Eurovision 2013-Preliminary

Posted on March 22, 2013 by sim1w

All 39 countries taking part this year have decided on their finalist, the act appearing in Malmö in May, 2013.

Don’t worry, I have reviewed them all for you and here is my preliminary report.

All acts are rated on Eurovisionabilty (ie, drama, cheese and non-sense)

A lot of the entries this year are of a solitary woman in a lot of fog. This earns a maximum of 3 points in my view.

Let’s not forget, the BIG FIVE- Germany, France, Italy, Spain and UK qualify automatically each year (much to their chagrin) and so does the previous year’s winner. In this case, Sweden. Good evening Malmö!

NB Belarus did not provide a video so were not included in this preliminary report.

Austria 0

Belgium 7

Croatia 10

Cyprus 5

Denmark 11                     Titanic + drama + haircut

Estonia 5

Ireland 11                        Hello!! How’r YOU doin’??

Lithuania 5                     Stop with the eyebrows

Moldova 10                    Scary! Hair!

Montenegro 11              Porn!

Russia 5

Serbia 8

Slovenia 0

Netherlands 12             Amazing voice!

Ukraine 3

Albania 9

Armenia 8                    Very deep but can’t sing

Azerbaijan 3

Bulgaria 10                  Cheese galore! Is that a bag pipe??

Macedonia 11              Drama galore!

Finland 5                    Trash

Georgia 10                Points for Schmaltz alone

Greece 15                  On the title alone, WINNER!

Hungary 11             Ed Sheeran, Hungarian style

Iceland 11                 Drama in Icelandic

Israel 3                   Zainab from EastEnders

Latvia 12                Proper Eurovision and they can’t sing!! Goody!

Malta 12                Awesome!

Norway 3

Romania 12         FUCK. ME!!

San Marino 3       Same bird as last year

Switzerland 10     An Anthem!

GERMANY 1       Lame. Embarrassing. 1 point through patriotism.

FRANCE 12        Oh my word!! France have this in the bag, non?

ITALY 5              Shows promise but doesn’t deliver on it, may win on cheese and drama

 

SPAIN Spain goes Irish/Weird. Solitary female and a horse. Bollox.

 

UK I want to believe, turn around and look out for a hero. All at the same time. But I don’t think she’s Eurovision enough. 😦

 

Host SWEDEN THAT’S what you’re sending in as a follow-up? But you know, this may well win again. For political and monetary reasons. Forgive us, ABBA.

 

 

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Mistletoe and wine

Posted on December 24, 2012 by sim1w

So this is Christmas and what have you done?

Another year over….

Well, actually, I think Mr. Lennon got that wrong- there’s another week to go and allsorts can happen in a week!

But hey, we’ve had the other 51 weeks already, so I can safely look back on the year that was 2012.

Well, what a year! I have graduated this year, so you may now call me by my name and stick the letters BA (Hons) Hum behind it. Thank you to my family for all piling into my one-bedroomed abode (Mum and stepdad in the bedroom, brother and girlfriend on an inflatable mattress in the living room/ kitchen and me on the sofa, fabulous!) and my Mum for stealing a lot more glasses of bubbly than we were entitled to.

This year, I have also been travelling like a maniac- Ireland, Hong Kong, Australia, Germany (5 times over), France, Sweden, Finland, Italy and Holland. Some of it was work-related and some of it was event-related. I loved spending time with my friends Down Under to celebrate our good friend PB’s wedding! Love you all lots. And after our few days there, Hamilton Island, QLD will never be quite the same again.

In 2012, I also started on the path of being a published author. Watch this space for news on that in early 2013!

I could of course, list the bad news here, too, but it’s Christmas and all I want to do is thank my family and friends for being in my life and the Universe for making sure they are.

I sincerely hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a fantastic year 2013 filled with love, laughter, a little bit of naughtiness and extraordinary adventures.

Lots of love,

Sim1 x

 

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Going out with a bang

Posted on November 1, 2012 by sim1w

So it is the 1st of November. Less than 8 weeks until Christmas. The year 2012 is drawing to a close. The days are getting shorter. People are winding down….

BUT NOT ME! WOOHOO! LET’S RAMP IT UP! 

My beloved employer has, following some kerfuffles and upheavals in the team, deemed me the appropriate person to keep an eye on our friends on the mainland. So what better way to do that, than to send me on a European Tour! Seven countries in 5 weeks, let’s go. I should probably be printing tour posters, proper rock star style.

I am starting off in quite a demure fashion- the Eurostar to Paris. There is something quite elegant, romantic about pan-European train travel, don’t you think? It’s all so ‘Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy in ‘Before Sunrise”. 

I shall return from gay Paris on a Friday. Two days later, I will be off to Frankfurt. This will be a slightly less elegant affair, as I am meeting my brother in an Irish Pub near Frankfurt station (aka the Red Light District) upon arrival. 

This trip will then be followed by Stockholm (God bless those Swedish boys) and Helsinki (God bless those Finish accents and the liquorice liquor).

Of course, I will have the weekends back at home. A girl needs to wash her smalls, after all! But then it’s straight onto Milano, (God bless the day when I can fly back from Milano). Last but not least, I will round off with some Belgian beer in Brussels and, erm, some, erm, sightseeing in Amsterdam. 

And that will bring me neatly into the third week of December. You know, when the days get shorter, Christmas is 2 weeks away, the year 2012 is drawing to a close, people are winding down….

 

P.S. Yes, dear readers, I’m back! 😉

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To my dear readers

Posted on October 4, 2010 by sim1w

Welcome to WordPress.com.

It would appear that I let myself being talked into shifting my blog from Windows Spaces to WordPress, wouldn’t it?

Whilst I am a little sad to see that a lot of my colourful formatting has gone, I shall, in due course, work out how to restore it. So whilst the Box of Various Pies is undergoing some refurbishment, please feel free to pop over to fishonfilm.com for some movie-related piffle.

Also, as winter is approaching in the Norther hemisphere, I’d like to share a quick cold remedy which originated in Canada:

1. Take a hat and a bottle of alcohol.

2. Put the hat on the table.

3. Drink, until you can see two hats.

4. Go to bed and sleep off the second hat and the cold. 🙂

Peace,

Sim1 xxx

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Bullshit Bingo

Posted on July 16, 2010 by sim1w

For as long as I have been in employment in the American Corporate environment, I have found team meetings to be a soul-destroying affair. The endless, random, political drivel that really only ever boils dow to one question: ‘Who has the biggest bollocks’ is sadly a regular occurence in my life and with it come the bullshit phrases. ‘Pain and predicament’. ‘Touch base.’ ‘Thinking outside the box.’ ‘I’m going to be honest…’ (what, as opposed to being dishonest?), ‘In my view of the world’, ‘We need to sharpen our pencils’….I’m sure you get the idea dear esteemed readers. So what are two colleagues to do, when they have been deserted by the remaining three team buddies, and left with the task to update the rest of the ‘UC Team’ with, well, I’m not entirely sure what….Of course, they play bullshit bingo!
I felt quite sorry for Mr. B when he was given 3 pages of notes to go through in this morning’s conference call. Especially as neither of us had any idea what the notes were about or what he was supposed to say about them. And so I set him a bullshit bingo task of including the words ‘exponentially’, ‘reaching out’, ‘ballpark’ and ‘for instance’ into the mix. In return, I promised not to laugh hysterically when he uttered those words. I’m not entirely sure who had the harder job here, but I kept a mostly-straight face when he announced:
‘Just to put you in the ballpark, we will….erm, reach out to the managers, for instance, to address the issue. We are hoping that this will result in a number of things, for instance, exponential growth.’
I tip my head to Mr. B for staying entirely serious and professional whilst waving at me in a ‘Tick that one off’-kinda gesture at the same time.
The bullshit didn’t stop there. According to Le Grande Fromage, we are now ‘templatising’ things and getting our sales force to role play with each other to ‘get their feet wet’. Le Grande Fromage then demanded to get our feedback on ‘whether this is a bad idea or not a good idea’. He needed to know, because he was planning the next ‘Vanilla Mondays’. When one of the managers was asked what she was contributing, she answered simply with ‘Well, what I am doing, and have done in the past, and will continue doing because I have found it very useful in the past and the feedback has been really positive and so I will continue doing this and I think everyone should start doing this….’ At this point, I got up to make a cup of tea to stop myself from ramming a company-logoed pen into my eye. When I returned to the call, another manager was asked what she thought about all this (nonsense) and she replied: ‘I agree.’
We then went on to talk about one of the company’s products which is ‘relatively proprietary’. We discussed the possibility of delivering ‘educational training’ (any other kind is rubbish, really).
Oh there were some howlers in that meeting. After the hour was up and debriefs were being held in the kitchen, we all agreed that we’d just had the same conversation that we’d had for the past three calls. Brilliant! It’s a good thing that the office eye candy was in today, otherwise I probably would have tried to slit my throat with one of the blunt knives in the kitchen (this week, the dishwasher is broken, so all the knives look like they’ve been washed in yoghurt) because evidently, the dropping-lift-adventure Wednesday lunchtime didn’t kill me.
Man, seven months on, I still adore my job!
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Musings of a 30-something

Posted on April 9, 2010 by sim1w

Most recently, I had a fabulous birthday party (photos on your right). My brother and his girlfriend flew over from Teutonia for the occasion. I paid for a hotel for the three of us and my brother was on hand to pour us all a glass of the complimentary bubbles at breakfast to go with the hotel fry-up.
The night before I officially joined ‘the other side’, I had made a two and a half-hour journey from the office to my favourite place in the world- Brighton. There I met my brother and his equally-awesome-half and after a quick exchange of pleasantries, it was time for the serious business of going to the pub. At midnight, my brother was on hand with the tequilas to soften the blow of switching decades.

Vee zen stolperten back 2 ze Hotel 4 moar Alko-hole.

It had come to our attention that any guest happening to have a birthday during their stay was entitled to a bottle of Champagne. And so we downed the complimentary washing-up liquid until 2am in the morn’.

The next day (after the fry-up champagne breakfast and some touristy must-do’s) I went to the hairdressers for 3 hours (yes, yes, shut up) where I parted with 170 of my finest English pounds (SHUT! UUUP!!). Mind you, I did emerge with a fabulous hair cut and even fabulouser hair colour. Also, for anyone still tut-tut-ing over my hair extravaganza, I would like to refer you to the lyrics of Blondie’s ‘Atomic’: ‘…..aaaiiiiihhhh….ooohhh….aaaahhaaaiiiii…iiiiiiii…ooohhh YOUR HAIR IS BEAUTIFUL….aaahhhh toooooniiiight’.
You see, that song was in fact number one in the UK when I was born. In the US and Australia it was ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’. And in Germany it was ‘Sun of Jamaica’ by the Goombay Dance Band. (had I known that, I wouldn’t have changed a thing).

So, hair beautiful and atomic….. yes, dear readers, at the fabulous age of 30, I am now officially platinum-blonde (thank you to Aaron and Jake at T&G Brighton).
Of course, I had an awesome birth-night! Surely, you expected nothing less, dear readers?
My heartfelt thanks and tons of love goes to everyone who came, even when I hadn’t seen them for YEARS! (Alex, Marion, Steve, Uta, Martin & Martina). Those who came from foreign shores- Tobias, Ina, Neil, Sue, Adam, Ruth, Sven, Dean, Jacky, & Jonny. The fantabulous staff at The Cricketers: Rich, Kausar, Tom et al. for letting me play my cheese-festival-music, providing an outstanding buffett and putting up with my mob generally. 🙂
Massive thanks, of course, goes to the regulars. Who are always there for me, regardless of where I am in the world and what I am doing. So if you need an excuse to drink, raise your glass to my Usual Suspects: Annett, Dani, Franzi, Matt. Love you all, you crazy cats!
So where am I now, in the great scheme of things. I hear you ask, dear readers.

I don’t think about my ‘new’ age half as much as I thought I would. In fact, the birthday came and went and I think back to it fondly, but I don’t associate it with a number.
But now that I am writing (and thinking) about it, I feel 30 is the much better decade- you’ve done the bad glasses, the bad hair and the bad-choice boyfriends. You now know a thing or two and as a result you now look better than you ever did in your twenties. Yet, you can still drink yourself into oblivion once in a while, because you still LOOK 25. This is due to the preservative qualities of the alcohol you consumed in your twenties.
You have had your heart broken, you have embarrassed yourself, you have made utterly stupid mistakes. One decade along, you won’t make the same mistakes again, you have learned that you rock and therefore you are no longer embarrassed and you still fall in love with the wrong people, but you are now cynical enough to get over it quicker.
The men who are now in your ‘age range’ are sooo much sexier than the ones you fancied in your Twenties. In my case, I now lust after Gerard Butler, Robbie Williams, Ronan Keating, Bryan McFadden, Gino D’Acampo, Jason O’Mara and CJ. Yes, of course, I could have fancied them when I was in my twenties, but have you SEEN them ten years ago?? Men get better with age, yes? Men grow more distinguished, they develop silver-go-faster-stripes (peasants call them ‘grey hairs’).
Still, if you miss your Twenties, there are some young ‘uns out there who adore an ‘older woman’. (Trust me, I know, I held hands with some of them….)
But the best thing is, you don’t feel any different. You are still you! You didn’t change at all on the day you were so pissed you missed the turn of the decade.
Now, you can openly listen to all the crap music you were previously ashamed of owning. Because those who are in their thirties and above will completely sympathise with you and those who frown, are clearly in their twenties. And what do they know??
You are now driving a brand new BMW, because you finally earn the money to afford one. You can also afford Clarins face creams, because God knows, now at 30, you need them more than ever
You finally have a plan, a goal, a road map. And you are able to put money aside for your life goals (although you secretly wish the Beemer wouldn’t guzzle quite so much petrol).
And of course, by now, you are wise enough to know that by ‘you’ I mean ‘I’.

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Bartholomew

Posted on January 23, 2010 by sim1w

Today, dear readers, I am brimming with adrenaline and other happy-excitement hormones. I am not entirely sure what to do with myself, I imagine this is what being on speed feels like.
The reason for my happiness is that I have a new love in my life.
He is stunningly gorgeous and very sophisticated and elegant indeed. Oh, and he is black. Sadly, I will have to wait until next Saturday until I see him again but I feel my endorphins will carry me through until then.
I only met him today but I knew instantly that he was the one. We got introduced by a kind and charming older gentleman named Mike. And I guess Mike knew that Bartholomew and I would hit it off. I don’t wish to divulge Bart’s full name on here, but suffice to say that his middle name starts with M and his surname is the same as mine (and thus starts with W).
He also has some numbers after his name: 116i SE. Of course, I call him BMW for short.
Yes, dear readers, as sad as I was to leave Neo, the Mazda3 behind in Australia, life goes on. And I ask you- what is a girl to do when she gets paid a car allowance as part of her fabulous new job AND she has a BMW dealership on her door step? I couldn’t resist going for a test drive and (I’m sorry to be crude) the car drives like a wet dream!
Mike has arranged another date for next Saturday and this time it will be a proper pick-up. 😉
Expect photos next week on here. xxx
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Year End Thoughts

Posted on December 27, 2009 by sim1w
I m sure, dear readers, that by now you have read enough of my drivel to know that I am a strong believer in fate, and karma.
But boy, someone up there had major issues with me this year!
I imagine the conversation in January went something like this:
‘She thinks that when she goes back to work in January, the company will organise her permanent Australian visa, so we must make sure that won’t happen.’
Clearly, in the February planning meeting someone decided that redundancy sounded like an entertaining idea:
‘Best make her leave her employer of over 10 years the day before her birthday, that way the birthday won’t be happy either.’
By July, another elaborate plan came together and I was forced to leave Australia and say goodbye to my home, my pride and joy (Neo, the Mazda3) and a bunch of people who are, and always will be, very special to me.
They must have temporarily run out of ideas over the summer, because I was offered my dream job in September.
‘Not to worry, we’ll just make sure the company withdraws their job offer again, muahahahaha!’
And with that job offer re-instated in November, there was only one thing left to do- ruin Christmas. Easily done. A quick intervention at Gatwick et voila, my flight to Germany to see the family at Christmas was cancelled.
Now I know you lot up there think you have done an outstanding job of pissing me off in 2009, but have you silly sods forgotten that I have the best friends in the world? There’s a whole army of them! And they live across the globe- Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, England, Germany, France, Sweden. This year, they have rallied round to make sure I never walked alone, I always had someone by my side climbing that mountain with me and someone would always offer a chilled glas of white wine when I needed it. They offered their love and support quicker than I could say ‘tight spot’.
Don’t you remember the magnificent 6 who raided the local liquor store and descended upon my flat the day I was informed of my redundancy? Do you not recall that kind gentleman in East Sussex who offered to store all my belongings in his spare home when they arrived from Australia, for as long as it took me to find a place to live. Surely you can’t have forgotten that I have had what seemed like 50 leaving dos, organised and attended by my friends? And remember my friend who dropped everything so we could go to Byron Bay for a week to relax before my big move? Let me remind you of the people who let me stay at their house while I found my bearings. They offered me to share their home for over 2 months!
And you know, when I was stranded at Gatwick airport earlier this week after my flight was cancelled, I met a couple who happened to go to Oxford and offered to give me a lift. Surely you remember them? Or all the crazy but wonderful people I met in LA in May- have you forgotten about them, too? Because I haven’t.
Yes, I know you think my Christmas was shit, but it wasn’t you know. Because I spent it with my friend’s family in Brighton and it was perfect- complete with massive Christmas dinner, mince pies, karaoke and outrageous EastEnders storylines.
So may I kindly ask you, dear Masters of the Universe, can you go bother someone else next year? You’re boring me now.
And to you dear readers- let me wish you a very happy and prosperous 2010. See you all soon.
Lots of love, Sim1x
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I’m your biggest fan, I’ll follow you until you love me….

Posted on November 27, 2009 by sim1w

Salutations of the day, my dear readers.
Once again, please accept my apologies for a prolonged absence. Although if you really missed me that much, you could always have popped over to the bitch-fest that is my movie review blog ‘fishonfilm.com’
You may wonder what I’ve been doing these past couple of months. So allow me to tell you!
I have been busy indeed, what with sitting around waiting for furniture deliveries and such like. I felt quite sorry for the DFS guys, when they had to dismantle my new sofa in the communal hallway and carry it into my new headquarters in pieces before reassembling it. But let me tell you, it is one fabulous piece of sofa craftsmanship and I have spent the odd night sleeping on it. Mainly because I was too inebriated to get up and go to bed.
My mum visited at the end of October with her new husband. I don’t know how many of you can sympathise with the following sentiment, but it was really good having her here. It was good for my soul, my emotional wellbeing- I was going crackers here on my own with no-one to talk to and nothing to do other than watch daytime telly. And lemme tell you, you can only stomach Philip Schofield for so many days before you start drinking the minute the theme tune to ‘This Morning’ starts chiming. (or whatever that bloody program is called). Yes, I have been catching up on British public culture.
During my three years in Australia, I clearly missed gems such as JLS and I’ve come back to Britain only to discover that Mark Lamarr no longer hosts ‘Never Mind the Buzzcocks’. And Heather and Darren had an encounter that involved a yoghurt pot on Valentine’s Day and which ultimately resulted in a baby named George Michael Trott. No, EastEnders hasn’t got any more plausible in the last three years, but that’s why I love it. And always have. In fact, when mum was here a few weeks ago, I was watching the doom and gloom emitting from Albert Square and my mother, who does not speak any English, said to me: ‘Ever since you’ve moved to England and I’ve visited you, we’ve been watching this shit.’ Quite.
So what else? Oh yes, I went to The Basics, live. I know, I know, my dear fanbase, you had hoped that once I’d moved back to the United Kingdom, my relentless reviews of the Basics’ live gigs would cease. But no. The lads decided that now I was back on the right side of the world, a tour of Europe was called for.
Did you know, it is only a 20-30 min train ride to London Paddington from the new Sim1 HQs? It would have been rude not to go and see the boys play at Hoxton Square. Not one of their best gigs, but it was passable. And there’s some gems on the new album- ‘Keep Your Friends Close’. Needless to say, I was in heaven that evening at Hoxton.
There it was- a massive reminder of my 40 months in the land down under, here on my doorstep.
Another reminder is the current series of ‘I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here’. I don’t recall ever following it, but these days, I am strangely drawn to it. Am I getting old? Or is it, literally, just the sheer boredom of my existence? I love Kim Woodburn because she is so deliciously annoying and, bizarrely, she reminds me of my dear friend SJV back in Sydney. (I think it’s the looks of death she shoots at Ant & Dec)
We all love Gino D’Acampo, of course. If you don’t, step away from this blog.
Joe Bugner is even growing on me. The sad old fart, desperate for one last hurrah on TV- is strangely enduring. I have no time for that Sabrina/ Stuart nonsense- vote those twats out.
I gather that these days, it is not whether you believe in God or not; or whether you like The Beatles or The Rolling Stones that define you as a person. Apparently, it’s whether you’re part of ‘Team Peter’ or ‘Team Katie’. Well, I’m sorry to have to be blunt here- Peter Andre is a wanker. Katie is a chav, but she’s got far more entertainment value and she’s a trooper. That’s all I have to say on the matter.
But enough of the Australian jungle….it will not do to dwell on the past and so, during my catching up with the British culture, I have found me a new object of affection- Russell Howard. (what’s the emoticon for ‘drool’ ?)
I cannot believe he has been kept a secret from the Australian public!
On tonight’s epimosode of ‘Russell Howard’s Good News’ (BBC3) he informed us that he was voted number 8 in the Heat poll of ‘Men You Don’t Want to Admit to Fancying’ (or some nonsense like that). Now, I am not sure if it’s favourable to be on the top of that list or at the bottom? The fact of the matter is, I adore the man.
I’m a little worried, that I may not be able to watch every re-run of ‘Mock the Week’ and other assorted RH-related shows on Dave, once I start work next week. That’s right, dear readers! I have finally got me job, after 8 months of doing pretty much nothing but watching TV and developing a crush on a comedian who’s 4 weeks younger than me and has a love of cock-related jokes. Ain’t life grand? 😉 Sim1 xxx
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The Next Chapter

Posted on September 30, 2009 by sim1w
Moving to a new place is a funny old thing, isn’t it? I’ve done it a couple of times over the past 4 years or so and it fills you with a mix of emotions- excitement, anxiety and expectation.
Today, I am writing to you from the Shire of the Berks. I told you in my last update, that the time would come when I had to start doing a real job again. Don’t get me wrong, I loved working in the pub in Brighton, with its ancient bed pans hanging from the ceiling and the equally ancient 70’s rockers drinking champagne at the bar. I even got to ring the bell on my last shift, it was most exciting! But a couple of weeks ago, I received a job offer. For a real job. One, that would allow me to travel to the homeland for two weeks every month and one that pays an obscene amount of money. And requires me to live in Royal Berkshire. So of course, I quit the bar job and upped sticks and found myself a new Headquarters in a new town. Only now that I have moved in and all that jazz, have I been informed that my new employer has been suffering from poor sales figures in the US of A during the month of August and thus all new employment has been put on hold. In plain English, my dear readers, that means I have moved to a place where I don’t know anyone, into a flat I can’t afford for a job that doesn’t exist! Ain’t life grand? The Job God is clearly not on my side this year. And so I find myself in my beautiful new flat and, I guess, heaps of time to explore my new surroundings, in between trips to the job centre. But, I have a new lava lamp. So all is not lost.
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