Showing posts with label Football. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Football. Show all posts

Friday, 15 August 2014

A Summer of Culture and Sport


This is my summer - a summer of culture and sport.  I’ve fulfilled one long-term ambition (seeing Rick Wakeman perform Journey to the Centre of the Earth), enjoyed the football World Cup, the Commonwealth Games, an opera (La Traviata), a rock festival in Hyde Park (watching Black Sabbath, Faith No More, Motorhead and Sound Garden), several Proms (with 7 to go plus Proms-in-the-Park), the tennis (I went to Queens for the day and watched Wimbledon on the telly), and the cricket (two series:  England vs Sri Lanka and now England vs India).

Monday of last week was my birthday.  After two weeks in which I saw Simple Minds perform at Kew-the-Music, drove from London to Scotland, went to four events at the Commonwealth Games (the opening ceremony, Rugby 7’s semi-finals, hockey and the athletics on 100m finals night), delivered the FY15 Plan (budget) to the Powers That Be in Glasgow, re-enacted the Battle of Bannockburn, attended a 60th birthday party, attended three Prom concerts (a Greek-themed one, Mozart’s Requiem and the War Horse Prom) and went to the Ballet (Swan Lake),  I took a much needed day off work on my birthday and crashed out.

It took me the best part of a week to recover from the Scotland trip plus the weekends that bookended it.  Scotland was a mixture of holiday to attend the Commonwealth Games and work, both coupled with little sleep – I trekked into the Glasgow office on 4 days including on the morning after the Opening Ceremony, when we’d got home at 2.30am and I had to be up at 6am in order to get the one-and-only direct train into Glasgow from Inverkeithing.  

 Somewhere in there, I've also managed two overnight trips to Manchester - it doesn't feel like work when you're spending the time at work with friends - plus several days working in the Tower Bridge office.   After one of those days at Tower Bridge, I even managed to extend my birthday celebrations by going for drinks/dinner with Dark.  (We were surprised at 9pm when there was a gun salute at the Tower.  I can't find out why there was a salute at that time so I've assumed it was to commemorate the start of the Siege of Lierge in WW1.)

The weather has been glorious, too – long, hot sunny days for most of the last two months.  I managed to get sunburnt at Queens and again at the Commonwealth Games (I never thought I’d ever get sunburnt in Glasgow!).  

As an August baby, I'm a child of the Sun - I was born in the week that Spring habitually returns to Melbourne.  Long, hot, sunny summer days feel like my birthright.  Bring them on Apollo.  Bring them on.

- Pam


Sunday, 18 August 2013

And so the season begins

You can guess where I am.

Come on Chelsea!!!


Sunday, 29 July 2012

Knitting at the Olympics

Tonight, my knitting witnessed Senegal beat Uruguay 2:0 at Wembley. In a few minutes we'll see Great Britain play the UAE - a great evening of football at the Olympics.

Sunday, 27 November 2011

RIP Gary Speed

Today, the British football world was shaken with the news of the suicide of the Welsh manager, Gary Speed, who was found hanged at his home this morning.  On the surface, he was a man with the world at his feet:  happily married with the footballer's dream job of successfully managing his national side.  He was a regular pundit on Football Focus and Match of the Day.  I didn't know him and yet I was moved to tears while listening to his close friend, Robbie Savage, fielding calls on a football phone-in that rapidly became a tribute program.  (Robbie, it was obvious you were crying.)

My heart goes out to his family:  his father, his wife and his children.  I am truly sorry for your loss.  (I have heard no mention of his mother so assume she has predeceased him.  If that assumption is wrong, I am very sorry.)  

The big question is "Why?".  Was it planned?  Was it spontaneous?  Were you living a double life for years, Gary, hiding depression from absolutely everyone?  Maybe we'll never know.  Hopefully his wife and children won't be left haunted for years, blaming themselves. The one thing I know about suicide is that, for the person involved, they want what-ever-it-is-tormenting-them to stop and to be at peace.  They often don't want to die but they can't see another way to make it stop. 

Gary, I hope you are at peace now.

Thursday, 24 June 2010

Random. Just Random.

In the things I wish I could remember department:

I wish I could remember how to reset the clock on the stove.  (Or, alternatively, what we did with the manual.)  I'm sure I used to know but it isn't intuitive and it's been 7 years since there was power to the clock and ovens.  (We used the gas hob.)  The electrician has wired it up temporarily for us and I've used both ovens, but I'd really, really like to set the clock to the correct time.  I've emailed the manufacturer - fingers crossed they can help me.

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Football

Have you been watching the World Cup?  Yesterday was a rather nail-biting day for me.  I'm cursed with having two national teams to follow:  Australia and England.  England needed to win to progress to the knock-out stages.  If Australia were to progress, they needed both a big win (with a goal difference of 3 or more) AND either Germany or Ghana to win the other match in their group. 

The canteen at work has been showing all the daytime matches on their big TV.  The England match was at 3pm so a group of us went down to watch.  (By the end of the match, there was 200 people in there.)  It was nerve-wracking!  I think I swore more in those 90+ minutes than I have ever sworn in the office.  Fortunately, England played like a team, defended well and won by a goal to nil. It was the best they've played in this competition - their match against the USA was OK but they looked nervous, while their game against Nigeria was dire.

Australia's game was at 7.30pm and not broadcast on terrestrial TV, so I watched the German game.  It was so frustrating!  I have only managed to watch one out of the three Australian matches and I was hoping to watch this one.  No dice.  We won, with two good goals, but it wasn't enough to go through.

Congratulations to the American team for getting through to the last 16.

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In Other News...

Can't remember if I've told you but DH is working a temporary job and has been since the second week of May. It's for a contractor for London Transport, which means that every day is in a different location. It's shift work. The hours are awful.   And he has to get there by public transport so an 8 hour shift is really a minimum of an 11 hour day.  It's not in his field.  But any job is better than no job and he's happy to be earning some money.

- Pam

Sunday, 9 May 2010

8:0

I don't think I've written about Football before, but today was a rather momentous day - my team, Chelsea, won the Premiership!  And  I went to the match.


 This morning, we had a one point lead over Manchester United.  And one game to go - a home match against Wigan Athletic.  We had to win the match in order to win the title.  A draw wouldn't do.  When the players walked out onto the pitch, you could have cut the tension in Stamford Bridge with a knife.


Everyone was jumpy.  And the ball wasn't going where we wanted.


Six minutes into the game, Anelka scored!  The stadium erupted. We had the goal we needed to win the match and, as long as we could keep our lead over them, we'd win the Premiership.

But Wigan refused to lie down.  They came back at us again and again.  At about 30 minutes in, a Wigan player cut down a Chelsea player in the Wigan goal mouth.  Penalty!  Frank Lampard faced the Wigan keeper.  And scored!

The third goal was Salomon Kalou's.

The fourth and fifth took Didier Drogba to the top of the table of goal scorers and won him the Golden Boot.

On the fifth goal, Chelsea achieved the milestone of 100 goals in a season.   The first team ever to do so.  By the eighth goal, we'd set another record - our biggest win EVER.  Plus, our Keeper, Peter Cech won the Golden Gloves for the most clean sheets of the season.


Congratulations Chelsea FC.

- Pam (Stick that in your pipe ManU and smoke it!)