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Feb. 8th, 2007 10:45 pmFinally hawked up a few globules of gilbert first thing this morning. Still feels like there's an awful lot more down there that, for all my coughing, refuses to come up :(
The phones were a struggle again; more than once I had to say 'excuse me' and move my headset away from my face while coughing overtook me. Thank goodness we came off them from 10 to 11.30 to have a briefing in the Map Room. Although I paid full attention throughout, it had been one of those mornings where I really hadn't fancied getting up, and with it still being early in the shift, for most of the briefing I shifted in my chair, keeping myself awake, desperately wanting to be back home relaxing, eyes shut with Radio 5 Live in the background.
Was fully awake by the time we got back on the phones, but the rest of the shift was still a strain. Not only was my throat still giving me gyp but I had to contend with a succession of people who told me they were fed up with the survey and wanted us to 'replace them with someone else'. I did explain that we can't do that, that if they drop out then all the work we've done with them so far is wasted; I succeeded in talking two of them into agreeing to carry on.
To the Pyramids in Southsea this evening for The News Sports Awards. My old pal Steve, one of the News's sports correspondents, was one of the first people we met, but only had time for a quick hello as he was busy networking. After getting our drinks, we arrived at our table to find KATY SEXTON and her boyfriend sitting there!! She was really nice. In conversation with Katy I focused on how she is now and what her future plans are; I didn't think she'd want to talk too much about the Commonwealth Games because of her mediocre performance, but my mother held forth at length about my trip to Melbourne. So I told Katy I'd gone to all her events to cheer her on, then swung back to asking her plans for this year. She happily autographed my menu - top babe.
Soon we were joined by Mark, The News editor, who was delighted to see us there. "Your lads, going up this season," he said to me enthusiastically.
"Hmm, I'm not sure, we just got tanked by Fisher."
"Just a blip," he grinned.
When all the guests had arrived Mark went up on the stage, the lights dimmed, and Mark took us through a review of 2006 in sport in Portsmouth and district, with a slide-show. After that he introduced our host for the night, Fred Dinenage, who went down into the audience to talk to a few of the local sports stars, including Katy. Katy revealed she was without sponsorship at the moment; when Fred asked her why, she said people "don't believe in me any more". Fred led an awww from the audience, then appealed to any businesspeople who were there to come forward and boost Katy's career.
Next came the Darts Challenge, which pitted Katy and Hampshire cricketer Greg Lamb against two young lads who came forward when Fred appealed to the audience for volunteers. Katy had been dreading it - she said she was no good at darts - but it turned out to only be a 'nearest the bull' contest. The prize was a bottle of champagne - Fred made the two boys promise that if they won it they'd give it to their dad "or to Harry" (pointing to Harry Redknapp sitting at the front table). Katy won clearly, but Fred announced that she and Greg had dead-heated and would have to play off. Justice was done, Katy won again and returned triumphantly to our table with the champers - she didn't open it though :)
During the interval, we talked to Louise Minett, the Gosport girl who won a shooting gold medal in Melbourne. She too was really nice. My mother tried to take a photo of us together, but she'd gone and brought a fun camera with no flash, so Louise suggested we arrange a time to meet when we could have the photo taken with her medal. She gave me her mobile number, and my mother asked if she'd like to do it in the Mayor's Parlour. Louise agreed. As she was nominated for Sportswoman of the Year, I said I was keeping my fingers crossed and added "Between you and me, I voted for you." "I think that woman who sailed round the world'll be tough to beat," she smiled. We also talked to her sister Kim, the Paralympic shot-putter. I wished them both luck for the coming year, and for getting to Beijing next year - they're both really hoping they make it, as they'd be the first pair of sisters to compete at the Olympics and Paralympics in the same year.
Saw Steve for a quick chat about the fortunes of Hawks and Portsmouth (he's a passionate Pompey fan) before we had to resume our seats for the award presentations. The format was much like the business awards, except there was no nosh :( Sports awards, though, were much more my bag. Several of the nominated teams let up big cheers when their names were announced. From a Hawks point of view, we did as well in the awards as we could really have hoped. Rocky came second in Sportsman of the Year behind Kevin Pietersen, while the team came second in Best One-Off Performance, behind a couple of pub cricketers who'd made a 300 partnership. Not bad at all, considering the performance Hawks were nominated for was a defeat - the FA Cup match with Millwall. I was only sorry Louise didn't get second in Sportswoman of the Year (Dee Caffari won as expected; runner-up spot went to a ten-pin bowler).
We hung around at the end to get Linvoy Primus' and Harry Redknapp's autographs for Michelle's Pompey-mad son Sam, and to talk to Anne-Marie, a very nice lady from Dee Caffari's support team.
On the drive home, we hit heavy traffic going out of the city and crawled all the way onto the motorway and beyond. It wasn't long before we saw warning signs that a section of the M27 was closed. All the traffic was being diverted down the Fareham and Gosport turn-off. As we passed the beginning of the huge closed section of motorway, we looked out at it, but couldn't see the cause of the closure, just policemen, police cars, bollards and a big empty stretch of road.
The phones were a struggle again; more than once I had to say 'excuse me' and move my headset away from my face while coughing overtook me. Thank goodness we came off them from 10 to 11.30 to have a briefing in the Map Room. Although I paid full attention throughout, it had been one of those mornings where I really hadn't fancied getting up, and with it still being early in the shift, for most of the briefing I shifted in my chair, keeping myself awake, desperately wanting to be back home relaxing, eyes shut with Radio 5 Live in the background.
Was fully awake by the time we got back on the phones, but the rest of the shift was still a strain. Not only was my throat still giving me gyp but I had to contend with a succession of people who told me they were fed up with the survey and wanted us to 'replace them with someone else'. I did explain that we can't do that, that if they drop out then all the work we've done with them so far is wasted; I succeeded in talking two of them into agreeing to carry on.
To the Pyramids in Southsea this evening for The News Sports Awards. My old pal Steve, one of the News's sports correspondents, was one of the first people we met, but only had time for a quick hello as he was busy networking. After getting our drinks, we arrived at our table to find KATY SEXTON and her boyfriend sitting there!! She was really nice. In conversation with Katy I focused on how she is now and what her future plans are; I didn't think she'd want to talk too much about the Commonwealth Games because of her mediocre performance, but my mother held forth at length about my trip to Melbourne. So I told Katy I'd gone to all her events to cheer her on, then swung back to asking her plans for this year. She happily autographed my menu - top babe.
Soon we were joined by Mark, The News editor, who was delighted to see us there. "Your lads, going up this season," he said to me enthusiastically.
"Hmm, I'm not sure, we just got tanked by Fisher."
"Just a blip," he grinned.
When all the guests had arrived Mark went up on the stage, the lights dimmed, and Mark took us through a review of 2006 in sport in Portsmouth and district, with a slide-show. After that he introduced our host for the night, Fred Dinenage, who went down into the audience to talk to a few of the local sports stars, including Katy. Katy revealed she was without sponsorship at the moment; when Fred asked her why, she said people "don't believe in me any more". Fred led an awww from the audience, then appealed to any businesspeople who were there to come forward and boost Katy's career.
Next came the Darts Challenge, which pitted Katy and Hampshire cricketer Greg Lamb against two young lads who came forward when Fred appealed to the audience for volunteers. Katy had been dreading it - she said she was no good at darts - but it turned out to only be a 'nearest the bull' contest. The prize was a bottle of champagne - Fred made the two boys promise that if they won it they'd give it to their dad "or to Harry" (pointing to Harry Redknapp sitting at the front table). Katy won clearly, but Fred announced that she and Greg had dead-heated and would have to play off. Justice was done, Katy won again and returned triumphantly to our table with the champers - she didn't open it though :)
During the interval, we talked to Louise Minett, the Gosport girl who won a shooting gold medal in Melbourne. She too was really nice. My mother tried to take a photo of us together, but she'd gone and brought a fun camera with no flash, so Louise suggested we arrange a time to meet when we could have the photo taken with her medal. She gave me her mobile number, and my mother asked if she'd like to do it in the Mayor's Parlour. Louise agreed. As she was nominated for Sportswoman of the Year, I said I was keeping my fingers crossed and added "Between you and me, I voted for you." "I think that woman who sailed round the world'll be tough to beat," she smiled. We also talked to her sister Kim, the Paralympic shot-putter. I wished them both luck for the coming year, and for getting to Beijing next year - they're both really hoping they make it, as they'd be the first pair of sisters to compete at the Olympics and Paralympics in the same year.
Saw Steve for a quick chat about the fortunes of Hawks and Portsmouth (he's a passionate Pompey fan) before we had to resume our seats for the award presentations. The format was much like the business awards, except there was no nosh :( Sports awards, though, were much more my bag. Several of the nominated teams let up big cheers when their names were announced. From a Hawks point of view, we did as well in the awards as we could really have hoped. Rocky came second in Sportsman of the Year behind Kevin Pietersen, while the team came second in Best One-Off Performance, behind a couple of pub cricketers who'd made a 300 partnership. Not bad at all, considering the performance Hawks were nominated for was a defeat - the FA Cup match with Millwall. I was only sorry Louise didn't get second in Sportswoman of the Year (Dee Caffari won as expected; runner-up spot went to a ten-pin bowler).
We hung around at the end to get Linvoy Primus' and Harry Redknapp's autographs for Michelle's Pompey-mad son Sam, and to talk to Anne-Marie, a very nice lady from Dee Caffari's support team.
On the drive home, we hit heavy traffic going out of the city and crawled all the way onto the motorway and beyond. It wasn't long before we saw warning signs that a section of the M27 was closed. All the traffic was being diverted down the Fareham and Gosport turn-off. As we passed the beginning of the huge closed section of motorway, we looked out at it, but couldn't see the cause of the closure, just policemen, police cars, bollards and a big empty stretch of road.
