Last week was an eminently forgettable week.
It started badly when my greenhouse paraffin heater caught fire while I was refilling it and, with the exception of a brief period of entertainment on Tuesday evening, went steadily downhill to the weekend.
On Friday I was severely over-served. First an early door with Walkerman and Mullard in the Old Ford was followed by a lengthy session in the Fox.
Returning home clutching a large bag of Chinese goodies, in high spirits (predominantly IPA) and full of anticipation of the big game the following day, I slipped backwards on a patch of wet leaves right outside Cotswold Towers. In a desperate attempt to stop my fall I lurched forward tripping on the kerb and landing face down like a sack of potatoes right on top of my Chinese takeaway. After a couple of minutes, first checking that no one had witnessed my fall, I clambered up, salvaged what was left of our Friday night banquet and stumbled in through the door.
Did I receive any sympathy from Janice?
Despite recounting in great detail how I had manfully fought off two drug crazed muggers intent on stealing our Chinky, all I got in the way of thanks was " the trouble with you is you drink too much"!
Resisting the temptation to remind my darling wife that I had made her fully aware of that fact 43 years earlier before she married me, I attended to my wounds and we ate our Friday night treat in silence, with rather a lot of very small prawn crackers and without any chicken and sweet corn soup or sweet and sour sauce which had combined to create a deadly looking cocktail in the bottom of the carrier bag.
Undaunted by these events the following morning, complete with cuts to the knee and bruised ribs, I arrived at Farnborough railway station with fellow ITFC fan journalist Jon at the appointed hour to catch the fast, no change train to Southampton Central, as recommended by a member of the Farnborough British Rail staff the previous day. What he had omitted to tell us was that due to engineering works between Woking and Basingstoke over the whole of the weekend it was not possible to board it or any other bloody train at Farnborough until Monday morning.
Now I didn't get where I am today by being wise after the event but at this juncture I now realise we should have cut our losses and retired gracefully to the Fox and watched the days FA Cup events unfold in the comfort of the bar with one or two pints.
However, blinded by FA Cup fever, we boarded a clapped out single decker bus along with 70 other unfortunates, predominantly kids under 16, and proceeded to crawl to Basingstoke station faithfully following the train route calling at Fleet, Winchfield and Hook stations, finally arriving over an hour later.
The day deteriorated horribly from this point on and I won't bore you with the details but suffice to say my blue and white scarf and bobble hat that witnessed Mick Mills lifting the FA Cup at Wembley some 33 years earlier have once again been consigned to the back of the wardrobe for another year.
The one highlight of the week was witnessing FFC destroy Banbury United's undefeated home record by a convincing 3 goals to nil. If ever there was case of one team being "In Toon" and the other "Out of Toon" this was it, particularly the young Banbury goal keeper - see picture from the match below.
At one point I felt so sorry for him I was on the point of offering him my pocket edition of "In Toon with the Moon" but soon came to my senses and rejoined in with the "Dodgy Dodgy Keeper" chant. Sentiment has no place at a soccer match!
It started badly when my greenhouse paraffin heater caught fire while I was refilling it and, with the exception of a brief period of entertainment on Tuesday evening, went steadily downhill to the weekend.
On Friday I was severely over-served. First an early door with Walkerman and Mullard in the Old Ford was followed by a lengthy session in the Fox.
Returning home clutching a large bag of Chinese goodies, in high spirits (predominantly IPA) and full of anticipation of the big game the following day, I slipped backwards on a patch of wet leaves right outside Cotswold Towers. In a desperate attempt to stop my fall I lurched forward tripping on the kerb and landing face down like a sack of potatoes right on top of my Chinese takeaway. After a couple of minutes, first checking that no one had witnessed my fall, I clambered up, salvaged what was left of our Friday night banquet and stumbled in through the door.
Did I receive any sympathy from Janice?
Despite recounting in great detail how I had manfully fought off two drug crazed muggers intent on stealing our Chinky, all I got in the way of thanks was " the trouble with you is you drink too much"!
Resisting the temptation to remind my darling wife that I had made her fully aware of that fact 43 years earlier before she married me, I attended to my wounds and we ate our Friday night treat in silence, with rather a lot of very small prawn crackers and without any chicken and sweet corn soup or sweet and sour sauce which had combined to create a deadly looking cocktail in the bottom of the carrier bag.
Undaunted by these events the following morning, complete with cuts to the knee and bruised ribs, I arrived at Farnborough railway station with fellow ITFC fan journalist Jon at the appointed hour to catch the fast, no change train to Southampton Central, as recommended by a member of the Farnborough British Rail staff the previous day. What he had omitted to tell us was that due to engineering works between Woking and Basingstoke over the whole of the weekend it was not possible to board it or any other bloody train at Farnborough until Monday morning.
Now I didn't get where I am today by being wise after the event but at this juncture I now realise we should have cut our losses and retired gracefully to the Fox and watched the days FA Cup events unfold in the comfort of the bar with one or two pints.
However, blinded by FA Cup fever, we boarded a clapped out single decker bus along with 70 other unfortunates, predominantly kids under 16, and proceeded to crawl to Basingstoke station faithfully following the train route calling at Fleet, Winchfield and Hook stations, finally arriving over an hour later.
The day deteriorated horribly from this point on and I won't bore you with the details but suffice to say my blue and white scarf and bobble hat that witnessed Mick Mills lifting the FA Cup at Wembley some 33 years earlier have once again been consigned to the back of the wardrobe for another year.
The one highlight of the week was witnessing FFC destroy Banbury United's undefeated home record by a convincing 3 goals to nil. If ever there was case of one team being "In Toon" and the other "Out of Toon" this was it, particularly the young Banbury goal keeper - see picture from the match below.
At one point I felt so sorry for him I was on the point of offering him my pocket edition of "In Toon with the Moon" but soon came to my senses and rejoined in with the "Dodgy Dodgy Keeper" chant. Sentiment has no place at a soccer match!
To finish have a look at this video of the ex Boro legend Rocky Baptiste playing for Harrow Borough to see how being "Out of Toon" and "In Toon" can apply to the same player:
What's he done! Must have been a full moon!
What's he done! Must have been a full moon!
