Quote Of The Day

"Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake - Chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower (1887-1956)"

Saturday, June 29, 2024

Pride Photoshoot…

So yesterday evening this Swedish woman spotted  Elliot Darce and me having a quiet beer down by the river. She kept shouting “I love your shirts!” and “photo shoot!” at us. She wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer. 😂 

Happy Pride to everyone who is celebrating today. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🥳

@arsenal
#Pride24
@adidaslondon
@gaygooners
@elliot.guthrie 
@darce_styles


















Friday, June 28, 2024

Air Fryer Scandal…

This has to be one of the greatest scandals since the last one. I, for one, demand answers. 

@whichuk #letters #airfryer #scandal #400gmissing  #£35 #rathermisled #willnoonethinkofthechildren 




Thursday, June 27, 2024

Cyndi Lauper @ Royal Albert Hall...

Last night Stuart, Darren, and I went to see Cyndi Lauper perform at the Royal Albert Hall in glitzy South Kensington.
 
Last time I saw her was on her Bring Ya To The Brink World Tour in 2008. Back then she was great. Last night, not so much.
 
The good: she was there, the hits were all there.
The bad: she sounded awful, woefully unrehearsed, the set was very short (80 mins).
 
The sound was dreadful. Time After Time made us wince. The trumpet player sounded like a 4-year-old with new Christmas present. The guitarist like he’d only just finished Guitars for Dummies. 

I hope Blogger mutes my video - if it can recognise the tune! 🤪
 
True Colors stopped and started more often than the Piccadilly Line on a hot day.
 
Yes, there were glimpses of her incredible stage presence like in 'I Drove All Night', but these were few and far between.
Yes, she acknowledged Pride Month and she has done amazing work with her True Colors and her Girls Just Want to Have Fun charities.
But we were there to hear her sing.
 
Was this a dress rehearsal for her Glastonbury gig? Probably. 
 
Let's hope she gets a chance to run through the sound cues and setlist a few more times before Saturday afternoon and sort out those sound issues.
 
Even the late appearance of six drag artists for the last song of the night did little to save the night.
 
 ⭐️⭐️
 
Set List
 
The Goonies 'R' Good Enough
She Bop
Into the Nightlife
Rocking Chair
I Drove All Night
Change of Heart
Time After Time
When You Were Mine (Prince cover)
Fearless (Acapella)
Money Changes Everything (The Brains cover)
Girls Just Want to Have Fun
 
Encore
Savage Daughter (Sarah Hester Ross cover) (Acapella Snippet)
Not My Father's Son (Snippet)
True Colors
Hey Now, Girls Just Want to Have Fun (With drag artists - Michael Marouli, Jonbers Blonde, Tete Bang, Tomara Thomas, Chiyo and Joan Oh)












Wednesday, June 26, 2024

Giulio Cesare @ Glyndebourne...

Yesterday afternoon Paul and I went to see Handel's Giulio Cesare (his retelling of Cleopatra and Julius Caesar’s tempestuous love affair) performed at Glyndebourne just outside glitzy Lewes in East Sussex.
 
Glyndebourne is a posh English country house, the site of an opera house that, since 1934, has been the venue for the annual Glyndebourne Opera Festival. Initially, operas were presented within the house but there is now a freestanding opera house in its grounds. The house itself is thought to be about six hundred years old and listed at grade II.
 
We had a boozy picnic in the grounds before the show started.
 
The show itself was great. Sung in Italian with supertitles accompanied by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. The production was lush - it was a sort of Bollywood meets Baroque. All-singing, all-dancing.
 
Countertenor Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen as Giulio Cesare was amazing. His vocal dexterity was incredible. Soprano Louise Alder's Cleopatra equally so.
 
But the spoils of the night must go to, and be shared between, Cameron Shahbazi as Tolomeo and Ray Chenez as Nireno. They were beautifully sung, laugh-out-loud funny, and both camp as a row of Egyptian tents. Great fun.
 
These were the timing of the night:-
Gardens open: 2.00pm
Opera starts Act I: 4.00pm
Interval (20 mins): 5.25pm
Opera resumes Act II: 5.45pm
Interval (90 mins): 6.50pm
Opera resumes Act III: 8.20pm
Opera ends: 9.30pm
 
The final third act actually finished slightly so with the applause still ringing in our ears we legged it for the exit so I could make the 10:25 Lewes train back to London.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
 





















Flag Pride. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

Flag Pride. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️ @gaygooners @thegunnerspub @gay.pride.london




 


Monday, June 24, 2024

Wells-next-the-Sea…

Stuart and I have spent a lovely long weekend with the family up on the north Norfolk coast in the beautiful port town of Wells-next-the-Sea. 

The weather has been great. We’ve been for walks, to the beach, and to the odd pub or two. Lovely.


















Friday, June 21, 2024

Horizon of Khufu: An Immersive VR Expedition to Ancient Egypt...

Last night Stuart and I ventured to glitzy Stratford to immerse ourselves in a spot of Egyptian VR. Horizon of Khufu: An Immersive VR Expedition to Ancient Egypt is a headset experience with 3D video and role play. 
 
The floor is a flat surface with black and white shapes.  Which is worth remembering later as the vertigo kicks in. 
 
We received the VR equipment - goggles with dials to get images in focus and control the volume.
 
With the goggles on I could see Stuart had transformed into a purple digital avatar with his name hovering above his head.
 
Suddenly I saw our virtual tour guide Mona, who led us to the Great Pyramid of Giza.
 
This breathtaking pyramid served as the tomb of the Pharaoh Khufu some 4,500 years ago.
 
Mona shone a light on its entrance half way up, suggesting we go and have a look.
 
I won't lie, my excitement turned into sheer terror. I took tiny steps with my arms out to balance because I thought I'd fall over.
 
The block we were standing then started rising, as I muttered to myself "this is a flat surface, this is not real, I cannot fall" and missed much of the historical information. 
 
In short, the experience was magnificent. Mona took us into tunnels and chambers in the interior, unveiling the ancient secrets and tomb of Pharaoh Khufu.
 
In one of the King's rooms, Mona dropped her torch and vanished to go and find another.
 
We were plunged into darkness, but a mystical cat, Bastet, goddess of protection, appeared and the adventure went up a gear.
 
Treading carefully over stone bridges that appeared magically, we stepped into areas in the pyramid's substructure inaccessible to any human. Vertigo was high as we floated way up high.
 
Our platform then took us up the outside of the pyramid and eventually way above the apex.  I had to remove my goggles at that point! 
 
Thankfully soon the Giza plateau shrank and we became giants looking over a magnificent landscape, with a birds-eye view of how the temples were connected.
 
In a magical moment the King's boat floated into view and we were invited to step on board to visit the land of the dead. 
 
We had a "return ticket" the cat purred, which was a relief.
 
I expected the River Styx(!), but blue skies and fishermen and water lilies near the banks indicated this was the River Nile. 
 
We alighted at a temple where funeral rituals including the embalming process were explained, and attended the funeral of the Pharaoh Khufu, led by his son.
 
There was quite a crowd, with historical figures I didn't recognise and several avatars indicating fellow visitors.
 
We then left the temple and said our goodbyes.
 
The whole experience - created by virtual reality studio Excurio in collaboration with Peter Der Manuelian, an Egyptology professor at Harvard University - was great fun.






Thursday, June 20, 2024

23…

As a man living in the UK I have got a 50/50 chance of living until I’m 85 years old.

So for me an average chance of seeing another 23 birthdays, another 23 Christmases, another 23 Springs, another 23 Summers, and another 23 New Years, and another 23 chances of Arsenal to win the league. 

A 50/50 chance of spending another 12,000 Friday nights out and another 12,000 Saturday mornings recovering. Every pleasure has its price!

23 years hence is 2047. 
23 years back is 2001. 

The universe was here long time before I was, and will be here a long time after I’m gone. 

Hopefully my atoms can be of some use once I’m gone. 

Far from being a depressing or reflective thing I look at as an opportunity.

An opportunity to enjoy myself, to help others, to make my mark, and to hug more. To live each day like it’s my last. And that’s what I do. 

And that’s a joyous thing. 

Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think. 





Tuesday, June 18, 2024

Arsenal Fixtures 24/25...

See you all next May 😂

Arsenal Fixtures 24/25...
 
AUGUST
Sat 17  Wolverhampton Wanderers (H)    
Sat 24  Aston Villa (A)    
Sat 31  Brighton & Hove Albion (H)
SEPTEMBER    
Sat 14  Tottenham Hotspur (A)    
Sat 21  Manchester City (A)    
Sat 28  Leicester City (H)
OCTOBER    
Sat 5  Southampton (H)    
Sat 19  Bournemouth (A)    
Sat 26  Liverpool (H)    
NOVEMBER
Sat 2  Newcastle United (A)    
Sat 9  Chelsea (A)    
Sat 23  Nottingham Forest (H)    
Sat 30  West Ham United (A)    
DECEMBER
Tue 3  Manchester United (H)    
Sat 7  Fulham (A)    
Sat 14  Everton (H)    
Sat 21  Crystal Palace (A)    
Thu 26  Ipswich Town (H)    
Sun 29  Brentford (A)    
JANUARY
Sat 4  Brighton & Hove Albion (A)    
Tue 14  Tottenham Hotspur (H)    
Sat 18  Aston Villa (H)    
Sat 25  Wolverhampton Wanderers (A)
FEBRUARY    
Sat 1  Manchester City (H)    
Sat 15  Leicester City (A)    
Sat 22  West Ham United (H)    
Tue 25  Nottingham Forest (A)
MARCH    
Sat 8  Manchester United (A)    
Sat 15  Chelsea (H)    
APRIL
Tue 1  Fulham (H)    
Sat 5  Everton (A)    
Sat 12  Brentford (H)    
Sat 19  Ipswich Town (A)    
Sat 26  Crystal Palace (H)
MAY    
Sat 3  Bournemouth (H)    
Sat 10  Liverpool (A)    
Sun 18  Newcastle United (H)    
Sun 25  Southampton (A)
 
 

Monday, June 17, 2024

Saka Sauce…

Thank you Nando’s UK for the free Saka sauce bottles. Nice giveaway idea. ❤️🔴⚪️⚽️🌶️
@bukayosaka87 
@nandosuk