Today is the battle for 4th place in the Premier league. Chelsea currently occupy that space, Spurs, just one point below them, need a win to overtake them. It’s a battle. It’s a war. It’s… its fucking horrible. I hate such games. Whenever spurs ‘just’ need to win/draw/score more than one/concede less than 2/survive for 42 minutes/whatever, it all goes to shit. And Stamford Bridge can hardly be described as a ‘happy hunting ground’ for my boys, having won once there in the last 436 meetings there. Ok, may need to check those numbers, but that’s what it feels like. In fact we’ve just gone 1-0 down and I can’t even bring myself to watch it.

But I did get to play tennis. Which is the third miracle in the last three weeks of storms, floodings, gales, hurricanes, whirlwinds, nuclear bombings and… earthquakes! At match time minus 30 minutes it was pissing down in a gale. Then it stopped raining. Then… we played. In the gale. But at least it was dry. You take what you can get. It’s February.

Before that I was at Tai Chi. Doing my self-defence. I was talking to a mate yesterday and he asked me, if I was attacked or something similar, ‘would I use it?’ As if it was something kept in a special department and switched on using two separate keys for safety. In case of emergency, break glass. Or for me, in case of broken glasses, that is an emergency. Because its not like that. What we do is drill. We practice various attacks and learn to defend. And then we repeat. And then repeat. And then (quite literally) do it with our eyes closed. And then we work on different types of attacks (knives, fists, sticks, bricks, bottles, soft fruit, whatever) coming from different places (front, side, head, behind) and when we’ve done those we do them all again. The idea being not that your self-defence mechanism needs turning on, but that it becomes how you react. It becomes you. I live my entire life as a ninja warrior!!! My hands and feet are dangerous weapons! Something Mel’s always known because if she stands too near me I’ll generally kick her, tread on her, drop something on her or fall over her. It’s what I’ve always done. Now I just do it in a more… Chinesey way.

This is a photo of Joey and the football, which we lost. Joey, the only happy Spurs fan in England, Ireland, Wales or California. And only because he’s too young to realise he’s a Spurs fan. Shame to tell him, really.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx