Andy's Glasses

I can feel it. The vibe. The buzz. The karma. The excitement. The totally universal acceptance (as long as your ‘universe’ is bounded by the English Channel, the North Sea, Hadrian’s Wall and the Forth Bridge) that destiny favours… Harry Kane. And Gareth Southgate. It’s in the air, its all around and its totally different to what they’re feeling this morning in Rome, Turin, Milan and all those foreign places ‘over there’. Totally different. Even though Italians may not think so.

I’m getting ‘match prepared’. I haven’t eaten pizza all week. Not one. Not even a small pepperoni with extra cheese, jalapeños and avocado (gotta have something green otherwise you die). No pasta. Not one drop of Prosecco or one grate of Parmesan. And I won’t use olive oil unless it comes from somewhere like North Korea or Syria.

And I’ve got my ‘kit’ ready. England shirt, obviously, face paint (red and white only) awaiting. My lucky socks, which I wore when my school team beat Dagenham Comprehensive 3-1 to avoid relegation to the Sarf-west Essix 9th division (east) in 1973. I have my football boots from 1975 still covered in lucky mud from Hackney Marshes. And then I opened up the safe and removed, wrapped in their sealed plastic protective coveringS… the underpants I wore for both legs (and ON both legs) of the 1981 FA Cup Final when Spurs beat Man City!!! Never washed, obviously, you need as much concentrated ‘goodness’ as you can get with lucky clothing.

Because football is not just about kicking a ball around. It’s not about ‘form’ and its not about ‘England have never beaten Italy in a knockout match’. That’s all completely irrelevant. When compared both to the wearing of my lucky underpants and the mindset of the players on the pitch. Because England have never lost a major final at Wembley. Italy have never won a game that Joey’s watched. It’s about today, tonight, and what happens at eight o’clock.

The stars feel aligned to me. I have faith in Gareth and both his teams. The few who play football and the much bigger team of physiotherapists, psychotherapists, counsellors, faith healers, voodoo perveyors and yoga gurus. That’s who really wins games.

COME ON ENGLAND!!!!

A xxxx

Ok, so what do you do if…

You book a mini ‘staycation’. A night in a lovely (allegedly) hotel in Bournemouth. And it ain’t that far, so you can leave Saturday morning, enjoy the rest of Saturday, eat a lovely meal somewhere, relax, rest, breakfast (hotel breakfasts are just the best things in life because someone else does it all for you… and then there’s more), and then another day on the beach, coming home in time for the football tomorrow night. What could go wrong?

Mel. That’s what went wrong. Ok there were weather issues too. Like all reports, all week, had promised ‘bit a rain, bit a sun, bit a cloud’. But the proportions kept changing until last night, when the middle ‘bit a’ wasn’t included at all. Just in time for us not be able to deploy the ‘cancel up to 24 hours prior…’ card.

Well never mind. We’ll have a lovely stay, walk when we can, eat the rest of the time, blah, blah, blah. Bournemouth’s lovely, how bad can it be?

We arrived about 11.30 so went straight to a car park (the entire south coast of England is a controlled zone for parking) which we know leads to some fab walks. And off we walked. In the… let’s call it ‘drizzle’. But heh, this is England!!! Sunshine here is wet.

And we’re on a massive, really beautiful beach, surprisingly quiet and unpeopled (in the fucking rain) and Mel decided to redecorate parts of the beach. She was ill. Like horrible, vomitingly ill. Poor thing. Joey had it last week. Lila the following day. Their mum and dad last weekend, and now THIS! All over Southbourne Beach.

I phoned the hotel’s call centre, I’m guessing somewhere in Slovakia? And they can’t cancel on the day of arrival. Simply not done in Slovakia. Or Sandbanks, apparently. So we went to the hotel. Where I informed them that although I appreciate their cancellation policy, do they really want a woman throwing up all over their hotel? At this time of heightened sensitivity to all things viral and bug-like? It’s their call.

So the receptionist, I’ll call him ‘Billy Panic’, though he was very sweet, went to speak to the Manager, Mr I’m not going to shut the entire hotel down for the first 2 weeks of summer holiday because some curly haired grandmother brung her London germs here, adopted a more pragmatic, less Slavic approach and offered us a ‘no charge cancellation’. I walked back to the car, where I’d left Mrs Billious, in the rain, with a smile on my face, and we high-tailed back to London.

Comin home, I’m comin home, Andy’s comin home… I’m comin home…

Happy lotta drivin’ Saturday

A xxxx

Well who’d’a thought that two days before the final we little Englanders would still be talking about ‘coming home’ in earnest??? Though there are many who talk nothing else for 365 days every fucking year. As Casper Schmeikel pointed out, the European Trophy has never ever been in England, so how’s that ‘home’? But we don’t care about such details, Pedantic fucking Dane, ‘isss comin’ ‘ome, innit’. And all we have to do is beat the Italians. How hard can that be?

But cynical Danes aside, the ‘comin home’ thing now carries its own meaning for (almost said ‘Brits’, but no!- for-) English people. And you shouldn’t miss that the line ‘30 years of hurt’ was written 25 barren years ago. They need to re-write the song, but obviously, whilst waiting for a year with the right and rhyming phonetic, we might go and ruin it by winning the bloody thing!!! That would be a tragedy for music and would seriously dent the future income of Messrs Baddeil and Skinner. But we’d take it in a moment.

Of course, the main man in all this, the dude who, come win or lose, becomes elevated to the Gods of Legend, is Gareth Southgate. And that is definitely his rightful place. He is charming, humble, intelligent and lovely. I would bear him children, pronouns notwithstanding… ok, the womb’s a bit of an issue, but NOTHING is impossible with the right amount of self-definition. Gareth has taken us (the entire nation) further than any previous manager. And there have been a few. All serial losers. Gareth is a winner. Ok, his penalty taking is questionable but the fact is, he got ‘right back on that horse’ and had a fabulous career after his miss. Which endears him even more strongly to the plebs (me and you). Because we’d all have missed it too. Its not as easy as it looks. Just ask Harry Kane. Or Killian Mbappe.

Wednesday night’s win was simply incredible. The total definition of ‘it doesn’t matter how you win, long as you do’. Was it a penalty? Who cares? Was theirs a free kick??? Many say no. Would we have had a penalty 2 minutes later for a more offensive tackle? Probably. But its irrelevant. Totally. We won, they didn’t, the final’s on Sunday and I’ll be ‘there’! Which I won’t be for the Wimbledon men’s final the same day because we’re off on another mini-break. Oh yes, England holds many wonders, plus many types of rain and cloud, and we intend to try them all. But a Wimbledon final without the sublime Mnsr Federer? Not worth renting space on my own sofa.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

I’m a strong adherent to social distancing. Mainly because I hate people. Hate crushes. Hate crowds. But only on group levels. Individually its different. I love hugging. I love the total invasion and complete overthrow of someone’s personal space. It’s not a ‘hug’, its a ‘coup’. An invasion. Oh, well can you get your hands off my ass, Mr Hancock? That kind’a thing. But in massed throngs such proximity is not so nice. Leaving a football ground can be challenging in the ‘bottleneck’ areas which all grounds seem designed to incorporate. It starts to feel a bit ‘Hillsboro’. Tube travel, with great fat sumo types forcing bodies onto carriages, that’s the stuff of panic attacks. Leaving a theatre or cinema, because ‘old people’ (beyond 70, for the purposes of this conversation) insist on stopping to look at stairs before descending. Don’t know why, they’re the same stairs they walked up not 2 hours before, but they have to stop first. Clogging up the ‘traffic flow’.

But nightclubs are different. They are there for the crush. Bodies jammed tightly together moving to the same beat (except for 1 or 2 who move to a slightly different beat), that’s the buzz. Enhanced, obviously, by alcohol or other ‘mood altering substances’, which are available at every decent nightclub or from an alleyway close by.

And on CGFI day, July 19th, nightclubs can open for the first time since March 2020. And at ‘full capacity’. But in view of the intervening 16 months, in case anyone missed that bit, the clubs are advising people to remain ‘sensible and spread out’. As opposed to insensible and spread-eagled, as many ended the night in ‘normal’, pre-covid times. So I’m not sure if that the geezer who asked for sensible and spread out, has ever been to a nightclub. He owns 47 of them but possibly has never been to play in earnest. I can’t wait til they re-open, personally. #itchinf’rarave.

Football tonight. The biggest… EVERYTHING EVERRRRRR. Words can hardly describe the bigness of this event, so immense is its magnitude.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

So what am I supposed to do with my mask collection from July 19??? I’ve spent the last 16 months building up a collection unrivalled on any western face, plus boxes and boxes of the shitty blue and pink ones. Which fill every pocket on every jacket, trouser and other suitable item of clothing I possess. (Yet I still arrive at a shop at least 3 times a week to find myself maskless; how the fuck does that happen???) So I’m refusing to ditch the mask on CGFI day, in 2 weeks time. CGFI? Covid Go Fuck Itself. And here’s our new mantra, which, due to our forthcoming masklessness, people will actually be able to hear repeated: ‘IT HASN’T GONE AWAY, WE’RE JUST LIVING WITH IT’.

We’ve all become a little too numerate in the last year or so. We’re obsessed about the numbers of positive tests, the number of vaccinations, the number of deaths, hospitalisation, first doses, both doses, anything countable. We’ve never done this before. But those numbers rule our life. Yet we’ve never before counted up those getting and dying of ‘normal’ flu, which always kills at least 15,000 every year. We don’t count up ‘new cases of hay fever’, nor colds, athletes foot, Irritable bowel or chlamydia. Because ‘wot don’t kill you makes you stronger’ and none of those kill you. So why count them? Which is pretty much where we are with our pet virus. Loads of people get it, but very few need hospitalisation and a minuscule number die. Ok, not good if you’re that number, but we all play the odds every day in a million ways. Ever crossed a road with me?

I hate wearing a mask. Don’t do it other than on the tube or in certain shops that give me dirty looks if I don’t. I just hate being muffled (my words are just too important to miss) and I hate being faceless. You smile at someone for helping you and think ‘why bother?’ But I’ll probably still choose to wear one on the tube. No idea why, I just will. Maybe because social interaction is completely banned on the tube so the mask won’t impede. Or maybe because that’s my one little bit of ‘Covid paranoia’, the rest of which I managed to overcome by April 2020 when I was bored with it.

Crowds are back. We can fly to Germany. This week. The laws governing our Coronavirus lifestyle end on CGFI day. It all becomes ‘voluntary’. Or, ‘ignored’ as we call it. We’re getting there. Oh the wonder of those vaccinations.

Happy nearly free Tuesday

A xxxx

There are winners and there are losers.

In Batley & Spen (what’s ‘Spen’? FFS), Labour held their seat in the ‘most important by-election the world has ever known’, but reduced their majority from 3.5 thousand to 350. And claimed this as a ‘stunning victory’. As in, ‘yeah, we did 10 times worse than last time so that’s brilliant, barely clinging on to a seat we’ve virtually never lost; well ‘appy with that.’ And yet Kier Starmer, who would not have survived a loss as party leader, was leaping around, punching the air. As if he’d just put four goals past Ukraine.

Now THAT is a fucking victory. That is a ‘win’. But I will NOT gloat. I will not become ‘that’ person. No. Not for one minute. Just because we’ve gone 5 matches without conceding a goal. And have now reached the semi-finals of the biggest competition held in Europe. And just because Harry Kane not only proved his impatient, short-sighted, clueless detractors wrong in emphatic style, but also increased his selling price by at least 50 mil in the process. But I won’t be in any way arrogant, complacent or horrible about this amazing, stunning, spectacular trouncing of a bunch of almost-Russian racists and anti-semites. I bear them no grudge. Nor will I mention ‘Scotland’. Even ‘Wales’. Because that would not be in keeping with the nature and tone of this day of glory. Our glory. England’s glory. So I won’t. Don’t try to make me.

And if that wasn’t enough, there was Wimbledon. The only tennis tournament in the world. Which actually matters. To ‘proper’ tennis fans. And the best news is: we no longer need Andy Murray. Because we have…

Emma!!!

In tennis as in football, its not about winning, but how you win. And if you’re winning with a smile on your pretty face, boundless energy and enthusiasm as well as a killer game, that’s almost as good as watching a whingeing moaner grumble his miserable way Scottishly round the court. She’s 18 years old, a ‘wild card’ entry and simply brilliant. And funny. Clever. Gorgeous doesn’t hurt either. And although she has a funny name, at least it doesn’t end in -ova.

What a day for ENGLAND. Just sayin’…

A xxxx

I watched a program called ‘Canada hits on the BBC’. I love those programs and watching BBC4 always makes me feel like the intellectual I really should have been, had I been more… intellectual. More cleverer.

Originally I didn’t intend to watch it. I thought ‘wass’it gonna be? Celine farkin’ Dion? Justin effin Bieber??? And Leonard Cohen (all bow)’. And its not about knowing lots of Canadian artists, because we all do. It’s knowing that they are in fact Canadians and don’t belong to that nether-world to the south.

But a theme emerged, as I watched. They showed about 10 numbers by different artists. And 3 of them had suffered badly from Lyme disease. Shania Twain, who lost her voice for 15 years as a consequence, Bieber himself (see the tattoo of a tic, midway down his left forearm, just beside three death’s heads, a Mona Lisa and a big red maple leaf, before you get to the polar bear on his elbow), Shania and Avril Levigne.

So being a keen statistician I’m going to argue that 30% of Candians have Lyme disease. Or probably will get it. At least before they get their third number 1 hit. And its a horrible thing. You get bitten by a tic and the next thing… you’re Lymed out for the foreseeable.

Therefore if you go to Canada, remember to watch out for 2 serious problems: Polar bears and tics. Of which, Polar bears are much easier to see. And hence, hopefully, avoid. They also don’t eat humans, which tics do. Warning over.

Bryan Adams is obviously Canadian. Obviously. And Alannah Myles who sang the brilliant ‘Black Velvet’, a song filled with Mississippi and other such references, presumably because ‘Calgary’ didn’t rhyme. Anyone with the surname ‘Wainwright’ is a Candian, hundreds of them, generations, all really good. Who knew? Alannis Morissette, yeah we knew that. And Nickleback. Canadian rockers extraordinaire. If ‘How you Remind Me’ isn’t the best rock track of all time, its in my top 5… possibly 15…

There were others, loads of others. But I was suffering withdrawal at that point. I’d been watching the tv for more than 30 minutes and hadn’t seen a goal scored or an ace served. Shaking uncontrollably, I quickly switched channel.

I’d be prepared to forgive Canada a lot just for producing Leonard Cohen. In fact, just for ‘Halleluyah’. But for a small country (I know, its either the biggest or second biggest, depending on who Russia invaded this week; I mean people) it has produced some seriously great music. And Celine Dion.

England playing Ukraine tonight for a place in the semi-finals. Could we… can we… will we…

Answers to all those questions tomorrow. Unless we lose. Then you can all fuck off and let me sulk.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

Well that felt good. Nice. Satisfying. Refreshing. WE BEAT THE FUCKING GERMANS!!!!!

In an incredible turn around of the norm, an amazing suspension of reality, an outstandingly unusual event, which happens in nature with the regularity and frequency of the Cretaceous Extinction, (when the dinosaurs died), England beat Germany in the knockout stages of an international competition.

Yes, for the first time since 1966, WE BEAT THE FUCKING GERMANS!!!!!!

HARRY KANE 1, ADOLPH HITLER 0.

That wasn’t the scoreline, just the overriding emotion. And it was emotional. Winning big matches is always so, but that baggage, those horrible memories of defeats past of penalty shoot-outs gone wrong, of just doing well in tournaments ‘until we meet the Germans’, made last night especially sweet.

England, my England…

We did meet the Germans and then we won. To progress. To the quarter finals where we meet Ukraine. A nation, like America, who elected a comedian as its president. But unlike Trump, Ukraine’s was a real comedian, rather than a mere laughing stock. The nation deserves respect just for that alone.

But heh, I’m getting ahead of myself. Ukraine, then who? Italy? Belgium? But we need, like the team, to take it ‘one game at a time’. I’m focussing all my fan-ness and supportivity on Ukraine. Thinking too far ahead gives you further to fall when it all goes wrong (Spurs fan Help Book, page 3). So I’ll leave the hyperbole and the incessantly annoying ‘WE CAN GO ALL THE WAY!!!!’s to the pundits.

The team were collectively good. Harry Kane was probably the worst-performing on the night, but then scored a goal and rose instantly to man-of-the-match. Which is a bit annoying as I actually had to spend time admiring scumbags like Jack Grealish, who changed the game pretty much instantly, and Kyle Walker, who was outstanding. Thought the real man of the match was Jordan Pickford in goal.

So now we have it. England are in the Euros and I’m finally on board. I have a red-and-white cross of St George on my face and its staying TIL THE END!!!! Ok, its only metaphorical currently, but if we win on Saturday????

Official, national, Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

The relationship between England and Germany is a complex one. Emotionally, psychologically and, especially, footballingly. We love the Germans, most of them, we cheered when the wall came down and their nation was re-unified and we send our daughters to live in Berlin because its the best city in Europe. Yet we can’t forgive them for those wars. And if we could, we could never forgive them for the repeated tortures on the football field.

None more tortuous than in the 1996 European Championships when Gareth Southgate, our national team manager, missed the penalty that sent the Germans through to the final. And although his teammates immediately flew to him to support him, to give him love and comfort and ‘it’s not your faults’, that event scarred Gareth. He went to see Eileen, the famous Glenn Hoddle favourite and faith healer, which in fact had a very positive impact and brought his game back to its previous exemplary standard. But underneath… in those dark moments… you just know, it can never leave you.

We beat the Germans in the World Cup final in 1966 and in the intervening 55 years we ain’t done so good. And tonight, its game on once again. Victory would be a belated redemption for Gareth, no question about that. But a loss? A LOSS??? Unthinkable. Hands up all English people confident (truly, deeply, in heart-of-hearts) that we can win…

Ok, none exactly flying up in the air.

Last night’s matches were amazing. Simply brilliant, exciting, thrilling, come-from-behinds, extra time, penalties, they had everything.

We don’t want that tonight. We want a dull and dreary 1-0 win. Harry Kane in the 7th minute then shut up shop and bring on 9 more defenders. I have no desire to thrill every Slavic ‘neutral’ or Italian bar-fly. Just to beat the Germans.

They want to ban mobile phones in schools. Research has shown, conclusively, that children’s productivity improves by 6.4% as a result. Possible 9.7%, up to 14.2% for the more challenged pupils, and as little as 0.3% for bright kids. Maybe there’s a 10.6 in there as well somewhere, I gave up the will to live at that point in the article. Which can only really be described as ‘inconclusive’. But sounds like a great idea anyway.

Yet I feel this infringes on children’s human rights and intend to bring action. Because it is the basic, fundamental right of every schoolboy to send pictures of his penis to every 13 year old girl in the class. In fact its his duty! What’s wrong with spending the Advanced Algebra class surfing porn sites? And how are you supposed to be a proper, totally committed bully without using social media for 15 hours a day?? Eh???

Very happy, massively important Tuesday

A xxxx

Now if Matt Hancock and Gina Coladangelo had been clever, like Mel and me in this picture, there’d be no story. No sacking. No aggro. No bother at all. Sensible, that’s us. And Covid safe.

Ok there’s the whole moral issue about two families being destroyed, about chronic self-indulgence and lust over decency and a few other trivial concepts which don’t seem to worry anybody outside the Daily Mail, but the resignation was about breach of (stupid, pretty ineffective, possibly meaningless) covid measures which HE put in place for the rest of us.

Now its all about ‘Boris should have sacked him on Friday’. Rather than waiting for him to fall on his sword on Saturday. The whole message from the inept and useless opposition party has become about ‘Boris lacking the spine, the balls, the backbone… lungs, teeth, hair, elbows and most other anatomical parts, to sack him!’

I don’t even like Boris but this is an argument not worth having. Unlike the one about Gina’s initial appointment but ‘we’ are still looking into that. Her Majesty’s Opposition really needs to up its game.

I’ve worked out why the Cotswolds are so beautifully, gloriously, spectacularly, verdantly, green. Rain. Then more rain. Then loads more rain. Then 10 minutes of sunshine, then let the heavens open once more.

It wasn’t actually too bad today, the overnight rain had stopped by breakfast. Not that I gave a shit at that time, because hotel breakfasts are magical things and I don’t care about the weather whilst indulging. And indulge I do.

So we went for a country walk. Got a map from the hotel, checked the parameters of Google maps (as if) and out we went. Like the true townies we are, into the countryside where Oxfordshire meets Gloucestershire. I wore shorts and hiking boots. Because mud was predicted. And even before we got catastrophically lost, as we always do, we got catastrophically wet. The water being borne by the long grass and… catastrophic levels of stinging nettles. And we’re in shorts. Hmmm…

We circled several fields several times, looking for a landmark which wasn’t a tree or shrub. And… we were lost. But found our way back. Eventually. Wetly.

And now we’re home. To the paved streets and solid pavements and bloody sunshine!! in London. Safe. I’m done with green.

Happy Monday

A xxxx