Holy mackerel, ‘Adam’ was good. This was the first episode of Torchwood that I don’t feel like bitching about. How can it possibly be written by the same person who wrote the previous dirge of an episode, ‘ Meat‘? 

Barrowman! Way to tone down the musical theatre vibe. Yeah, he was still over the top, but it fit right in with the madness of the episode. Great to get a bit of Jack back story. Ianto… he’s still got an ugly cry on him, but when he channeled the psycho killer he was truly frightening.

I must be starting to care for this bunch of oddballs, because I felt genuinely creeped out by the fact that the alien had messed with their memories and screwed up their personalities and relationships. I wanted the old team back, stat! Poor Rhys, I felt so sorry for him. Toshiko and Owen’s personality switch was comical more than anything else, though Naoko Mori showed her vamp is far more convincing than her geek.

The guy who played the monster of the week, living off of the memories of our heroes, did a great job, particularly in the final scenes with Jack. He had a real genuine old school tragic villain vibe about him, sort of a throwback to older episodes of Doctor Who or Blake’s 7 that I enjoyed as a kid.

So… creepy, funny, poignant… a big fat A from me. Yeah, I really prefer this series when it’s mostly about human behaviour and doesn’t have to rely on cheap CGI.

I just found my wallet.

In my fatigues’ leg pocket. Which I only put on today, so I must have slipped the wallet in this morning and promptly forgot about it.

This is the state of my brain this week.

So here I am with my wallet and a handful of cancelled cards.

The Dutch are known for and pride themselves on their command of the English language, but they’re a lot less good at it than they think they are. (Have you ever heard Dutch politicians speak English? Jaw droppingly bad.) Their need to show off their skills sometimes makes for hilarious examples. Check the blog for some.

English is also thought of as ‘cool’ by copy writers, so we’re treated to mostly inapropriate and often cringeworthy English-language advertising: literal translations, grammatical errors, etc.

I’ve always thought I should keep track of them, write them down, but I never do. Now I don’t have to. Awe, as they say, some.

My English is bloody good, but it is far from perfect. I started learning English at a very young age, 6 or 7, through English speaking relatives. In primary school we started age 10, it was a new initiative of the school I was at. I believe it’s standard practice now, but I’m not sure. By the age of 12 I was more fluent than my teachers and did my school friends’ homework and their written tests. We had a ‘system’. Our teacher suspected what was happening, but he couldn’t prove it and never caught us.

Sometimes I make ‘Dunglish’-type mistakes, especially when I get tired. When I’m abroad, speaking English, for more than three weeks, something happens to the language part of my brain. I’ll open my mouth and *think* I’m speaking English, but Dutch will come out and it takes a few seconds for me to realise it. A few vodka tonics fixes the problem. Do I think in English? Yes.

very interesting point. i came to think in english over the last couple of years, even if i speak german most of the time. by now i´m reading exclusively english books, plus i am writing my thesis in english, so probably that´s why…..but i´m even more far from being perfect, sometimes i think of myself using to many platitudes in my speaking and writing.
bernhard (link) – 21 March 2005 – 13:36

Thanks for mentioning my site! Have a nice day, Natasha.
Natasha (link) – 31 May 2005 – 19:51

Any migraine girls and boys out there experience the same?