pap

Can I be the first to ask? What the actual fúck? (pardon the French)

Retweet. Like. Whatever the f**k.

Well, it looks like we're veering toward perpetually unwipeable bottoms, people. FFS.

As many will know, I'm a bit of a happy clapper during good times and a fence-sitter when shít is up in the air, so I haven't really said anything I need to apologise to the board for. P'raps a couple of sarcastic tweets Anyway, I'm providing for multiple outcomes here, Wayne's World style. Good outcome Scenario: Morgs and Jay Rod stay, RK pulls together team capable of achieving mid-table Prem League status, along with platform for further success. Message to board: Sorry for sending a sarcastic tweet to club in reply to Les Reed's quote about keeping hold of best quality youngsters. Stay around, as apart from the occasional bit of drama, the Liebherr ownership has been positive. Bad outcome Scenario: Ralph is lying through his teeth. Morgs and Jay are off to Spurs this week. Anything not nailed down sold to nearest Premier League reclamation yard. Message to board: May you forever have unwipeable bottoms. May you always be plagued with ever-present winnets that only take a break from biting your ringpiece to bits when the Haemorrhoid family come to visit. Scooby Doo outcome Scenario: Kat isn't really Kat, and is unmasked as NC - who has been holding the real Kat under house arrest and posing as her since January, scaring players away so he can buy the club on the cheap. Message to board: He'd have gotten away with it, if only for those pesky kids.

You don't sound like a crusty old hippy.

http://talksport.com/drivetime Anywhere between 4pm and 7pm then.

Drink is not the answer, Jamie.

That, and the fallback position of uber geek.

Ah, belief is such an outmoded concept. Real men find a home in their heads for multiple competing realities

The old saying, "you don't know what goes on behind closed doors". Release clauses might have been an excellent way to exercise a bit of control. NC could have told the players that he had their backs, and told the board that the players would leave if he did. All speculation though, and others have already questioned the idea that big club release clauses even existed.

I have often wondered if Cortese might have had a couple of time bombs in place. Other reports, such as the difference in the way he reportedly treated the players (gods) to the way he treated most everyone else (scum), give this a bit of weight. Reading between the lines, looks like he cultivated a cult of personality style of management, backed up with readies. If we're being honest, it wasn't even that stable a form of management while he was about. Looks to be killing us after the event.

Not been a Saints fan long then?

Anyone got a rough idea of what has just disappeared off the wage bill?

I'm well up for this. Cheer on the new lads, harass the old ones. What's not to like?

Yup. I'm personally conflicted. On the one hand, I'm alarmed at all the crap that is going on with the club. On the other, I'm just amazed at the sense of entitlement, whether that's tweets or pointless new threads.

Founder quits. Claims Britain First attracts "racists and extremists". http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/britain-first-founder-quits-over-3923810 Who knew?

Bóllocks to that. I've only just got my season ticket. Worst case scenario, the board are clowns of Venky's proportions and we're going to have a couple of interesting seasons before being bought by somebody else. Was never frightened by the prospect of relegation before, certainly not frightened of it now that I've seen it up, close and personal. Hugely depressing to see all of these players go. End of an era, but with the sums on offer elsewhere, it is difficult to see what the club could have done to stop the players from leaving. Fair play to the lad Chambers for keeping schtum about his move, but that's got to be the most depressing one of all. We've gone from Roy of the Rovers to Raided by Vultures. It is truly shít; maybe the club could have done more, I dunno - but the time to chuck your lot in with Saints was years ago. Most of us faced the prospect of Saints being out of business, or being in entirely the wrong hands Cov style. If we'd gone to the wall then, it would have been like getting kicked out of football. This is horrible, but it's almost the opposite of those dark days. This is a consequence of success, not of failure. Let's just hope the vast majority of that cash is reinvested.

I see two possible theories given previous club statements:- 1) Koeman really doesn't rate our players, even though everyone else seems to. 2) The club staff are lying out of their fúcking arses.

New York Times editorial calls for (another) end to Prohibition. http://boingboing.net/2014/07/27/new-york-times-editorial-board-2.html

Ofcom has ruled that Clarkson deliberately used a pejorative term to describe an East Asian man. http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jul/28/top-gear-jeremy-clarkson-racial-term-ofcom-bbc

They said and did things that corrupted the fruits of their labour.

We paid £8.5 million for a committed and quality centre back that gave us a season of quality football. We received £20million on a wantaway prima-donna that'll probably file a missing person's report for his head in a year, suspected to be in Madrid. Damn good business.

Just back from seeing Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Takes a little while to get going, but overall, a very impressive sequel to the excellent Rise of the Planet if the Apes. It's set ten years after the first film, and humanity has been more than decimated. The apes haven't seen any for a couple of years, but events bring some their way and the movie focuses on a fragile, yet doomed attempt at reconciliation (the clue is in the title, people). What I really like about both recent apes movies is their insistence on being their own thing. There are few knowing nods to what came before, because in both cases, they've managed to cover new ground.

I've been reading the Vorkosigan saga, a series of far future space opera books that centre around a family of nobles. The books cover different generations; I've jumped in with arguably the most famous protagonist of the books, Miles Vorkosigan. His story begins in "The Warrior's Apprentice". The books are hugely character driven; Miles is quite the character to root for. He stands at 4'9", has brittle bones and been in and out of surgery throughout his childhood. Despite (and perhaps because of) these impediments, he's hugely driven to maintain his family honour and be more than the sum of his parts. "The Warrior's Apprentice" starts during his attempt at overcoming a military physical test to get into the service without being seen to have any help. Won't go too much further into any story details, but what Miles lacks in brawn he makes up for in guile and brain. The man can credibly create moons of believable bullshít at a moment's notice. Watching him blag his way through the first book is something special. Don't want to spoil anyone, but I really like the world-building in these novels. Barryar, the Vorkosigan's "home" planet, is inspired by Russia's feudal period, p'raps without the serfdom component. The Betan colony, sometimes visited and often mentioned, is liberalism run amok. Genetic engineering, uterine replicators, hermaphrodites and equal rights for all forms of life are the norm there. Ooh, and Earth is still about - quite a bit of one novel is set in a future London! Mostly though, it's the characters and the audacity of their actions which makes these novels so good, though. Well recommended. http://www.amazon.com/Warriors-Apprentice-Lois-McMaster-Bujold/dp/1886778272