Ricoh Arena

The Ricoh Arena is just a couple of minutes drive from my house. It is the home of the Coventry City F.C. and has a stadium that seats 32,609 people. Japanese company Ricoh paid £10 million to get it's name on the stadium for 10 years. However, the stadium which will be one of the football venues during the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, will be known as the City of Coventry Stadium as sponsorship names are not allowed.

The first and only time I have been inside the stadium was when I attended the Academy of Marketing Conference 2010 last month which was held here. I quickly took some pics using the Nokia N900 before my presentation.








The Bryan Adams bar
This was taken using my Samsung Galaxy Portal and you can clearly see the difference in the picture quality.

Email from Margaret

I receive a lot of scam mails every day but this one caught my attention because of the picture they attached with the mail.

Margaret Steven
sender time Sent at 06:53 (UTC). Current time there: 22:48. ✆
reply-to margaretsteven22@hotmail.com
to Windows Live
date 24 August 2010 06:53
subject FW: Please Help!!
mailed-by hotmail.com

Dearest friend,
Am Margaret Steven from England, when i saw your Email contact on internet when searching, i decided to tell you about my situation, i have been diagnosed with cancer and i need your help in distributing my funds of $7.5M to charities. I contacted you because i strongly believe you are in a position to handle this project. Please get back to me soon if you will help me so that i can give you all the details on how to receive the fund without any delay.


Here is the picture of Margaret, that was attached with the email:

Classic Motorbikes

The Academy of Marketing conference 2010 had it's final dinner at the National Motorcycle Museum in Solihull. This was my first trip to this museum.

They have an amazing collection of classic motorbikes from different eras.

There were Triumphs, Nortons, Zeniths...

Wonder where all these British companies have gone.

My favourite pizza

Right now I am in the process of writing up my thesis and this means sitting in front of the pc most of the time. This means that I don't have much time to do most of the things I love - like blogging (the reason why this blog is not updated regularly), gardening (the lawn is is need mowing) let alone cook. My wife is in the same boat and she is writing up her thesis as well. We only cook for our son who needs a special diet and occasionally for ourselves. Thank God for Domino's Pizza which is just around the corner and of course the Internet.

Domino's became our favourite just because of the convenience and as for my favourite pizza - nothing fancy, the Original Cheese and Tomato. They also have subs and dessert as well. I am always on the lookout to save money and I usually go to the Voucher Hub - my favourite discount voucher site. They have online as well as printable voucher codes. The site updates vouchers available in the UK daily for high street stores such as Debenhams as well as online retailers like Littlewoods among others.

They have dominos discount codes as well and I always save some money every time I buy online by using their codes. All I have to do is click the discount code on the site and the code is automatically copid and I am taken to the site. One great deal I look forward to is Domino's special offer every Tuesday, where you get a pizza free for every one you buy. However, I sometimes get tired eating pizza and might go for a vege sub with a chocolate melt. Yummy!

Yes, you are right. All this rich food and lack of exercise means that I have been putting on some weight. But I am going to sign up with a gym once I submit my first draft and go on a strict heath regime.

Writing this is making my mouth water, and I think I will go down and grab the leftover from yesterday.

my son the photographer

My son loves taking pictures but with my supervision all the time because I was quite scared that he would damage the camera or something. However, I realised that I was telling him what to shoot and thought that it would be a good idea to let him take pictures of whatever he fancied. So I just gave him my digital camera and let him go.

I forgot all about it until I discovered the camera on the floor where he had discarded it - after he lost interest. It was in great shape and the lens was not even smudged.

I looked at the pictures that he had taken all around the house. Most of the pics were of himself - probably enjoying the flash. Some were of his mum and rest of things I would have never thought interesting topics - like coats hanging, behind the radiator, table legs and so on.

Here are some of the pics that came out clearly:










Next project: the garden at the back of our house.

Strawberries with cream

Enjoying the fresh organic strawberries from my garden. I am harvesting like a small bowl a day and wondering how long this will keep up.



My favourite recipe is to cut them into two pieces (after washing them of course). Sprinkle a little bit of brown sugar and pour a bit of cream in.

Tuck in.

Go for a customised t-shirt this summer

Now that summer's truly here, it's T-shirt time again. I am one of those guys who hoard stuff and I have some t-shirts which are more than 10 years old. I sill have a Stonehenge t-shirt that my then wife-to-be had brought back from the UK. Another one of my favourites is the old Firefox t-shirt which always seems to attract a lot of attention.

However, I guess it's time to get some new t-shirts and I have decided that this time there will be no famous brand t-shirts for me. I would like to go for something unique, something that's not available in the stores, a t-shirt that stand out and says that "I am unique".

What can be more unique than to have your own picture or design on your t-shirt. Now there are a number of sites online where you can have them printed out on a t-shirt. And if you are the entrepreneurial type, you can even set up a store. Just take a look at some of the customized tshirts on Cafepress. As a long time user, I am quite satisfied with their services. You do not have to worry about payment or delivery. All you have to do is upload your designs and select the apparel you want your designs on.

I just came across a page that lists all the fan created Eclipse apparel and I am thinking of getting her a t-shirt before the movie comes out. As a Twilight fan who's eagerly looking forward to the movie, I am sure she will appreciate it. One of the designs I found quite interesting are the Edward/ Jacob loves Bella t-shirts. You can personalise the design by cutting out Bella's name and putting up your own name.

You can also check out the fabulous designs on the T-Critic blog as well. Some of the designs are really amazing - would be like wearing a work of art. I won't be seen wearing some of the others but I am sure you will find one you like.