Such is the good weather we're getting this weekend that Yahoo is making a news item of it. That said, I look out of the window this morning and the sky is a plain white sheet of cloud. Perhaps Yahoo need to be a bit quicker off the mark with their journalism?

Grand National

We have a horse race in Britain called the Grand National. It's something of a national event these days. It was televised yesterday and some outsider won it, leaving bookies with huge losses. One complained that they'd lost last years profit in one hit. Dodgy game that, horseracing. Personally I'm not that interested. Those horses who get in front at the start generally stay there, and curiously enough the winning jockey was being lauded as a hero when the race finished. Erm.. Didn't the horse run the race?

Oh look. Who should crawl out from under his stone but fatboy John Prescott, telling the British public that the Grand National is a public event and should remain on freeview, not payview, and he went on to make a political point and criticise the opposition.. Well I suppose that's to be expected, thre is an election around the corner. But does he actually believe I care about the Grand National? It can go on payview with my approval. At least that way the neighbours won't be able to afford to watch the race with the sound turned right up. Surely there's something more interesting to do this weekend?

Modelling The Latest

On my way from the library yesterday I passed a crowd assembled outside the model shop justacross the way. That model shop is a small place, but stuffed full of wonders to delight a child of any age. It's been there since I was very young and still does good business, though sadly I'm less of a customer than I once was. There's something wonderful about assembling a plastic kit. You get a box of light blue bits and create a shape, a scaled down facsimile of something that was real, and of course in your childhood days the completed model is a doorway to games and fantasies. On the other hand maybe you just get high on fumes from that horrible solvent glue.

But I digress. The reason the crowd had assembled was due to an impromptu display of a pair of radio controlled trucks out on the pavement. Big, american style lorries, one tanker and one box freight rig. I have to say it was an impressive performance. The models generated all the correct noises. Diesel, horns, reversing beeps... I wonder if there's button for the driver to lean out the cab and yell suggestions to other motorists?

Thing is though both models were finsihed in chrome. Okay, it was bright and shiney, and thus all the more impressive as models go, but is that really how a truck would appear? I recall that recently some guy bought himself a BMW-Mini finished in chrome and got spectacular quotes for insurance. A Ferrari would've been cheaper.

Ahh, who cares... Look, the rear doors open remotely... Wow...