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I've found this a very useful little tip - get it so your DVD recorder hard drive only has enough space for one tape on it. That way you have to deal with each tape after you've recorded it and you can't just let the awkward, fiddly bits mount up as you record tape after tape and only THINK you're achieving something.

Enough is enough, I thought. Time to get rid of the last of my VHS collection. Well, apart from "Live at the Ambassadors" which Eddie Izzard stubbornly refuses to ever release on DVD and any Doctor Whos that aren't on DVD and aren't worth selling. I've got a pile of 58 tapes left to copy to DVD. There is a second pile of about 80 tapes that I've either copied over the past 2 weeks or decided aren't worth doing.

The problem with copying video to DVD is that it is a more than real time process. If you have a 4 hour tape it takes 4 hours to copy it, a few minutes to do even the most basic editing and then about 15 minutes to copy it onto disc. Woe betide anyone that decides to do a more than basic editing job. That's what has always killed these efforts in the past. I have good intentions -

I'm going to edit out all the adverts
I'm going to split everything into separate items
I'm going to give everything nice titles and thumbnails

That usually kills the project after maybe three tapes. I think the most impressive thing I ever did was find all 120+ episodes of "Doctor in the House" (et al) across dozens of tapes, put them on the hard drive, edit the hell out of them, label them and burn them to disc in broadcast order. Then the bastards at Network released the whole lot on DVD  the moment I'd finished. Never again.

So now I'm doing little more than recording the tape, topping and tailing it (largely just to make sure it's recorded properly) and sticking it onto disc. The idea of ploughing through 15 tapes of RI:SE from the days when Mel and Sue hosted the last half hour (2003, probably their last work together on TV until this year) and doing a decent job is beyond me.

This isn't the end of VHS despite the title. I've got two draws of Light Lunch - 143 of the 150 episodes - to tackle one day. I probably ought to make a bit more effort with that seeing as it's the GREATEST TELEVISION PROGRAMME EVER MADE~!

Oh and I reckon, from counting the crates, that there are about 1,200 tapes in mother's garage providing extra insulation for her Ka. I may conveniently forget about those for the rest of my life. Either that or I can effectively forget about the rest of my life.

And I did find possibly the gayest sounding video ever recorded. "The Pride Man Festival 2003" isn't what it sounds like. It's what happens when Japanese fighting spirit is translated too literally into English. It's actually an MMA show headlines by Kazushi Sakuraba vs Antonio Rogerio Nogueira but you probably already knew that. 

One of the chaps in IT - and he's in computers so he would know - suggested that waiting for O2 to get iPhone 4's might prove a valuable waste of time. Why not, instead, try Vodafone. They have the following advantages:

• They let you back-order the phone and will deliver it when they've got it rather than expecting you to go into the store every day and ask them if they've got any yet
• They're slightly cheaper

So I did. I learned what a PAC code is (and I know the C in PAC stands for Code but (a) you can't say "Pac" on its own without sounding strange and (b) there is a field in our database called pac_code so it feels like a natural thing to say), got one from O2 and ordered an iPhone 4 from the Vodafone website.

Then I get an email asking me to PROVE just who the ruddy hell I am. Driving licence and bank statement should suffice. Or "driving license" as the email said. I could fax them through but faxing documents is a nightmare and they never end up where they should do. Besides, I don't know how to use the fax machine and would have to ask someone who almost certainly assumes I know more about technology than they do. My aura would be shattered. So the fax machine is out. I could also email them but to do that I'd need to scan them and to scan them I'd need a scanner and I've still not got round to buying a scanner after Vista took one look at my old one, drew in a cold breath through offended nostrils and said "I think not". So my only option was to go into the Vodafone shop and present my credentials. Easy as pi.

After ten minutes of waiting while the crew of the SS Vodafone attended to other people (this is how you send pictures by text message - it's basically the same as MMS...) I explained what I wanted. The guy looked at me. Blankly. I gave him the email Vodafone had sent me. He stared at it. Blankly. I showed him where the order number was on the email. He stared at it. Blankly. Then his brain rebooted and he had a different idea.

The new plan was to start all over again because faxing documents to their credit check department would slow the whole process down by 24 hours. Why not order the phone in store TODAY and get the ball rolling TODAY and I could have my iPhone 4 TOD... in seven to ten days. Fair enough - he seemed to know what he was doing. Or he had a Vodafone name badge which was enough.

He asked his colleague which computer to use to place an order. The colleague had a blond-ginger square of pretentiousness below his bottom lip and despite a name badge which said "IVAN" he insisted it was pronounced "Ee-vahhhhn". There was no accent to excuse this. So we sit down and go through the same details as I'd entered on the computer the first time I'd ordered one. He had great difficulty spelling my name and, after three or four attempts, so had I. It seemed such a strange bundle of letters.

Eventually - after a strange little game where I kept giving him cards and he kept giving them back to me and then he kept asking to see them again and I kept giving them back to him - we'd finished. Hooray. He pressed the submit button.

Error.

He stared blankly at the screen for a moment before asking Ee-vahhhhn what it meant.

"Ordering system's down" he replied. He could've mentioned this before, when asked which computer to use to place an order but he chose not to.

Not to worry - my blank guy would take a note of all my FACTS and key the order in when the system was fine. He wrote down my number, PAC code (shut up) and my choice of phone and tariff.

"I'll give you a call when I've processed it" he added. I asked if he needed to write my credit card number down.

"Oh yeah" he said. He wrote it down. "I'll give you a call when I've processed it."

I asked if he also needed my bank account details for the direct debit.

"Oh yeah" he said. He wrote it down. "I'll give you a call when I've processed it."

You'll also need my contact number, I suggested.

"Oh yeah" he said. He wrote it down. "I'll give you a call when I've processed it."

And, to be fair, he did give me a call to say everything had gone through and was sorted.

He then left a voice mail to say that, after someone else had a look at the order, he needed me to go back in tomorrow with the proof of identity I took today and which he did everything he could to avoid looking at. He also sent an email to that effect. My blank guy is the store manager. That explains a lot.

During last night's Roger Gracie vs Kevin Randleman fight, announcer Gus Johnson suddenly decided to identify which of these two fighters was which. See if you can spot which of the many differences between them was his method of choice.



Lose points if you said:
(a) one's white and one's black,
(b) one's tall and one's short,
(c) one's lanky and one's muscular,
(d) one has dark hair and one has white hair,
(e) one has blue gloves and one has red gloves

No - instead he said "Randleman is the one in the shorter black trunks and Gracie has the longer black trunks". It's obvious now that he says it.

Here's the thing - lots of people say that lots of Lib Dems will be furious if Nick Clegg does a deal with the Conservative Party to form a government. This makes no sense.

FACT 1

The Liberal Democrats and their supporters favour a change in the voting system so the Lib Dems will get a share of the seats equal to their share of the vote.

FACT 2

No one party ever gets more than 50% of the vote in a British general election. It hasn't happened since 1931 and recent "landslides" have been achieved with between 42 and 44%.

FACT 3

Fact 2 means that a reformed and proportional Parliament will always require a coalition of some kind.

FACT 4

We have three parties in this country which can bring a meaningful number of MPs to the table.

FACT 5

Fact 4 means you only have three possible coalitions (short of a government of national unity but that only happens in wartime) - CON-LAB, LIB-CON and LIB-LAB.

FACT 6

A CON-LAB pact is basically impossible which leaves LIB-LAB and LIB-CON as the only possible outcomes of a hung parliament (which, lets remember, is what Lib Dem supporters want).

FACT 7

If you rule out a LIB-CON pact then that only leaves one alternative - LIB-LAB - and taking facts 1 to 6 into account you would always have a LIB-LAB government in this country regardless of the election result.

FACT 8

A system where you can't change the government is a dictatorship and I don't think many people want that.

MORAL

There is nothing wrong with parties talking to each other and if the deal is right then they should be free to form whatever coalition they want. Anyone opposed to a LIB-CON pact either hasn't thought through what being a Lib Dem is all about or is in favour of a LIB-LAB PR dictatorship.

I'm not convinced getting into bed with the Tories is a good thing - it feels too much like a trap to me - but if it means the Lib Dems sitting on Tory shoulders, acting like the angel in a cartoon and being the conscience of the new government then that isn't a bad thing.

My sidekick says I'm lazy for having got a postal vote for the upcoming election but he's wrong. Obviously he's wrong - he wouldn't be a sidekick if he wasn't wrong would he? I have perfectly good reasons for having a postal vote and they don't necessarily include the postbox being ONE MINUTE CLOSER TO HOME~! than the polling station.

Basically, a postal vote is like a DVR. A DVR lets you watch television when you want to rather than when the cretins who schedule television programmes tell you to. A postal vote lets you decide who to vote for, when you want to and saves you all that messy business of showing up on a particular day between 7am and 10pm, going into a tiny booth with a dirty curtain and making a really big deal out of drawing a cross on a piece of paper. Not to mention the fact that I know exactly what would happen if I tried to use a polling booth - I walk towards it, panic that everyone inside would immediately see that I had no idea what I was doing and walk past (intending to go on the way back but somehow ending up walking a different way home). In short, I'd wimp out because it's a long, long time since I've been to a polling booth and I might get it wrong. With a postal vote I can take my time, read the instructions a hundred times and pop it in a letter box. If I cock it up, I won't have to look anyone in the face while I'm doing it.

They've sent me a second lot of ballot papers - at first I thought they'd recognised my wisdom and given me special powers but it turns out that something called "the council" is being voted for at the same time as the Prime Minister. I don't know what that's about but now I don't have to go to a booth to vote, I can use THE INTERNET~! to find out who the council are and whether they're worth voting in again.

So although I'm probably not the target audience of the postal vote (and the Conservative Party paid all the admin expenses to get me a postal vote in the mistaken belief I'm like my mother) it won't be going to waste. It's the future of voting. At least it is for people who would prefer to get on with it without having to actually meet anyone while doing it.

"Carlos Tevez is set to stun Manchester City fans by fighting for a summer move if the club fail to qualify for the Champions League.

Tevez has become increasingly disillusioned at life at Eastlands under manager Roberto Mancini, and his adviser Kia Joorabchian is believed to have contacted some of Europe's leading clubs as a contingency if City miss out on the top four."

Forget the waffle about qualification for the Champions League - that's irrelevant here. Tevez left United when they were league champions and pretty much guaranteed Champions League football for life. He's one of football's mercenaries - or rather his agent (and former "owner") Kia Joorabchian is. The only reason he left United was beacuse Kia Joorabchian would make more money going elsewhere. £26m from United (as per their pre-loan contract) or £40m+ from City who have cash to burn? It's not a difficult choice. Tevez was NEVER going to stay at United unless they got in a bidding war for their "own" player and Fergie doesn't do that sort of thing. So he goes to cash-rich City and does very well for himself. Now he - or Kia Joorabchian - wants more. This ploy is designed to get him even more from City or a move to the continent. And if he goes to Madrid, expect him to have some spurious reason to demand a move in a year or two from there as well. The pair of them are in it for as much as they can possibly get out of it and have absolutely no loyalty except to themselves and their wallets. All those City fans who seemed to genuinely believe Tevez was there out of love were idiots. We knew they were idiots at the time but they let themselves be conned into thinking that oil money could buy loyalty. It can't. Tevez is the new Anelka and if he's not careful he could end up the same way*.

*No - not Chelsea - the bit before that when he bounced from Man City to Turkey and had to be rescued by Bolton Wanderers before finally getting a decent move again.

...isn't to watch football.

I really didn't want to watch the United-City game this lunchtime. I couldn't help but think it could turn out really rather badly. Free scoring City at home against spluttering, stuttering United whose only hope was a banged up and unfit Wayne Rooney who might not even make it onto the pitch. I despise what the City revolution is doing to football and hope that their financial doping is dealt with by UEFA before football becomes a top heavy mess where rich men's toys dominate and the only way to get anywhere is to get your own billionaire sugar daddy. Fuck the hard work of managers like Harry Redknapp and Martin O'Neil - spend oil money like water and buy your way to the top. It's like photocopying extra money to win a game of Monopoly. Yes, it works. No, it doesn't do anyone any good in the long run. Would you rather play Monopoly or play with a photocopier to try and win the printing arms race?

Anyway, messy allegories (if it was an allegory) aside, I realised while listening to the Big Finish podcast and yomping past some very expensive cars and their owners' very expensive houses that I didn't have to put myself through the grim slaughter. The choice was this -

(a) Spend two hours being miserable, or

(b) Spend two hours watching Top Gear and then looking up a couple of numbers (hoping that it would only be a couple of numbers) on the internet and going back to amusing quips about Hammond's teeth or James's cautious driving style.

I chose option (b) and jolly enjoyable it was too. They entered an endurance race using diesel they'd grown themselves, David Tennant went round the track in the reasonably priced car and James lost a race across Budapest to a couple of spotty boys on BMXs.

And, thanks to the second most wonderful ginger person* in the world, United won.



*Dr Alice is actually a bottle red head so Paul Scholes is technically the most wonderful ginger person in the world.