Staying in

Today's weather was a rare one. The sun was out! For the first time in like forever! We could go mountain biking again! But we decided to stay in instead. The first stage of Tour de France was on and so was the Wimbledon men's final. We were glad we stayed in as it was a classic match. Though we were rooting for the Spaniard, the better man won today. Those buggers at Centre Court really got their money's worth.

Streaking a crowd pleasing stunt? You betcha!

I was just going through my picture collections, sorting out the junk from the rest, when I happened on this year's Wimbledon collection. Ah, it was a fun time. But what was even funnier was the reaction of the crowd when the streaker (NSFW) interrupted the dull match between Sharapova and Dementieva. Check the cropped pictures below:





Plus a press photograph we found on the web. Ah, the dedication I had in order capture something for my blog readers...



We should have more of this. Anything to keep the crowd excited!

Technorati tags: Wimbledon London Wimbledon 2006 Tennis Maria Sharapova Sharapova Streaker

Product Review: FranceMed Pharma's Magicool

Ah, another mini head-wave threatens Briton. Here is something that you may find useful. The Magicool.

We bought a couple of these about three weeks ago and used one during the first summer 'super heat-wave'. Now the manufacturers claims that this is the world's first and only safe instant cooling spray. It works as a personal air-conditioner and is apparently CFC free.

It is simple to use really. Just spray it all over your body (a couple of seconds per surface) from a foot away, like you would normally do with a deodorant or hairspray. It does work, for a while (about a minute), before you start heating up again. It provide light relief from when you are truly experiencing heat exhaustion like we did during Wimbledon. We also used it when we went cycling and when the cheap fan stopped working.

The downside is these products, while easily obtainable in health stores (we got ours at Boots), may frighten easily paranoid people, especially if you start spraying yourself while traveling on the Tube. Also, the scent while smells like cheap fragrance. Fortunately unlike deodorants, it isn't permanent. It is musky, almost like bad vanilla. The 'unscented' version, weirdly enough, seems to smell almost as strongly as the scented version.

I do find it better if you just splash some water but recognise that not anyone can do that and in certain situations - it would probably be frowned upon. Like when you are trying to sleep. So despite it's rather overhyped marketing content, Magicool does produce, albeit briefly, cooling elements for that emergency situations when you just need a temporary relief from the hot summer days.

At a fiver a pop, it is pretty pricey. Best to get them during one of those '3 for 2' offers or by trading in your loyalty points at Boots. It isn't the best cooling product out there (paddling in Trafalgar Square fountains is easily the best cooling method in London), but it beats having to visit the hospital due to heat exhaustion.

Technorati tags: Magicool Summer

Some tennis stuff

Bloody fuck. Tooch-ache arrives. Now more money needed to spend on rip-off NHS dentists. What I really need now is one of those Cannabis ice-tea.

Anyway, am looking forward to today's Wimbledon ladies' finals between Amelie Mauresmo and Justine Henin-Hardenne. I will be supporting Mauresmo of course but common sense meant that I think that Henin-Hardenne will win. We will see. Similar with the gentlemens' finals, I will be rooting for Rafael Nadal because we need a new Wimbledon champion. But I still think Roger Federer will emerge with his fourth title this Sunday.

Continuing with tennis, the day before queuing for Wimbledon we brought our DS Lite consoles to hack away time. We weren't going to be drinking lots and lots of alcohol like our front neighbuor did (I counted about 30 500mm cans of beers). So what did I get? Top Spin 2.

There has been a lot of criticism of Top Spin 2 for DS. The main thing that seems to irk reviewers was the frame rate issue. Having now given it a go I agree that the frame rate was a negative, but I don't think it really matters much. The framerate isn't that bad and the loading time, while slow, was comparable to fixed console loading times. The graphics on the other hand are impressive with full 3D graphics during play. Player animations are fluid and realistic.

There are sixteen licensed real world players, including Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova, each having their own unique facial built, clothings and statistics. Some even had built-in grunts in them. Playing as Sharapova for example would have her grunting anytime you hit the ball at a certain pace. Some of the locations are licensed as well and Wimbledon even had its official name there. Having been to Centre Court I can honestly say that the developers has recreated the arena pretty well. Occasionally people will shout encouragement too. This is the kind of details that I loved.

Top Spin 2 is quite simple an underrated game that should have been given a chance. I do hope they resolve the framerate issue for the next version (as well as implementing WiFi multiplayer like the Xbox 1.5 version). but I am quite content with this version. If this were a review I would have given the game a 6.5/10.

Now something about the World Cup. Who here is fed-up with the ongoing hate campaign with some Portugal winger? Sure that guy is a diver but seriously if a player in the team you are supporting dives you wouldn't be complaining now would you? Michael Owen does. Thierry Henry does. And Shrek does. So get over it.

Technorati tags: Tennis Wimbledon 2006 Top Spin 2 Nintendo DS

My Wimbledon Centre Court Ladies' Quarter Finals pictures

Maria Sharapova (4) Vs Elena Dementieva (7)

The match was a pretty disappointement. It was too short. We wanted an exciting match but Elena Dementieva kept making too many simple mistakes.

Granted Sharapova's grunts were quite annoying until Elena tried to mimic her's by creating an almost amusing grunt. It was pretty funny. But still we pushed her on. We wanted her to fight back. And while most of the crowds were supporting Sharapova, they are also keen on seeing a quality match that doesn't end in two sets.

Probably the only real highlight was the emergence of the streaker. He was sitting about a couple of seats from us. Below is a censored version of the shot I took.











Look at the number of ladies with their eyes wide open and smiling (some laughing too):



Update: Due to request, the uncensored picture can be found here. Please note that this is not suitable for work.

The streaker sat here, I must remember not to sit there...!



Victory, and one of the rare moments when Sharapova smiled:



Didn't I mention we had great seats?



Kim Clijsters (2) Vs Na Li (27)

In this match I was clearly rooting for Kim Clijsters. I read some articles about China's Na Li and frankly I do not like her one bit. At least not her attitude. The second reason why I am rooting for Kim is I want to see her face off again with her fellow Belgium rival Justine Henin-Hardenne. She didn't disappoint although she did have trouble despacting Na Li during the second set. But great and wonderful show court match though.







Yesterday's Centre Court ended with mens doubles, which not many people cared for, so we left early to enjoy the rest of the ground. I hope to be able to visit Centre Court again next year.



Technorati tags: Wimbledon London Wimbledon 2006 Tennis Maria Sharapova Sharapova Elena Dementieva Kim Clijsters

Queuing for Wimbledon 2006

Some of you probably know that I was at Wimbledon today due to an over-enthusiastic text message I sent out.

I have always wanted to attend Wimbledon but due to freakish weather of sorts (and general laziness in obtaining the tickets) I have never. But this 'heatwave' (that apparently can kill you) started hitting London last weekend and that was it. Surely this 'nice' weather can't last forever, so it was now or never.

We started queuing at about 6pm on Monday. There were already 11 people in front of us. These are the queue cards that you will receive from the stewards on your arrival if you decide to queue for a next day ticket:



During queue time our address was 'Queue no xx, North side, Church Road' in case we wanted deliveries from the local takeaways.



Tuesday morning and we all have to pack our stuff by 6:45am to move the queue into the golf course...



...where we had to wait until 8:30am to go through an airport style security check. Some people caught up with sleep while some, like Jennifer, played with Nintendo DS (no actually there was just the two of us - no wonder kids were pointing at us to their mothers).



Another queue for the ticket gate which opened at 9:15am. A bunch of Americans eyeing for centre court tickets broke up and went into three separate ticket booths asking about the tickets while pissing the rest of us. They couldn't make up their mind that they had to let us go first. The ringleader (the mum) even had the cheek to ask me to climb over to the next ticket booth so it would be easier for us to go through.



We were in at 9:20am!



And here are our tickets. We weren't as fussy as the Americans. We just asked for closest to the court please and we got just that. Entrance A, row A, Seat 005/006 - that is as close as you can get to the court AND the player's entrance/exit.



Centre Court play begins at 1pm so we wasted time sampling overpriced canteen food and getting rehydrated due to the famous London heatwave.



We headed to the training ground when the rest of Wimbledon opened at 10:30am. Here we saw Russia's Elena Dementieva training for her (then) afternoon match with Maria Sharapova.



Last year's Wimbledon semi-finalist Amelie Mauresmo was also practicing for today's No 1 Court quarter final ladies match.



We saw Sharapova heading towards the training ground...



...where we followed her to see what she was up to. Unfortunately the access to the training ground is restricted so we had to just wait for her quarter final match later in the afternoon.



12:30pm Centre Court. This was our view. The royal box was to our right (out of shot) as was the player's entrance/exit.



That's it for now. I will try to post the pictures (different camera) I took during the Maria Sharapova/Elena Dementieva (pretty dull - and yes their on-site grunting match proved to be popular entertainment to us) and Kim Clijsters/Na Li (more exciting) quarter final matches. That includes the nude streaker that interrupted the Sharapova/Dementieva match.

Technorati tags: Wimbledon London Wimbledon 2006 Tennis Maria Sharapova SharapovaElena Dementieva Kim Clijsters Amelia Mauresmo

The curse of Wimbledon

Bloody fucking hell. The rain started pissing early today and I quipped on the phone "it must be Wimbledon first day". Which was true, but I forgot. Surely Ken Livingstone should now attempt all within his power to rid London of Wimbledon. I heard Milton Keynes are interested. Anything to get rid its wretched curse.

Technorati tags: Wimbledon London

Wimbledon, Formula One, Philips DVD+RW

Wimbledon begins today! And with it comes the curse of Wimbledon on London's weather. Yes after yesterday's record heatwave Thor decided to punish us with a little bit of rain, thunder and lightning. All this on the first day of Wimbledon. Still looking forward to the tournament. Depending on the play (and ticket availability), I might even attend Friday's or Saturday's event.

BBC Wimbledon blog

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Follow up to my Bernie challenge post - it looks like he really took it up. Heh. So what if the 'sport' is in jeopardy? They have loads of obscene money from doing nothing but 'risking' their life. Farcical? Maybe. Expected? Yeah. The only reason why such a debacle happened in the first place was the tyre regulations FIA put in place to reduce cost and speed. And the inevitable happened. Some might cry for Formula One today in disgust. I wasn't. I was elated. Formula One deserves to be in this position. It was shameful and they deserved it.

And I really won't blame Michelin for this. All of Formula One is to blame including Ferrari who were the only team to veto a compromise. Regardless it was a funny sight when I switched on the telly for the highlights at 12.30am. What a laugh. A sport worth millions and a bunch of rich adults who would not find a compromise. And that idiot Monteiro. So you won. Big deal.

Can't wait for the breakaway championship.

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This is from Comet. 25 Philips 4x DVD+RW media on a spindle for only £12.99 when I bought them a month ago. That is about 50p per disc. Not a bad deal considering it is a branded package. Comet had a pack of 5 Philips 4x DVD+RW (with boxes) for £10 so I think I got a good deal here.

I always use branded optical disc media because they never fail me. Learnt that the hard way a few years back when I got a couple of cheap Memorex CD-Rs and although the discs were kept in safe dry storage, a few months later most of them were unreadable. My Sony CD-R medias burnt three years ago can still be read despite all the scratches on them.

Film Review: Wimbledon

Another day another pointless film review. Full of spoilers too. Do I care? No.

Yesterday was Wimbledon.

And it was alright.

The film is based on a British tennis player, Peter Colt (played by the talented Paul Bettany) who will be playing his last ever tournament in Wimbledon. At 119th ranking, he was a wild card entry and is favourite to lose in the first round. He would then retire and start a new life as a director.



That is until he met young fresh and nude Lizzie Bradbury (Kirsten Dunst). The two unnaturally falls in love in a record time after only having eaten fish and chips (ah...the staple of British diet). It all bears resemblance to the other chick flick that is Notting Hill (where an American actress fell in love with a bumbling British book store owner in trendy Notting Hill).

Apart from outrageous fake tennis, the movie did have some highlights. First up was John McEnroe, the real life American former World champion who was commenting in almost every match. I am a keen Wimbledon fan and I have never heard McEnroe commented on the BBC's Wimbledon matches before. As far as I was concern he was a pundit. But still its nice having him around since he was the original tennis 'bad ass'.

Brighton was the next highlight. (I saw part of the filming last September when they were there) I love Brighton and often visit the seaside town. It is probably the best town in the South East outside London in my opinion. Hopefully this would raise Brighton's profile as an international recognisable town.



Bernald Hill as always was excellent - this time as Peter's mad father, Edward.

I am glad they got Paul Bettany to play the British guy. They actually intended Hugh Grant to play the guy. Now I don't hate Hugh Grant or anything but his acting is beginning to bore me to death with his posh accent. Come on man, can't you do a London accent?

There are problems with the movie itself and some technical one too. I frequently see the IBM serve board record only slightly above 100mph. Personally that is a bit too slow for professional tennis. I am sure speeds of 150mph has been recorded by such fine real life tennis professionals such as Andy Roddick and Roger Federer.

Kirsten Dunst plays an unbelievable tempered woman and it was lucky she could pull it off. In my opinion they should have got a more athletic actress to play the romantic lead - but hey they could have done worst. They actually wanted Reese Whiterspoon!

The ending was typical Notting Hill. They fall in love get married and have kids. Unlike Notting Hill which had the American moving to the fine life of London here we have the Colts moving to urban America (New York? Los Angeles?). Very disappointing... What is wrong with Brighton?

Paul Bettany will have an amazing career after this movie and I do hope he will overtake Hugh Grant since he is more talented. However I also wish that he would not be typecast into anymore romantic comedy leads. He has already proved that he can play Hollywood in The Beautiful Mind as the imaginary friend of Russell Crowe.

Overall I give Wimbledon a 5.5/10.