From the drafts: Crafty games

This was one of the final TinaLostInSpace posts that never made it. That's because I only added the photos. No comments, no writing, no nothing...I'll do that now.

It'll probably not surprise you that I was big into crafts when I was little. Every Christmas and birthday I got something that needed me to make, create, paint, set, do. I had them all, plaster of Paris, clay, Fimo modelling clay...and these fine examples of craftiness.

Latch hook is actually quite hard to do, which is why this remains mostly undone.

The weaving loom though...

Oh yeah, half done as well.

Sylvanian Families paint by numbers is done. Actually, this was a practice one just done on paper, not the 'canvas' they give you. So what, I liked to practice my crafts.

There was something I did particularly enjoy about the things I found - the box kids. You know, the ones that demonstrate what you're supposed to do and how well they can do it (which, no matter how hard you try, you'll never be able to recreate). Take these examples:

I don't know how old you have to be before you can be described as 'preppy' but I'd say that boy has reached it. (Discover Food Technology allowed to do experiments on mouldy bread and the like. You got your own petri dishes and everything.]

Oh hair, hair, hair. So big you don't notice the braces until at least the second look. (Bead and stitch, you probably had one yourself. Ahem.)

It's good to have your ribbons match your shirt and pinafore combo. (Clothes peg dolls could be the theme of a four Yorkshire (wo)men skit. Dolls? We used to dream of dolls, we used to make them out of clothes pegs. Clothes pegs? Luxury.)

I also found a few card games. Nothing was complete, except this one, The Neighbours Card Game.

It's like a version of Happy Families, you have to complete the families, which if you can't see are the Robinsons, the Mangels, the Clarkes, and the Ramseys. Proper old Neighbours like.

Well, you don't just lose your Neighbours cards, do you? 

Ah good 80s times!

From the drafts: old computers

This should have gone on August 17th, but I think I thought I was plaguing you with posts about my roof space tidy. So better now to post it when I'm plaguing you with posts in order to beat the deadline eh?

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Technically the tidying started last week. Dad started to throw away our old computers, like this one.

A Mackintosh PowerMac 5500. It boasted a 4GB hard drive and interweb capabilities.

This was its laptop cousin, a PowerBook 5300cs. No one in my house remembers actually buying it. Do let us know if you think it's yours.

Our very first computer, a Spectrum ZX. That's not a tape deck folks, that's where you load the games!

I found video of the screen you got when a game was loading on You Tube. There's no sound though, I remember there being a screechy kind of sound.

Our favourite games were Treasure Island and Postman Pat. Both are on You Tube, of course.



That's 128k technology right there my friend.

Then the Postman Pat game. You can click through to it here, I didn't want to post it because of the username of the person who posted it - you might be sensitive to such words. Bet you click through now though...

This game became famous in our house for the phrase 'Cup of tea Pat?'. Even now, every once in a while it's likely my parents will say it each other (neither of them are called Pat, you probably knew that though.)

From the drafts: I've got a golden ticket

[This is from June 22nd. As you might guess, I'm excited for 2012 arrive!]

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The email finally telling us what we got in the Olympics came last night. I had heard rumours that if you checked your 2012 account in the early hours of the morning then you'd see what they got. I tried that, as it happens at 23.59pm and nothing. At the stroke of midnight I hit refresh and bam! There were my bloody handball tickets listed in all their glory!

Obviously I got mum to check hers immediately and I am delighted to say that she got Athletics tickets for the last night! How exciting! The night includes:

- 4 x 100m Men's Final (no baton drops in the heats Team GB, USA or Jamaica please and thank you)

- 5000m Men's Final (Mo Farah, I hope you decide to double up)

- 800m Women's Final (Jenny Meadows? Come on girl!)

So today I have been reliving some 4 x 100m action. I must have watched this about five times today. My favourite things are Steve Cram saying 'In fact it was terrible!" and Maurice Green's seriously unimpressed face during the medal ceremony. Brilliant!

Slightly concerned that Team GB don't really have many sprinters left in their prime, never mind their baton dropping. So who knows if we'll see them even make the final.

And there's this one, which lacks Steve Cram's excitement. The commentators seem slightly underwhelmed by Jamaica breaking a world record which stood since the days of Carl Lewis. So you'll have to make your own excitement of the magic of 37.10.




[December edit: I was lucky enough to receive a How to Watch the Olympics book for Christmas. It's very good, although, strangely it lists the sport as Handball, not Bloody Handball as it is referred to in our house.]

'Resolutions'

My resolution this year was to write more. I wrote my dissertation, all 20,000 words of it (60,000 if you include appendices. Just saying.) So check that one off the list.

I also vowed to blog more. And I did do that too! Last year I blogged 64 times. This year, I'm up to 66. Oh yeah! I say 'up to' because obviously this one will make it 67. Plus if you include the drafts that I never quite published (but am about to) I'll beat the dizzy heights of 2009 level blogging. Not sure the glory days Princess blogging in 2005-2007 will ever return. Ah, glory days.

I'm not sure the point of resolutions is to do them on the last day, but I do like the pressure of a deadline.

Click here to read:
I've got a golden ticket
Old computers
Crafty games

Christmas activities

New Year's Eve. Ugh. Not only is Christmas over, it's followed by the most hyped two days of all. We've had a good Christmas, lots of reading (Michael Johnson's book, Gold Rush, and Bill Bryson's Troublesome Words, which made me never want to write again - I make so many mistakes), gaming (see below) and television watching. Right now I'm watching Who Do You Think You Are? Actually this one is called Who Do You Think You Are UK? because I recorded it from RTE (southerners say 'Who d'ya think ye aar? but OarTE. I know, you enjoy my deep observations on life.)

I was happy to chance upon it earlier this week because it's the one I saw being filmed on my way home from work one day. I blogged about it here. It was being made in the autumn of 2006, and depending how well you know/remember the life of Tina, I was away in Singapore 2007 so missed it's transmission. I had looked on repeats on BBC and on Yesterday or whatever channel they appear on, but then chanced upon it this week on RTE! Delighted, I was!

As I watched the opening credits I was a bit confused because there, staring off into the distance in front of some barn/battlefield/workhouse, were celebrities whose programmes I'd seen, like Chris Moyles and Kim Cattrall. Had I actually been back and missed it? Nope, the opening moments of the programme told me OarTE had repackaged the programme, with some Irish accented man narrating. So they must have picked out the 'best' ones too. I still checked the website to be doubley sure. Sure enough, Graham's was broadcast in October 2007. Yeeeoooo.

And sure enough when I watched the programme I saw the bit I saw being filmed.

My original photograph. My phone camera didn't have zoom. But it's him.

As I think this photo from the programme shows.

I forgot when I blogged about it first time of the Graham H connection and how if I had gone to get him he could have met his namesake. I speculated at the time that this might have made the cut. Well, a funny exchange with a passer-by did so, I'm going to say, for sure I could have been on TV.

"They seem nice..."

In other Christmas activity news, we finished our jigsaw. Like I might have mentioned before we're a jigsawing kind of family. Or as I've typed each time (and then corrected) jogsaw. Our jogsaw (I'm just going to leave it) of choice this Christmas was this olde worlde shopping from the 1950s.

It doesn't look too bad, there's lots of distinctive pieces, but that's exactly the problem - they're all distinctive pieces.

When the box arrived we put it under the tree, alongside the tin of Roses (a tree just looks better with a tin of Roses underneath. You can keep your Quality Street.) Anyway, it was all looking lovely. And then Christmas Eve came when I wrapped my presents and put them under the tree.

"But oh no, what this? Oh the jogsaw box. I'll move it to make room....presents, presents, presents...I'll carry them across..."

Crunch!

I stood on the box. Not only was there a massive Tina sized foot dent, the box even ripped in the impact. Oopsy. Thankfully no pieces were harmed in this act of clumsiness.

All good jogsawers know you start with the frame.

Getting there...

And we're done! Let me just say that basket down at the  bottom was ridiculously hard.

I got to spend some time round at the home of the Duke and Duchess of Finaghy. As any good host knows, after-dinner entertainment must be planned. Thankfully Nicky knew this and laid on a great game of Mullet Power Top Trumps. Makes me want to see the Royal Wedding version ever more now.

You couldn't make it up.

We also played a good old fashioned game of Boggle. Word games like this aren't my favourite, I'm just not very good at them. My words in this game were mostly made up of three letter words, like pea, lad, gin... I got a handful of four letter word (no, not that sort) and the whole game I only got one five letter word, sings. I thank you. I wasn't allowed coo, which I thought was a travesity. People coo at babies all the time. But they very generously allowed me peed, you know, I peed, you peed, he peed.

That's why it's best to just leave me to the jogsaws.

Saying happy Christmas!

I didn't send cards this year. Thanks very much for yours (if you sent me one). Sorry if you are thinking I'm extremely rude and struck you off my list. That's not true, I didn't even have a list. So please take this instead as my card.

Nothing says "Celebrate hope, joy and love!" like posing with a giant snowman. [Photo taken by Megan.]

While my card writing efforts were poor, I did make the effort for my present gift tags. Not just a present to show I cared, oh no! They got a hand-made, original, one of a kind Tina-made gift-tag. The lucky recipients got these bad boys.

Too bad my handwriting has deteriorated so badly that the inside of the tag wasn't as pretty as the outside. That said, if there was a world record for gift tag making and speed writing, I'd really pick up points in the speed writing element.

When I was making them I realised that gift tags such as these wouldn't really be the things for Johnny and Kiera. Kiera would probably try to eat the angel, which couldn't have many benefits (although who's to know what digesting a celestial being and their glad tidings might do for you?) Johnny, on the other hand, wouldn't care two hoots for an angel on a bit of sparkly card and nice ribbon. Furthermore, they can't read, so labelling any present with their names was pointless.

So I came up with a clever plan to show who the present was for and who it was from.

Kiera is even cuter as a little elf. I'm Sant-ina!

For Johnny's one, I tried to make one of us into a snowman, but the results were disappointing, and not in the least bit snowmany.  And besides, what goes with a snowman? Santa would have to be repeated and there didn't appear to be many more options than what I ended up with, but that meant I would have to be, well, a reindeer.

Although I'd prefer it if you called me Rutolphina.

I still printed the tags on sparkly paper.

Oh come on, what was I supposed to do? I couldn't abandon all my pretty crafting principles, could I?!

A fair exchange

Karen Photographer and I went for lunch together today.

She gave me a gingerbread man that wasn't decorated.

And he had a broken leg.

I gave her a card with a typo.

I should also mention it was a birthday card. From last month. I forgot to bring it with me when it was her birthday, alright.

I fixed the card.

And the gingerbread man? 

Well like Doc Brown would say, 'Legs? Where's he's going, he won't need legs!'

The Christmas switch

I'm not quite ready for Christmas yet. I should be. Earlier this week, rather smugly, I thought I had all my presents when I got my last delivery this week. I didn't even open the package til the afternoon, because I knew what it was. Ha! What a fool I was! In short, the bozos messed up my order, sent me the wrong thing and now I'm a present down because of the hoops I have to jump through in order to return it and get the right thing back. Bozos.

Other things I have to do include, but are not limited to:
-Tidying my room (I think it's always nice to have a tidy room and clean bed clothes on Christmas Eve.)
-Making rocky road traybakes (Just call me Nigella.)
-Ironing (All my ironing is in the utility room, sorry, I mean dining room. That'll never do.)
-Wrap presents (Although I traditionally don't do this until Christmas Eve. See below.)

Things I've done to get ready for Christmas include, but are not limited to:
-Decorate the tree (With Christmas Day being on a Sunday ours is up for the maximum time. Eh...see below again)
-Shopping (annual shopping trip to Belfast with Father and ordering some stuff online? Done.)
-The Christmas food big shop and annual trip to M&S (it's the only time we get food from M&S, best summed up in these four words 'Wensleydale and blueberry cheese'.)

I don't know about you, but what makes it Christmas to me is a hundred million tiny things, mostly based around our own family's Christmas traditions. Everyone has these. Dave Gorman on his radio show this week got people to tweet the things listeners' families did that no one else does. They included the men of the family all sitting down to watch a spaghetti western on Christmas Eve, someone's parents putting wrapping paper across their bedroom door frame so they have to burst out on Christmas morning (genius idea!) and someone having to tidy up all the discarded wrapping paper and when they go out to the kitchen to throw it out their final big present is out there. Ah family Christmas traditions!

My family's aren't that spectacular. Like most families we get special-don't-buy-them-any-other-time-of-year foods, like the aforementioned Wensleydale and blueberry cheese, but also Primula cheese (you may know it by it's more common name of 'toothpaste cheese') and duck spring rolls (and other party food) from M&S. You might be more extravagant than ours and get those foods during the year. Like Cheryl was at CHW when she brought Wensleydale and blueberry cheese camping! I've never been more shocked. Not us though.

We don't put our tree up until two Sundays before Christmas. Mostly because we get a real tree, but also because decorating the tree has always been a Sunday afternoon activity. We could never put our tree up on any other day. Another one is that I always go Christmas shopping with my dad. This originates from when David and I were small and dad would take us shopping, in turn, to buy each other's present. Equally, I don't wrap my presents until Christmas Eve, because my dad would take us in turn to wrap them on Christmas Eve while Mum was busy cooking stuff. It genuinely doesn't feel right to me to wrap Christmas presents before Christmas Eve, you know if there's someone you need to give their present to earlier than Christmas Day.

I think for these reasons my Christmas switch take a few weeks to come on. It's more your dimmer switch. It's not just seeing the Coca-Cola holidays a-coming advert or having Elf on TV. My Christmas switch does not get flicked on on 1st December or by me playing a Christmas song on my iPod. I can't make myself feel Christmassy in November. I'm immune to Christmas adverts before December; you're wasting your money on me advertisers. Same with Christmas music. To me, it's just wrong in November (and October - Scott Mills I'm looking at you). To me, it's a feeling that builds over a couple of weeks in December. I can't help it, it's just how I was raised.

That said, I'm there now. I unleashed my Christmas jumper this week. Oh yes.

Court of arbitration for Scattergories

Here's a idea world, can we have a Court of Arbitration for Scattergories? (Actually, for the sake of its acronym and to avoid confusion with the actual CAS it should be a Scattergories Court of Arbitration (SCA).) You know Scattergories, that game where you have certain categories and have to things in that category that begin with a particular letter, but can't be the same as anyone else suggested? (You may have played its unofficial home-made version of Bus Stop or Fish and Chips.)

I've never played a game where there weren't arguments about the validity of some answers. Actually, by the end of the game it's most of the answers. A few weeks ago we had a get-together with a few CHW buddies and out came Scattergories. It was all good fun and enjoyable craic, but there were some still some arguments going on.

Take for example the category 'Something cold'. It was suggested by one team that doorstep was something cold. Hmmm...I wouldn't say that's always true. Nor would I say it's the first (or even second) adjective you'd use to describe it. It got voted down. When that happened the team tried to back reference to the previous round when arctic wind was awarded a point. Not always cold they said. Well, while that might be true (I'm no geographer), the round after is not the time to launch your complaint.

The currencies category proved particularly difficult with the letters we had. C? I was quite pleased with my suggestion of cigarettes (in prison) as an answer. I thought it was clever and, more importantly true (if TV shows and movies are to be believed - I've never been) so the other teams might be so impressed with its brilliance that they'd allow it. Not so. It was voted down. Huh.

The next letter was B. Again difficult. But a discussion was had at the start of the round about whether you could have old currencies, like before the Euro. It was decided you could, so we offered the Belgian franc. It was a currency, it begins with B. But noooooo we were told, it begins with F they said. This is a tricky one and one of the reasons why I suggest the SCA. Because, if you go down the route of only allowing what the unit of currency is called (pound, won, dollar) then you rule out a lot of currencies in countries where the unit of currency was unimaginatively named the same as another. Dollar, well do you mean the US, Canadian, Singapore, Australian, Hong Kong and indeed most of the Caribbean? The Great British pound, or the Egyptian pound or the Guernsey pound?  North Korean or South Korean won?  However, I do see the counter-argument. If you take the country's name into account, well then it's just about writing the country (albeit with the correct currency unit). Tricky. But I stand by my earlier argument, the name of the currency needs the country as the descriptor. Other descriptors were allowed on the night, for example we were successful with old sock for something that smells beginning with O. Equally, I would argue that we would have been successful with sock in that same category but with S. Of course, maybe there would have been no arguments if they'd been easy letters. Standing by the unit arguments, you'd have to be as obscure as the Birr (Ethiopian) and the Colon (Costa Rican) to get any points in those rounds. Unless I'm missing something more obvious on XE.com.

Another one I'd like a ruling on from the SCA is on 'vegetables'. That term, I would argue, is somewhat ambiguous. Do you mean a plant grown for food or a more culinary/cultural definition, ie what it's eaten with/when it's eaten? Because you see, to me, in order for the game to be accessible for all, surely the aim of all board games, it should be the later. And as a consequence, we would have been allowed olive. Nobody puts olives in a fruit salad, or decorates a cheesecake with them. Equally, cream of rhubarb soup it's not a thing anyone eats on a cold winter day. And poor mushrooms, they're nothing in all of this.

Colours is definitely a category that needs a ruling on. Light and dark is tricky. I'd say lazy descriptors like that shouldn't be rewarded, but yet other descriptors (again, like old sock) are allowed, so reluctantly they have to be allowed on consistency grounds. You need the descriptors in colours otherwise you'd only get about 10 letters covered. Oh and I'd say the SCA needs a definitive ruling on black and the nay-sayers who say it's not a colour. So clearly a colour. Crayola have a crayon with it written on and everything.

On the YF weekend, we played the home-made version and colour was a category. For D my group offered denim. I think that's perfectly acceptable, you know immediately what colour it is. But we got shouted down. The group beside us even offered us the history of denim and how it was named after Nimes, the French town, and therefore was unacceptable as a colour. You can understand therefore why we got the biggest laugh at their suggestion of Dijon mustard! They didn't think that through, did they?! And anyway mustard? Yes, I'd say that's an identifiable colour. Dijon mustard is clearly just a condiment. 

And this double letter, double point rule? Don't get me started! This has been abused too much over the years and the SCA needs to rule on what exactly is covered. For example, you should not be able to use part of the category to get more points. Things at a football match beginning with F cannot be football fans for two points. The fact the fans are at a football match in the first place, it's clear they're football fans and not rugby, Daniel O'Donnell or any other sort of fans. The descriptor is just an abuse of the generous double points on offer. But what if you've got three (or more) words and only two begin with the letter? Do you get double points? Like Movies/C? Catch Me If You Can. And what if it's T and there's a The in the answer. That's not a double scoring points surely, because in other parts you ignore it, and have, for example The West Wing under W. Are triple points (Clothing/S? Short sleeved shirt) not a logical extension of the double point rule?

See, it's tricky stuff this Scattergories business. In the research for this post  I came across other people who've had arguments themselves so I know it's not just the games I've played. One couple argued over menu items, and particularly the veracity of the claim that Tim the Toolman Taylor was a TV star. She took it to her blog here. He responded, in a Frankee/Eamon kind of way, on his blog (some swearing, *ed out). Best I can tell they're still together. 

That's the urgency with which we need a SCA. We're in the festive season where families gather round and play board games. How many of these will end in arguments and fights? 

Hopefully none like this though. A horrible 'incident' over whether a Philips screwdriver could be used as a weapon where three people died in an attempt to prove it. Fear not, it's just a satire site. But for how long?!

We're sticking to jigsaws this Christmas. Nice bit team work and no point scoring.

Sports (Male) Personality

Dear Sportspeople of the female gender,

The first thing I noticed about this year's BBC Sports Personality of the Year award nominees was that none of 'your kind' had made the list. 'Huh', I thought to myself and then I began to wonder who should have been nominated instead of all these men.

After a second I realised Jess Ennis should have been, but her silver medal at the World Championships was probably a bit of a disappointment to these fine people who nominate the shortlist. Afterall, she got gold in 2009 and could only manage third in the public vote. Last year, when she won the European Championships with a personal best, again she was third. So yes, second in the world is a bit of a disappointment and let's face it Jess, you're not going to make any improvement on your third places with that. But wait now. Wasn't Andy Murray also second in the Australian Open? Well still, he won Wimbledon so that's probably ok then. Oh no, wait, I just remembered that he went out in the semi-finals...again.

Then there's Rebecca Adlington. She's always winning things. And yup, in 2011, there she was winning a world title, casual as you like. Although, I say that, it was anything but casual. Adlington was 0.65s behind Friis (in first place) at the bell, she turned it round in the last 100m to win by 0.69s. And let's not forget, this was the 800m; the rest of the competitors came in 5-15s later, just to highlight further the fight she had on her hands. I should make mention of her silver medal in the 400m too.

But again, though in this award, you women shouldn't expect too much. In 2008, when Adlington won two, two gold medals at the Olympics, she came third. Nevermind Adlington's medals were the first Olympic golds any British woman had won in the pool since 1960 - before Gary Lineker was even born. She was third to some fine sportspeople though. Chris Hoy won. Well three golds is more than two golds. Fair enough.

Lewis Hamilton was second that year, and oh my, how those Formula One drivers have had to wait to be recognised. Not since 1896 has a Formula One driver won SPOTY. Sorry, I meant 1996. There were no cars in 1896, silly. In fact, Formula 1 personalities have only won SPOTY six times. Out of a whopping 57 times it's been awarded. Why, that's less than half the number of times a woman across all sports have won it (12.5 awards to women, Jane Torvill having the 0.5 award when she won with Christopher Dean.) So poor old Formula One. Although, comparing the winners of the Driver's Championships with the placings of the SPOTY, it does seem to guarantee that you'll at least place. Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton, and James Hunt all placed while Damon Hill (twice), Nigel Mansell (twice), Jackie Stewart, and Stirling Moss won it. See women if you were to get a bit more involved in Formula 1, then you'd be sorted and there'd be none of this complaining nonsense.

A few people have mentioned that Chrissie Wellington should have been nominated. Truthfully? I've never heard of her before. Which is remarkable because apparently she has won four Ironman Triathalon World Championships, you know the one where you swim forever, cycle forever and then do a marathon? Yeah, that. She's won that four times! Quite the achievement, eh?! Why have I not heard of her before? Still Chrissie, take heart. Look at poor Phil 'The Power' Taylor. He had to win the PDC World Championship (you know the one half the darts players play in?) 13 times before he got second place last year at SPOTY. Ah now, Chrissie, let's not go down the line of saying darts isn't a real sport. It's throwing. And walking. And darts players are well known for needing emergency rehydration...at the bar.

I do have a vague memory of Kath Grainger winning something this year too. Although I can't quite remember what it was exactly. Sorry, I was busy in the roof space during the highlights of the rowing World Championships and couldn't make it out. But can you blame me? Men's sport is built up to be event television. Women's sport is...well, something to put on the red button. Look at how the Football World Cup was shown this year. Yes, this year, not 2010. Sorry, did I not say the Women's World Cup? I should have been more specific. Anyway, there it was on the red button - until the English team made it to the quarterfinals. Now, come on, don't be silly, it wasn't quite as simple as just getting to the quarterfinals to get on regular television. Oh no, what's women's sports mainstream coverage without a bit of last minute letters from politicians to campaign beforehand? Apparently, the reason why it couldn't be scheduled to be on BBC2 before was because of those pesky male golfers and their British Open were on BBC1. Oh you're right, the BBC does have two mainstream terrestial channels, but who wants sport on both of them? Especially so soon after Wimbledon and all its simultaneous BBC1, BBC2 and red button coverage.

Sadly, the team got beaten on penalties. Imagine if they'd won; they might have been in with a shout of the Team of the Year at the awards. I say might, because it seems women's teams have only ever one once, the 1969 4x400m relay team. And they had to share it. Well, it was a Ryder Cup Year. Reading the Wikipedia entry for the Ryder Cup that year though, you'd wonder why. It was marred by unsports...person like behaviour from both sides. And it was tied so the USA actually retained the Cup. So that's why I say the footballers might have won. It seems that men's teams can win Team of the Year, by not even winning their competition outright, and can be unsporting in doing so.

The important thing here, British Sportswomen, is not to panic. It's not like there's any different treatment for international sportswomen, for they have only managed to win Overseas Personality of the Year six times, out of 51 times it's been awarded. That said, I'm pretty sure that wasn't the equality you were after.

But see, the really difficult thing, girls, is that's it's the Sports Personality of the Year; you need to capture, not only the public's imagination, but as we're learning, also the sports editors and journalists from papers around the country. If only you had some interesting stories which they could tell and then we could read in order to capture our imagination. Like Darren Clarke, he's nominated this year. He'd never won a major before, but aged 42 he did! Of course, many of us remember the terrible tragedy of him losing his wife to cancer in 2006. Yet, he helped Europe to a famous victory in the Ryder Cup just a few weeks later. An awful story like that can't be compared with another, of course. But if all things were equal, SPOTY recognition would surely be coming Sarah Stevenson's way. She won a gold medal in the Taekwondo World Championships in May while both her parents were in the last grips of terminal cancer. Sadly, she lost both of them within months of each other. Wow. Talk about mental strength. I hope you can win gold next year at the Olympics Sarah, when no doubt you'll get lots more coverage. 

Gary Lineker said on The One Show when the ten nominees for SPOTY were announced, "Perhaps not been a strong year in women's sport for British women...let's hope that'll change next year with the Olympics." But you see sportwomen, I beg to differ with Sir Gary. I’d change his words to "Perhaps not been a strong year in women's sport coverage for British women...that will change next year with the Olympics." We know that on previous Olympics years it has changed. Maybe not enough to win the award, but enough to be recognised. Thank goodness they don't have separate medals tables, one for the men and one for the women, eh?

So keep doing what you’re doing. Keep being brilliant, keep winning, keep fighting. Some time, somehow, the press and the media will actually give you widespread coverage in non-Olympic years.

Yours,

Tina

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Dear BBC,

I love you. You know I do. But maybe Gary shouldn’t have been so quick to blame the newspapers for the nominations. Perhaps look to the coverage you provide of women in sport yourself. Yes, I'm thinking of the red button here. It's good, but it's not great.

And maybe, as a separate issue, you could expand the list of who is asked to nominate to be more, I don't know, inclusive. Just a thought.

Warm regards,

Tina

______________________

Dear Daily Post, Daily Star Sunday, Evening Standard, The Independent, Irish News, Metro, Nuts, The People and Western Mail and Zoo

You suck. Sorry to be blunt. But if you're in the business of sports reporting and can't see how female sports performances and achievements are worthy of reporting and how they've captured the public's imagination, then it needs to be said, out loud and to your face. So again I say: You suck.

Please do better in future. Assuming you're asked again of course.

Thanks in advance,

Tina

______________________

Dear Alex Chick,

Footballers were again snubbed? Get in line.

You remind me of a great CJ quote in The West Wing:

Sam: Where'd you get the bathrobe?
Carol: The gym.
Sam: There are bathrobes at the gym?
CJ: In the women's locker room.
Sam: But not the men's.
CJ: Yeah.
Sam: Now, that's outrageous. There's a thousand men working here and 50 women.
CJ: Yeah, and it's the *bathrobes* that's outrageous.


Oh, wait. Did you mean women footballers were snubbed in the year of a decent performance at the World Cup? Yeah, that is ridiculous.

Yours in blogging,

Tina


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Here's a great article with some stats about coverage, sponsorship and number female sports journalists. Even if you don't read it, this is worth knowing: women's sports coverage makes up just 5% of all sports media. In a good year.

Compare and contrast Children in Need with Comic Relief

A few years ago I wrote a blog about how I didn't really like Children in Need. I watched it last night. I know, I know, I've changed. But so have they; they've changed it since I wrote that. They've dropped a lot of the local element from it. Instead of cross overs to the regions with what I (accurately) described in 2005, you get a (relentless) ticker across the bottom of the screen telling you of local schools and community groups' fundraising efforts with the odd pre-recorded film specific to NI.

As I watched last night I began to think though the ways in which Children in Need and Comic Relief differ, now that the BBC regions have been reigned in. While there's a lot of similarities between the two, there's no doubt that Comic Relief is much more edgy, both in terms of the appeal films and the content of the entertainment. This edginess definitely gives it a cooler feel. Is that related to how much each night typically raises? Up until last night's record £26 million, Children in Need never really broke the £20 million on the night barrier. Comic Relief typically raises £50-60 million on the night. This year it was £74 million.

Another big difference is Comic Relief focus on Africa as well as the UK. Maybe the totals raised means we're still shocked at the starvation, illness and poverty that exists in the world today? I hope so.

Given these changes, I set to and created a handy guide to the differences and similarities between the two charities (including the Comic Relief spin-off, Sport Relief). I did it in the style of a wordle, with the larger the type meaning the more importance/greater emphasis/association it has on/with the night. The colours mean nowt, but they do make it pretty.

Of course, when you're talking differences then there's perhaps none bigger than the Wogan factor. Last night he seemed to have a dose of the Brucies. You know, not quite knowing where he was, scripted jokes, not knowing how to read the autocue, talking over Tess, that kind of thing. Still, you can't imagine it without him. Although we said that about the Eurovision too and Graham Norton is so fantastic on it I barely miss Wogan.

If you do miss the more cringy aspects of Children in Need, given their new output, please enjoy these videos from yesteryear.

(Please be warned the song will be stuck in your head all the flipping live long day, like it's stuck in mine.)

Not dissimilar to Gareth Malone's choir last night. Although they sang Avril Lavigne (or Avrille Le Vine if you're Terry - see here at 2:40.45. I thought Fearne did very well not to show laughter in her face.)

I don't even know how to explain this next one. It's from the opening of the 1992 show. It nearly hurts to watch it.

Contemporary dance

I know what you're thinking, when did I get so cultured. But hang tight. This post will again confirm that I'm horribly mainstream.

You see, I've learnt last summer that contemporary dance doesn't have be 'dancing' in a morphsuit/floaty pastel dress to clanging atonal music. Oh no. There's a subdivision I have named Mainstream Contemporary Dance. It's for dancing numpties like me.

I was watching Dancing With the Stars on Saturday morning. See, right there, mainstream. Anyway Christina Perri was on it (again with the mainstream, although I'll come back to this later). Anyway the American version of Strictly seems to have some sort of 'Sob Story Slot' (this might not be the actual name of it) and so there was a girl who'd had a brain tumour on dancing to Christina Perri's song 'Arms'. Now with all the airplay (remember, mainstream) of Jar of Hearts I hadn't heard this. It's lovely and the dance was beautiful. More ballet perhaps than contemporary dance (although in my limited understanding of contemporary dance that seems to be ok), but beautiful all the same.




Skip to 3.00 for the dance, although her story with the brain tumour is worth it for context.

Anyway that reminded me of reading Christina Perri's story and how her Jar of Hearts song was featured on the American So You Think You Can Dance last summer when she was trying to make it. She was working as a waitress, the song was used and bam, two weeks later she had a recording deal. I came across this reading another blog I dip in and out of and it had me in a loop of watching dances from the American SYTYCD (which is infinitely better than ours by the way). So in this small way, I was ahead of the curve on Christina Perri. Not mainstream. Ha!

Then on Sunday night's Strictly, who was appearing? Only Christina Perri. She sang Jar of Hearts (see aforementioned airplay) and they had Kristina and Robin dance to it in that Stricly come-on-half-way-through-the-song way. I don't really know what 'style' of dance they did, essentially they just did a lot of tricks and what not. It reminded me of the free dance the finalists do, although Christina's dress is Rumba-y. But then she's in bare feet which is the contemporary signal to me, so it's confusing to a dance novice like myself. I will say this though, those candles must have been a bally nightmare to light and keep lit. And it now seems to be important for men to dance to Christina Perri songs with their shirts unbuttoned.




You don't have to watch it, it wasn't my favourite and it's not that important to the post, but seeing as I mentioned it I thought I might as well make it easy for you.

Anyway, this is all pointing to my two favourite contemporary dances from my tour through them last summer which I thought I'd share (annoyingly, I can't embed them here, but you've stuck with this post this long, you may as well click on through).

First off, the Jar of Hearts one that discovered Christina Perri. I'm going to sound like a real contemporary dance numptyhead here, but I thought the interpretation of the lyrics was so much better than the Strictly one. You can watch it here.

This is my favourite one though. Just beautiful. And then Cat Deeley starts to speak. It's to Collide, which interestingly is song that featured on my August 2006 playlist...the same time as I was watching Travis Wall (who choreographed this routine - he's standing at the end) competing in SYTYCD. Yeah, fair enough, only interesting to me.

Much like this post. Unless you too are a fan of mainstream contemporary dance.

Dreaming big

Tonight, Karen Marathon* has her very first photography exhibit. It's based around her iPhone photographs, or iPhoneography, if you will. [You can see some of her work on her new website.]

I would like to take some credit for encouraging her along this photography route. Here's the proof. Not long after I wrote that we both started a GCSE in Photography. Although I didn't finish it, Karen did and will soon have a degree in Creative Imaging. Yeah, ok there's a limit to how much credit I can actually take.

Even walking down the street is like seeing inside her photography brain. She sees a class photo in something I (and let's face it, probably you) would walk right past.

Like this chair in a front yard in Studentland. I think you can see I walked past it.

Or these closed curtains. I know, really, closed curtains. But there was a great photo in that.

Yesterday I went with her to help set up the studio where the exhibit will be. It was so great to be there, it was another landmark in the journey. Karen got a lovely gift and card from someone she has inspired to follow her own adventure in photography. I nearly cried. Karen, for the record, held it together like a pro, like a pros tend to do.

Anyway, not to go all Martin Luther King on you, Karen has a dream and she's steadily working towards it.

I like it when people dream big. I like it even more when they start achieving those dreams. It's exciting!

*Tonight Karen Marathon will become Karen Photographer in my contacts. It seems only right.

The goose is getting fat

I don't know why Hallowe'en is as big as it is really. It must be the dressing up. It kind of annoys me. Like today on This Morning there were witches (I'm not actually sure if they were witches or 'witches', I didn't watch long enough to find out). Do they ever have Christians on when it's Christmas or Easter? I've never seen that happen.

Anyway, that said, last week on our YF weekend we had pumpkins to carve.

My group did the Christian thing to do crosses on it.

I've never carved a pumpkin before so it was quite cool. Back when we younger you didn't ever see a pumpkin in the supermarket, no way. But now they're all over the place. So along with the younger generation thinking ours is weird because we didn't have mobile phones or the internet, they're also going to think it's hilarious that we didn't have pumpkins, like we were living through the War when they didn't have bananas.

We used to carve turnips. In fact truth be told, I used to think that American turnips were really orange in colour. Yeah, I know. Shut up.

You don't often see a pumpkin head with a moustache. That's Hallowe'en's fault for being before Movember.

Reminiscing about carving turnips turned into a funny Yorkshiremen-esque bit between me and a co-leader:

Pumpkins! Luxury! We never had pumpkins.
No, never.
Turnips. We carved turnips.
Turnips? Luxury! We used potatoes. And then we had to eat them.
Eat potatoes?! We used to dream of eating potatoes...

It really helps if you read it with a Yorkshire accent in mind. Not that I can do one, you understand.


Paradise!

And just while I'm on this little Hallowe'en rant, what's the deal with trick or treating? Give me a bit of hallowe'en rhyming. Youth clubs around NI could probably get European funding to protect that part of NI culture.

Unplayed

I'm been working on my computer tonight so thought I'd play some music. I was a bit bored of whatever was playing and thought it'd be a good idea to play some of the tracks I've never played before. I was shocked, shocked I say to discover there are 3039 of them. Three thousand and thirty nine of them! Are you kidding me?! Even taking out the 133 re-imported voice memos (love you iOS 5) that's 2906 songs I've never listened to. I've gone to the trouble of putting them on there and never listened to them. Why, why?

Some of the things are just recent imports from #TinaLostinSpace but there's still some surprising songs, either because I have them, or because I've never listened to them, and of course there's some no-great-shock-I've-never-listened-to-you songs.

Here are some examples:

Category 1 - Songs I can't believe I have
Lost Pup (in a Christmas Shop) - Adam Faith (Seriously? What?)
Venus - Bananarama (No way, I have that?)
Axel F - Crazy Frog (You are making a mockery of my iTunes.)
Hero - Enrique Iglesias (I don't have a lighter, that's probably why I've never play this)
Let's Face the Music and Dance - Fred Astaire (He sung too, did he? Huh.)
Any Dream Will Do - Jason Donovan (Fear not, I've played Too Many Broken Hearts)
The Rain in Spain - My Fair Lady (Well I know the film, forgotten I had the soundtrack.)

Cateogory 2 songs - Songs I'm surprised I've never played
Make You Feel My Love - Adele (I'm not that fond of this song, which is unfortunate because I watch the X-Factor. )
Chasing Pavements - Adele (Yeah, no, not this one either. Still thought it might have sneaked in there though.)
Hand in Pocket - Alanis Morriestte (Really?! Definitely thought this would have been played once, at least for teenage memories sake.)
Total Eclipse of the Heart - Bonnie Tyler (Oh come on Tina, play a power ballad!)
Prospekt's March EP - Coldplay (I have no excuse to offer you.)
Home - Dixie Chicks (Again, I heart the Chicks.)
Things Can Only Get Better - D:Ream (This once was the lead song on Top Tunes, my homemade tape compilation tapes so this does shock me a bit.)
Standing Still - Jewel (Shocked. She's brilliant.)
I've Been Everywhere - Johnny Cash (I'm sure I've listened to this, maybe I have it twice?)
Kids - MGMT (Hmm, I'm not, like, a massive fan, but I would have thought this would have got played one time.)
Losing My Religion -REM (No. Way. Surely I would have played this at some point. If you had to name one REM song chances are this would be it.)

Category 3 - No shock here
No Matter What - Boyzone (Whine on boys.)
Sacrifice - Elton John (My least favourite Elton John song ever. Ev-er. Even more than Diana Candle in the Wind which makes everyone cringe nowadays.)
Some Day My Prince Will Come - Disney (Tests have shown this song can make your ears bleed.)
When a Man Loves a Woman - Percy Sledge (Boke.)
Most anything by The Killers (Aside from Mr. Brightside, I'm not a fan. There I said it.)
Most anything by The Kooks (Say your Rs right and I might listen to you.)
Most anything by Lionel Ritchie (You can whine on as well.)
Most anything by Mariah Carey (Dreamlover? Do me a favour.)
Most anything by The Prodigy (At the risk of sounding 90 it's just noise.)

So I started working my through the list, but I couldn't do it. Aside from the fact it would take ten and a half days, it was just too painful for the most part. So now I'm just picking out the real travesties of justice and playing them, you know like I Know Where It's At - All Saints.

Now where are my oversized cargo pants?

I got love for you if you were born in the 80s

Over a period of weeks at the end of the summer I pretty much ended up touching everything I own because of the great roof space clear out of '11.  I was supposed to do it last summer, but then I went to see Toy Story 3 and I don't think I could cope with the idea of throwing anything from my childhood away. So this summer...well, I still didn't really, but I did tidy up the stuff and put things together that had for too long been apart. Like my Guernsey doll had been missing a shoe for about fifteen years because it was carelessly strewn in another box. She was very pleased to get it back. I imagine.

Actually it turned out to be a good thing that it took me this long to post this blog. Because just this week on Twitter I was pointed towards the Flickr collections that someone had put on of a 1985 and 1986 Argos catalogue. Go on, go get lost in those for a while. I'll wait here. You'll be amazed at how much your toys cost. Like that Fisher Price garage/car park thing that everyone had. Twenty quid, which in 1985 was...well, a clean fortune. And just what the heck was this slide/plane deal. Did this pass safety standards? Oh, I see it's the reason we have safety standards! And what's going on here? Some love triangle at the home gym? Mind you, in amongst all that humour, I still look at the Mr. Frosty longingly. Never got one, but if wishing had made it so...

So, the big roof space clear out was depressing and exciting all at once. It was exciting to find things I hadn't seen in year, things I thought were long gone and, well depressing because of the things I kept. This post celebrates some of the more exciting finds!

Like Tiny Tears. Mum made her a Bunny outfit to match mine. Bless.

And here she is ready for a rainy day!

This was her when I got her. Quite the head of hair she has there. (Meanwhile David got what appears to be a underpanted Action Man.)

Sweet Secrets anyone? She was in a car and it turned into...

a brush! Not one that you could brush my hair with (see photos). I liked to think of them as Transformers for girls.

My Little Pony! The one on the right is the one I famously cut the hair of and blamed on David. Sorry again. The yellow one had glitter hair - it was a birthday party present from someone. As was the blue one's outfit. I seem to only have three leg warmers and one shoe left. Oops. You can see more My Little Pony magic here!

Etch A Sketch! Santa brought me this, then it didn't work and Mum had to send it back to him.  He rectified his elves' mistake. And you can see it still works!! Good job Santa!

As does my type writer.

Here it is in all its glory.

Anyone remember Acorn Green? I don't really know much about it except I had the postman and the nurse. The Argos catalogue has the nurse on the bike, but I always put the postman on the bike. I don't know if he came with a bike too, or maybe it was my logical child brain working out that the postman also needed a bike and the nurse would work in Acorn Green General.

Crayola Draw 'n' Do desk! Oh the pictures I drew on this desk!

Snugglebum, which remains, to this day, a fantastic name for a toy. David got me this for Christmas one year. And I even documented in my diary the day she squeaked for the last time. I think it came from the water when I washed her hair, for I loved washing and brushing her hair. Although I really don't remember whatever the hairband thing is she has on here. Nor did I ever have her hair all crazy.

I found my Gordon the Gopher! He still squeaks. 

I also found our Edd the Ducks. CBBC kid, me.

Remember when 3D glasses looked like this?

Finders Keepers! The yellow bear was a birthday party present, the pink swan a present from my parents. I naively thought I could lock things from David in the swan. That was until he fashioned a key out of a crayon to open it up. Tight security eh?

In fact, here it is opened my birthday. Looks like I also got some Care Bears.

Probably some of these fellas. I also found my soft toy Care Bears - Bedtime Bear and one that was a reject from a factory (Sunshine Bear yellow but with a red heart Care Bears fans). Good old bargain hunt parents!

I quite liked the Care Bears. This is my Care Bear bumbag and all the things I deemed important enough to carry with me in it - my Popple, my Giggle Wiggle and my Care Bears purse and mirror. Yup, all the essentials there. These were important enough that I took them rollerstaking round the block. Oh yes.

I found my umbrella!

Clearly we weren't a superstitious lot.

Remember Trolls? I had the surgeon and the astronaut. Who knew Trolls were so keen on space exploration? (It would stand to reason they'd have to have medical experts. D'uh.)

Amongst about 92 pencil tins, I found my pen tidy. Remember these? Its exhaust is the pencil sharpener! Clever!

I had about 40 of these coloured rubbers.

Oh yes, a real Bronx cheer! Who ever called them that?!

This was David's one. Mine was red. Don't panic David, there was no money in it.

Remember these things? You could go swimming with them, although why you would was beyond me.

I'm glad I found my medal! I was one half of the team that won the 1989 P4 three legged race.

There I am with the medal, and I believe in my hands is the very tie that we used to. I look every bit the winner! While David is clearly jealous.

So that was all good fun! And then I found my Sindy and Barbie dolls. Well!

I had Crystal Barbie and My First Barbie (which genuinely was my first Barbie). I loved her white dress and her perfect little pink high heels. Sadly Crystal Barbie has only one leg now, but you can't tell in her evening gown.

It seems I got My First Barbie on my 5th birthday. Along with my bike basket.

I got the Sindy in red trousers first though. Bless her, the mid 80s Sindy had a bit of a big head. Ballerina Sindy then joined the fold. She could do all sorts of amazing ballerina moves, such flexibility! The last Sindy, in the blue dress, was a later addition. She even came with make-up, which was still smeared across her face. I wiped it off in the tidy up, let her be stored with a modicum of dignity eh?

A big head was the least of Ballerina Sindy's worries. She has a serious touch of the alopecia.

Apparently the makers of new Sindy got in trouble with the Barbie people for copying her design. I don't see it myself. Ahem.

And then there was Jem. I don't know where I got Jem from, I don't think it was my mum's style. If memory serves she was some sort of a pop star, with possibly a double life twist. While the Barbie people got into problems about the ridiculous size of Barbie's hips, or feet, or boobs, the makers of Jem were careful to avoid all unrealistic portrayals of women.

She was a bit of a heffer by comparison though. Check out those shoulders. Sturdy.

My favourite comparison comes with the shoes. Jem wasn't that much taller than Barbie, but she had majassive feet.

However, rumours that she had to have them make by Harland and Wolff are unfounded.

Look at the little tiny Barbie shoes (which include my collection of one red and one blue shoe for Crystal Barbie and her 'condition').  Jem's big boats are in the back row. Poor Sindy wasn't blessed with the prettiest of shoes either, but definitely more practical than either Barbie's or Jem's.

I don't think I really need to prove to anymore that I threw nothing out, but just incase you do question the validity of that statement, here's one more find:

my cast from when I broke my arm. In 1993. Eeew.

I found this picture of Karen and I on holiday in Majorca. Somehow the cast isn't the thing I notice about the photo.

Nice hats girls.