Book to Film

In light of the new Harry Potter film release, Becca posed an interesting question to me today at work. What, in your opinion, is the best book-to-movie adaptation in which you've both read the book and seen the movie? I thought about it and came up with a Top 5:

1. A Clockwork Orange
2. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest
3. Blade Runner
4. The Wizard of Oz
5. Frankenstein

I ranked these movies based on their adaptation of the book to the screen and how both combined impact me. This is why "The Wizard of Oz" is not ranked higher; even though I think it's the best movie of the 5, to me it's not the best adaptation of the book.

With this in mind, what are some of your favorite book-to-film adaptations? I believe we okay'd made for TV movies and in my opinion plays are not books.

2:22

That's what time I've got left on the computer. The pub tour last night rocked and we learned while we drank. We managed to book a last minute Scotland tour today and so toured the highlands and went to Loch Ness, etc. It's very beautiful countryside. We've been spending a lot of money on gifts for people (as well as ourselves) and it's sad to see it coming to an end. We'll leave tomorrow for England then back to the states soon. Bye!

From Scotland

I'm on the clock here at the hostel computer (you pay for use and I've only got a couple minutes left), but I wanted to say that we are in Scotland now and are having fun. Last night we went on a scotch whiskey tour and tonight we are going to try and go on a literary pub crawl (since our previous attempts haven't exactly worked out). Tomorrow, hopefully we'll tour a good section of the highlands and the rest of Scotland. Rach is currently in Glasgow doing research so I've had the day to myself. Well I'm almost gone so I'll sign off.

Pubbing

Last night Rach and I found ourselves walking down a street when we noticed a sign advocating official pub crawl trails. We went into the nearby pub to pick up a pamphlet and as it turns out that if you visit at least 5 of the pubs on a single trail (and drink of course) you get a free t-shirt. Unfortunately it was too late last night (the pubs close at 11pm here) to really start anything, but we have that to look forward to sometime before we go to Scotland (Thursday). We did however go on our own mini pub-crawl last night trying to down as many pints from pubs before they closed. I did match my previously achieved half-gallon of ale and Rachel kept up as well. I won't go into the rest of the details of the evening, but we did have a blast and enjoyed some very cheap (1£) garlic chips.

Brief Update

We've got a little time here before we move our luggage from Christina's flat to Heidi's, so I've jumped on to post a bit about life here. We went to service today at St. Paul's Cathedral, which was very cool and very nice (especially since we would have had to pay 8 pounds to enter any other time). We've done so much in such a short time that we're hardly ever around a computer to post anything, but we are taking tons of pictures to show off everything we've done. Last night there were lots of fireworks celebrating Guy Fawkes day and we saw a replica of parliment burn down in a park (we'll explain later). Tonight we're going to check out the HP premier, though we're not sure what exactly to expect. And when that's over.... the night will be young. We didn't get to our pub crawl last night (though we did well the night before if you couldn't tell by the previous post) so we've got that to look forward to. The weather's been surprising warm (for this time of year) and hasn't really rained much (just sprinkles) so it's been nice not wearing all this bulky clothing. We also had a formal tea yesterday afternoon (and no Becca it doesn't taste like poop) that came with delicious sandwiches, scones and desserts. Mmmmm...... Anyway, we're currently planning our stint in Scotland; looking in different guide books for random adventures (possibly a tour of a scotch whiskey factory?). We'll post again later (I'm stealing Rachel's posting time so don't expect any new posts soon). And now off for more misadventures! (just like Japan, right Becca)

eggsnog

I LOVE LONDON I AM HAVIN SOOOOO MCH FUN WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

YAY

One Long Day

Well, we have safely made it to London and have recovered after a very exhausting first day here. I know technically it has been two days since we left, but with the plane ride thrown in it has felt like one very long day. Right now I'm here in Christina's room using her computer while she's at class and Rachel's out at a library doing research. This gave me some time to sleep a little more and to send/receive emails. We'll be going out for some exploring in just a little bit.

The plane ride was good; not nearly feeling as long as it seemed. We watched "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" on the plane then decided to get some sleep. I think I was more successful at that than Rachel and by the time we officially woke up, we were about an hour away from London. Once we landed, we made our way to customs where we were hassled by the customs lady and then went to pick up our bags. My bag, of course, was the very last bag to come out, so I was trying not to panic. We then jumped on the tube and rode it for about an hour or so until they annouced that something was wrong and that they wouldn't be making it to our stop.

So we had to disembark early and tried taking a cabbie to the university. Unfortunately, earlier in the week a bus had caught fire under a tunnel (causing structural damage), thus creating only one route east for all traffic to go through creating a big traffic jam. Our cabbie made good time, though, and we finally made it to the university, but had to find Christina's place. Rachel saw a tube station one direction and so we lugged our luggage for about a half mile before we found out that we were moving in the opposite direction. So we turned around and backtracked until we finally found the place. Needless to say, by the time we had arrived, we were both exhausted from the little sleep we got on the plane, not having "lunch" and lugging our heavy bags up-and-down streets.

Once we arrived, we cleaned ourselves up and went out for a quick dinner. Afterwards we signed up for our 7-day tube passes and then came back to Christina's to crash at like 9:30. I'm not sure exactly what's going on today, but I'll be out and about doing something exciting. It sounds pretty windy outside so we'll see how things go today.