Great Uncle Bulgaria

Anything by the great impressionists really - Monet, Cezanne, Yarwood....

Yay, injury time winner! 3-2! Final v Dartford next week. Sure you're all fascinated.....

No, they can draw or lose tomorrow, finish 7th and still get in the europa league, as long as Chelsea win the Cup Final. If Arsenal win the Cup Final you'll need to finish 6th to qualify (again, ironically, relying on Chelsea to do you a favour by beating Wolves tomorrow). If Wolves lose then a draw will be enough as your goal difference is better. Better to finish 6th rather than 7th then if Chelsea win the cup final you'll be seeded to the group stages of the UEFA league (and Wolves will have to get through qualifying rounds). If arsenal win the Cup then the 6th place team will have to do the UEFA qualifying rounds and Arsenal will be seeded to the group stages, along with whoever finishes 5th.

Interest now turns to the major footballing event of the weekend, Saturday's National League South playoff semi finals. I give you the heroic mighty Terras (Weymouth FC) taking on the professional divers and timewasters of Dorking (boo) for a place in next week's final to determine who goes up to the National League (formerly the Conference). In the 'after the Lord Mayor's Show' undercard, I take Leicester to beat Man U (who have looked knackered in the last 2 weeks) in the effective champs league playoff game and all the bottom 4 to lose, leaving Villa to stay up thanks to the point they shouldn't have got because of the 'ghost' goal Sheffield United scored against them last month. Villa were also lucky to play Arsenal in the match when half the latter's first team were knackered after their FA Cup SF heroics against Man City 3 days previously and the other half were rested, whereas Watford will be playing the full Arsenal first team, who will all be up for it to secure their places in the Cup Final the following week.

24/12/20

Don't mind it personally and the young wombles are quite keen in it, And at least (thankfully) no Tigers go into the making of it (see also Toad in the hole, Lion Bars, Penguin biscuits, etc).

although not as good as Francoise Pascal....who I see is now 70!

Normally I think it would be, but the games are so slose together that (as demonstarted by Wigan last night) any team that has the match won at half time is told to take it easy and conserve energy for the next one. I think City will be 4 up at half time and stroll the rest of the game. They have a tough FA Cup semi final at the weekend against an Arsenal team whose whole season/chances of getting into Europe rest on that game. I fancy Arsenal to upset the form book. Never seen a team play so badly and win 4-1 as Bournemouth did v Leicester. Mind you, Leicester scored one for them and got assists in all the others.

Wigan are about to have 12 points deducted for going into administration. If you take them off now, they are out of the bottom 3 on goal difference, at the expense of...Hull.

Not my choice I'm afraid, they have started with classic Eric Clapton/Derek & The Dominos song titles, as it happens.

Nephew's wife has produced their first baby. I am a great uncle for the 3rd time.

Thanks. Largely as expected. Surprised half the forum claims to have known who Tom Smith was 9 months ago.

Black presenters matter. If Ian Wright or Jermaine Jenas aren't available they have to find someone else non-white, however cr*p they may be. Personally I'd rather they have Alex Scott on, she's no worse than several of her male counterparts and much nicer to look at.

Cast members of Deadpool film franchise or people from Derby? :-)

Comfortably the highest point of my deadpooling career, especially as I had no idea he was ill. But, couple of weeks ago, I had a dream. Just waiting for the following night's dream involving Madame Cholet and a large vat of apricot yoghurt to materialise now....

Until quite recently I thought Frankie Banali was a mis-rendering of Francis Benali the ex-Southampton defender. Only heard of Draper and Zanardi. This is of course why I lose in the first round every year.

Out Ric Flair Ron Atkinson In Captain Tom Moore Jack Charlton Thanks. GUB

but still affecting the image of a 13yo Lolita

Nope. if the govt wanted to get us all back indoors that badly they would have shot several people on Bournemouth/Brighton beach the other day, not unleashed an idiot to stab two people in a hotel in Glasgow.

An older lady in our opera group. who sat a couple of rows in front of me at rehearsals, had cancer. Never had much to do with her and when I heard a month ago she had terminal cancer and wasn't going to last more than a couple of weeks I wasn't personally too upset. She died last week. So far so dull, I hear you say. It turns out that this lady had an MBE, her own wikipedia page and got obits in the Washington Post, Guardian et al. Prime example of why I suck at deadpooling. Not only do i generally avoid people I've never heard of but I also fail to realize when there's a terminally ill obitable person sat about about 2 yards away from me. In my defence had I known her better I would not have entered a personal friend in a deadpool anyway. Still, ironic though, Wouldn't have beaten Willie Thorne but died before 21st so would have got the bronze.

Think 'the' Salome is a bit older than that.....

Agree with all of this (except would add one dead and one still living DL-member to Gates). Other observation I would make comes down to the fundamental question of whether this is a UK or a 'world' list. Tbh I'd never heard of (say) Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Alex Trebek before I came on here but I assume (hope!) they are famous in the US. Equally, Edrich (and just about any other cricketer) and Tony Britton (and any other old actor who was in UK sitcoms in the 70s) are well known in the UK/to me but I suspect not many of our 'overseas' friends have heard of them. Fundamentally, I guess we vote 'no' if we've never heard of them outside of DL (or at least believe that a majority of our non-dead-pooling friends haven't done so).

Points for everyone, everywhere!

Yes, same here. Often used to feature legend Jeff Astle singing (very badly). At the end of his career Astle played for my lot (Weymouth). Met him once, very nice guy. Died some years back, one of the 'dementia through too much heading a heavy ball' brigade.

Caught up with Peter Crouch's Save our Summer. Plays like a Youtube football fanzine programme rather than primetime viewing, i.e. amateurs half hour. Crouch himself is pretty good on screen, better than a lot of ex-footballer pundits who have had a lot more exposure (looking at you Alan Shearer) . His co-presenter (Maya something) wore a dress so low cut she forfeited the right to be taken seriously for the next 5 years. One of the Gallagher brothers came on and mumbled incoherently for 2-3 minutes. Rob Beckett was OK, We got the latest in a series of wives trying to build a TV career via exposure on her husband's programme (see also Jon Richardson, Joel Dommett). Abby Clancy, having spent most of her life as an underwear model, knows how to look good, but then she opens her mouth, the scouse accent issues forth the spell breaks.... The crew have obviously been told to laugh uproariously at any attempt at humour, however weak. Verdict - possibly tolerable as late night post-closing time (remember that?) entertainment - not worth watching otherwise