posting unplugged

No, I don’t have an internet connection yet. And by the looks of it I will only get one in an-other month or so. Damn!

I can’t remember how fast these things were in Portugal but for sure that they weren’t as slow as here. I asked for a BT landline in the very beginning of the month. Yesterday, I was told that the line would only be activated on the 26th Feb. Only after it’s working I can call Sky to install internet and tv. Pat says it’s better if I call Talk Talk and get inter-net/phone from them.
I need help here guys, can anyone tell me which operator can provide better value for money services, knowing that I have already requested a BT line with cheap calls to other european countries? (landlines only)

I can live with no free-view tv. What I need is cable or satellite. I need good series and good movies. I don’t need silly old crappy english soaps and contests. I don’t mind watching brazillian soaps for 2 weeks when I’m on holidays but english soaps can even be worse than the portuguese ones. Believe me!
My friend E. from work gave me (or rather saying, lent me) a tv set. It’s a small tv but keeps me company. So far I can only see 4 channels. It has an aerial that takes me back to the 80’s (and before that) when there was no such thing as clear, sharp images. On one channel there’s a soap called Echo Beach that resembles the “Morangos com Açucar” crap. It’s set in Cornwall where every teenager is a model and all the parents are in their 30’s and look very good as well. Not a portrait of the brits AT ALL. I only saw one episode and there was an indian kid and a black girl. This makes the soap very PC and represents the general public. The indian kid was talking about Bollywood movies. Now, how cliché is that?

Living with no internet is far worse than living with no tv. I *need* internet. I need to blog, I need to chat, I need to see who’s online. I need to post pics and see other’s pics. Has Zaka posted anything on her blog lately? Is Celia adding stuff to her new crafts blog? What about skype, that wonderful thing that lets me talk for hours with my friends. And youtube! Youtube is another wonder! How am I supposed to watch music videos now?
Living in an "unplugged" house is very odd. Not for me at all. I need to read the papers and see in "correio da manhã" how maria das dores is hanging on in prison. I also need to read real news... Yesterday my dad called -from PORTUGAL - to tell me that Camden Town was on fire and that the Hawley Arms pub was no more. I used to live right around the corner to that street. If I had internet at home I could’ve checked some news websites. But because I only have free-view tv I could only watch 2 contests (like who wants to be a mil-lionaire with casino chips) and two soaps or dull series... And at 11.00 pm Scary Movie was on. I didn’t see 10 minutes of it and I PROMISE I won’t ever watch that stuff again. YUCK! How can a comedy movie be so boring???
Anyway, enough complaining. I’m fortunate enough to have a mobile phone from which I can text and call whomever I want to.

The lack of internet or tv makes me watch DVDs. Not on E.’s tv though. I watch them on the laptop.
This week I saw the Fight Club (I like Edward Norton more than I like Brad Pitt), I tried to see Goodbye Lenin (by Wolfgang Becker) but I can’t speak any German and the subtitles were incomplete. I just wanted to see it again, I saw it on the cinema a few years ago. Totally recommend it. And today I saw Carandiru (directed by Hector Barbenco). Again, I already had seen the movie. If you like Brazilian cinema, this is a masterpiece. A bit bloody and raw but its set on an overcrowded prison where a massacre happened not that long ago. A true story told by the in-house doctor. Dave, you should see this.
I have a few more DVDs sitting on the book shelf to watch and they are:
• Belle de Jour - Luis Buñuel
• Blow-up - Antonioni
• Domicile Conjugal - Truffaut
• L’amour en fuite - Truffaut
• Big Fish - Tim Burton
• Eternal Sunshine of the spotless mind - Michael Gondry
After I finish this list I’ll have to buy / borrow more dvds. I accept suggestions.
I’ve started reading Salman Rushdie’s "The Satanic Verses" and I’m listening to Muse a lot. I can't get "Hysteria" and "Blackout" out of my head!
And that’s enough blogging for today. I will post this from work tomorrow and read your comments on my email there.
Oh! and please if you already have my new address, please feel free to write letters or visit! (as it says in the blogs description you can send flowers and chocolates as well that I don’t mind)