Children, eh?

The grandchildren are due back from their holiday to Turkey tomorrow. Call it intuition but I have a hunch one of them may be missing.

Love Is...

Hearts Manager Update

Steve McClaren: Shho, Ian….shhhould I take the Heartsh job then?

Ian Cathro: It’s fine. You’re not quite at the point where you want to be but you’re working hard to attain this position and it’s very much a work in progress. There are elements that you can pick which will dictate the pattern of how your career will play out and you’ll work hard on the training ground to address these.

SMC: Thanksh, Ian. Shho, ish that a yesh or a no?

IC: The thing is, Steve, is we keep using this word fight. And that’s because I’ve used it but it’s fine. It just an easy way of explaining things.

SMC: Err….Well….err….do you think I should move to Tynecastle.

IC: It’s not the sort of question that can elicit a straightforward answer. It’s not really a case of yes or no, it’s much more difficult than that. The question you really need to ask yourself is – do you still have that umbrella you sheltered under at that England game all those years ago?

SMC: For shure…err…it’sh somewhere in the house.

IC: That’s good. That’s a positive. Because you’ll need it when the fans start chucking things at you when the new stand is built.

SMC: Thanksh. Itsh a big job, rebuilding the Heartsh team from the shite they’ve played in the last shix monthsh.

IC: Well, Steve, to be fair, the players have been brilliant for me. Take away the goalposts and we would have qualified for this season’s Champions League.

SMC: Yes, well, err….managing in Scotland will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity  - and these don’t come along very often.

IC: Bugger!

SMC: Whatsh the problem, Ian?

IC: I’ve just come across an email from Ann Budge from three months ago.

SMC: What doesh it shay?

IC: Remember and order the seats for the new stand…

Curses! The Fitba's Back

It’s that time of the year again. Although this ‘time of the year’ seems to have been getting earlier and earlier in recent times. Yes, dear reader, I’m talking about the start of the football season.

For the past couple of months, it’s been relatively calm in the Smith household (apart from Mrs Smith’s increasingly frequent rants about the bedroom needing to be re-decorated) On Tuesday evening, however, the sound of cursing emanated again, increasing in volume as the evening wore on.

Hearts returned to competitive action as they travelled to Elgin on Betfred Cup duty. The prospect of making a 340-round trip on a Tuesday evening was less than enticing so this Hearts fan opted to follow the Maroons’ progress - if you could call it that – online via social media and a live scores app on my mobile phone.

When I first began following Hearts nearly 50 years ago, a mobile phone was when my father threw the dialling contraption across the room when he opened the phone bill. In my formative Hearts supporting years the best way of finding out how Hearts were doing was to actually be at the game itself. The BBC was the main source of radio coverage but the blanket coverage we have today was just a fantasy.

This was the case even well into the 1980s. I recall Hearts entertaining Montrose in the League Cup in season 1986/87 – the season after they infamously lost the league in the last eight minutes of the season at Dens Park. I was living in Aberdeen at the time and this was an era before the internet and immediate communication we demand today. I didn’t even have that new-fangled information service, Ceefax, on my telly. Instead, I had to anxiously pace the living room for most of the evening before tuning into BBC Radio 2’s sports desk at five past ten. ‘And one football result from Scotland tonight – it was Hearts 0 Montrose 2’

My transistor radio went the same way as my father’s telephone nearly two decades earlier. 2-0 Montrose? Bloody BBC! Can’t they get anything right? But the newspapers the following morning confirmed the news. Hearts Dens Park hangover had carried on…

31 years on, I’m sitting on a sofa in darkest Leith (yes, I’m a Jambo abroad) The present Mrs Smith compels me to ‘stop looking at that bloody phone every two seconds’. Tuesday evening went pretty much like this:

7.40: I tell Mrs Smith that Hearts are playing tonight. Ian Cathro has picked a strong team so it should be an easy win against a team that lost 6-0 on Saturday. She ignores me.

7.50: No scoring as yet but it’s early days.

7.55: Still no score.

8.00: Still no score. C’mon Hearts, get the finger out.

8.03: Mrs Smith asks if there is a game on tonight. Clearly, my statement 23 minutes earlier had a major impact.

8.05: Still no score. Bloody hell, Hearts, Dunfermline were 2-0 up by this stage last Saturday.

8.07: Edinburgh City go ahead against Berwick Rangers. See, even City can score.

8.10: Still no score. I throw my phone aside. That’s it. I insist I’m not bothering to check the score again until half-time.

8.15: Still no score. Mrs Smith questions my previous declaration that I wouldn’t check the score until half-time. I tell her I’m not in the mood for her pedantic utterances.

8.22: Bloody hell, Hearts. This is a disgrace.

8.25: Still no score. Kyle Lafferty? Ha! Yer havin’ a laff.

8.30: Half-time. Elgin City 0 Hearts 0. The official Hearts Twitter account says Hearts are dominating the game but have still to make the breakthrough. Talk about stating the bleedin’ obvious.

At least there’s a 15-minute break now which gives me the chance to recharge my phone and to pour myself a stiff drink.

8.47: Hearts will surely do the business in the second half. Won’t they?

8.49: Still no score. More sighing from me as Mrs Smith asks the somewhat rhetorical question ‘have they scored yet?’

8.52: Still no score. At this stage on Saturday Dunfermline were 5-0 up against Elgin. I pour myself another drink.

8.57: Still no score. I throw my phone on to the chair across the room. That bloody team of mine! Bloody Ian Cathro! He has to go! Bloody Elgin City.

9.02: GOALLLLLLL! Kyle Lafferty puts Hearts in front. Yaaa beauty!

9.03: Mrs Smith comments on my remarkable change in mood. Kyle Lafferty? Great player, I say. Will make a real difference to Hearts this season.

9.05: Ian Cathro will do a great job this season. He’s got his own team in place now.

9.10; 9.15; and at frequent times until 9.35:  Bloody hell, Hearts! Only 1-0 against a bunch of part-timers. It’s a disgrace!

9.37:  Full-time Elgin City 0 Hearts 1 (Lafferty, 60)

9.38: That will do for starters. Tough place to go, Elgin. And a win’s a win.

The world’s a better place again. The fitba’s back. But I need to see my doctor tomorrow – I think my blood pressure is a bit on the high side…

Texting For the Over 55s

Pic: qz.com

We live in an age of instant communication. Internet, computers, mobile phones, IPhones etc, etc has evolved through satellite technology and it seems a whole new language has evolved through it. The kids of today (I know, I'm sounding ancient here) have their own short codes for text messaging and for Twittering and Facebook. Codes like WTF, LOL and LMFAO are used increasingly widely and it can get a wee bit confusing for the older generation. There was a story the other week of an elderly lady who sent a text to her grand daughter telling her the family cat had died. She added LOL at the end of her message, thinking it stood for Lots of Love...

So, to avoid people of my generation getting embarrassed, here are some text codes for the more mature...

ATD - at the doctor's

BFF - Best Friend's Funeral

BTW - Bring the Wheelchair

FWIW - Forgot Where I Was

GGPBL - Gotta Go, Pacemaker Battery Low

GHA - Got Heartburn Again

HGBM - Had Good Bowel Movement

IMHO - Is My Hearing-aid On?

WAITT - Who Am I Talking To?

And finally - GGLKI - Gotta Go, Laxative Kicking In.

It's time to get down with the kids. Although I may not get up again...

The Story of the Blues

"...well that's my story and I'm sticking to that. So let's have another drink and let's talk about the blues.

Blues is about dignity, it's about self-respect, and no matter what they take away from you - that's yours for keeps.

I remember how it was, how every medium - T.V. and papers and radio and all those people were saying: 'you're on the scrap-heap, you're useless', and I remember how easy it was to start believing that. I remember how you'd hear people take it for granted that it was true - just 'cause someone with an ounce of power said so.

And that's a problem now, too many oddballs, too many pocketbook psychologists and would-be philosophers with an axe to grind. But there's a solution, it's not easy, but it's a matter of coming to terms in your heart with situation you're in, a matter of choosing how things go for you and not having things forced upon you.

There are plenty of forces against you, forcing you against your will, your ideals - you've got to hope for the best, and that's the best you can hope for - you've got to hope against hope...

I remember something Sal Paradise said, he said: 'the city intellectuals of the world are debauched from the full body blood-of-the-land and are just rootless fools'.

So listen, when the smile, the condescending pat-on-the-back comes and says: 'we're sorry, but you're nothing, you've got nothing for us and we've got nothing for you', you say: 'No', and say it loud: "NO!", and remember, people who talk about revolution and a class-struggle without referring explicitly to everyday life, without understanding what is subversive about love, and what is positive in the refusal and constraint......"

One of the best songs ever written. The sublime Pete Wylie who I had the pleasure of seeing play in Glasgow last year. A gifted musician and songwriter.

Make The Days Count

Happiness is a faraway land
Although if you are far away it is home
Some might say it cannot be seen or heard
But sometimes it has to be seen to be heard
Be sure it has to be round the corner
Hidden, obscured by fate

Happiness is good music sometimes
Rude Boys bopping to ska
Seeing someone smiling, nearly almost

When the bath water is just right
A paragraph in a book
Sleepy sensations on trains
An afternoon nap
When beer goes down just right

A brilliant conversation, music, football, independence
Hearts beating Hibernian (although not for some time, mind you)
Edinburgh in all its magnificent splendour
The smell of the distillery wafting over the streets of Gorgie

These all have their moments

Happiness is reflections....on better days when times are sad