Meenzer

Greetings from the press centre at the Swedish Eurovision final. No free booze, and the snacks are hot dogs that you have to assemble yourself. Classy.

If you do end up depressed, just watch this. Russia chose it for Eurovision a couple of minutes ago.

Do a better job please.

Why hello, my little ginger ray of sunshine. All well?

Fuck yeah Sweden.

Oo, missed this. Happy birthday to a true gent.

In the same spirit, the local park here is called Hilly Fields. I'll leave you to guess as to its flora and topography.

(As for mother dearest, she sent me an e-mail to thank me for the flowers and choccies - from the iPad 2 she won in a competition on her birthday. I rather suspect she didn't even notice the absence of anything from me. )

Ohhh Martin.... Buy her Englebert's latest single Meenzer. ( But seriously man, Englebert Humperdinck ? We'll walk it ) I don't even know how to begin to process that particular bit of information. I mean, it's clearly ridiculous. But it might just be a stroke of bloody genius...

A gambler's lot, eh...

Just hoyed together a turkey thigh mince, chick pea, garden pea and potato curry. All a bit hippy-dippy really, but scooped up in a naan bread, the nutty flavours went together rather well.

Just realised that I've missed my mam's birthday. By about a week. Quick trip to the Interflora website followed by a grovelling phone call tomorrow I think.

Culinary cottaging eh? Mince, topping, etc. This stuff writes itself.

Good stuff, CT. Hope you keep it up. Desperately need to get a grip on my own weight/fitness. I don't want to change jobs but I'm starting to realise that working from home really doesn't help.

Really good. Bit schizophrenic though - powerful but cold and calculated for most of the set, then she goes and does a protracted whirling dervish crowd-surfing guitar solo in the encore. Several fans needed medical treatment for a stiletto to the head.

He's familiar with the concept.

Made a cottage pie at the weekend, first time in ages (ever?). Recipe seemed promising (yet fairly straightforward) but the end result was disappointing, not a patch on my trusty shepherd's pie. Don't know if I did something wrong or lamb is just inherently better.

Glowsticks in the air, boys!

Good stuff

Careful you don't use that Onken wholegrain stuff by mistake though. You'll have bits up all your bits.

I tried a teaspoonful of it once and that was more than enough.

Ireland are sending Jedward to Eurovision again. But on the plus side, Austria have chosen this bit of barminess:

God, that was a gay post.