But why oh why has Foxy Bingo chosen the ‘celebrities’ it has for its 2012 calendar? The only reason I can think of is that it is meant to be a players guilty pleasure.

There is no denying that The Only Way is Essex is a popular show. It has generated celebrity status for Mark Wright who is currently on I’m a Celebrity, Get me out of Here’ and Amy Childs, who featured on Celebrity Big Brother. Alex Reid has had his moments too, marrying and divorcing Jordan and winning the series of Celebrity Big Brother he appeared in.

But really, Foxy? The cast of Geordie Shore!! Pleeease! What were you thinking. For starters three quarter of Foxy Bingo players will never have heard of the show. I watched it a couple of times – from behind the sofa it was that cringeingly embarrassing – but I still struggled to recognise any of the participants in the calendar from that show.

These poor examples of today’s youth culture could be its weak point.

The idea is great. The Foxy Bingo 2012 calendar takes iconic movie moments and puts Foxy and one of his ‘friends’ in the pose. So we have Vince and Jules in affro style from Pulp Fiction (Foxy and Alex Reid) and we have Nanny Pat as Marilyn Monroe in the famous white dress from The Seven Year Itch. That really is asking people to stretch their imaginations a little, but highlights that this is a bit of fun for online bingo players to enjoy.

Have a look for yourself at some of the pictures here and pop along to Foxy Bingo to pick up a copy to give to your best(!!) friend.

Of course, I have colleagues who use it a lot more than I do and they do tend to search around and find out what brings readers to WhichBingo. The natural choices crop up a lot as you would expect given our speciality – no deposit bingo, bingo sites, new bingo sites and the brand names like Jackpotjoy and Foxy Bingo and Mecca Bingo (plus dozens more).

However, every now and again a search term just jumps out from the page and makes you think ‘how did they ever find us by typing in that’, or ‘why on earth would they type that in to Google’ (or wherever, other search engines are available!).

That happened this month and someone found WhichBingo and paid us a visit by searching for the term ‘tombola winners are all Geordies’!

Could it be that they were implying that because tombola Bingo is based in the North East it somehow favours people from that area? Hardly likely, given that a little research goes to show that tombola is based in Sunderland and Geordies actually hail from Newcastle that is 14.4 miles away and there is no love lost between the two areas at the best of times, especially if we are talking football. tombola Bingo even sponsors the Premier League side Sunderland FC.

It’s highly unlikely that the majority of tombola winners are Geordies given the nationwide nature of the player base at this popular bingo site.

This is one discovery that made us smile and as such we will be on the lookout for more weird and wonderful WhichBingo searches in the coming months.

One item really jumped out from the pages of BBC news this morning and really made me laugh out loud!

Have you thought about what will happen to all your digital information when you die? At first sight that might not seem like a something funny to laugh about and there is a serious point to be made. Not many people will have considered what will happen to their all the accounts they sign up to online as a matter of routine these days and family members may have no way of accessing the information should the worst happen.

Many people have online gaming accounts such as sportsbetting, poker or online bingo, there are the music fans that have iTunes accounts, film fans that subscribe to LoveFilm and the like, not to mention all the precious photographs that might be stored as well as books and films that have been purchased. Without careful planning all could be lost.

What about all those people that operate online businesses with loads of different domains. Family members would have no way of knowing how they all operate.

However, a new online service called – wait for it – iCroak, has been set up to help people through this dilemma. If they have their way all future last will and testaments will feature sections that say something like, “To my husband, I leave the balances of my Foxy Bingo, X Bingo and William Hill Bingo accounts – now you can see what I was doing it for every night, enjoy”.

For a fee the user can nominate a ‘Guardian’ and when the person dies the Guardian will be able to access the online information through the iCroak service. The service will also delete any embarrassing memberships should this be required! They have covered all the bases here.

Can you believe that a study has found that in Britain alone we are storing at least £2.3 billion in online gaming balances, music, film and subscriptions. It also found that only one in ten people has made provision for how this would be accessed should they die.

I must admit it’s not something I’ve ever thought about, but they have a point. While I wouldn’t want my pictures to be lost I’m not sure my online bingo balances are going to be a loss to my family – see graphic above, lol.

It’s not just the voice though. This latest interview sees Foxy use a shoehorn the size of Everest to keep the bingo terminology flowing, with every question being framed around a bingo call – “Will your new book be a novel that will “tickle me?”. Who’s the “Queen Bee” on the Loose Women panel?”.

Does Foxy Bingo really need to go to these extremes? Does Sherrie Hewson need the publicity that badly? It doesn’t really matter, because what it adds up to is another piece of Foxy Bingo fun for us to enjoy. It’s a good job that the celebs that they sign up are good sports too.

It’s a shame that the bingo line of questioning is kept up throughout though, as there are parts of Sherrie’s life and career that bingo players would be really interested in, but they may not sit through the whole thing as the puns get worse and worse.

Will Sherrie’s visit be a one off, or will she be a new addition to the Foxy entourage and start appearing in the TV adverts – we will have to wait and see.

You may have heard of the Grand National and The Derby, but did you know that there was a horserace called the ‘Play Mecca Bingo on your iPhone Handicap’?

No, me neither. I thought this might be a one off that Mecca Bingo had managed to blag somehow through a friend of a friend at the racecourse, but one of the guys in the office that knows about these things says this is not an unusual occurance.

So, I took him at his word (or really because I didn’t believe him!!), and took a look at the paper to see the rest of the races on the card at Ayr the same day. Do you know what, it made hilarious reading. See what you think:

2.50 Download the Blue Square App Handicap
3.20 Join Bluesq.com for £20 Free Bets Handicap
3.50 Play Mecca Bingo on your iPhone Handicap
4.20 Weddings at Western House Hotel Handicap
4.50 Bet at Bluesq.com Handicap

and finally at 5.20 – wait for it – See Stacey Solomon Here on 17th June Handicap

Maybe Foxy Bingo had a hand in the last one, lol. (Stacey is the Foxy Bingo Celeb Mum of the Year 2011)

All credit to Rank and Mecca Bingo for getting the brands and the fact that you can now go mobile out there, but as they say, you really couldn’t make it up.

They have quite long commercial breaks and Costa Bingo have featured quite a lot with their freeing bingo series. The kids keep yelling at me “Have you got that one, mum?” and as there are only three in the series this is now getting to be an old joke in my house.

The ads feature bingo balls being freed from being tied to train tracks or from a prison or from a net. Do you get it? The site is famous for its free bingo, innit!!

These can seem a bit light hearted in amongst some of the angst ridden subjects of the cop shows I have been watching – see I don’t just watch the celeb shows – but they can add a bit of light relief.

I also caught the first episode of Geordie Shore on MTV. It was by accident I hasten to add, but talk about car crash TV. I just couldn’t tear myself away and my jaw was so far dropped you wouldn’t believe. Then in the middle of the MTV programmes you get ads for the bingo site they have set up called Up Your Bingo.

Now if you want to see a truly awful bingo TV ad then this has to be it. At least the Foxy Bingo ones are tongue in cheek bad! These are just really baaadd! I’ve been looking for it on YouTube for a while, but can only imagine they’ve been to embarrassed to post it.

I refuse to have it anywhere else on the site, so check it out below.

OK, so it may be an advertising feature dreamt up by the PR department over at Foxy Towers, but so what. It’s a bit of fun and, together with the fun, and tongue firmly in cheek TV ads, helps to bring the world of online bingo to the real world.

Although this sounds strange to those of us that are involved with online bingo every day and love to play, many people are still sceptical about and wary of online bingo. I think Foxy Bingo is going to be one of those top sites that can help turn around this outdated attitude and have chosen just the right way to go about it – don’t take yourself too seriously!

For those of you that might not have seen it, the OK mag article went to Foxy’s six bedroomed mansion home to conduct the ‘interview’. The aim was mainly to promote the sponsorship by Foxy Bingo of the Celebrity Mum of the Year Award at the end of March. Don’t forget that you can submit your vote through Foxy Bingo – click here - and when asked for a code quote ‘Green’. Choose from the likes of last year’s winner Holly Willoughby, Kym Marsh and Katie Price – that’s a diverse bunch right there.

The ‘interview’ stresses how many celebrity visitors Foxy has. Maybe a hint that we might see more big names unveilled in upcoming TV adverts? It stresses the Lancashire lads down to earth roots, but liking for designer furniture and high living. It tells us that he likes the ladies, but there is no-one special in his life. Could that be the legion of bingo loving ladies that populate Foxy Bingo that he loves?

Nikki Grahame of Big Brother fame is a close friend, but not linked romantically we are informed – she just likes to hang around the famous, foxy one and offer her support.

Anyway, it made me smile and I love anything that brings the world of online bingo to a wider audience. Well done Foxy, keep it up.

Foxy as featured in OK! Mag

Jim with Foxy

Jim Bowen has been back on our TV screens recently in the Foxy Bingo TV adverts, reminding us all why we love him (super, smashing, great), but I was sad to read today that he has suffered two strokes over the last couple of weeks and has ended up in hospital. He appears to be in no immediate danger and is responding well to physiotherapy.

Jim is 73 and almost a national treasure (much like Foxy himself) having fronted the ‘so bad it’s good’ quiz show Bullseye for 15 years and being one of the first batch of stand up comedians to appear on TV regularly, paving the way for the likes of Michael McIntyre and John Bishop.

Jim was a great sport in the Foxy Bingo TV ad and doesn’t mind sending himself up and we love him for it. Foxy has sent flowers and his best wishes for a speedy recovery. WhichBingo joins Foxy Bingo in sending Jim get well wishes and are sure that the whole online bingo community is right there for him too – you’re one of us now Jim,  there is no escape!

The brown-furred, purple suited bingo icon is once again back on your TV screens, but this time its not ‘Travolta at Tesco’. Step forward Christopher Biggins in a giant green bingo ball (makes a change from a dress I suppose), Jim ‘Bullseye’ Bowen sitting on a toilet (why?) and Nikki ‘Who is she’ Grahame from Big Brother doing what she does best (the only thing she does?), shouting (unsurprisingly) “Who is He?”.

What has all this got to do with online bingo I hear you ask? Well you might well ask; this time the TV admen have positioned Foxy as a celebrity star, and show him being chased by Paparazzi, doing a celeb mag photo shoot and reading about himself in the papers.

You can see the ad in out bingo TV ad gallery. Let us know below what you think.

My suspicion is that this is the start of a ”Cleaner Close’ or ‘Gold Blend’ type ad saga featuring fabulous Mr Fox. Let’s wait and see shall we……

Oh, and in there somewhere, the ad is actually promoting a ’100 card free’ offer. Read more about it here.

Tell me whether you love the ad or hate it. It’s growing on me each time I see it…

But the big promotion for the month is their holiday offer which runs from February 14 – 27. All well and good. Yes, we’d love to win “prizes ranging from a weekend in Paris to a family holiday in Florida worth £4,550.” However, this is where the fun begins because the email we received says……

“Win 14 holidays every night in pre purchased games”

Hmmmm….. 14 holidays on offer every night? And this runs from February 14 – 27? Are you sure? Now my maths isn’t brilliant, but I make that somewhere around 200 holidays !!!! Whooo hoooo…. get down to Foxy Bingo and get playing right away………..

Unfortunately once my sensible head kicks in you have to ask “are there really 14 holidays every night?” Or should that really have said “win a holiday every night for 14 days”.

Either way that’s still plenty of chances to win a lovely holiday.