Slack Jawed Babbling

  ……the Cheltenham Festival that is. Not the kebab house. Six weeks to go. Touching distance. Tickets bought, gaff sorted, travel planned. And most importantly, ante-post bets being struck and demolished on a daily basis. That’s how I know it’s close enough to smell. It’s been the highlight of my year - something like Christmas, birthdays and holidays rolled into one big adrenaline-soaked betting frenzy - for the last 10 years. But my participation in the 2011 version has been in some doubt. I’ve shared that glorious festival decade with my erstwhile pro-punting mate Bacchy. We have ridden the highs and lows together. Confided the intimate details of rash exactas, embarrassing Lucky 15s and salvage trade-outs. We’ve eaten monumental kebabs, tackled Auntie Mona’s mountainous high teas and ridden the Queens Hotel party wave. In that time Bacchy has graduated from a £10-a-bet mug punter (like me) through escalating commitments of disposable income and finally to fully fledged, ful...

**Miserable blog alert** I hate Preston.  I did when I came here as a student to visit my mates. I did when I came last January on a one-day work-related round-trip. And I do tonight when I’m here again on a return work visit, passing under the pigeon crap covered ‘Welcome to Lancashire’ red rose above the station exit.  Only this year, I need to stay overnight.  It’s a soulless, bleak town. The wind whistles through the bland, exposed shopping and business area propelled unremittingly down the valleys from featureless surrounding hills. The buildings are unambitious, dull and utilitarian, filled with clone-town-Britain retail outlets and coffee purveyors. There is a lot of infill development conceived in the 60’s and 70’s as part of the Central Lancashire New Town, of which Preston is the hub (in a theoretical sense), granted City status in 2002.   There aren’t many cities and large towns I dislike in their entirety. Manchester, all muscular and assertive civi...

Not much horse racing in Tenerife. I don’t think there’s a bookies on the island. On the other hand, sunshine is ubiquitously available in glittering and glorious skyfulls. And I can’t recall a trip to see Mrs A’s sister (and there have been many) when Family Atkinson has appreciated the weather quite so much. Escaping ice-bound, frozen-track Britain for 10 days was pure pleasure. Sis-in-law is a tremendous host. We descended on her splendid apartment on Boxing day as wild-eyed daylight starved refugees and left after New Year as bronzed, wined and dined cats-that-got-the-cream. Thanks Auntie Sue. Don’t know who let those messy locusts in. Sue's terraaaace One of the best bits about visiting Sis-in-law at that time of the year is the chance to have a 2 nd  Christmas. So on Welsh National Day (that’s 27 th  Dec to the unititiated. Although, confusingly, it’s 8 th  Jan this season. And that’s subject a 10am inspection this morning. Still with me?), we had buck’s fizz...

Some of the most unexpected tingles of pleasure at this festive time are provided by those touching family round-up missives that occasionally drop out of Christmas cards. You know the ones: photocopied bits of A4 offering saccharine sweet glimpses into the cosy world of friends we don’t see (for some reason) very often. I love those scanned photos of grinning children on ski slopes; chuckle along with middle class ho-ho-ho-ing about busy lives; and gently scold myself at reminders to those who’ve forgotten that the family has moved (but not to worry because mail is still being forwarded from the old address). Sometimes, there’s barely a hint of self-satisfied smugness dripping from the pages, which might otherwise dampen my (clearly anticipated) eagerness to devour the updates. I was worried that facebooking might have dealt the traditional round robin fatal blow. Obviously not. So I now see that this blog provides a perfect platform to spread some Atkinson love at a time when ou...

White out. Blizzard Berkhamsted. I swear we get more snow here than can be justified for a soft, southern, home counties location. Bulbourne Valley seems to act like a beacon for the white stuff: fat, snow-laden clouds homing in on my house with unerring accuracy. Is it just me that takes the weather personally? Last year about this time I was chiselling packed snow off the pavement and road out the front. The subzero temperatures had spot welded solid sheets of ice onto the freezing ground in a near permanent seal. I distinctly remember hacking away laboriously with a shovel, trying to clear enough space for the kitchen fitter to arrive. We had a half finished new kitchen in the week before Christmas and the weather was threatening to keep it that way until after the big day. Not a pleasant prospect. This year the snows have arrived bang on cue. Another white Christmas in prospect. It’s beautiful out there. So not much horse racing reportage with which to crackle the airwaves...

Train wreck. Disaster zone. Highway to Hell. Car crash. Calamity. Carnage. A selection of juicy hyperbolic terms often used inappropriately to amplify mundane incidents and inflate banality with exaggerated importance. Which is exactly the way I intend to report the sheer and unadulterated devastation that is my 40 to follow project. Approaching the end of November I am languishing on –25.3 points. My worst ever start to the season.  Bruv is over the horizon with some long shot, high profile winners and even Dad is kicking up a dust cloud for me to choke on. Don’t believe the guff that the non-believers dish out about storm-in-teacup, only-a-game, escapist-nonsense. Because this does matter. I am weeping. It’s desperate stuff. I could claim near misses, but I’m kidding myself. The veneer of bad luck - three place finishes last Saturday and another today - is a mere fig leaf decomposing under a ruthless analysis: they were all completely stuffed by the winners. Thursday was a new...

So I’m three weeks into this moustache-growing extravaganza known as Movember.   It’s all for charidee mate. But I can’t say it’s too much fun. As with many charitable enterprises it is humiliation that unlocks the donations. Some fund raising activities are based on achievement: marathons, climbs and swims all spring to mind; others are about rewards: auctions, competitions, raffles are the standard fodder of garden parties and school fetes up and down the country; and then others are simply about making a prat of oneself in return for support. I guess Children In Need and Movember both fall into the latter category. Funny that I should be attracted to this one. Here's  My Movember donation page I nearly joined in last year. But not quite.   A couple of mates were doing the mo thing and I said I’d go for it. Then I lost my nerve. I landed a project interview early doors in November with clients I’d never met before. I bottled it! I couldn’t face up to dishing out my ...