So we've reached the end of yet another week; one that has seen more leaves falling, being able to see your breath first thing when you step outside, and needing your lights on when you drive to work.

But it's Friday which means it's the weekend...and that is reason enough to smile!

We don't know how your week has been but we think you might be just a little bored of reading finance stories by now.

Frankly, we've had enough of writing them too...so the staff here got together over our tea break, pooled our collective wisdom and decided to share with you the things we like, love, find funny and generally get excited about!

Starting with our selection of YouTube favourites:

This guy clearly needs to come see us for some treatment after this little episode. Wrangling superstar Zeb Lanham gets dumped at Calgary stampede this year. We know we shouldn't laugh but...

Utter madness on a motorbike

Jeepers this is a big wave!

The late Colin McRae shows driving perfection right on the limit.

This is musical comedy genius at its best. If you haven't heard of the Flight of the Concords then you have clearly been hiding under a rock recently.

And if you are not watching YouTube, then you should watch the greatest ever series on TV. Ever.

If you get a spare moment at work today and want to lark around (not that we would ever encourage that!), you could do no better than to play some games over at Mousebreaker and Miniclip.

But, as the hours tick down to the end of a busy week, we thought we should also give you a little something for the weekend.

Perhaps you could start by kicking back with this quality beer from Sharps and watch England vs. Tonga in the crunch Rugby World Cup match tonight?

(And here's a little reminder of the last World Cup, when we were quite good!)

Ok, so not everyone is a rugby fan and maybe the good lady is a bit annoyed that you have watched every World Cup match since it started?

How about you make it up to her over the weekend with a nice home cooked meal (come on man, even you can manage a stir fry or fajitas!) and a decent bottle of wine?

We recommend the Fairleigh Estate Single Vineyard Chardonnay 2005 from New Zealand as our white for the weekend.

If you fancy a decent red then try the Cono Sur Pinot Noir 2006 from Chile.

And after a good home cooked meal you need a decent dessert.

You should try one from GU's range (easily available in Sainsbury's) and the GU Chocolate & Vanilla Cheesecake is the best of the lot!

Then how about relaxing with a DVD? (especially if it's a bit chilly outside!)

Get yourself down to Blockbusters and get one of the following and we know you won't be disappointed:

For the action/drama fans amongst you, why not try Déjà Vu? Any film with Denzel Washington is a sure fire winner and this one is no exception!

For those who like a bit of romance, you should try The Lake House. Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves and a twist on an old fashioned love story.

And if you want to laugh so hard you will stop breathing, then you have to watch this:

Anchorman:The legend of Ron Burgundy which proves that Will Ferrell is the funniest man in film.

Oh, and if you like DVDs, there is a little competition for you to enter, courtesy of The Times.

Vote for the best movie scene ever and win 10 DVDs of your choice.

So, there we are; some things to amuse and inspire. We hope the staff choices prove enjoyable. We do try to help!

And now, it's the countdown to home time and so lovely people, its time for us to wish you a happy Friday and an even better weekend!

Why not share some of your favourites in the comments?

Trains: they actually quite useful things when they are on time (or turn up) and certainly can be quicker than plodding along the motorway.

Virgin Trains might well have their super shiny and green Pendelino train and First Great Western (surely neither first nor great could be applied to them?) may be popular enough to carry 70 million passengers a year but are we still paying over the odds to travel with them by rail?

The problem, it would seem, is not that there aren't cheap rail fares available; but finding them. And new research from Which? shows that even the experts are confused!

Which? did a little investigation you see, and the fact that only half of the 50 questions answered by station staff and the National Rail Enquiries (NRES) telephone helpline were correct.

In fact, Which? calculated that if you do your own research, you would have been up to £1,263.60 better off than if you had followed the advice of the professionals!

So just how bad was the advice given out? We will let you be the judge:

• Bad advice was given for the cheapest fare for a single journey between London and Grantham by both station staff and NRES.

• NRES made another gaffe when asked if passengers could travel from Southampton to Bristol, then on to Birmingham later the same day.

• Some of the most costly misinformation was given for journeys where season tickets should have been recommended.

But both NRES and station staff quoted £67 per journey, making £134 in total - nearly double the cheapest price! (and you wondered how train companies made all their money?!)

Which? also checked out 'the earlier you book, the cheaper the ticket' claims of five train companies (One, Virgin, First Great Western, Midland Mainline and GNER) and found that it was not always the case...

People willing to look online saw better results. Which? found the National Rail Enquiries website always provided accurate information, but was only flexible enough to handle 14 of the 25 questions.

However it isn't possible to use the NRES website to plan a route where a journey is broken or to plan multiple journeys over time (which is not exactly helpful!)

Malcolm Coles, Editor, which.co.uk, said: 'The NRES website provides accurate information, so why can't station clerks and those manning the NRES helpline?

A good question indeed and one that clearly needs answering!

So just how useful are rail companies when it comes to booking tickets?

Why not share you experiences in the comments?

Banks; quite a popular subject with us here at the Money Hospital but they are clearly not so popular with many of you!

As if the never ending bank penalty charges saga wasn't enough, there was then the small matter of the Northern Rock fiasco; (Finance Physician said he hadn't seen such mass-hysteria-induced running-around-like-headless-chickens since Tottenham last played at home!)

Clearly this has had a big effect on many of you when it comes to trust as nearly half of us here in Britain say that we no longer trust banks! In fact, according to a survey by marketing firm Teamspirit, almost a quarter of us no longer trust lenders of any kind following the near-collapse of Northern Rock and the first run on a bank in over 100 years.

In fact, the whole mistrust virus seems to have spread to the internet too (which Matron frequently refers to as the "devils' tool" but then she is a little strange...)

After many of you struggled for days to withdraw your money via Northern Rock's website, faith in online banking has also been sapped, with 25% of you saying it is untrustworthy.

Volatility in the UK's financial sector has also bashed confidence across financial services, with credit card companies, insurance companies and investment firms all scoring poorly.

In short, it seems that the mistrust has also spread to other sectors of the financial services industry: 26% of you saying you no longer trusted supermarkets to provide financial products, while 22% of you had lost faith in credit card companies, (something that has been on the cards for a while!) and 20% did not trust insurers. Gosh, we are skeptical lot aren't we?!

The only companies that appeared to have been unaffected were investment companies, which were deemed to be untrustworthy by just 7% of you, and loan companies that were not trusted by 6% of you.

One bright spot amongst the financial glom and doom was that building societies came out top in the league of trustworthiness, with 48% of you declaring your confidence in them.

Joanne Parker, chief executive of Teamspirit commented on their survey:

"The Northern Rock situation has contributed to the low levels of trust that the British public has in companies that look after their money."

"But with the UK having one of the most regulated financial services markets in the world, our industry offers customers a great deal of choice and flexibility" she added.

So, it would appear that we have a healthy distrust of many financial organizations; but which of the lenders do you trust the least?

Why not vote in our poll below?

Northern Rock was a bit of wake up call for the banking world and also for those of you with savings!

Whilst some of you made the rational decision to keep your money in Northern Rock, others amongst you decided to play safe and take your money out.

So, if that was you, where should you put your savings now?

A good question indeed and here are a few suggestions that we hope might prove useful:

A pretty obvious place to start would be National Savings and Investments:

National Savings has products such as the Easy Access savings account which has proved massively popular post Northern Rock crisis. It also has index linked savings certificates and income bonds.

Because it's the Government savings bank, it doesn't really offer any high risk/high return products, but many people are now looking beyond that and seeing the safety that it offers!

Their products are 100% secure seeing as their investments are backed by HM Treasury (which we hope is unlikely to go bust!) and this is clearly proving popular as over £65 million of savings have been deposited with them since Northern Rock went a bit wonky!

Despite not having great interest rates, their Easy Access Savings Account does exactly what it says.

Its is an instant access account with a cash card that allows you to pay money in at post offices and take money out at ATMs. You can open it with £100 and has interest rates of 2.6% for £100-£999 and 5.15% for £50,000 or more.

They also have fixed rate savings bonds where you have to commit your cash for 1, 3 or 5 years.

The 1 year bond pays interest at 5.2% from £500, rising to 5.35% at £20,000 and 5.55% at £50,000. The 3 year bond starts at 5.25% and the 5 year bond at 5.05%.

Though these seem good, there are better bonds available from other lenders that pay more interest as you can see:

• Birmingham Midshires has an 11 month bond paying 6.91%
• Halifax has a 2 year Web saver bond that pays 6.75%

You should also consider putting your savings into one of the big High Street banks.

No really, this is not as daft as it sounds right now!

If you do put your savings into one of them, you are every unlikely to lose your money if one of them collapses. This is because there is a strong presumption that the Government won't allow a situation like Barclays or HSBC to go under.

So, what are the big banks offering you are a saver?

Abbey is paying 7.25% and Halifax 7% so long as you pay in a regular amount of money and the maximum deposit is £3,000.

You should also be fairly safe with Building Societies so you might want to check out these savings accounts:

• Principality's online eSaver pays 6.2%
• Market Harborough's onthedot 30 Day Notice account offers 6.15%
• Coventry's online Sixty-Plus eSave for the over 60s pays a rate of 6.4%
• Skipton's Christmas Saver pays 7.55%

Ok, so you might not love gold that much but if you want to save your money wisely then gold is a pretty good bet investment right now!

Why? Because it will survive any banking crash!

However it does not pay interest, you have to pay transaction fees when you sell and its price goes up and down frequently! (In the last few weeks, the price has gone from $660 an ounce to $725)

The starting price for a gold bar is currently £39.25 for a bar weighing 2.5 grams but real investors start with a bar weighing 1kg and that will cost you a tidy £12,000!

You should also consider buying gold coins such as Krugerrands (1oz for £381.50) or sovereigns (the QE2 2007 version sells for £111.)

Of course you could always stuff it under the mattress?

A bit old skool and tempting for some of you, but very definitely not recommended!

If you stash your cash at home and it's stolen by burglars, or a fire or flood destroys it then unlucky; your insurance won't cover you!

You could of course buy yourself a safe but the small 4 digit safe that can be bought in Argos for example wouldn't deter a trained monkey so it best to avoid.

Online retailer www.safeoptions.co.uk says there are 2 types of safe: fire proof ones for documents and certificates and security safes for cash and jewellery.

The industry grades safes according to insurance bands running from £1,000 to £150,000.

A £1,000 safe is supposedly secure for £1,000 of cash and £10,000 of jewellery while a £5,000 safe covers you for the same amount of cash and £50,000 of jewellery.

Safeoptions recommends the Burton Torino safe which sells for £269. It topped the Which? best buy tables as the most secure it tested.

So, Northern Rock may have crumbled a bit in the last couple of weeks but as you can see, there are a few ways and places to save your hard earned money that might give you more peace of mind!

They say that lightning never strikes twice; but surely it can't be true when it comes to banks being nice?!

However, truth is stranger than fiction, especially as there is now another bank that is planning on reducing their overdraft charges!

Earlier this month Lloyds TSB banks revamped its overdraft charges, cut its interest rates for unauthorised borrowing by about a third, and reduced its charges for going into the red.

Now, (and the cynics amongst you would think its another bank trying to pre-empt next year's test case with the Office of Fair Trading), the Alliance and Leicester is suddenly being generous!

Alliance & Leicester is bringing in a daily fee for being overdrawn, but says it will continue to offer free banking to customers in credit.

Up to now, as one of their customers using an authorised overdraft you paid interest of between 6% and 17% each month.

However from Oct 22nd, the A&L will become the first UK bank to abolish overdraft interest for all its customers!

Also, their charge for agreeing to pay a cheque, direct debit, or standing order while overdrawn without permission will stay at £25 each time it happens.

But the charge for refusing to make the payment while in the red (bouncing a cheque) will be reduced from £34 to £25.

That seems pretty clear and simple, but the new rules could have a sting in the tail for those of you who go over your authorised overdraft limit or go overdrawn without an overdraft!

That's because there will be a new £5-a-day charge on unauthorised borrowing!

At the moment, the fees charged for going over your agreed limit are £25 on the first day and £25 on the fifth day, with a maximum charge of £50 a month.

"Five pounds a day may seem a better deal, but fees are not capped, meaning a customer could face a monthly charge of up to £155 if they were to go over their authorised overdraft limit every day," says Mike Naylor at price comparison website uSwitch.com.

Kevin Mountford of the price comparison website Moneysupermarket.com said: "Customers should ask themselves whether the new simplified fee structure does actually save them money in the long-term".

"According to our analysis, the new way of charging will result in Alliance & Leicester customers being marginally better off" he added.

The bank says that if you go overdrawn without permission you can ask for an approved overdraft to escape the charges and in any case, it says that most people who end up in this position pay money into their accounts to restore their balance within seven days.

So, while not having to pay interest on your overdraft may seem like a positive move, going overdrawn for longer than a week could prove very costly under A&L new "pay-per-day" overdraft system!

What do you think? Is it better to pay as you go on an overdraft or to continue to pay monthly interest?

Why not let us know in the comments?