Four months tomorrow I turn 30. When my mother asked what I wanted to do for my 30th she was expecting an answer along the lines of a house party, a spa day, a meal, a weekend away. The answer she actually got was the Blenheim Triathlon.

Playing their first hometown gig in almost twelve months, Pressure Kids once again took Tamworth by storm. Fans packed into the small upstairs room at Em's Bar on Friday night to witness an energy packed, vivacious performance that has become a trademark of Pressure Kids shows.

While everybody was gushing over the sex scenes in 50 Shades, many failed to recognise the damaging message that it is romanticising a controlling, abusive relationship. Not that there is anything wrong with engaging in an S&M lifestyle, but the first book many women and girls, by their own admission, have ever read is the story of a young, naive girl being coerced into signing a contract that blurs the line between consent and control. Not to mention that it is written in the style of a teen romance crossed with a Mills & Boon novel and that most of the sex scenes are more cringeworthy than erotic.

On New Year's Day this year I woke up to the news that Dave Hodgson had lost his battle with metastatic melanoma. I'd never met Dave, he was a friend of my boyfriend at the time and living in Dubai, but we talked regularly on Twitter, mostly late at night about baseball and bucketlists.

There's only one man I am more in love with than Jack Reacher, and that's Joe Pike. I think I may have a type when it comes to my crushes on literary characters - a bit moody, quiet, devastatingly attractive and massive.

This time last year I was asking Randy to get me Quique Sanchez Flores for my birthday and he completely let me down and gave me McLeish instead. That was probably the worst birthday present anybody ever gave me, but I'll forgive him as he has redeemed himself somewhat this year.

It's been a while since I've written about football, specifically about Aston Villa, because let's face it, writing anything half decent, particularly when you're not getting paid for it, requires at least some degree of inspiration, which Aston Villa spectacularly failed to provide last season.

Even the sacking of McLeish and the subsequent speculation about a replacement manager couldn't make me muster any sort of excitement after the suspense and subsequent shuddering disappointment of the last appointment. I refused to have any sort of expectation that the board might actually do the right thing for fear of having those hopes shattered again.

The genius that is @quaystock shared this link http://t.co/f5AA8N47 yesterday so I have been experimenting with close-ups today.