So October was my least productive month in possible my site’s history, amassing a total of just four posts, two of which were weekly updates. Needless to say, I didn’t hit my targets. Wedding preparation stepped up a gear, as did day-job commitments dealing with the fall-out from last month’s China trip, plus my TV viewing is far exceeding my movies, with season 2 of The Wire, season 7 of The Walking Dead and season 1 of The Night Of all being part of October’s obsessions.

Out in the real world, October saw me at least partially embracing an annual event I normally shy away from, Halloween. It’s a significantly lesser holiday here in the UK than elsewhere in the world, but a friend of mine holds an annual party regardless and, despite living pretty damn close I’d never gone before, with this being at least his 8th year hosting one. I’ve always been busy or exhausted or away, but this year I had nothing going on, plus he’s moving soon so it’ll be his last party, so the plan was made and I sorted out a Dr. Alan Grant costume that absolutely no-one recognised until I produced the paper mache velociraptor claw, and even then I’d say less than six people got it. Philistines. Anyway the party turned into a late on, or rather an exceedingly early one, as I drank rather too much alcohol (I had almost an entire litre of amaretto to myself, plus numerous whiskies and rums) so my decision to walk two hours home at 4am without a jacket was probably not my best, and might explain the stinking cold I have now. Still, I had a good time, regardless of how much of a waste the following Sunday was (I’d set aside the morning to get some writing done, this did not happen).

So as mentioned, brace yourselves for a truly meagre list of October’s blogging accomplishments:

Aim: Review 8 or 9 1001 List movies each month
Reviewed: 2
Cool Hand Luke
The Exorcist
Successful?: No!

Aim: Review 1 “Bad” movie each month
Reviewed: 0
Successful?: No!

Aim: Review 1 “Blind Spot” movie each month
Reviewed: 1
The Exorcist
Successful?: Yes!

Aim: Review 2 “Film-Makers” movies each month
Reviewed: 1
Cool Hand Luke (Paul Newman)
Successful?: No!

Aim: Read A New-To-Me Book
Read: 0
I’m finding it hard to read Richard Ayoade’s Ayoade on Ayoade for long periods of time, it seems to be more of a pick-up-put-down kind of thing, which isn’t really what I’ve been in the mood for, but I’ve yet to decide on anything else yet.
Successful?: No!

Aim: Visit Somewhere New
Visited: Wareham Foresy
I’ve been here before, Aisha has taken Murphy here before, but I have never taken Murphy (and Bailey) here before, so it counts. It’s another forest, we did a long-ass walk around it, it was fun but autumn hadn’t taken as much of an effect as I’d have liked. I wanted the dogs to jump through giant piles of leaves, which alas were very much still up in the trees.
Successful?: Yes!

Yep, rubbish all round. Six targets, only two actually achieved, consider me ashamed. Will November be any better? I bloody well hope so.