Against the odds

Good luck to Chelsea in the Champion's League Final.  Hopefully it will put them off their stride for the FA Cup Final.  However, given the number of them that will be suspended for that Final and therefore will have a point to prove in the FA Cup final...  maybe it would have been better if Barcelona had won.

Barca look like they have run out of steam.

Liverpool however look like a team that dont have the exact change necessary to buy luck from a vending machine.   We shall see.

Monday night's hotel room - Ramada Birmingham City

Somewhat tricky to find, and the wrong side of the city centre for where I had to be in the morning.  But apart from that absolutely fine.  Interesting location - my room looked out over a canal basin, with the BBC on the right and a series of bars, cafes and restaurants.  If I go back, and get there earlier, it will be worth investigating further.

Sometimes it snows in April

and today it did.  Last week it was 20 degC.
Climate change - coming now to a location near you.

Silverware

The League Cup was our first silverware for 6 years - but great to have.  However, I think it will not be enough for the owners.  Champions League has got to be their priority, and I think that it is now beyond us - which may mean the end of King Kenny's reign.

Meanwhile, finally recovering from 3 months of chest infection to discover that I appear to have put on 3kg.  How does that work?

Could be worse

Nothing like making you feel like a malingerer when you are under the weather, than hearing about someone who has it worse.  A friend of Mrs. Breadcrumbs maid of honour, has died of pneumonia at age 41 after ignoring a chest complaint for weeks.  Now I feel both pleased I went to the doctor, and embarassed about whinging for so long about my little illness.

So onwards and upwards into 2012 at last (x-rays and blood tests permitting...)

Been ill so long

it feels like well to me.

Finally finish 3rd course of antibiotics tomorrow.  Finished steroids today.  Which of couse means I am out of the Olypmics.  But hopefully chest infection will have gone and I can finally start this year.

Bonfire of the Dictators

Kim jong-il is added to the role call of dicators who have gone in 2011.  The attendance at the evil dictators club meetings is going to be significantly reduced without Kim, Gadaffi, and Mubarak.  It is too much to hope that Mugabe will soon be missing meetings too?

This week's hotel room - Radisson Edwardian, London

Stayed here before, and it continues to be fine.  If I wasn't full of cold it would be finer.

Jet lag and culture shock

The view from my hotel room just now.  The Fireworks were so close I could feel the percussive shock on the window pane.  I don't know what they are for.
 
KL is a strange mixture.  There are women in Niqab, as you might expect in a muslim country.  However the ethnic Chinese have a different dress sense - have just been on an escalator fact to posterior of a young lady wearing 4 inch heels and a pair of what I believe are called Daisy Dukes - denim shorts that just about cover the bottom.  The view was not unedifying - just a culture shock to someone acclimatised to the middle east.

One more thing

Lovely though it is, this hotel room is as dark as most.  I know they want us out in the restaurants and bars spending money, but is it too much to ask that we have sufficient illumination for when we want to work in our rooms?

This week's hotel room - Ritz Carlton, Kuala Lumpur

It's as nice as you might think.  And of course, cheaper than the Radisson previously posted because it is not in London.  At least according to one of my delegates - I'm not paying for this one either.  Outside it is rainly fairly constantly.  That is why KL is so lush.  My only complaints are about the food - it is lovely but rather slow to arrive, and not my sort of dishes.  But again, it's paid for by the client so I cannot complain.  I have no idea why there are 3 sets of pillows.   Are they suggesting something?

Another suitcase, another hall - Radisson Edwardian, London

Another hotel room.  This is the Radisson Edwardian which is jolly nice.  I have stayed here before.  Lovely as it is the best thing is that it is just across the road from the British Museum.  Apparently it is not as expensive as you might think - luckily I dont have to know.  The building visible through the window is the Radisson Kennilworth which is across the road.  I guess there was not the room to expand on one of the sites, and so they bought one across the road.  Also jolly nice.

this week's hotel room - Gloria Hotel, Media City, Dubai

Pretty nice really.  Somewhat surprised to be here, but it is ok.  All the rooms appear to be suites, and are probably residences.  Which may account for why for the first time I have a washing machine in my hotel room.  Or to be more precise rooms.  Apparently it is a dry hotel, but I have not noticed.  The view from the 24th floor is of the 20 lanes of Sheikh Zayed Road.  However from the 41st floor you get an amazing view of The Palm, and the Atlantis hotel.  The Burg Al Arab is just around the corner of the view, as are the remains of The World - a bunch of sandbanks designed to look like an exploded map of the world.  Now abandoned I believe.

Reaper dodging

The breadcrumbs little helper appears to have dodged the bullet.

I am old father time..

Next year I am 50.  This year the BBC is celebrating the 75th anniversary of the first BBC television broadcast.  I have been alived for 2/3 of the history of television.

Gosh that is old.  Here I am.  Hurtling into the future, one day at a time, and I don't realise what a time traveller I am.

Facebook just reminded me that it is 24 years since I finished my doctorate.  The founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, is just 27.

As Sandy Denny sang, who knows where the time goes.

Reaper

I thought it was the wolf in the garden, but it feels like it might be the grim reaper.  Sonia and Jonathan gone in 2 weeks, and waiting for M's results.  Mogh a few weeks ago.  L & M having irregular heartbeats.

Feels like Death is using my facebook friends list as a To Do list.

I am become death the destroyer of worlds.

Season of doom

It is peeing down, autumn is here, money isnt and it is hard to keep a positive thought in your head.  Into this mix we are thrown the bombshell that the breadcrumb's little helper, M, has a tumour the size of a grapefruit.  We are all still in the denial and keeping on going phases.  But it is a gutter for a very important person in all of our lives.  More tests and then surgery.  Let us hope it is still in time.

Woof

here comes the black dog.

And I miss my white cat.

Here comes the rain again

After a late burst of summer the rain and cold are back with a vengence.  My shoulder is aching, its chucking it down, and we are out of money.  I can feel the winter depression gathering strength before it launches at me.

Going to  the gym has helped me be physically in better shape for this winter (the shoulder is nothing to do with that), and I should have plenty of work in the next 2 1/2 months - but the black dog is back sniffing at the picket fence again.

Still, I'm not down yet.  And I'm still alive, in the game, and have got grounds for optimism about the next 3 months.

It’s Ed

Personally I went for David.  I hope we don’t regret this.

Meanwhile, with the other reds – roll on next season (yes, already).