Summer is officially here !!!!!!!

Summer is officially here as the summer sport and leisure season starts. 

It kicked off last week with the Chelsea Flower show and what a fantastic week of weather they have had....long may it continue. We have International Football friendlies this week with England playing Norway and Belgium. 

And of course the tennis really gets going with the French open starting today, then Queens, a nice warm up before the big one.... Wimbledon. The weather is definitely heading in the right direction, and lets hope it stays that way as we have a lovely long weekend next week for the Queens Jubilee. That, I really am looking forward to!

Eurovision........oh how predictable

What an unbelievably predictable outcome once again for our Eurovision hopes.
Engelbert Humperdinck did us proud though, I thought, coming out first, it was always going to be an uphill struggle........and thats even before the political and tactical voting started! At the tender age of 76, he said that he had done his best for his country, and that the rest was out of his hands. And so it was. I still dont think we are particularly popular in Europe, but on the bright side, at least we dont have to fork out millions of pounds staging next years final! That privilege has been given to Sweden, won by the former Swedish Idol contestant Loreen with her club track Euphoria. Well done Sweden.......I think !!!

England Footballs Solid Start

With only a few weeks until England's Euro 2012 campaign starts, it was a much anticipated match against Norway last night as Roy Hodgson took the reigns.
It was to be expected that it was a taster to see how the team worked together. Not the most spectacular of football matches, but they got the job done.
I was a little disappointed with Steven Gerrard though I have to say. He made a mistake, but had already committed himself to the tackle. It was not malicious by any means, but the Norwegian fans punished him for it, and he let them get to him. As a result he made several silly mistakes which coming from someone with his experience, should never have happened. I was quite relieved to see him come off, as I think he really was shaken by the response from the fans.
Other than that it was business as usual for England, predictably, I am afraid. Lets hope we see a little more spark from our lads on Saturday against Belgium, before Hodgson has to hand his final squad into FIFA on midday Tuesday.

Loan Warnings

Just a quick word of warning. A friend of mine was in need of a quick loan, so trawled the internet. He put his details onto a form and within literally minutes had a phone call from a loan company. They promised he could have the money in his bank account before the day was out. He just assumed it was the company he had given his details to. It wasnt. They had picked the details up from the internet and got in there quick before any one else could. They turned out to be a loan broker, but didnt tell him this. They asked for some more details to clarify for the credit search and asked for his card details. This is the bit that gets me. They asked for the security number on the back of the card and when he queried  it, they said it was for the bank details to go in. My friend wasnt aware that you only use this to take money OUT of your account. And with that, they took his last £60 out of his account only to tell him after they had done it, and it was for their fees as they were just the brokers and passed him onto someone else.
 Needless to say, he didnt get a loan with them and fought long and hard to get his money back. In short, always look at someone before you take out a loan with them. After he had the phone call, my friend then looked up the said company on a search engine and found nothing but complaints of a similar nature about them.
Whether it be a payday loan, or secure loan, ALWAYS do your homework........it pays!

Who has the Premiership title......

When I went to check the current scores at 4.45pm on Sunday afternoon, I thought the race would be all over bar the shouting.......how wrong was I? When I got onto the internet, Man Utd were winning their game 1-0 away to Sunderland.
Man City on the other hand were losing, at home, to a 10 man QPR ! But wait......1 minute into extra time and City score to level the game. This doesnt give them the title however as Man Utd won their game. But again, just to keep every one on their toes, City score again, and take the title!!
Sir Alex Ferguson must be absolutely mortified. Just a few weeks ago, they were just about the only contenders for the title, with even City's manager conceding that they were probably too far behind to make any real challange.
This is what Mancici had to say after the match.
 "The football was incredible. This is for our supporters, they deserve this. To win like this is incredible. I've never seen a climax like this. We didn't deserve to lose this game. We had a lot of chances. We deserve to win this Championship. After 44 years I dedicate this to all our supporters. This is incredible. It's been a crazy season and a crazy last few minutes."

Britain's Got Talent.........has it really ?

Last night 17 year old Ashleigh Butler, and her dog Pudsey won £500,000 and a coveted spot on the Royal Variety Performance after coming first on Britains got talent...........how????? It should be re-named Britains got No Taste (as they were voted by the public).
The duo were a good act, but lets face it, there was some REALLY good talent on there this year. I think there will be more stars to come out of this show, than any previous years. The singers alone were phenomenal.
It was also nice to see the lighter side of Simon Cowell, although I dont really think he had a choice with David Walliams sat a few feet from him.

Spanish Grand Prix

The weekend started off promising for our British hopefuls in Spain this weekend, with Button setting the fastest time in Fridays practice sessions, and Hamilton tipping him (Button) to take pole. Oh well, it started off well!
 By the end of qualifying on Saturday, Jenson button had been squeezed out of Q3, going very quickly in the dying seconds of the session from a comfortable 6th place to a very UN-comfortable 11th  when several drivers came in faster.
As for Hamilton, he was doing fabulously all day and managed to get himself on pole position with Williams' Pastor Maldonado close behind in P2. But as the McLaren car of Lewis Hamilton was doing his in lap he received an urgent radio message to stop the car. F1 rules state that you must have enough fuel in the car to get the car back to the pits with 1 litre for testing by the stewards. As it turned out, he didnt have enough (there was found to be 1.3 litres of fuel in the tank) and so was stripped of his qualifying times, and started the race last in Q24.
So the race started with Williams' Maldanado in P1, and Ferrari's Alonso in P2.......and that is how the race finished! The first Venezuelan to EVER take a Grand Prix. What pride he and his team must be feeling as it is also the first win in 8 years for the Williams team. They made some brilliant strategic choices in the pit stop timings during the race, and Maldonado did some fantastic driving! The Lotus of former World Champion Kimi Raikkonen came in 3rd.
McLaren managed to drag some points out of this one with Hamilton managing to crawl back up the pack from last, to 8th place, and Button gaining a few spots to come in 9th. Lets see if McLaren can sort themselves out for one of my favourite races...........next stop, Monaco : )