Whitey Grandad

You always start from the back and work forwards. We were shipping goals until now so it's important to steady the defence and stop the rot. Then the confidence will improve and eventually the goals will come. This is going to take some time and I, for one, have just about written off this season. If all goes well we may have a chance of outpacing all the others but I'm not as confident as I was after Bristol Rovers.

The one on the left of their penalty area. I'll look it up again, if you like. He was done for pace and just hacked the fellow down from behind. I can't remember the other team right now but I'm sure somebody will remind me.

Just wait until you're old and married to a granny. Luckily your eyesight is usually failing by then.

He always tried to cross from just over the halfway line so the forwards were usually getting very poor service, if the ball actually reached them. I can't remember many assists? Defensively his postioning was very poor and he was also very slow. I can never forgive him for giving away that penalty.

There's a long, long way to go until the end of the season. The table will look completely different then.

James's delivery was almost always woeful.

We agree! I have always said the same about calculators too.

All strikers go through lean spells. To talk about getting rid of him after a handful of games is a bit premature, don't you think?

There are plenty of them about now. I think there's a gradual programme of updating the pumps. It means that they can reduce the staff at the tills.

I agree. And the quality of the posts is atrocious. I expect more for my fiver.

Computers have absolutely no place in the classroom. There is too much dependence on technology. It replaces the ability to think and analyse based upon fundamental knowledge and first principles.

These tables don't include the effects of employers' payroll taxes. In the UK you must also consider the employers' NI contributions which are just as much a part of an individual's tax as PAYE. They are a tax on your salary which is taken before you even see it.

That really is a stupid statement. If you want people to work hard then you have to let them keep their earnings. If not, then they will just leave the country.

Use the miles for air tickets. I'm in Bermuda at the moment. Two return tickets for just over 13,000 miles and that includes all the airport charges and taxes.

I'm not whelmed by the thought of Adkins but we are in desperate need of getting this whole sorry affair sorted. If he's the best that we can get then he'll have to do.

Get a room.

I was driving back from Paris to Le Havre with my wife. I turned the radio on to hear that one of the towers had collapsed. Shock and disbelief. I've just realized this evening that it was the day before our wedding anniversary, 12th September. We reach 40 years tomorrow but my thoughts are with all those who never had the chance to live the lives that we have experienced.

The designer of the Vulcan (and the Lancaster), Roy Chadwick, worked for Avro at Hamble and lived at 38 Chessell Avenue, Southampton, from 1922 to 1929. There is a blue plaque on the house. http://www.wingweb.co.uk/biographies/Roy_Chadwick.html The Avro company was founded by Sir Alliott Verdon-Roe. He is buried in the graveyard at St. Andrews Church, Hamble. His son Geoffrey Verdon-Roe founded the Vero companies that used to be dotted around Southampton.

A Vulcan was used as a testbed for the Olympus 593: http://www.2av8.co.uk/pages/xa903/xa903c.htm The Vulcan was powered by four earlier Olympus models: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_Olympus

In the early 70s I used to work with a chap who came from Bristol. He told me that in his day there used to be a petrol station just off the end of the runway at Filton. Then one day a Vulcan had to overshoot the runway and applied full power at very low altitude just as he was passing over the station. Apparently everything was blown flat and all the petrol pumps were left dangling on the end of their pipes.

Wouldn't a giant Toblerone be better? You can sometimes get special offers if you buy three.

That's what happens when you change managers. It takes a couple of transfer windows to get the team that the new one wants, and you get left with a heap of rejects that he doesn't want to play.

It may just be me, but most of these names leave me distinctly underwowed.

Bless you.

As we thought. Just where is Staplethorpe exactly?