IOW2

Up early, by holiday standards, today and downstairs to try out the hotel breakfast. We had the full works, and it got thumbs up from Jake. As the sun was shining we decided that we would head for Sandown. We noticed that the aircraft carrier was on the move along the Solent as we left the hotel, and spotted it again from Sandown later on.

Dad will be pleased to know that I took the left turn before Sandown and went in through Yaverland. However, we didn't park at the zoo, but found a spot on the road only a few yards from the pier. The pier was our first destination, and we tried out their crazy golf course. Jake won.

After a stroll on the pier we purchased a ball from a beachfront store and went onto the beach. Rather than jumpers for goalposts, we used shoes. It was warming up nicely by this time. I was almost tempted to take off my cardigan!

We earned a cold drink from all of our running around on the beach, and for our next sporting challenge we walked along to Browns golf course (stopping for a game of hover hockey in the arcade on the way). As we walked past, I pointed out to Jake the (now defunct) boating lake. If memory serves, Bec had a go at canoeing, but I wasn't brave enough.

There were lots of courses to choose from at Browns, and we plumper for Blue, which was the longest for the putting courses. I was in charge of scoring, but wasn't keeping a running total. Jake did the adding up at the end and we were exactly level. We retired to the19th hole, the Browns cafe, and awarded ourselves a slice of cake and a drink.

On the way back to the car, Jake returned to the cafe he'd spotted on our way to golf, as they were offering bubble gum flavor ice cream. As I type this I've just asked him to stick his tongue out. It's not blue any more.

Our next stop was Godshill, where there were two places we wanted to visit - the chocolate shop, where we could watch the chocolate being made, and where choosing what to buy was extremely difficult, and secondly, obviously, the model village. All of the traditional photos were taken, the church with the real church behind it, the model of the model (of the model ...), and the picture leaning on the blue teapot. Helpfully they've painted the year onto the side of the teapot! (Another photo archive scanning challenge will be to track down the photo of me at the same age, or possibly younger, than Jake is now, stood with the famous teapot.)

We came back to our hotel for a well-earned rest, and had dinner downstairs in the bar (cod and chips). Then for our after dinner stroll we wandered along to Appley. There the sad news seems to be that the pitch and putt is no more, and a quick Google search seems to indicate that it has shut down from 2011 onwards. Fighting back the tears here - may have to start a petition.

We are now tucked up in bed, and the plan for tomorrow is to head way out west. Needles here we come.

IOW1

Up fairly early this morning, and the last few bits were put into the bags before we set off just after half past eight. Our journey to Portsmouth went amazingly smoothly - we didn't even stop at the Hindhead lights, never mind queue. I pointed out the official "holiday starts here" bridge to Jake as we neared our destination, and we arrived at the ferry terminal at about twenty to eleven.

We didn't quite manage to make it onto the eleven o'clock (Clare) but were on the upper car deck of the 11.30 (Helen). The highlight of the crossing was seeing the pride of the American navy, the George H W Bush aircraft carrier, in the Solent.

We arrived at the hotel at about half past twelve, too early to check in, and so we wandered along the Esplanade with our bag of 2p's. Our collection of key rings has begun, and we also won a pirate rubber and a mini pack of cards.

After an ice cream we came back to the hotel, checked in and unpacked. Jake has given our room a thumbs up, and the beds scored well of the Jake comfy-o-meter. We relaxed in our room for a little while before deciding to pay a visit to Shanklin. We stopped off at Tesco on the way to stock up with biscuits and sachets of hot chocolate. I picked up the new Bond book for the bargain price of a fiver (not bad as the cover price is £20 and I passed up the half price offer in Waterstones on Saturday).

In Shanklin, the first stop was the sweet shop ( fudge and honeycomb) before we went to find a game of crazy golf and a game of bowling. Then tea at the pub next to the car park. For pudding we shared something called the volcano. It arrived with sparkling sparklers, and contained three flavones of ice cream, strawberries, chocolate brownie, whipped cream, marshmallows, chocolate biscuits and flakes.

We were not defeated!

On our way out of the car park we noticed a very nice green VW camper, and on closer inspection it turned out to be one of the Isle of Wight campers' fleet. Maybe next time!

Back home we've just watched the Italian Job (Jake enjoyed it very much but was a little frustrated by the ending!).

Off to bed now. We will wait and see what tomorrow's weather is like, and will decide what to do with our day over our cooked breakfast.

Packing

And so we are nearly ready to go in the morning. A selection of T-shirts have been put in a bag, some for me and some for Jake. He has a second pair of shoes - I'm going to muddle on through with just one for the week. Toiletries are to be collected up and packed as used in the morning. The camera battery is charged, and the memory stick has space. We've chosen our holiday reading books. Nicky has been trying to sync Jake's ipod with his requested music - we await the verdict in the morning. The bag of 2p's has been found - increases the payload quite considerably, but gives us a head start in the arcades. Ferry tickets have been tracked down, and the postcode for the terminal looked up for sat nav purposes. Sunglasses are being packed - ever the optimist. I've turned the work computer off - finally finished off a couple of feedback forms I'd been putting off. Got the reservation number for our hotel. Collected up chargers - my phone, Jake's phone, ipod / pad, DS. Car has a full tank of petrol.

What else?

Pirates

Haircuts for Jake and me this morning, and then this afternoon we had a trip out to Bluey to see the fourth instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. Much like the third it was fairly short on any sign of a sensible plot, but still had lots of action and some good one-liners from Captain Jack.

As a bonus, it even had Lovejoy in it!

After the film, we went to Zizzi's for tea before heading back to Oaks Dene to collect the dog plus share a few donuts that we had picked up from Krispy Kreme.

Half

Half term is here. Ended up being a very short first half of the term thanks to a combination of a late Easter and bonus Bank Holidays (as well as a sneaky trip to Paris for some of us) but despite that, we're all still really tired.

Looking forward to our holiday - we head South on Monday, and the bonus news is that Dad is going to be joining us for a day. Jake is going to make a list of the things that he is hoping to do whilst we are on the Island, and then work out which ones he thinks that Poppa will enjoy most, and save them up for the day we spend together.

Today I was in the office this morning, dashing around trying to get things finished. Then I had a very pleasant lunch in T Wells before heading back here. Had more to do, but didn't get much of it done, so will need to do some more tomorrow or Sunday so that I can go away on Monday with a clear conscience.

I meant to post a book update yesterday, but forgot to do so. I finished off Morse 2 (Last Seen Wearing) on Wednesday night, and this proved to be good timing, as the latest Grisham came out in paperback yesterday as well as the Deaver Bond book (as mentioned earlier in the year here). I picked up a copy of the Grisham at Victoria on my way home yesterday, as Smith's had it for half price, and am already a few chapters in. Will be looking out for the Deaver at a bargain price soon as that may have to be next on the list.

Finally for today, I have been meaning to post some more pictures from our Paris trip. (The observant amongst you may have noticed recently that the row of pictures at the top of the page has been updated and now includes some more recent shots.)

By far the most recognisable and familiar sight in Paris is the Eiffel Tower. We went to the top on our trip back in 1997, and when I am considerably more organised than I am now (no promises on when that will be!) I will get cracking with the pre digital camera photo scanning project, and will be able to include pictures like that here. However, on this visit, we mostly took pictures of the tower from afar.

Completed one hundred years after the French Revolution, the Eiffel Tower became the tallest building in the world in 1889, a record that it held for over forty years until surpassed by the Chrysler Building in New York.

Amazingly the tower was not intended to be a permanent structure when it was originally built. Some Parisians thoroughly disliked it. The story goes that one in particular made a point of having lunch in the tower restaurant every day, and when asked why he did this, replied by explaining that this was the one place in Paris where he could be sure of not having a view of the tower. However, the city has clearly taken the tower to its heart and it is impossible now to imagine Paris without it.

Whilst on one of our open top buses, we were sat opposite some American tourists, and we overheard them saying (thankfully in jest I hasten to add before being accused of stereotyping!) that the tower was a good copy of the original in Las Vegas!

Fall

Today:

Miff - after meetings in Brighton this morning I headed up to London, and to the offices of a national newspaper where I had a video interview to do. The video is due to be posted to their website early next week. If it isn't totally embarrassing, I may, on request, send out a link of where to find it!

Jake - football training was called off part way through this evening due to a rather heavy thunderstorm. Jake reappeared at home looking like a drowned rat, and needed to get into a warm bath to thaw out.

Nicky - walking the dog this morning, Nicky took a tumble in the woods. Thankfully she was able to hobble home and nothing is broken. She's taken herself off to bed, and fingers crossed she will still be able to walk in the morning.

Dude

London today - conference time. Brighton tomorrow morning and then London again in the afternoon.

Half term is nearly here.

As promised yesterday, I have received permission, and so here is a picture of Jake looking suitably cool, ready to head off to the fancy dress day at school. The last half term of year 6 is clearly non stop hard work!

Kart

One thing I meant to mention over the last few days - I completed my fifth and final call to Florida successfully, and we now have all of our Christmas accommodation sorted out. We will be staying at the Old Key West resort for 11 nights.

I was supposed to do the fifth call on Saturday, but as a result of having a busy day with visitors, I managed to forget. So I ended up talking to one of the Vacation Club guides from the car park at White Hart Lane on Sunday afternoon (as they open at 2pm our time). Thankfully we hadn't missed out and we are now all set for both of this year's trips.

Today was 70's day at Jake school and so they all went in with fancy dress on. The pictures look great. I will check with Jake that I have his permission to put a picture on the blog, and if I get a green light from him then hopefully you will see a picture of him looking like a groovy dude, a real kool kat here very soon.

This evening I have been go-karting with work. Nine of us went to an indoor track near the office. Huge amounts of fun, although I think that I might ache a little bit tomorrow morning!

Train

Following on from yesterday's post, I thought that Patrick Barclay, writing in The Times today, summed it up very nicely:

"the Birmingham fans ... picked their chins up off the floor and exhibited a defiant pride. Such was the roar from their corner of the ground that the home crowd responded, with all joining in a standing ovation that ... exuded respect for the way City's players had been encouraged to the bitter end."

Indeed we did, and a rather touching moment it was too.

Back to today, and the Breakfast Show provides me with fodder for comment once again.

Two songs that take me back to the early eighties and my childhood, and particularly make me think of Dad were played whilst I was on my way to work.

The first one of them is The Lion Sleeps Tonight, or as we would much rather call it, The Wimoweh Song! On the radio this morning, they played the version that first made me aware of this song - the one by the one hit wonder that was Tight Fit. I remember Dad taking great delight in singing along with the Wimowehs! It is a much older song than Tight Fit's version - I've never asked Dad if he already knew it - I'm sure he must have done. Dad, if you are reading this (catching up once you are back from the Lakes), do let me know!

By the way, having a quick rummage around about the song, apparently Wimoweh crept into the song as a mistake somewhere along the way. It should be "Uyimbube" which is Zulu for "you are a lion".

The second song worthy of a mention was one I had never heard before in its original version! The song in question was written and performed by Albert Hammond, someone I hadn't previously heard of.

Mind you, now that I've looked him up, it turns out that he had a hand in writing some great stuff, including "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now", "One Moment in Time" and "Room In Your Heart". I really should have been paying more attention!

The song in question is track 1 on one of my favourite albums of all time.

The song in question: "I'm a train"!

Spurs

Thanks to Nicky's successful bidding in Mrs Cook's charity auction, Jake and I had a trip to White Hart Lane today. As our tickets included a pass for the car park, we decided to drive. It took about an hour and a half, and we got there at about half past two. Our timing was good, as food (chicken and chips) was about to be served in our box, so we sat down to eat pretty much straight away.

The first half of the game was pretty uneventful and lacklustre to be honest, and certainly didn't feel like a game between one team looking to secure European football for next season and another trying to hang on to their Premier League future, and they went into the break at 0-0.

Towards the end of the first half Crouch had been substituted for Pavlyuchenko, and early in the second, the sub curled one into the corner past Foster.

One of the entertaining things during the game was seeing the scores from the other nine games scrolling along the big screen. Some of them (Arsenal losing, Blackpool in the lead against Man Utd) got bigger cheers than the on field action.

Not long after Spurs had taken the lead, Birmingham equalised, and they were still in with a shout of staying up. But, even though they were losing, Wolves 2nd goal against Blackburn who had already scored three meant that Wolves went above Birmingham on goal difference and so Birmingham were in trouble.

Their fate was sealed when, with pretty much the last kick of the game, Pav doubled his tally with a deflected shot that looped over Foster, and it was bye bye Blues.

One of the nicest things about the whole afternoon was that, despite all of the "You're going down with West Ham" chants during the game, the Birmingham fans continued to sing their support up to and beyond the final whistle, and the Spurs fans gave them a spontaneous huge round of applause for their loyalty. This was repeated when the announcer said that we hope to see them back in the top flight in the season after next.

See, it turns out that football fans are nice people after all - well, Spurs fans are anyway.

Being the last game of the season there were a couple of presentations and the players did a lap of honour along with their kids. All good family fun.

Oh, and by winning we secured our Europa league place for next season (albeit that we didn't need to win anyway as Villa beat Liverpool).

We took a slightly different route home, coming down the A12 and through the Blackwall Tunnel. This meant that we went right past the Olympic site and got a good view of both the velodrome and the athletics stadium. Jake tells me that I am not supposed to call it the velodrome, it is the "pringle".

Jake came up with another great comment. Looking over at the towers of Canary Wharf just before we went into the tunnel he asked me, "why do banks need such large tower blocks? How many offices to they need to work out you're in debt?"

No answer to that one sunshine! All I could say was "good question, good question!"

Once back at home we could tally up our sporting challenge points for the day. Before leaving for White Hart Lane, Jake and I both made predictions for the score in all ten of today's matches. One point was to be awarded if we got the result right, and a bonus point if we got the scoreline spot on as well.

So, it was marks out of twenty.

Jake won: he scored 5, beating me by one point.

He will be collecting his prize in the Isle of Wight next week.

Friends

It was jolly nice to have friends over today. We enjoyed spending time with them and catching up after what was agreed by all as too long a gap.

Jake and I popped out in the evening to his football presentation evening. Thankfully we didn't have to stay too long and Jake is now the proud owner of a new trophy.

Friday

End of the week.

Nicky a bit poorly thanks to strange insect bite.

Chinese for tea.

Off to bed.

One more call to Florida tomorrow.

Officer

Brighton for work today, and Brighton again tomorrow.

Heard a good joke in the car this afternoon:

My friend has just admitted to me that he is addicted to brake fluid.

Mind you, he says that he can stop whenever he wants to!

An Officer and a Gentlemen is on the TV at the moment. I daren't start watching it, otherwise I'll have to watch all the way through to the end, and I'll only end up crying.

Who knows what tomorrow brings?

Arc

Today started with a trip to the dentist for me and Jake. We both got away without needing fillings or other work doing, which is always a relief. However, we may well get a referral for Jake to go and see an orthodontist soon so that we can start discussing the brace possibilities.

Once I'd dropped Jake off at school, I came home and did some work here before heading into London for lunch. We were meeting a client at Le Pont de la Tour restaurant. Having just been in Paris for the weekend, I was feeling confident that I could translate the name of the restaurant, especially as we'd been to the Eiffel Tower, as well as going on a bus tour that took us over Pont Neuf. Oh yes, and the view from the terrace where we had lunch was a bit of a clue as well!

I have finally made a start on uploading photos to Flickr from our weekend away, and so can bore you with pictures for quite some time now. I thought that I would start with the Arc de Triomphe, as it was the closest of the major Parisian landmarks to our hotel.

The Arc de Triomphe stands at the end of the Champs Elysees, and is basically in the middle of a very large and very scary (based on a few trips round it in a taxi) roundabout. The key things that make it somewhat nerve-wracking are that it is about six lanes wide all the way around, has absolutely no road markings, no traffic controlling signals, and has twelve, yes twelve, exits. Thankfully, there is a pedestrian underpass to get to the arch itself, and visitors can climb a few hundred stairs to the top to enjoy the views, but having already done the 300 steps at Sacre Coeur, we declined this opportunity.

Underneath the arch is the tomb of the unknown soldier, commemorating the many fallen in the First World War, whose remains were never identified (rather like the similar memorial in Westminster Abbey which we all watched William and Kate process past a few weeks ago). An eternal flame burns at the memorial (which was visited by JFK in the early sixties and which inspired Jackie to light an eternal flame at his grave - as we saw in the final scene of the Kennedys that we watched a few weeks ago).

As is well known in my family, I suffer from what we call the "Cinderella Castle syndrome" which basically involves me latching onto a particular sight or attraction whilst on holiday, and insisting on taking a great number of photos of it from every possible angle. I had a number of bouts of the syndrome during the weekend, suffering particularly badly not just with the Arc de Triomphe, but also with Sacre Coeur, the Eiffel Tower, and Notre Dame as well! There are a couple of photos of it that I particularly like, that I will share with you here. The first one was taken just as it was getting dark on Friday evening, and I like the fact that there are blurred car lights in front of the arch, and the Eiffel Tower is lit up in the background. The second one was taken on Saturday evening with the sun low in the sky behind me. I like the fact that I captured a moment when there was hardly any traffic, apart from the old Mini in the foreground, as well as that if you look closely I am in the photo, and so is the moon!

Back

Back to work today, and I got through most of the email backlog, but probably not quite so far on the actual work itself. Still, three more days this week to get back into the swing of things - today was a bit of a struggle really.

I've got as far as getting our Paris photos off the camera and onto the computer, but still no progress in getting them onto flickr, so photo blogging will still have to wait.

No sooner have we finished one holiday that plans are being made for others. Today marks seven months until our Christmas trip to Florida, and so I was able to phone up and get some accommodation booked (although per club rules I can only book seven days out from our seven month window, so I have to phone for the next four days, tagging an extra day onto the end of our holiday each time. Bit of a faff, but hopefully will be worth it if we end up with the booking that we want, given that Christmas is such a busy time). We'll be staying at the Old Key West resort, the place where DVC began.

So, by the end of this year, we will have been to five different DVC resorts in Orlando (Animal Kingdom Villas, Saratoga Springs, Beach Club Villas, Bay Lake Tower and Old Key West) with, as things currently stand, only Boardwalk and Wilderness Lodge Villas to go (and maybe Grand Floridian some time soon, if rumours are to be believed).

Paris4

We are home safe and sound from Paris, having had a great weekend away. All is well here, and the only disappointment is that I have to go to work tomorrow, and my phone is taunting me with the news that I have 101 unread emails. Well, they are going to stay unread until tomorrow.

Started the day with breakfast at our hotel. Made the most of the buffet, enjoying cereal, juice, coffee, cooked, and pastries. Didn't really need to eat for most of the rest of the day.

After packing up and stowing our bags at the hotel, we went to find the nearest open top bus stop (having bought a two day pass yesterday) and had a bit of a tour around. It was pretty cold this morning, but we still braved the top deck.

We got off at Notre Dame, and first stop was a cafe to have a warming cup of coffee, before some souvenir shopping and a trip around and into the cathedral.

Back on the bus and up the Champs Elysees, where we decided to hop off and go back to our hotel for a snack and a rest.

One final stroll and it was time to head for the station and home.

I have hundreds of photos that need to be put on the computer and uploaded, and then I can share some of them here. Too tired for all of that today - maybe tomorrow.

Paris3

Another busy day in Paris. We were at the Museum just after it opened, and already the line was fairly long.

We got tickets to include the Manet exhibition, although we enjoyed the rest of the museum rather more than the Manet.

(I'm more of a Monet man than a Manet man.)

We saw lots of famous paintings, including a Van Gogh self portrait and Monet's Houses of Parliament. As expected, it was strictly no photos, so we've bought books and postcards.

Sadly Nicky's favourite polar bear sculpture was not on display, so we had to make do with a postcard of that as well.

After the museum we found a café for lunch (croque monsieur for Nicky, onion soup for me) and had a look at some of the artists' stands along the Left Bank.

Crossing the river we had a look around the underground mall at the Louvre (I got a good photo of the inverted pyramid) and then got on the open top bus, which in a roundabout way brought us back to the Champs Elysees.

This evening we've had dinner at the hotel restaurant. Tried to go to the restaurant around the corner as recommended by Erica but it was closed.

Paris2

We've had a busy day seeing the sights in Paris, and now we're watching the Eurovision Song Contest, wondering whether the French commentators are being a sarcastic as Graham will be for the BBC!

We weren't off to the earliest of starts this morning, but then that's what holidays are for. We cabbed it up to Montmartre, and bravely decided we'd make the 300 step climb up to the dome of Sacre Coeur.

We made it to the top, albeit a little breathless, but the views of Paris were well worth it. Be warned, I took lots of photos.

After descending to street level, we had a good look around the Montmartre area, a fascinating mixture of cheesy souvenir shops, street artists and cafes.

We had lunch at La Mere Catherine, a café in the Place du Tertre. According to the guide book, this was the spot where the term Bistro was first coined.

After lunch we made our artwork purchase before heading down the stairs in front of Sacre Coeur (busy as the buskers were drawing quite a crowd, who were enjoying singing along).

Our wanderings in the streets of Paris took us past the Moulin Rouge, Galeries Lafayette, the Opera and Place Vendome, before we stopped for a well-earned beer in a café on the Rue de Rivoli.

We didn't go in to the Louvre, but enjoyed taking photos outside, and then headed for the Batobus. Turned out we could only get day passes, so to get our money's worth, we did a full tour up and down the Seine, eventually getting off at the Eiffel Tower, taking yet more photos, and then heading back to the hotel.

Too tired to look far for food, we grabbed a burger from the fast food place up the road for dinner.

Time now to rest our weary feet and recharge batteries (both ours and the camera's). First stop Musee d'Orsay tomorrow.

Paris1

It looks like Blogger is back up and running, so here's an update from Paris.

What seems like a long time ago now, we dropped Jake off at school, and John gave us a lift over to Ebbsfleet.

We were in plenty of time for our train and so stocked up with newspaper and magazines.

The train was on time, and pretty full up but we managed to find a spot to stow our bags and wedged ourselves into our seats.

We were in the front carriage, so when Nicky decided to track down the buffet car, it was a rather long walk, and a rather disappointing one too given the floppy toasted sarnies that were on offer.

Once we arrived at Gare du Nord, we cabbed it to the hotel. As we had hoped, it is something of a step up from the last time we stayed in Paris.

Went out for a wander this afternoon (the Arc de Triomphe is a couple of hundred yards from the hotel) and this evening we went for dinner a café / restaurant called Café Lateral.

Tomorrow we plan to go either to Montmartre or the Musee d'Orsay, depending on the weather.

Packing

Annoyingly, blogger seems to have packed up, and when I try to log in to it I get a message telling me that it is currently unavailable, so today's post is being sent by email (as will be the case for the next few days as well). I am hoping that it finds its way through their systems before tomorrow.

Today I had a meeting in Hersham, near Walton on Thames. Having not been there before I set off with plenty of time, and with the sat nav telling me where to go. I was in Nicky's car, as she was taking mine in for its long overdue service (which thankfully it got through without incident), and so had a less familiar voice than usual giving the instructions.

It took me off the motorway at J9, and I went through Oxshott and Esher. All I can say is, wow, so that's where all the money went then! I didn't realise there could be that many huge houses so close together. Who on earth can afford these places? They can't all be bankers. Maybe some are partners in large accounting firms!!

Continuing with the packing up theme, things are being put in bags for our trip, for tomorrow we board the Eurostar and head for Paris.

Next post to be despatched from French France ...

Righteous

I finally finished The Righteous Men by Sam Bourne the other day. I hadn't realised when I picked it up that Sam Bourne was actually Jonathan Freedland - him of The Long View on R4. The book blurb promised that it would be "the next Dan Brown" or some such comment.

Now I know that the fashionable view is that Dan Brown's books are of no merit whatsoever and from a literary perspective they are not worth the paper that they are written on. Well, I don't care, I really enjoy them.

In my humble opinion, The Righteous Men didn't live up to this billing. It took me a really long time to get into it, seemed to go nowhere for a very long time, and whilst it got more interesting towards the end, it took a good 350 pages to really get going, and at 550+ pages felt considerably too long.

I think that I will go back to more familiar territory with my next read, and continue with one of the many series I've started this year. No.2 of Morse, Dexter or Brennan is calling.

Apprentice

The new series of The Apprentice kicks off on TV this evening.

I won't be watching.

Over the last few days there have been adverts for it on the radio, with quotes from the contestants along the lines of "I was born to be in business", "I have a heart of steel" and "All I do is work". I am paraphrasing as I can't remember the exact words, but that was the gist.

Is it just me, or are these all really rather sad lines? To my mind, these are precisely the sentiments that would stop someone from getting along in the world of industry and commerce. How about "I want to contribute to a team with a shared goal" or "Understanding other people is important to me", or, shock horror "Business isn't everything - I want to keep a sense of proportion in my life."

Now I know that The Apprentice shouldn't be viewed as an instructional programme or as something we should learn from. It is a game show / reality TV offering, and if considered as such, then fine. But, just like people who have ambition to be in the entertainment business now think that the way to get ahead is to get noticed on the X Factor or Britain's Got Talent, I wonder whether young people do actually think that emulating the contestants on this show will stand them in good stead in their careers. I hope not.

Apparently there is a change to this series in that the first prize is no longer having a well paid job carrying Alan Sugar's bags for him (or whatever it is that previous winners have done) but rather to get some investment from his Lordship to put towards starting up their own business. Maybe this will attract a different sort of interest and different skills will be valued. Maybe.

Pressure

Pressure is a horrible thing, especially when it is completely unnecessary.

The worst sort is the type that is brought on by everyone else's expectations of you. Whilst it is always nice to know that people have confidence in you and think that you are capable of achieving great things, sometimes the very fact of knowing that's how people are thinking can lead to a whole load of extra pressure.

I know of a certain young man who, I think, is feeling a little bit like that this week.

Well for him, here is a public message from me.

Firstly, so long as I know that you are giving things your all and doing your best, and that you are willing to participate in your studies in a mature way, I'm never going to ask any more of you than that.

Secondly, I don't need to see test results to tell me how clever you are. Talking to you every day shows me just how smart you are in so many different ways.

Thirdly, how much I love you isn't measured in test results. Never has been, never will be.

Pool

As is well known, I have enjoyed a game of snooker or pool for a very long time. I remember Mum getting an old 6x3 table at an auction when I was little. It came without any legs, and so we would either rest it on the (round!) dining room table or in the summer we would sometimes put it on the "well" in the back garden and play there.

I expect that my family will tell me that I annoyed them a fair deal with requests for games all of the time. (Still, what goes around comes around I suppose!)

Later I moved on to a rather iffy pool club in Chatham which I would frequent after school with some friends. I think this must have been in the sixth form, when we were more independently mobile and we would head down there after lessons in my old 205.

Then, I found a kindred spirit at university, and we spent the bast part of three years playing pool in the pub down the road. It was either that or playing on computer games - we weren't very typical students really.

Now Jake has his own pool table. This one does come with legs, but I think is a little smaller than the one I had many years ago, although Jake's one is probably more on the level - I remember my old one being a bit hump-backed. Jake has even been on an outing to the pool and snooker club with Paul and me.

Now Jake (thanks to his friends) has discovered a website which has a decent pool game on it, where it is possible to play in tournaments against real opponents.

Guess what I've been doing for the last hour or so?!

Reads

This evening we've been to Reads restaurant in Faversham, with our friends Carolyn and Chris. We had a lovely evening, and the meal was superb. I could go on in great detail about each course and what we all had, but it's probably for the best if I spare you.

Jake has his friends Joshua and Samuel staying over tonight, and so they are all lined up on airbeds in the games room. They were all asleep when we got in, but I think we may have disturbed them a little when checking on them, and there are a few murmurs now.

It has been lovely to read a new blog just now, posted by Mum. As promised, Mum is showing me how it should be done.

I remember a fair amount about the trip to Haileybury, including being very apprehensive, and more than a little bit homesick at times. I also remember the big dormitories, the food hall, learning how to process properly, being praised by one of the choir masters for doing a good job of singing the second treble part, and being told that Monty Python videos were being shown one evening and having no idea what Monty Python was!

Christian

In the late 1960s, Harrods liked to live up to its reputation of being the store where you could buy absolutely anything. Amazingly by today's standards, this even included being able purchase a lion cub from the pet department.

Two young Australians living in London, John Rendall and Anthony "Ace" Bourke saw a cub in the store, fell in love with it, and bought it.

The cub lived with John and Ace in London, but as cubs will do, it grew quickly, and a year later the pair realised that it just wasn't going to be possible to keep a rapidly growing lion in the city.

They got in touch with George Adamson (of Born Free fame) and agreed to take the lion, who they had named Christian, to Kenya to be introduced to its natural habitat.

Christian was introduced to other lions, was successfully integrated into a pride, and John and Ace returned to London.

One year later, the Australians decided to make a return trip to Kenya, to see if they could visit Christian. They were warned that the lion was a wild animal now, and that they should not expect him to remember them.

This is what happened next.

Bloggie

Today we're all supposed to be voting in the big AV referendum.

I haven't.

I know I should be exercising my democratic right, but I don't really have strong views between the first past the post and AV systems. The simple fact of the matter is that where you have a situation in which there are three or more options, and only one of them can be chosen, there is no solution that keeps most of the people happy.

So, no dash for to the polling booth for me this evening.

I was home first today, and so went to pick up child plus dog. Neither of them were overly pleased to see me: one because not enough football had been played, and one because they don't like riding in my little car. I'll leave you to guess which was which!

Today I finally got around to doing two things that I should have done ages ago. One was booking the car in for a service (next Thursday). I'm hoping that the leasing company don't get too stressed with me when they realise that I am over 10,000 miles overdue. Fingers crossed that it gets through without incident. Similarly, I'm hoping that I don't get moaned at too much by the dentist when I go in a couple of weeks (the other thing I got around to organising today). I'm taking Jake along for a check up as well, so we'll both be seeing if we can get away without work needing to be done!

Finally for today, Bloggie has arrived. Bloggie is a little camcorder (a bit like the Flip cameras, but Sony's version) and it looks like lots of fun. Will be taking it to Paris next weekend for its first major outing. You never know, there may be some videos turning up on the blog sometime soon.

Pun

One quick update from yesterday's Sporting post - I forgot to mention that in July the Open golf championship is heading our way once again, to Royal St George's. As was the case the last time it was here in 2003, I may well take a day off on the Friday and head that way.

Last time I went, I spent the day on the stand behind the 16th green, and then got in trouble with one of the stewards at the end of the day for taking a photo of where I'd been!

Anyway, today is officially a pun. As Jake took great delight in saying to me earlier on, "May the Fourth be with you".

Reminds me of another pun, a long-standing rhyme that I have been taking great delight in annoying Jake with any time anyone mentions the new "Thor" film that has just come out.

It goes like this:

The God of war rode forth one day, upon his trusty filly

"I'm Thor!" he cried; his horse replied, "That's because you forgot your saddle, silly!"

I get groaned at every time I mention it!

On the way to work this morning, a rather lovely song came on the radio, and so I thought that I would share it with you.

Isn't it great. I think I might have heard it once or twice before, but I'm not sure. Looking it up, it seems that Over the Rainbow is song best appreciated posthumously. Sadly, like Eva Cassidy, the Hawaiian singer who did this version, Israel Kamakawiwo'Ole, is no longer with us.

(By the way, what is it with songs from around the Second World War era and bluebirds? They keep cropping up: they get a mention in Over The Rainbow, The White Cliffs of Dover, and Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah!)

One other thing before I go: Mum - I am looking forward to seeing the extract from the book that you are reading that you mentioned to me yesterday. Either e-mail it over, or even better, get Dad to set up a blog for you and you can use it in your first post. Then you can show me how this blogging lark should be done properly!

Sporting

One of my many ambitions is to have a "Sporting Year" in which I go to as many big sporting events as possible in a twelve month period. Not sure I will be able to afford to charter a yacht to be moored in the harbour at Monte Carlo, but just being there whilst the race is on would be good enough for me. In addition, I've already decided where I would like to sit during my visit to Augusta (just behind the 12th tee at Amen Corner, so that I can watch the putting on the 11th, all of the action on the famous par 3 12th and see them heading off down the par 5 13th).

I am reminded of this as 2011 isn't shaping up too badly on the sporting front. Not sure if the Harlem Globetrotters really count, but later this month Jake and I will be off to White Hart Lane, and then I've had confirmation today that we will be getting a couple of ground passes, so next month we will be enjoying a day at Wimbledon. Then in July I will be seeing some cricket with work (just a county Twenty20, but they all count!).

2012 looks promising as well - fingers crossed for our Olympics application.

Also, having been to see both ice hockey and basketball whilst on holiday in the US, I've just checked their website, and the Tampa Bay Rays (baseball) are playing at home while we are in Florida in the summer. Now there's an idea!

Sweeps

Given that we will be away when the Dickens Festival is on in Rochester at the start of June, we thought we'd head that way today for the last day of the Sweeps Festival.

Weather was bright and sunny, but rather chilly in the wind, and at times it was blowing a gale.

We had a good meander around, stopping for for a burger from the Topes BBQ, and then stayed for the final procession. Bumped into lots of people we know, including one who later turned up in the parade as well (see photos below).

Sadly it's back to work tomorrow, and this time we have to do a four day week. Bit of a hardship if you ask me!

Globetrotters

Today we've been to Wembley.

After roast lamb for Sunday lunch we left Nanny and Granddad in charge of the dog, and headed round the M25 and to Wembley Arena, as we had tickets to go and see the Harlem Globetrotters.

We arrived in plenty of time, and went into the arena and made a beeline for the souvenir stall. As well as the obligatory glossy programme, Jake is now the proud owner of an official Harlem Globetrotters basketball, later also supplemented by some Harlem Globetrotters sweatbands.

We grabbed a burger at the arena and waited to head in to find our seats. There was a short delay before we were let in - turned out that the stars had been delayed in a queue on the motorway.

The show itself was lots of fun. The Globetrotters were up against another team styled as the baddies of the piece, and true to the script, ran rings around them. The game was subject to frequent interruptions for more set piece fun and games and audience participation.

I wasn't entirely sure of what to expect today, but they put on a really good show. Jake seemed to thoroughly enjoy himself and was laughing along with all of their antics.