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I went in to pre-record something for 6 Music, do my trails for next week and to attend my first big, multimedia film screening in a West End cinema for donkey's years. Things have changed since I last attended these things regularly, three years ago. Clearly, piracy paranoia has increased. You now have to hand in your mobile phone beforehand (luckily mine is an antique that - crazy! - doesn't take photos, so I was allowed to keep it). You also have to spend more time hanging around the foyer of the cinema in a big queue, shuffling forward like captive idiots, than you do actually watching the film. Ah, the sophisticated cachet of being a film critic! Arrived at the Vue cinema at 8.10. Finally sat down at 8.50. Warner Bros had over-ticketed and had to open a second screen, causing mayhem. The queue that had patiently snaked round pass the pick'n'mix suddenly disintegrated and turned into a scrum when the second screen was opened. A disgraceful spectacle. Professional journalists acting like shoppers at a sale. (What's the point of being British if we can't even queue any more. The world is going to hell.)

The film? Oh yes the film. Batman Begins. (Or Batman Never Begins, as we retitled it half an hour into the Soviet-style queue.) An excellent addition to the franchise from director Christopher Nolan, who apparently screened Blade Runner to cast and crew before shooting. True to the spirit of the Dark Knight graphic novels, a world away from Tim Burton, admirably gloomy and serious, with only occasional wisecracks ("You're looking fashionable") and on points, I'd say even better than Spider-Man, the gold standard for superhero movies. Packed with British and Irish actors too: Bale, Caine, Oldman, Wilkinson, Neeson, Roache, Murphy (that's Cillian Murphy from 28 Days Later, whose name I couldn't remember until I looked it up). Oddest sight of the film - Tim Booth, out of James, in a small, non-speaking psychopath role. He looked the part with the devil beard and shaved head, but what a surprise!

Saturday June 4
Saw The Woodsman on DVD at last. I've been keen to see this ever since it came and perhaps unsurprisingly went at the cinema. Not exactly a popcorn-muncher. Kevin Bacon as a paedophile, sensitively handled and the film took no sides, which in itself was incredibly brave. I don't suppose Rebekah Wade would have liked it very much. (I dozed off in the middle, partly because it was late and partly because I foolishly put my feet up on the sofa, but mostly because I keep falling asleep in front of the telly. It's not that I'm worried about it, just disappointed, as I keep missing bits of films and TV programmes I really like. Sleep has no critical filter. Didn't miss as much as I thought - I checked later.)

Sunday June 5
It was all too brief, but I met up with old schoolfriend Pete Sawtell after work. He and I were big mates at Weston Favell Upper School and formed Absolute Heroes with Craig McKenna (Pete was the guitarist, Craig played bass, I was the drummer, Jo was our pointy-eyebrowed singer). Moody pic of us here  - Pete's the one in the doorway of the derelict house. Pete now lives in Seattle, he works in radio, and he and his Canadian girlfriend were here for a Sawtell family get-together. It was fantastic to see him, looking happy and healthy - I note with satisfaction that his accent hasn't become too Americanised - and even though we only had an hour together in the Crown & Sceptre it all came flooding back. We worked out that the last time we bumped into each other was backstage at Reading 1993 and I apparently gave him a pass to New Order's tent where the booze was free. I don't remember much about it, and nor does Pete thanks to the pass, but then it was 1993. It was all so different then.

Caught up with Soul Deep, which gets better and better; part 5 was ostensibly about James Brown, but also the politicisation of soul into funk, tracing a line from I'm Black And I'm Proud to Public Enemy by way of Sly Stone, Bootsy Collins, P-Funk, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder. That was too much to pack into an hour, so there was an element of fast-forwarding but the echoes across the generations were well drawn.

ER : last episode in the series - sorry, Season Finale, as we all live in America now. Carter finally left County General after 11 years (we've been there with him since episode one). There was a huge disaster with a collapsing porch that gave the up-to-now disappointing Rock'n'Roll Ray something to get his teeth into. And Pratt went to see his estranged father who turned out to be Danny Glover out of Lethal Weapon!! Not a vintage series, this one, but I'll be there when the next one starts. Carter has been crap ever since he went to Africa, and I think the programme-makers knew that. So, it's all down to you, Ray.

Monday June 6
Nice to have Mum and Dad down to visit. Haven't seen them for a long time - not since March - mainly due to them being on holiday all the time. (If I ever retire I'll be on holiday all the time too.) Had some new tyres fitted this morning (nothing to do with Mum and Dad coming down) and finished clearing all the moss from the front drive (prompted, I will admit, by Mum and Dad coming down - you get a lot of moss falling off the roof in rainy Reigate). They arrived at 2pm. We went for a pleasant walk to Priory Park to see the ducks and wished we'd taken some bread with us. I was enchanted by the squeaking ducklings and signets and goslings and whatever baby coots are called (cootlets?). Breeding has been successful again this year. Pretty sure we saw two Egyptian goslings sleeping in a nest.

Tuesday June 7
Mum and Dad always like to do something useful when they visit. In the old days, when I lived alone in my first flat, they'd clean or put up shelves. Now I am tantamount to a grown man, this would be inappropriate behaviour, but once Dad learned of my new, as-yet-unchristened lawnmower, he was keen to get involved, so I caved in and between us we got it revved up and working, and Dad raked up the grass clippings as I mowed the front lawn. I didn't mind the help. It was a new experience for me, getting behind a mower with an engine, but I mastered it without being dragged along behind it like Norman Wisdom.

After Mum and Dad had gone, and since the sun stayed out, I tackled the back lawn. It was a back-breaker even with a self-propelled mower - largely because the grass was so long in places it stalled the engine if I had it on "hare" setting (the other extreme being "tortoise" - it's idiot-proof). So I had to propel it myself in places. A satisfying safari all round, and I kept myself interested by cutting swirly, impressionistic shapes around the trees and perimeter. (I refrained from doing a Nike logo or a big love heart.) There is something very John Major about mowing the lawn - even on a Tuesday afternoon - and I can't say I entirely disapprove of the feeling. I've always liked the smell. It even oils the social wheels, as I ended up having a pleasant over-the-fence conversation with the bloke whose garden adjoins ours at the bottom - he even invited me to hop over the fence for a tour of his pond, an offer I gladly accepted. Now all I need is warm beer and the crack of leather on willow.

The foxes came by at the appointed hour of eight o'clock and were a bit put out by the lack of long grass to skulk in, but they ate the cat food anyway.

It's been a good fake Sunday. Steak and salad for what I will controversially call "tea" (I know it's dinner in the South, but it was always tea in Northampton and some days it feels like tea down here). Enjoyed Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares, partly because it had a completely different narrative - a soul food café in Brighton whose owner wasn't a fool, whose kitchen wasn't a health hazard, whose food was edible and whose chef wasn't useless. A tougher nut for Ramsay to crack, as they were £65,000 in the hole and the place was empty, but he rallied the troops, simplified the menu (anyone spotting a theme?) and turned it around. It was heartwarming. The people were so nice he had to really force himself to swear at them!

Thursday June 9
A packed programme today. First, into 6 Music for an "air check" - which sounds, pertinently, like something you'd have done at a garage. It is in fact a chance for you and the boss to monitor your performance on the radio by way of a "snoop" (wow, it's a big day for radio jargon). This is a tape made of a recent programme through the desk that only springs into action when you open the presenter's mic; in other words, it only records you, talking. The result is a quite spooky tape of links with no music inbetween. Anyway, the boss and I basically sat for an hour listening to my links and all seems OK. I'm giving too much numerical information on the chart show (down three places to 34 etc.) but other than that, it's business as usual. It's strange to examine every last word spoken but when you do live radio there's little time for this, and you only improve if you check under the bonnet occasionally.

Great to see my producer Leona, back from two weeks in Spain, which equalled three sets of weekend shows. She's a good colour. She also countersigned my passport form so I can finally send away for a replacement for the one I spilt tea all over. I've been using in for European travel but each time I come back into the UK, they tell me it wouldn't get me into America. When I used it to verify my identity at the post office when applying for a replacement driving licence (also spoiled with tea - the same cup), the woman behind the counter also informed me that it wouldn't get me into America. I considered explaining that I was boycotting America for political and nutritional reasons (GM in the food chain), but I'm sure they would have all thought me a nut.

Lost my second item in two days on eBay while I was out. I'm just not keeping a note of when the auctions end. It was another vintage New Yorker, this one from 1939.

Next, a favour. The Day The Music Died producer Will and co-host Jon were putting together some fake talking-heads footage for a 100 Greatest Radio Moments presentation they are presenting at the forthcoming Radio Festival. I was happy to sit in a studio and pretend to refuse to remember a clip unless they paid me. It took three takes, with one for luck. I'm not an actor.

Next, a social engagement, drinks at The Heights with Adam Smith, who I haven't seen since we packed in the weekday radio show, on which he was our film critic. (He's Empire's "senior writer" and he's certainly earned his retainer in the current Batman issue.) Nice to catch up with my favourite old bon vivant , especially in the serene, high-up, waiter-serviced environs of the Georges Hotel bar, where they serve nice pots of green tea with lime. Adam drank beer, like any sensible person would. I did three pots and two pineapple juices in two hours. Steady.

Then onto a film screening: Last Days, Gus Van Sant's impressionistic account of a fictional junkie rock star's last days in a big old house in the woods who just happens to look exactly like Kurt Cobain (courtesy of rangy, up-his-own-arse actor Michael Pitt, who was perfect in the role). It is Kurt Cobain, come on! When he tops himself, the shot where his body is discovered by the gardener is deliberately modelled on the famous photo of Kurt's legs in the garage. I really liked the film. It's mostly mumbling and long takes of not much happening but I think Van Sant really got into the head of an out-of-it genius and really nailed the hangers-on. I shall have to rewrite the review submitted to the Radio Times, as the writer took against it and gave it a damning one star. Pretentious it may occasionally be, but no way is it as worthless as that. It's released in September.

Home in time to watch last night's Nip/Tuck, first of a new series, and tonight's Desperate Midwives, an eye-opening docusoap on BBC3. Explicit surgery followed by explicit childbirth. Needed a quick Sudoku before bed to clear my head of gore.


The views expressed in this column are the views of Andrew Collins and do not represent the views of the BBC.