I’m always intrigued by the desire to live in compact spaces - whether it is seeing how they manage to fit impressive buildings into small pockets of land on Grand Designs, or a great layout on a narrow boat. Today I stumbled across this video from Gizmodo, in which there is some great design thinking on display to make the most of zero space in a New York City apartment. I love these concepts, but I know immediately that I wouldn’t have the patience to pack and unpack everything each time I wanted to use it. I am quite messy by nature and like to just pick things up and put them down so they’ll be right there when I need them next time.

Football is still mostly a mystery to me, but I occasionally find matches on TV and leave them on so I can soak it up via osmosis. This weekend, the Champions League final was on TV, and we watched Bayern Munich - the only German team I have heard of - play another German team. At one point I recognised the name Schweinsteiger but that’s about as far as it went.

Recently, Mr C played me a music video that showed nothing but the lyrics of the song in question. I was a bit disappointed, thinking it was just like Adele’s Skyfall video. Whilst that was quite Bond, and an interesting experiment, I thought a video of only the lyrics was a bit… lazy. However, it turns out that there’s a craze for Official Lyrics Videos that run alongside their more traditional action-packed counterparts. For example, Pink’s Try video was very well received, with her contemporary dancing and beautiful imagery. Then there is the lyrics video which is stripped back, bare with just the words.

When Will Smith appeared on Graham Norton last time, he did the rap from Fresh Prince and it was brilliant. This time, he goes a step further. At first, it’s like… yea, he’s rapping with his kid, that’s cute. Then he does the Fresh Prince bit again. And then, it gets magical. I almost welled up, it was so good.

Picked this one up in a Humble Bundle and although it got off to a really slow start, the first few chapters were so intriguing that I had to keep reading. It gradually picked up the pace and ended up being a pretty good page turner. Showing off the really awful side of identity theft, it is one of those that makes you sit up and take notice and ponder if this could happen to you.

I’ve been trying to read this one for ages, little bits here and there, and I finally knuckled down and gave it a good go. I got nearly halfway through before I had to admit defeat. I just couldn’t follow any of it. I don’t mind the stream-of-consciousness style but it didn’t seem to be going anywhere, and it didn’t seem to make any sense at all.

I vividly remember watching the episode of Sex and the City where they finally revealed Mr Big’s name. It was such an intense letdown that I couldn’t believe it had been given the go ahead to be screened. I was so disappointed, and I wasn’t even that big a fan of Carrie and co. Thus, I approached this episode of Doctor Who with some trepidation, worried they would reveal our favourite alien’s name as Bob or Trevor or something. It wasn’t helped by the big hype machine calling this a gamechanging episode. I’ll be the judge of that, thank you very much.

Loved this, although not quite as much as Moneyball. I thought it was quite predictable in places, and although the emotional journey was interesting and incredibly well-acted, you could sort of see where it was going from very early on. However, we have recently been talking about how John Goodman steals every film he is in, no matter how small the part. Turns out that is not the case when Clint Eastwood is involved.

I always appreciate a unique and amusing way of getting a message across. I also appreciate Matt Damon. This video, and the mission behind it, is win-win!

Another book that is the first in a series of crime novels, but this one is a little bit different. Set in what appears to be the flapping 1920s, Phryne Fisher (a terrible name, I must say) heads to Australia and becomes a private investigator. She’s got more money than sense and enough bravery to do the job, managing to gather a collection of characters around her along the way.

I have a love/hate relationship with Charles Dickens, but this one was a book I loved. It was different in style to many of the Dickens books I have read so far, much more concise, far less of a sprawling work. The story was interesting, and although it did follow a character through much of their life, it felt a lot more focused and structured.

This is an interesting read, a sort of guidebook to the concept of running a marathon. Written by Richard Nerurkar, it takes you through the very basics of why you might want to run a marathon, through some training schedules, preparing for the race, and advice on what to do when things don’t go to plan. There’s also an extra section about turning into more of an elite runner.

It wasn’t long into my Film Watch experiment that I faced the question of “What constitutes a film?” I had made notes on something that I watched via the iPlayer and then after a little bit of investigation, I found it was a made-for-TV movie. This made it less appealing to me in terms of Film Watch-ing it, and I decided not to publish it. From then on, I decided that if in doubt, I would check IMDB and if it had a Box Office takings figure, then I would count it as a film. This worked fine until just recently, when I had a crisis of consciousness over the criteria.

Having devoured this very quickly and enjoyed almost every word of it, I can’t quite understand why I haven’t read it before. It’s short and fabulously well-written, and the tension can be felt from start to finish. I really liked the first half, with such attention to detail in the vast differences between those who had seen the Martians first hand, and the gradual spread of panic. The juxtaposition of those fleeing with those who were going about their daily life was brilliant.

A couple of weeks on from watching Mission to Lars, Mr C and I settled down to watch another documentary film. This time, it was Side By Side - a film in which Keanu Reeves talks to a lot of directors, cinematographers, producers, actors and the like about the evolution from film to digital when it comes to making movies. Once again I didn’t think I was going to like it, so I was reading stuff on my iPad rather than paying attention. I wanted to see what it was like, because, you know, Keanu Reeves, but I didn’t think it would suck me in the same way Lars did. Thankfully, I was right this time. I picked up some bits and pieces here and there, and was half-listening for most of it, but I wasn’t in tears by the end.

Expectations couldn’t be anything but high for this episode of Doctor Who. The Cybermen were promised to be back - bigger and better, but hopefully less colourful than the Daleks 2.0 - and it was also a return to the series for Neil Gaiman, after his incredible episode, The Doctor’s Wife. Although the man himself spoke of how different this episode would be, I was still anticipating good things. And mostly, I was not disappointed.

I have a love / hate relationship with books about running, because whilst I enjoy reading about other people’s adventures with the sport/exercise that has grabbed my attention, I am always insanely jealous of those who are actually quite good at it. This was an autobiography of sorts from Charlie Spedding, bronze medal winner in the marathon at the Los Angeles’ Olympics.

I’ve been joyously listening to the new podcast from Molly Wood and Tom Merritt, called It’s a Thing. They were so good together on Buzz Out Loud and it was a shame when they went their separate ways, but onwards and upwards, the glorious duo are back together! This time, it’s not specifically technology topics, they just talk about whatever they deem to be an up and coming trend, or thing!

It’s been Mr C’s turn to come up with something for us to do on a day out for a while now. With a sunny bank holiday approaching, he said he finally had something in mind, so we hopped in the car. I’m not good with surprises, but he wouldn’t tell me where we were going. After navigating us this way and that, he admitted that I shouldn’t really get my hopes up as we were going to a field in the middle of the countryside. Having grown up in the countryside, I’ve seen my fair share of nature so this didn’t exactly thrill me. I assumed there would be a bit more to it.

This was an interesting one, I think I must have snatched it up in a Kindle sale or Daily Deal somewhere, as I do so love the start of a series. It surprised me to find this was written way back in the 1950s, and that there was a whole world of sequels out there waiting, but the first had to grab my attention.

My foray into books featuring amusing anecdotes/columns has been limited to a bit of Bill Bryson, the occasional Jeremy Clarkson and now David Sedaris. I’ve heard him on This American Life before, although I haven’t listened to that show in far too long. Regardless, I was a bit concerned that reading his words wouldn’t translate as well to the page, and I did suffer a little because I couldn’t remember what his voice sounded like in my head. I find with this kind of thing, it often helps to hear their intonation as you are reading along.

The trouble with reviewing these excellent ‘In an Hour’ books is that I just end up displaying my complete ignorance of the topic in the first place. And they are usually quite important topics. This time, I read the book in my lunch hour, meaning it really did take just sixty minutes to devour.

I have recently been looking at magazines on the Newsstand, and investigated the digital version of the BBC’s GoodFood magazine. Considering most of my recipes tend to come from the BBC or their GoodFood equivalent, this seemed like a natural extension. In my first issue, I stumbled across this recipe for a lighter Bakewell tart. It being “lighter” didn’t bother me all that much, but I suddenly had a craving for all things Bakewell!

I think I knew within a couple of chapters that I wasn’t going to particularly enjoy this one, but as it was so short, I kept on ploughing through it. Gradually, I got into it a bit more, but by the end, I wasn’t sure I’d learnt anything, or would remember what I had just read.

Enjoyed this one! It has its predictable elements, boy meets girl, girl embarrasses herself then meets boy again as he turns out to be her new boss. Kooky friend. Big debt collector/stalker. You know how it is. It was nice that this had enough elements to make it individual to most run-of-the-mill romantic comedies, it was funny and super awkward throughout. The British guy was cute as a button, which always helps, too.

I really quite enjoyed it. The one reason I’m not going all out and giving it a full five out of five is because some of the fight scenes were just a bit brutal for my tastes. I know Reacher is above and beyond the law, but these things don’t seem so graphic when you are reading about them. It wasn’t all that bad, it just felt as though he fought dirty too much and I found it distasteful.

Knowing this episode was written by Mark Gatiss and was set in Victorian Britain, I was fully expecting his brand of gothic horror to be stamped all over it. I hadn’t expected it to be quite so disturbing, but it was an episode that stood up for itself very well, despite very little alien or sci-fi meddling. The highlights of the episode were, of course, provided by Madame Vastra, Jenny and Strax. Jenny had her fair share of screen time, but topped it all with a great fight scene - disarming serveral henchman all by herself. Madame Vastra barely got a chance to get into the mystery but did manage to make a guy faint, at least twice. And Strax, he had some of the best lines, with the horse and preparing for the North, but he was criminally underused. At least he got to save the day.

Helen persuades her mum and dad to think seriously about Tom’s proposal, and after a bit of debate, Pat eventually comes round. The timing couldn’t be better, as they agree to sell the cows and make all his dreams come true just as Brenda decides to break his heart. I thought the break-up was done very well, although slightly weird. Am I the only one who thought it odd they still slept in the same bed for a week after deciding to split up? Eventually they moved out, and as it finally did start to dawn on Tom that his relationship was over, well I did start to feel sorry for him.

Mr C rented the documentary Mission to Lars from iTunes, and settled down to watch it one evening. I sat, aloofly, browsing magazines on my iPad, mostly ignoring the TV. I’ve never managed to get into documentary films - for whatever reason they fail to grab my attention when it comes to trailers and thus I never really get round to giving them a go. The only documentary I can remember watching is Super Size Me, which did stay with me for a bit.

All the videos we’ve seen from those Russian dash cameras have been dramatic/explosive/terrifying. Here, a slice of the nicer side of humanity.

I read this because I have a vague long-term goal to watch all the Bond films in order, and thought this could be a bit of a quick-start guide. It does fulfil that role, although it is also a bit snobbish in repeating the fact that the books are better than the films. I also want to read the books too, so that was not necessarily a bad thing.

So, having read Les Miserables and followed it up with World Without End, two of the longest books on the planet, I suddenly realised how many books I have sitting on my Kindle waiting to be devoured. I think I’m going to have to pick some of the shorter ones and start ploughing through. Expect more than a few Casual Reader updates over the next while. Whilst on that subject, it was brought to my attention a couple of times recently that Casual Reader can’t be casual at the frequency I’m posting reviews. But I like to think it is casual as in “not an expert” rather than “not very often.”

Hoorah! At last I have managed to not only keep up with the target, but overtake it and get a bit of a healthy lead. Another achievement this month is to have no gap longer than three days. That is something I am looking at working on reducing even further but I am slightly torn. This 5k route I have found myself is becoming routine but I think I would have to do less to run more days, at least to start with anyway. And I don’t want to give up my 5k!

As a big fan of The Pillars of the Earth, I couldn’t quite work out how there could be a sequel. How can you follow something quite so epic and sprawling and do it successfully? Well, I needn’t have pondered. I loved World Without End, perhaps even more than the original. Despite its length, it was an absolute page-turner, I was hooked and read it at every opportunity.

There’s no escaping that this film is twenty years old now, it hasn’t really aged all that well. The phones look old, the computers are very dated, the hairstyles are quite old. It also doesn’t help that they’re referencing black and white films which makes it feel even further removed. Mr C and I realised we don’t know anything about ye olde films and probably need to brush up on some of that too. I do like it, though, the relationship between Hanks and son is good, and it was enlightening to hear the text speak from so long ago. Enjoyable but not all that special twenty years on.

Ghost: Just a Blogging Platform It’s about time there was a bit of competition in the blog-hosting space. I am quite ingrained in Wordpress these days, but always looking to try something new.

My bread-making skills are still very basic, and although I keep meaning to practice more, it is such a stop-start and lengthy process that I never get round to it. Nevertheless, when I bought a loaf tin for my cherry cake, I decided I should probably try and make a loaf of bread - it would be rude not to do so! I delved into my copy of Paul Hollywood’s How to Bake and got kneading. I tried one batch of dough that I left for an hour and it didn’t rise at all. I don’t know what I did to offend it but there was absolutely no movement. I tried another batch and this was better, but it still took about three hours to get to double the size, whereas most recipes suggest an hour. I’m wondering whether it is the cool water I’m using. Paul Hollywood may say that you don’t need to use luke-warm water and that’s an old wives tale, but I’m thinking maybe not.

30 abandoned places that look truly beautiful An incredible look at some former buildings that have been left behind by humans and reclaimed by nature. Some are eerie, some are gorgeous, some fascinating - a great collection to look through.

I watched this episode not from the comfort of my own armchair, but in a hotel room on a tiny television. I never quite realise how used to HD I am until it is taken away from me! Thankfully, this episode didn’t look like it delivered much on the grand scale of beauty. Rather than gorgeous outer space landscapes, or moody forest settings, we were locked away inside the TARDIS - quite literally going round and round in circles.

Q turned out to be a tricky letter in my Alphabet Adventure. I was expecting it to be hard to find something beginning with the required letter, but I wasn’t necessarily anticipating it taking so long for me to get there too. I gave up waiting for the weather and made my way to Quarry Bank Mill, somewhere near Manchester Airport. Along the way, I passed Jodrell Bank Observatory which would have been a good stop for J! I would have stopped off and had a look around but just as I pulled into the drive, it started hailing good and proper. So, I settled for a photo from a distance.

Passing by Jodrell Bank, paused for a mega hailstorm to move away. Quite the day for upwards observation.

Looks good. Had forgotten how short Natalie is. And Loki’s hair!

I am quite behind on talking of my recent bakes, but equally, you haven’t missed that much. I have discovered the Basil iPad app for keeping track of the recipes I like, and spent some time importing all the recipes I’ve tried, noticing that a lot of them come from the BBC. I’ve also been looking at the GoodFood (BBC) magazine available on the Newsstand. Perhaps I need to spread my wings a bit!

This was different to what I was expecting, but not bad at all. It occasionally teetered on the edge of ridiculous and ’not for us’ but then it was also very funny in places and brought it right back. I thought some of the shooting scenes were a bit much, but then again, it was very much tongue-in-cheek and self aware. A movie within a movie and all that. Overall, not perfect but quite enjoyable.

I enjoyed the film, the tense moments and the thrilling rollercoaster ride, and the twists and turns at the end really did have me on the edge of my seat. However, the conclusion had me a bit befuddled because I just can’t believe anyone would be okay with going through that for… a gift? It doesn’t make sense to me. That only took a little away from the film, though, because the rest of it was so intriguing.

Just two weeks after the divisive Rings of Akhaten, Neil Cross was back on writer’s duty for Hide - a ghost-hunting romp through an old stately home in the seventies. What begins as a traditional ghost story, moves through some really quite tense and scary scenes, before resolving itself as a love story that spans pocket/balloon universes. This felt more like the Doctor Who people expect, dashing through corridors, unravelling a mystery that appears to be one thing but is actually something quite different. And boy, it was beautiful to look at.

I found this really quite interesting, as JK Rowling fleshes out the history of the sport that has almost become a part of the conscience as any other traditional real life sport! The information about how the Golden Snitch came into being was fascinating, and I particularly enjoyed the quotes from unhappy fans every time there was a significant change in the regulations. As an F1 fan, I can understand that perfectly!

I thought this would be my least favourite of the three charity specials produced by JK Rowling to accompany the Harry Potter series. The part this plays in the final book has always been a bit weird to me, but this was only short so it wasn’t too much of an investment to take an hour and indulge in some fairy stories.

The three extra Harry Potter books, written by JK Rowling in aid of Comic Relief, were finally made available digitally to coincide with the charity event this year. I snapped them up, doing my bit for charity, and getting some extended insight into the Harry Potter universe. I love books that extend upon a series like this, and I particularly like the HP world, so it’s win win.

I used to own this in a two-volume paperback set, and I remember picking out bits here and there but never really reading much of it in one go. As a big fan of the musical, I’ve enjoyed the renaissance it has had since the film came out (haven’t seen it yet though) and thought it was a good time to really give the book a firm go. Once I started, it soon became clear this was on the same level as War and Peace - long, sprawling, but with great characters.