Mark’s Blog

• Excited and a little bit nervous about Wembley tomorrow. Up the Clarets! #
• It’s the Boyle! http://tinyurl.com/qfc7fp #
• #BurnleyFC I’ve got a good feeling about today. Nerves are still there though. Blog post done, get packed and off we go to Wembley! #
• Offically signing out for the Wembley trip. Up the Clarets! #
• #BurnleyFC We love you Burnley, we do, we love you Burnley, we do, we love you Burnley, we do, oh Burnley we love you! #
• #BurnleyFC It’s official: Coyle is staying as manager despite what they may say north of the border ( http://tinyurl.com/qmfq2p) #
• Generating some excellent blog posts for you all to read over the coming weeks #
• Test status update from mobile phone. How exciting #
• Setting up Dad’s new laptop; these Dell Inspirons are good value for money #

One for those of you in the UK that watch The Apprentice here in terms of Siralun being rather misrepresented. Quite funny though .

If you are reading this in an feed aggregator and can’t see the above video click here. Enjoy and full props to Cassetteboy who deserves a shout out for some excellent work with this.

Brian "Beast" Jensen showing how 36,000 Burnley fans felt when the full-time whistle arrived at Wembley

It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life, and I’m feeling good…

Well, it’s the day after the extraordinary afternoon which saw Burnley, a small mill town in Lancashire with only 70,000 residents, win the play-off final at Wembley to take us to the Premier League.

Feel free to re-read that statement, I can’t quite believe it either.

It’s one of those days that each and every one of the 36,000 clarets who attended Wembley will cherish and remember for the rest of their days. Some may say the Orient game back in ‘87 (Burnley had to win in order to survive in the 4th division. Had they have lost it would have meant playing non-league football and quite possibly the end of the club) was more important than yesterday but make no mistake that the 90 minutes played on the 25th May 2009 gave the club the biggest financial reward (around £60M) that we’ve ever had in our long and illustrious history dating back from 1882.

Burnley celebrate a fantastic victory over Sheffield United at Wembley

The feeling and emotion at the end of the game is indescribable, and you would only ever appreciate what it was like if you were actually there (simply look at the image to the left to see what I mean). I have huge sympathy for those who were unable to get tickets, especially as there were sections of Wembley completely empty around the “Club Wembley” section where the corporate “prawn sandwich brigade” like to locate themselves. Hopefully everybody who wanted to watch the game found a position where they were able to see the fantastic scenes, even if they were unable to be a part of them.

The entire town will be on a high for the considerable future. Proof of this lies with this evening, and the parade of the team through the streets for a civic reception at the town hall. Brilliant scenes, I only wish that I could have joined the crowds to celebrate the team’s homecoming.

So, some 33 years after being relegated from the top flight we are back where we belong. History has been made, and a new chapter in the Burnley Football Club book has been created. Premier League here we come .

We are Burnley. Super Burnley. We are Burnley. From the North.

Today will hopefully be a good day in the life and times of Burnley Football Club, and I’ll be there to experience it at Wembley. In the meantime, we must thank an individual who has joined our football club and taken us to the edge of the Premier League with a tiny budget and the smallest squad in either the Premier League or the Championship. Owen Coyle, a true legend in every sense of the word who will have firmly cemented his place in the history books should success ensue today.

Whatever happens today, we’ve done amazing things this season and I’m utterly proud to call myself a Claret. Come on Burnley, after 33 years of wandering lets dig out one more game to take us back where we belong; the top flight of English football.

Que sera sera, whatever will be will be, we’re going to Wembley, que sera sera

While Burnley are certainly on their way to the grand old (considerably less old since they decided to pull it down and start again ) national stadium it is always a little concerning as a supporter to know if you are going to get tickets to the big games such as Wembley. I’m pleased to report that I managed to get tickets this morning after they were released to the general public .

I’m also well aware of the ongoing saga with TicketZone and their handling of the sudden flow of Burnley supporters wanting tickets this morning and not coping with demand; I do hope that those genuine supporters who want tickets are able to get them rather than the touts gaining the upper hand and snapping up a large allocation to sell for a ridiculous profit on their part. Clearly demand is high, if the sums are correct then some 14,000 tickets that were available on general allocation from this morning at 9am have already sold (the website was completely off-line and more pure luck than judgement at getting a space in the queue on the phones when I claimed mine at 10:30am)

If you do happen to support the Clarets and have managed to get tickets, I’ll see you there .

Image shamelessly “borrowed” from the Burnley FC site under a fair use mantra

Spotted this on one of my regular forum haunts about the new motorcycle test that started yesterday (Monday 27th) and felt the irresistible urge to share the funny (albeit not for the riders concerned) with you all…

Rotherhams new bike test center had five tests today. four of those candidates failed with two of the four crashing and one of the those ending up in hospital.

A few instructors were saying that the high speed avoidance manoeuver was dangerous in the wet.

Best of luck to all those yet to take the new test just hope it not raining for you.

wizzzard at Bike Chat Forums

Absolute classic, DSA seem to be doing as well as ever these days.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock (or living in another country, in which case I’m sure you have your own privacy battles to face ) you’ll realise that Phorm is well on its way to launching properly in the UK. Now, putting aside if it is legal or not (it isn’t, by the way, and the EU seem to have realised this as well – BBC & El Reg) we need to all come together and take steps to put this beast out of business permanently.

So, if you are currently with an ISP that is thinking about Phorm inform them in the strongest possible terms of your viewpoint. If they continue with the roll-out then switch supplier to somebody who isn’t going to snoop on your browsing habits.

I’ve also taken steps to get this site removed so that the crawlers are no longer able to visit and use this site’s data to send targeted ads to you. I’ve done this by emailing website-exclusion@webwise.com stating that I wish to remove this domain from their systems. One fully hopes that they comply with this request, and I’ll have no hesitation in taking more formal proceedings against them if they don’t. I’ll also be posting the full transcripts of both my email and the response(s) that I receive on my writings page, so check there for updates.

Thus, if you currently operate a site I would request that you email the above address detailing all your domains and requesting that you don’t wish to be a part of their system. If you want more information on Phorm, there is plenty available online and elsewhere, I’m sure.

My “Keyboard Not Found” avatar goes everywhere online with me; chances are you’ll probably recognise that before my username, so I very rarely use anything else.

Now, that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t get edited once in a while for special occasions; we’ve had Christmas and general winter variations as well as a special Easter egg one very recently.

You’ll also probably be aware from previous blog posts that I’m a Burnley FC supporter, and if you are following the Coca-Cola Championship you’ll realise we are pushing for a “play-off” spot to get into the top flight of English football, the Premier League. To celebrate this, and to offer my support towards the campaign I’ve added our club crest onto the avatar as you can see above (if you click on the image you’ll see the avatar in all its glory; 512×512 instead of the usual 120×120. You should also be able to scroll through and view the other variations I’ve talked about).

Let’s hope that all our omens and rituals are worthwhile and we’ll be contesting in the premiership next season .