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Match Report: Wednesday 31st October 2007 – Stragglers v Almonds
Dear Craptain,
I have had a bit of a difficult week, especially in respect of being left alone long enough to collect my thoughts & write the usual defamatory denunciations, so I apologise for the rather Eleventh Hour of this MR. At this point I can’t tell you if it’s been worth the wait… but I can build a picture of its delay for you, if that would help? Of course it would!
It all started when I changed my day off last week from Wednesday to Friday. Actually, to be more accurate, it started Tuesday when I tried to juggle too many things & failed, which is why I changed my day off – so that I gave myself chance to catch up at work rather than let it get any worse. Now, going to work last Wednesday made it feel like a Thursday, so it follows on quite logically that Thursday felt like a Friday. I was going to be very prompt with the MR from last week & planned to write Friday evening because we had no plans. However, with my ‘Friday’ really being a Thursday that meant we were out to watch the firework display at AXA, & all ooohhh ahhhed out after that, I put off the pleasure of recounting events for you until proper Friday – which you may remember was when I had no plans. I hope due attention is being paid... there is a test at the end!
Now – & Sparky will appreciate the stresses & strains this will have inflicted – having Friday off instead meant I could go Christmas shopping with my 2 eldest daughters at The Mall. I hadn’t really been convinced of the whole idea & about 3 seconds after walking into Boots I realised I’d made a savage mistake: it was going to be full of far too many irritating people getting in my way & spoiling my fun, making it feel like a Saturday. Despite having had enough after 10 minutes, the 3 of us lasted about 1½ hours – which wasn’t bad going really, although it was all in John Lewis circling the same few stands over & over again, hoping each time something amazing would appear before my very eyes & just have to be taken home with me – before aborting our Christmas shopping plans & deciding to head for a Bella Italia lunch instead. That decision made, it took us a further 90 minutes to exit, my girls taking that long to get the ‘essentials’ they couldn’t leave without. Lunch was good, but ruined me for the rest of the day, & in that relaxed state, having happily remembered it wasn’t Saturday at all, but Friday & therefore I still had plenty of time to do the MR, I chose to lie in a stupor on the sofa & couldn’t even summon up the enthusiasm to get irritated at the endless, mindless channel hopping that is a prerequisite for not missing anything vital chez Lester.
Saturday, happily, felt like Saturday: I had a lovely autumnal walk up to my mate’s house in the morning, which negated any guilt about stuffing myself full of croissant & blueberry muffin & washing it down with tea, & an equally lovely walk back home again several happy hours later. Paying penance for my excursion I had to do a bit of cosmetic & selective tidying when I got home, lest my sister arrive for her wonderful evening’s gourmet extravaganza & rollicking entertainment only to think squatters had moved in or there’d been a freak hurricane raging through our house…, & before I knew it my MR time had once again been stolen from me. Sunday wasn’t my fault either – one unexpected visitor later, who had been quite happy outstaying his welcome until I remembered my photos taken at Westonbirt Arboretum & in North Wales & all of a sudden remembered he had to be somewhere, it was time to cook up a storm for the hungry hoards I’d carelessly invited for a roast, & after that I had to do my youngest’s homework for her – she being in such social demand she obviously didn’t have time to do it herself… so, as you can see, it has been a bit of a trial & allowances have to be made. Which brings us to today & The Last Minute, for which we all thank God regularly!!
If you’re still awake or remotely interested after that introduction, you may recall that last week’s game took place on Wednesday at Patchway Sports & Social Club against the Stragglers, who were obviously keen to get the game under way asap as the first pairs were already on when I arrived just after 8, & our Vice Craptain had been forced to put himself on with Turk! They were a well-matched pair, each scoring 21 & pulling 7 pins to give us an early lead, but Compact was wasted going on so early in the evening as we weren’t warmed up to the abusive stage yet & most of the worst offenders for that were missing anyway, but he didn’t escape entirely: told it was ‘all gravy’ as he took to the backboard for his last up, Compact endured complaints about the lumpiness of his gravy as he took a sum total of 1 pin with his last ball! He was quite happy with that as it saved him any dcuk money & enabled him to enjoy a stroke of the Pussy. Taffy made excellent use of the term ‘spawny git’ during this opening salvo when a Straggler got a spare, but we all drew great comfort from the fact he only took 1 pin with his last ball!
Next up we had Barnesy Junior & Lodge. Perhaps trying to impress everyone with their fitness regime, making out they’d hurried along to the game straight from the gym & that was why their hair was wet, BJ & Deb had their bubbles burst when Orical saw through their excuses for not bothering to get ready for skittles like the rest of us. BJ bounced his way to 16, whilst Lodge managed to break his run of single figured scores & put 20 on the board, aRCe helping him along by taking his mind off the game itself when he asked who was expecting to watch SpongeBob SquarePants at this time of night, ‘mistaking’ Lodge’s state of the art car stereo front for a TV remote control!
Our boys had pulled another 7 pins, so 14 in front Compact now decides it’s safe to play Wiggle, & this week she was ably assisted in crime by aRCe. The distinction between being ‘rubbish’ & ‘struggling’ escapes me, but when the opposition start rooting for me to do better I know it can’t be good! Sure enough that was clarified for me when Compact told me to “get off” after a particularly difficult up, deeming my skittles ‘rubbish’. Harsh. I put 15 on the board, whilst my partner aRCe managed 13. He wasn’t rubbish though, oh no – he “struggled”. I suspect Compact was more wary of reprisals from one of us than the other, but he did a grand job of trying to dig himself out of trouble by telling me the distinction between the two comes from how you expect a person to play…
Dropping 5 pins at this point wasn’t too bad, we still had 9 in hand & 3 pairs to go. Compact played Taffy & Orical next & they continued our descent, dropping a further 8 pins so that we were only 1 up after Taffy’s 7 & Orical’s 26 were chalked up. The conversation had taken a turn for the worse by now, & I think I can be forgiven for taking my eye off the game when I was faced with peRV, Orical & aRCe trying to outdo one another with tales about their respective piles – nice! I didn’t realise that size matters no matter what body part they are referring to… peRV got over excited & wanted to compare scars but was thankfully restrained from dropping his trousers: I think I could have lived quite happily without the knowledge that his first sh*t after his piles op was like giving birth, & I don’t think it has enhanced my life any hearing about other people’s experiences with enemas either.
Also quite worrying amongst this mix was Sparky’s announcement that he loved & missed the 5ive boys – I didn’t know his musical taste extended to boy bands, but it transpired that he wasn’t referring to music at all… I still have no idea what a 5boys is, but apparently Sparky used to like eating them & our own 11 boys livened up considerably at this turn in the conversation. Anyway, peRV & Hammer were tasked with clawing back some dignity (there’s irony for you… peRV in his football garb over skin tight lycra & Hammer effing & blinding on the alley), & silenced their critics by serving up a 24 & 30 respectively, pulling back 34 pins on the game in the process. It has to be said that any pair would have looked good playing against the 2 Stragglers who scored 8 & 12, but it’s a team game after all! Hammer enjoyed the full support of the team as always – he called himself a Tosser after a particularly poor shot, the team voted on it & were unanimous in their agreement.
In buoyant mode because he could smell another victory in the air, Compact chalked up Chuckle 1 & Sparky to take us to the ribbon. Sparky couldn’t believe how all the people who went on holiday last week were allowed to walk straight back into the team – always so much choice, obviously! I think he plans to have a word or 2 when you get back Reg, but there again you are going to be in a worse position than anyone else when you do finally come back to the fold!!
With no real tension to keep you on tenterhooks til the bitter end, it only remains to tell you that C1 scored 21 on this occasion, whilst Sparky put a tick in all the boxes with his unassumingly stylish 35. I couldn’t believe the lack of interest in looking at the last Averages sheet I had in my possession… was it my fault Conspiracy Pete couldn’t be ****** to update it in timely fashion so that I was still showing at the top? I don’t rate Sparky’s chances very high at seeing them next week either…
We won our game by 58 pins in the end, so another 3 points for the Almonds, who allegedly sit near the top of the League Table now. Let’s hope we can continue this winning streak next Tuesday 6/11, when we are back on our home alley against the Smelters. I wonder what funny things we can think to say about them…
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