Turtles

One of the things we did with the family last week was to go round London looking at turtles. We did it with snowmen and a little bit with penguins but this time it was turtles. Good fun.

Penguin Lessons

Yesterday we went to the cinema to see the charming "The Penguin Lessons". Steve Coogan is the main actor. Jonathan Pryce is also in it. It is based on a 2015 memoir by Tom Michell, a British teacher who taught at a boys' boarding school in Argentina in the 1970s (when he was in his twenties; the fact Coogan is 58 didn't really matter). Michell finds a penguin soaked with oil on a beach in Uruguay and takes it back to the school, where it becomes a popular pet. The message is the usual positive side of humanism, the main character being a bit of a waster with a sad past (fictional addition) who perhaps does some good despite himself. It's a 12a for good reason but is worth watching if you can cope with the periodic swearing. The penguin is brilliant. They mostly used real animals apparently but there was a little jiggery-pokery. (This is at least the third Argentinian-themed film for Welsh actor Jonathan Pryce, who previously played Argentinian president Juan Perón in Evita, as my wife pointed out to me, and also Pope Francis II (who was Argentinian) in The Two Popes.

Christmas Week More Pics

Christmas Week 2024

We had a good week Christmas week, with various family members arriving and departing atdiffernt times. I have reported on the Christmas Day service. Christmas dinner was an excellent affair, Eleri providing amazing variety with turkey and lamb as the meats. We watched the king's speech, which was okay and I have been keeping up with the Christmas University Challenges. I also watched the documentary on Maria Callas. Very interesting. We completed a thousand piece jigsaw and had lots of time for games, mainly scategories and heads up. Plenty of late nights and mornings but we made sure to get out and walk some of the time. Lots of presents given and received. Eleri and I had stockings and a hamper full of good things including a framed picture of the grandchildren and an AirBnB voucher. Today we went into town searching for coloured penguins. We have kept well mostly though Eleri has a cold today. In the midst of all this I was able to prepare two sermons and then preached yesterday (report to follow). Tomorrow we are off to Cardiff for more family fun.

Day Off Week 30 2023

The main thing on my day off this week was going down to the aquarium in central London, Sea Life. We went by tube, getting off at Waterloo. It's a while since I've been to the aquarium and there were new things to see. It's expensive but Tesco vouchers help. We went with my third son and his family. Their youngest is too young to enjoy it properly but their two year old thought it was great, as did the rest of us. We briefly met a boy working there from Carmarthen, a Welsh speaker. We wandered north then to Leiceser Square. I came home for the dog. The rest of the day was spent mostly reading. I've been catching up on my Banner mags. The penguins are Gentoos.

10 Types of penguin

There are as many as 26 different types of penguin, Here are ten

1. Emperor
2. King
3. Chinstrap
4. Macaroni
5. (Northern, Southern and Eastern) Rockhopper
6. Gentoo
7. Jackass
8. Galapagos
9. Magellanic
10. Humboldt