Sunday, Apr. 19, 2009 - 22:34

Warm and sunny today. I walked to the Spar down the road, rather than my most local shop, 'cause it was nice weather this lunchtime. Pleasant trip out, partially because I've just not been down that part of town for many months, so it was good to see some of the once-'under construction' buildings now completed. There were quite a few good special offers on at the Spar too, which was nice :-)

The second FA Cup semi-final of the weekend was an even affair. Well, if you were being charitable you might call it 'tight and committed', but in truth it was scrappy and dull. It finished nil-nil at ninety, the same after extra time, and in the end Everton won 5-3 on penalties.

Cahill blazed one over, Berbatov plopped a weak one into Howard's legs when trying to be cheeky, Baines twatted one hard and high in the middle, Ferdinand's was in the corner but at a good height for Howard who managed to save, Phil Neville's was cool and accurately right in the corner, Vidic scored in similar style, Vaughan shot high into the top left, Anderson prolonged the shootout with a decent one, but Jagielka scored the final penalty for Everton.

I'm delighted, not just that United were beaten, but that Alex Ferguson's lack of respect for the competition (esp. considering the hypocricy he's shown after criticising Benitez for showing a lack of respect) in fielding a second-string team proved an undoing.

In the Premier League, a limp (and apparently clueless, from the commentary I heard) Newcastle performance at White Hart Lane led to a 1-0 win for Spurs, which suits me as far as relegation issues are concerned. Elsewhere West Brom made a good fight of it, coming from two down to level it up, but in the end they lost 4-2 to Man City - making The Baggies' fate even more certain.

Read quite a bit of NewsBiscuit today, which was witty and amusing. A little like The Onion - but being British, more relevant to my sense of humour.

Watched 'Severance' the other night, which was quite entertaining in a quickish British gory horror that didn't take it's self too seriously. It wasn't perhaps as funny as I might've expected it to be, but that's probably my fault for assuming it was more 'Shaun of The Dead' than 'Saw'. Entertaining and involving enough.

I watched Louis Theroux this evening doing a documentary about an institution dealing with paedophiles and sex offenders. I was disappointed, alas - it seemed that Theroux's provocative cynicism wasn't right for the subject he was covering. In his previous programmes he could get away with taking the constantly badgering and constantly misinterpreting stance, because the subjects were less serious and the people he addressed were more minority.

How we deal with child sexual offenders and such stuff is a big problem for society, but all LT seemed to want to do was gloss over any psychological sureness and honesty of paedophiles, and.. well he just went on and on about lying and scenarios.. I just felt that the documentary could have been more revealing and just and educational, had the documentarian been less of a prink.

Paul Gascoigne on MOTD2 this evening was a gibbering sun-dried Geordie Gollum. Pretty much inpenetrable, what he was saying - and that's coming from me who was born and bred in the North-East :-) Funny seeing Adrian Chiles and Lee Dixon trying to shut him up and run the programme according to time!