Warwick Castle slideshow

This is a belated slideshow of our trip to Warwick Castle which was our first day out in the Bongo.

Ifs and buts

If England had managed to get through to the European Championship finals it would have clashed with Glastonbury and No1 Son's performance as Billy the Duckling in the musical Honk.

If we had booked tickets to Glastonbury it would have caused the aforementioned clashtastic horror but we would also be in a foul mood now, on our way home or thinking about it, inconsolable about the return to reality.

Glastonbury

I'm watching Glastonbury on telly. I'm warm. I just walked out to the car to get a CD I wanted to listen to. That's a ten yard trip to the next band. It's a four yard stroll to the tea stall. I have a seat. I'm clean and as far as I can tell, there is almost no chance of any crusties urinating where I am going to be sleeping. It would be too much of a cliche to wish I was there.

I used to go every year and would go again but I'm put off by the palaver of getting a ticket, the unlikelihood of getting a ticket and the question of whether or not to take my millions of children too.

I am now reading The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien. Kick it.

I have loads of books to read...

... and I have just ordered a load more. These are my birthday books that I have allowed myself because it was my birthday. I have a lot of guilt about the dead trees stacked around my house but books are probably my deepest and oldest vice. Nothing fancy. Nothing hugely academic. Variety is the spice and all that.

The thing about books is that they are such simple devices for delivering so much information. Film throws coloured lights on to a screen. Books throw coloured ideas on to your imagination.

Books can be objects of beauty or they can be a thumbed wad you stuff in your pocket. And the value for money of a book, in terms of the quantity of new ideas it pours into your mind, is not really bettered by any other medium. So buying new books when you have got more than you can read already is not such a bad thing...

No water

No water is one thing, but no coffee machine?!? Damn you crypto water bug...

New book time

I have just finished Persepolis (4/5), v good, now Im pondering my next read...

Birthday hangover

Back at work after my birthday weekend. So this is it, my 40s. At least I have new toys to play with.

Euro fan

Euro fan, originally uploaded by stevescoles.

Here is no2 son loving football

New phone...

So all the old mucking around starts again.

Ok that's it...

I've given up on the new manbag, swapped my stuff out of it, the missus is going to get it after all.

A maaanbag?

Getting untold grief about my brand new aged leather manbag. May have to restore status of my old modern style one...

The Royal Marines

Gordon Ramsay was running around with the Royal Marines on the f-word the other night. That's a very cheesy dish before you've even opened the effin can, but sometimes you just can't help smiling.

Cheese warning, by the way.

The marines were taking Gordon through an assault course. They had just used him as a pull through in a sewer pipe and were composing themselves to yomp onwards to the next challenge. The dripping marine (everyone got pulled through) said something like: "deploy chest, activate pride..." as he started jogging on.

Yes it's cheese... Deploy chest. Activate pride.

...but it's also a beautifully honed little chunk of language, a perfect design in word form. It's almost like a haiku. Good cheese.

Hello

Hello from my mobile.