Scots wha hae

It's been a good weekend to be a Rangers and Scotland supporter.

On Saturday Rangers beat Kilmarnock 3-0 to go back to the top of the league, albeit only for 24 hours if Celtic beat Dundee United 24 hours later.

Then, Scotland beat Australia at rugby for the first time since 1982. I only saw the last, desperate goal-line stand from the Scots that ended in an overtime try for Australia that they failed to convert. 9-8 to Scotland. Obviously England losing to the All Blacks made the win all the sweeter.

On Sunday, while I was buying some very bright - some might say brave - 5-a-side shoes, Celtic managed to lose two late goals in Dundee to make sure Rangers stay at the top, and with a game in hand. Lovely.

Meanwhile, at the O2 Arena Andy Murray was doing his bit for Scotland by despatching Juan Martin del Potro in the ATP World Tour finals.

So, all in all a pretty good sporting weekend, although not if you're an English rugby-following Wigan supporter, who got humped 9-1 by Tottenham.

The sporting weekend ended with one final piece of good news with The Eagles beating the Bears 24-20 in Chicago.

It doesn't happen very often, so allow me my indulgence...

Oh yes

Ok, so I now like a bit of Above and Beyond, and I can number Sucker DJs and Thievery Corporation among my iPod favourites; but still, show me a Yes gig and I'll be there, which is what happened tonight when
Sav, Sav's son Christopher, Welsh Pete and I went to see Yes at Hammersmith Apollo.

This has been an oft-travelled journey for Sav and me but it was a new experience for the others.

Some of the shine was taken off the occasion since this time there was no Jon Anderson - due to a combination of illness and a fallout with the rest of the band. For those of you unfamiliar with Yes (and I hope that won't be many of you once this post inspires you to discover their work...), it's the coupling of Jon Anderson's child-like voice with the big, complex layers of sound that makes Yes sound so unique. So Yes without Jon Anderson is a bit like Liverpool without Torres. Or The Wire without McNulty.

It was a relief, then, to find that the replacement singer was not bad at all, and sounded pretty much like the original.

I won't bore you with the details, but suffice to say it was a fine show, featuring the old favourites, a few surprises, and ending with an epic encore of Starship Trooper with enough bass to power a small city.

But no Jon Anderson. Maybe next time...

Hitler-arious

It's been a fun week at Ministry of Sound. On Wednesday we launched a new homepage at ministryofsound.com; making it a bit more interesting, adding more rich content, some community elements and for the first time selling straight from the page. Here's hoping it gives our currently modest sales a pre-Christmas push.

We're hosting a massive New Year's Eve party at the O2, and the marketing is starting to ramp up. Yesterday one of the guys at work put this together in his downtime - enjoy and share...

That Friday feeling

There's something about Ministry of Sound on a Friday. Being a club, while most businesses are winding down for the weekend the club guys are ramping up their preparations for the big Friday and Saturday nights. There's always music being played in the office, but on a Friday it's a little more funky and a little louder.

Then there's the traditional trip up to Borough Market - I didn't go this week but as a food lover it's a fantastic place to spend Friday lunchtime.

Ministry of Sound is definitely not a 9 till 5 environment, but Friday is the one day when most people down tools at 5.30 - and we take over the company watering hole, The Libertine, for pre-weekend refreshments.

That's in an average week. An email came round today with potential dates for the Christmas party, which will be in the club. That'll be anything but an average week...

In God's country

Wenge and I went up to Edinburgh at the weekend for a whistle stop visit. It was supposed to be a surprise party for my younger bruv Nigel, who celebrated his 50th a couple of weeks ago. Then, when he announced that he was getting engaged, it became a double celebration. Except that he found out about it, so it was no longer a surprise. Still, that helped with the pickup arrangements.

We left Luton on Saturday morning in torrential rain, and arrived in Edinburgh in glorious sunshine. We had a couple of hours in the centre - most of it at the Debenham's sale - before heading out to Torphichen, where Nigel and Fiona live. My older brother, Scott, was also there with his girlfriend Rosemary.

The day was spent eating, drinking (yes, in moderation) and walking into the village. At night we went to nearby Linlithgow for a pretty average but enjoyable Italian at Bar Leo.

The next morning was torrential again but we made it back without any problems - I'd maintained radio silence since getting on the plane so that I could watch the Rangers game when I got home, only for it to be abandoned at half time due to the waterlogged pitch.

Have I mentioned the new kitchen we're having fitted? It should have been done and dusted by now, but another week's gone by and Lincoln is still here. I won't bore you with the details but suffice to say I'm looking forward to christening it by cooking something special - I'm just hoping it won't be Christmas dinner...