Warner Park, Eyemouth

Eyemouth United take on Tynecastle FC in the Image Printers East of Scotland Qualifying Cup 1st round. United prevailed 4-3 after extra time.

The European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT)

Could they not have had a competition in conjunction with The Guardian or something to give it a bit more of a memorable name? Unless it's a double bluff, and the name is going to be delivered deadpan in a Peter Cook-esque type fashion at the Christening. Mind you, I don't think telescopes get Christened, so I doubt it. 

Lucy Beale's Predicament is Nonsense. Sort it Out

Observation about Ian Beale running off to have a nervous breakdown and leaving Lucy home alone to look after Bobby and run several businesses and stuff...

For the past week writers have been letting the viewers know that Lucy is running out of money to feed her and her half brother (who I think has been played by the same actor for the last 10 years, despite the fact he's still meant to be about three, and has yet to utter more than three words in any one scene) because of course she's a teenager/student (or whatever she was before Beale-O ran off on a post-Mandy mental flip out) and doesn't have ready access to cash - to the point where she's even had to sell Bobby's toys to the sons of David Essex* to scrape together some money for Fig Newtons. Fair enough likes, we geddit. Not every kid has a brother called Buzz whose shelving unit you can merely shimmy up in search of a spot of quantitative easing.

And yet at the same Lucy has been clearly shown to be running two bustling eateries when not worrying about where she's going to get the money from to feed her and her little bro!  Argggghhhhh! Ah say ah say ah say Eastenders writers - after building her up to be such a selfish scheming cow, shirley she'd have the gumption to take a few kopeks out the Kaff till to pay for Bobby's breakie?

* Oh yeah! Where the bloody hell did he ever go? I really hate it when they sign up these once-famous half-names who get moody steamy ident ads played all over the place and then scarper off after three months. How the hell did they write that one into the script? Must have missed that one. "Alright boys, do you like it here in Walford even though you'd never been here before I brought you here last week? Well that's good because I'm going to open up an antique shop and then disappear."

In fairness, he's probably rushed off to Charlie's sick bed. Ask any Eastenders writer what Charlie's illness is, they'd probably stutter, vomit, then cry uncontrollably.

Pray for the Wanderers

Due to a combination of bloodlines and cruel freaks of nature, I have been a Bolton Wanderers fan since childbirth.

It's certainly been a roller coaster ride, with much of that ride spent plummeting through Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom tunnels at 90mph. Vertically. Downwards. I'm not even old enough to appreciate the great Sherpa Van trophy win of '88.

And to compound matters, today is the day I will witness Bolton be relegated from the Premier League. 

To stay up, we need to beat dowdy, middle-of-the-road, nothing-to-play-for Stoke, and that's something I just can't consider for a minute; any Bolton fan worth his or her salt knows not to ever give more than a tenth of a second of their life over to optimism when it comes to The Wanderers.

We will lose today. Or we'll throw away a two goal lead to draw. Or we'll cruise to victory only for QPR to score two goals in injury time to beat Man CIty.

We're going down. Pray for us.

Newbattle Complex, Easthouses

Easthouses Lily MW host Duns fc in their final match of the East of Scotland 1st division season 2011/12. Duns won the match 4-0.

Stadio Delle Recreation Park

Ormiston, East Lothian, EH35 191.

Ormiston FC take on Peebles Rovers in an East of Scotland 1st division match. Ormiston run out 3-2 winners.

Lettuce ponder this

At work today I had to do some research into what speed snails could travel at. (You've probably heard me talk about how important my work is).

It caused me to come across this article from 2010.

Sidney crowned world's fastest snail"Ready, steady, slow!" 

- Sidney the snail stormed to victory at the World Snail Racing Championship in Norfolk. He beat off stiff competition over the 13-inch course to win a silver tankard stuffed with lettuce.
The event at Congham near King's Lynn has been running for nearly 40 years, and although there are a number of imitations it's the only recognised World Championship. 
This year's winner belongs to 62-year-old Claire Lawrence, from Litcham in Norfolk, and crossed the line in three minutes 41 seconds.
"I'm shell shocked my mum has won, as it's the first time she has entered," her son Harry Lawrence told Rex.
"She selected Sidney a couple of days ago and she has been training him in our garden and feeding him on a diet of rocket salad."
The world record stands at two minutes and was set by a snail called Archie in 1995. Unfortunately this year's windy conditions meant times were much slower than usual.

It's just brilliant. Firstly, and probably leastly, for the puns, whether intended or not. "I'm shell-shocked?" Did Harry actually say this? Was he planning to turn his flimsy connection to Sidney into some sort of platform for his comedic talents? Or was it genuinely inadvertent?

Then there's Sidney's award. A tankard (because a bowl or something would just be insulting) stuffed with lettuce (because of course a tankard alone would be of little value to a snail).

Then the training regime, and the apparent belief that two days on rocket salad made Sidney the snail he is today (or at least, then. He's probably been done in by a starling by now). Does Harry (you'll have picked up already that I have my suspicions about this Harry character) really think we can be led in to believing the logic that changing an animal's typical diet slightly (but not radically) for a fraction of its lifespan (starlings permitting) causes an animal to have heightened powers? It's a bit like (I've built myself up for a super-funny analogy here and I'm going to fail epically)......

The best bit though is learning that wind conditions greatly affect the performance of even rocket salad-eating snaiils. And that there are people who've studied whether they do or not. 

BREAKING NEWS...before I finish this, think I've just found the best taglines ever... the first result googling 'fastest snail 2011' comes up with a link to another snail racing event with the description:

FIRST it was worm charming and now it's snail racing...it can only mean one thing - The Prestatyn Flower Show