Arse

It was a footballing weekend as Rangers came to Town for the Emirates tournament. Two double headers in two days, and a chance to see how the Scottish champions would fare against Arsenal, Paris St Germain and Atletico Madrid.

My brother Nigel came down with tickets, and shortly after midday on Saturday we set off for the first day. Our seats were right at the back, but we were able to move forward to empty seats much nearer the front. The view was fantastic.

The football was less fantastic. Rangers beat PSG 1-0 in a dull encounter that had pre-season friendly written all over it. Tidy in possession but not much in the way of action. The decent sized Rangers support did its best to liven things up and we had a good singalong - the only problem being the paucity of songs that aren't anti-catholic which, frankly, embarrases me as a Rangers fan. A shame, because some of the tunes are quite good. Arsenal then beat Atletico Madrid 2-1 with all the goals coming in the last 5 minutes... just after I'd received a text from James to say that he and his mate had left to get the tube.

On Sunday we watched a very entertaining PSG v Atletico game while the atmosphere built up for the main event; Rangers v Arsenal. All the noise was coming from a full Rangers end, but unfortunately it didn't take long for spirits to be dampened. Just 2 minutes in fact when Eduardo - offside by the way - laid off nicely to Wilshere to slot home. What a player he is, by the way. Less than 10 minutes later Eduardo scored and the game was over as a contest.

Arsenal showed the gulf in class between the English and Scottish leagues and when Wilshere scored a third nobody could say it was an unfair reflection of play. Rangers should have scored at least one but poor finishing saw to that.

We did at least win the battle of the supporters - singing for most of the game while the best Arsenal could do was the Mexican wave, which has no place in football. Once again, though, I was reminded how unpleasant some of the Rangers support can be. Thankfully there are also many decent ones who made the long journey down t support their team.

In the end, it wasn't the greatest of tournaments and a disappointing second day but a rare chance to see the Gers. A chance, also, to see a free-flowing Arsenal side that will excite again this year. Next up, Man City at Ibrox.

Here comes the weekend...

With the launch of hedkandi.com just a week away, it's good to have Lee beside me at Ministry of Sound for the week to manage testing. After recent events, the last thing I need is to launch a site with any undiscovered bugs (although, I suppose if they went undiscovered until September it wouldn't hurt that much... only joking - I'm a pro, remember?)

And Lee provided the good news story of the week. A call on Wednesday afternoon, interview on Thursday morning and starts work next Thursday at the world's most famous department store. They're going to become even more famous when Lee gets his teeth into the website.

A sunny weekend is forecast so that means plenty of barbie action.  I'm picking James up at the end of his first year at Uni on Saturday, and if I'm very lucky will get to meet his hot new girlfriend.  

And of course it's Rangers v Falkirk in the Scottish Cup Final.  Football's truly coming home...

The weekend

I had a really good weekend. On Friday evening Wenge and I went to one of our regular haunts - Pradera in Hornsey, for some excellent tapas. On Saturday we walked down to Crouch End to pick up some ingredients for an Indian chicken recipe that Wenge saw on TV. Apart from that it was a catch-up day although I did have a lengthy transatlantic phone call with Steven about all things Mac. I still don't get spaces...

I managed to stay injury free at footie, where we had a good 5 v 6 game.

James arrived home on Saturday night, understandably tired from partying all through the previous night then playing football for the university team. Those were the days...

Actually, one of the highlights of the weekend was James showing us some photos from uni. A large proportion of them seemed to involve him surrounded by assorted babes, which drew interesting and differing reactions from Wenge and me.

The mother's reaction was: "That's it. You're not going back to university with all those girls"

Mine, by contrast, went more like: "Get back to Surrey and make sure you send pictures".

Today has been tough, as most Mondays are. Negotiating the terms of my new contract; meeting with the development team; fleshing out requirements with the e-Commerce team. I even had time to talk to a headhunter about an interesting role (which would, however, require me to be an expert in SEO). I've got a feeling that it's going to be pretty intense from now on as I try to manage stuff at Ministry of Sound while keeping active in the job market. But I'm thankful that I do have some work, so I'm not complaining.

Meanwhile, Lee emailed to say that all zavvi head office staff were made redundant today. Good luck to everyone.

When Saturday comes...

Up late, shopped and cooked some chilli two-bean beef for friends coming round tomorrow.

Rangers beat Hibs 1-0 (Boyd again...), then, after a decent game of 5-a-side I went to Guildford to bring James home for Christmas.

On the way home he was able to fill me in on the details of his game earlier in the day for Surrey University - particularly:

A depleted Surrey team found themselves two goals behind but fought back with James Simpson bagging a sensational hat trick to win the game for Surrey.

I'd like to say 'like father, like son' but of course modesty forbids...

Pluses and minuses

It was a weekend to remember, and a test of glass half-fullness, if such a thing exists...

On Friday, Steve and I went to Liverpool to meet with a potential fulfilment partner to replace EUK. In the morning there was a Times article saying that we were about to go into administration, and on the way up we heard that the administrators have given up on EUK and had made 700 people redundant. So by the time I got home the glass was definitely close to empty.

Let's say, then, that the weekend started on a score of -5.

Friday night saw the first of two football nights out, with my Thursday night football crew. Drinks at a pub in Hornsey followed by a curry in Crouch End. While we were in the pub, one of the guys produced a 'chocolate roulette' game - spin a pistol and it points to a numbered chocolate that you eat. Except that one of them is laced with chilli. The way my week had gone, nothing was surer than the fact that I would get the chilli one and, sure enough, fate didn't disappoint. It felt like one of those comedy film moments when leading man has lost his wife, kids, house, job and everything he has, and to cap it all a dog pisses on his leg. So that was another -1 (-6 cumulative).

It was a good night though. Rob put together a football quiz that was great fun, and I wisely bowed out at around midnight instead of going to Will's for cheap liquers. +2 (-4).

Saturday morning, and a visit to my accountant to find out the damage for my tax return. To my huge relief, the bill is just over half of what I had expected. A big +2 (-2).

Rangers could only draw 2-2 at Dundee United, giving Celtic the chance to open up a 6 point lead at the top of the league -1 (-3). Celtic could only draw 1-1 with Hearts +1 (-2).

Saturday was the Chiswick Casuals day/night out. Started with team go-karting, in which Sav and I came second. Annoyingly, and to my mind controversially, I was given a sin bin penalty for entering the pit lane too fast, which could just have made the difference between first and second place. Still, never let it be said that I'm a poor loser...

A great game of football followed, then drinks and a Thai meal. I brought along a copy of the quiz from Friday night, which was fun. Soapy and I got home by Scooterman - a guy with a fold-up scooter who drove us back in Soapy's car. They really haven't marketed this properly - it's a great idea and should be more popular than it is.

All in all, a good day and night out +2 (0).

When I got home on Saturday, James was home for the weekend. On Sunday Wenge went to Nottingham to pick up Laura. In the meantime, I went to the Race of Champions at Wembley, with Lee, Suzanne and Michael. A 6 hour motorsports extravaganza on a mobias band of a racing track, with appearances by Lewis Hamilton, Chris Hoy, Michael Schumacher, Jensen Button, David Coulthard and others. That said, once you've seen a couple of cars racing round Wembley, it doesn't really matter who the drivers are or what cars they're driving - so it was mildly interesting for a while but not that long. The much-vaunted race between Chris Hoy and Lewis Hamilton didn't take place for safety reasons, which must have been annoying for the people who came because of all the publicity around it. +0 (0).

So we left before the final round of races, which allowed me to get home in time to have roast dinner with Wenge, Laura and James. A very big +3, taking me to +3 for the weekend and restoring my faith in the power of Melvtopia...