Early yesterday, Cup Final morning, I can’t recall what it was now, but something led me to an internet page. I was probably obediently researching some arbitrary request from my wife. Contemporary dance. Modern Jazz. An exhibition of surrealist paintings or abstract sculpture. When it comes to art, she’s the Arsenal to my Corinthian Casuals. Whatever it was, I found myself beholding a page with a marginal mention that caught my eye: Donovan in Reading, it said. Donovan? Now there’s a name I’d not heard in a long time. I clicked on the link, and found myself at the website of The Hexagon, Reading’s slightly outmoded theatre and arts centre. Donovan? Crikey. There was his picture. Yep, that’s … …
Author: andy
How many people under 40 know what this is? Until this morning, I hadn’t realised how low in our esteem the humble bicycle bell had fallen. It seems to have been all but eliminated. Running down the canal for 12 miles, I was overtaken by a total of 34 bikes. I’ve no objection to them on the towpath. The average cyclist looks like a quivering sack of jelly abandoned on a garden wall, so it’s probably the only exercise these poor people get. Moreover, the path is part of the SUSTRANS network, so I expect to see the weekend cyclist, and believe in our harmonious coexistence. But some of them are complete tossers. Perhaps the excess weight that most of … …
Three people stand on an isolated patch of Mediterranean beach, staring at the hundreds of flamingos preening themselves at the water’s edge. Behind them lie miles of mottled, lunar landscape. Over there in the far, far distance a sharp eye could just make out a line of cranes, marking the start of one of Europe’s largest and most anarchic construction sites. Armies of foreigners, Germans mainly, seem to want to buy retirement homes here in Roquetas, and the skeletons of a thousand concrete mausoleums mark out the final resting place of their sunlit dreams. Se vende, se vende. Nothing exists yet, but it’s all se vende. It’s funny how things only half-built can look almost identical to … …
Something untoward to report. Work. After fairly stately progress with my task in recent weeks, I’ve had to accelerate a bit this week, squeezing my running time. A pathetic excuse, of course. Shame on me for pulling that one out of The Lazy Bugger’s Book Of Flimsy Excuses. The week has been busy, but there’s always time to run, just as there is always time to read – despite what people say. Maybe it isn’t so bad. For whatever reason, I didn’t get out yesterday, but I did manage 20 minutes early this morning, and another 25 this evening, on the treadmill in the small hotel gym. Sorry, the “Leisure Centre”. First one I’ve come across since those delightful days … …
I’d presumed there’d be no more Leeds entries after my break. But it seems the plan to migrate south again last week, never got off the ground. I was also expecting to be on holiday this week too, until being told, two days before my fortnight was due to start, that my second week had been cancelled. Pitiful Bastards. Let’s hope my bosses are not tempted to arrange a social occasion at the local brewery. A mysterious event is happening in Leeds this week. No one knows for sure what it is, but it’s claimed the life of almost every hotel room in the city. Rather good news for me as I have an excuse to seek out a change … …
Struggling up Croagh Patrick this afternoon, I was sure this was to be one of those landmark feats that I’d want to write a lot about. But maybe that won’t happen. Is it a hill or a mountain? It’s not very high, only 2500 feet or so, but its ruggedness and steepness make it seem more like the latter. It was a tough walk, much harder than I expected. Beyond the statue at the foot of the… mountain, the path quickly becomes a hard, rocky climb for an hour or so. Then a brief respite with a few hundred yards of grassy track, and a chance to gape over your shoulder at the view across Clew Bay and the tiny … …
Say “Nim”. And “foamer”. Then “nigher” Nim-foamer Nim-foamer nigher. Nim-foamer nigher. Then add a “kull” at the end. Nim-foamer nigher-kull. Good, now we have the right pronunciation for “nymphomaniacal”. As in “Nymphomaniacal Alice”. It’s the first line of the only limerick that I know. But if you pronounce the first word wrongly, it doesn’t work. Nymphomaniacal Alice I was thinking about this as I drove out of Galway City this morning. The importance of rhythm in writing. The train of thought began this morning because I was thinking about the rhythm of limericks, which in turn had come from my driving through the eponymous Irish city. Nymphomaniacal Alice Used dynamite sticks for a phallus Oops, I should have mentioned that … …
Ireland can’t quite make up its mind whether it’s 2004 or 1952. I thought about this as I drove through Tipperary town this afternoon. The high street looks like a film set. The innocent gaudiness of the pub facias with their ancient adverts for Guinness and Smithwick’s and Harp, and the traditional butchers and bakers with their high counters and staff in white overalls, compete with internet cafés and estate agents struggling to cope with the property boom. Outside McGillicuddy’s Bar, an old man in a battered trilby and farmer’s jacket sat smoking a long-stemmed pipe. He must have escaped from the pages of The Mayor Of Casterbridge. I found myself driving behind a hearse, and watched as the entire … …
By the time I was 18, I’d fallen in love a hundred or so times. One of my victims was a racehorse called Wollow, and like most of my relationships, it was fun while it lasted, but at the end, I felt kinda let down. They later said that a piece of metal, a fastener, had twisted under her saddle. Twisted under her saddle, pierced her flank and distracted her. Someone more cynical said that her trainer had been bought off. Maybe she just wasn’t as good as I thought. But anyway, the long and the short of it is that she won me a stack of money through the unforgettable spring of 1976, the same spring that QPR were … …
It seems like a long time since I lived in this town, and I’d taken it for granted that the people I hung round with then must have moved away or shrivelled into middle-age. But this morning I saw someone I recognised. I was standing outside the George Hotel in my Reading Half Marathon teeshirt and shorts, waiting for my watch to wake up and find a satellite, when he shambled past me. I couldn’t place him at first, but I knew the face. A guy in his thirties now, red-faced, eyes bloodshot, hair awry. He panted up the final slope to the station, shirt hanging out of his trousers, puffing on a cigarette. As he lunged past me, coughing, … …