And so, dear listener, many, many years ago I decided to keep this blog more-or-less a football free zone. My relationship with Partick Thistle is a unique one as it is part of my alcoholic recovery, albeit an unusual one. I can go to games and to pubs with people who know my status and who do not force me to have drink. But for the second week in a row, we have a slight change.
No. I have not been drinking. I want to mention Wednesday night before catching up on other matters. Wednesday night was amazing!!!!!! The crowd was 8,872 and that minus three of our usual crew and to anyone I tongue-in-cheekly suggested that ‘if you made the Cup Final, then make sure you are there for the Morton game’…… You must have done…….. so many thanks. 😀
My voice is still recovering from both games and it shows. I have been talking a lot recently. Unusually.
‘We are Partick Thistle – we score when we want’……….be it the 89th and 90th minute….phew!
So I am taking the weekend to recover from that. And a number of meals out recently. In good company. And a brilliant movie. Good spot, Dr W, and I was a wee bit apprehensive ‘cos of the French sub-titles but, no, they worked.
And in that scene at the end I not only saw a woman taking her clothes off but there was a sex scene and someone being shot. Oh, and the British Board of Censors thing at the top of the movie? It highlights too much of what to expect. It said there’d be a hanging scene, so I spent most of the movie trying to guess who, what and where…..and I was wrong.
So it’s been a couple of weeks of catch-up. Lots of things. I mentioned to someone, for example, that I had received an invite to the wedding of this and any other year and they said, ‘Oh, is that the first you knew of it?’ NO! I am dead chuffed at how much, as part of the wedding party, I have been kept in the loop and I am making big effort. I am even having people across to show me how to wear and tie the laces you get on brogues – the shoe; not the accent. Seriously.
And this is a big event for me as well………but I will stand quietly to the side and smile….not just the smile of a proud dad (and dad-in-law)…….but as someone who got there with lots of help….and some interesting practice at the Spateson Bowling Club in Spateston some time back…. 🙂 Every so often I will leave the room. Those of you who read this who will be there…you’re not to worry about me and it won’t be during the speeches….
But I caught up with some interesting news on TV. I had never heard, for example, of 17 year-old Paris Brown, who tweeted her way out of her job as a Police and Crime Commissioner. She had said some bad things some time back and they had bounced back. One irony was that that would have been part of her job – to talk to people to explain the dangers associated with social media……..a lesson lost on 72 year-old Martin Fitzmaurice – ‘the voice of darts’ – who did not understand the significance of the British International Championship being streamed live on the British Darts Organisation’s website and told racist gags. Now has he done the decent thing like Paris Brown and resigned? Don’t think so but I could be wrong.
And if we’re talking about responsibility and taking it……don’t blame computer game manufacturers cos you’re stupid enough to give your five year old your password! Jeez…….
And there’s been a lot of editing work but it does my head in when people say they will send me work on, say, a Saturday morning and I have the entire global resources of www.thewordprocess.net available and standing by and they make no effort to contact us….but on the other hand there’s the man who, when I asked how much I usually charged gave me a figure much more than I had ever expected……….I am one of Thatcher’s children so I took it……
One quick thought on her death (a sad old woman with no friends or family there at the end). She encouraged the sale of council houses to do away with one of the strengths of local authorities – the ability to build the type of housing that was needed and thought appropriate. Had local authorities still that responsibility then they could be building a whole range of social housing so that people on housing benefit but with two bedrooms might be offered alternative housing as appropriate; thereby giving people the jobs of building and maintaining them; and therefore reducing the reliance on benefits……anyone out there with the ear of Ian Duncan Smith, please feel free to present this idea as your own.
And finally, the Domination degree is back up and running. The Essex Committee has met and decided and I’m cool…….all the time I’ve spent recently at the computer mastering away is about to pay dividends and me and a tape recorder is about to go back out there. And for those of you wondered if I’d had any feedback from that presentation I did to the Post Grads…apparently they enjoyed it, but no, they had never heard of Watergate. Sometimes I do feel older than 42. 😦
Cya keep(ing) it fun and still wearing that badge? It may need a season ticket next year….mmmmm
Johnt850 – the man who talks with porpoises.
So as well as various goings-out already mentioned I spent some time in Vodka Wodka off Byres Road last Thursday night……a nice wee bar. And I’m often asked if I miss alcohol and my standard reply is I don’t really miss the taste but I do miss the effect……but I’m now asking myself what ‘effect’?
I no longer need the blackouts (which was why sometimes I kept on drinking after I got home) and if I ever needed it as a way of loosening my tongue…….well, I think not these days. It’s quite interesting to wake up the next day and remember everything that was said the night before. Doesn’t mean it’s any less embarrassing but it’s nice to remember.
And in a week when all the talk was about Radio 1 editorialising, this long link is to an Elvis Costello song which was editorialised but didn’t seem to get any attention…….the offending word? Here’s the clue. It’s the same word as was the name of the dog in a black and white movie called The Dam Busters…..No. No prize.
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