Thanksgiving

This is Thanksgiving weekend, a lovely American tradition in which they celebrate something and eat a lot.

In many respects, it's like Christmas - which it's a month before - but dedicated to family. This year, people all over America will be flying and driving to be with their relatives and to spend a couple of days doing what families do.

It's bittersweet for me, because it will be my last.

By this time next year I should be back in England, for good, and no longer a husband or stepfather. My wife of six years has decided that she can't put up with me being a depressive, and whatever else I am - typically, I don't know why I'm a crap human being - and doesn't want to be married to me any more. I cannot explain how this feels, so I won't. It's hard enough to blog it, because I'm normally a quiet, private person. Ideas are for sharing, pain is not.

The plan, then, is to do the whole divorce thing and move out. I will spend several months saving like mad, and then I will leave the country, return to the UK, find a city and live in it.

My family have not spoken to me since I came out here. This has been a source of pain for some time, and they are not likely to start talking to me any time soon. They do not like me, and to be perfectly honest I am no longer all that fond of them.

I have not picked a city. I like the looks of Leicester, and Newcastle, and perhaps Birmingham. I won't make a decision about this for a while, because I don't need to. I am not looking forward to starting again, from scratch, for the third time in ten years. But I will.

I am very good at beginnings, but time is ticking on. My father died aged 49 and I wonder if I will follow him; given that I am currently a conglomeration of bad habits - and that's infuriating because the ones I want (wine, women and song) are denied me (can't drink, don't want to turn into a drunk. no more women, thanks all the same. Couldn't carry a tune in a bucket) while the ones I have (depression, a tendency to eat when depressed, a tendency to smoke instead of eat) are getting worse.

And I cannot tell you how dull this all is. Look, I hate talking about myself because I'm boring. Instead:

Don't see The Brave One. If you want to watch a movie about a vigilante gunning people down for no reason other than that it seems like a good way to make sense of the world, go and rent Death Wish. Jodie Foster is excellent, and as a study of how someone turns to violence and revenge as a way to make sense of the world this is a good character study. But character studies do not make good movies unless there is a story to be told. Here, there isn't. You want to see this done well? Watch The Dark Knight instead.

Also don't see Click because it's just It's a Wonderful Life done with considerably less charm and warmth, or even life affirming qualities. It's an Adam Sandler vehicle telling that all too familiar tale of a man who can't do everything at once but desperately needs to because his life demands and pressures him into it, and his own role as breadwinner means he needs to provide for his family. And it's dull. There are some laughs, but they are too few and far between and the best of them are delivered by Christopher Walken.
Normally I wouldn't spoil a movie, but you don't need to see it - so, it Adam Sandler - who is playing himself as usual - fast forwards through his life using a magic "universal remote" and ends up losing his wife and kids (to Sean Astin in a red speedo) whilst becoming a success at his job. Of course, this leads to him also alienating his own parents, and missing all the fun times. At the end, on his deathbed (or death tarmac, possibly, since he kicks the bucket on a road while it's raining) he passes on one scrap of wisdom to his son and expires. Only to wake up back where he started, given another chance at life with a stern injunction from the Angel of Death to do it right this time.

I also saw Sweeny Todd, with Depp and Bonham Carter and Timothy Spall, Alan Rickman, Sacha Baron Cohen...assorted others. Victorian, gloomy, lingering shots down HBC's top for no readily apparent reason, and Johnny Depp. Since he's generally worth the price of admission on his own, I thought I might like this. I was right. Well, it's the movie version of a Sondheim musical and that's also good news. The gruesomeness is gruesome. The cast are pretty decent, although I am getting a bit weary of seeing the entire cast of Harry Potter trot before my eyes - don't we have any other actors in Britain? - and although I wasn't supposed to be uplifted or cheered by this gore splashed penny dreadful, I was. So there.

It also renewed my enthusiasm for owning a straight razor. I had one once and was almost able to shave myself properly without opening an artery. I would like to master that skill, so I might go look up something special for my tonsorial arrangements.

Meat pie, anyone?