"Even when the darkest clouds are in the sky"

Dark clouds literally (it is November in Norfolk, big skies=much cloud, much of 'em frightfully dark and often wet)
Dark clouds metaphorically (what exactly will we do next summer without Euro08 to enjoy?)

"You mus'nt cry and you mus'nt sigh"

Old chums lighten your load with fantastic new blogs!Mayor Johnsen (husband of Lisa at Onegoodcook and a drummer by trade). Looking forward to as many blog related good times as we've had real ones! (This guy knows everyone, he's like that).

"spread a little happiness as time goes by".

I seem to collect drummers.

I was not wrong.

I said this over a year ago. McClaren has to go.

The manager of the England football team has certain expectations placed upon him.

He must lead the team to the Quarter finals of the major tournaments. At least.

To fail to obtain qualification is an immediate resignation matter.

Mr McClaren, leave, leave now.

Oh what a day, Oh what a day,What a most incredible day!

Everything is happening in a most incredible way!



First of all these fellas (that's Her Majesty's Government to you and me) lose all our personal and financial data on a misplaced disc. That's the banking and personal details of 25 million of us with children in the UK.

Thanks.

Then this.



England get dicked by Croatia and fail to qualify for Euro 2008.

Apalling.

A really shitty day to be an Englishman.

A blog is born

Joy! A new blog is born. OK, it's been about since June but I have only just been informed of it's existence.
You can see the author (with the late Kitten whom she adored and in turn was adored right back) in th picture above.

Tales of LA and fine eatin!

תודה ישראל

But there's also this...

...when it's not misty and damp or dark it can be alarmingly crisp and bright and sunny!

Norfolk Gothic

The weather is damp and misty.
Misty all day long.
Dark alot of the time too.
Very, very dark.
"Dark at breakfast, dark at tea".

Book learning #38

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain.

I did enjoy this book. I did.

I just felt that I would have enjoyed it much more five years ago.

It was one of the books on my parent's shelves, a book amongst many that I had wanted to read for a few years. Each time he appeared on TV doing his food/travel thing I thought to myself "Oh, I should read his book, the one about not eating fish on a Monday" . But I never did.
And I enjoyed it. I mean, I thoroughly enjoyed the first half , the early years, the crazy shit. Then he became more proficient, more clean and tidy, and slightly dull. I fell away towards then end. There are only so many well run and successful restaurant kitchens I can be bothered to read about.

Stig of the dump.

I was at the dump on Sunday emptying half a tree into the 'bits of tree' bin.

A bloke I'd never seen before made some dump type comment to which I replied "Yes, my wife does all the gardening and I have to clear it up".

His response?

"At least you've got a wife" and then he started sniffing.

That was awkward.

Also, alot of the kids I went to school with, the kids with 'issues', they have ended up as police officers.

The almost floods

It's like living in Holland. Well, in some ways but not in so many others. The whole 'living below sea level' thing is a distinct similarity.
This can get slightly awkward when the perfect storm of tides/winds/heavy rain/swell etc threaten the fragile coast.
Luckily the threatened catastrophe was avoided this morning as the winds weren't quite as bad, the tides not quite as high, the rain eased a bit and the swell was, well, just different.
Fortunately the coast was saved the worst effects.

And us?
We live 30 miles away on a hill.
Phew.

This is not a football blog

Norwich 1 Watford 3



Captain Canary I can understand, every team needs a mascot. I will tolerate you.
Splat the cat? I loathe you. I see no point in your existence. Especially when you come on the pitch at half time, we're 0-2 down and you start poncing about with the Captain looking like you're having fun. I don't care how much they are paying you. It's wrong.



The Silver fox watches Watford warm up for a second half against a tired and effete City.
He's been doing this for years



The groundstaff sort out the divots at half time.
I have some questions. Questions I have had in mind for about 25 years.

How much do they get paid?
What do they do for the rest of the week? Do they look after the pitches at Colney and turn up at Carra Rud?
How do you get that job?

My journey home.

I was placing my phone on the dashboard after calling Frau Random Doubt to see if we needed any potatoes or some such menial domestic errand and the damn thing went click.

This is the result.

The road between work and hometown on a Friday afternoon.

And before I get all the road safety calls I was using a hands free headset thingy and was within the speed limit/sobre/obeying the two second rule etc etc....

ADRIFT!

Adrift at the bottom of the Championship and 2-0 down against Ipswich.

Bollocks.

NB: Never blog at half time. It's a silly thing to do. I'm glad this time it worked in my favour as City clawed a 2-2 draw. We are currently a little less adrift than we were before.

Free spuds for life!

After months of patient waiting the Silver Fox finally has his allotment!

Here he is weeding the plot on the edge of Hometown.

This should mean that we will soon be treated to homegrown organic vegetables fresh from the soil.

In order to create the best possible growing environment we will need to remove the stones that litter the soil. I recommend employing the walking grandchildren to spend an hour or so picking stones and placing them into buckets. Of course knowing the particular grandchildren they would probably unionise themselves and demand something called 'an honest wage'.

Huh.

Overheard on our sofa

Me "I miss jews and I want a pizza"
FRD: "Where are the Puerto Ricans?"

Happy Halloween

Blog pics

I was curiously looking at possible new images for the blog icon. These two came into contention but only for a moment.

enjoy.


Mondale as almost Rock star.



Oohhh! 1984.

Books.

This may sound a bit odd so please bear with me.

It's actually great to be living fairly close to my parents. They adore the wee hen and he gurgles and chuckles right back at them. It's one of the reasons we moved back, so that they could know him as he grows up.

There is a side effect.

It's a benefical one.

The bookshelves at B****s Towers are loaded.

They are loaded with all those books that you thought you should have read, all those books that you might have read, all those books that you sort of thought you should have read or might have read and a few in between. Don't even get me started on The Silver Fox's study which is crammed with sporting volumes from over five decades, everything from how to tune your racing dinghy to photostudies of the 1966 World Cup Finals. In the next room and downstairs there are all the great classics (Austen, Bronte, Dickens, Tolstoy etc) as well as lots and lots of more modern fiction and biography. It's a wonderfully random selection and from time to time it's a place where a passion for books can be indulged, especially as I am currently banned from bookshops (it's a single income thing, we need to tighten our belts a bit and my book habit was costly).

Gretna 0 Inverness Caledonian Thistle 4

One of the most utterly forgettable things about English life?
The media reporting of Scottish football.

Why?

Who cares?

(and I'm not drunk)

This made me smile

From time to time words crop up in an order that touches one's emotions, moves one, makes one cry or laugh. This wee nugget is from a recent post of Weasel's

"But life is not a Greek tragedy (unless you are a Greek person with perpetual bad luck. Then life is a Greek tragedy tinged with irony)."

That's it.

I love the way words, poetic or prose can delight, amuse or move. Mere snippets of poems, novels or songs can enchant and motivate.

More to follow I'm sure.