Sports news

Having decided to start blogging again, the first question has to be what I should write about. My general lifestyle hasn't changed overly, despite the upheavals of the Covid pandemic - I've been lucky, or maybe careful, to be fair to myself, in not contracting the virus (as far as I know, although there have been untold numbers of asymptomatic cases, certainly here in the UK), and I've had all of the vaccinations available to me (including the regular flu jabs I've been taking for more than 10 years), so my overall health, apart from the after-effects of my stroke in October 2017 (5 years ago now, doesn't time fly when you're not having fun), hasn't been too bad, I'm relieved to say.

So, instead, how about discussing one of the items that has been helping with my sanity over the last couple of years, namely watching a lot of televised sport. I've been a football (i.e. soccer, for those not in Western Europe) aficionado all my life, so the World Cup is a current favourite, needless to say (I'm watching the Germany v Japan game right now), and I'm also a big fan of many winter sports, the new season of the various Alpine disciplines has started to kick in, and I hope the Nordic events and biathlon won't be far behind. But my greatest passion is, sadly, in the off season at the moment - Australian Rules Football. I remember seeing a few highlights of the sport in the early 1970s (VFL games at that time), and enjoyed it, but then there was a 10-15 year hiatus here, when (as far as I know) there wasn't any coverage at all. But then Channel 4 stepped into the breach with a weekly 90 minute programme during the season in the late 1980s (I think was first shown in 1987 or 1988, but I haven't managed to find the exact year), and before long I was an enthusiastic viewer, firstly of the sport in general, but soon of a particular player - the best forward, in my humble opinion, that has ever played in the history of Aussie Rules, Tony Lockett. And his team was St Kilda, without a doubt the least successful club in Aussie Rules history (27 wooden spoons, one solitary flag!). Given my penchant for underdogs, me becoming a Saints tragic was a no-brainer. And so here I am, 30-odd years later, still riding the roller coaster, the highs and lows (mostly lows!), with my beloved, heartbreaking Saints. We've sacked yet another head coach, replaced him with the coach, Ross Lyon, who's been the most successful for us in recent times (although I wasn't a fan of his even when we were pretty good, 2007-2011, including three Grand Finals, one of them drawn - I thought his gameplan, revolving around ultra-defensive pressure, was hard to watch, even though we were winning most games in that era, especially 2009) after another underwhelming season. But hope springs eternal, the National Draft is happening on Monday and Tuesday (another date in the TV diary!), we might find the new superstar we've been craving for years. But I'm not holding my breath in expectation! Go Sainters!

Love & best wishes to all

Sammy B

998

Well, I guessed it was close to 1000, but I was surprised how close it turned to be. Looking at the last post I published here, and its anniversal theme, I idly wondered how many days had passed since my decision to go on hiatus. I could've worked it out, by mental arithmetic, but it was far easier to find a website to do it for me instead. And the answer is 998. 998 days since I was here, in a writing capacity, at least. I have considered resuming this blog a number of times in the interim, but I haven't committed myself, found the motivation, basically, until now. I can't imagine many, if any, of the few people who used to read my ramblings are still around in 'Blogworld' - blogging is a bit passé, I suspect, long supplanted by 'cooler' social media options - but I'm a bit of a stick in the mud, so Blogger will have to do, I'm afraid. I won't be posting daily, all in probability, but who knows? I might find the impetus from somewhere, stranger things have happened.

I'm aware that my blog's name is now an anachronism, given that I'm a sexagenarian these days, but, at least for the moment, I can't be bothered to adjust it yet, if at all. Consider it a quirk, perhaps!

Love & best wishes to all

Sammy B

Decennial, and out

Probably out, anyway. Today marks ten years to the day since I launched myself into the cyberspace ocean, and, predictably, a lot of things have changed in my life, some good but far more bad, pretty much all documented in the pages of this blog. In terms of carrying on here, though, the worst thing is my aphasia - it's just so frustrating to not be able to express myself fluently, even though my writing is markedly better than it was when I had my stroke in October 2017. Given the fact that its so painful, mostly psychologically but, occasionally, physically, too - writing can be a literal headache, on the bad days - and the fact that my blogs, never popular, but now almost completely ignored, means that I can't find the motivation anymore. I'll never say never, but this very well could be my last post.
If this is the end, thank you for reading - I'm not intending to delete the blogs, so I still hope that some people might find what I've written is useful, or even entertaining, but I'm not holding my breath in expectation.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

The last cutie

Maybe, at least. I was out and about yesterday, and saw a delightful boy, 12/13, right in my AoA, the most beautiful creature I've seen this year so far, and close to being the cutest I've seen in the 11 months since I moved to my 'new home town'. But, apart from the fact that he was a 'ghost', disappearing within a couple of minutes my seeing him, the usual depression set in, the knowledge that even if I saw him all day everyday, he could never be mine, even as a friend. Just like I've never had a boy in my life, ever, even when I was a boy myself. I'm 60 in a couple of months time, and I've spent nearly 50 years living with unrequited desire, never able to have what I want most. Pretty much the ultimate life sentence. No doubt the haters will say that is what I deserve, apart from the ones who just think I should be lynched instead. Days like this, I just feel like drinking myself to death. At least the pain will stop, finally. And there will be no cuties anymore. Forever.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Nostalgia and sadness

Both of those things, and together, too, in more than one case today. It started with watching an old 'short' on TV, a film originally designed, I suspect, as a cinema filler before the 'main feature'. The film was about 1950s Cornwall, hence my interest, and it showed my last domicile before I left the area, but more pertinently, a shot of a village pretty close to where we first moved to the duchy, and a village I really liked - apart from the fact that I would've never been able to afford a house there. That led to me googling, stupidly, the village we did live in at the time, with the predictable result that I ended up feeling pretty miserable, given the fiasco that subsequently befell me (albeit self-inflicted, for the most part). As if that wasn't bad enough, the lunchtime news announced that Terry Jones had died. Monty Python was a big huge thing in my life, especially when I was a teenager, so losing another 'hero' is a thoroughly sad day. To ice a very dark cake, Sky News (when I was in the pub, I wouldn't piss on the Murdoch cabal and their operation if they were on fire normally) had a 'talking head' discussing Jones' life, a comedian and writer who happens to be the resident 'celeb' at a Wetherspoons I used pretty regularly, especially when my 'real local' closed down in 2016. And that led me into further in greyness, about Stanmore in general, but in particularly about Cammy, who I lost as a pal because of the pub's demise. As I've said before, life is shit, except when it's really shit.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Funny how memory works

I was browsing a website I read regularly a while ago, and the post I saw, rather tangentially in terms of their usual fare, mentioned fossil hunting. Given that I was (and still am, being honest) a bit of a nerd, I joined the school Natural History Club when I was 13-ish, being a member for a couple of years. It was mostly conducted during lunchtime break (which was beneficial sometimes, especially in the winter, when you could stay indoors rather being chucked out in the cold!), but there were a couple of Saturday 'field trips', too, cheap enough for my parents to afford the cost. One of them was to a place well known for finding fossils, so I was very keen to go. It was Springtime, and it was a nice day, weather-wise, too, but it had been pretty wet earlier in the week, so the hillside we were investigating rapidly became a carbon copy of The Somme - I've never been so muddy in my life, as far as I can remember. But that wasn't the most memorable element of the day, though, hence the post title. I ended up working with a guy, who I knew by sight, but soon became friendly with that day. And he was utterly gorgeous! I was barely 14 then (he was two years younger) and was starting to realise (hazily) that I might’ve been, by the vernacular of the times, 'a poof', so, needless to say, I didn't do or say anything to out myself - I'd have been lynched, probably - but I spent the afternoon doe-eyed, to say the least. Nothing substantial happened later, either, in terms of our 'relationship', but we stayed 'mates', loosely, until I left the school when I finished my A-Levels in 1978. And that was it, I've never thought about him again (although I recall, very vaguely, one of my long-term friends from school mentioning him some time in the 80's), until today. He'll be 57/58 now, I've no idea what he's doing now or where he lives, but I hope he's had a good life. Better than mine, certainly. But the vagaries of memory can still recall the beautiful boy I remember, all those years ago.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Catalunya

I've had a e-mail from K this morning, complete with a couple of photos, telling me that she's settling in well enough as regards her Catalan adventure - she's staying in a rural area, 25 miles or so from Tarragona, away from the tourist hotspots, which is good from her perspective, so that she can't be tempted to spend too much of her money, she says! I'm pleased she seems to be happy so far, and, of course, I'm relieved that she's safe and sound - I know she's an adult and a sensible one, too, but I can't help worrying a little bit occasionally. K is the only person, really, that cares if I live or die (including myself, sometimes), so anything bad happening to her would be close to unbearable.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B