NJS

Went to Cologne for the Leverkusen match, nice cobbled old market street with good bars and a fantastic curry house around the corner from our hotel (Intercontentinal I think). The cathedral is a good visit - though we bottled the tower climb after seeing some fans who'd just come down in desperate need of oxygen masks and new legs.

2 or 3 35k crowds would only affect the average by 1/1.5k over a season.

I think that's around the time my Irish ex-boss started getting begging emails offering cheap tickets for midweek games after years of having no chance.

How come when I see Scouse cunts on SSN saying "Hopefully we'll get the owners we need and deserve" there's no "deluded" backlash? The owners they deserved would have been any of the cunts who destroyed Pompey.

I enjoyed reading Googlewhack but agree he's not good in person.

Having seen the "pen" repeated a few times there, I'd seriously consider auditing Dowd's accounts - nobody could be that incompetent.

Take that Dowd you twat!!!

Corrupt cunt.

"I'll just stroke this with the outside of me boot it'll be dead classy - oh shit" Shit. Anelka.

What happened? Classic hamstring pull. Bit of a multi-lingual week commentary wise - French on Saturday and Serb? tonight.

Some kind of religious tax comes out of your pay here, Meenz or Ise will know more. Only if you say you're religious. If you don't - no tax. Seems like a reasonable enough way of getting funds from the true believers, at least it's more honest than sheer guilt. I would imagine that non-believers may see such a contribution as a "good works" tax akin to community charity which they may be happy to pay. I think I've seen that argument used to explain the disparity between the payment of such a tax in Skandanavian countries and the level of outright belief.

They piss on the US and most of the first world for child literacy and low infant moratility iirc.

The rest of the Carribean countries aren't exactly thriving are they? - I suppose they'll have to go all out on tourism but I don't know if that will support the whole population - freedom of emmigration will probably be a problem for the US. I remember being struck by how bad the American attitude to them was when Clinton who I thought was a decent bloke, early in his presidency stated that nothing was going to change and basically called them worse than shit. I know there are rights issues but the bullying by the US going back 45 years is fucking pathetic - not helped by the bitter bastards in Florida who you'd think would be happy they'd escaped. Aye, I suppose you have to take into account the American mindset though. They look at Western Europe with suspicion because of our evil socialist ways, so to have a fully fledged communist country on their doorstep is an anathema. I went to Cuba last year and had mixed feelings. On the one hand there was undeniably less extreme poverty than many other countries I have visited like Jamaica, and look at its neighbour Haiti. On the other hand, there was no doubt the people were oppressed and lacked basic freedoms such as the right to travel abroad. If Cuba opened fully for US tourism, the country would be transformed beyond recognition within a generation, as it is the perfect destination for Americans. There'd obviously be winners and losers during this transition, probably more in the latter category. Is the average Russian better off now than 25 years ago I wonder? You mean like it used to be before the communists took it over and made it such a success. Run by the mafia and Fascists?

Not that it was ever an excuse, but I always found it interesting that a place like Newcastle which probably has the lowest black population of any English city did have a problem with racism at football (as did/do the Mackems) which is sort of understandable from a "fear of anything different" point of view since not many people in the NE mixed with many black immigrants. I always thought that made places like West Ham worse in some ways as they must have had black mates growing up - the same applies to Liverpool/Everton.

The rest of the Carribean countries aren't exactly thriving are they? - I suppose they'll have to go all out on tourism but I don't know if that will support the whole population - freedom of emmigration will probably be a problem for the US. I remember being struck by how bad the American attitude to them was when Clinton who I thought was a decent bloke, early in his presidency stated that nothing was going to change and basically called them worse than shit. I know there are rights issues but the bullying by the US going back 45 years is fucking pathetic - not helped by the bitter bastards in Florida who you'd think would be happy they'd escaped.

Sorry, if you mean the one about the philosophical influences then no, I haven't read either. My position on religion is the usual bitter ex-catholic, semi-intelligent ranting.

JFK had to make a point when he was elected saying he wouldn't look to the Vatican or his faith when making decisions. I'd liked to have asked Ruth Kelly and others to make the same pledge in the UK - something I think she would have failed on.

I used to have an audio cassette with Mick Lowes' commentary for all of 92/93 which made great listening at the time.

I noticed he also criticised "social consensus" in relation to anything relating to rights that goes against church teaching - progess and democracy is what I'd call it.

My favourite radio moment: "My God, Cascarino has scored again"

Did a topic search honest guv - cheers Besty.

After returning two shit alarm clock/radios from Argos, I ordered a fuck off model on Friday which it turns out is out of stock so they're going to send me the next one up for the same price. It has the WI-FI internet/ media player client I wanted but also has a feature to access Last.fm I used to use Pandora before it was barred and discovered some good stuff throught it but hadn't really bothered looking for a replacement which this looks like it may be. Has anyone tried it?

I noticed a couple of times he was shrugged off the ball a bit easily - I'm all for lithe/nimble/skillfull players but maybe he could toughen up a bit.

The system seems to be caught in the middle between the old days when you had to be rich to be in public service (ironic given the present mob) and paying a decent salary compared with how much they could earn in London given some of their qualifications. As a former contractor I still resent the way what is essentially a 4/5 year contract has full employee benefits - I'd be happy to see them as contractors (at a decent rate) which would also allow timesheet based scrutiny of what they actually do.

I can see how the head of a hospital employing 100s of people could "justify" that level of salary but teachers and to some extent GPs seems a bit much imo.