There was an old person from Hants...

Just in case you may have read this blog in the past and might be remotely interested, I have started a new one devoted to limericks. Click here to descend into the madness. 

Another exciting game wot I made up

Remember the game I invented, ooh, a couple of hundred years ago? You know, the Much More Elaborate, Purposeful And Fulfilling Number Plate Spotting Than That Other Not Clever Or Anything Rubbish Version (i.e. Spotting Car Number Plates By Starting At One). Well, here's one you can play without moving off your settee, as long as you have Sky TV and access to its electronical programme guide.

I spotted the fun potential quite a long time ago but, although almost my entire family are very familiar with (and unsurprisingly quite exasperated by) the concept, I think there are exciting possibilities, as you will soon see.

I'll give you some examples and you will imagine the hilarity that ensues when a group of people visualise what's missing from the title of the programme and call out their suggestions – it's a bit like the missing words round on Have I Got News For You. When you bring up the Programme Guide on the TV screen, sometimes the names of the programmes are too long to appear in full and only the first part is displayed followed by a few dots. All you have to do is surmise the name of the programme armed with just a segment of it. Over the course of the last few weeks, I've been scanning the listings for suitable candidates for treatment.

Christmas Day with Ale… A perfectly reasonable idea, you might think, and there's really no need to suggest that there may be anything missing from such an admirable statement until you realise with horror when selecting the programme that it's Christmas Day with Aled Jones. *shudder*

The Librarian – The C… This surely had the makings of a particularly boring documentary about the …Chap who collects and issues your library books; an admirable calling, of course, but hardly a topic for peak time seasonal viewing. To my relief, it was another of those Indiana Jones type thrillers: The Librarian – The Curse of the Judas Chalice. It’s got Noah Wyle off ER and everything.

The Sheriffs are C… I would dearly love to elaborate upon the possibilities here but children are watching; they always used to be Cowboys, of course. Damn! They're Coming, apparently.

Sun, Sex and Suspicious Pa… Given the content of this show, it really ought to be Pant-stains but, somewhat disappointingly and, I suppose, inevitably, it's Parents.

Nursing th… I did think this might have been another one of those cringeworthy documentaries about young Brits in Ibiza acting like idiots, casting off their inhibitions and, frequently, their underwear, being very unkind to their livers and very kind to the bank balances of the owners of bars and clubs, nursing th…e Mother of all Hangovers practically every day. Instead of which, it’s a much more delightful televisual offering looking at the work of district nurses, called Nursing the Nation. Hurrah, for a change!

The Treasures of Ancient R… Apparently there are no treasures of any appreciable interest from ancient Reading, Rotherham, or even Ragged Appleshaw, Hampshire (N51.23 W01.55,  SU3148). Of course, you knew it was R…ome, didn’t you?

Get the idea? Now, the rules are simple. As you’re likely to be the sole participant (I usually am), you’ll earn points for all your suggestions, unless some disgruntled member of your family turns off the television and goes to bed. You won’t even be able to carry on playing by yourself as they will have taken the remote control with them. And, just to make sure, they’ll switch off the electricity supply*. Some folk are real spoilsports.

*I’m not sure how they do it but they turn 3G off as well.

More than a tea dance

This is an extract from a letter in a recent edition of Metro. When I first read it, I found myself in a melange of emotions: shock and disgust at the revelation that there are, seemingly, many old folk who, because of the straitened circumstances in which they find themselves, are reduced to taking off their clothes to earn money for necessaries, wonder at the fact there may be an audience out there that relishes this wholesale degradation of a vulnerable section of society, and, after the righteous indignation subsided, concern that the old dears are being adequately compensated for the humiliation of displaying their week's ironing to the perverts of the parish and that they are managing their self-assessment tax returns.

Perhaps the government has at last realised that, by paying special allowances to the wrinkled ecdysiasts, it demonstrates a tacit acceptance of this vile and exploitative industry, and so have decided to have a long hard look at them. The allowances, that is, not the performances. That would be above and beyond.

Right, off to Westminster we go. Chant loudly after me:

"What do we want?"

"FAIR PAY."

"When do we want it?"

"WHAT?"

I don't know why I bother.

Headlines

You know, I really shouldn't allow myself to have idle moments because they enable me to drift off into a dangerous reverie fuelled by pedantry. I suppose, in a way, it's inevitable given my idiosyncratic obsession with the English language and its vagaries.

One of the many futile exercises which occupy my mind from time to time is trying to guess what news headlines REALLY mean. Not those ones in The Sun, some of  which make you want to take up a cudgel and break the limbs of innocent passers‑by (in a rather perverse way, I almost admire some of them – not that I couldn't write better ones, obviously), but the summaries in about 24 point font you see above an actual story. It's very easy to deliberately misinterpret it and write a completely different summary of the story. I can see you're straining at the leash for examples, aren't you? Whatever.

Villas-Boas named Tottenham Boss

(BBC Sport)

Levy: "Good morning, André. Welcome to the interview. Please sit down."

AVB: "Thank you, I'd rather crouch here and keep my mac on."

Levy: "Very well. I have an important question for you. Who was the manager we sacked recently?"

AVB: "Harry Redknapp."

Levy: "Well done, you've got the job!"

Apple settles China iPad case

(BBC News)

The opportunities here are endless. It ought to be the strange story of the man who bought a hard case made of porcelain for his iPad and foolishly sat under an apple tree in windy weather with the trusty device by his side. As predicted by dear old Isaac Newton all those years ago, an apple fell from the tree and smashed the fragile cover to smithereens.

Katie Holmes braves split from Tom Cruise

(Daily Express)

Apparently, as a wedding present, Katie gave Tom some Red Indian servants and, as well as carrying out traditional duties, they were experts in the provision of vital services like scalp treatment and face-painting; also, Tom frequently ate at the best restaurants and they were extraordinarily good at making reservations. However, they all fancied Katie and reluctantly went with Cruise when the couple moved apart. Also, they were bitterly opposed to Scientology, constantly accusing L Ron Hubbard of having spoken with a forked tongue. So they resigned en masse.

 

A source close to Cruise said "Tom's not really bothered as they used to hold a staff disco every Friday night and it never bloody stopped raining, even though it was dry everywhere else in the County."

I'm a hopeless case. Still, at least it's a blog.

Complete and utter iWash

I'm not sure if I've mentioned the disaster which befell my brand new iPhone in a bathroom-based incident a while ago, after I'd had it barely a week - which just goes to show the verisimilitude of the statistic pointed out to me by several piss-takers well-wishers that two of the most common forms of damage caused to iPhones is the screen cracking and that occasioned by submersion in water. Mine fell into the *ahem* latter category.

And no, I didn't undertake the immersion-in-a-pouch-of-rice treatment afterwards; I was too upset and actually quite concerned that  a family member might find it and think it was a boil-in-the-bag ready meal, thus making matters even worse.

Smarting from the incident, I wandered around the house in a daze, wondering what iniquitous deed I had perpetrated in my past which had rendered me deserving of such a harsh gadgetry-related punishment. Suddenly, I remembered; in an episode of that top comedy show The IT Crowd, precisely the same thing had happened to one of the main characters (Moss), after he had put his phone in that most conveniently placed of locations, the top shirt pocket – and I had laughed out loud.

My tweet to the show's writer Graham Linehan, demanding compensation, elicited no response, so I turned my attention to my buildings and contents insurance, administered by a certain company from whom I could possibly have obtained a claim form in person if I had bothered to take the 20½-hour journey via Brittany Ferries from Plymouth. No, there isn't a prize.

My first telephone conversation was with a very friendly and helpful young lady who, I realised after a subsequent conversation with another equally helpful young lady four days later (which was on the Friday afternoon), had done absolutely nothing she had promised, i.e. passed the matter to the company who dealt with damage repairs on their behalf.  So the second young lady made the same promise and, all things considered, I couldn't help feeling rather pessimistic about the outcome. However, I had a call within a couple of hours, giving me a reference number and informing me that DPD would be collecting the phone for repair or replacement on the Monday, between 9.00am and 6.30pm.

I had a text message on Monday morning saying that the phone would be collected - bizarrely - between 12.18pm and 1.18pm! It was therefore with a strange but totally unfounded disappointment that I welcomed the DPD bloke at 12.21pm.

The company dealing with the phone had told me it was repairable and would be returned via Royal Mail within 7 to 10 working days. Given that Royal Mail make a habit of doing things like ditching the first-class post, conveniently forgetting to tell everyone about it, and bearing in mind the onset of Christmas mail, I was not all that optimistic.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I was forced to make four more telephone calls, the repairing company decided the phone couldn't be mended, the insurer coughed up the full amount for a new replacement (less £35 excess) and, as soon as the dosh appeared in my bank account, I hastened down to the nearest iPhone merchant and bought one.

I'd had a Blackberry for almost three years (which my employer provided) but I finally decided enough was enough (I hated it) and that, after a good deal of research, I was desperate to have an iPhone.

Hey! An Apple turnover.*

*I'll get me coat

Essence

That word commands rather a lengthy entry in my Oxtail Dictionary of Words & Phrases With Which Is Incorporated Latin Words & Phrases and New Words Introduced Into the English Language. It is simply a feature of speech which unfortunately achieves prominence if you have to wear dentures. This may be part of the natural degenerative process through advancing years or the inevitable consequence of a lack of tooth care - if you choose to believe Pam Ayres – but, however it happens, ensure you acquire some decent ones, or you should avoid singing Gracie Fields' famous song The Biggest Aspidistra In The World, attempting tongue twisters like 'she sells seashells on the seashore', Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven (or, at least, the line that begins "And the silken sad uncertain rustling…"), if you don't want to keep being asked at the Christmas party for a rendition of the Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' song "Whistle While You Work", or Pinocchio's "Give A Little Whistle" or constantly being given the cards in Charades for The Old Grey Whistle Test, Whistle Down The Wind, The Whistle Blower, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café, and, last but by no means least, the memorable 1968 film from the well-known Filipino director Consuelo Osorio, based on the story by Mars Ravelo, Ngitngit ng Pitong Whistle Bomb.

Imagine if Lauren Bacall's immortal lines as Marie "Slim" Browning in To Have And Have Not  had to be changed because poor old Bogie was a sufferer: "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow jam in the false gnashers and say 'ipsissimus'."

Notable proponents of this occupational hazard are John Craven (currently appearing on the BBC's Countryfile) and Sir David Attenborough (currently appearing in most nature programmes on several channels and the BBC's more and more annoyingly frequent ITV-style interludes advertising its  current and upcoming offerings).

I count myself very lucky that I am in the position of not knowing if all dentures exhibit this irritating tendency but, if I were John or Sir Dave*, I'd consult the BBC Props Department. Michael Parkinson (currently reduced to TV commercials for insurance) appears to have the problem beaten, although he can't read the auto-cue without it looking totally obvious that's what he's doing.

Geoffrey Palmer is a very good actor, isn't he?

*polite informality

Road Observations (leaving Rage for another day)

 

You will all be familiar with (and, no doubt by now, totally hacked off by) my ramblings about road travel, particularly via the M6; the notorious section just before Junction 15 to Stoke‑on‑Trent and Newcastle‑under‑Lyme is pictured above with, I think I’m right in saying, most of the traffic somewhat disingenuously Photoshopped out. I just can’t help it, though, no more than the motorway itself can help being in league with the Devil – if you ask me (though I know you won’t) it should be called the M666 (or, if you are a pedantic devotee of QI, the M616) but giving one of England’s main cross‑country arteries a bad name is not my current purpose - not this time, anyway.

Some people might think that, whilst driving north and south up and down the highways and byways of the country, all I do is spend my time thinking about what vitriol I can pen in my next highway-related diatribe, and that’s why I have to get Sheila to read out the Daily Telegraph crossword clues several times before properly taking them in. No, no, not at all, I can’t hear them because of the ambient noise of the radio coupled with the constant hum of tyre on road (that’s what I tell her anyway). We finished both crosswords on the way up on Monday, but only one and a half on the way back on Tuesday (I think I had the radio on louder and possibly some more decent resurfacing is required on the southward leg).

The following are simply observations on one or two new initiatives introduced by my very good friends at the Highways Agency (HA) and spotted during our latest trip – quite uneventful as it turned out, except for a new half-hour programme we watched on Monday night, The Sergio Aguero Show, a feature that I hope to be repeated on a regular basis.

The signs which used to say: “Queue Ahead” now read: “Queue Caution” – this has been done, apparently, as too many motorists had been regarding the former as an instruction.

The HA has also instigated new signs at several locations which say: “Bin Your Litter – Other People Do”. The first three words are an admirable suggestion but their effectiveness is considerably lessened by virtue of the accompanying statement which is based, in my view, upon the thinnest evidence. Rather, they ought to say: “Bin Your Litter Even Though Most People Don’t And The Bins At Motorway Services Get So Full That They Quickly Become A Health Hazard What With All The Rubbish Blowing Around The Car Park And Everything Not To Mention Wasps Etc”. I suppose if the signs were too lengthy, everyone would have to slow down considerably or even park up to read them. In which case, maybe they could give us advance warning by changing the signs at appropriate intervals to read “Queue Ahead To Read Next Sign”.

Right, how many words in the answer to 12 down? Sorry? What?

Driving me mad

After due deliberation, I have come to the conclusion that I am a jam magnet. Before you run away with the idea that, in some strange way, I attract fruit spread, let me disavow you of this misapprehension with the following relevant definitions for ‘jam’ from Dictionary.com: to fill or block up by crowding; pack or obstruct; to make (something) unworkable by causing parts to become stuck, blocked, caught, displaced; and - probably the most relevant - a mass of objects, vehicles, etc., packed together or otherwise unable to move except slowly.

You may or may not have read the sad account of one of my many journeys north-westward when the M6 jumped out from behind a clear road and made me take almost four hours to travel just 20 miles. Well, I am now proud to announce that I was once a participant in the greatest M60 Manchester Ring Road snarl-up in living memory. The traffic lady on the local radio was delivering the news in a most inappropriately gleeful manner, in my humble opinion, saying that she had never seen the like: apparently, the whole circular route had been a massive car park for most of the afternoon. I would therefore dispute the ‘move slowly’ bit of the last part of the dictionary entry above as it engenders an entirely false impression that movement was a regular feature of the affair.

I had travelled from Manchester (where we were spending a few days away from Hants with rellies) to Merseyside for a meeting with a colleague, and this vehicular melée was the culmination of a wonderful day on rain-sodden roads (one stretch of the M56 was far better suited for water-skiing) that included a stop-start excursion through the centre of Liverpool (where, incidentally, I had never driven before) and a surreal episode with my satnav in the Wallasey Tunnel. I was understandably surprised to see my journey under the great River Mersey depicted on its screen all the way through (quite often it goes blank when I drive under a tree) and I assumed that there must have been some sort of signal boosting equipment installed in it (more damned electrickery, you can't get away from it). I did wonder why, though, as soon as I emerged into the open from the tunnel towards the toll booths, it told me the satellite signal had been lost!

Pretty much par for the course that day.

Henners' Day

On Sunday 19th June, one year and one day after the sad passing of a famous parish nuisance, some of us met up in darkest Surrey to commemorate the event and to visit his very first geocache and where his ashes are laid. By the time we got to within 10 or 12 feet of the spot (according to Omally's GPS), I had been o'er many a hill and dale and was well and truly knackered. So was this poor little creature:-

 

No, no, not Jan - Daisy! And despite my obvious physical distress, Jan flatly refused to cuddle me on her lap while I had a kip.

For about an hour At first, we were unable to locate the sacred spot despite much circular non-environmental thrashing about in the undergrowth - well, it was deep in the woods, hidden among the head-high ferns. And there was me thinking Ned and Marco Polo had been soul mates.

No, Ned - the ground's by your feet - tchoh! Also, I think this was one of the moments when we had to snap Hutters out of his obvious fixation for the forest floor in the region of my right leg and point him in a particular direction whilst reminding him how to move his legs alternately. I swear I could hear Henry guffawing on more than one occasion. Wanna see a good scowl? The geographical challenge was causing desperation to set in:-

All of a sudden, Hutters uttered a 'Eureka'-type exclamation and there it was, about two feet from where I had been standing (or trying to stand without my leg seizing up) for a good half an hour!

Unfortunately, the birch sapling that was originally planted hadn't lasted, so we planted an Acer (Orange Dream variety, I was reliably informed by the label) next to the small wooden cross. Well, I say we, Omally did all the digging with his very own trowel, brought specially for the purpose. Hutters' joke about an Acer spade was beginning to wear a bit thin after the third or fourth time. Here's the plant which we hope will flourish:-

Hutters did the honours and read the very moving pome by Canon Henry Scott-Holland, "Death is nothing at all", which you can read here and cry a bit as well, if you are so inclined.

All in all, it was a very worthwhile day and my guilt has been a little assuaged for having missed the dear old chap's funeral last year.

RIP, David.

The Unsocial Network

By and large, I think the internet is one of the most significant and influential innovations of the modern age. You can interface with friends and family wherever in the world they might be, via the written word or live audio/video, you can buy and sell all manner of goods and services, and it is a vast source of information on anything you care to name - even donkey porn.

A lot of the time, though, it just gets on my bloody tripe.

You are - by which I mean, one is - well, at least, I am – if you’re still with me? - bombarded with e-mails from banks and building societies explaining that your account has been the subject of unusual activity – it would actually be unusual if I used it seeing as I don’t have an account with you – vital security checks requiring confirmation of your PIN and other account details. What can you do to put a cyber spanner in the works of these thieving morons? It’s a great shame there isn’t an option in Outlook to “reply with 5,000 volts”; that’d make their follicles sizzle. Maybe I should reply to them all, helpfully providing my hat/willy size, inside leg measurement and medical history, hoping they’ll eventually get fed up. Fat chance.

I have recently distanced myself from Farcebollok and disabled my account (it’s not your fault, by the way) – I object to the intrusive, overbearing way it subjects you to an unsolicited barrage of invitations to take part in inane quizzes the results of which are then published to an audience of your friends who are apparently agog with eager anticipation to learn what sort of television set you are (I bet I’m a wide screen) or which member of the cast of ‘Friends’ you would most like to (a) take out to dinner, (b) shag, or (c) punch in the face. No, I’m not going to tell you (although I imagine you could take an educated guess).

I really don’t want to know that someone has just found a three-legged brown sheep wandering (limping, surely? I am a pedant, after all) around the farm – I’m a tolerant sort of bloke and, if they want to play that game, leave them alone to do so, without a commentary which is best suited to a weak plot line in The Archers. The farmer’s wife going missing and a dismembered body discovered in a grain silo would be infinitely more interesting but I still remain unconvinced that I’d want to know about it.

Before I’d ever even countenanced going on Farcebollok (the only reason being that, just prior to taking the plunge, I didn’t fully understand how it worked but some friends persuaded me – to join, that is, not that I definitely didn’t know how it worked), I did have a temporary dalliance with MySpace but gradually became disenchanted with the eerie solitude – I believe it’s now known as MyEmptySpace.

I wonder how long it’ll be before I get fed up with Twitter?!

Lege et lacrima II (Read it and weep 2)

Vah! Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum. Interdum modo elabitur - Oh! Was I speaking Latin again? Silly me. Sometimes it just sort of slips out.

I just wanted to remind you of the campaign I first proposed last year here, in case you had forgotten about it. I’m still keen to revive the so-called dead language and you may remember my outlining the distinct advantages (and some pitfalls, unfortunately) of resurrecting its universal usage.

One of the unfortunate advantages (at least from the standpoint of the drive for awareness) is that, on the assumption that he/she is not fluent (as you are) you can be quite rude to or dismissive of someone without them realising. In fact, because, as I have mentioned before, however banal, surreal or outlandish the statement, Quid quid latine dictum sit, altum videtur - Anything said in Latin sounds profound.

For example – oops, e.g. - Verveces tui similes pro ientaculo mihi appositi sunt - I have twits like you for breakfast; Tua mater tam antiquior ut linguam latine loquatur - Your mother is so old she speaks Latin; Sic friatur crustum dulce - That's the way the cookie crumbles. Nowhere is it more demonstrable then in phrases such as Ubi est mea anaticula cumminosa? – Where is my rubber duck? Semper ubi sub ubi ubique - Always wear underwear everywhere; Te audire non possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure - I can't hear you. I have a banana in my ear; Oblitus sum perpolire clepsydras! - I forgot to polish the clocks! Omnes lagani pistrinae gelate male sapiunt - All frozen pizzas taste lousy; In dentibus anticis frustrum magnum spiniciae habes - You have a large piece of spinach in your front teeth; Loqueris excrementum - You are talking shit.

I have considerable support for the renaissance advocated, in the person of the great Roman poet Publius Ovidius Naso (20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18) - Ovid to you – who once said: Rident stolidi verba latina - Fools laugh at the Latin language - and everyone, but everyone, always used to listen to him. And they still do - you only have to look at any public school curriculum (see? You can’t get away from it).

In my earlier treatise, I suggested that the dialogue in films could be considerably romanticised by speaking them in Latin; I have found a few more examples to bolster this contention: Ire fortiter quo nemo ante iit - To boldly go where no man has gone before; Te capiam, cunicule sceleste! - I'll get you, you wascally wabbit!  Tu, rattus turpis! - You dirty rat! Re vera, cara mea, mea nil refert - Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn; Luke sum ipse patrem te - Luke, I am your father; Revelare pecunia! - Show me the money! Pistrix! Pistrix! - Shark! Shark! (shouted in Jaws, surely?); Farrago fatigans! - Suffering succotash! Latro! fremo! - Woof woof! Grrrr! (Lassie).

You may remember that jokes relying on the vagaries of the English language don’t work (remember I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream?); well, neither do tongue twisters: Quantum silvam modio picus si posset picus silvam modio? - How much wood would a woodpecker peck if a woodpecker could peck wood? Pietro Fistulator lectis modii capsicum conditaneum, ubi modii capsicum conditaneum  quod lectis Petro Fistulator? – Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled pepper, where’s the peck of pickled pepper Peter Piper picked?  Corio rubeus, corio flava, corio rubeus, corio flava… - Red leather, yellow leather, red leather, yellow leather… Vendit concha mare in litum marum – She sells seashells on the seashore;  Vigilum publicorum Lethium nos dimitte – The Leith police dismisseth us. See? Almost ridiculously easy to enunciate, I think you’ll agree.

Well, there you are, keep practising the lingo (from the Latin lingua - tongue or language); It’s got a lot to answer for, hasn’t it?

Just when I thought it was safe to go back in the water...

Many apologies for the long absence - and for the returning blog being about football and traffic, Trouty - you’ll not be too pleased to learn that there’s more where that came from! Today, after due (and, I have to say, hesitant) deliberation I am bringing you more news of my progress through the long and winding corridors of the NHS. I should also apologise for the length of the piece; I had initially decided to split it into two or even three separate chunks, but then changed my mind 

As part of my continued healthcare, I was invited to have a CAT scan at Salisbury District Hospital (my second home for various parts of 2010). The notification had been sent to me several weeks earlier and informed me that I needed to present myself one hour before the appointed time so I could be given a contrast drink to improve the pictures produced by the scan. I was familiar with this as I had had one last year. It involves sitting around for up to an hour, sipping a milky substance, being bored out of your skull and trying to concentrate on your book, invariably with little success!

I duly turned up just after 10 a.m., reported to reception and sat in the waiting room. I was so bored, I became enthralled by an episode of Property Ladder. Yes, that bored. At 10.45, the receptionist smiled and said “You were a bit early, weren’t you?” I explained that my letter had instructed me to arrive an hour early for the drink. “Oh,” she replied and strode off purposefully, returning a few minutes later saying that my letter had been sent just before they stopped requiring patients to have the drink! Oh well, the up side of this was that I went to the treatment area fifteen minutes early!

The CT scan experts among you will know that the initial step is to insert a canular into a convenient vein in order that a dye can be injected during the scan. If you are at all familiar with my veins, you will be only too aware that ‘convenient’ is not a description readily applicable to them: they are either extremely shy or just plain bloody rude, because they just don’t turn up to these parties and no amount of violent skin-slapping encourages an appearance. The nurse gave up after one attempt and took me in to the scan room, saying she had called for a doctor to do the dirty work.

The six subsequent failures to effect an incursion (three in each arm) showed - statistically at least – that the nurse was significantly less crap at this than the doc. Anyway, the end result was that the whole shebang had to be rescheduled and I left the hospital self-consciously sporting seven bits of transparent sticky plaster and more cotton wool balls than three teddy bears.

The new appointment was fixed for a week ahead but, in between times, I had a phone call to say that the scanner had broken down and could I turn up two days later than originally planned? So I did and, after three attempts, one was in vein. Ha! See what I did there? After all this hoohah, I saw the oncologist last week who told me that the scan had revealed a small (2cm) growth in my right lung which is almost certainly a cancer but almost certainly removable.

Now I’ve got to have a PET scan tomorrow at Southampton which will give the medics pictures in glorious Technicolor and 3D to indicate whether the little bugger is the result of a spread or completely new and help them decide the best way to deal with it. This time, I’ve got to be injected with a radioactive liquid; wish me luck with the veins. I wonder if I’ll glow in the dark?

So, CAT scan, PET scan, presumably a LAB test is next.

Back on THE road again

Someone's roused me from my literary slumbers and I've been giving the blog a bit of a short back and sides and checking some notes. The following should have appeared a couple of months ago, just before we went to see City's game against Reading at Eastlands. Prior to that, I had spent about 10 days in Manchester, taking the air in great frigid trouserfuls, and watching four football matches. I won’t bore you with too much of the detail but I will summarise the team’s performances – v. Aris Thessaloniki: brilliant, v. Fulham: dreadful (2 points chucked away), v. Aston Villa: excellent, v. Wigan: mediocre (but 3 points). The Reading game (FA Cup, sponsored, don’t forget, by E.ON), on Sunday 13^th March, 4.45pm. Which would bring me to that road again.

I have previously documented (not here) some quite negative thoughts and views on the M6, but on the various journeys undertaken both north-westward and southward between Thursday 24^th February and Sunday 6^th March, I began to feel that I had been cruelly unfair in my criticisms and – to my surprise – realised that I could compile quite a significant list of positive features. So, here is my *List Of Things I Like About The M6:

1. The eerie emptiness of the stretch between junctions 14 and 16; it almost makes you hanker for the always incredibly congested M6 Toll.
2. The inexplicable but comforting friendliness of your fellow road-users which causes them to stay very close (as if they are somehow guarding or protecting you), usually by parking immediately in front of/behind/next to you, but obviously everywhere on the motorway except the section mentioned above.
3. The disarmingly amusing and always entertaining messages from our friends at the Highways Agency: ‘Queue Ahead’ (I always obey); ‘M6 Toll Clear’ (liars); ‘End’ (when there appears to have been no ‘Beginning’); ‘40’ (when you are stationary).
4. The population of the road between about 7pm and 9pm on a Sunday night by hordes of dedicated motorists, deliberately and selflessly foregoing their normal end‑of‑weekend home comforts just to experience once more the pleasure of sharing the delights of highway congestion with one additional exciting ingredient – darkness. Being a non-working day does not seem to prevent the endearing jams that prevail for about 2 miles before you are due to exit. Marvellous companionship, wouldn’t you agree?

 *may include irony

Your usual bed, sir?

I owe you all an account of my recent shenanigans at the behest of the NHS and there follows a summary (somewhat expurgated to avoid Exorcist type vomit being induced) of my merry pre- and post-Christmas horsepiddle holiday.

There I was, lunchtime Thursday 9^th December, lining up a particularly tricky plant into the middle pocket on the White Hart’s pool table, when my phone rang. It was Sheila, saying that the hospital had been in touch – they’d had a cancellation and did I want to go in for my surgery on the Monday (it wasn’t due until sometime this month); errrrm, oh! Anyway, that was all decided (with no little trepidation, I might add) and, probably as a result of this sudden storm in the timetable, missed the shot.

I duly went under the knife on Monday – ileostomy reversed and (unexpected) hernia repaired - and allowed home late Tuesday – marvellous – or so I thought. All went well in the run-up to Christmas (apart from the ambulance a few days afterwards to whisk me back to hospital with yet another few episodes of posterior epistaxis - nosebleed to you - which necessitated another overnight stay – in all the excitement, I nearly forgot about that!) until Boxing Day morning when I realised there was something wrong with the wound; I didn’t think it should have been gushing brown foul-smelling gunge. Back to the hospital, then, and, during the next five days (two of which were a bit like Ray Milland’s Lost Weekend, much of two others spent in theatre), I was treated for a very bad abscess/infection. I came home on New Year’s Eve eve and I’ve seen a nurse every day since then to have the trench in my stomach packed and the dressing changed. Apparently, it’s very clean and healing nicely but I’m saying no more about it so as not to tempt fate!

Oh, and, by the way, when I went to bed at 9.00pm on New Year’s Eve, I told 2010 (rather more succinctly than hereafter described – this is a family audience, after all) that it could go away and have sex with itself.

And a Happy New Year to you all!

When Chris Rea wrote "Road to Hell"...

...he must have been on the M6.

Earlier this year (in September), we travelled north from deepest Hants to watch the only league club in Manchester (a status to be lost if Oldham Athletic’s plans to move to a new stadium come to fruition) play Liverpool. Although the pleasing outcome to the game did much to lift our flagging spirits, I shuddered at the memory of the trip, and still do. I’m not good travelling at the best of times.

We left home at 11.15am on a journey which normally takes between 4 and 4½ hours and fondly imagined ourselves checking in at the Oldham Premier Inn (on Broadway, about 15 minutes from Eastlands) at around half-past three, then relaxing for an hour or so before setting off to savour at our leisure (insofar as you can relax with a stoma and a walking stick!) the new delights of City Square (around the outside of the stadium) with its selection of covered bars and cafés, live music and big screens. Instead of which, we didn’t have time to go to the hotel and had to go straight to the game, eventually (having been turned away from four full car parks and leaving the car on the pavement outside one of them) taking our seats ten minutes after kick-off; 9 hours door-to-door – hello, is that Mr Guinness?

Obviously, I hope no-one was badly injured in the accident that precipitated our misfortune (so far as I can ascertain from the Crewe Chronicle, no-one in any of the seven vehicles was) but, surprise, surprise, an HGV was involved; just do a Google search for accidents on the M6 and see how many HGVs play a part in the frightening statistics. Several incidents during the trips there and back certainly didn’t do anything to dispel the notion that the majority of HGV drivers are no longer the ‘knights of the road’ they once were; blights of the road, more like. If I wasn’t in mixed company, I’d say they were, by and large, the biggest knobheads on the roads today. Anyway, it took us 3½ hours to travel the 20 miles between Junctions 14 and 16 but I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Highways Agency for its helpful messages on the information boards as we approached our doom: “J14 - J16 Long Delays” (when we were stuck in it, I phoned my son and asked him to check the Highways Agency website; he reported that they were warning of a 1½-hour delay – blatant lie – not on my son’s part, naturally, he was brung up proper) “Caution – Spray, Slow Down” (actually it had been quite difficult to see this message because of the spray – when we were travelling fast enough to be affected by it, obviously), and as we progressed (‘progressed’ doesn’t sound quite right, somehow) through the queue: 40 – just their little joke, of course; although I did manage the 4 part once or twice.

On the day we returned home, we left Oldham at 9.15am and got home at 1.30pm.

I still hate the M6.

Hello, is that Cross Country Trains – or Virgin – or National Express - or Flybe?

Marvellous

I see the Loan Relationships and Derivative Contracts (Disregard and Bringing into Account of Profits and Losses) (Amendment) Regulations 2009 have been brought in. Doesn't it give you a nice warm feeling?

Cars and electrickery

I think there is too much of it in cars these days and our technological expertise seems to be running away from us; the more there is, the more it’s likely something will go wrong.

So it seemed to be with my 2002 Citroën Xsara Picasso with 52,000 miles on the (electronical) clock – genuine low mileage. I had decided that, because the mobility of my left leg continues to be in a state of flux and, in case it deteriorates to the extent I might find it difficult to operate the clutch pedal, I should look for an automatic. I commenced a trawl of the internet and local advertising media (the latter often containing columns in the classified ads headed “Citreon” and, in one instance “Citron” – just lemon-coloured cars in this one) finally deciding that, being part of a family of Citroën devotees, I quite fancied a C4. I found a couple quite quickly at a main agent nearby and took the Picasso (car, not painting) to let them assess its part‑exchange value and to view the aforementioned C4s. The red one was quickly dismissed (nothing red allowed in our household – surely, you don’t need to ask why) and the Arctic Grey was settled upon, 2007 1.6SX 5-door hatchback model, only one owner and 12,000 miles on the clock (electronical, obviously). The deal was struck and I arranged to collect it the following Friday.

Anyway, I cleaned the Picasso out on the Monday but, when I went to move it, it wouldn’t start (first time in eight years and it had to be this week). My friendly local mechanic, having decided it looked like an electrical fault, sent an auto‑electrician round (an expert in car electrics, not a robot), who spent some time with his diagnostic box plugged in, concluding that the fault lay with the BSI (something-or-other Systems Interface) unit which was causing the immobiliser to kick in for some reason. At this point, I must come clean and admit that, although I have had the car from new, I never knew that there was an immobiliser lurking within the vehicle’s circuitry; you learn something new every day.

So, nothing could be done to rectify the problem and, at 7.30 a.m. on the morning following the electrician's visit, I was given a rigid tow to the garage by my life-saving mechanic so they could determine how much they could fleece me to morph the car into something that moved of its own accord. They have concluded that it needs a new fuel pump, cost £316.41, inc. VAT, fitted. So that was how much the part-ex has been reduced (well, they let me off the 41p – decent of them). In view of their ultimate diagnosis, though, I just wish I hadn’t given a chap there my confident summation of the problem that had produced a fault code on the electrician’s diagnostic unit thus making them aware of a potential new problem. See? Electrickery – it trips you up.

The situation is actually not quite as bad as it sounds – I had previously managed to get the salesman to give me an additional £250 in part-exchange than he offered originally, subject to the road tax remaining (to May 2011) being part of the deal. A nice touch and, in the end, satisfaction all round.

It's a shame that, less than two weeks later, some bastard drove into the back of it while it was parked in a car park in the centre of Malmesbury, Wilts. No note under the wipers, no CCTV, no response to my whingeing letter in the North Wilts Gazette & Herald. £225, thank you very much! There goes my winter fuel allowance - I'll have to wear extra clothes now.