another fantastic weekend for sport

Well that’s a been a pretty breathtaking weekend sports-wise. Let’s start with the RWC. That match between Wales and Fiji was the key talking point I guess. For me it was the best match in RWC rugby I’ve seen since France beat NZ back in ’99. It was simply riveting. I know there’s a lot of heart-wrenching in Wales over the result and the coach has been dismissed for failing to take the team into the final stages but I believe it’ll be one of the sports’ great matches of all time and the Welsh team should be proud of the part they played.

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Debbie does Moyles

My regular newspaper is the Independent and I always enjoy reading the Deborah Ross interview in the Saturday magazine. Yesterday’s feature was an interview with Chris Moyles, who as you’ll know from previous postings, isn’t my favourite radio personality. But I was intrigued to find out how DR viewed him – she writes as she finds but always allows her subjects the opportunity to have their say about themselves. Often their own words are the most telling. The first headlined quote from him, for example, was ‘there are people who think I’m rude and nasty, but I don’t think I am’. It kind of set the tone for the piece.

rugby world cup; upset on the cards?

Great result for England last night and today it’s Wales’ and Scotland’s turns to qualify for the QF stages. Come on you Celts. After an indifferent start by the Home nations (make that crap in England’s case), the tournament is just brewing up nicely now. The only blemish is the form of Ireland who really do look out of sorts. Something’s not right in that camp. The match against Argentina will be really tough. If all clicks they could do it but all their key players have got to hit top from simultaneously you feel. But come on you Greens.

so long USA

One result from yesterday that caught my eye was in th Womens’ Football World Cup where Brazil beat the seemingly unbeatable USA team 4-0. I think that’s the US team’s first reverse in over 50 games. It’s hell of a run but I’m glad it ended because, well, they stuffed England in the, yes, Quarter Finals. I’m tempted to think that instead of gold stars for WC wins we should add the letters QF beneath the 3 Lions on all England team shirts, signifying our love affair with major tournaments almost always ends at this point.

Is it just me or should we…. bring on Australia then!

Well England finally find a bit of form and put in a decent display to beat Tonga. Phew. England have been rubbish at this RWC but they can’t be running into a bit of form and confidence just as the tournament gets into top gear, can they? Crikey the Aussies might just be beginning to have slight misgivings dya’ think? Nah you’re right, it’ll all end in tears at the QF stage as usual. But as John Lennon would have said ‘I am the Walrus’. Sorry I meant ‘Imagine eh’. I added the last bit of course.

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oh yeh gaunty?

I think I’m going to stop listening to John Gaunt on Talksport. I tend to listen in only because it runs through from the early morning Brazil show which is also quite reactionary but in a harmless/well-intentioned sort of way. JG’s more aggressively opinionated as I’ve said recently and it’s not to my taste. But this morning I heard him make a mess of some pronunciation and it made me smile.

more favourite places

I have to say I’ve been overwhelmed by the response to this posting subject; my wife’s 10 suggestions were sensational but it’s the contributions from all the other commentators that have left me breathless. Ah well I’m going to press on until someone gets moved enough to write back with some locations and venues that made them sigh with with pleasure. As promised the next two lists are my favourite art galleries/museums that we’ve visited or spent time in over the years. Increasingly, I find myself spending more time here than other more hedonistic places these days. A sure sign of advancing maturity (some might call it boring old git syndrome). I don’t care.

cooking (fmwddc), mashed potatoes reprise

I haven’t done a cooking posting for a while, and from my stat-o-meter thingy, it seems that the last posting was one of the most popular yet on the blog. That was a bit of a surprise I have to say. But that does tells me there may be loads of shy guys out there (since none of you have left a comment) interested in becoming a little better at cooking. Or lots of you checked it out in disbelief that a rough old Northern boy could end up stirring sauces and enjoying it. It was probably the latter but who cares, I’m going to write more on this so read it and laugh or, maybe just try it out.