“We old athletes carry the disfigurements and markings of contests remembered only by us and no one else. Nothing is more lost than a forgotten game.”
Pat Conroy
And another cricket season comes to an end…
You Don’t Say?
Strangely the residents of Bradford don’t appear to be keen on cycling our mean streets according to an article in the local rag here.
David Robinson, director of Capital of Cycling and chair of the Bradford Cycling Campaign said the figures were “disappointing”, but said there was no silver bullet.
“Bradford does have a particular reputation for driving styles, uninsured drivers and things like that – it doesn’t help – but they’re all things that don’t need to stop cycling growing,” he said.
Just a wee problem with psychopaths behind the wheels of high powered killing machines then?
Those of us who also pointed out the folly of spending some £30m on a cycle lane from Leeds to Bradford may be having a “told you so” moment too. One day they will issue prizes for Spot the Cyclist.
As far as cycling in certain parts of Bradford you would have to be as deranged as most of the drivers.
Only the same day as this was published came yet another piece regarding driving that would shame a retarded monkey – see the video here – as a car collided at speed with several other cars.
The driver of the small four-wheel-drive vehicle lost control, hit a parked car, another car waiting in traffic, three more parked cars and overturned before fleeing the scene.
I rest my case.
Poor Boy
I was probably in a minority of Radio 2 listeners who cheered and whooped when I heard Chris Evans was leaving the breakfast show recently. Sadly, the days of Wogan are long gone but suffer the ginger cretin I would not.
So it was with perhaps an understandable lack of pity that I read that BBC director general Tony Hall has said the publication of star salaries was a factor in radio presenters Chris Evans and Eddie Mair (who?) choosing to leave.
The director general said Evans found the pressure “quite hard” after topping the BBC talent pay list last year and coming second in this year’s list.
As I reached for my tissue to dry my eyes I wondered how earning millions could be “quite hard”.
The BBC website article went on…Evans, who was paid £1.66m in 2017-18, also wanted to leave so he could find a new challenge. Pull the other one!
Maybe it is age but I have a feeling that life gets noisier the older you get. Gone are the days when radio presenters let the music speak or sports commentators merely added a few finishing touches to the action on screen.
Witless whooping and hollering now bombard us. During Evan’s tenure at R2 I’ve tried everything though never gone back.
For a good few years I stuck with R4 seeking level and intelligent comment to start my day until it became the home of Brexit whiners and a staging post for Tony Blair, who should have been banned from commenting on even the bloody weather.
I’ve tried R5 despite the pompous and unctuous Nicky Campbell who clearly owns the station. They claim to be a sports channel but the level of knowledge and insight from contributors is piss poor.
Over to the commercial channels where people who several decades ago would have been institutionalised rant at you in between mindless adverts that…rant at you. I tried Classic FM but found I was waking at three in the afternoon.
What is so wrong with simply sticking on a good tune and shutting up? If the BBC claim to be cash-strapped why not try this and save £1.66m a year to start with?
Inevitably they will soon announce some witless “celebrity” – aka pleb – who I will never have heard.
Nurse!!!
Stumps
It’s the last game of the season tomorrow and things are different from yesteryear where a “see you next April” would suffice. Nowadays, egos are massaged throughout winter and bold promises made, the sacred community of team spirit sold for a brown envelope full of hot air.
For those lucky enough to be able to roll up from Saturday to Saturday, spare a thought as you read this; the grass does not stop growing in winter, bills need paying and those of us trying to improve on what we already have will be hard at it.
We are a dwindling band but maybe this may prick a conscience or two or maybe I am a deluded old hopeful who knows how it all ends?
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