...my funky new eyebrows?

PS No. That isn't them.

This post is not about Andy Robinson the England coach, who has finally "fallen on his sword" this week.

He has not decided to "lie back on his sword" as some clown on Radio 5 said at around 6pm on Tuesday night, when I was driving to my nightshift. In a calmer world I would have been straight on to Private Eye's "Colmanballs" section (you know the stuff - "And Juantareno opens his legs and shows his class" - David Colman) but I see from this week's edition that I wasn't. Straight on to them, that is. However they HAVE printed a rather amusing job as advertised at Clarke's restaurant in Bath, where they want a

"Sioux Chef"

apparently.

Anyway, this isn't about him. It's about my youngest son,aged 2 1/2, who for the sake of his anonymity we shall call ...oh, I don't know. Rupert? Arnold? Tarquin?

Ok, this won't work unless I reveal his name, so you'd better respect his right to remain anonymous because he's family and you don't want to be swimming with the fishes wearing concrete boots do you? Capisce? [...please - someone enlighten me...]

So the only people I can think of who share his name are Roosevelt and that lovable tortoise on Channel 5 who learns an important lesson about life every day at about 6:45 am. Right, now we've cleared that up....

More clues? OK you sluggards, think soul singer Aretha or inventor Benjamin.

More clues? OK you sluggards, they named a mint after him. And he's not called Polo, or Trebor, even though that is Robert backwards.

OK? It sounds a bit like the rotary engine guy: Wanklin*. Which will have to do for now, because I need to be somewhere else and I haven't even started yet!

His latest thing seems to be doing stuff wrong and then telling himself off about it.
EG Attempting to juggle with rolled up bin bags and then saying "Don't throw, Wanklin.
EG This morning, saying "Put Wanklin in the washing machine no Wanklin you're too big."
[I did worry for a few moments about whether this was childish inventiveness or reported speech. Hello? Social Services?]

But my favourite moment of last night's visit was when he initiated a mad game of hide and seek by hiding behind a door and shouting "Where's me?"

Gotta gettaway now....

You don't hear the phrase "Wanklin Rotary Engine" and forget it in a hurry. Maybe that would have been a better name*?

*No. It wouldn't.

...Shoe anyone?
(Voice in corridor)
...Dogs?
(Response to question: Who was given the vote in 1969?)
...Margaret Thatcher
(Resonse to question: Who was the most vicious tyrant to ever live monarch ruling for much of the 19th century?)
...hugs
(Apparently I give good hugs)

Well I can't be fagged working out what colour I am so how about this for birthday cheeriness? How will I die?
[I think this means I'm probably going to disappear myself to death. But I'm suddenly disinclined to believe in the predictive powers of someone who cannot spell poison]

Your death will be suicide. What more can I say? Fact: Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. If you want to know hwo you will commit suicide, take a look at your second highest percentage on the bar graphs.

Suicide 93%
Disappear 87%
Bomb 67%
Posion 60%
Stabbed 53%
Eaten 40%
Accident 40%
Gunshot 33%
Suffocated33%
Cut Throat20%
Natural Causes
20%
Disease 7%
Drowning 0%

Yesterday League two saw my former partner's home town team pitted against my home town team.
We took the lead.
They equalised.
We lost to an own goal in the last minute.

For those of us still immature enough (ie 43 tomorrow) to feel that football mirrors life, my one birthday card from all three children (why waste money on more than one) begins to seem a touch ironic!

Luckily I know that football doesn't mirror life.
I'm a very lucky man because I've got sixpence.
And now I'm going downstairs because I've just rescued from the garage the song which I danced on tables to during a live performance from the great man back in 1983 when I was (ahem) 20.

"Who's a lucky birthday boy everybody's gonna sing..."

Suffice it to say:
I'm in the garden
Bloggin in the dark
Smokin a fag
Drinkin
Too mad to speak
More will follow

I'm going for my dinner.
That's what I eat at 1 o'clock, posh folk.

As I do so, top blog is Blondie82- rightly so as she continues to post hugely-entertaining updates on her precariously balanced sanity.

Number two is sixpence, who claims to be at work today.

znethru is probably still in the top ten, posting fascinating chess endgames read by people in Malawi.

I'm in the "neverheardofhim" also rans.
Not that I care. Sob.

There aint no f in "justice" is copyright my brother. Seriously, it is. His Lawyers are watching.

You got THAT right.

I need a ticker factory ticker to count down how many days until my birthday.
Or at least I DID. It's probably too late now, bearing in mind
IT's MY BIRTHDAY ON MONDAY NOVEMBER 27th

Now I need a countdown to the number of days before I can find enough time to make the old ticker work.
Asking me questions about my cervix isn't helping, frankly.

Reading the Dilbert blog the other day i came across a pithy definition of the American position on Iraq:

Comedian Larry Miller once described America’s war strategy in Iraq as “Driving around until people shoot at us.” That’s the sort of observation that makes me think our history books are way too long.

And then I came across this - an example of how we/they are winning hearts and minds in Iraq. I know it's tough being a squaddie, but I found this even more depressing than the torture stuff. See if you can spot the emergent "terrorists" here.
http://www.glumbert.com/media/iraqiwater

Went looking for some goblin action in Town Hall Square.

Edit: Goblin-infested day.
Goblins in the Noddy section of the Town Hall Christmas Light Show were infuriating cus they didn’t work properly. Chanting “Goblin” didn’t seem to work.

Goblins on the telly all night, either real ones in that Hobbitty Peter Jackson extravaganza (How LONG IS that film?) or fake goblins (X-factor anyone?). When I found myself watching American Goblin police car chases with a bottle of whiskey, I realised I was missing my other goblin children.

Goblin in bed. Well, nipper coughed himself awake in the small hours so I had to share a bed with the rasping, kicking goblin child. So I hardly slept at all.

It was fantastic.

PS sixpence came voluntarily to a local league footy match with me and the littlun on Saturday. So she’s due some serious payback time, like an hour and a half of sexual favours or something.
45 minutes each way.
If only I could get some fellatio puns into this post…

If only I wasn’t so exhausted.
Is it me, or is November hard work?

Anyway, Fall fans:
CITY HOBGOBLINS
Spiders know these things
Gremlins know these things
Tap, tap, tap, tap
You think it's the pipes
But who turns on the lights?
Our city hobgoblins
Ubu le Roi is a home hobgoblin
And at nights all ready
Our city hobgoblins
Infest my home at night
They are not alright
Ten times my age
One-tenth my height
Our city hobgoblins
Buzz of the all-night mill
Ah but evil
Emigres from old green glades
Pretentious eh?
Our city hobgoblins
They'll get yer
So Queen Victoria
Is a large black slug in Piccadilly, Manchester
Our city hobgoblins
And they say
We cannot walk the floor at night in peace
At night in peace.

Hawk swoops on rare bird visitor
Tuesday, 14 November 2006, 13:55 GMT
The swallow was spotted briefly before it was eaten.
Birdwatchers who gathered to see a rare swallow on the Angus coast were horrified when they saw it being snatched and eaten by a hungry hawk.
Twitchers headed for Lunan Bay as word spread that enthusiasts had discovered a bird so unusual that it was last seen in the area 20 years ago.
However, the red-rumped swallow, which is usually to be found in the southern Mediterranean, did not last long.
A sparrowhawk swooped and snatched the swallow from the roof of a building.

RARE BIRD FLEW FROM US TO SHETLAND TO BE EATEN BY A CAT
4 October 2005
A TINY American songbird survived against all the odds after it was blown thousands of miles off course across the Atlantic and birdwatchers on the Shetlands were delighted when they found the rare veery – a type of small thrush -exhausted but safe after its epic journey.
Twitchers managed to trap the yellow bird at Northdale, Unst, and ring one of its legs for future identification.
But within hours, the veery was pounced on and killed by a local cat.
Rare bird is spotted then eaten by a sparrowhawk
Evening Standard (London), Oct 17, 2005
BIRDWATCHERS at the London Wetland Centre in Barnes had been watching a rare spotted crake feeding when a sparrowhawk swooped down and devoured it.
The bird was last seen in the area in 1999. A spokesman for the centre said: "It was only a matter of time before the bird came to the attention of a hungry predator."
Twitchers watch robin served rare
Tuesday, 9 March, 2004, 11:21 GMT
Birdwatchers from all over Britain who gathered in Grimsby to catch sight of a rare American robin were horrified to see it eaten by a passing sparrowhawk.
They were still setting up their cameras when the predator swooped down from a row of drab factories and warehouses on an industrial estate.
The young bird, from the southern US, "didn't really live to enjoy her moment of fame," a twitcher told the Guardian.
The robin's vivid red breast made it an obvious candidate for a lunch date.

A farmer with a talking sheepdog has just bought the tallest sheep in the world. It is 5.9 metres high.
The talking sheepdog is multi-talented and enjoys helping out around the farm - baling hay, collecting eggs, milking and solving complex mathematical problems.
The farmer, however, is worried about his sheep. He has been told that unless it receives the proper nutrients and regular exercise, its place in the Guinness Book of Sheep Records will be under threat.
So he sends the talking sheepdog to check on it.

"It's ok," says the sheepdog. "It's looking fit and healthy and is 6 metres tall."

"But how can this be?" questions the perturbed farmer. "It was only 5.9 metres this morning."

"Don't worry," says the sheepdog.

"I rounded it up."

(Ripped off the radio and completely pimped)
(Adaptation is a good film, btw)

...and you've got some. One.

Yes, I've broken cover on the whole "privacy" thing to publish the last photo I took on Friday night.

It's evidence of something, certainly. Any ideas?

Blogmeet: Ace folk, great time, really enjoyed myself.

These Racing Grannies are WRONG on so many levels that I don't know where to begin.
It was an unbelievable moment of weakness and work boredom that allowed me to be talked into ordering them off PLAY

And this is what happens when you let a two year old have a play.

Reflections on Blogmeet will have to wait - bit hungover and busy constructing wooden rail network with littlun. So a quick question:

Which football team has the highest average score in FA Cup finals?
Liverpool? Manchester United? Chelsea? Spurs? Arsenal? Cardiff City?

It is of course the mighty Shakers, Bury FC.

Live on BBC1 this afternoon. 2pm

(Any observations about the data being out of date are signs of Johnny-Come-Lately jealousy. For the record, it's a 4-0 win against Southampton in 1900 and a 6-0 thrashing of Derby County in 1903)

We're on the end of a 6 game winning run but our cup form this century is pretty poor and we always lose when we're on telly.

I expect you remember the last time we were on Match of the Day. 1967, I think..

Prompted by Abilene, here are some pics of my little village in the Rossendale valley - featuring the landscape, my daughter with a camera wrapped round her neck, my brother and my eldest playing football in the snow across the road, my niece on a swing and my littlun. And my littlun's buggy in a snowstorm.
Leeds has hills, right?

Style 1
Not John Agard's rainbow* but tonight's sunset!

Style 2

Just in case you haven't followed Juzzy's link already, go to, sirrah.

Style 3
*Rainbow - by John Agard

When you see de rainbow you know God know wha he doing -
one big smile across the sky -
I tell you God got style the man got style
When you see
raincloud pass
and de rainbow
make a show
I tell you
is God doing
limbo
the man doing limbo

But sometimes
you know
when I see
de rainbow
so full of glow
and curving
like she bearing child
I does want know
if God
ain’t a woman

If that is so
the woman got style
man she got style

Style 4 (and welll done for making it this far!)
Sexy Sixy

In an incredible reproduction of the shock of last week, Newcastle United are again on the wrong end of a 20 goal thriller. Latest from St James's Park is Newcastle 5: 15 Sheff Utd.

What's gone wrong with their defence? Is it all Titus Bramble's fault? (Probably)

As Ray Stubbs says, "There's plenty of time for these scores to change," but I've already had enough.

"Roeder out!"

I'm poorly!

I had a close encounter with a robin in the garden yesterday.

I stood still and waited for it to take fright / flight, which I thought was inevitable bearing in mind I had a a fully operational lawnmower in my hands, but it just perched on the fence and eyeballed me. So I cut the mower and waited for it to fly off. Which it didn't.

By this time it was dark, and I think the the bird was pleasantly surprised to find a madman mowing the lawn at 6pm in November. It folowed me round companionably for a spell (looking for grubs in the grass, you know. I'm not stupid enough [10 stupid points, remember] to think it wanted to be my friend)while I tried to get the place fit for the weekend's visitors.

This was a more succesful attempt to be nice to the birds. Last week me n the littlun found ourselves in Aldi buying a birdfeeder to cheer us up before he went back to "see mummy" - but to be honest I've not seen any cheep-cheeps anywhere near it.

It does successfully feed seed into its little tray, though. I found this out when attempting to nail a Catherine wheel to the wooden pole I nailed it to, and being showered with birdseed in the process.

Catherine wheels are generally one of life's disappointments, I think, but this one was quite spectacular - it spun like a dervish for quite some time, spraying different coloured sparks all over he place, blackening the pole it was nailed to before spinning out of control and setting fire to a bush.

Littlun's reactions moved from "verry verrry scared" to "gracious me" and "colours so pretty"

So that was good.

Here's something for you cold people:

I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself.
A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough
without ever having felt sorry for itself.
D H Lawrence

Famous Robin anyone.
Robin Cook for one....