Carry on my wayward son

If you go to Marks & Spencer's in Bournemouth and buy your lunch then when you get to the till you will be asked "do you have a carrier bag?" If you say no then they will offer you one...for 5p (or 10p if you want one of their "bags for life").

Now I approve of the sentiment behind this initiative 100%, so why do I feel I'm being ripped off? Maybe the smug look on the member of staff serving me needs work on?

The Freeze

For the past two nights I have loved watching the new BBC comedy "Freezing". It has an array of stars (Hugh Bonneville, Elizabeth McGovern and Tom Hollander are the main leads) and is a wonderful satire on the world of TV, films and all things PR.

You can see it on the BBC iplayer now. The final part is tomorrow (Friday)

Rule Britannia

It was the Brits last night when we celebrate all that is good (or bad) about the British music industry.

I had a passing interest in this years ceremony as three girls from work won tickets through a link up with one of the sponsers. In addition I discovered that Word magazine would be blogging about the evening live on their website. Finally Britains scarriest family were hosting the evening and we all waited to see if they would surpass the "Mick & Sam" debacle of a previous year.
The reality was:-

• The Osbournes were as awful as we all hoped they would be. Ozzy sadly can hardly string a whole sentence together, which he never needs to I suspect with Sharon as his wife. She took over when ever she could and her dissmissal of Vic Reeves when he took too long over an announcement was embarrassing. True Vic wasn't sober and is a pale shadow of the comedian of 10 years ago but her belief that she is the most powerful woman on TV (or Britains favourite Mother) is uncalled for. Jack and Kelly did ok but when ever they were partnered by either parent looked very ill at ease. The highlight of the evening was when Ozzy introduced Paul McCartney as Mr Sir Paul McCartney!
• The Word blog event was a revelation and actually made the whole thing a joy to behold. You can read it here but without the visuals via ITV is probably nowhere near as funny. Mark Ronson seemed to get most stick but the Kaiser Chiefs and Leona Lewis got their fair share as well. I even made a contribution.
• Kylie looked great!
• Macca started with his last single off his latest album. Starbucks clearly want their monies worth.
• The best music of the whole evening was from 1973 when he played "Live and let die"
• I correctly predicted "Hey Jude" just before he played it ,which impressed my boys, but little do thy know that he is incapable of doing a show like the Brits without playing it.

Generally it was the "same old same old" but watching while reading the Word blog did add a new and very entertaining dimension.

Who are you?

Nigel Pearson was today appointed the new Saints manager.

How do I feel? Well shocked firstly, as he was never mentioned by any of the so called pundits as being a candidate for the job. Now that could mean that as he was until the last week or so part of the Kevin Keegan circus at Newcastle(new sponser HM Government following the nationalisation of Northern Rock), that he just slipped under the radar. The pundits could be rubbish is another viewpoint but let's face it they throw so many names at any vacancy, they always usually get the correct name in there somewhere. But not this time!

So the next emotion is concern that this is a knee jerk reaction. We played embarrassingly badly on Saturday when we were knocked out of the F A Cup by Bristol Rovers (22 places below us in League One). We have slipped down the Championship so far since George Burley left that relagation is a word now heard far more frequently than promotion (actually the words would be play off but that's two words!). So have we just appointed our new coach as he is free and has an acceptable CV and probably most importantly is cheaper than other options?

Finally, however, Pearson when he was a player was a no nonsense hard tackling centre back. In the interviews he gave the BBC for Match of the Day as "Big Sam's" deputy (Big Sam wasn't talking to the BBC over allegations they made about him) he came across as articulate and strong minded. If he can impose his playing style on our defence then that alone would be a good enough reason for his appointment. As to the rest, well only time, as they say, will tell.

The kick inside

The RBS Six nations kicks off tomorrow and it seems an appropriate time therefore to put on record my experiences of playing the "wrong shaped" ball game.

I only really played rugby at school and only then at senior school, namely King Edward VI school in Southampton. King Edwards (or KES) only played three main sports, rugby in the winter, hockey in the spring and cricket in the summer.

So in the winter of 1971 I was introduced to the "joys" of rugger. Even as a 13 year old I was tall for my age and so I was put in the scrum either at prop forward or second row. Both of these positions involved "binding" with the rest of your scrum and then your scrum "engaged"with the oppositions. At this point the scrum half rolled the ball down the middle of the scrum and each team would then try to drag the ball back with their feet so that the ball could pop out the back and off out into play again.

This whole process involved a number of experiences for which I was completely and utterly unprepared. Firstly "binding" meant that you bent over and the person behind you similarly bent over and then attached themselves to you by putting one of their hands between your legs and then grabbing the front of your shorts. Now no one even remotely warned me on that one and anything in the general area of the front of your shorts could get grabbed! I never was and never will be comfortable with that requirement!

Then engaging with the other scrum meant heads together and then hands, fingers and knees were applied to any oriface you were faced with and the introduction of the ball was incidental in the extreme.

I learnt very very quickly that the scrum was not a place I wanted to be anywhere near! The solution was to learn one of two skills, kicking or throwing. Kicking meant you would be put at fly half, throwing meant you were put on the wing as at that time the winger threw the ball in at a line out. Neither of these positions involved being in the scrum (result) although in modern rugby as the hooker tends to do the throw in at a line out, only kicking would be an alternative today.

I very quickly learnt to kick the ball as far as I could. At any moment in a game if the ball was passed to me and I caught it (rare but not unheard of) before anyone could tackle me (physically assult me) I would kick the ball as hard and as far as I could. Then I mastered the throw in so standing on the wing hoping the ball would never reach me became another alternative.

I know I probably sound like a right wuss, but I was far from alone in my views. As to my achievements on the field, in four winters of rugby union I never scored a try (although I did once dive over the 22 yard line thinking it was the try line and jump up in celebration, only to realise my mistake as all around me fell about in uncontrolable laughter). Strangely, however the only time we played rugby league, I did score two tries, but at a grammar school in the south of England, we were only ever going to play league as an end of term jolly!!

Despite all of the above I do love watching the game from the safety of my armchair and will be there tomorrow as England beat the Ospreys.