St Landrew

That's what my motorbiking mate said to me. But then again he says that about any fairly decent sounding phrase. But I wrote Papa Waigo and the Endless Offsides, as a title, because I knew he'd appreciate it.

Wow, am I p!ssed off with this rain. I mean, let's qualify this: I'm not flooded out, although I can hear the odd naughty drip of water coming in, which is slightly disturbing. There's absolutely no danger of my house being flooded out, as I live near the top of a hill, and it all drains away faster than it can accumulate. And I think of those who live on floodplains and especially those who live in Cumbria, and I hope for them that it stops. But it is such a bloody awful faff. All day it has been p!ssing it down, then slightly easing off, then stopping for a few moments while the gutters and drains flush whatever is in them. Then again it comes, with another flurry of breeze introducing the next wet front. Occasionally, just to vary the weather a bit, we had thunder and lightning earlier, with the rain. I think we also had a little hail, for good measure. I'm thankful I work indoors, is all I can say. Pity those working outside.

Was watching Delia Smith last night. I still chuckle over how good she is, and how the nation of cooks and chefs note her every word and new idea. I note that Cranberries are back on the menu. That'll clear the shelves of them, and send the price of them rocketing again. But I digress. While watching, I noted how many excellent tunes were being played in the background. There was excellent stuff by Nick Drake, Beach Boys, Ella Fitzgerald, etc.. and quite a few notable others. I ended up listening as much as watching.

In which case Minty, it is you, and those of you who are open minded enough to know, that you can never be absolutely certain, that have won the debate, in mine and most people's eyes. Those with closed minds are entirely in the minority, and only a fool would say that the emissions caused by the world that industrial and all consuming mankind has brought about has not made the slightest measureable difference, over a truly natural cycle, as I believe these people are saying. There are 6.4 billion of us now. We're not merely the fly in the soup anymore.

OK, VFTT, much as I might support your sentiments, let's try to keep it civil, eh..?

I've seen that too. I reckon he knows the offside rule plenty well, and this evening's match where he was subbed, p!ssed him off a bit. So would I be, if I was doing runs that weren't being noticed in time. It takes effort and skill, and it goes unnoticed. For example, and to hark back a bit - during the WGS era, when he used to play Tessum up front; often Jo would get a lukewarm response, but the runs he used to make to pull defenders this way of that, was nothing short of astonishing. All to nothing, or Beatts might score a goal, and he would get all the credit. Off-ball watching can be really entertaining and gives an insight into what players are really doing when they don't have the ball at their feet.

But now I'm listening to The Moody Blues - To Our Children's Children's Children. After all these years, I still love it. I can NOT play it for years, and then put it on, and it is crisp and new. TMB have/had no peers, and so you either loved them or hated them, because there was nothing else of their shade. I think this might be my favourite TMB album, but I'm about to put Every Good Boy Deserves Favour on [note musicians], and this is the most assessible TMB album, so we'll see how it goes. I'm betting I flip the vinyl over to side 2, after I've finished side 1. Here goes.

No I haven't. My only gripe with that vinyl album is that it was a tad undynamic. That is, although it has a reasonably quiet noise floor, it doesn't go loud. It's a possibility that a strange studio, to Anderson, brought about that effect. Happily, the Aqualung album has so much variety, skill and scope that one tends to overlook the quiet nature of it, and turn the volume up accordingly.

Whilst I completely agree with your sentiment, isn't it about time you stopped holding a candle for Watford's striker..?

He keeps on being caught offside. The Wycombe game was no exception, so I read. Several times he was offside. I keep seeing people going on about how much a waste of space he is, but I see a super-fast and pretty skillful striker who knows the offside law perfectly well, but keeps getting caught because he is too bloody fast for the linesman and referee. I have personally seen Papa twice this season, and most of his offsides were so bloody marginal, they'd be allowed in the Premiership, where benefit of the doubt seems to be given to the striker most of the time, unlike this league. Is he just too fast for this league and the team at the moment..?

Wasn't even able to tune in tonight as I was working until about an hour or more ago. I couldn't even come here first, but had to go to the BBC Football website just to see it in cold figures. Oh le god, please let us have won. Please, just 1-0 will do. Don't let us have drawn, or horror of horrors, have lost. Perhaps we tonked them, really good..? I don't care, just as long as we won. 1-0 will certainly do. Phew..!

So here they are: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Manager: Lawrie McMenemy A-Team -------------------Shilton--------------------- Golac-------Wright--------Svensson------Bridge Paine---------Ball--------Le Tissier----Armstrong ------------Channon-------Davies-------------- A-Team subs GK: Tim Flowers DF: Ken Monkou MF: Rod Wallace ST: Steve Moran UP: Nick Holmes ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Manager: Ted Bates B-Team ----------------------Niemi---------------------- Dodd------Lundekvam------Watson---------Dennis D.Wallace----Williams---------Case--------Marsden -------------Keegan--------Pahars--------------- B-Team Subs GK: Kelvin Davis DF: Mick Mills MF: Ronnie Ekelund ST: Alan Shearer UP: Peter Osgood Good aren't they..? Especially as Ron takes his rightful place at number 9 in the A-Team. In my opinion, the teams are nicely balanced. I think the A-Team would just about beat the B-Team on the most occasions. But just once in a while, I think the B-Team might run amok, because there is searing pace in that forward line. And the midfield are no sluggards either. But there's so much craft, skill and guile in the A-Team, it would be a joy to watch them play. And Micky would be their hare..! But of course, if any of the first elevens were having an off-day, what a subs bench there is to pick from for either team.

Well done Tim. You are doing excellent work. Let's hope that in the future, we can give Ron an opportunity to do the same.

As I said in this thread: http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=18272 Post 28. Completely agree with you Tim.

Was just about to post the same message.

Jethro Tull - Aqualung [the whole lot again].

And I was butting in..!

Jethro Tull - Warchild [the album].

A couple or more years ago was a particularly slim time of it finances wise, for me. But I was still able to go sailing, as it's generally a lot cheaper than watching football. Occasionally, we'd be directly downwind of St Marys, and you'd be surprised how much we'd be able to experience the atmosphere, especially with Radio Hampshire or Solent commentary on the radio. Oh and bottles of beer, wine and whisky washing down sausage rolls, pork pies, roast chicken and other little delectable things to eat; while we were flying along at all of 8-12 knots, with the sunshine beating down agreeably. If I hadn't told you, you could immediately see I wasn't talking about this late spring/late summer. How's that for a pie and pint..? Bet I saw as much football as some of you too.

An almost impossible decision. My reasoning would probably depend on who I thought would have the best chance of surviving without help; who was nearest and therefore able to receive help quickest; and who was most in trouble. That could lead to many different variables. In the end, you just do what you can do. It's a deep, wide river is the Wanganui, and is slightly atypical of NZ rivers. I've canoed and swum it, in it's reaches above Wanganui [the town], and it is truely a beautiful river. But they can all drown you.

I don't know why some of you are getting so flustered over it. It's a bit of a local [relatively] derby match, when playing against Brighton & H Albion, and they did beat us 3-1 rather well. Credit where it's due. I also bought the 3-1/6-3 DVD wins over ManU, and they were fun, so why can't Brighton have a few laughs too..?

Watched tonight's [yesterday's, not 22-11-09] edition on iPlayer, and oh lordy, oh bloody hell, there's two of my favourite cars on there. The Lancia Stratos and the Integrale. And The Stig did that lap in the kit car Stratos with the most awesome [ Apart from that, it was all rather iffy entertainment. Another I don't care because today I operated the clutch on the 1964 Honda 250 cc RC164 4-cylinder DOHC racing motorcycle, ridden by Mike Hailwood to one of his World Championships. Which makes it Mike Hailwood, his mechanic, a few others and Me who have done that. It felt a bit special. I would have liked to have seen the Honda 250 Six from that era too, but settled for drooling over a Vincent Black Shadow. Despite the rain, today [yesterday] was fun.

The Dark Knight Watched this Batman film last night. I don't what it is about Batman, but the whole character and scenario that he plays his adventures in, fails to do just about anything for me. I don't care about his mission. I don't care about the people he's trying to put away. It's all too absurd. The ordinary people who live in Gotham City would do well to move... as far away as possible. Because the rest of them are nuts. Yes, this film was engaging. Heath Ledger is particularly deranged as The Joker, although how on Earth we are supposed to believe he manages to infiltrate himself and seemingly tonnes of dynamite and/or napalm into highly secure places, makes the whole story very shaky indeed. I thought Gary Oldman was quietly very good; as usual, I might add. Aaron Eckhart threw himself into his part in a very American Actor kind of way. Perhaps that was what he was asked to do. At least it did make for individuals instead of cyphers. And talking of cyphers, much as I like Christian Bale, as an actor, I still don't see him as a lead. Perhaps I can't shake off the memory of Empire Of The Sun. An older Michael Caine was an older Michael Caine. He seems to have reduced his act to the point where he almost doesn't anymore, He's just Michael Caine; which is certainly better than hamming it up. Likewise, Morgan Freeman was Morgan Freeman. All that effort and pseudo-creativity, and I can only give it 6/10, and that's because I'm feeling generous. But as I said, I've never been stuck on the Batman story.

Setting aside the Dubai-can't-meet-its-interest-payments issue; the sale of the QE2 was first mentioned sometime back in the summer. There was talk of making it a hotel in Southampton. In a sense, it's not a stupid idea either. S.C.C seems to think hotels are the thing, so why not an iconic one..? Just don't keep the bugger in the water. Do an HMS Victory job on it.

Interesting article. Cheers S-i-P