I must have a gene missing.
I am English, born in Buckinghamshire, know most of the words for Jerusalem and can get a bit emotional if our nation acheives great things in sport. My warm feelings can be quite expansive on seeing a home based cyclist trumph in the World Championships or if our domestic football teams take on and win against the usually more technical and skilful European teams.
I am sorry to say however that I just do not get cricket.
Such an admission , say 100 years ago will have done for any career aspirations I may have had in the Civil Service and 50 years ago in the Diplomatic Corps. I did have a Grammar School education with cricket being a mainstay of the summer term, and by default even got to play in a proper match against another similar establishment. At other times I would be volunteered to keep score. This involved sitting on a deckchair in front of the pavilion, yes we had our own such building from the 1930's on the school field, with a large score book ledger in which, in a series of binary strokes I would record balls per over, runs per over and the extra things, called extras where there was a no-ball or a by.
Essential equipment for this task was a pencil eraser. Fortunately for the morale and fortitude of the cricketers there was always a Master sat adjacent who would tell me what to write and when. His patience and calm demeanour were quite admirable given my obvious disinterest and incompetence. He was a true follower of the sport and I could see him fidget and grimace with each ball bowled as though he was out on the crease himself. Periodically he would exclaim admiration at a good shot or display of fielding followed by polite clapping of the hands which I always likened to a chip pan just reaching the temperature for the sliced potatoes to go in.
If I was typical for the student intake at the school then cricket was doomed to die out due to lack of ability and interest. To instil us in the sport we were introduced to playing cricket in the summer term and on a warmish, dry and breezy wednesday games lesson it could be quite pleasant an experience unless you were stood in the direct firing line for one of the most barbaric weapons in existence- the cricket ball.
An evil thing. Red leather, raised ribbed stitching, hard and heavy. I was immediately alerted to the hazards associated with gravity and a cricket ball as I ran about madly to try to catch a high arching strike during a practice session. The ball plummeted through the humid air, gathering momentum before smacking painfully through my prayerful upturned hands and passing through with still enough velocity to embed itself on my thigh leaving an almost perfect imprint of leather on skin and tendon. Ouch, as I exclaimed at the time.
There was no sympathetic response for my pain, just a lecture on what I had done wrong. This was followed by a personal training session on what I can only describe as a torture rack. Where it lived during the 10 months of the year when it had no use was a mystery. A low wrought iron frame supported a cradle of engineered wooden strips in a shallow bowl. It was a bit like a park bench but after sat upon by the worlds heaviest person. A cricket ball, thrown with vigour into the contraption would take the contour line of the wood and shoot out the other side like a slingshot with the intention for the recipient or target to attempt a catch. Without the commensurate concentration the experience was startling and shocking.
Some of my peers were excellent cricketers. They fully embraced the tradition and knew all the terminology and ritualistic procedure. We were also forced to practice in the cricket nets which I felt akin to being a coconut on a fairground shy. The good players revelled in throwing down a bouncing ball of maiming potential to invoke utter panic or if taking up the bat sending a rocket missile back up the netted corridor leaving a small window of opportunity to dive for cover.
Some sense was made of cricket when relatives of my father took me to a first class match involving Somerset and Middlesex in the early 1970's. I had been invited to keep another young guest company. He was very posh and evidently a big enthusiast but quite gracious in providing authoratative answers to some , quite frankly, stupid questions and queries that I raised. I remember that it was a good day out, very civilised and polite.
The mystery of cricket however persists in my mind. The end of the football season in May heralds the start of the cricket and I am sorry to say that I remain cold and unemotional to it. Is there something wrong with me?
Monday, 14 May 2012
Sunday, 13 May 2012
Freestyle Keepie Uppies
Juggling with a football was a means to waste a considerable portion of my childhood. I can only therefore express complete admiration for the recent exploits of a football freestyler who completed a record breaking 'longest distance journey whilst juggling a football' from Wembley Stadium to Old Trafford, Manchester. The statistics are incomprehensible. Approaching 200 miles distance, 400,000 steps and over half million keepie uppies over the ten day duration.
The pursuit of a personal best record for Keepie Uppies becomes a bit obsessive and sad. I well know, from experience that it is a lonely quest out in the back garden, on the patio, down the park or just in the street.
It starts in an idle moment.
Perhaps the football, kicked against a wall, bounces back at just the right height and velocity to be tee'd up and then it falls back onto your bovver boots to attain the first ever count of 'One'. The challenge is on. It may take a few further hours to get to that elusive 'Two' but having done so you can go indoors and watch some television.
If there is anything left of the day then before bedtime in the summer months or under the outdoor light the rest of the year a few minutes can be stolen to improve on the record to date. Tiredness, over-compensating for the poorer light, or just adverse weather conditions will all contribute to failure on such an occasion. The feeling of disappointment on climbing into your bed is tangible and eats away at your very soul.
There may be some respite the following morning if it is snowing, raining or howling a gale but anything less in climatic conditions makes it absolutely necessary to try again. Ground conditions also play their part in thwarting an attempt on the record of 'Two'. A divot, twig or stone in the lawn can deflect the ball away from your foot, even though the trajectory and pace are nicely set up for a 'Three'.
On the patio, a pivoting paver or where the ball straddles a joint between the slabs can be similarly disastrous. In frustration the ball can be booted away into next doors garden or over the back hedge into the farmers field. A cheap plastic football, when caught on a rose bush in the border, can give out an horrendous sound of escaping air in simulation of the very last gasp from your own deflated ego.
It is so easy to just try too hard to get to a 'Three'. A more carefree and casual, non-plussed approach to keepie uppies can often surprise and I once ran indoors and announced to the whole assembled family that I had got to a 'Three, Four and Five' in one such informal go. This was not in any good style or method but it was undeniably a 'Five'. Invariably, there were no witnesses apart from the neighbours chihuahua who pressed its diminuitive nose against the fence as though wanting to join in. It would be some months before that personal best would be bettered.
A 'Five' was however presentable and worth mentioning to friends who would gasp and swear in either admiration, disbelief or derision. There would be that golden moment when someone would actually see you equal and then nearly break the record.
My grandad Dick taught me a few tricks with a football as he would tell the story of how he had a trial with his local team when he was a lad. He showed me how to kick the ball with the outside of the foot to create a wicked swerving and twisting shot that would leave my friend Anthony Whitbread standing forlonly between the pile of jumpers and coats as goal posts not knowing which way he had to dive to intercept the attempt on goal. Being a kind grandad he never tried to keepie uppy because he knew that he would shatter my personal best and my fragile confidence with ease and panache.
I seem to think that I never actually reached more than a 'Five' as a child. As a father myself I spent a good few hours in the garden with The Boy trying to reach a ridiculous target for Keepie Uppies that was doomed to failure. Only the looming darkness as the halogen bulb on the garage mounted security light burnt out in a flash of flame permitted a legitimate reason to give up for that particular day.
The temptation to juggle a football still however persists. This can be embarassing at the local recreation ground when walking the dog if the kids shout "Hey, Mister, can you give us our ball back' , as it comes my way. I should just boot it back, grandad Dick style, but cannot resist a tee-up, juggle and volley. This scenario is acted out in my mind to great success but in reality I mis-kick, fall over and pull a muscle to the accompanying sound of laughter and ridicule. The dog looks on faithfully bemused and hoping that my antics are the start of a more interesting day out after a rather boring drag around the field.
The pursuit of a personal best record for Keepie Uppies becomes a bit obsessive and sad. I well know, from experience that it is a lonely quest out in the back garden, on the patio, down the park or just in the street.
It starts in an idle moment.
Perhaps the football, kicked against a wall, bounces back at just the right height and velocity to be tee'd up and then it falls back onto your bovver boots to attain the first ever count of 'One'. The challenge is on. It may take a few further hours to get to that elusive 'Two' but having done so you can go indoors and watch some television.
If there is anything left of the day then before bedtime in the summer months or under the outdoor light the rest of the year a few minutes can be stolen to improve on the record to date. Tiredness, over-compensating for the poorer light, or just adverse weather conditions will all contribute to failure on such an occasion. The feeling of disappointment on climbing into your bed is tangible and eats away at your very soul.
There may be some respite the following morning if it is snowing, raining or howling a gale but anything less in climatic conditions makes it absolutely necessary to try again. Ground conditions also play their part in thwarting an attempt on the record of 'Two'. A divot, twig or stone in the lawn can deflect the ball away from your foot, even though the trajectory and pace are nicely set up for a 'Three'.
On the patio, a pivoting paver or where the ball straddles a joint between the slabs can be similarly disastrous. In frustration the ball can be booted away into next doors garden or over the back hedge into the farmers field. A cheap plastic football, when caught on a rose bush in the border, can give out an horrendous sound of escaping air in simulation of the very last gasp from your own deflated ego.
It is so easy to just try too hard to get to a 'Three'. A more carefree and casual, non-plussed approach to keepie uppies can often surprise and I once ran indoors and announced to the whole assembled family that I had got to a 'Three, Four and Five' in one such informal go. This was not in any good style or method but it was undeniably a 'Five'. Invariably, there were no witnesses apart from the neighbours chihuahua who pressed its diminuitive nose against the fence as though wanting to join in. It would be some months before that personal best would be bettered.
A 'Five' was however presentable and worth mentioning to friends who would gasp and swear in either admiration, disbelief or derision. There would be that golden moment when someone would actually see you equal and then nearly break the record.
My grandad Dick taught me a few tricks with a football as he would tell the story of how he had a trial with his local team when he was a lad. He showed me how to kick the ball with the outside of the foot to create a wicked swerving and twisting shot that would leave my friend Anthony Whitbread standing forlonly between the pile of jumpers and coats as goal posts not knowing which way he had to dive to intercept the attempt on goal. Being a kind grandad he never tried to keepie uppy because he knew that he would shatter my personal best and my fragile confidence with ease and panache.
I seem to think that I never actually reached more than a 'Five' as a child. As a father myself I spent a good few hours in the garden with The Boy trying to reach a ridiculous target for Keepie Uppies that was doomed to failure. Only the looming darkness as the halogen bulb on the garage mounted security light burnt out in a flash of flame permitted a legitimate reason to give up for that particular day.
The temptation to juggle a football still however persists. This can be embarassing at the local recreation ground when walking the dog if the kids shout "Hey, Mister, can you give us our ball back' , as it comes my way. I should just boot it back, grandad Dick style, but cannot resist a tee-up, juggle and volley. This scenario is acted out in my mind to great success but in reality I mis-kick, fall over and pull a muscle to the accompanying sound of laughter and ridicule. The dog looks on faithfully bemused and hoping that my antics are the start of a more interesting day out after a rather boring drag around the field.
Saturday, 12 May 2012
Funny Shaped Balls Relatively Speaking
A family, and in ascending size order, usually, neighbours, the street, town, city, county, region, nation, continent, hemisphere and world can be divided on, in descending order, resources, wealth, culture, politics, language, education, sport, housing, parking, hedging and choice of takeaway.
In their own way and sphere of influence even the smallest point of contention can cause major rifts, fractures and tears in the fabric of life.
In our city of Hull the main divide is east to west across the urban sprawl. The physical feature forming the front line is the tidal River Hull which flows in and out of the Humber. It is bridged in many places but being navigable the crossing points have to be of a mechanical lifting or swinging type. Sensible in itself but smacking of a possibility of perpetuating the segregation of the city by whosoever has control over their operation.
Because of this feeling of insecurity the constituent parts of the city have polarised into tribal colours of their Rugby League teams, the red and white of Hull Kingston Rovers from the east and the black and white of Hull FC from the west. The fortunes of the teams, like the demilitarised zone represented by the river, have ebbed and flowed, stagnated, become muddied and mired and on increasingly rare occasions been in full unstoppable flood and so, in following have the loyal, respective supporters in their sense of status, achivement and pride.
The display of team colours is everywhere. Weekend and work apparel is strongly influenced by the latest release of replica , authentic sponsored jerseys to such a extent that the shopping streets of Hull can resemble a solid block of red/white and black/white moving effortlessly and seamlessly about their business.
Commercialism is a fact of life for the sport with frequent changes of the naming of the League and in recent years the introduction of teams from the south of England, having been a predominantly northern working class game and France.
Embroidery and iron on transfer business must be booming on the basis of the proportion of the high tech sports fabric under some form of logo. Not just a chest emblazoned main sponsor anymore but sleeves, cuffs, epaulettes, collars, shoulder yoke and shirt tail as well as any spare gaps in between which have potential for overprinting with your owm name, nickname or dedication. The wardrobes of loyal supporters must be expansive to accommodate year on year changes to the strip and also variations within each season for home games, away games, sunday and friday matches and for one-off competitions such as Finals. This latter event has been regrettably absent from the honours roll of both our city teams for many years.
Merchandise is also extensive and inventive. New born babies will be first swaddled in team colours and returned home triumphantly branded in what will be a life-long, periodically euphoric but mainly stressful and disappointing obsession. Casual wear for the ladies includes boob tubes, halter tops, vests and a full soft sheen leisure or jogging suit in rich velour.
There are many individual and customised attestations to the team you support. House frontages afford a great opportunity for a display of colours on woodwork and rainwater fittings, door and window frames, where not in bright white UPVC, and with flags and banners acting as curtains and blinds. The small oval glazed pane of a plastic front door can sustain a stained glass and leaded caricature of a league player in full flight with ball in play.
My late father in law, having installed a neutral and functionally white kitchen in a house he was working on returned the following day to fit the handles only to find it had been re-painted in the gawdy post box red of Hull Kingston Rovers. The tribal basis does not however prohibit or stifle mobility amongst the population of the city. It may be necessary to cross the divide for employment or even a mixed marriage. My wife, from the east side of the city and a HKR fan has had to endure many years of residence on the western side and on a daily basis expresses a desire to return to the homeland.
I am of course not a native of these parts and feel able, therefore , to stand back and review the situation but in no way can I appreciate the true depth of emotions that are involved in supporting not just a team but a heritage and ethos across what really is an unbridgeable divide.
In their own way and sphere of influence even the smallest point of contention can cause major rifts, fractures and tears in the fabric of life.
In our city of Hull the main divide is east to west across the urban sprawl. The physical feature forming the front line is the tidal River Hull which flows in and out of the Humber. It is bridged in many places but being navigable the crossing points have to be of a mechanical lifting or swinging type. Sensible in itself but smacking of a possibility of perpetuating the segregation of the city by whosoever has control over their operation.
Because of this feeling of insecurity the constituent parts of the city have polarised into tribal colours of their Rugby League teams, the red and white of Hull Kingston Rovers from the east and the black and white of Hull FC from the west. The fortunes of the teams, like the demilitarised zone represented by the river, have ebbed and flowed, stagnated, become muddied and mired and on increasingly rare occasions been in full unstoppable flood and so, in following have the loyal, respective supporters in their sense of status, achivement and pride.
The display of team colours is everywhere. Weekend and work apparel is strongly influenced by the latest release of replica , authentic sponsored jerseys to such a extent that the shopping streets of Hull can resemble a solid block of red/white and black/white moving effortlessly and seamlessly about their business.
Commercialism is a fact of life for the sport with frequent changes of the naming of the League and in recent years the introduction of teams from the south of England, having been a predominantly northern working class game and France.
Embroidery and iron on transfer business must be booming on the basis of the proportion of the high tech sports fabric under some form of logo. Not just a chest emblazoned main sponsor anymore but sleeves, cuffs, epaulettes, collars, shoulder yoke and shirt tail as well as any spare gaps in between which have potential for overprinting with your owm name, nickname or dedication. The wardrobes of loyal supporters must be expansive to accommodate year on year changes to the strip and also variations within each season for home games, away games, sunday and friday matches and for one-off competitions such as Finals. This latter event has been regrettably absent from the honours roll of both our city teams for many years.
Merchandise is also extensive and inventive. New born babies will be first swaddled in team colours and returned home triumphantly branded in what will be a life-long, periodically euphoric but mainly stressful and disappointing obsession. Casual wear for the ladies includes boob tubes, halter tops, vests and a full soft sheen leisure or jogging suit in rich velour.
There are many individual and customised attestations to the team you support. House frontages afford a great opportunity for a display of colours on woodwork and rainwater fittings, door and window frames, where not in bright white UPVC, and with flags and banners acting as curtains and blinds. The small oval glazed pane of a plastic front door can sustain a stained glass and leaded caricature of a league player in full flight with ball in play.
My late father in law, having installed a neutral and functionally white kitchen in a house he was working on returned the following day to fit the handles only to find it had been re-painted in the gawdy post box red of Hull Kingston Rovers. The tribal basis does not however prohibit or stifle mobility amongst the population of the city. It may be necessary to cross the divide for employment or even a mixed marriage. My wife, from the east side of the city and a HKR fan has had to endure many years of residence on the western side and on a daily basis expresses a desire to return to the homeland.
I am of course not a native of these parts and feel able, therefore , to stand back and review the situation but in no way can I appreciate the true depth of emotions that are involved in supporting not just a team but a heritage and ethos across what really is an unbridgeable divide.
Friday, 11 May 2012
Swiss Miss
I spent a lot of time in a place called Little Switzerland.
The name conjurs up all sorts of wonderful vistas, sparklingly clean air, towering snow capped peaks above neatly laid out handerkerchief meadows strewn with daisies, bracing hillside walks above steeply sided valleys and twinkling watercourses cavorting in white water like a meringue topping.
Unfortunately my version was little more than a large hole formed from mineral workings which periodically smelt rank and fetid, regularly flooded, often suffered from landslip to the eroded precipices and I hold personally to blame for the death of our Pointer dog, Toffy as the most likely source of the Weils disease that cut her short in her prime years.
Whoever first named that pit to allude to the beauty and majesty of an Alpine paradise must have not travelled very widely or was drunk at the time. The only possible link between the Swiss nation and the hole in the ground is loose and tenuous in that on the rare occasion that sunlight penetrates the swamp gas and algae infused hazy mist the residual chalk face could possibly and with squinty eyes resemble, perhaps, a light covering of snow, maybe.
I have seen photographs of the place in its heyday as a quarry in the latter part of the 1800's. Considerable activity from men and machines with the raw chalk being dug, chipped, blasted and coerced from its prehistoric resting place and then run out onto the bank of the River Humber where barges and shallow draught vessels waited at wooden quays to be loaded.
The black, bitumenous tower of a windmill remains as a sole surviving structure of what was a small community of houses and works. The operations on the site will have ceased sometime in the early part of the twentieth century and with many subsequent decades of the reclamation by nature back to a wilderness. In less sensitive locations, being close to the river and upwind of a town the large void will have formed a good resource for landfill for a few years at least and it's sister quarry within half a mile inland was commandered by the Council for such a purpose.
A few events transpired to salvage the quarry.
The Humber Bridge was built and the quarry , overlooking the structure, was ideally placed for transformation into a Visitor Centre with childrens play area and a large landscaped bowl shaped public park. The task to make the place hospitable was on a large scale. The only level access point was from the river bank and obstacles included a main line railway and, at that time, a dual carriageway forming the principal approach to Hull from the west. Tunnels were formed in smooth dressed concrete although now heavily disguised in what passes for urbanised art of dubious origin and showing that biology and human anatomy have not been taught in our local schools for some years.
Volunteers and possibly those on community service for urban art atrocities dug into the floor of the quarry and carved out paths and steps, laid down walkways in railway sleepers and cleared a good few tons of litter and deposited waste as a consequence of a free for all fly tipping practice.
The lowest parts were shaped into lagoons and pools but on chalk they invariably filled up and emptied at will. The startling green colour of the stagnant water did serve to warn off those intent on paddling but dogs and even a few skinny dippers could be at first heard and then seen splashing around in the murky shallows.
In the twilight hours and beyond the park was taken over by the youth wing of the society of Arsonists with the charring and collapse of many of the wooden bench seats, picnic tables, sculpture carvings and playground apparatus.
Still, in reasonable daylight and dry conditions it was a regular destination of choice for our young family with buggies, bikes and dog sled team. It took a good 1 mile uphill slog to get there from the house but we would spend many an hour circling the base of the cliffs, dragging sticks, skimming and throwing pebbles into the gaseous flouresecent mire and rescuing the dogs from face offs or worse with those squat ugly breeds and their killer mongrels. For our education there were information points through the park with pictures of dinosaurs, fossils and other illustrations of the local history aspects. It appears that the minerals in the quarry had origins in the carcasses of small crustaceans which had accumulated in the bed of a tropical sea some considerable millenia ago. Whosoever had dumped them in the quarry should have been prosecuted in my opinion.
It was also a place to take sunday visitors and with favourable weather it could be quite a pleasant family and social experience. The children, when small, enjoyed clambouring up the banks and undulations. A shortcut we regularly took skirted the contours up the inner eastern face and over a few years we established a well worn path inspite of the treacherously loose ground, sheer drops and protruding and snaking tree roots that could easily catch out the inattentive. As with most regular haunts they do have only a finite attraction and use and we gradually drifted away from Little Switzerland in favour of lazer quest, bowling and hanging about in shopping malls which the children, now much older, also enjoyed.
A lasting memory is of Toffy the Pointer in her element chasing down a rabbit or squirrel but always and thankfully in vain. Her activities will have been watched by a cautious rat in a hole before its ultimate contribution to her untimely demise.
The name conjurs up all sorts of wonderful vistas, sparklingly clean air, towering snow capped peaks above neatly laid out handerkerchief meadows strewn with daisies, bracing hillside walks above steeply sided valleys and twinkling watercourses cavorting in white water like a meringue topping.
Unfortunately my version was little more than a large hole formed from mineral workings which periodically smelt rank and fetid, regularly flooded, often suffered from landslip to the eroded precipices and I hold personally to blame for the death of our Pointer dog, Toffy as the most likely source of the Weils disease that cut her short in her prime years.
Whoever first named that pit to allude to the beauty and majesty of an Alpine paradise must have not travelled very widely or was drunk at the time. The only possible link between the Swiss nation and the hole in the ground is loose and tenuous in that on the rare occasion that sunlight penetrates the swamp gas and algae infused hazy mist the residual chalk face could possibly and with squinty eyes resemble, perhaps, a light covering of snow, maybe.
I have seen photographs of the place in its heyday as a quarry in the latter part of the 1800's. Considerable activity from men and machines with the raw chalk being dug, chipped, blasted and coerced from its prehistoric resting place and then run out onto the bank of the River Humber where barges and shallow draught vessels waited at wooden quays to be loaded.
The black, bitumenous tower of a windmill remains as a sole surviving structure of what was a small community of houses and works. The operations on the site will have ceased sometime in the early part of the twentieth century and with many subsequent decades of the reclamation by nature back to a wilderness. In less sensitive locations, being close to the river and upwind of a town the large void will have formed a good resource for landfill for a few years at least and it's sister quarry within half a mile inland was commandered by the Council for such a purpose.
A few events transpired to salvage the quarry.
The Humber Bridge was built and the quarry , overlooking the structure, was ideally placed for transformation into a Visitor Centre with childrens play area and a large landscaped bowl shaped public park. The task to make the place hospitable was on a large scale. The only level access point was from the river bank and obstacles included a main line railway and, at that time, a dual carriageway forming the principal approach to Hull from the west. Tunnels were formed in smooth dressed concrete although now heavily disguised in what passes for urbanised art of dubious origin and showing that biology and human anatomy have not been taught in our local schools for some years.
Volunteers and possibly those on community service for urban art atrocities dug into the floor of the quarry and carved out paths and steps, laid down walkways in railway sleepers and cleared a good few tons of litter and deposited waste as a consequence of a free for all fly tipping practice.
The lowest parts were shaped into lagoons and pools but on chalk they invariably filled up and emptied at will. The startling green colour of the stagnant water did serve to warn off those intent on paddling but dogs and even a few skinny dippers could be at first heard and then seen splashing around in the murky shallows.
In the twilight hours and beyond the park was taken over by the youth wing of the society of Arsonists with the charring and collapse of many of the wooden bench seats, picnic tables, sculpture carvings and playground apparatus.
Still, in reasonable daylight and dry conditions it was a regular destination of choice for our young family with buggies, bikes and dog sled team. It took a good 1 mile uphill slog to get there from the house but we would spend many an hour circling the base of the cliffs, dragging sticks, skimming and throwing pebbles into the gaseous flouresecent mire and rescuing the dogs from face offs or worse with those squat ugly breeds and their killer mongrels. For our education there were information points through the park with pictures of dinosaurs, fossils and other illustrations of the local history aspects. It appears that the minerals in the quarry had origins in the carcasses of small crustaceans which had accumulated in the bed of a tropical sea some considerable millenia ago. Whosoever had dumped them in the quarry should have been prosecuted in my opinion.
It was also a place to take sunday visitors and with favourable weather it could be quite a pleasant family and social experience. The children, when small, enjoyed clambouring up the banks and undulations. A shortcut we regularly took skirted the contours up the inner eastern face and over a few years we established a well worn path inspite of the treacherously loose ground, sheer drops and protruding and snaking tree roots that could easily catch out the inattentive. As with most regular haunts they do have only a finite attraction and use and we gradually drifted away from Little Switzerland in favour of lazer quest, bowling and hanging about in shopping malls which the children, now much older, also enjoyed.
A lasting memory is of Toffy the Pointer in her element chasing down a rabbit or squirrel but always and thankfully in vain. Her activities will have been watched by a cautious rat in a hole before its ultimate contribution to her untimely demise.
Thursday, 10 May 2012
Natural Selection
I am aware that what passes for Sports in our schools is now little more than larger scale soft play. Over the last three decades the competitive element of school sports has been whittled and eroded away in the interests of equality, liberalism, laziness and the culture of cotton wool wrapped health and safety.
What better way to avoid claims for injury or worse by not letting the little darlings do or participate in anything involving a bat and ball, or with any prospect or possibility of contact with another human being.
I am sorry but life is a contact sport from day one and to give the impression to our youngsters that competition is not necessary is just a case of selling them one huge fat lie that will not serve them any use in their subsequent adult lives.
I find it interesting that the Public School system in the UK still maintain a rough, tough and bloody sports regime and wth their graduates going on to dominate positions of authority in government, industry and commerce. Meanwhile, those who have endured a non-sports upbringing are pliable, manageable and very capable of being controlled and manipulated by those of a stronger competitive mentality.
My own secondary schooling and in particular the sports we partook of very much formed part of the process of natural selection.
Take, for example, the activity of the Long Jump. The long and narrow rectangle of the run-up and sandpit was, at our school, on the far side of the playing field, close and paralell to the fence line with private houses and under willow trees. The long jump only came into the curriculum in the summer term and its actual use could be measured in terms of a few hours only in that period. For the rest of the academic year the sandpit served the neighbourhood cats as a large litter tray or as a dumping ground for lawn and hedge trimmings from the adjoining houses. The sandpit was also handy for the under-age smokers as an ash tray and the boozers as somewhere to bury and conceal cans and bottles, intact or sharp jagged edged. Under such conditions the fear of i) Tripping on a run up, ii) Pulling a muscle iii) Twisting an ankle, paled into insignificance compared with the distinct possibility of contracting hepatitis, blood poisoning, actually bleeding to death or swallowing most of the large cloudlike haze of flies that favoured the sandpit for its primordial environment.
We were also allowed free and usually unsupervised access to classical sporting weaponry including the steel javelin, leather clad discus and cannon ball dimension shot put.
There was a briefing way back in the first year of secondary school about not running up to retrieve a thrown javelin as this could lead to a painful case of being impaled through which your sports kit could become damaged and with some implications amongst parents should this occur. The etiquette of throwing in strict turn was also covered and well away from the running track or where the fatter kids would congregate after dropping out of the 800 metres heats. This was common sense after all but did not make any allowance for the one pupil in our class, a Traveller by descent, who we suspected was actually about 16 years old in a class of 13 year olds . He was catching up on a sketchy educational background. He had amazed his peers upon his arrival in school by being sufficiently tall enough to pee out of the window above the urinals in the boys cloakroom, a feat much copied by subsequent pupil intakes but never actually achieved. His magnificent although not altogether conventional javelin throw caught the fatter kids by surprise and scattered them with some sprightliness from what they had been told and understood as the safe zone on the playing field.
The discus was a strange concept, a bit like an ancient frisbee. This sport did discriminate against those in our year who had smaller, feminine hands but we had our suspicions anyway at an early stage.
Shot Put was a chance to show off love bites on the neck from scuffles with the High School Girls but again fresh ones from the night before or even lunch time liaisons did introduce the potential for transmission of blood related maladies.
Pole Vault was available but without a mattress to land on it was not that popular. Only one pupil in our year embraced that discipline from the first year until school leaving age and had accumulated a nice cabinet full of certificates and awards for his, I must say frankly, stupidity and reckless self-endangerment.
Climatic conditions did not really impact on our being marched out onto the field for sports lessons. Exceptions being when the field was flooded, snowbound or cloaked in fog or on that one occasion, smoke, when someone set fire to the groundsmans shed. The indoor Gymnasium had similar torture equipment such as the vaulting horse( ex- Prisoner of War surplus), wall bars and climbing ropes. The sensation on legs and groin of using the ropes was quite an attraction for adolescent boys but with,again, some scope for the spreading of contagious conditions.
Most of us survived the competition and hazards of school sports with little or no mental or tissue damage. I am strongly of the viewpoint that through such activities we became well prepared for that ruthless and heartless, selfish and debilitating assault course that is everyday adult life.
What better way to avoid claims for injury or worse by not letting the little darlings do or participate in anything involving a bat and ball, or with any prospect or possibility of contact with another human being.
I am sorry but life is a contact sport from day one and to give the impression to our youngsters that competition is not necessary is just a case of selling them one huge fat lie that will not serve them any use in their subsequent adult lives.
I find it interesting that the Public School system in the UK still maintain a rough, tough and bloody sports regime and wth their graduates going on to dominate positions of authority in government, industry and commerce. Meanwhile, those who have endured a non-sports upbringing are pliable, manageable and very capable of being controlled and manipulated by those of a stronger competitive mentality.
My own secondary schooling and in particular the sports we partook of very much formed part of the process of natural selection.
Take, for example, the activity of the Long Jump. The long and narrow rectangle of the run-up and sandpit was, at our school, on the far side of the playing field, close and paralell to the fence line with private houses and under willow trees. The long jump only came into the curriculum in the summer term and its actual use could be measured in terms of a few hours only in that period. For the rest of the academic year the sandpit served the neighbourhood cats as a large litter tray or as a dumping ground for lawn and hedge trimmings from the adjoining houses. The sandpit was also handy for the under-age smokers as an ash tray and the boozers as somewhere to bury and conceal cans and bottles, intact or sharp jagged edged. Under such conditions the fear of i) Tripping on a run up, ii) Pulling a muscle iii) Twisting an ankle, paled into insignificance compared with the distinct possibility of contracting hepatitis, blood poisoning, actually bleeding to death or swallowing most of the large cloudlike haze of flies that favoured the sandpit for its primordial environment.
We were also allowed free and usually unsupervised access to classical sporting weaponry including the steel javelin, leather clad discus and cannon ball dimension shot put.
There was a briefing way back in the first year of secondary school about not running up to retrieve a thrown javelin as this could lead to a painful case of being impaled through which your sports kit could become damaged and with some implications amongst parents should this occur. The etiquette of throwing in strict turn was also covered and well away from the running track or where the fatter kids would congregate after dropping out of the 800 metres heats. This was common sense after all but did not make any allowance for the one pupil in our class, a Traveller by descent, who we suspected was actually about 16 years old in a class of 13 year olds . He was catching up on a sketchy educational background. He had amazed his peers upon his arrival in school by being sufficiently tall enough to pee out of the window above the urinals in the boys cloakroom, a feat much copied by subsequent pupil intakes but never actually achieved. His magnificent although not altogether conventional javelin throw caught the fatter kids by surprise and scattered them with some sprightliness from what they had been told and understood as the safe zone on the playing field.
The discus was a strange concept, a bit like an ancient frisbee. This sport did discriminate against those in our year who had smaller, feminine hands but we had our suspicions anyway at an early stage.
Shot Put was a chance to show off love bites on the neck from scuffles with the High School Girls but again fresh ones from the night before or even lunch time liaisons did introduce the potential for transmission of blood related maladies.
Pole Vault was available but without a mattress to land on it was not that popular. Only one pupil in our year embraced that discipline from the first year until school leaving age and had accumulated a nice cabinet full of certificates and awards for his, I must say frankly, stupidity and reckless self-endangerment.
Climatic conditions did not really impact on our being marched out onto the field for sports lessons. Exceptions being when the field was flooded, snowbound or cloaked in fog or on that one occasion, smoke, when someone set fire to the groundsmans shed. The indoor Gymnasium had similar torture equipment such as the vaulting horse( ex- Prisoner of War surplus), wall bars and climbing ropes. The sensation on legs and groin of using the ropes was quite an attraction for adolescent boys but with,again, some scope for the spreading of contagious conditions.
Most of us survived the competition and hazards of school sports with little or no mental or tissue damage. I am strongly of the viewpoint that through such activities we became well prepared for that ruthless and heartless, selfish and debilitating assault course that is everyday adult life.
Wednesday, 9 May 2012
Beastie Boy
In the 1970's I tried a few things in order to supplement my pocket money
Coming from a large family of 5 money absorbing children and with a Bank Manager father we operated on a strictly within means basis which was a sound grounding for later years.I have not, however, really applied the theory from my early years lessons in frugality and economy. My parents were fair in their distribution of pocket money and for every year of our age we children got 1p decimal a week. At the age of 15 I found that this allowance never went very far especially as my Speed and Power Magazine cost 10p per month and I never had the sense to save over the four weeks between issues. In addition I liked fizz bomb sweets and my absolute and still current favourite of sherbert fountains. It is little wonder that my interest in smoking was short lived and I stopped that pastime at the age of 12 fearing bankruptcy or withdrawal of finance from the IMF- Income for my Fags.
I did the usual paper delivery round for the newsagent shop opposite the Grammar School. In summer this was a delight with fresh air and a lot of cycling. My technique of scooting along on my bike between house gates on one pedal laden down with a sack of weighty morning tabloids soon cause chronic metal fatigue to the cranks of the pedals and their replacement devastated any profit from that job.
Potato picking sounded good in theory and with the promise of a kingly sum of £15 for a weeks work I promptly signed up. My mercenary attitude backfired big style as I had a round trip of 6 miles to reach the spud field and I had to buy packed lunch and liquids to offset premature death from such arduous work. I had not really thought through the physical demands of harvesting a potato, let alone how many of them could actually be found in a 5 acre field .The tractor had a rear mounted arm attachment that spun out the despised vegetable and a group of us schoolkids had to follow and quickly hand pick and fill up wire mesh baskets before tipping the contents into a nearby trailer. The field was wedge shaped and the first two days were totally demoralising and back breaking in that we were working on the longest rows and had no actual sense of real progress. By days three, four and five we were up and down the shorter furrow lengths at rapid speed and soon completed that form of employment. On the same agricultural theme I also spent a week picking out the wild oats and weeds as part of a crop yield study. Perhaps you could say I was outstanding in that particular field.
I also participated regularly as a bush beater for a large corporate shooting business. This involved wearing thick waterproof clothing all day whilst walking through dripping wet fields of Kale and Sugar Beet a-whooping and a-hollering and smacking the ground and available ground cover with a stout stick in order to startle pheasants, partridge, woodcock and pigeon to almost certain death under a barrage of lead shot from a front line of posh people out for the day in order to claim the highest body count of small animals. There was no more an example of the social divide than between a shooting party and the minions of the bush beaters. I often thought ,with head down against stray lead shot fragments in a head on beat towards the guns,that if one of us beaters actually died from inflicted wounds in these circumstances we would still be retrieved by the trained dogs and hung up for a few days to mature before families were informed.
The afternoon sessions were the most nerve wracking as the shooters had just partaken of a generous, mostly liquid lunch and could not be relied upon to fire straight or even differentiate between man and beast at an alcohol induced squinting range. The larger animals of the fields and forests were wise to the approach of humans and were rarely ever seen in a perilous position between beaters and guns. I did enjoy the revenge of a huge Hare which, having been shot and then disrespectfully thrown over the proud shoulders of a waxed jacketed businessman for a photo opportunity, promptly evacuated its bowels all over the hapless individual. The stench over the course of the day was warning enough of the position of the guns. The shooting season was mostly in the damp and misty early mornings of the spring before any real damage could be done to the crops by waves of beater infantry. My income from this hazardous work was £6 for a full day.
I now acknowledge that I participated in some barbarous, cruel and, frankly, painful activities in my attempts to supplement my pocket money but this has made me appreciate to this day the value of a strong work ethic in life. If there was a surplus of kill from the shooting party then this was distributed like and in the manner of charity to the scruffy and cold air induced ruddy faced beater brigade. We bowed and grovelled in thanks which the executive ladder climbers lapped up before alighting in their Range Rovers and Jags.
Any pheasant that I presented at home was hung up in the shed for a few days and always ended up being buried in the garden as no-one had the desire to pluck, gut and dress the fabulously flashy male of the species. I did reserve one or two of the fancy tail feathers to adorn my rather faded and sweat stained bush hat to give my beating activities some credibility. I made a point of taking off the hat for the post-lunchtime shooting drives mindful that, to the half cut owner of a double barrelled shot-gun , I could appear like a giant freakish game bird and fair game for that.
(Yeah,yeah, another recycled blog. No I have not got writers block, No I am not trying to do too much, yes I have had another busy day ......apologies OK, whatever LOL)
Coming from a large family of 5 money absorbing children and with a Bank Manager father we operated on a strictly within means basis which was a sound grounding for later years.I have not, however, really applied the theory from my early years lessons in frugality and economy. My parents were fair in their distribution of pocket money and for every year of our age we children got 1p decimal a week. At the age of 15 I found that this allowance never went very far especially as my Speed and Power Magazine cost 10p per month and I never had the sense to save over the four weeks between issues. In addition I liked fizz bomb sweets and my absolute and still current favourite of sherbert fountains. It is little wonder that my interest in smoking was short lived and I stopped that pastime at the age of 12 fearing bankruptcy or withdrawal of finance from the IMF- Income for my Fags.
I did the usual paper delivery round for the newsagent shop opposite the Grammar School. In summer this was a delight with fresh air and a lot of cycling. My technique of scooting along on my bike between house gates on one pedal laden down with a sack of weighty morning tabloids soon cause chronic metal fatigue to the cranks of the pedals and their replacement devastated any profit from that job.
Potato picking sounded good in theory and with the promise of a kingly sum of £15 for a weeks work I promptly signed up. My mercenary attitude backfired big style as I had a round trip of 6 miles to reach the spud field and I had to buy packed lunch and liquids to offset premature death from such arduous work. I had not really thought through the physical demands of harvesting a potato, let alone how many of them could actually be found in a 5 acre field .The tractor had a rear mounted arm attachment that spun out the despised vegetable and a group of us schoolkids had to follow and quickly hand pick and fill up wire mesh baskets before tipping the contents into a nearby trailer. The field was wedge shaped and the first two days were totally demoralising and back breaking in that we were working on the longest rows and had no actual sense of real progress. By days three, four and five we were up and down the shorter furrow lengths at rapid speed and soon completed that form of employment. On the same agricultural theme I also spent a week picking out the wild oats and weeds as part of a crop yield study. Perhaps you could say I was outstanding in that particular field.
I also participated regularly as a bush beater for a large corporate shooting business. This involved wearing thick waterproof clothing all day whilst walking through dripping wet fields of Kale and Sugar Beet a-whooping and a-hollering and smacking the ground and available ground cover with a stout stick in order to startle pheasants, partridge, woodcock and pigeon to almost certain death under a barrage of lead shot from a front line of posh people out for the day in order to claim the highest body count of small animals. There was no more an example of the social divide than between a shooting party and the minions of the bush beaters. I often thought ,with head down against stray lead shot fragments in a head on beat towards the guns,that if one of us beaters actually died from inflicted wounds in these circumstances we would still be retrieved by the trained dogs and hung up for a few days to mature before families were informed.
The afternoon sessions were the most nerve wracking as the shooters had just partaken of a generous, mostly liquid lunch and could not be relied upon to fire straight or even differentiate between man and beast at an alcohol induced squinting range. The larger animals of the fields and forests were wise to the approach of humans and were rarely ever seen in a perilous position between beaters and guns. I did enjoy the revenge of a huge Hare which, having been shot and then disrespectfully thrown over the proud shoulders of a waxed jacketed businessman for a photo opportunity, promptly evacuated its bowels all over the hapless individual. The stench over the course of the day was warning enough of the position of the guns. The shooting season was mostly in the damp and misty early mornings of the spring before any real damage could be done to the crops by waves of beater infantry. My income from this hazardous work was £6 for a full day.
I now acknowledge that I participated in some barbarous, cruel and, frankly, painful activities in my attempts to supplement my pocket money but this has made me appreciate to this day the value of a strong work ethic in life. If there was a surplus of kill from the shooting party then this was distributed like and in the manner of charity to the scruffy and cold air induced ruddy faced beater brigade. We bowed and grovelled in thanks which the executive ladder climbers lapped up before alighting in their Range Rovers and Jags.
Any pheasant that I presented at home was hung up in the shed for a few days and always ended up being buried in the garden as no-one had the desire to pluck, gut and dress the fabulously flashy male of the species. I did reserve one or two of the fancy tail feathers to adorn my rather faded and sweat stained bush hat to give my beating activities some credibility. I made a point of taking off the hat for the post-lunchtime shooting drives mindful that, to the half cut owner of a double barrelled shot-gun , I could appear like a giant freakish game bird and fair game for that.
(Yeah,yeah, another recycled blog. No I have not got writers block, No I am not trying to do too much, yes I have had another busy day ......apologies OK, whatever LOL)
Tuesday, 8 May 2012
Home for Christmas 2012- possibly......
I think that I am still involved in a professional role in the periodic supervision of a Cube House being built in Hull. I am not sure because to my knowledge it is not yet finished after 7 years.
This is a pure bred example, and not the shameful lip service to the genre which is starting to emerge in the brochures of the mass volume, low quality, speculative builders. Their versions have all the external appearance of a Cube House but merely as cladding to a very ordinary design and construction format. It is as though the Corporate Suits all got a copy of Grand Designs as a Christmas present and went berserk taking on board the stylish bits but deliberately ignoring the essential substance.
Hence, you may see amongst the characterless and bleak acres of housing estates called such derivative names as Shipman Road (no Doctors have purchased there), Blackwater Way (actually flooded in 2007) and Wankley Dell (made that one up), the emergence of coloured composite panels, ceramic tile elevational treatments, excessive square metres of machine finished planking and some oddly angled masonry or fibre glass attachments. The sad thing is that these crude and insulting embellishments are being fully accepted and enthused about by the house buying public, or at least those who have the sizeable deposit needed to pass through into the Mortgage Lounge of the financiers to meet their colleague representative advisory person (CRAP) and be sold not just a mortgage but break-down cover, a second hand meerkat toy and entry into a bi-annual prize draw.
The real Cube House I mention was started in 2005 but is not yet (nearly) ready for first occupation in 2012. The timescale involved is not, get lost Kevin McCleod, due to complex structural or planning issues but because the Architect, Builder, Project Manager, Funder, Navvy, Powder monkey and Tea Boy are all the same person and at the same time holding down a day job.
By definition the construction has taken place on the occasional evening during the week and with a more concentrated effort at weekends, during Bank Holidays and any general vacation entitlements. Add to these constraints a strong sense of authenticity and respect for the Cube House and great attention to detail and you have, dah, dah, dah . daaar, a 7 year labour of love so far.
My first site visit was at the steelwork stage all those years ago. The bright red oxide finish was a bit overpowering as well as the sheer size and scale of the skeletal frame over three equivalent storeys but yet long and narrow in dimensions. The house was located on a narrow strip of land adjacent to a cemetery . In the earliest stages of emergence out of the ground the locals and passers-by thought the structure was going to be a public convenience and even a crematorium for the internees which says a lot for the role of a bright yellow Planning Notice on a lampost or the actual validity of writing to all surrounding households to inform them of what was going to be built.
With the steelwork in place the intermediate floors were positioned and then the elevational finishes could be erected. The main south face of the house consisted entirely of glass blocks, individually sanded to combat any lethal solar magnifying effect and then mounted and reinforced in a framework. The appearance is exceptional in texture and impact. The eastern and northern elevations were fitted with a grey thermally insulated panelling and to the west, full floor to ceiling windows over the three floors.
The interior provides great flexibility as there are no loadbearing requirements. Natural light comes in a softened hue through the glass wall onto the stairways and with large glazed apertures and light wells illuminating efficiently all the accommodation. A stainless steel staircase is suspended above the ground floor and appears to float. At the front of the ground floor is the principal living area. A large open plan arrangement includes a kitchen. The space is open and airy to a full two storey height. There is a further day room behind a balcony above and with bedrooms and bathrooms beyond and above.
Internal floor area at over 2000 square feet is more than double that available for the faux versions on a non-descript housing estate. I have had to advise and undertake an exercise in calculating the cost to build and ultimate value of the Cube House but this transcends all normal conventions.
What price for 7 years of labour not to mention the thinking time during 7 years worth of waking hours?
What price for hundreds of journeys to and from the site, builders merchants and maintaining a lifestyle in current residence?
What price for missing out on time with family over 7 years?
It is not about price at all , it is about the underlying values.
( a previous blog which was entitled The Cube House but now a bit updated from october 2011- I have had a busy day)
This is a pure bred example, and not the shameful lip service to the genre which is starting to emerge in the brochures of the mass volume, low quality, speculative builders. Their versions have all the external appearance of a Cube House but merely as cladding to a very ordinary design and construction format. It is as though the Corporate Suits all got a copy of Grand Designs as a Christmas present and went berserk taking on board the stylish bits but deliberately ignoring the essential substance.
Hence, you may see amongst the characterless and bleak acres of housing estates called such derivative names as Shipman Road (no Doctors have purchased there), Blackwater Way (actually flooded in 2007) and Wankley Dell (made that one up), the emergence of coloured composite panels, ceramic tile elevational treatments, excessive square metres of machine finished planking and some oddly angled masonry or fibre glass attachments. The sad thing is that these crude and insulting embellishments are being fully accepted and enthused about by the house buying public, or at least those who have the sizeable deposit needed to pass through into the Mortgage Lounge of the financiers to meet their colleague representative advisory person (CRAP) and be sold not just a mortgage but break-down cover, a second hand meerkat toy and entry into a bi-annual prize draw.
The real Cube House I mention was started in 2005 but is not yet (nearly) ready for first occupation in 2012. The timescale involved is not, get lost Kevin McCleod, due to complex structural or planning issues but because the Architect, Builder, Project Manager, Funder, Navvy, Powder monkey and Tea Boy are all the same person and at the same time holding down a day job.
By definition the construction has taken place on the occasional evening during the week and with a more concentrated effort at weekends, during Bank Holidays and any general vacation entitlements. Add to these constraints a strong sense of authenticity and respect for the Cube House and great attention to detail and you have, dah, dah, dah . daaar, a 7 year labour of love so far.
My first site visit was at the steelwork stage all those years ago. The bright red oxide finish was a bit overpowering as well as the sheer size and scale of the skeletal frame over three equivalent storeys but yet long and narrow in dimensions. The house was located on a narrow strip of land adjacent to a cemetery . In the earliest stages of emergence out of the ground the locals and passers-by thought the structure was going to be a public convenience and even a crematorium for the internees which says a lot for the role of a bright yellow Planning Notice on a lampost or the actual validity of writing to all surrounding households to inform them of what was going to be built.
With the steelwork in place the intermediate floors were positioned and then the elevational finishes could be erected. The main south face of the house consisted entirely of glass blocks, individually sanded to combat any lethal solar magnifying effect and then mounted and reinforced in a framework. The appearance is exceptional in texture and impact. The eastern and northern elevations were fitted with a grey thermally insulated panelling and to the west, full floor to ceiling windows over the three floors.
The interior provides great flexibility as there are no loadbearing requirements. Natural light comes in a softened hue through the glass wall onto the stairways and with large glazed apertures and light wells illuminating efficiently all the accommodation. A stainless steel staircase is suspended above the ground floor and appears to float. At the front of the ground floor is the principal living area. A large open plan arrangement includes a kitchen. The space is open and airy to a full two storey height. There is a further day room behind a balcony above and with bedrooms and bathrooms beyond and above.
Internal floor area at over 2000 square feet is more than double that available for the faux versions on a non-descript housing estate. I have had to advise and undertake an exercise in calculating the cost to build and ultimate value of the Cube House but this transcends all normal conventions.
What price for 7 years of labour not to mention the thinking time during 7 years worth of waking hours?
What price for hundreds of journeys to and from the site, builders merchants and maintaining a lifestyle in current residence?
What price for missing out on time with family over 7 years?
It is not about price at all , it is about the underlying values.
( a previous blog which was entitled The Cube House but now a bit updated from october 2011- I have had a busy day)
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