Hi Mic

A few days off the old PC is probably no bad thing. A chance to get back in touch with the body, the ground and fresh air. That said I'm writing this on the London underground (the Tube) on a Blackberry screen with an iPod wrapped round my head and no fresh air to be had, just the rush of air that heralds the arrival of the train. Do you know the Jam song Down in the Tube Station at Midnight (A distant echo of faraway voices boarding faraway trains...)

Following on our conversation about Purim, are there many exiles from Persia living in modern Israel? I'm not even 100% sure what constitutes Persia - Iraq, Iran? anything else?

I only have one Iranian friend here in London - Mansell, the father of my younger son's friend. We recently went to his mother's funeral which was an interesting if sad experience. In a very English cemetery - Victorian Gothic chapel, a variety of native trees, and of course the rain - we attended a full Islamic funeral followed by a meal of Persian delicacies. I'm not sure how many nationalities reside in London but it's certainly hundreds - including the odd Israeli!

There's one Israeli fella that I know in my neighbourhood, Daniel, my backgammon victim ...I mean partner. I love the game (you guys call it sheshbesh no?) He is married to a local artist/photographer. We originally met them through the local school at the bottom of my road where my older son went to.

So you can see I do have children - two boys. They're both technically Irish - their mum, my partner, was born in Northern Ireland which gives them both the right to an Irish passport. One of them has Charlie as his middle name - after Chaplin.

So how many brothers and sisters do you have? What ages? Do they also live in Tiberias?

It was very interesting to hear about your time in the army. Did you enjoy it at all? Did you make any friends in the army? And is that it now, do you ever have to go back at all?

I’m going to order Walk On Water from Amazon and I'll report back when I've watched it. I really like thrillers.

Talking of Mossad, did you see Spielberg's Munich? I thought it was a really interesting movie, not least for its timing. Last year was a good time to reflect on the chicken-and-egg cycle of violence and revenge, and how people lose their souls in it.

Also did you see One Day in September, the feature documentary about the Munich massacre made around 2001ish? I remember my grandfather getting me a book about the Olympics that year which you filled up with stickers which you could get from the petrol station. As a kid I knew nothing of the horrific events which played out in the athletes' village - all I knew was the sport and medals. I guess my parents shielded me from the tragedy.

Which traditions and cultures does Late Wedding explore?

Did you see any of the shooting (as in production not bullets or missiles!) of Aviva My Love?

Back to Chaplin and The Great Dictator - I love the sequence where Adenoid Hinkel dances with the globe, I guess that's the most famous one but it captures Chaplin's physical grace as a comedian as evinced by The Tramp in everything from how he rollerskated to how he kicked butt.

I did see Richard Attenborough's Chaplin when it came out and remember enjoying it. Think I'll get that from Amazon too as I'd love to revisit it. God knows why I'm promoting the said online store so much here but, for all my reservations about its impact on real bookshops, I suppose it is one of the best ways to access the older and obscurer film titles at this juncture.

Robert Downey Jr's career took a bit of a sad nose-dive after the promise of Chaplin. I saw him recently in Goodbye and Goodnight or whatever George Clooney's movie from last year was called - good film, bad title if you're not American and can't remember the tv show from which it derives.

Let me suggest a game to include in our next entries. Picking up from your point about the Dan Brown book and casting, let's see if we can find a book we've both read but which hasn't been made into a film yet (or not recently) and both do an imaginary casting.

Over&out
A