By Today marked the 4th anniversary of my mam's death. Dad, Catherine and I took some pink roses up to the Chapel of Rememberence at the local crematorium. It's nice and peaceful up there and I had an opportunity to spend a couple of minutes in quiet reflection.
Roll on October 2009...
A few days after Real Madrid seal a £56m deal for Brazilian star Kaka comes news that they have been given permission by Manchester United to discuss the details of a proposed £80m move for Cristiano Ronaldo. A lot of people have already; just 10 hours later, had lots to say on the matter. I'd just like to remind everybody that he has always expressed a desire to play for Real Madrid. If he doees leave then I wish him luck and say "Thank You" for the 6 years service that he has provided. I will be more than delighted if he goes on to win many trophies at the Bernabeau. With one caveat; that none come at the expense of Manchester United.
A lot of names have already been bandied about as possible replacements or targets. One thought I have is that United already have a young gun that could step up; the Serb, Zoran Tosic. Lyon forward Karim Benzema, Bayern Munich winger Franck Ribery and Wigan midfielder Antonio Valencia are some of the names mentioned. Benzema has stated that he is happy at Lyon and I'm fine with that. Bayern are allegedly looking for anywhere from £40m to £65m for Ribery. He's good, but not that good. I'm not 100% sure about Valencia either.
One player I would love to see at Old Trafford come August is Lionel Messi. Although I doubt that the little Argentinian wizard would want to leave the Camp Nou and he would likely cost a significant chunk of that £80m. Andreas Iniesta may end up being surplus to requirements at Barcelona if rumours of him been offered as part of a swap deal earlier in the week are true. He has shown repeatedly the sort of quality that would slot right into United's midfield. Another is Andrea Pirlo, who apparently is unhappy with Kaka leaving AC Milan. There doesn't appear to be any other players, especially in the Premier League, that would get a United fan excited.
Oh, one final thought. United need to get a permanent deal sorted for Carlos Tevez. They guy gives 110% and deserves the love he receives from the Old Trafford faithful. It's time the club follwed the fans' lead.
I attended the local county council election count last Friday and the local european election count last night. Both counts seemed to go on for an interminably long time although I must admit the counting staff did an excellent job under difficult circumstances. Neither event were particulalrly good news for the party I support, the Liberal Democrats. And, no doubt everybody in the UK must be aware by now that the BNP has managed to grab two seats at yesterday's european election counts. One in Humberside and one in the Northwest.
I heard a commentator on BBC Radio Five Live last night state that this was "a dark day for British democracy." Whilst I don't agree with the BNP I feel that the commentator is extremely wide of the mark. The electorate in those two regions elected the BNP in fair and democratic elections. Whilst people may argue about the fact that the seats were won under a proportional representation system, the fact is that that is the system in place. As much as I, or anybody else, may dislike the BNP and what their mandate is, the fact remains that they have as much right to be on the ballot paper as any other political organisation.
It may be a dark day for British politics, note I said politics and not democracy, and a sorry indictment of the British electorate but it is the end result of a wholly democratic process. I may be extremely disheartened that the BNP have won 2 seats in the European Parliament but I recognise the fact that the democratic process remains intact.
Sadly another member of the fantasy fraternity has slipped away. David Eddings died yesterday; 2nd June 2009, aged 77. Eddings was the author that introduced me to the fantasy genre. I had been a fan of sci-fi up unti reading Pawn Of Prophecy. I still read the occasional sci-fi and/or non-fantasy book; most notably Tom Clancy, but the main genre that I enjoy is fantasy. Such a shame that we won't get to read any more of the Eddings' output.
The Champions League final kicks off in about 25 minutes. I will be cheering on Manchester United, who are attempting to retain the trophy, by beating FC Barcelona.
Today was the Whitehaven Musical Festival and Chrissy's daughter was entered into the poetry recital this morning. She's had a birthday since she won at Workington in November and was entered into the slightly older under 8s class. She recited 'My Little House by J. M. Westrup' and was selected as winner in her age group; out of a total of 15 entrants. A lot of the entrants were very good and I think she won mainly because she recited the poem in a nice, clear voice and took her time with it.
I received back my TMA02 for my M150 course this morning. I scored 87% and most of the marks that I lost were in my Javascript implementaions; which didn't really surprise me. I'm not too keen to learn JavaScript; or any other programming language, more than I have to, and am trying to make do with the knowledge I have or that the course imparts. If I can scrape by with what I have then so much the better as far as I'm concerned.
On Saturday morning I went to the cinema with a couple of friends to watch the new Star Trek movie; and I can honestly say that I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact, I have since watched it again. There's enough for long-time fans and new fans alike. I would rate the film very highly and feel it's the best Trek film since Wrath of Khan.
I then went roleplaying on Saturday afternoon and didn't get home until well after 4am. I then enjoyed the Manchester derby on Sunday afternoon before falling asleep whilst watching the Noth London derby. The late night finally caught up with me.
I got my CMA41 result back earlier this week for my T175 course and scored 100% which is fantastic. Yesterday I got my TMA02 result back for the same course and scored 96%. TMA02 involved a discussion of virtual worlds, designing a web page about cloud computing and discussing the advantages of WiMax over other services such as 3G and WiFi. I'm really enjoying the course and am already starting to look forward to the next section of the course.
The cut-off date for the next TMA for my M150 course is due next week. I was rather concerned with my health and made a point of getting it in early. I should get the results of that back within a couple of weeks.
I'm also adding a OU Bloggers section to my Blogroll. If you're an OU Blogger that reads this blog then please get in touch via the feedback form and let me know. I would like to add links to as many OU Bloggers as I can.
I've been perservering with some pain in my left calf for a while now. It feels like it's constantly cramped. I had just assumed it was probably a muscle strain but after talking to a friend I decided I better get it checked out in case it was anything more serious. Anyway, I went to see the Doctor about it last Thursday and they referred me to the Nurse Practioner's Unit at the local hospital. They looked at the leg and said that it was likely to be a muscle strain rather than a clot but since my Dad has a history of DVT they would arrange me to have an ultrasound on the following day.
I had the ultrasound on Friday; it involved a couple of hour wait during which time I made inroads into Bret Hart's autobiography. They only scanned the top of my leg and when I mentioned that the pain was in my calf they said that they were more concerned of a potential problem further up and would only scan the lower leg if the pain continued to persist. The results show that I don't have a clot in my upper leg; which is a relief, but doesn't leave me any the wiser about my calf.
Anyway, it's been almost a week since I first went to the hospital and the pain in my calf has abated somewhat. It's not gone; but, it's nowhere near as bad as it had been.
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Dave Arneson may not be as well known as Gary Gygax, but his name is equally important in the development of D&D. It was Arneson who helped transfom Gygax's game Chainmail into what would become the first edition of Dungeons & Dragons. Late Tuesday night Mr Arneson lost his battle with cancer; he was 61.
I spent most of this last weekend in Folkestone with Alley; first time since he and his wife split. My main reason for staying was so that I didn't have to drive all the way into the heart of Norfolk and then all the way back home on the same day. I'd gone to Norfolk to drop some friends off for a 2 week boating holiday. I'm picking them up again on the 19th. Not looking forward to that. I have to leave home at about 3am to pick them up at 9am and then take another 6 hours or so to drive back home. Although I may insist on a couple of hours break before returning home.
Left home at about 8:30am, arrived in Horning about 3:30pm, left at about 4pm and arrived in Folkestone at about 7pm or so. Anyway, didn't really get up to much at Alley's; not enough time really. We spent most of Saturday evening just sitting relaxing, watching TV. Watched th Malaysian Grand Prix on Sunday morning before taking Alley's kids to Tali's flat after lunch. I had the largest kebab I have ever seen on Sunday night whilst watching "You Don't Mess With The Zohan." I must have seen it about 4 or 5 times now but it was Alley's first. It really is a very good comedy.
Left Alley's just after 10am on Monday and arrived back home more or less bang on 7pm. Then took my sister shopping. Haven't really done much today either. Took Tricia her new laptop; took Dad to the Doctor and bought myself some new XBox 360 games that I will eventually get round to playing.
The 54th Eurovision Song Contest will be held at the Olympiyski Indoor Arena in Moscow on 12th, 14th & 16th May 2009. There are 42 entrants and they have been split up into two semi-finals and a final.
The first semi-final on 12th May will feature 18 entrants:
Montenegro: Andrea Demirovic singing Just Get Out of My Life
Czech Republic: Gipsy.cz singing Aven Romale
Belgium: Copycat singing Copycat
Belarus: Petr Elfimov singing Eyes That Never Lie
Sweden: Malena Ernman singing La Voix
Armenia: Inga & Anush singing Jan Jan
Andorra: Susanne Georgi singing La Teva Decisió (Get A Life)
Switzerland: Lovebugs singing The Highest Heights
Turkey: Hadise singing Düm Tek Tek
Israel: Noa & Mira Awad singing There Must Be Another Way
Bulgaria: Krassimir Avramov singing Illusion
Iceland: Yohanna singing Is It True?
F.Y.R. Macedonia: Next Time singing Neshto Shto Ke Ostane
Romania: Elena singing The Balkan Girls
Finland: Waldo's People singing Lose Control
Portugal: Flor-de-lis singing Todas As Ruas Do Amor
Malta: Chiara singing What If We
Bosnia & Herzegovina: Regina singing Bistra Voda
The second semi-final on 14th May will feature 19 entrants:
Croatia: Igor Cukrov feat. Andrea singing Liepa Tena
Ireland: Sinéad Mulvey & Black Daisy singing Et Cetera
Latvia: Intars Busulis singing Probka
Serbia: Marko Kon & Milaan singing Cipela
Poland: Lidia Kopania singing I Don't Wanna Leave
Norway: Alexander Rybak singing Fairytale
Cyprus: Christina Metaxa singing Firefly
Slovakia: Kamil Mikulčík & Nela Pocisková singing Leť Tmou
Denmark: Brinck singing Believe Again
Slovenia: Quartissimo feat. Martina singing Love Symphony
Hungary: Zoli Ádok singing Dance With Me
Azerbaijan: AySel & Arash singing Always
Greece: Sakis Rouvas singing This Is Our Night
Lithuania: Sasha Son singing Love
Moldova: Nelly Ciobanu singing Hora Din Moldova
Albania: Kejsi Tola singing Carry Me In Your Dreams
Ukraine: Svetlana Loboda singing Be my Valentine! (Anti-crisis Girl)
Estonia: Urban Symphony singing Rändajad
The Netherlands: The Toppers singing Shine
The final on 16th May will feature 25 entrants including 10 qualifiers from each semi-final and the following 5 entrants:
France: Patricia Kaas singing Et S'il Fallait Le Faire
Spain: Soraya singing La Noche Es Para Mí (The Night Is For Me)
United Kingdom: Jade Ewen singing It's My Time
Germany: Alex Swings Oscar Sings! singing Miss Kiss Kiss Bang
Russia: Anastasia Prikhodko singing Mamo
Videos of all 42 participants can be found on the official Eurovision site or here. If you're going to be in Moscow anytime between 11th and 16th May then tickets for any of the Dress Rehersals, Semi-finals or Final can be ordered from here.
