New towels, please

For every match the players at Wimbledon are issued with two towels. These are the property of the All England Club. Post-match the deal is they are returned to the nearest ball boy. Not so. The players walk off court with them. Stealing in plain sight. The used towels are then given to friends, family or auction. You can never be too wealthy.

I’ve written before on the despicable practice of the players towelling off then hurling their sweat-drenched towels to ball boys between every point, passing on all their germs. I’d now like to chastise their manner when “asking” for the towel; they point at it: fetch. The slave children then serve their masters with this greasy piece of fabric.

Why don’t the players ask the child, nicely, to hand them their towel? Do they think our young are stupid? The bright young things are more multi-lingual than their ancestors were at that age. I’m sure they would know a smattering of Serbo-Croat, a slice of Swiss, a chip of Czech, and, naturally, be faultless at French.

Our ball boys are too nice but it would be good if at the end of the contest they employed their linguistic skills to volley abuse at the robbers. Stop złodziej oddać nam nasze ręczniki kurwa.

Same Topic (Politics) – Different Venue (Oz)

In case no-one knows, today Oz is going to the Polls. It’s a bit different from the UK.

Polling Day is always a Saturday, the polls open at 8.00 am and shut at 6.00 pm and voting is compulsory – fines apply for not voting – and every polling station has a sausage sizzle (no fines apply for not buying or eating the same). Continue reading “Same Topic (Politics) – Different Venue (Oz)”

If you’re sick of my stuff…..

Write some yourself! summer-flat-cap-grey-prince-of-wales-pop-up-jpg

But it has to be said, there’s so much postable news these days, innit?

With the virtual certainty that our next PM will be a Tory lady, second only to our beloved Maggie, we can look forward to pragmatic gubmint, a phenomenon sadly lacking for many years. (Boris hums, ‘Can’t buy me Gove, yeah; everybody tells me so…’)

Meanwhile the Bremainers are still sulking, talking about second votes, about chaos, about Scotland, Ireland and Gibraltar. (Boris did say, ‘What part of Bleave don’t they understand?.)

But the ever-present Welsh are celebrating with a symbolic win over Brussels Belgium, adding fuel to the flames of the English team’s funeral pyre. Their victory only goes to show: England have sweet FA.

And while I’m here, I should mention that Andy’s best chance this year is if his arch opponent loses the third set today to a Yank. Come on, the special relationship.

Nothing else in today’s news, sorry. Oh yes, it’s a peaky blinder. Stylish, huh?

The old one-two

Troubles rarely come singly, especially for prima donnas like the England football team that got what they deserved yesterday.

May I point out that more than a few of the Chosen will return to their clubs to discover the world has changed since they left for France?

At Chelsea, Italy’s impassioned boss, Conte, takes charge. At Man City, the legendary Guardiola arrives and at Man United, Mourinho pitches up. If some of the Nice failures think Iceland were tough to face, they ain’t seen nuffin yet. The fact is that any quality the Prem League boasts is down to foreign players; the locals just take the benefits – for now.

And in case anybody is feeling smug about Wales, they are going to get a lesson in quality from Belgium very soon. Gareth cannot save them.

It will be an interesting few days, nay months!

Overrated: Classical Music

“Unlike the truest kind of genius, he did not grow artistically”

These words of critic, John Simon, on the shortcomings of the career of Tennessee Williams could be applied to the musical form that is self-proclaimed as classical. Classical, my baroque left Bechstein pedal.

The classicists are stuck in a time warp. They listen, over and over again, to the same pieces of orchestral music; a blaring maelstrom of noise. And they party like it’s 1799. Honestly, some of the ghastly tunes sound as if they’ve been composed by a deaf man. And the titles are boring New York street numbers: Mozart’s piano concerto no.25, Haydn’s symphony no. 76, Bach’s cantata no. 211, Balfour’s bagpipe quartet no.1872.

Continue reading “Overrated: Classical Music”