Well the new season’s started and it’s a long time since I did a footie posting. Prompted by Charlie Cranium’s recent comments I thought I should offer up some thoughts on the season ahead which you’re all welcome to challenge. Let me know what you think.
Regular readers will be aware of my passion for crap car names (special editions in particular), interesting number sequencies and fascinating reference books. There’s another thing that intrigues me and that’s weird or at least unusual place names. It must be because I was brought up in a place called Poulton-le-Fylde or, as my old friend Colin calls it, somewhere unpronounceable up north. Continue reading
I wrote briefly in the recent posting ‘Back’ about the slightly tiring journey back to Italy. We’d been in the UK and at the wedding in Ireland for over 3 weeks and as much as we’d enoyed ourselves we were conscious of over-staying our welcome, particularly at E and S’s place. We’d also left our beautifully (and painstakingly) restored pool replenished with soft, crystal clean and very expensively-metered Italian mountain water in the hands of our good neighbour P. She was a little excited I think at the prospect of looking after it and using it in the August heat but she’d never taken responsibility for one before. I left copious instructions and we were a phone call or e-mail away if necessary, so I was fairly sure that P would be alright just topping it up with chemicals every few days. Even so, when we were invited to extend our stay by 4 more days to attend my nephew Russell and fiancee Rachel’s engagement party back uo north, we sadly declined because we really felt like we had to get back just in case. Pool’s are fickle things but nothing would go wrong, surely. Umm… we just thought let’s be fair to P and get back asap after the wedding. Continue reading
I’ve written about our great friends L and S often before (L runs the charity Heats which is linked on the side-bar). We were neighbours nearly 30 years ago in Wood Green in London when our kids were all babies and although we’ve both moved home several times, we’ve remained firm friends ever since. With L and S now living in Yorkshire and us in Italy, we are distant physically but as close as we’ve ever been, emotionally. Anyway we were delighted to be invited to the wedding of their first daughter, the delightful Dawn and top lad Jamie who we’ve come to know very well. We’ve known Dawn since she was a year old and have watched her grow into a tremendous young woman. The real delight for us though was our daughter R was asked to be Dawn’s ‘best lady’ – R was absolutely thrilled to be invited. Continue reading
Well whilst we were back home quite accidently I heard two guys I know really well on the radio (in one case, I’ve known him all his life). On the first occasion I was just doing the after dinner dishes at E’s, Radio 4 on in the background with End the Week or Loose Ends perhaps when I heard the unmistakeable voice of Maurice Collins. Maurice was one of the founder members of a self-help group for families with handicapped kids, called Kith and Kids. We joined the group after R was born and it was a tremendous support for us during those early years. The group was full of interesting and really strong people and fascinating kids. Maurice was one of the leading lights and he and his wife remained highly involved even though their own child had grown up and long since moved on in life. We lost touch with the group when we moved from London to Buckingham when R was 10, more than 20 years ago. We’ve had no contact with Maurice since then but his distinctive voice was instantly recognisable.
Well that was quite a break from the blogging. I haven’t posted anything for exactly a month, not because I’ve had a writing block but just because we’ve been back to UK seeing family and friends on a kind of wedding occasion cum holiday and have simply been too busy to do any postings. Yeh right, who’s that busy eh? Fair enough – here’s the schedule below. So much to write about – I’m not sure I’ll get all the postings done this side of Xmas. But whilst we’ve been away we’ve gone through the 50K visits mark on the site. What can I say but thank you, thank you, thank you. I remain staggered and delighted that so many have come by to read this self-regarding ranting and raving. You must be mad, sad or unbelievably wonderful. Whatever, I think you’re just great.
Pasta Paulie 