City Traffic

I’ve just realised that Manchester City players are fast becoming a theme here, so I’ll put a stop to that soon, but I couldn't resist this as it involves my two favourite things - crazy footballers and their weird cars (they’re not really my two favourite things, I just said that for effect. Foam bananas and animals wearing hats are the things that really top the list). While before we have simply focussed on the extreme lack of taste on display, this time the news is of slightly more pleasing a nature. It goes a little something like this: Footballers, in the vain hope that people will want to look at the crisp packets, muddy football boots and teammates' wives sat in their cars with them, have taken to tinting the windows in order to prevent prying eyes. We knew that though, right? And many people who aren’t footballers and aren’t earning £100,000 a week also do this. Not everyone, however, has the police sitting outside their place of work waiting for them to arrive just so that they can slap some on the spot fines on them. That is, apparently, what happened just this week, outside city’s training ground, which is near Carrington, incidentally, and looks from above like this:


Thank you Google Maps. So Kolo Toure, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Patrick Vieira, Stephen Ireland and Shay Given all arrived for work (i.e. running around a bit and kicking a football) to find plod waiting for them with £30 tickets for having their windows too dark. They were told that if they wanted to drive the cars they’d have to wind the windows down fully but, unfortunately, the club arranged for a local window tinting specialist to come and fix all the problems while they were training – boo. The police said they weren’t targeting any particular group of people, simply saying, “We never deliberately target any one person or group and will issue penalties, ranging from verbal advice to fixed penalty notices or prohibition notices, to those found breaking the law." Hey just happened to be sitting in an otherwise deserted country lane around the time local premiership footballers were likely to turn up...hmm.

Anyway, the real reason I’m writing about this is of course to provide an excuse to find some pictures of ridiculous cars bought by those with more football skill than sense. Google normally provides on such occasions and doesn’t disappoint his time. Most of the pictures I found were of cars owned by Stephen Ireland and – one of the clutch of players reprimanded for window indiscretions. First up a rather disgusting thing to do to a Range Rover:


This one he apparently had changed from red to blue after some gentle ribbing (i.e. merciless piss taking) from his team mates – and it still looks awful:

This was his present to his girlfriend:


But this surely takes the prize. In fact, I’m not sure I believe this picture isn’t a) a joke, or, b) photoshopped (or indeed both of those things), but it is apparently a picture of one of Stephen Ireland’s vehicles – a hummer by the looks of it – with wooden cart wheels. Yes, that’s what I said – wooden cart wheels. Look away now if you are at all squeamish.


Still, looks like his tinted windows are legal, so it’s not all bad.

City Slippers

“They've been winning in style for weeks,” the article starts in naturally glib fashion, “now Manchester City’s hotshots have fashioned another winner - by taking to the catwalk.” Quite how one would be able to bring themselves to read beyond this tirade of achingly mediocre journalism I’m not sure but I pressed on painfully, in the interests of research. I shan’t put you through what I had to endure, only relay to you the basic premise of the piece – Manchester City players modelled some clothes for a charity do. “Hero striker Carlos Tevez led from the front, looking relaxed as he showcased the latest neon jacket from Dolce and Gabbana,” were the chosen words to lead us to this image:

There he is, our hero at the front, looking relaxed. I am bound by moral code to reiterate at this point that this was all for charity, which obviously justifies this unashamed fawning over these kickers of round leather. Organiser Shay Given (City goalkeeper – keep up at the back) said, “It's the first time a lot of the lads at City have done it. It’s very much out of their comfort zone ...the catwalk is definitely more frightening. There’s no comparison.” So brave heroes as well as relaxed ones. Well done you brave, brave boys – not only do you throw yourselves to the mercy of perfectly rolled and preened patches of grass for a whole hour and a half each week, you also had the guts – that’s right, the guts – to walk down a platform in some grossly expensive clothes and have your photos taken. You, City players...men...icons...heroes...are an example to us all. Isn’t that right, Carlos? Go on, give us that winning smile.


Good boy.

iSmash

A few weeks ago you may remember some ripples in the technology world at the unveiling of Apple’s latest ‘we make computers simple’ money spinner – the iPad. Much musing and discussion took place at the time regarding its position in the industry, what impact it might have on the publishing world, the limitations of its functionality and the fact that the name makes it sound like a feminine hygiene product. For what it’s worth, as soon as I found out you could only run one thing at a time on it I lost interest, but then my relationship with new technology is a fairly fickle one anyway.

The news this week is that the iPad went on sale in the US over the weekend, meaning reactions from real consumers would follow. The most prominent and, it has to be said, extreme of these are contained within the following two videos, their rather bizarre content already making them viral hits. This first one introduces the world of ‘Will It Blend’, one that I’d not heard of before and not one I’m sure I ever really needed to know about. It is a rather clever idea from the manufacturers of a blender product, one has to admit, if the number of people watching the videos is anything to go by. It’s also quite interesting to see what actually does happen when you smash something like this up – something I’ve always been tempted to do before but have always been stopped by the part of my conscious concerned with economics:



This second one runs on a similar theme but without the corporate interest behind it. The only question really raised here, for me, is, if you don’t like Apple/iPad, why spend £300 on one, in order to smash it up? Just...I don’t know...don’t buy one. Surely that would have been a more effective reaction? It all seems to be being filmed on iPhones though, I note.

All aboard

I have talked about my dislike for all things airborne on here before. Well, all things airborne is perhaps not the right term – I don’t dislike planes particularly, I just don’t like being in them when they’re off the ground. I’m still not that confident in them not crashing when viewing them from the ground either, if I’m being honest, but let’s not dwell on that. For someone with a disliking of flying the news that the Airbus A380 is to fly from Manchester Airport on a daily basis from autumn 2010 should be of little consequence, you might think. It’s not as if I’m ever going to be on it.

I do still find aeroplanes quite fascinating, however, and a quick Google of the A380 took me straight to that wonderful giver of all knowledge – Wikipedia. Many interesting things can be learned from good old Wikipedia about the A380 – it’s the largest passenger airliner in the world, has seating for 525 people if split into three classes (economy, business and first class) or 853 if everyone’s crammed in like cattle. It has a design range of 15,200 km, costs about $320 million to make and...and...and the amount of geek information on that page is quite astounding. I especially like the fact that there are photos of the cockpit (aka the flight deck):


Business class:
The wheels:

A graph detailing net orders since the start of production:


I know – do try to contain yourselves. I happen to have a friend whose husband is a bit of a plane fanatic and he has booked a place on the inaugural flight of the A380 out of Manchester, heading to Dubai. He’s going for the experience of the flight – once he gets to Dubai, he’s going to get on another plane and come back straight away. It’s a shame I can’t get someone like that to do my flying for me.