Mrs Birks Blogs

Last week, thanks to the generous babysitting of Nanny, Mr Birks and I went to the cinema. The last time we went was to see Skyfall, which I loved and started writing a big blog post about straight away.  Unfortunately, I never quite finished it and now it seems a bit dated.  But nevermind, I will tell you about Star Trek instead! Now, I wasn't entirely sure what was on at the flicks when we arrived, it seemed to be mostly action films and in the end we decided on action of the sci-fi variety.  It seems unusual to me that two big action films (the other being Iron Man 3) have been released at around the same time but judging by the number of people watching Star Trek, the gap between the release dates has been significant enough. Those who know me, know how much I love to get a bargain. Which is probably why I find parting with nearly £10 to go and sit in a darkened room a bit of a rip off,especially as I'm not convinced you really get what you pay for. I'm not criticis

Shhh! Don't tell anyone I'm here! I should be marking! What could distract me from my professional commitment and enthusiasm, I guess you're wondering.  Well, I just had to take a moment to lament the loss of Merlin from our TV screens.  Yes, I know the award winning, prime time BBC TV show left our screens at Christmas but, quite frankly, I still haven't got over the loss and am extremely grateful that I received the series 1 box set for my birthday back in March (I hope the others will follow shortly!) Now to some, Merlin was the annoying medieval programme that followed the glitter and glamour of Strictly Come Dancing on a Saturday night (that Merlin-yoke as described by Marian Keyes on Twitter).  It's true, you could not get a bigger contrast than these two programmes - one is about fake tan, sequins and posh frocks, whilst the other is all running around in the forest with mud caked clothes.  But I loved them both and I can see why the BBC scheduled these two