Go to Formby and have a look at the red squirrels (don't start) at The National Trust site here Wonder at the little scousers as they feed the red squirrels bags of peanuts. Go soon before the poor sods are wiped out by disease transmitted by the grey variety. (That's the reds not the little scousers) Malham's good too, gettable from Blackburn in a car within an hour. here

Perhaps it would be a decent read if all the players mentioned above contributed just a couple of pages to a book of recollections of the Rovers era from say 1990 to 2004. If I wasn't such a idle waster I would probably have a go at it myself. It does seem quite a good idea.

Why Wembley wasn't built to the same design as the National Stadium is beyond me (here's one we built earlier) But as Wembley was constructed specifically to accommodate the corporate snouts and as Rovers fan are unlikely to be needing to get there in the near future quite frankly I don't give a damn. Let's leave it to the pimps & spivs of Chelsea & Arsenal & the Essex massive of the Red Scum and the Scoucers to pay their £300 to sit in a half empty stadium, while the corporate guests clink wine glasses and have a jolly good time. I'd rather make the round trip of 60 miles to watch us v Sheffield United on February 3rd in the pouring rain than go to the new Wembley. They can go and stuff it. It means nothing to me (Oooh Vienna)

I'm doing well, hope you are too. I think I've read most of Flan O'Brian's books, it's a while since, so I probably need to go and enjoy them again. For a good entertaining read for a few hours you could do worse than "Penguins Stopped Play" by Harry Thompson. It's an account of a "village" cricket team (who all just happen to be based in central London so they only play away games) embark on a trip around the world to play a game in every continent in a matter of a couple of weeks. I'm not particularly interested in cricket, but I found it entertaining and funny. Particularly good is the continual slagging-off he gives to British Airways and the little cameo role played by Ian Hislop. Ignore the Postscript & Afterword if you want to remain happy

Merge them, call them oooh, let's see..."Lancashire United" So that's "Claretrant" and Thonodrug together in hot luuuurve. As Montgomery Burns would say....."Excellent."

Top post AESM, agree with the lot of it. Mind you Lampard is apparantly being paid loads of dosh by The News Of The World to serialise his autobiography. So the words "sorry I was cr@p, I was just trying to win a bet that I would score a goal - so screw the rest of the team, oh yes I really played cr@p" will not be printed. I wonder if Frank would stamp on a hamster in front of a bunch of primary school children if someone offered him enough money. I reckon £100k would do it. £200k to stomp a panda cub.

Glad some one else like this one too. I think I put a recommendation some pages back.

Flann O'Brien is brilliant. He is funny, he is wise, he sees things that you and I see, but don't really think about. Worth a read. I'll probably get scolded for this, but if Terry Pratchett had an Irish grandfather it would have been Flann

I don't suppose it really matter too much as long as we can see the name and the ref can book them properly. Didn't Jordi Cruyff have "jordi" on his shirt because he didn't want to have to follow his dad's reputation? As for Kerimoglu Tugay........first name second, second name first That Norwegian thing about using either your mother or father's surname has resonances. There used to be a Lancashire thing of giving the first born a second "christian name" of the mothers's maiden name. My elder brother has our mother's maiden name as his second "christian name." Does this ring any bells with anyone else? I'm sure it was common practice.

As the majority of the most recent England managers have been hounded out of the job by the media it makes sense for Mclaren to use a media manipulator to help him out. For which he will be hounded by the media. (Irony anyone?) Which of this lot did not leave without the media's condemnation ringing in their ears: Keegan Hoddle Robson Taylor Wilkinson Ericsson Venables (the latter probably got away with it because he used to take them to his club and get them rat-arsed. Probably a better & cheaper method than employing Clifford. "I represented OJ Simpson when he was accused of murder, which was certainly a bit tougher" - Max Clifford gives a frank assessment of the task of making the English public warm to Steve McClaren.

Well resurrected Sidders, "The Sex Lives Of Cannibals" by J Maarten Troost" The tale of an American who gets to spend three years on Tarawa which is the bottom sphincter of nowhere in the Pacific Ocean. Here it is here Light hearted, & enjoyable.

Presume the words "is Bellamy" are missing from between "year" and "took". No doubt you'll understand, he did the same to you lot. And as for Duff, £5m seems a decent price, looks like you've got a decent deal down to Abramovich. But if you are ever heading towards an injury crisis Duffers hamstrings will have their own treatment table reserved. Can't see why you feel your lot will finish above Rovers this coming season. Got anything better than "because we will?" Come on son, speak.

Dillo, Just to clear your request: You would like to take photographs of people who have been Rovers' supporters for a long time. You want grandfathers & grandmothers, and their sons & daughters & their sons & daughters? Is that right?

Eh? Can you think of/name one single reason why Maureen would want to walk out on Chelsea? You need to share it with us.

I shall be travelling by space-hopper It's a bit of a strain, but it saves petrol.

Off we go top 50 albums I've got 13 The Velvet Underground and Nico (1967) Patti Smith Horses (1975) Brian Eno Discreet Music (1975) The Stooges Raw Power (1973) The Clash London Calling (1979) Jimi Hendrix Are You Experienced (1967) Pink Floyd The Dark Side of the Moon (1973) The Stone Roses The Stone Roses (1989) The Ramones The Ramones (1976) The Smiths The Smiths (1984) Primal Scream Screamadelica (1991) Talking Heads Fear of Music (1979) Nirvana Nevermind (1991)

Yup, like he really knew about USA cigar brands before he emigrated to the USA in 1932. And as he was born in 1879 it's not likely that he wrote it "early during the 19th century." And just how did he know that only 2% of the population would be able to answer it? Too bloomin' hot at the moment....grump grump.......

I think we all owe ZZ a big round of applause for making that final something to talk about. What a wonderful and glorious moment of lunacy, which lightened an otherwise dull match. A Keith Moon "telly out of the hotel window" moment. A Rooney stomp; Ronaldo dives; Sven taking Theo; Graham Poll & his three yellow cards; that Russian ref with his 16 yellow and 4 red cards. Brilliant, without all that lot it would have been a bore.

Sven's CV 1976: Degerfors (Assistant Coach) 1977-78: Degerfors (Coach) 1979-82: IFK Gothenburg Swedish Cup Winners 1979 Swedish League Champions 1981 Swedish League Champions 1982 UEFA Cup Winners 1982 1982-84: SL Benfica Portuguese League Champions 1983 Portuguese League Champions 1984 Portuguese Cup Winners 1983 1984-87: AS Roma Italian Cup Winners 1986 1987-89: AC Fiorentina 1989-92: SL Benfica Portuguese League Champions 1991 1992-97: Sampdoria UC Italian Cup Winners 1994 1997-2000: SS Lazio Italian Cup Winners 1998 Italian Super Cup Winners 1998 UEFA Cup Winners 1999 UEFA Super Cup Winners 1999 Italian League Champions 2000 "Clueless" is probably a bit harsh old chap. Mind you, he could have done a bit better. But as Abbey has quoted the Mirror, which has happily jumped on the Sven-kicking bandwagon, I'll take it all with a pinch of salt. [sarcasm mode\] Of course England have been brilliant over the past 40 years, it's only since Sven arrived that the country has failed to win every World Cup and every European Championship. [/sarcasm mode]

Anyone speak German? The Colin family is half convinced that Schweinsteiger translates to pig-tiger. Is this true?

There's some very entertaining stuff here some of it not normal

Just a thought about Dunn. And this is neither calling him a fat waster nor injury prone. We all know that: (a) Souness had seemingly little understanding of fitness training & fitness regimes and that DD was one of the many players with whom he fell out because he (GS) has bugger-all management skills. ( Similarly Steve Bruce was recently criticised by (? remind me, the guy who just left Brum) for not having management, training, nor fitness training skills. (c ) However Mark Hughes is fairly well known for being slap-bang up to date with all the latest science and technology for getting the best out of players both physically & mentally. A number of Rovers players have said that since GS left they have come on leaps & bounds. (d) he found The Admiral: he made bellamy and Savage half the pillocks they were (at least on the pitch); he's made Stephen Reid a class performer and he's got Mickey Gray into a half decent left back. So maybe he can get DD in for lipsuction, ice baths & a daily run up Pendle Hill and knock some sense into him and make him a decent player. DD has the potential to take over from Tugay. On the other hand pigs might fly.

Two more signings by Mark Hughes & the Rovers board. Speak it quietly and hush, but have they yet to sign a donkey? Roberts has been seen as a potentially good player who just needs some coaching; Jeffers, as noted earlier, worked with Eddie Nid at Arsenal & he also played with MH at Everton. They must have spotted something. Fingers crossed guys & gals that our management team know what they are doing. I'm willing to trust them.

I've seen England lift the World Cup. I was watching in 1966. Wooppeee for me! You youngsters are never ever going to see it happen. Basically because the English football team is now comprised of over-paid, chavs who think they have a god-given right to earn lots of lovverly money. And they are basically crap at international level. Notice at the end of the game, none of them bothered to go over to the fans who had spend thousands to watch them? Instead they sat there like little girlies having a good cry. Soft gits. Probably thinking about their win bonuses. Selfish buggers England will never ever win a World Cup or a European Cup or anything in the rest of my my lifetime because they are simply not good enough. Sven couldn't do it, neither will MacLaren. Nor could Hoddle, Keegan, Taylor, Venables, Wilkinson, Robson..... Time take down the flags, stop beleiving all the hype. I know, I know, but England are pretty rubbish really. Just like Rovers some of the time

Dillo, have a start here Colin