So the idea was this. We’d all queue up in an orderly fashion, small boys drowned both metaphorically by the ill fitting red rugby shirts and literally by the sideways slanting cold November rain. One by one, instructed forwards the booming Welsh tones of the PE Teacher Mr.Van Block, each boy would catch the rugby... Continue Reading →
Ok, I’ll admit it. I was suffering with wind, and it wasn’t a good look… wait. That doesn’t sound right. Let me start from the top… Having already fallen asleep during the Broadway masterpiece ‘Les Misrables’, my wife and I made our way to the base of The Empire State Building in a haze of... Continue Reading →
It was New Years Eve 2024, and I was doing what any self respecting ‘30-something’ year old Birmingham boy would want to do to mark such an occasion… I was sat in the waiting room of the Arnold Clark show room, rinsing their free coffee, whilst waiting for them to finish servicing my wife’s car. ... Continue Reading →
They say that it’s the hope that kills you… And on a warm summers night in Germany, where it was a case of waiting for someone to deliver the killer blow (to avoid a mass shootout at all costs), hope was the strategy that we were clinging on to with our lives. But can hope... Continue Reading →
It was August 1999, deep in the sweltering summer sunshine of the South of France. Aged 13, I was on a family holiday in the Dordogne - happy to be there but (like every teenager), happy to be anywhere other than school on one of those 6 week summer breaks that seemed to last a... Continue Reading →
They say that ‘good things come to those who wait’. But then again, so do death and taxes. So you really have to ask yourself…is it really worth it? At least this was the theory of my 5 year old son the other week. In sole charge of the eldest of my two boys, I... Continue Reading →
At this point in my life, it is probably fair to say that red wine & I do not get on… However, that’s not to say that I don’t enjoy a drop of red. No, no, no my juniper soaked compadres - let’s not go jumping to hasty conclusions now! But as purveyors of my... Continue Reading →
I would love to say that my annual abstinence from Movember was a personal choice. And I guess, in a way, it is a choice…my second choice. I could write and tell you a multitude of reasons that I stick to a look of, at best, ‘morning shadow’ stubble; ‘I can’t take part in Movember... Continue Reading →
It’s fair to say that the aroma that was rising from my clothes, so pungent that I had half expected to see a visible haze, was reminiscent of a smoked ham (if that ham had been smoked in the fumes of Chilli Heatwave Doritos, undercooked Pot Noodles and week old socks)… I was returning home... Continue Reading →
As the summer months begin to peter out, with the days becoming shorter and the evenings becoming darker, the inevitable changing of the seasons is nigh. For most people, Autumns arrival will conjure imagery of rust coloured tree tops, seemingly alive with the burning oranges and yellows of a blinding sunset, whilst simultaneously signalling the... Continue Reading →
The Gin Shelf 
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