HOLLYWOOD SENDS ITS MESSAGE OF WELCOME TO THE BECKHAMS!

Of course, his decision to move and earn a £128 million payout was more to do with his desire to play with Bolivian hatchet-men and talentless US college players, rather than anything else...............

Hibernation is over!

BACK Back back b a c k...........

Welcome back to my blog! That's to me as much as anyone else. Due to commitments of my new job, and the holiday and Christmas period, and then our subsequent holiday in Lanzarote, I've not updated my blog since October.

Very remiss of me I must confess!

Well I shall endeavour to start it all up again now, like an old van with a very dead battery.

Anyone got any crocodile leads?

Tomorrow is my first day back at work after two weeks in the Islas Canarias. Two weeks of beer, food and general abuse. I'm paying for it now though.

Above is just a little taster of the beautiful island of Lanzarote. More pics will appear in subsequent days!

This picture is the garden wall of Lanzarote's famous artist Cesar Manrique, who is largely responsible for the unspoilt state of the island to this day.

I just caught an octopus!

I was sitting here just now, writing the piece below, when Brian, totally out of the blue blurts out: 'I caught an octopus'.

It's all part of a new game that he's started playing where he lives in some mad world where he has to collect acorns, go fishing and sell fruit at outrageous prices. A game in virtual reality. Some would say he's already on another planet......

Hitherto, there has been no mention of beer or fishcakes.

Proud

we're all proud of our mums, that's a given, but mine is one very talented lady. Since retiring she's taken up painting in a serious way, given exhibitions, helps with the running of a gallery and sold some of her work!

Brian and I are also very grateful to her for furnishing our flat with three fabulous paintings.

With her permission, I have shown some of her work here.

Thanks ma!

Paul Hunter

Paul Hunter, the 27 year-old Leeds snooker player died today, after a battle with stomach cancer. He leaves a wife and a 1 year old daughter.

What can you say to the family? What can anyone possibly say to console the loved ones of a young lad in the prime of his life and career?

What a desperately sad story.

RIP

Strictly Parochial!

Football is more than just about the Premiership, in spite of what the media tell us!




Tonight was Woking's big derby match against Aldershot, and for the first time since Aldershot joined the Conference, Woking triumphed against their neighbours.

Goals from Stephen Evans (3o mins) and Giuseppe Sole (87 mins, pic right) were scant reward for Woking's dominance, but Aldershot showed enough spirit in the second half to suggest they are a decent enough side, and when they get their full squad back to strength, they will be a force to be reckoned with.

Anyway, tonight was Woking's night, and he majority of the 3,725 crowd will go home happy.
Glenn Cockerill's side were slammed for their early season performances, but since he brought youngsters Sole and Goma Lambu into the side, they've had more cohesion, better shape, better fitness and a MUCH better attitude. Well done Glenn, well done Cardinals!

One week left!

Tomorrow is the first day of my last week with Ultratone. One more week, and then that's it.

Then I'll be taking the car and equipment back up to Manchester and hopefuly having a week to recharge the batteries.

I must say, I'm looking forward to a new challenge and a change of scenery, but I really like the sound of my new company, and the guy I'll be working for seems so much more dynamic than our current management team.

So the last week begins, and it's going to be difficult getting through it properly as my head isn't there any more. However, I pride myself in my professionalism, and my patients will get the same level of care that they've become used to, right up until the last minute.

Here we go again!

It doesn't seem over a year ago already, that the umpires made the purely symbolic gesture of toppling the bails in the last Ashes test match at the Oval in Kennington, London.

Rarely has a nation been so united as it was for the ultimate victory, the final toppling of the outstanding Australian cricket team by Michael Vaughan's up and coming young England side. Much water has passed under the bridge since then, and we've had some interesting test series to whet our appetites for the main event this winter.

The winter tour of Pakistan showed us how thin on the ground we were for quality other than the main team, and a spirited performance to earn a draw in the second sub-continent tour of India did little more than disguise the team's shortcomings.

We seemed to have reason to worry when we let Sri Lanka off the hook in the first series of this Summer, and they fought back very creditably for a series draw. Then of course, we had the terrific series win over a tremendous Pakistan team (officially 3-0 but 2-0 as far as I am concerned), that was soured by events off the field, which seems to have showed Pakistan in a very unfair light.

So now it's the big one. Cue jokes about pots of yoghurt having more culture than Australia and songs and jibes about our ancestors stealing loaves of bread... You can say all you like about Australia, but what cannot be doubted is that for a country with a smallish population, they have to be the world's greatest sporting nation. The population, young and old, live, eat and breathe sport, and when we went down under for the Ashes tour in '98, they made us more welcome than any other place I've ever been to. Australia is a FANTASTIC country, and my experience of Australians, is that they are FANTASTIC people.

I really f***ing hate their cricket team though!

Shane Warne excepted.

That pigeon-toed tosspot Glenn McGrath has already dared to criticise our own dear Monty Panesar for wanting to see a sports psychologist before flying down there. I don't blame him one bit. They will look for any weakness in our morale and work on it, so the better prepared we are, the more chance we will have of bringing home what is rightfully ours. We are a younger up and coming team, whereas they are a bunch of washed-up old convicts with less culture than a pot of....... Ahem.

It'll be a fabulous series, and if Warne and McGrath stay fit, it will probably be their last major contribution in an ashes series. Let's hope our boys can stop them making it their most successful.

So good luck, in no particular order, to: Marcus Trescothick, Alistair Cook, Andrew Strauss, Michael Vaughan?, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Andrew Flintoff, Ian Bell, Chris Reade, Gerraint Jones, Liam Plunkett, Sajid Mahmood, Monty Panesar, Ashley Giles, Jimmy Anderson, Matthew Hoggard and Steve (Grievous Bodily) Harmison.

Go on lads, you can do it, you did it a year ago, they're the same Aussies, just a year older and stiffer!

World's media in shock at revelation!

Brian had soup for tea!

Just when I thought he'd say sausages, fishcakes, fishfingers or even the old favourite, cheese sandwiches, he stuns me and the world's watching media by asking for Oxtail Soup!

He even threatened to attempt to heat it up too. However, I have no idea as to the current call-out times of her Majesty's Fire Brigade, and I think the battery in the smoke alarm may be a little tired, so I passed on that one.

Whatever next, lobster thermidore with oven chips?