One back, one out, the library is magic

Sussex 212 from 20 overs

Quite something last night. The other teams' fear is the Sussex top six. Described, all six of them, as destructive bats. Any two of the six get going, and there's a fearsome total to try and get. Last night one of them was Matt Prior. He blocked two or three balls to get his bearings, then went proper mental and ignited the rocket fuel acceleration cylinders. Not a close game, but 212 from 20 was great watching.

Body falling apart

Got one from Zak today. Short but didn't take off, and I mistimed putting it away. Badly. Edged it off the shoulder of my bat and into my balls. Naturally I tried to take evasive action in the micro second between shoulder of bat and testicular impact. Even with a box on, that remains instinctive. In doing so, something in my right achilles went ping. It had been coming. Both achilles tendons have been feeling tighter week on week, but along with knees, shoulder, neck, etc, etc, I've done nothing about it.

Draw snatched from jaws of defeat

Some draws feel like a win. They should've sorted us right out today, and they didn't. Great.

Concentrated bores

Behind us at the game yesterday, we had the five or six loudest and most boring men ever. A statistical anomaly. In any usual bunch there are less than or equal to one humourless irony-free bloke, specialist subject general knowledge. Then the others alleviate the pain by supplying the humour and irony. Seldom are there > 2 such in any group. Let alone half a dozen or more all the same. Me? I'm not so easy going all the time. Mr Naughty is. He went out for a Melvin and came back saying: “nice to have a couple of overs without the commentary”. When you've cheesed Mr Naughty, you know you're the one in the wrong.

Finally, a football final

It'll be tight tomorrow. I predict a Spain win, in a close game.

The Art of Fielding and Lionel Asbo

A new author's book went back to the library yesterday, and I collected the new Martin Amis. So cool. Here's a fantastic book I've finished with back. Thanks. 60 p that cost me. Can I pick up the new Martin Amis. Hardback. Unread. First time out. Would've bought it in any case. Another 60 p. If you can find better value, point me in that direction, please.

Martin Amis always draws mixed reviews. They can be reliably ignored. Everything he writes is worth reading. Everything.

Unexpected stars of the Euros

Italy were 2-0 up at half time...

...good stuff, great management Bob:

4^th official Uncle Fester was a busy boy:

Will Self did well in goal:

While the German manager's behaving badly:

And two goals for the Martian:

Way past bedtime

Gatic Slotdrain

I got an email with the subject: News from Gatic Slotdrain. It took a while. "Are we buying him?" And "was it Russia or Poland he played for?" Then I realised. Trade literature.

Way, way past my bedtime

It was almost like being a grown-up. After midnight. Last time must have been new year's eve. I was dozing then because Jools Holland's line up wasn't too scintillating. Two long, hard, interminable days without football. There were two T20 games on Sky, but even so...

Then, when the football's back, we're playing cricket. Not great timing, but playing always comes first before spectating. “Spectating” reminds me of “England's Irie”:

Hey diddle-diddle

There's a fella in the middle

And I think he's pulling my string

My wife's lactating, I'm spectating

It's a football thing

Poetry like that does not come along every day. Seriously. The song's writing credits are Strummer, Keith Allen and Black Grape i.e. Sean Ryder.

MM was born 1990. Italia. Lost on penalties to Germany in the semi-final. Great tournament. MM's first word was 'goal'. A son can have Dada or Dad as their first word and that's enough for a whole lot of pride. But 'goal'. That's a lifetime bond. Not everyone will understand, it's a football thing.

So we played, quick beer, some crisps, home. Curry (turkey balti in thirty minutes - not bad going), plates, laps, telly, first semi. Note to the medical profession: blood pressure tablets, and how to save a fortune. Forget all those relaxation techniques. “Now, breathe” now bog off, you new age hippy. Opposite effect. They wind me up. Of course I'm breathing, you stupid tart. If I weren't I'd be dead. Which, in some terms, is the ultimate relaxed. Forget what you mongs call exercise and we call torture. I had an occupational therapist ask me whether I'd tried dance. I probably did that snorting dog poo through a straw face. “No”. “You should” she said, “low impact on the joints, good cardiovascular”. What's wrong with chasing a squash ball around a court? That's cardiovascular and I can summon enthusiasm to do that. Low impact? I like high impact. Generally, into an opposing player. I like tackles flying in. I like sitting an opponent down on his arse with a rising ball. As MM said yesterday, he liked receiving the beamer. It isn't going to get him out. It's an easy scoring chance. There's another run for us for the no-ball. I like bowlers digging it in short. I get runs off those deliveries, if I can hit them. If I can't hit them, they 'aint hitting the stumps. That's good clean fun. Standing in a line with an instructor and copying the jigging about? That's old-folks home for the demented. No thanks. I'll be the old boy in the corner playing chess or gambling my happy pills on the geriatric Texas Hold 'Em table with the cigar and whisky gang. Nights like this lower my blood pressure. Prescribe leaving work early, picking up MM, playing a highly competitive but good spirit game of cricket, then home for the football. Work = stress and sport = all enveloping involvement = not worrying about work = less stress.

Pills and new age bull and visiting the doctor = more stress.

So. Portugal gave it a go and fair play to them they're not a one-man team, whatever that one man believes. They had the better first half. The second half wasn't sterile as the surface scratching, superficial, perma-tan lightweights would suggest. It was a good contest. In a context where neither team wants to concede, and the less time left to equalise after conceding, the less they want to concede, it was fascinating. Spain battered them in extra time. Win win. A dramatic goal and a dramatic climax or the drama of penalties. Penalties is was. Spain through. Portugal out.

Tonight? Germany v Italy is a lipsmacking prospect.

Simply a great game this evening...at the Saffrons

We played cricket tonight

A great game. Thanks to AD for doing all the organising, cajoling and arse-kicking required to turn out eleven blokes on a Wednesday evening. They batted and got 115 in their twenty overs. I make that 5.3 runs an over.

It was great to see Mr BO'S, and even better to see bowling as well as ever. Rich bowled beautifully, too. MM looked a little rusty for all of one ball before slipping into the groove. MM and Mr BO'S held tricky catches, too. Rich also had the difficult task of keeping Steve R awake on the boundary. Motty and Russ bowled good opening three over spells at good bats. Luke and Neal came on at the death and were difficult to get away.

I like playing cricket with MM. I love his robust, mickey-taking, blokeish sense of humour. He's great to have around in a changing room, quick and sharp. He fields like a demon, covering more ground than two of us old codgers working together. I love the calm way he bats.

Rich batted beautifully on top of his performance with the ball. MM thought he looked a bit dodgy in the nervous nineteens (we were retired out at twenty runs, but like the indoor game, able to resume in the same order when the other wickets fell). Motty smashed his way to twenty in no time at all as we were chasing the runs. My twenty took quite a bit longer. In the end we were 108 for seven or so, losing a very close and hugely enjoyable game.

They laid on crisps and beer. There was a good few quid collected for a children's charity. Both teams had a quick bit of socialising and went home happy. I think the general consensus was that we should do that more often.

Don't panic, Mr Mainwearing

We're going to the T20 game on Friday. AD, Mr Naughty and me. I looked on line and the tickets were £25 at the gate (pot-luck seating), or £20 in advance, with the booked seats £25 in advance. I got three of those as otherwise they can't guarantee sitting together. As AD put it, we have to sit together to ensure Mr Naughty receives the required large dollop of abuse over the evening. Just as I confirmed the booking an email came in. The Grad had dropped me in it, it said, and went on to say that I need to attend a residents' meeting. On Friday. I did that cold sweat and shivering thing. No. No, no, no. Then I opened the attachment. Typically these meetings are evening affairs. This on is at 11:00 in the morning. Phew.

There's nowt stranger than (female) folk [number one in an infinite series]

BLISS (looking smashing) had been out for a meal. Do you know what the score was? I asked. No, she said (it was a “hell, no, why should I?) I've been out with the girls, haven't I?

What do they talk about? How can you go out on semi-final night to somewhere without a telly? That makes no sense at all. I don't get it.

MM and I were having a long and detailed conversation about how useless Jonathan Pearce is. In one game (MM reports) he actually described a player has having the spring of a NFL basketball player. That's a National Football League, er...basketball player. Some of our cricketers presumably have arms like NBA quarterbacks. Right in the middle of this enthralling debate BLISS went to bed. She didn't have any interest in watching the recorded game. Odd. Very odd indeed.

Poison hammock

In the blink of an eye...

...there she was. Gone.

Just looked at the photos of BLISS's hammock stunt. The camera was on the sports setting. The one where the shutter machine-guns shot after shot. There are five photos in total. Not much happens in the first three. BLISS starts getting in the hammock. That's photo one. In photo two she's maybe, at most, moved 50 mm (that's two inches in old money). In photo three, she's moved another two inches, max.

In photo four there's just a glimpse of her feet and a blur of hammock. This means that in the time it takes to move two inches, she's been flipped through 180 degrees and thrown back-first onto the floor. Photo five is of a very blurry BLISS. The unkind suggestion has been made that the blurring is down to the camera man's laughter. I was just rushing to help. Honest. No, really I was. Not laughing. Not a bit.

Ulysses

One of the greatest ever novels, if not the greatest ever novel, dramatised on radio four, and available on those podcast things to listen to as and when you get a chance. Although there's some sort of sell-by date on the downloads. The novel takes place in one day, June 16^th, so that's when it was broadcast. In Dublin. I've listened to the first two of the seven parts it was broadcast in. Episode 1 is set in the Martello tower, and follows Stephen Dedalus to the school he teaches at. Episode 2 starts at the Blooms, 'Poldy taking Molly her breakfast before slipping out for a pig's kidney for his breakfast. They've done a great job. Let's face it, the book is so chock full of magnificent language and poetry that the dramaticist's only problem can be what to chop out.

Cashpoint rage

Frank Turner tweeted:

Pet hate: people who take forever using a cash point. Surely you do this pretty often, right?

Not just cashpoints Frank, but I've found myself frustrated behind someone who seems to check their balance several times over and perform some other functions of an ATM I've never explored before setting of to spend their tenner. I've found that I dislike people who mess about unnecessarily, in general, and I'm getting worse about it. Here's some of my pet hates:

• An irrational one to start with. People who drive to the wood then go through a long getting changed routine before walking their dogs. Clogging up the car park while they bugger about. Muddy boots off. Clean shoes on. Change jacket. Wipe dogs with towels. Just get out of the car. Walk. Walk back to the car. Get the dogs in. Get in. Drive away. Jesus. What is the matter with these people.
• The bank. The some of the people behind the counter in my bank have been on one of those chip into brain implant training courses and are under orders to cross-sell services. Fine, when there's no queue. After waiting an age, I don't want to wait any longer while the woman in front is quizzed about her mortgage / insurance / ISA arrangements.
• The tip. Rubbish disposal. The clue's in the name. I want to pull up and throw away. Not only is the tip now patrolled by the local authority gestapo monitoring my every move in their meddlesome way, people seem to be buying into the whole thing and appear only too happy to waste hours buggering about wallowing in piles of rotting filth and fiddling around sorting green glass from brown before it all goes off. In the same lorry.

Giving it some welly

He's given that some welly

Graham Onions bats eleven for Durham in the T20 competition. That means, well, it means he's not so good with the bat. More of a bowler. Eleven normally says: “the worst bat of the eleven we've got, don't expect much from this dude...”

He's just walked out, played a decent shot straight to the fielder, then smashed the next one out of sight for a massive six. Prompting Bumble, commentating, to say:

“Who was that? He wants testing.”

I may save that for the grad when he turns up on time or (whisper it) even early. Mind you, I'd never get to use it.

I love all those expressions. He's given that some welly. He's proper spanked that one. I was discussing Chris Gayle's incredible scoring rate with MM. “Yeah” he said. “He don't mess about.” Or something like 'mess', anyway.

Croft puts one into row Z. Bumble again: “That's been hit. Where's the builders?”

E-bay...

...part global auction emporium, part on-line car boot sale. Our sitting room is now a small distribution centre for the second hand Polly Pocket, various used toys, and assorted junk from the garage market.

I have problems with antique and second hand stuff people. Two problems. Problem one occurs when you are buying. When you are buying all sorts of absolute rubbish are suddenly transformed into worth a fortune, massively in demand, rocking horse poo rare gold dust. I can't then help asking the obvious. “If there's such massive demand, how come it hasn't been sold yet?” Problem two occurs when you are selling. When you are selling, there's no demand for gold, the bottom's just fallen out of Ming vases, and that mint edition of the bible in the original Hebrew signed by Moses? Can't shift 'em for love nor money mate. Market's flooded. “How come there's one for sale at £plenty then?” brings the response about your one being chipped, not in the wrapping, not chipped enough, still in the wrapping, the wrong edition / revision / too late a model / too early a model.

Make that three problems. I would have no problem with problems one and two if it weren't for problem three, which is: that they do the whole selling? worthless, absolutely worthless, and the buying? this is worth an absolute mint, and absolute fortune routine without a glimmer of humour or any suggestion of irony. Deadpan. Either they believe their baloney, or you should never sit down with them at the poker table.

Racism and incorrectness at the BBC

Radio 4 announcer this evening: “New balls please. No more interest in Eastern Europe, all eyes now switch to SW19.” Oh yeah? England may be out, but there's plenty of us neutrals still far more interested in the remaining games than the chosen sport of middle aged housewives too young for the snooker. What about Spanish, Portugese, German and Italian listeners, too?  

Penalty justice, England battered over 120 minutes

The Art of Fielding

A great first novel. Towards the final few pages: “You told me once that a soul isn't something a person is born with but something that must be built, by effort and error, study and love.” Beautiful.

The story is underpinned by a baseball team's season, and three players. One is gifted enough to make the team without really trying. One is gifted enough to be a star player, as long as his dedication to the cause and killing training regime is maintained at ridiculous levels. One is destined to play the game professionally, because he's supremely, superhumanly gifted, and also willing to work as hard as anyone else on the team to improve in all areas.

Things go right and wrong for the team and the individuals in and around it. Throughout the book the author describes sport and training with realism and grit. In any given changing room, for every nerveless, balls of steel ice in his veins character, there's two running to and from the toilets before a game, the guys all too aware that so often a single error decides the outcome.

It's been one where the 510 pages were not nearly enough. It goes back to the library tomorrow. Hopefully it will continue to find fond temporary owners to enjoy it.

No quarter final surprises

Portugal were favourites and they deserved to go through. I wasn't so sure about their supporter, interviewed on the radio the next day, claiming that they had proved that they're not a one man team. There wasn't much proof evident to suggest that stopping Ronaldo would not thwart Portugal.

Germany powered their way past Greece. They look energetic, physical and very technically good. They brushed Greece aside and the 4 – 2 score was not a true reflection of their superiority, and the second Greece goal was through a sympathy-vote penalty awarded in the dying minutes.

No surprise in the result between Spain and France, as Spain were slight favourites to go through. The surprise was that France didn't bother turning up and were beaten two – nil by a Spain side that hardly needed to change up from first gear. They had their slippers on and their cigars lit up from twenty minutes in when they went a goal ahead.

In the match that was generally considered too close to call, no surprises either in the result, a draw after normal time. The surprise was that it wasn't close at all. England looked like a Sam Alardyce team. A well-drilled, highly organised, highly competitive team, hardly likely to score from open play and hoping to get something from set pieces. Add a long-throw machine, some defenders more intent on committing brutal fouls, remove nine tenths of Roy Hodgson's brain and give him a baseball hat, and you have the current Stoke City team. Italy looked very much the better team. 0-0 full time, 0-0 after extra time, penalties, exactly according to the predictions. Italy being so much the better team wasn't foreseen.

The penalties went (Italy first) 1-0, 1-1, 1-1, 1-2, 2-2 (cheeky chip down the middle, now there's nerves of steel), 2-2 (Young thumps his against the bar), 3-2 (stuttering run up, into the corner), 3-2 (tame from Ashley Cole, saved by Buffon), 4-2, and that's that. England cannot feel hard done by, because football justice has prevailed, albeit by the cruel and unusual way of the penalty shoot-out.

There's now two days with no football, which is unjust, unfair, ridiculous and will seem to drag on for ages and be unbearable. Then it's Portugal Spain in the Iberian derby, and Germany Italy in the second semi-final. A Germany v Spain final is probably the most likely and mouthwatering outcome. Nice shot of Balotelli and Hart at the end of the night. Maybe with the game finishing after midnight (local time) some of our guys were mentally already in the nightclub.

TV awards for Euro 2012 coverage

Some TV awards

For the Euro 2012 coverage. Worst titles: ITV. Looks like they wanted the Wallace and Grommet bloke (Nick Park is it?) and a primary school's remedial art class instead. Great cost saving, worst titles ever.

The most irritating commentator has to be Jonathan Pearce. How Keown hasn't punched his lights out by now is a mystery. He'd be nicknamed 'Thrush' in any changing room.

The awards for most jug-eared Tottenham tosspot, the most kerb-crawling Tottenham tosspot, most dour Jock Scouser, and banal, Mary Poppins was a great call state the obvious Geordie are obvious.

ITV also have weird studio furniture. Are Roy Keane, Jamie Carragher and Patrick Viera on the set of a new Friends type series? What the Brummie bloke doing?

Best advert: Chris Kamara in the gym (you have to love that man) copping the ball in the head before the shouty Italian dude comes in. Shouting the odds (heh). Worst advert: that Ray Winstone 'you're the daddy' crap. “If I woz, I'd go fer cards an corners”. Would you. Would you really?

No barking

Poor Rich felt he'd become invisible, as he didn't get the usual barking at from White Dog. Don't worry mate. She was down the woods and promises to give you an extra-special barking at next time.

No parking (ticket)

Every visit to one seafront site, I pay at the machine, display the ticket, shut the car door and watch the ticket flip over. That's a fine in Brighton. So starts the whole Bazil Fawlty slapstick routine, trying to get the ticket the right way up while slamming the car door, all without the ticket turning over. Last time a warden walked by while I was parking I told her about the problem. Not a lot of comfort in the reply: “oh yes, we get a lot of fines along here that way”.

Deutschmark v Drachma

Too much football?

Commander Cody and the Lost Planet Airmen. Honest. Great foot-stompin' bluegrassy band. The Live at the World Armadillo Headquarters album. No, honest, really. Google it. Great song on there. The words include:

“There's a whole lot of things I bin an gone an done,

But I 'aint ever had too much fun.”

So it is with the European Championships, World Cup, the Prem, the FA and Carling Cups, the Championship, the lower leagues. Grass roots. Even that Scottish stuff. I can't for the life of me get the concept of too much football.

Last time I went on too much about the footy BLISS refused to read this and had a moan. So here's a Harry Enfield take on tonight's game between skint Greece and the cash rich Krauts:

Here's how the mind works and why the sport thing is what it is. Driving to work with MM this morning, radio on in the background. News item about the downgraded banks. I caught this:

“RBS, Barclays, HSBC”

My ears pricked up. I was (maybe subliminally) thinking:

RBS: Six Nations Rugby

Barclays: Premiership

“Must be a sport item, better pay closer attention.”

Then they went on about the bank rating agency downgrading...blah...blah, yada, yada, yada, boring don't really care, disappointed because it wasn't sport stuff.

Not ideal, I know, but how things are hardwired up there.

We're toast, Pleat says we're the bee's knees

K2 tax

Abhorrent. Morally vile. Indefensible. How can I get some? Let's face it, I've paid shedloads of tax. At source. At 20% (at least) on all purchases. At exorbitant per cent on petrol and beer. I'm due a bit of relief.

GCSE's and BSc's

Industry says the exams are rubbish. The exam boards and the education people say they're fine. This much I know: I have a graduate surveyor with Bsc(Hons) after his name. He can just about write in English, his first and only language. Their, they're and there are apparently interchangeable, as are you're and your.

I no indusrty luvs a moan + that, so their probably wrong + he's right.

Grexit and Chindown

After sub-prime toxic loans, we have Grexit (Greek exit) and Chindown (Chinese downturn) added to the economic disaster lexicon. Aparently Greece has a 'toxic mix of recession and austerity measures'.

Football's back...

Thank heavens. I've quickly become dependent. Had withdrawal yesterday.

I agree

With Cameron. Is that allowed around here? Gary Barlow is repugnant, abhorrent and nothing short of an abomination. Nothing to do with his tax affairs. Just the music.

England've had it

David Pleat, kerb-crawler extraordinaire and Tottenham Tosspot has endorsed England's chances of going all the way. Time to book those tickets home.

The doctors are on strike...

...does taking my pills amount to crossing the picket line? Should we all ignore all health advice for the day to show solidarity? Why should they chip in 14% to equivalent pensions while overpaid civil servants only pay 7%. Imagine that at the checkout of the petrol pump?

• Job?
• Ministry of Education, Whitehall.
• Cheese sandwich meal deal, £3.00. Next. Job?
• Doctor.
• Cheese sandwich meal deal. £6.00 please.

The Art of Fielding

The Art of Fielding

About baseball. Among other things. A good read for anyone without exposure to playing sport. A central character is dealing with the yips. There's a problem only players experience. Another pivotal character has dodgy knees. He does what almost every player not blessed with one of those superhuman bodies does. He pops painkillers like they're sweets and spends his down time either building things up in the gym or ice-packing them to reduce the swelling and the pain.

A common misconception is that every grass roots player jumps out of bed on matchdays feeling 100% up for it. For most of us, that was a handful of occasions. Most games involved differing amounts painkillers and bandages.

I was under fourteen years old when I had a massively swollen knee. Helpful as ever, my mother went straight to the blood poisoning and amputation diagnosis. Didn't sleep so well that night. The Dr was less of a drama queen and sent me off with some giant red pills and orders to rest. It was the football season. I played on the Saturday. I scoffed a week's worth of giant red pills on Sunday mornings. I lived with a tight bandage limiting the swelling between Sunday and Friday. Months later, during the cricket season and gentler exertion with less physical contact, it got better of its own accord. I didn't really think about it too much. Football was something I did. There wasn't a choice, no other option. You do whatever it takes to get out there and play.

The book describes sport as a special art. Unlike painting, writing, film making, where your mistakes end up on the cutting room floor, in the waste paper basket, or painted over, players mistakes are there for all to see. More like actors or musicians, it's more important to eradicate errors, become a machine, than to have the occasional burst of brilliance.

Euros v Olympics

I wonder how many of the great and good that are creaming themselves about a home Olympics, the same great and good that ignore what goes on year in year out while they sell off playing fields and tax grassroots sport out of existence, are secretly praying for England's failure at Euro 2012 in case that steals a bit of their thunder.

Past Olympics have featured solo synchronised swimming (WTF?), club swinging, Los Angeles 1932 (as opposed to swinging clubs, Los Angeles 1969), hot air ballooning and live pigeon shooting (both Paris 1900, not a combined event), croquet (also Paris 1900), and pistol duelling (1932, unfortunately discontinued, I have a long list of people making team UK for that one).

Paddy Power Pants

Get it right

England fans interviewed: “Wayne Rooney's return will have a great benefit in the dressing room”. Numpty. Like the BBC Muppet's legovers for stepovers. Learn the lingo before opening your mouth. There was that saying: better to keep your mouth shut, and risk everyone thinking you're a fool, than to open it and prove you're a fool beyond a scrap of doubt. Except it isn't 'fool' in the version I heard.

Actors, theatres, models, fashion shows, they have dressing rooms. With lots of mirrors. With lights all around them. Greasepaint. Make up. Costumes. That sort of thing. Players have changing rooms. Treatment tables. Benches. The smell of deep heat and white horse oils. Sweat. Dressing room. A giveaway, plastic fans.

1% tax? I'll have some of that, George

Thousands of mega-rich folk are paying 1% tax. No wonder the DWP morons and the HMRC mongs are after MM and me for £300 and £3,000, respectively. We've got to subsidise the 1% gang. Obsorne produced a soundbite about how he finds tax evasion “abhorrent”. I take it, George, that's abhorrent unless it's you or your slimeball mates that're benefiting.

There was a radio poll. Would you pay less tax if you could evade it. Now. Let's think about this. 0.000001 seconds later: yes. Yes I would, in fcat I'd pay ziltch if possible.

Rice or pasta

There's a pasta, risoni, that comes in small, rice-shaped pieces. So small, they're like grains of rice. I'm struggling with the point of making small bits of pasta shaped like rice when you can have, er, rice.

UEFA are pants

Nic Bendtner: Paddy Power pants. Advertising a non-UEFA sanctioned brand. One game ban and 100,000 euro fine.

Considerably more than the fines dolled out for the racist chanting and monkey-noises.

Good job UEFA. Great message. Confirmation that you are as useless, corrupt and did I say useless as we have all suspected for years.

Chapatis

Chapati pan and flour. Present from MM. Trial tonight. If I can get safely to the cooker. MM and BLISS are in here, skipping. If I'm not careful I could lose an eye attempting to get from the table to the fridge. No instructions with the skipping rope, obviously. Unlike BLISS's hammock which, according to the safety instructions, is one of the most deadly presents she's ever received. Before launching into the health and safety gone mad tirade, she did fall straight out of it and hurt her back.

Relativity and Jess Yates

Time is relative

Take the football tonight. Telly on. Fizzy water, bread, pate, gherkins. Blink. There's the clock, mate. Twenty minutes gone. Already. How did that happen? Conversely, try five minutes in the company of someone who thinks their diet, their aerobics / spinning / Zumba classes, or last night's soaps or skating / dancing / jungled / Big Brothered celebs are of huge interest. Each passing microsecond feels like an eternity.

Childhood Sundays were like that. Up and off out. Tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock. Suddenly, evening and the dreaded call. Tea-time. Ti...ck...to...ck. Tough grey indeterminate meat with overcooked vegetables. Tick...tick...tick, slowing down. Songs of Praise on the telly. School tomorrow. That's it. The second hand's flatlining. The minute and hour hands are static.

An empty jar of gherkins reminds me...

...of Charlie Connelly's gloriously insane Attention all Shipping. He went around all those locations where the visibility, weather, wind speed etc. is listed: Cromarty, Dogger, Lundy, German Bight, Rockall (that's Rockall, okay?). Or, where the is no land at the places, the nearest point. Why the gherkins? He visited some mental cases living on an ultra-exposed, cold and windy outpost of Scandinavia. They gave him some of the local, incredibly strong vodka, with some of the juice that remains in the jar when the gherkins are gone as a mixer.

Later he visited an old WWII concrete platform, which had declared independence and was in the process of minting its own currency.

Anyway, I've had a sip of the gherkin juice. By way of research, sans vodka. Actually, it isn't bad, but it'll never catch on.

Talking of boring

Jug-eared Tottenham tosser Lineaker is trying to sell Royal Ascot at half time in the Spain v Croatia game. Yes Gary. Posh nobs in very silly hats and races between identical brown horses won by one of the brown horses from the remaining brown horses. I'll file it with the Olympic swimming and those dieting telly-watching gym class people, under 'avoid at all costs'.

A few years back, in not so PC days, a journalist (unbelievably) writing in the Guardian questioned the entertainment value at the Olympics, which he described as “skinny tarts running around in circles”.

Come on Ireland

I've thought about it (not for very long) and for the good of everything that's right and decent, I want Ireland to sneak a draw or better still a win, and for Italy to be packed off home. I can't see that happening.

Beauty sallon at home

Having waxed me half to death yesterday, it's hair colouring time and there's a lot of purple water in the kitchen sink.

Fathers' Day waxing

MiB

Nice to have K & J visit today. Congratulations to them both. K's now a Bsc(Hons) 1^st class, and J's doing very well, good work fellahs.

Waxing lyrical

Somehow, after they explained back, sack and crack beauty treatment, I had wax applied to my (unshaven) face. That bit was fine. Then the wax was ripped off. It hurt. A lot. Apparently this was absolutely hilarious. That was at least four hours ago. The stubble, along with the soreness, remains. Does anyone actually pay to have that done to their scrotum? That must be agonising beyond words. Are the beauty places licenced to administer anaesthetic? This crack, back and sack thing. I'd want a general. Maybe settle for a local and some gas and air or an epidural. How on earth do they get any return business? There must be less painful ways to get shot of some unwanted fur.

Fathers' Day

I'm eating the gherkins (sharp, tart, crunchy, with dill) and the olives (stuffed with anchovies) with some cold meats, watching Holland v Denmark. There's coffee (Brazilian, ground) and espresso beans to look forward to, and a Jimmy Carr DVD to watch. Thanks guys.

Are Holland serious?

Can they be, playing tennis bad boy John McEnroe wide right?

ITV Euro 2012 titles

Are the worst ever. Worth a look just to assess them on the cringe-ometer. I rate them between WTF, and oh my god what have they done.

Come on Poland

Appy birf'day to you

Appy birf'day to you,

Appy birf'day dear BO'S,

Appy birf'day tooooo yooouuuuuu.

Have a good day mate.

Not happy at cricket

There was a fire brigade term for it in London, common canine copulation in polite terms. We lacked that today and paid the price.

Good bat / low scoring bat combination means give good bat the one, bowl five dot balls at Mr Low Scoring. Get in on the one when Mr Low Scoring is fcaing and keep him on strike. We failed to do the obvious. That means switching off mentally and that's inexcuseable.

Good day in the kitchen

Nice home made pizzas (tomato and mozarella, one with anchovies and olives, one with mushrooms). Goods lassi this morning. Prawn, muchroom and leaves chinese with oyster and fish sauce.

Proper government

Our (Polish) PM is at the game tonight. Big smile on his face, pleased to be there. Poland scarf around his neck. Remember Nelson Mandella when South Africa won the rugby world cup, dancing on the pitch with the trophy and a replica shirt on? Imagine our lot? Maggie? Tone? Cameron? All busy creaming their knickers over the Olympics, absent from the big tournament now in progress. Playing fields? Sell 'em to developers. Queenie at the Euro 96 final, great game, extra time, looked disgusted. Where's the horses, I'm bored.

Face it, our lot are scared of sport because it's noble, it's a real global language, it's capable of glory and beauty and removed from the filth and deviousness and dirty tricks and nastiness that abounds in politics. They don't understand, don't speak the language, and so are very, very afraid.

It's impossible to feel motivated to vote for any of our lot.

Great finale to first group

The only thing that could make things tighter was for Greece to take the lead against Russia. Greece have taken the lead against Russia. To go through Poland or the Czech Republic must win their game. The thing's blown wide open. Fantastic. Entralling. What does the Olympics offer? Dive into pool. Swim as fast as possible to the other end. Get out of pool. Collect medal if in first three. Yeah. I'll be glued to that spectacle.

Pounds, shillings and what?

Pure

Just finished, handing this back to the library today. Timothy Mo's prose is densely packed, and with the speed at which the story unfolds, the 390 pages could easily have sprawled to a less disciplined five or six hundred. Hedonistic ladyboy Snooky is recruited, press-ganged, into spying on an extremist training camp. There start the twists and turns. Underated author. Hardly prolific, over ten years since his last book. I was introduced when I picked up a remaindered Sour Sweet in the early 1980s. Mo is English, parents from Honk Kong and Yorkshire.

Fowlers End

Is a book about one of those seedy, scruff London suburbs where Dickens meets the Wild West. It's full of stuff like this “Youth is a dream, middle age a forlorn hope, and old agea nostalgia with a pervasive flavour of newly turned earth. Turn your back for five minutes and nothing can ever be the same again”. Tempered with “My mother was psychic – that is to say, she lived in a state of permanent premonition, so she was right at least half the time. If the sky became black and raindrops as big as shillings [that's about 10 mm diameter for anyone dealing in new money] started to come down and there was a rumbling overhead, she had a preminition of a thunderstorm”. A funny and sharp portrait of run down suburbia in the late fifties.

New money

We've had this newfangled decimal stuff for so long now that the term 'new money' has become meaningless, I suppose. At and after changeover, £sd and decimal were old and new money. The old stuff was absurd and I didn't miss it. There were ha'pennies and pennies. Twelve pennies to the shilling (a bob) and twenty shillings to the pound (hence my refering to £1.50 as 'thirty bob'). Twenty one shillings to the ginuea. What was that for? 50p was ten bob, and 2s6d (12.5p) was half a crown. 2s was a florin (I think) and there were things like a penny ha'penny being three ha'pence.

The bookie's odd well known to gamblers arise from this old money, and a different in countries that have always had decimal money. 11 to 8, 13 to 8, 6 to 4 and so on don't exist, and they have everything – to 10 or – to 5.

For example, place eight bob at 13 to 8 and, should your dog or horse win, the payout's a ginuea. Win thirteen shillings, stake back eight shillings, 13 + 8 = 21 shillings = a ginuea. Four bob at 6/4 wins ten bob. Easy then, absolutely painful now and forty years out of date.

Fantastic food last night

Brilliant, largely vegetarian Indian food last night. Highlights were a chilli paneer starter and a paneer with black pepper and South Indian spices main, the Tiffin Cup-winning elephant yam curry, and a mild in heat but very spicy chicken curry. Enough in the doggy bag for MM's lunch and BLISS's dinner tonight.

Lassi

I replaced the broken blender today and I've had a cumin and salt lassi and BLISS has had a sweet mango one. They were delicious. I got a glass one this time, hoping it might be a bit more robust.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BLISS!

Appy birf'day to you

Appy birf'day to you,

Appy birf'day dear BLISS,

Appy birf'day tooooo yoooouuuuu

We're all at work, leaving TGS wrapping presents. Not a bad idea. I'm ok as long as the present is (a) small, and (b) all angles are 90 degrees. Oh, and (c) there's no rush. Then there's (d) and (e) plentiful wrapping paper and sticky tape. Finally, (f) something soothing on the stereo. TGS is superb at wrapping presents under any and all circumstances.

Home now and TGS has done a magnificent job without (a), (b), (d) or (f). Fantastic.

Preja Vu

I just know this is going to happen. It's a Venus / Mars thing. Heading up the M23 on Monday with Fat Dave, he got all excited about pointing out a tree that appeared around one of the bends. The excitement was because it is actually a cellphone mast disguised to look like a tree. I sort of feigned interest. But the next time we head up the M23 I'm going to have to point it out. BLISS is going to do a massive 'whatever' and think I'm really sad and right boring. But it's one of those things. Now I know, there's no way of ever driving past it again without pointing it out. It's T-Mobile, by the way.

Borough Market

Took a short cut through there today. All the spices and fruit and veg smells, all the cooking. I've been hungry ever since. If you ever need an excuse for some fish and chips, or speciality sausage baguettes, or paella at 11:25 in the morning, this is the place. I was in the area because it has proved a big problem getting Transport for London to licence scaffolding in the area. Why? One of the reasons for the political sensitivity is, apparently, bacuase it is on Boris' cycle route in to County Hall.

Gants Hill

Right posh. Only hand-made birthday cards to be had and £9.80 for the business lunch in the chinese on the corner of Woodford Road and the A123. My maximum for one of those is £3.50, so I can't comment on whether it was good value. That's £3.50 including the can of Pepsi. Anyway, always nice to see somewhere new and tick another new station off on the tube map.

Pain all over

I'm creaking so badly at the moment. Pain, not aches. Right foot and ankle, both knees, back, limping. My bag felt like it was full of bricks and my shoulder was giving out by the end of the day. Could it be going back onto the blood pressure pills? It's now one in the morning (the normal one) and a Rempril last thing. Rempril. Sounds like a baddie in a bad novel or one of Dracula's henchmen. I was ok before I visited the doctors, so it must be their fault.

The cake's ready, the super-duper Indian restuarant's booked...

Just waiting for the big arrival of the birthday BLISS now...

Poland 1, The Archers 0

Ian Rush is managing Holland

There's nowt stranger than our elected representatives

Bizarre bunch in the Commons. The one thing politicians are all renowned for is lying. Yet the one thing they're never supposed to accuse each other of is lying. Misleading. Deliberately misleading. Being economic with the truth. Being disingenious. They're ok but the protocol is you don't call another Honourable Member (is that in itself a lie or just an oxymoron) a liar. It happened today during the debate about Jeremy Hunt (rhyming slang) and his involvement in...

...in some absolutely boring, tedious, uninteresting stuff with the newspapermen.

Anyway, someone called Jeremy (Rhyming Slang) a liar and his mate waded into the tormentors with “if it's ok to call my mate a liar” these are not the exact words, obviously, but the next bit is about right: “then may I say that the opposition front benches are the most smug, self-satisfied, pompous, holier-than-thou bunch ever to enter the chamber.” Apparently this was ok too. Probably because it's true. Along with the misleading, etc., the expenses claiming, and all that, their natural habitat is the moral high ground. They think they have the right to sit in judgement and meddle in other people's lives, doesn't that smack of pomposity, holier-than-thouness. Smug and self-satisfied? Just have a look at this gallery.

Poland 1 v 1 Russia

Great game last night. Poland came back from a goal down and drew one-all. The Polish goal was the best of the tournament so far. Huge Holland v Germany game tonight, made bigger by Portugal's win and now by Germany being two-nil up at half-time.

The Archers v Eastenders

The Archers is an institution. I love the way that, for a fascinating fifteen minutes every day, at seven o'clock, nothing happens. Unless the village flower show or a bull needing the vet's hand up his Khyber is high excitement. Now some Eastenders mush is taking over and talking about more cliff-hangers to the plot, more goings-on in general, and basically making it more like Eastenders. This suggests:

1. All the mush knows is Eastenders and that's the template that's going to be used;
2. The BBC lack the imagination to realise that if the Archers audience wanted Eastenders, they'd watch Eastenders;
3. The number of listeners is likely to plummet.

Frank Zappa scores, Jabba the Hutt managing the Hammers

Frank Zappa: leading the line for Sweden

Risky tactics from Sweden, starting zany pop musician Frank Zappa at centre forward.

Worked, as he got on the scoresheet, opening the scoring. Before serenading the Swedish fans with Joe's Garage and Brown Shoes Don't Make It.

Phil Collins in the Ukraine engine-room

While Ukraine played the torture-chamber favourite Phil Collins in midfield.

Come on Ukraine

I was neutral. Then Sweden did that long throw thing. Ball-wiping. Grand production about a throw-in. Hateful enough for some Sunday morning hungover no-hopers with no idea. Pathetic at Premiership level: that's you, Stoke, Tony Pubis, Rory Delap, and all who excuse you and your anti-football philosophy. Ridiculous at international level. Have Alardyce's Bolton turned up by mistake?

Talking of fat Sam

West Ham have found a cheaper alternative.

Stepovers or legovers?

Euro 2012 lookalikes

Little wonder the Republic of Ireland shipped goals in an uncharacteristic way against Croatia. Shay Given had an injury-prone season, but is known as a class international keeper. No wonder they tried to pull the wool over everyone's eyes by including Jack Dee in the squad. The comedian's grumpiness and dry wit have not caused any problems, but his diminutive stature has limited his ability to come and claim the high ball.

It looks like Giovanni Trappatoni chose the wrong day to give up the fags / glue / drugs. Luckily Lloyd Bridges was on hand to step in and do the post-match interviews. Obviously the decision to take a chance with Jack Dee didn't work out as he was at fault for two of the three goals conceded.

Cameron left his kid in the pub

Just after announcing further meddling in the form of compulsory parenting classes, and on the day that steps are announced to allow councils to cut the costs of dealing with troubled (I bet they were desperate to omit that final 'd') families, the Camerons leave their daughter behind. In the pub.

Added to the no teaching experience education ministers, the no bullets armed forces ministers, the no bedpans health ministers, we now have a prime minister going on about parenting, who is clearly unable to look after his own kids without shedloads of au pairs, nannies, and outside agencies pitching in. Perhaps some of those lessons, David?

What would MPs know about families? They're all sent off to boarding school the minute they can walk and talk, and not seen again until they graduate from Oxbridge and pop home for a few weeks before taking over a bank or a safe seat in the Home Counties.

My dad had a simple way of looking at things. There’s no middle class. If you work, because you need the money, then you’re working class. Everyone else is upper class or under class. The working class have been left behind by successive administrations and political parties and now don’t have any representation at all. Business class, that’s what all our parties now represent.

I bet their mobiles were red hot...

...that's the lifeboat crew in the floods in Wales. They had to be rescued. That'll take some living down.


England 1 v 1 France

Similar to Spain v Italy, this. Whatever's said, there's a point on the board and a draw on the record. However, England didn't pose as much of a threat as did France, they didn't pass the ball as well or as crisply, and they were second best at regaining and retaining possession. They still look like a quarter, sometimes semi-final team.


Slaven Bilic

Suit. Tie. Shoes. Topped with a woolly hat nicked off a wino. Got to love the bloke.


Legover?

BBC commentator for the Portugal game not only revealed his lack of technical knowledge and vocabulary, but an inability to learn from his colleagues in the Test Match Special team, and insisted on calling stepovers "legovers".

Henry V, all of us

We're off to the Globe...

...for the first time this season. I'm not big on ley lines and mystic stuff, but I get excited by the Globe. It isn't like going to the theatre. There's more of a buzz to it. More like going to a gig at the Marquee or 100 Club or The Nashville during the 70's. There's an underlying sense that something special is about to unfold. Without doubt the 700 standing groundlings are a big part of things. Having been one, for King Lear, for Midsummer Night's Dream, and for Romeo and Juliet, without shadow of doubt, it affords the best, most fantastic view of the stage; and it is the best value five quid you can spend without venturing abroad. On top of all that, it's so laid back, too. Bag of chips? Can of lager? Pack of cheese and onion sarnies you knocked up this morning? Flask of Bovril? Bring it in. You're here to enjoy yourself. Very different to the local multiscreen fleapit where the sweetie police turn all KGB if there's a sighting of an ASDA bag with some Revels and a Ribena in it.

MiB

We're meeting MiB (K and J) for lunch. As Henry V kicks off at one o'clock, this may be squeezing in one thing too many, and in any case (eating) time is going to be tight, ruling out starters (which I'm not happy about) and pudding (a cup of coffee for me, so I'm not so bothered about that), but mostly meaning that MiB will have a two hour return commute for a forty-minute quick lunch. Be good the see them, though, and I'll be doing my best to sell them the £5 standing option followed by a lift home.

K, no J

Just K for lunch, as J was busy back at home. Worked out very well. Arrived in time for some spectacular vivid green queen olives, and roast tomatoes, then garlic bread and a very good coleslaw. Pizza and pasta all round, picked up a standing ticket (MM did the first half, I did the second), then dropped J back to Beckton.

Henry V

This was my English literature O-level (what GCSE was in the olden days) Shakespeare. Unfortunately I was saddled with a teacher who could suck the joy out of a American Baptist congregation at peak joy level, and still have enough joy-sucking capacity to deal with all of Happy-Clappy-ville, Elation City, USA, on international joy day, when the Uni students dissolved buckets of extasy pills in the water supply. Suck all the joy out of it she duly did. She detested kids of school age. Apart from me. She hated and despised me with a vengeance.

How can you suck the joy out of a work of genius like Henry V? It's beautiful, well-paced, funny, and full of brilliant characters. Dominic Dromgoole knows the plays and this theatre inside out. He knows how to squeeze every drop from the cast and exactly how to play to the Globe audience. Jamie Parker was fantastic as the king, no doubt drawing on the experience of having played the Prince in Henry IV Parts 1 & 2.

BLISS, K, MM and TBG(17) were unanimous, a hit. Now, having seen it, I might read the reviews.

A win at last

There's nowt stranger than folk

BLISS and CRC, it seems, are not in European Championships Joyville. Less than enthusiastic, they are unable for some obscure reason, to set foot in football haven and let the rapture wash over them.

CRC: (After only the second game) How long does this go for?

Me: A few weeks.

MM: A month.

Me: A month, a few weeks, you know.

BLISS: There's always something. We had this in 1990.

Hold on a minute. MM was born in 1990. That's twenty two years ago. That was a World Cup year in any case, not a European Championships (that would've been 1992, when Denmark came from nowhere to win).

We've won a game of cricket

We're not really that bad. Over the years I'd say we were win a few, lose are few more, then we became difficult to beat and went up the ladder to lose some, win some, draw most. Then either some of the opposition slipped or some of us hit better form or both, and we had a couple of seasons where we won more than we lost, or at least broke even. More recently there's been bit of a slump. Fatherhood (precious years), fatherhood (new), geographical relocation (way too far every week), injury (achilles tendon), injury (head), and break up (back to Norfolk) have decimated the core of decent / better players available and left us struggling. Last season we drew a couple, lost the rest.

So winning today was very, very, sweet. Particularly against a good side we had to play well to get the win against. Particularly as some of them are spectacularly lacking in a sense of humour, some of them are below average in that department, and on today's evidence, only one or two pass muster.

Everyone chipped in. Considering my age, bulk, and adversion to running when I was younger and much less bulky that hasn't deserted me, I seemed to do a fair bit of running around in the field (thanks AD, G and DO). Bowlers bowled well, there was plenty of diving, running, chasing down and just plain getting in the way, from all corners. That kept them from running away with their scoring and then everyone chipped in with the bat (of those who batted) on a slow scoring, dodgy pitch against bowling that was at the very least naggingly accurate and difficult to get away, and at its peak (one over G faced) absolutely perfect.

Winning, leaves me grinning.

Football

Denmark beat Holland 1 – 0 in a shock result, and Germany beat Portugal which is a good thing because I like seeing Ronaldo cry and can't stick Nani (I don't like any type of goat, Ron). Every tournament has a group of death and Germany, Portugal, Holland and Denmark are it.