Star Soccer

Let me take you back, right back actually to Saturday 17^th January 1981. It’s about 9.40am and like most teenagers I’m having a problem dragging my wiry little carcass out of bed!

I pop my head out from under the bed sheets, reach out and pull aside my bedroom curtains to get a glimpse of what it’s doing outside. It looks like another cold one, a thin layer of ice appears to have set on the outside of the window and small pools of condensation have started to settle on the window sill. Like most folk on our road double glazing was yet to grace the façade of our humble abode.

Wild Horses

For three days we have been entrenched in this wet and filthy hollow, the rain is relentless and claws at our skin as we ready ourselves, staring skywards with empty eyes in silent contemplation of the scene we will face once the order is given and the whistle blows.

At times the silence is deafening. As you sit waiting, your thoughts, induced by an unfathomable fear, charge thunderously through your mind like a stampede of wild horses, and then they are gone, like the clouds in the sky.

Twice during these last few days we have been expecting the order. Twice we have prepared ourselves mentally for this moment, standing at the foot of the abyss, assuring ourselves that our artillery will do its worst, striking at the heart of our enemy’s defences, clearing the way as we advance in our quest for territorial gain.

Hasta la Vista David!

Trawling back through the weeks events I was curiously drawn to a meeting of friends which took place in the capital last Thursday.

David Cameron, on the cusp of declaring the ‘ConDems’ defence cuts strategy and with child benefit and public sector cuts still fresh in the minds of the electorate was in bullish mood as he greeted his guest and from all accounts 'buddy' Arnold Schwarzenegger, Governor of California on the steps of 10 Downing Street.

Don't Worry, Yeah Right!

It's Friday, about 2.20pm and I just got as big a tirade of abuse from a client that I have ever had, I wouldn't mind but it's not even my fault! (Well it never is, is it?). I put the phone down and reach for the Ibuprofen, I've not been feeling well recently and my head is pounding.

I turn to my laptop, a few more emails in my inbox, all requiring "action". (I must have a word with Mr. Gates one day about those fearsome big red exclamation marks, standing upright and proud beside their message like an infuriated Sergeant Major delighting in his "High Importance"). I ignore them, I really can't be bothered.

For a moment I stare at the laptop, that bloody laptop. I loved it when I first got it with it's iridescent style, soft springy keys that seemed to caress your fingertips like a tender kiss on the cheek from your first real love; but now? I despise it, it follows me everywhere, and it enslaves me, demanding my attention, feeding on my aspiration for information, communication and social empowerment.