5 weeks in the sun

Today we went to the mall after work to do some last minute shopping before heading home. Ate at Wendy's, something I've intended to do for a while since the one on the Lisburn road has closed. Then watched Southpark and Kingdom Hospital.

Southpark was funny as ever. They all went to see The Passion. Kingdom Hospital was dull as ever, and it seems the rest of its viewers agree. Since the two hour pilot was broadcast five weeks ago, the ratings have plummeted and ABC has moved it to a Thursday 9/8c timeslot. The move will essentially kill the show because that timeslot is already owned by CBS with CSI and NBC with The Apprentice. If anyone had bothered reading one of the scripts before throwing money and a primetime slot at the show, they may not have made the mistake of producing the series.

After more food than anyone could possibly eat at the Italian restaurant near the hotel, it was back to the cinema for The Ladykillers. It's a typical Cohen brothers film, which would have been enough to interest me five years ago but they can't just keep making the same sort of films over and over. It's getting tedious. It's not nearly as funny as the trailers make it out to be, although their films tend to contain very dry, dark humour rather than the laugh out loud comedy that the trailer implied.

It had its moments but they weren't frequent enough so the story dragged its heals a lot and by the time the end came I was glad to see the credits roll so I could leave. Still, it's great to see Bruce Campbell on the big screen, even if it is only a cameo appearance.

Ate in TGI Friday's and then went up to the Cinema for Scooby Doo 2. I didn't like the first one much and didn't enjoy this one any more. Again, the best thing about the film was Matthew Lillard, who plays Shaggy so well it's scary. Sara Michelle Gellar was just playing Buffy and Freddie Prinze Jr. was as annoying as ever. I had to do a double take of Linda Cardellini in one scene but she didn't bring anything else to the film. Even Seth Green looked like he didn't want to be there. As long as films like this get to No. 1, Hollywood will keep making them.

The trailer for Thunderbirds was shown and it looks like it's going to be worse than I thought.

I spent today in Naples Zoo. It's not a very big zoo so you could see everything in less than an hour. However, they put something on almost every half hour to keep you entertained. There are three shows during the day where they bring out animals and talk about them, letting you pet some of them at the end. They do talks near some of the exhibits like the lions and tigers and there's a boat trip around the islands where they keep the monkeys.

The Zoo was originally a botanical garden in 1919 and many parts are still reserved for plant-life only. The plant-life in Florida is alien enough but there are some fascinating trees with things that look like roots extending from the branches and into the ground. Other trees are covered in thorns and some are covered in what looks like dry, dead moss but is actually quite soft and still alive.

You can see the alligator lake live at the Naples News website.