What sort of award is this?

Shakira winning a tongue
It must be great to win a big award. Whether it’s an Oscar, a Tony, a BAFTA, an Emmy, whatever, you get to collect a prize that celebrates your achievements and are showered with compliments.

I can’t think of anything better, unless of course, I won an MTV Latin Award. Imagine this: your name gets called out and head to the stage, only to be presented with something that I can only liken to what’s inside Aerosmith singer Steve Tyler’s mouth.

Who on earth came up with a gong that looked like this? What were they thinking? I can only assume a man designed it, because surely no woman could ever conceive of something like this, could they?

Greetings to Netherlands Antilles

One of the freakiest things about having a blog is the ability to see where people are reading it from.

Now clearly I don’t mean their bedroom or at work, I’m talking country here.

It was a surprise to see someone in Nigeria had stumbled across the nonsense that I write, but then I spotted that someone from the Netherlands Antilles had visited.

Wow! The Dutch Antilles – I have to confess not even being 100% sure where they are.

I’ve since checked and it’s a group of islands in the Caribbean, including Curacao.

Goodness knows what they typed into Google to reach this space. I hope it was worth it! If you’re still reading, let me know, please!

The hurricane – what if it was 2007?

I enjoyed watching the ITV1 programme about the 1987 hurricane last night and it brought back many memories.

I lived at home on the Surrey/Kent border at the time and we were in the thick of the melee. Falling trees missed the house, thank goodness, but fences, sheds and all manner of other debris went everywhere.

I also remember watching a JCB try to clear a tree out of the road to unblock it and snap the telephone wire in the process.

What struck me, though, last night was how would be cope in 2007? Michael Fish admitted it was probably a good thing that they didn’t forecast the hurricane properly, as it saved people from being injured.

If it happened now, we’d all know about it and mass panic would ensue.

The other thing I remember from 1987 is that we kept up with the news using battery-powered radios. Given that everything is electric in 2007, this could prove a little tough now. With no TV and no computers, no office would be able to function without electricity.

My abiding memory of 1987, though, is that it meant I got almost a week off school, even though I was convinced that it would be open on the morning after the hurricane.