Views from Google Earth #2

Fallowfield

Views from Google Earth #1

Salford Precinct

Match of the Day

This article although factual may contain material of an extremely trivial nature







FA Cup Qualifying 2nd Round:

Marske Utd v Skelmersdale Utd, 15:00

The real minnows of the FA Cup are playing today for a chance to end up in the ping-pong ball bag for the first round proper of the FA Cup. Marske Utd. take on the mighty Skelmersdale Utd.

'Robocop'/Middlesbrough Mayor Ray Mallon has promised to be groundsman for a day for Marske if they can go through to the third round. Not exactly bearing one's arse in Binns window but certainly an incentive to cheer on Marske.

Star Forward David Onions could be the man to pull it off for Marske. Last years leading goalscorer won't be intimidated by Skelmersdale with experience at Guisborough Town FC and Northallerton.

Marske will be hoping to break this season's record attendance of 161 from the preliminary round of qualifying where a 'rampant' Onions scored a hat-trick to bury Brigg Town.

The 'Seasiders' manager, 'ex-copper' and former Boro player Charlie Bell will be hoping for a win at the Mount Pleasant ground this afternoon otherwise to honour Mayor Mallon's bet he will be spending a day sweeping roads in Middlesbrough for his former boss.















Marskes "state of the art" stadium on Mount Pleasant Road may be stretched if attendance today tops the '200' mar'k

First Gig

Like your first record 'Theme from Monkey' (BBC records) or first LP 'Zenyatta Mondatta' by the Police I guess everyone remembers their first gig. Mine unfortunately wasn't really cool enough too be called a 'gig'. It was more a 'Rocktacular' or 'Metal-fest'.

The venue was the Redcar Bowl and the band was called 'Magnum'. Birmingham's pomp rock outfit? It was actually quite a good night. Fueled on by halfs of cider we got quite into it, and instead of falling over laughing when the Spinal Tap moments arrived we gasped in amazement.

The lead singer disappeared before one song, then appeared in the spotlight with a angulared mirrored head mask shooting out beams of light in all directions into the crowd. The crowd gasped with delight. Another song was played wearing fruit head masks.











'She should be made to smell the glove'

I left the gig thinking I was going to really get into metal. I was only 13 and I blame it on hormones and leather pants. The metal phase never really came thankfully.

Stangely enough I had been invited to a gig 2 months previously by 3 girls. But I quickly turned them down. 1 - It scared witless the idea to be with 3 girls for a whole day in Newcastle, and 2, I thought it sounded a bit 'gay' going to a concert that would be full of 'teenyboppers' all adoring the blokes in the band. The band was 'Frankie goes to Hollywood'.

Gillette Fusion

A Couple of weeks ago on 'Dragon's Den' one inventor came on with a 5 bladed razor which was quickly thrown out as absurd. I was quite shocked by this decision as as anyone who has closely followed the revolution that is 'disposable razor technology' will know........

Simple equation is
New Technology = Old Technology + 1 blade.

Gillette are currently launching the Fusion disposable razor with 6 blades. 5 on the front and one on the back for 'those tricky places'. Yes Mr Gillette it is difficult to shave tricky places with a razor that is as wide as a football pitch.

Apparently the sales of the 'Fusion' haven't been that good so far , so John Consumer may be rebelling. Enough is enough. I think Gillette's next product may be the four bladed razor.

Gillette Quatroplex. Because 5 blades was too much , we taken the complexity out of shaving with 'Quatroplex'!

The 'Kirk'

The Kirk or Kirklevington Country Club as it was officially called was a club run by the brothers 'McCoy' in Kirklevington. A tiny village about 10 miles outside Middlesbrough. Not an easy place to get to if one intended on drinking as no buses ran after 11pm.

When we first started frequenting the Kirk in our mid-teens we thought it was the coolest place on Earth. We also found out that some of our parents also went to the Kirk and also thought of it as the place to go.

The Kirk was the only club we knew in Middlesbrough that played indie music at the time, and we would sip our pints around the outskirts of the dance floor ready to run on as soon as The Smiths, New Order or Joy Division came on.

It was the highlight of the week. And budgeting began on Monday if we planned to go on Friday. Occaisonally unknown local bands played downstairs in the 'Kirk' mostly not that good, but if you search on Google you will find that in its day the Kirk was the place to play for upcoming and established bands.

Jimi Hendrix - Jan 1967
Jeff Beck - Oct 1967
The Animals - Dec 1967
Moody Blues - Feb 1968
Yes - 69
Jackson Heights -1970
Simple Minds 1979
George Melly 1973
Level 42 1981
Mott the Hoople 1970
Ben E King, the Rolling Stones, Rod Stewart, the Small Faces , Chris Rea also played at this small venue.

Unfortunately the Kirk no longer stands in Kirklevington as it was decided to close the club. The McCoy brothers had decided to concentrate on their restaurant businesses 'The Tontine' and 'The Purple Onion'. They were raised in the Masham Hotel, an iconic 'green tiled' building in the centre of Middlesbrough with Marks and Sparks attached to its' side.

So our next generation will never experience the joy of returning home at 2 in the morning, aftertaste of 'dodgy mobile van' kebab in the mouth, and 'Rock the Kasbah' and 'The Passenger' ringing in your ears, and a sore arse from bouncing up and down on the country roads in the 'clapped-out' smelly mini-bus.

And Kirklevington, population 282 will only be known for its unofficial poulation in the HMP Prison

You Tube

You Tube seems to be the fastest growing phenomina in the world of the internet.
I believe that it will become an excellent reference library almost as indespensible as as a 'google' search or a 'wikpeda' listing.

On Sunday my sister bought me a 'Diablo' and after exhausting the only trick I could do I quickly found lots of 'youtube' tutorials on how to perform flabergasting tricks for your mates at your next party. (Still can't do any though).

A recent trend also seems to be to stick a digicam in your car and record a trip through your place of residance. What a waste of Megabytes!

Coupe Aeronautiqe Gordon Bennett

The 'Coupe Aeronautique Gordon Bennet' is a balloon race. Well it's not really a race more a competition as the winner is the hot air balloon that travels the furthest.

First run in 1906 from Paris, the event was organised by Gordon Bennet, an eccentric millionaire newspaper man from New York. 200,000 people turned up to watch the start in Paris. Most teams dared not cross the English channel but the team that did won the event landing in Scarborough on the North East coast.

This year the event is running for the 50th time and starting in Antwerp in Belgium. Rather like the Eurovision Song Contest the winner of the 'coupe' has the honour of hosting the following years event.

At present (10.09.06 12:24 UTC) the 16 competitors are winging their way accross the North Sea heading towards Norway. You can follow their progress live by GPS co-ordinates at the competition website.

Belgium 2 looks like it is going to pass over Middlesbrough. What a treat for the crew. Currrent position is (Team Name: Belgium 2Van Geyte, Luc / Paenen, RudyLast Update (UTC): 2006-09-10 12:03:12Position: N53°59'38" W001°32'47"Flown Distance (km): 495.09) . Putting that into Streetmap.co.uk they are currently passing over Harrogate. The Royal Pump Room Museum to be exact.











Museum in Harrogate used by Royalty though the ages for relief from flatulence
















Germany 3 (Columus V) narrowly misses Middlesbrough instead passing over Skinningrove's Cliffs

Halluçienda

Am i halluçianting? Are there really 41 Haçienda Flyers for sale on Ebay. Why that eBayer must be of his trolly to sell those. And it must have taken him at least two hours to put them all on eBay!. Espeçially when his stupid PÇ kept crashing.

When i first sold a çouple of Stone Roses flyers for 10 quid and upwards, one going for 20, I thought the attraçtion was the Roses, but sinçe realised there is a huge bunch of Faç nutters out there, who foam at the mouth at the thought of anything related to 11/13 Whitworth Street West.

Before I'd managed to finish posting the items I already had 1 bid, 2 email questions and about 10 people watching these items. Even the ones that look like they have been used as beer çoasters.

Any bids are welçome........ Old Paper for sale

Banksy Strikes Again

Paris Hilton's album entered the UK chart at number 29 last week Hundreds of Paris Hilton albums have been tampered with in the latest stunt by "guerrilla artist" Banksy.
Banksy has replaced Hilton's CD with his own remixes and given them titles such as Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For?

He has also changed pictures of her on the CD sleeve to show the US socialite topless and with a dog's head. A spokeswoman for Banksy said he had doctored 500 copies of her debut album Paris in 48 record shops across the UK.

A spokesman for Virgin Megastores said staff were searching for affected CDs but it was proving hard to find them all. "I have to take my hat off - it's a very good stunt," he added.

Considering that it is very difficult to get hold of this guys 'art', surely these CD's could be fetching 1,000's in years to come. I'm off to ebay now! I'm sure one or two dumb Hilton fans will think they are worthless.

Supermouse

I'm so pleased with my new mouse, bought from the Aldi for 19,99 Euros.
It's got 10 buttons! How many more buttons would you want.
I can't work out what buttons 9 & 10 do yet, but I'm sure I will found out.
I think we are going to be very happy together. When i have finished with him he sits very comfy in his little house. Also due to some kind of amazing radio signal technology he doesn't have a tail.
Thank you ALDI.

James Harries - A Child Prodigy

I was looking at an old VHS video tape i found in the attic yesterday, when I came across an old clip from a TV show ( I think it was 'TheWord'). It was of Child Prodigy 'James Harries' who was taking phone calls from the public. The section of the show was always done like this and normal good natured questions would be posed to the celebs. But on this occasion most callers saw it a good opportunity to take a chunk out of the blonde freak. Watch the clip....sorry about the quality i had to film it off the telly and it may take a short while to download.




If you want to know how James turned out later in life read on

Post it Note Art #1

My good friend and fellow blogger "the Ape" has started a new art movement. - 'Post-it note' art. So I thought I'd give it a bash.

Presenting: Coffee Stain on Child Prodigy (ink/coffee on 3M 'Post-it' Note. 76X76mm)

Where's Redcar beach gone?

When i was back in the UK 2 months ago I went for my usual walk along Redcar beach which is the closest coast to my house. It was a pretty miserable day as you can see. I've been going down there all my life and even went for a swim on Boxing Day one year to raise funds for the brain-washing of Papua New Guinean canibals.

Anyway if you went down to the beach today you wouldn't recognise it.



The set of 'Atonement' a World War II movie set in Dunkirk. Redcar has been chosen to be converted into the set as they knew there would be loads of extras gagging for 50 quid for a day on the beach.

They are using over 1,000 extras and 300 crew are booked into more than 200 hotel rooms across Teesside. The set will contain 45 military vehicles and even a 30m, 75-ton Thames barge boat, lifted onto the beach by crane.

some facts:

1: Keira Knightley and Vanessa Redgrave will surely get to experience a lemon-top from Pacittos.
2: There has been 4 films named "Atonement" previously filmed . All pants.
3: Previous films to feature Redcar beach are God on the Rocks starring Minnie Driver
4: Redcar Beach was also used in 'A Man called Adam's' video "Barefoot in the Head"




A Lemon Top from Pacittos

BA Halts flights to UK

Star Trek = Cobblers

On Saturday, 12th August 2006, Voyager 1 will become the first spacecraft to reach 100 AU from the Sun after 29 years in space.

An 'AU' is an 'astronomical unit' equivalent to the distance from the earth to the sun. 1 AU is equal to 92 955 807 miles or nearly 500 light seconds or 1 / 63,241 light years.

So 29 years in space, and the Voyager is 1 / 63 241 light years away. The nearset star to Earth is Proxima Centauri, a 'red-dwarf' in the "Alpha Centurai" star system. This star is 4.2 light years away . So if the Voyager keeps travelling for another 265,612 years it would reach Proxima Centauri, if it was travelling in the right direction, which it isn't.

P.S 'Voyager 1' is still working suprisingly so maybe in the year 267,618ish we may start to see picture of little green people.

Life Ambition #1

Every since i first played arcade games like Defender, Track and Field, Gorf etc. I always wanted to top the leaderboard for scores. Never did though. I think i once got 4th. Anyway today i managed it . It won't stand for long I'm sure as the game only went online today and only about 100 people have played it so far.















But i took a screen shot for prosterity.












To Play http://www.mousebreaker.com/games/savages/play.php

To see how rubbish that score is now http://www.mousebreaker.com/index.php?page=scoresbest_savages_0

A blast from the past.......

419 Eater

Scamming the Scammer - or 419 Eater.

A 419'er is a name for these guys who send out those annoying emails about the millions of USD they have tied up in Nigeria. I once tried this myself but didn't get far, as i cacked my pants when i realised I would have to give out my work fax number to try to reel him in.

Well never mind as there is people out there who dedicate their spare time (more likely work time) to frustrate and waste these scammers' time.

Maybe the next stage will be to try this with spammers of Viagra and Penis enlargement.

Anyway here is the story of 'John Boko' of the "Ivory Coast". Who wasted almost two months of his time and money trying to scam an imaginery arts scholarship from Derek 'Del Boy' Trotter. He obviously doesn't get BBC comedy repeats in the Cote d'Ivoire.

Read on.......

http://forum.419eater.com/john_boko.htm

Rooney On the Buses

Posters of a persistent troublemaker are being displayed on the backs of buses to encourage members of the public to keep an eye on him.

The mugshot of Adam Rooney, 20, from Middlesbrough, are accompanied by the conditions of his Asbo, which prohibit him from certain parts of the town.

Ten buses travelling between the town centre and Pallister Park, where Rooney lives, carry the posters.

Anyone who sees him in the prohibited areas can call a police hotline.

Rooney has spoken out against the posters, saying they will harm his chances of getting a job and has asked the police and council to remove them.

But Barry Coppinger, Middlesbrough Council's executive member for community safety and leisure, said the aim of the scheme was to make sure Rooney did not breach the Asbo.
He said: "We've tried the leaflet approach, but we thought putting posters on the backs of buses might be a better way of getting people's attention.

"We want the community to be aware who the troublemakers are."

Sunday Bloody Sunday

122 dead in a Russian plane crash (mainly children),
40 dead in Baghdad in sectarian killings,
4 dead in a domestic slaughter in Newcastle.

But never mind Federer won his 4th Wimbledon title and
Italy won a 4th World Cup they didn't deserve.

Since i have digital television I thought I could have seen a bit more of
the first three events I was trying to see this morning , but had to wait until late afternoon, almost 12 hours after the first to see a detailed report but even that was interspersed with reports of Federer/Nadal and the World Cup.

What is more important Wimbledon, the World Cup Final or the tradegies?

None of the above because one thing will fill the front pages tomorrow and
that is Zidane's forehead.



















"I wanted to go out on a high!"