It is nice to see the England Women football team doing well this year, just like their male counterparts 12 months ago.
To be fair to the Lionesses, they’ve been getting better and better over the last decade. Until last summer, England men had been pretty rubbish since 1996.
I’m not here to blog about the players. I am blogging about my observations concerning the fans and their behaviour.
Maybe it is just the media portrays things, but if you are a supporter of a country in the Womens World Cup, whether it is England or another team, you’re perceived to be well-behaved, honourable and, according to one story I noticed, “photogentic”.
At first, I did find that a tad sexist, especially the word “photogenic”, as the headline came across as “look at these lovely girlies. See, they can watch football too. Bless their cotton socks”.
I can assure anyone in any doubt that women enjoy mens football too. Indeed, it was following Bath City where I met my wonderful wife of three years and 364 days (it’s our anniversary tomorrow).
I can forgive the news article a bit, as I noticed photos of male fans – of course, tucked away at the bottom of the page!
Compare this to how male fans of the mens team are usually reported… loud, sweaty, lager louts. At least the red-top tabloids have stopped brandishing any man with the audacity to fly the St George flag a hooligan.
To be fair, there are a lot of football fans who are loud, sweaty, lager louts… many of these are even women!
Since becoming a homeowner, I have liked the idea of naming our house. Nothing cheesy or weird. I was thinking “The Warren”. Like I said, nothing cheesy or weird.
I did discuss my idea with Claire sometime ago. Our discussion lasted about 10 seconds. I can’t remember exactly what was said word-for-word, but I think it included the words “F***ing”, “Way” and “No”.
Using the Royal Mail Postcode Finder, I thought I would search to see if anyone else had the idea to name their home after a location in Watership Down.
I couldn’t find any ‘rabbity’ houses, but I did locate a rabbit street! How cool is this?
I now understand when people say that they have suffered from Stockholm Syndrome. I have it. My SS involves hospitals.
I’ve been in and out of the damn things throughout my life, unfortunately a lot more in the last two years. As a result, there are now aspects of my visits which I have become accustomed to and in one case, even enjoy!
Before I continue, I will say that my hospital Stockholm Syndrome is yet to extend to stays as an inpatient. I still detest every second of THAT kind of hospital encounter and am only able to compare my time as an inpatient to that of a prison inmate. Not that I have ever been to prison, but I haven’t been held hostage in a Swedish bank robbery either.
One thing my frequent medical appointments have forced me to grow accustomed to are injections. It would be no exaggeration to say that I once had a needle phobia. I hated and was scared stiff of the things. However, I was once placed in a situation whereby, it was a simple case of “let me stick these sharp, pointy things into your arm, or die”.
The more jabs I received, the less scared I became – up until the stage where I now tolerate a nurse stabbing me with a needle. I do wonder that if someone was to put a bird-eating spider down my shirt, every day for a year, I may grow to love arachnids, like I do my pet rabbit. There is also a risk that I would die of a heart attack by Day 2, or murder the bastard putting the creature down my shirt… on Day 1.
I would never go as far to say I like getting injected, but who does? Jimmy Corkhill maybe – a crack addict from Brookside in the mid-1990s.
The second aspects of medical treatment I can now tolerate is x rays and scans. I would even go as far to say that these can be enjoyable.
As I write this blog post, I am in the waiting area of a fracture clinic. I will hopefully get to see a consultant soon, as it would be nice to get home, plus it smells like one or two of my fellow outpatients, in the overcrowded room, lack personal hygiene and a can of Lynx Africa.
I have recently returned from having an x ray. What bliss! What a strange to say, I know you are thinking. Whatever way you look at that statement, you would be correct to think that.
The reason I enjoyed getting my bones photographed, is because it allowed me to lie down during the procedure. After almost a full day at work, getting onto a bed (however uncomfortable) is always welcome.
I led back, head on the pillow, eyes closed, my mind and body in harmony. The relaxation was only occasionally broken, when I was required to move my limbs into a new position, for the radiographer to take a suitable image.
I was disappointed that this time, it was only a brief photoshoot, so only got a small rest. In the past I have almost had a little nap! Indeed, during one particularly lengthy MRI scan, I did fall asleep. I was awoken by my own body, inadvertently jumping for some reason – most likely because I was lying down in what can best be described as a futuristic coffin, placed in an excessively loud building site. Claire always tells me that I have a gift of being able to fall asleep easily. I guess she may have a point.
I am currently wrapping up this blog at home – some 3 hours after I started writing it in the BO Waiting Room. Somewhere between paragraphs 9 and 10, I was summoned into the consulting room to see the doctor…
The good news – following the operation in January, everything has healed well and they don’t need to see me again.
The bad news – this means no more afternoon naps in the radiology department.
“Dear Lord. I pray for lots of carrots, treats and cuddles”
“Oh no! Mummy’s whistling again!”
What a bloody marvellous way to spend a Sunday afternoon! In case you were wondering, I was being sarcastic. I appreciate that sarcasm doesn’t come across well over the internet.
As I write this, Claire and I find ourselves in the middle of a powercut. So that’s no television or films on the sofa. On the plus side, it also means no Love Island.
When this has happened in the past, I have done what every right-minded person does in an emergency – take to Twitter to find out what is going on and see if anyone else has the same problem.
For example, if you couldn’t access Facebook, you would search Twitter for the word “Facebook”, to read all the sad and emotional tweets from Facebook addicts, complaining that their lifeline to the outside world has been severed.
If you couldn’t find Mars Bars on sale in any of the supermarkets, you may search “Mars Bars”. Getting the idea?
I am sure that if the internet and Twitter had been in existence in 1912, passengers aboard the Titanic would have searched “sinking”, to see if the unsinkable ship was indeed sinking. Although, if the White Star Line charged as much as P&O for using a mobile phone at sea, the ill-fated tweeters may as well have thrown their iPhones overboard.
As I was saying, Twitter has been helpful during previous powercuts, to learn if other people in the area are affected and how widespread the problem is.
During this latest loss of power, the big news story throughout the world is that the whole of Argentina and Uruguay are also without electricity. The way this story is being reported, you would have thought this was something of a major incident. I notice that Weston in Bath isn’t getting a mentioned by Reuters or Fox News! Typical.
Unfortunately for me, all these news reports concerning South America are clogging up Twitter, meaning that whenever I search for “powercut”, I only get results concerning the poor people of Argentina and Uruguay. I know exactly how they feel.
There have been some updates since I started writing this blog. Firstly, the electricity board have discovered there is a problem. Sadly, this diagnosis only extendeds to my street in Weston. I don’t think Western Power Distribution’s coverage extends to countries within South America.
The second update is that the power is now back! All of this drama took place in just under an hour.
I generally feel sorry for those people in Argentina and Uruguay, who still have no electricity; although at least they won’t have to endure Love Island this evening.
About Me
So you stumbled across my blog. No doubt after searching for something bizarre on Google. Before you hit that 'Back Button', why not stay and have a read for a few minutes?
If you are after a website which gives advice on how to hack an iPhone X, download the latest Steven Seagal movie, or view nudy ladies, you've come to the wrong place and may now press 'Back'.
However, if you would like a lifestyle blog, written by a 30-something chap, living in Bath (England), feast your eyes on this.
You won't discover how to copy PlayStation 4 games. What you will find is a blog, covering life in the West Country, the highs and lows of supporting two unsuccessful football teams, while sharing a house with a wife and rabbit.
All written by a man, somewhere on the sanity-scale between normal and eccentric.
