The Eurovision Football Contest

Yesterday I found myself watching the draw for the Champions League. To say it was soporific would be a remarkable example of understatement. Essentially, the draw is unimportant because the seeding ensures that all the best teams avoid each other. For example, Arsenal are drawn with three football clubs, each of which would get you over 3 million points at Scrabble. Despite the international nature of Arsenal no one at the club has a clue where AZ Alkmaar play their football - and I doubt many of you do either. Barcelona is scheduled to play Rubin Kazan prompting most of the players to ask why they would be playing the Prime Minister of Israel. Chelsea has to pit their wits against the mighty Apoel FC, who I understand are champions of an Armish one legged hopping league established in an island 60 miles north east of the Faroe Islands in 1642. Apparently a 60 foot lugger packed to the gunnels with bearded blokes married to their sisters washed up on the beach and the first thing they did was put down some jumpers and have a kick about. It’s the only football team in the world staffed entirely by one family.

The contrivance of it all bought to mind the Eurovision Song Contest. At least when we had Terry Wogan we could jointly enjoy the mirth he created by pointing out Greece constantly give Turkey ‘nil point’ and all the Baltic states vote for Russia in case they cut the oil supplies off.

The trouble with both of these competitions is we pretty much know what the outcome will be.

But I’ve come up with an idea to shake it up a bit – why not inject some Eurovision into the Champions League. Confused? Don’t be, its really very simple. In the future, instead of the boring league systems from which we already know the winners lets put in a singing round and get Europe to vote on it. I’m still working out the fine detail but this is how I envisage it:

After each game, irrespective of the result, five players from each team have to knock out a song in the centre circle. Fans from around Europe then vote on the performance. The numbers of votes are then added to score. So, a typical scoreline of say, 1-0 might become, after the singing round, 10,000,001 – 11,000,643.

This will add some much needed unpredictability. Clubs will have to adapt by recruiting singers into the squad. Substitutions will turn very tactical, in that you might see Manchester City (if they ever get into a European competition), with 10 minutes to go, replace their entire midfield with Oasis.

This idea can easily be adapted for the World Cup too, perhaps by replacing penalty shoot-outs with a ‘sing off.’ In a twist I’d insist that each team has to perform music from their country. We’d never lose a penalty shoot out again. Who is Germany going to put up against The Arctic Monkeys? Kraftwerk? Please….

France wouldn’t win a thing either because all they’ve got is Edith Piaf and she sounds like a grandmother gurgling without her teeth in. Italy would be out of the running now that Pavarotti’s gone and Nana Mouskouri isn’t going to trouble anyone outside of Kos is she? I can’t see how we’d lose, although some of the smaller nations might sneak up on us. Don’t forget, the Irish have got Daniel O’Donnell.

Now I come to think of it, why not apply it to politics? Susan Boyle could dislodge Gordon Brown and bring in a new law forcing all women to grow moustaches.

The opportunities are endless. I really think I’m onto something here, but it won’t get anywhere. Why? Well, I don’t want to make a song and dance about it do I?...

Irritable or sleepy?

Obviously the most irritating thing about insomnia is that it happens at night. Although it beggars the question: can people who work night shifts get a daylight version of it?

That could be quite unsettling. How would we know they have insomnia? For all intents and purposes they will be awake in a world of people, who are, well, awake. The usual insomnia symptoms will simply be lost. Take irritability. Irritability is a constant companion of insomniacs, but then it is in most shop assistants. So, are we to assume everyone in JJB Sports is suffering from daylight insomnia?

It’s the sort of vexing question that plagues me. Especially when I can’t sleep. Not that I had any trouble dropping off to sleep. In fact you could stand me upside down in a tub of wasps and I’d still fall asleep. No, my trouble is that, occasionally, usually around 1.33am, my brain jams itself into the ‘on’ position and refuses to shut down.

Rather than lull me back to a healthy state of repose it opens up my life’s photo album and bores me to death with memories I never knew I had – like visits to my grandmother, the last of which must have been all of 40 years ago. My brain tabulates a scene that offers more questions than answers. Why is she wearing a tabard? Why can I remember her smell (musty cardigan) and not how she looked? Did she live alone or with my dad’s sister? Who is my dad’s sister, because I don’t remember him having one? And so it goes on.

When I studied creative writing my tutor suggested keeping a notebook by the bed for such occasions so that I might use the material in some of my work. I tried it a couple of times but by the time I’d clicked the pen and opened the book my thoughts had returned to more mundane things, like, what time is it? That’s the other thing about insomnia: once you stop lying there in the dark and attempt to get up the memories disappear, like smoke up a vent. It’s very irritating, which sort of brings me back to the beginning.

Lots of bustle outside my window now, the rushing hour will be in full swing soon, and I’ve just realised I’ve been awake all night.

Might go to JJB sports later for some communal grouchiness…

What's the time?

Here’s something to ponder: why do time management courses take so long? I attended one once that lasted 3 days. If they’d applied some of the techniques they were teaching me they could’ve fitted it into 2, probably 1 ½. But the bigger question is, why be trained in time management anyway?

The obsession with time is a British thing. It’s not the same in other countries. In Libya time is simply a concept: Libyans would consider the idea of managing it more fanciful than turning the Sahara into a giant egg timer. In Oman working hours are 7am until midday, 4 hours for lunch then 4pm until 6pm. In reality the 4 – 6 shift is merely used for socialising. It’s the Muslim State’s version of the cocktail hour.

They have no time, if you’ll excuse the pun, for time management in Asia either. Quite simply, if it’s daylight it’s work, if it’s dark it’s sleep. What’s the point in trying to manage that?

You might be forgiven for thinking that the laissez faire attitude towards time is a geographical thing. As soon as you step into France, and by varying degrees, it escalates the further east you travel. But, you’d be wrong. In fact, if you look in the opposite direction you’ll find a nation that think clocks are merely pieces of furniture – the Irish.

How do I know this? Well, lets look at my friend Nomis who, rather helpfully, married an Irish lady called Lynda so that I could use the event to highlight my point. After a whirlwind romance lasting 17 years they rather impetuously decided to get married last Sunday – naturally Lynda was 20 minutes late for the ceremony.

But, she was only 20 minutes late on the English side of the chapel. On the Irish side she was simply beautiful. So, while we were tutting and looking at our watches, they were smiling and clicking cameras.

In Lynda’s world, time has the same qualities as an elastic band. She famously displayed this elasticity at a dinner party I attended. On this occasion she arrived over an hour late. This story doesn’t, in itself, move the issue of her time management along much, until I tell you it was her own dinner party and she was never further than 50 metres from her seat at the head of the table.

Over the years Nomis has developed a Lynda proof time management system.

He’s taken to wearing 7 watches along his wrist, all set at different times. The one nearest his hand is set at the actual time and the one nearest his elbow runs four hours slower. The ones in between are set at various intervals that he adjusts depending on the situation. Unimportant times, such as when to meet him for lunch, for example, necessitates a wider range, than say, arrival at the wedding ceremony. As soon as she turns up he looks at the watch nearest her arrival time. In this way he is able to kid himself she is never late.

OK, this might not be an infallible system but it’s better than the time management courses I’ve been on…

This is a rant free zone... nearly

I’ve noticed, and some readers have mentioned this in passing, that I’ve recently tended towards a rant in my blog entries. The problem is twofold. One, there is a lot to rant about and two, I am a natural ranter. When people ask me if I’m a half full glass or half empty glass kind of person I tell them I’m neither. I’m the sort of person that assumes the glass is chipped and I’m going to cut my lip on it.

But, today’s entry is going to be a rant free zone. Today I’m going to pretend the glass is brimming. How am I going to do this? Simple I’m going to offer you an extract from my book – available at all good computers on my desk.

My book publishing odyssey is now taking up more time than I can afford to give it, so I have made a decision. If I don’t find a publisher by the middle of October (about a year after the actual trip) I am going to stop looking.

I will then explore two options. The first is self-publishing, but the time I need to enable me to market the book may render this option prohibitive. Alternatively I might produce my book as an audio book. I have found a site where this is moderately easy to do, and simple for readers to download.

But while I’m pondering all of this why don’t you have a read of the extract below. By way of background my hotel in Moscow was hopeless, none of the staff spoke English despite being called the Hotel Tourist (what tourist were they expecting, Muscovites from the next road?) and they were universally rude and unhelpful. This extract describes my checking out

… The same receptionist and dead man are on duty. He gets my bags and I only have to sign twice, in triplicate. I turn to the receptionist.

‘My taxi to take me to the station doesn’t arrive until 10 pm. would you mind if I waited in your lobby?

‘Eh?’

‘Lobby, can I wait in the lobby for my taxi?’

The bag man walks back over to the reception from his desk by the door.

‘Tax? He looks at the receptionist and smiles. ‘Tax.’

‘Ah, Tax.’ She smiles and reaches for the phone.

‘No, I don’t need a taxi. I have tax.’

‘Eh?’ she says. ‘Eh?’ he says.

‘Airport? She asks.

‘No, no, I don’t need a tax. I have a tax. I just want to sit in your lobby for an hour.’

And believe me if it wasn’t minus two degrees outside I wouldn’t be having this conversation at all. I’d be sitting on my bags on the pavement. Blank. I watch their brains retreat out the back door.

I pull out a piece of paper and write on it “tax 21.45.” I point to it.

‘Not tax, wait in lobby,’ I point to the couch opposite the telly, do a driving charade, and repeat ‘niet, niet, niet.’

‘Ah!’ She says and picks up the phone again.

‘Fuck me, what is the point,’ I say, reaching over to stop he phoning a taxi. The bag man grabs my hand and smiles. I assume he’s beginning to understand. This assumption is based on his eyebrows no longer being knitted together. He reaches for the phone.

‘Fuck me sideways.’ I grab his arm. I am ready to fight if this conversation goes on any longer. He removes my hand and smiles, dials a number and hands me the phone. It’s the woman I spoke to earlier who speaks English.

‘Can I help you?’ she says. Her voice is husky, she must be on at least 80 a day.

‘Yes,’ I say, trying to get my voice back from the falsetto its been operating at. I have a taxi booked to collect me at 21.45 and all I want to do is wait in the lobby until it comes.’

‘What time tax?’ she asks.

‘21.45,’ I repeat.

‘OK, pass me to administrator I will tell her book tax.’

‘No listen. Please listen. I don’t want a taxi. I already have one booked.’

‘Ah… you book tax already?’

‘Yes! And if we keep this conversation going any longer, waiting in the lobby will be irrelevant.’

‘OK, understand now, give administrator please.’ I hand the phone back to bag man. His face lights up like a jackpot on a fruit machine and he puts the phone down, waffles off something to the receptionist, probably in a dialect only understood by her and his cousins, and shows me to the couch that I’d pointed to a lifetime ago.

There is a Russian variety show on the television, a buxom wench in a red dress with overflowing boobs is presenting. She’s watching a guest who’s performing a song in English. When he finishes she walks across the stage to greet him, her bosoms are about three paces behind her so when she stops they take a while to catch up. There is a brief pause while both wait for them to wobble to a full stop.

‘Fuck you!’

‘Fuck me?’ He says back, ‘you want to fuck me?’

‘Fucking beautiful,’ she responds, and they fade out to a commercial break.

OK, as interviews go its not in the David Frost mould, but you have to admit its different. I spend an enjoyable hour watching her guests murder rock and pop classics, dressed in jumpers knitted by babushkas in the Urals. Each song is preceded with a short film showing the singers relaxing at home. You’re probably thinking cocktails by the pool, or flopped out in the private cinema with a wife with unfeasibly large, plastic bosoms. You’d be wrong. Think of the shack in Deliverance, with Nora Batty cooking soup in a kitchen that’s been cobbled together with 1970s MFI stock.

My taxi driver arrives and I bid farewell to the receptionist and the dead man. They, together with the taxi driver, watch me struggle with my luggage to his car. I take one last look at the Hotel Tourist and decide that the description of functional so proudly highlighted on their website is the most accurate piece of English I’ve encountered while staying there….

I’ve just realised my excerpt is made up of one long rant… bugger…