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To Ann's last night for the Eurovision final. She'd promised to make Finnish food, and she did us proud. As I arrived, she was in the kitchen putting the finishing touches to our meal; she said of it "This is completely bizarre." She added "This really should not work." She invited me to take a Foster's from the fridge, and we sat down to eat - and the food was very, very tasty! We'd each half-finished when she revealed what the meal was. "Cabbage rolls." It was indeed cabbage wrapped around some kind of meat. She went on "It's mince, and maple syrup. It really should not work." But she agreed with me when I said it was actually very nice.

There was a Teach Yourself Bulgarian course on the table. Ann told me how she and Steve had bought two houses in Bulgaria (she didn't say how that came to pass, except that she bought them on ebay) and had been over there a few months ago to exchange contracts and made a holiday of it, so she'd be rooting for the Bulgarian entry.

When Ann had said the recipe was bizarre I'd told her that the other Scandinavians all say the Finns are as mad as a dog in a bungalow. As the Contest progressed, and the postcards included a bride rushing off to fetch a bouquet of carrots to carry at her wedding, and Father Christmas playing chess with Moomin, Ann was firmly won over to that view! I love Eurovision night as much for Ann's comments as the songs, and she didn't let me down. She was on good form as early as the Spanish entry, saying "That would have been a nice song if they'd sung instead of shouting." She went on to say the Irish lady was "as flat as a pancake".

Krisse, the pink lady, whom the two presenters pretended to pluck from the audience as co-host, won my heart the moment she introduced herself and said she was single <3 I got extremely annoyed with Terry Wogan's constant talking over her.

Steve was on business in Ireland this weekend, and was watching the Contest in a pub with his colleague Jason. Every now and then he phoned Ann to compare notes on the songs - his first call was to say they appreciated the entry from FYR Macedonia. That didn't surprise Ann, who'd observed that the Macedonian lady had "legs up to her armpits." I also got texts throughout the evening from Jade who was also watching.

She liked the Greek entry, being, as she told Rob when we phoned him to exchange our points, "a Eurovision-pop kind of girl". "A Ricky Martin thing going on there," she told me, so I christened him "Rickyos Martinopoulos." During the instrumental break of the Swedish glam-rock entry, I said "My name is DI Sam Tyler. I sat down to watch the Eurovision Song Contest and woke up in 1973." Ann had hysterics.

My favourite was still the French entry, but Steve rang just after it finished to say he found it scary. Ann did point out that if it won we could all hop over to Paris on the Eurostar to go to next year's contest live. I called the Russian group "Girls Aloudski".

Just before the Ukrainian entry, I said to Ann "Denmark getting knocked out on the semi means this guy's got a clear run at the camp vote." Ann said she'd heard about the Ukrainian, but nothing prepared her for the actual performance! As it ended, she said "Steve's comment about the French entry being scary is now obsolete."

It's traditional for us to drink a good-luck toast when the UK entry comes on. As we both had serious reservations about Scooch, during the postcard to introduce them, we looked at each other, shrugged, and said a half-hearted, musing "Cheers" as we clinked our glasses together. We both groaned at the asides like "Would you like something to suck on for the landing?"

During the Turkish entry, Ann said "I can see us dancing to this in a bad disco in Germany after a few shandies." Being the 'cheap Europop girl' that she is, she still gave it points, though she gave Georgia her 12. She gave Bulgaria 1 point "as it's my second home."

Speaking to Rob on the phone, he, Sue and I had all given France our 12s. Rob and Sue had both given Scooch points (!) and had also both given marks to Ireland - when I put Ann on, she pointed out to Rob "She was as flat as a pancake!"

When we went to the green room, with Krisse introducing, Mr Wogan immediately began scornfully talking over her yet again. I said out loud "Terry, I would rather listen to that young lady than to you moaning about neighbourly voting, so put a sock in it."

With the voting about to start, Ann said to me "Remind me I don't get het up about political voting. Remind me I don't get het up about political voting." The very first vote, Montenegro, had her reaching for our safety valve - we sing "Neighbours, everybody needs good neighbours!" When Ireland broke Scooch's duck with 7 points we sang it again, with ironic laughter! Then when Malta obliged with 12, we let up a huge cheer, a toast of "Thank you, Malta" and an observation from Ann that the Maltese must be nutters. I thought of Maria and smiled.

Ann said she wasn't altogether surprised with Serbia winning, though I'd never seen that one coming at all. With Scooch second to bottom, we agreed they owed the Irish lady a massive debt of gratitude for singing flat, but also agreed that the British public who'd voted for Scooch had got exactly what they deserved. Ann showed me her snaps of her trip to Bulgaria as we had TOTP2 Eurovision Special on in the background for a while, then she ran me home.