Merhaba! Forgot to tell you we all had a day off yesterday, so there was no need to come anywhere near the venue (it takes me 50 mins from my hotel, so it's not something I'd do casually.

I spent a lovely, relaxing day, being a tourist at the Sultanahmet (Blue) Mosque, eating and drinking outdoors and meeting up with friends. In the evening, we went to Belgium's party and then a combined one from Ukraine with Serbia and Montenegro. We were treated to the five song set that makes up the whole Wild Dances routine. The energy of Ruslana and her dancers is unbelievable.

Gossip here today on two main issues:

Firstly the above mentioned Ukraine is 'leaked' as the runaway winner from the semi-final on esctoday.com
If the figures are right, and they could be made up, I warn you, there was no competition; Ruslana must have received 12s, 10s and 8s from nearly every country.

Secondly, there has been an official revision to the scores from the EBU. There were two unforgivable cock-ups in the compilation of votes, which was all done centrally this year, and I imagine head will roll at Digame, the German-based voting partner who were supposed to run it.

Monaco's televote didn't work, so the system allocated votes at random! Croatia gave points to themselves, so the figures had to be revised. They are saying it doesn't alter the ten who got through. They would, wouldn't they? However, it means Israel now climb to 11th, above Estonia but on the same points. Slovenia slump to second last, with only five points. We're hearing suggestions that Turkish TV went to the ad break at the wrong time and only showed a fraction of Slovenia's song. To be continued...

How was Paddy O'Connell on BBC3? Feedback I'm getting here is all negative. Did he really talk over lots of intros, including the beautiful, long Serbian one? That's a disgrace, if it's true.

Right then, it's 14.40. Twenty minutes until the start of the first dress'll see if the UK's song just gets forgotten as the Cypriot song follows it now. Still, nice to see two UK songs and singers together in the final. We now have a battle between England and Wales. Must go and take my seat...
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