Let's Go To The Pictures *

As I commented elsewhere, the closing 10 minutes or so of the five-a-side football on Tuesday saw me flat out, gasping for breath, hardly able to do much more running, so I resorted to kicking and barging my way into the opposition players. At this stage, I'm thinking that I'm knackered as a result of fellow players being rubbish and giving me no back up whatsover. I'm playing up front and, while the ball from keeper finds me just about every time, no-one is following up to accept the ball from me so this means I'm doing all the work in taking on the oppisition defence on my own and banging the shots in time after time after time. I score our only goal - for the second game in a row - but, in a 6-1 defeat and a ratio of shots to goals of around 20:1 it's pretty pish from me, even if ill. So, anyway, I'm not well after the game and go straight to bed and get a lot worse as the night wears on. But up I get in the morning cos I have a date with Jane in the evening and there is no fucking way in hell I'm going to miss that just cos I have a bit of a runny nose. So I struggle through work and get on the train and get off the train and get what I've been missing and desperate to receive for a week - a kiss and a hug from my perfect friend.

Off to the cinema we go to see the utterly stupendous The Proposition. Lisa and Kev have already given us a run-down of this one, but only to say that it is an amazing work of film, great acting, superb direction, brilliant script from Nick Cave, beautifully evocative score, and some stupendous cinematography.

The night is rounded off with a glass of wine at what is becoming my favourite bar and then Jane drops me off at the station. I should say at this point that I'm thinking I'm spoiling her evening somewhat by my constant coughing - but, Jane being the perfectly nice person that she is, assures me that everything is fine!

As soon as I board the train, I'm missing her. Unfortunately, my mind is soon unable to have any thoughts about anything other than bad contemporary r 'n' b music - you know, the kind that has no resemblance to proper rhythm and blues but gets that description nevertheless - as the guy sitting behind me is listening to it on his phone. Fucking wanker! At least I get the chance to have a bit of a kip when he departs at Watford.

Eventually get home and into bed and the inevitable shakes and sweating start again. I have every intention of going to work in the morning, but, as dawn arrives, I decide that, as I can hardly talk and that every swallow feels like I'm drinking broken glass and that I'm sweating like I have just run a marathon, I'm not going to work after all. This is about only the second day off with illness I've had in my three and a half years in the job but I'm still feeling bit bad that I don't go in, but rather that than spreading my germs throughout the office, eh?

So I've seen some of the Commonwealth Games (with Scotland briefly heading the medals table after their success in the swimming pool) and then some cricket.

As the day has worn on, I've felt better and better. In fact, so good do I now feel that I've just put some music on - the amazing late great Kevin Coyne (Room Full of Fools). Whether I go to work tomorrow or not is, of course, another matter ...


* Wreckless Eric