Busy busy

Had a very interesting weekend. Friday afternoon, Mark and I headed up to Birmingham to go to MPH '07. Basically it's a car show with exotica, classics and some motoring theatre hosted by the Top Gear guys.

Well, the theatre part was great. But sadly, the rest of it was complete rubbish. £33 for a ticket, about a tank of petrol and £8 to park (yes, eight quid), for barely half a hall of said "exotica". To top it off, by the time we had got out of the theatre, the classic exhibition had closed :(

Turns out the classic exhibition was actually a separate event in the next hall that was included in the entry price for the MPH show, but nobody bothers to tell you that the two have very different opening hours. Was it good fun? Yes, I guess it was over all, but only if you have money to burn and live close to the NEC. It's not one I'd go to again by any means.

Saturday was more long distance madness. I was intending to go and watch some of the Tempest Rally, being held all around our area, but to be honest I was still knackered from driving back the previous night so wasn't really in the mood. At lunchtime Mark and I headed off up to Wigan to watch the final Great Britain vs. New Zealand rugby league test match. Journey was very long, weather was bitterly cold and after 20 minutes of the match with GB losing 0-12, I was wondering why I'd bothered. Then GB woke up and scored 28 points with NZ adding only a further 10 and GB rounded off the series 3 matches to nil, so all in all a very satisfying end result despite the rain storm that engulfed the ground in the second half. Yay for tickets putting us back under the roof of the stand :)

Sadly the traffic management around the ground was absolutely non-existant and we sat in gridlock for about an hour. There were only about 25,000 people there, it's not like it was the FA Cup Final or something, but I've not seen more incompetent handling of the traffic since the Bon Jovi concert I went to at Milton Keynes Bowl with Si, Ade and Hannah many years ago.

Seriously, guys, if Hampshire Cricket Club can get it right when they're selling out the Rose Bowl for 20twenty, you guys who run Super League and Premier League matches at the JJB should be able to. It just requires a bit of nouse.

It's really annoying to have to whine about things, but really, if you've made the effort to do a 500 mile round trip in one day to support your country in the last ever GB home international, you really don't need to top off your day with an hour of needless chaos in the car park.

Sunday, I slept.