Whoosh

And there it was gone - the weekend over again already..whoosh.

Today I awoke at 7.30am. Got up, stripped bed, put washing on and went for my walk. Home. Shower. Put second load of washing on. Clean bathroom whilst listening to The Archers. Re-make bed. Hang out washing. Wash up. Clean oven whilst listening to Desert Island Discs (James Nesbitt). Noon. Time to hoover the flat. Then some ironing I have been putting off. Prepare food for my tea. Have a cuppa soup. Watch a bit of Eastenders whilst wrapping presents. By which time its nearly 3.30pm. Mm. There goes a day. I decide at 4.30pm to go and listen to the footie. Horizontal and in my bedroom so I can escape the noises from above. Get up at 6ish to warm through my tea and bake an apple. Watch Top Gear on iPlayer. Wash up and now here I am. Nearly 8pm. A whole day without so much as a lazy moment... Feel knackered.

I need a haircut.

Still need to get my Pops something for Xmas.

I think the reason I stay at work till the end and keep doing things when I'm home is so I don't have to stop and think about stuff. It's the time of year to either dwell or regret. Or be jolly as the song says. I intend to keep mulling to a minimum. That's my intention. But going home means 'stopping'. Thanks heavens for footie. It's 90mins to sit still (ish) and be swept away on a tide of something completely unrelated to work/home life - just the success/failure of the team. The train journey down provided me 45 mins to delete the never ending text messages I have accumulated. Am I the only one that does that? Some are 2 years old. The journey back. Radio 5 for the West Ham game and dozing. Easy to do apart from in the tunnels when the 2 sisters who were bickering opposite filled the void with meaningless angry words.

London takes on a different persona over this fortnight. Yesterday morning the tube was rammed. Suitcases. Shoppers. On the move. Victoria Station. Arrivals and many departures. Me, I'm just doing my usual Saturday thing amid evil eyes from Millwall fans, Brentford fans and the other odd Fulham fan loitering around. I find wearing my bright blue Gills scarf does cause stares. BUT wearing a footie scarf does not a yob make. I support my team just like, let's face it, all the overweight middle aged men giving me the stares. To this day can't work it out. Surely we all support the beautiful game?

My Saturday morning started around 7.30am. I leave the house at gone 8.20 so that by the time I get to Wimbledon shops will be opening. I drop plastic bags in for recycling at SavaCentre - its already quite busy. Head for Wimbledon. I need glue to fix something. Then I check with Millet's. Nope that range sent back til summer. I also make a trip into a very depleted Woolworth's. Credit crunch. There. I've said it. The country is falling into an abyss of unpaid debts, job cuts, high energy prices, low VAT and low inflation. I have avoided talking about it much because the daily news feed seems to get more gruesome. I fear having to pay for the mistakes of a nation who took too much for granted. I predicted to my mum anarchy on the streets. A nation not used to getting its own way... That said going round Woolworths was very eerie. The shelves were all practically stripped of their wares. I bought 2 cereal bowls and a milk pan. The same girl served me who served me a few months ago when I bought a couple of birthday cards. What January and 2009 lies ahead for those staff? I walk with my 30% reduced kitchenware and onto Sava Centre for my Saturday shop - mainly for some fresh fruit and food for the rest of the weekend. Home by 10am. I decided to sort fixing up with glue. I don't read the instructions and end up with super sticky glue all over my right hand. I spend a good 10 mins running it under water and trying to remove my rings before the worse happens. I am successful. It dawns on me how such a seemingly small activity could have had major repercussions. I have no desire to visit A&E again for a few more years thanks. I was going to wrap some pressies up and take with me so Dad could take them home. But time runs against me. That and Blue Peter stuck hands. I pack a bag of clothes etc in prep for the days I will be at home. That's always the drawback of not being in you r own place - second guessing the weather and the clothing required to get you through a few days elsewhere. My bag therefore contains my walking gear and spare trainers! I shall be maintaining the walks. Means I can eat an extra mince pie!

Fighting Talk.

Leave house at noon.

Queue for ticket. Train. It smells of vomit. And then fellow passengers eating pasties. Similar smell. I call Sparky even tho its midnight in Sydney. The toddle down to Gillingham. Walk to meet Pops and dump bag into car. We wander back to the ground. It provides a good opportunity for Pops to chat to me and also for me to gauge his walking ability. Arrive. Cups of chocolate all round. Take our seats. Everyone around us is talking about the Cup game tickets. Seems last Monday the ticket office didn't really know what it was doing. Surprise surprise. AM still slightly peeved that not just Season Ticket Holders got first refusal. Typical Scally.

Ah but what a game! We fought really well until a defensive error (of course by Nutter whom I have cursed by saying is cute) led to the softest goal ever. It was so against the run of play. Then Brentford got more defensive. We could have dropped heads, we didn't but we definitely lost the drive of the earlier spell. Half time. Christmas chocolates. Second half - beautiful sunset. Oh and some red card action! Their man went first after raising an elbow to nudge Simon King whilst driving down the right wing. There followed a 20 man brawl whilst the culprit thought that changing out of his shirt into one with no number would help.... ?! It didn't. He walked. Somehow the mighty Jackson scored. And then our captain went native. It was right down the other end so we were unable to comment. Either way within seconds he was red carded too. Much like the sunset earlier everyone was seeing red. Seems that rather daft action rules him out of the Cup game. Which is a right shame cause Mr Fuller does help keep the defense tight. Grr. All in all a highly entertaining 90mins with flashes that against better teams we can raise our game. Just need to keep in under control a bit more. Oh and put away any of the number of chances we also managed in the second half. I spent much of it on my feet. Interesting also how many people turned up yesterday. They cleared smelt the whiff of TV fame... fair weathers.

So home. Tesco for a loaf. Tea. Strictly. I vote for Tom. Part 1 of a Casualty 2 parter. Strictly results show.

Bed.