrying if was indeed deliberate. What measures can we take to safeguard our own property? Gets one thinking…

Freddie Hubbard, trumpet
Rick Zunagar, guitar
Larry Klein, bass
Carlos Vega, drums

Another Hubbard gig from the later ‘70s…

This looks interesting… I’m in bed (as usual!), so I’ll check it out tomorrow.

I was left wondering about Debbie Reynolds, which lead me to this interesting bit of tittle tattle…

Wow! A pretty bonkers film, this. Part Mills & Boon Romance, part seventies softcore, and part psychological horror.

It’s superbly shot, acted, directed, and so on. In many ways, certainly visually, and occasionally sonically, it’s very beautiful.

But there’s also a rather horrid rotten core to it as well. This mainly emanates from an awful lil’ Hitler type character, called Chief.

For now I’m going to leave my ‘review’ pretty basic. I’ve long wanted to watch this film, as: I’ve always loved the poster; I quite like Kris Kristoffersen, in the ‘70s; and Sarah Miles is gorgeous!

There were parts of this film I could barely watch. Two parts. One involves the Chief dispatching the family cat, involving his hapless henchmen in the heinous act.

*Can’t see many films nowadays going places like this! And certainly not in the manner of this ‘handling’.

The other? Well, I basically bailed on the film. Not ‘cause I think it’s bad. But because it was getting too dark for me, as I am these days. I need light, warmth, happiness!

Would I recommend watching this film? That’s a tough one, to be honest. But I’m glad there are films like this out there. Because it’s not your average humdrum pulp potboiler.

I think it’s a film I might come back to? But then I might not? Who knows? Who cares…

I certainly want to find out two things arising from watching it: what font they’ve used in the titles, and on the posters. And who designed the superb Avco Embassy ident that we see at the beginning.

I watched the film on YouTube. And I see that it’s also been made available to download, here.

I only really knew Sarah Miles as a dotty aristo’ type, from an episode of Suchet’s Poirot. It’s kind of odd, alarming, and yet very erotic, seeing her as she appears here.

But here, nothing is merely surface appearances; the theme of her son spying on her lovemaking complicates what could’ve been straightforward eroticism.

In an intriguing footnote, Earl Rhodes, who plays the utterly loathsome Chief, continued acting for a while, before switching to being a cameraman. Later on he became involved with the Falun Gong martial arts/religious movement. This latter activity saw him deported from China, back to the UK, in 2002.

FOOTNOTE:

This film is based upon, or at least shares a title with, a book by notorious Japanese novelist Mishima. From what little I’ve read about him, he was a right wing nut job. So it’s possible that in his book the Chief type character is the hero. Whereas in this film I’d say he’s certainly not. But it’s all very interesting. Mishima committed seppuku, ritual self-disemboweling, after staging a failed ‘nationalist’ coup!