I love Superman

Now Jo and I are staying with our Great Aunty Anne in Grays, Essex. It's odd to be here in Mother England. I saw a policewoman today and felt like I was in The Bill. Probably like when English people come to Australia and see beautiful, dumb suburban families and feel like they're in Ramsey St. I bags being Toadfish.

When we went up to Passport Control at Heathrow last night the man said to us "You here to work?"

We told him we were here to visit friends and relatives. Then he said "And you're here two weeks? Is that right?" (Or something like that)

So we replied "Ten days."

And then he stamped our passports. And as we were walking out with thought "We never told him how long we were staying in here. How did he know it was around two weeks."

Very odd.

Today we spent the day recovering from non-stop doing stuff. We lay about sleeping, reading, writing, praying, talking on the telephone, eating with Anne and her old school friend and trying to plan the next ten days. They are now semi-planned. At least, we know where we're sleeping most of the time.

It was a lovely relaxing day.

Tonight Anne went out to a dinner, so Jo and I went to the movies and saw Superman Returns. I was so excited. I was so upset when I realised I was leaving Australia the day before it came out. And all through Russia and Hungary I carried a longing, deep within, to be watching Superman. And tonight I got to see it.

I loved it. Yeah. It was really good. I love Superman, and Bryan Singer is a champ! I loved the way they used the original John Williams theme. And the original opening titles look. I loved the new costume. Kevin Spacy is a champ. It looked good, the action was good, the story was good. It was almost all good.

Superman is a little bit of a cad when it comes to love. He gets a little stalker-ish, doesn't mind cutting another man's grass. He should remember that possession is 9/10ths of the law. That's not a flaw in the film, except perhaps that the film seemed to endorse his behaviour.

Kate Bosworth was a little bit flaky. She was too nice, too immature. She didn't have the roughness of Margot Kidder, and she didn't have the grown-upness of Kidder's Lois would have had after losing the love of her life and having a kid. But you can forgive Bosworth because she looks good with Superman.

And I think I would have laid off the messianic referances a little. Some of the time I felt like the script was written by the Apostle John.

But these are little things. I had a lot of fun. I'm happy.

Tomorrow we're off to see London, and we'll probably end up in Oxford. We were going to visit Soul Survivor Watford, but we couldn't figure out how to make it all work. Oh well. Maybe the Sunday after. Hopefully, or I won't be able to show my face at church without much shame. It'd be like being a Muslim and going to Mecca but never making it to the Ka'bah.

Being here reminds me of Biggles. And everyone's accent makes me want to laugh.

Anyway chaps. I'm off to bed.