Just about to book tickets to go and see Derren Brown who is resident at the Garrick Theatre, in London throughout May. I saw one of his televised theatre performances from a couple of years ago and I really enjoyed it!

... a barbecue!

A dinner-plate sized coil of bratwurst sausage has been ordered from the Wincheap butchers in Canterbury along with some of their quarter pounders all of which will hopefully be sizzling away nicely on the barbie at around 2pm tomorrow whilst I tuck into an ice-cold beer!

I just watched the trailer for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as I've been looking forward to seeing this movie. I do like Spielberg but I think this movie might be just one too many in this franchise... Harrison Ford looks rather old and I'm afraid he's going to keep cracking gags about how his old bones aren't up to what they use to be... 'What! With my knee?' etc... I will still watch it when it comes out later this month and I'll really enjoy it!

This evening, after a fervour of activity in the garden, I joined Mum, Dad, Matt and MJ for dinner in The Dolphin in Canterbury. They have a large, well-lit beer garden out the back and the food there is great - especially their home-made burgers which we all ordered with a variety of extra toppings. I also tried a new beer this evening in keeping with my new-found penchant for real ales; it's called Doom Bar and hails from Cornwall. Matty, as is customary, ordered the chocolate fudge cake with ice-cream...

Ten muppets left now. All packed off amidst fervent glee to the haggling capital of the world, Marrakesh. Surprisingly, it was the boys and not the girls discussing what clothes to pack for their two-day trip, with Raef advising the chaps on linens and 'the African colours' - He really is a gem, isn't he? I'm so glad he's still there as he causes me no end of amusement!

Sir Alan couldn't make it in person to North Africa so they wheeled out a large TV, flanked by Nick and Margaret - both in textbook 'I'm English and I'm in Africa' attire - and this weeks task was delivered by the wonders of plasma technology... Ten items to purchase (see below), 5 square miles of souks, lowest total paid wins. Simple.

A mosque shaped alarm clock in green
A cream Berber bedspread with silver sequins
Grey slippers
Santos orange juicer
A blue cactus (specified height)
Large cowhide with tail attached
Kosher chicken
Dye
3 red Akal branded tagines
2 tennis racquets, medium strung

Jennifer 'cold as ice' Maguire was appointed team leader of Renaissance and immediately lost her cool in the Morrocan heat and set off into the maze of souks without the merest hint of a plan... Lee 'Steve' McQueen took time to formulate a grand plan before delivering his trademark "reverse pterodactyl" squawk to get Alpha on their way...

Renaissance lost after a catalogue of mistakes, including bungled haggling (Claire Young: "I'd rather buy it here, my feet are killing me"), purchasing the wrong items (Alex Wotherspoon buys the wrong tagines and Jennifer Maguire purchases the wrong colour clock) and a misunderstanding over Kosher chicken (Jenny Celerier and Michael Sophocles accept that a butcher saying 'allah' over a chicken is a suitable kosher blessing). They were all hauled over the coals back in the boardroom and these two witches got fired!

Just got back from a nice lunch in the beer garden of the Crown Inn at Finglesham, just outside Deal and a few minutes drive from work. They had a nice range of real ales so I plumped for a pint of Kentish Reserve (5.0%) brewed by the local Whitstable Brewery and it was jolly nice... Could easily have had a few more of those, but had to come back to work I also had a nice bit of sea bass in thai sweet chilli sauce which was great too! Apparently, they won CAMRA pub of the year in 2007...

At last, the sun shined all day! Matty and MJ came round to the house and we cycled along bridleways and country roads through Patrixbourne and onto Bishopsbourne for lunch at the Mermaid Inn. They have a nice little walled garden providing a perfect sun-trap and a large Jenga set... Weirdly, we happened across a Spanish fruit farm/factory called Gomez in the middle of the Kent countryside and all of the signs around there were in Spanish!

Annie came down to Canterbury for the evening so after meeting at the station we took a walk into town for a spot of shopping and a visit to the (fairly) new M&S Bakery - They sell the nicest apple crumble cake in there! Later on after faffing around with iPod Touches for a bit we had a walk down to the Bangkok House for some lovely Thai food - All the usual stuff really: Thai fishcakes, Pad Thai noodles, Red Thai curry, Jasmine rice, Satay chicken and beef... It was great! Later on, I introduced Annie to the funny little quiz game thing in the Two Sawyers wher you have a remote control on the table which you use to answer questions appearing on TV screens around the pub. It's nice in the Two Sawyers - Very chilled out and almost entirely lit by candle alone...

These clowns were at it again this week, coming up with ideas for a new occasion to be marked with the giving of a card. Alpha, led by Michael Sophocles, decided to go with a National Singles' Day on 13th February - Send a card to that special person the day before Valentine's day just to remind them they're single - Terrible.

Renaissance, lead by Kevin Shaw, got behind Jenny Celerier's idea of an environmental week when people are expected to send cards to each other with little sermons on how to be green inside them... Crock of shit, if you ask me. Surely, even the country's best performing imbecele would not send a card to somebody containing a naff message about trying to save the rain forests. Kevin thought it was a great idea and decided to pitch it to leading high street greetings card retailers himself. He sounded like Flash Gordon going on about saving the planet! To make matters worse, once it became clear in the boardroom that this whole idea was awful from the outset, and doomed to failure, the muppet didn't even bring the person whose idea it was back into the boardroom. Needless to say, he got his marching orders... One village has their idiot back.

I love this series by Graham Rawle - they used to be published in The Guardian and Observer but I don't think I've seen them for a while...

Here's his website anyway: http://www.grahamrawle.com/

Ten of my favorite cuisine experiences:

1) Soft boiled eggs for breakfast at Le Pain Quotidien (Soho, New York)
2) Scoffing Walkers Salt and Vinegar crisps at my desk at work
3) Doughnuts in a huge stretch limo on my way to work (San Francisco)
4) Spaghetti alla pesce at the Lemon Tree (Domus de Maria, Sardinia)
5) Taiwanese chicken at Yagya (Nagoya, Japan)
6) Lamb madras, peshwari naan, pilau rice at the Kashmir (Canterbury)
7) Spice cake at Heirloom (East Village, New York) Not there any more
8) Thai style fishcakes at Lanna Thai or The Bangkok House (Canterbury)
9) Steak at Chez Kiki (Meribel, France)
10) Scrambled eggs on toasted muffins with grilled mushrooms, rocket and grated parmesan in the garden on a warm summer morning

I just realised that the end of today will mark my first complete year of blogging on here as I became a member on 02-May-2007. Since then, not including the back-dated ones, I've made exactly 298 posts...

A trip has been organised for this Saturday to a nice little enclave of our fine capital known as Smithfield... Why? Because Karaoke Box just opened a fantastically swish new branch there which is utterly palatial compared to their original gaff in Frith Street. Touch screen song selection, great cocktails and a waitress call button in the room! Plus, there are lots of nice places to eat in the area, including a Japanese restaurant called Saki with an excellent range of Shochu. Perfection.

After a thoroughly interesting encounter on the social club astroturf I got a lift back to Canterbury with Dazza and quickly showered before making the very short journey down to The Cross Keys. The chaps were already all in place as I arrived about 5 minutes into the game... As a neutral, but slightly erring on the side of Liverpool, I found the first 45 minutes rather dull, although Drogba's goal was superbly taken! The second half was altogether more lively though and when Benayoun made his only real significant contribution to the game with a jinking run into the box, I didn't expect Torres to do anything else but score. Penalties, I thought! However, as the first period of extra time began, it was obvious that both sides wanted this settled. Lampard's spot-kick was fantastic and I think it was pretty much sealed then. Drogba added another to make sure and Ryan Babel scored a goal that will almost be forgotten, which is shame because it was a belter!

We rounded off the night with a brief yet pleasant visit to The Old City Bar. Afterwhich, I returned home for a corned beef and tomato sandwich.

Heston Blumenthal (a chef who I have a lot of time for) has just been awarded a prize at the Condé Nast Traveller Innovation and Design Awards for his chocolate wine recipe using fortified, sweet red Maury wine.

— Bring wine to boil. Set it alight and allow flame to burn off. Boil until liquid becomes syrupy and reduces to 150ml

— Grate or finely chop chocolate and put to one side. In a separate pan, bring milk slowly to the boil, pour it over the chocolate and stir

— Add reduced wine to the chocolate milk, heat and froth using a whisk or hand blender. Serve immediately

I'm tempted to give it a go as well!

PS. Heston Blumenthal must surely be the only chef who is also a member of the prestigious Royal Society of Chemistry!

Well, who'd have thought after all these years that Paul Scholes would pop up with a winner like that. I wonder, is that the most important goal he's ever scored? I still can't believe that a team like Barcelona can play two legs of football and not come close to scoring a goal. Credit to United's defence, I guess...

After the game, we moved on to The Tally Ho, a local little alehouse, for a spot of pool - they have two nice tables in there. Another ill-advised trip to the late night Canterbury Tales meant that I certainly realised I'd had a few beers on waking the next morning...

Claire and Lucinda took the reins of their respective teams this evening and embarked upon an ice cream production and sales task. The idea was to develop three new flavours of ice cream, put them through some market research to identify the best two, and then sell those ice creams in bulk to the trade in London.

Alpha decided upon Avocado & Chilli and Toffee Apple after one old buffer thought that their Cosmopolitan flavour 'tasted like mashed poatato' Nice! Renaissance went for Cider & Elderflower and Chocolate Orange after taste testing on a couple of drunks in the pub.

I really enjoyed Michael Sophocles cameos in this episode and Claire Young came across as less of a bitch too. We also finally see that Lucinda can actually do something - manage! Jennifer Maguire meanwhile is quickly making a bad name for herself - Here's my tribute to her:

When it came down to the digits, Lucinda's team fell short and she called Helene "no bullshit" Speight back into the boardroom with Lindi Mngaza. Lindi got the boot in the boardroom for failing to manage the sales end of things which she was charged with - A bit unlucky, I think.

All done! We're flying to New York on Saturday 7th June and staying for 5 nights in an apartment, probably downtown, which I will hopefully be able to sort out today, then flying to Las Vegas on Thursday 12th June, staying at the Wynn Resort. Looking into doing a helicopter trip to the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam etc as well one day... Then we're flying back to the UK on Monday 16th June, arriving on the Tuesday and I'll be heading straight back to work

A few us made our first venture of the year into a beer garden this evening, and not just any old beer garden - probably the best in Canterbury at The White Hart. I'll definitely be spending many hours in there over summer chowing down on their excellent burger and home fries with coleslaw... More drinking ensued in Bramley's and Alberry's

I think it was on BenjaminBrum's blog that I saw this a while ago now... Anyway, I set up an account and lent some money because I thought it was a great idea and if it didn't work out I wasn't going to be too bothered losing a few quid...

It's all explained on the website, but basically you sift through the ads and lend one or more of these guys a microloan for a business idea and they start to pay you back once they get up and running.

I lent $25 (I guess around £12.50) to a girl in Samoa in December who was looking for a loan to build a fence on a plantation. She's already made four repayments on the loan and once the repayment term is complete I can either withdraw the money or lend it to someone else, so the cash just gets recycled, which means that one loan of £12.50 can really make a difference.

http://www.kiva.org/

Well, plans are afoot for a little trip stateside to the bright lights of New York and a visit to Las Vegas! I've been to New York several times but the anticipation of some quality time in Manhatten still excites me. Never been to Las Vegas before so I'm uber-keen to have a mooch around the strip, play some cards and check out the hotels - It is all a bit tacky, I guess, but a bit of escapism never hurt anyone...

After watching the game last night in the Cross Keys, a few of us moved on for half-price jugs of cocktail in Alberrys. I ended up drinking a whole jug of Long Island Iced Tea, but it is probably my favorite cocktail...

Shot of gin
Shot of rum
Shot of tequila
Shot of vodka
Sour mix
Splash of triple sec
Splash of cola
Serve with lemon, on ice

Magic.

I've decided that whilst the weather is not quite nice enough for barbecues and days out in the sun, I ought to get some jobs done inside the house so that I can concentrate on jobs outside when it finally starts to get nice... Such indoor jobs include:

Painting the stair well, but it's double height and I don't know how I'm going to get right to the top to paint yet. Go-Go gadget arms?

Organsing all the stuff which is currently cluttering the spare room. I've only ever sold two things on eBay but I might list a few more things and see what happens.

Installing more photo frames. I've had a load of frames for ages that I need to put some photgraphs in.

Fixing faulty ball-cock in the cold tank in the loft. The overflow pipe is currently dripping water onto the rear extension.

Phew... That should keep me out of mischief!