It's the taking part....

Tonight's, the night. The Olympic Games opening ceremony signifies the start of the London 2012 event. The question on everybodies lips is, of course, who will light the torch in the stadium?

Tradition dictates that it is an Olympian, so thet rules out Davis Beckham, although Ryan Giggs now qualifies after the game last night. Don't worry though it won't be him.

For what it's worth here is my take on how tonight will unfold.........

The stadium goes black, by design, not due to non-payment of leckie bill.....a single spotlight pierces the darkness and picks out a solitary figure riding a trandem. ( a three person bicycle made famous by The Goodies ). Zoom in and it becomes evident that riding the trandem is the recently crowned winner of the Tour de France, Bradley Wiggins.

Bradley waves to the crowd, then thinks better of it as the bicycle careers all over the track. He pedals on for another few seconds before another spotlight picks out a bus stop at which stands another solitary figure. Bradley stops, and picks up his first passenger, no less a person than Daley Thompson, the 1980 and 1984 Olympic Decathlon gold medalist.

They then wobble round the track to the final bus stop and there waiting for them is the Olympic torch being carried by Sir Steve Redgrave, Olympic gold medalist at five different games, and to many people the greatest ever Olympian. He jumps on and they all pedal to the top of the stadium where they all hold the torch as the flame is lit.

Everybody cheers and the games begin.....you read it here first!!!

And they're off....

It's Olympic Games time, and I am trying to be positive about them, albeit they have done me no favours over the last few years. Indeed they have done me no favours next week as I have had to change my hotel in West London as it is slap bang in the middle of the cycle road race and I would have no access to my car for most of the day. let's hope Bradley Wiggins does the business in that one and then BBC sports personality of the year 2012 should be a nailed on certainty.

The Games kicked off yesterday with a spot of ladies footie. the standard is certainly improving, and isn't it great that they don't fall over at the slightest touch, or scream at the ref all the time, the male professional game should look and learn. They won't of course.

I played golf last night with a gentlemen who was at the opening ceremony of the 1948 games in London, as a seven year old, and he has moved heaven and earth to get tickets for the opening ceremony on Friday, that must be a great feeling for him. he said he could remember the 1948 event like it was yesterday, so I hope he has a  really enjoyable experience in Stratford, regardless of the fact hotel prices in the area are 400% higher than normal.

I have not given up hope of getting to the stadium for the athletics. Usually sponsors tickets get returned last minute so I am looking daily to see what's around. It might need to be a day trip, but at least we can say ' we were there!'

No woman, no cry.....

Well we have just returned from two glorious weeks holiday in our idyllic hideaway, St Lucia, in the Caribbean. I understand it was a tad damp here in Blighty while we were away, but I am pleased to report St Lucia were experiencing the driest July for some while.

Its the rainy season at this time of year, and its not a time we would normally visit, however, with such hectic schedules at our usual, and preferred, times, March and September, it was a matter of going in July or not going at all.

The resort we visit, Le Sport, has just had a multimillion pound makeover paid for in part by the insurance claims from recent hurricane damage. Hurricanes are fairly rare in St Lucia, but the ones in 20009 and 2010 certainly left their mark on the island. There are still roads which are single passage only, and the mud slides in Soufiere buried a number of people in their homes.

On the whole, though, the hotel has done a good job. There is a new clubhouse with pizza oven and permanent kitchen which takes the catering outlets up to three. There is a new infinity pool for the water volleyball and new instruction areas for Scuba and water aerobics. The boardwalk has been extended and there are new boutiques and bars as well. The price has gone up, but on the whole the benefits have justified it.

The manager did indicate to us that food costs are their biggest recent price increase, and that was reflected across the resort where the selection was less varied than previously. that said, while we were there the house white, part of the all inclusive deal, was Napa Valley Chardonnay which retails at £17 a bottle in UK. we must have drunk £500 worth!! It had just run out as we left to be replaced by a South Australian which was not in the same league. I guess that's the luck of the draw.

I got in a few golf lessons when I played some holes with Edwin the pro. He made a couple of swing changes which provided instant reward and he jokingly said were $50 a pop. all i need to do now is try them out in the Wallasey wind.....fore!

Greenwood and Gazza revisited?

This weekend we witnessed the final games for the England football and rugby teams. Both groups of players have been away from home testing themselves against some of the best players in the World. As far as the rugby team is concerned they lost a three test series 2-0, gaining some comfort for a 14-14 draw in the final game against South Africa.

For the football team it was defeat in the quarter-finals of the European Cup, to Italy.

The similarities of the two national sides are worth considering. Both have relatively new coaches trying to impress their own styles on their side. Both, sadly lack creative and dominant players, the like of which is vital to be able to compete on a world stage.

Lets look at the football team first. Two banks of four players protecting the goal, with two isolated strikers is not the best recipe for attractive football. What alternatives are there, however?  If you were to name the three most creative players in the top English premiership teams you would struggle to find too many English qualified players. Tottenham have Modric, Bale and Adebayor, or even Van der Vaart. Chelsea have Drogba, Torres and a host of others, Manchester City have Alonso, Balotelli and Nasri. Its only when you include Wayne Rooney in the Manchester United trio that you can select a player who starts regularly for his club, as a key international.

Mirror that process with the rugby team and you consistently see the core players in the top teams, fly half, centre, fullback, scrum half, number 8, flanker and hooker more often than not being sourced from other countries, and,   at a point in their career when they are looking for a source of money and a gentle passage into retirement.

While the rugby team are trying to redress the balance by introducing a salary cap and we are seeing English fullbacks coming through, it will be a few seasons yet before they can have the right young talent to choose from. They need to be clever as well as muscle bound and the professional game is not doing much to aid that process.

So we have to be realistic at the moment and not expect our sides to be world beaters, although with the Rugby World Cup in England in 2015 it would be good to see a semi-final place as a realistic target. At that stage anything can happen.

Alright my lover?

This week I have been down in Plymouth with the sole purpose of moving my aged mother up to a flat in Hoylake on the Wirral. My mother is 86 years old, and by the look of some photographs we found, was a bit of a looker all those years ago. No wonder she caught my father's eye.

We moved down to Plymouth as a family in 1959 from Isleworth in West London. My dad worked for National Benzole, a petrol company, in those days and was posted to Devon and Cornwall a year or so earlier. He supervised the completion of our house which was part of  a Costain development  in Plymstock and my mum and I moved down when it was ready.

I went to school in Plymstock from 1959 until 1964 when I moved to a grammer school in Beacon Park, Plymouth. The area was notarised by the folk singer, Cyril Tawney, in his ballad of the same name, and there I stayed until 1971 when I upped sticks and moved back to London to go to college.

My mum and dad stayed in Plymouth. My dad retired in 1975 and my mum set up and ran a pre-school playgroup in a local church hall, with one of her closest friends. There are many Plymouthians who went through that facility at a time when play groups were relatively new and certainly not as regulated as they are now.

When my dad died in 1980, my mum stayed in the family home for a few years, before deciding to try to settle back in her family town of Wisbech. Sadly her family never really embraced her and after a few years she abandoned the exercise and returned to Devon. An inappropriate house purchase in Oreston soon found her back in Plymstock, living less than 100yards from the original family home.

Yesterday she said goodbye to Plymstock and that house, her home for twenty years,  for the last time. We spent the week filling a skip with 'stuff' that people of all ages collect over time, and which has little or no value, either sentimental or monetary. We then labeled the furniture which was to be collected and distributed to the poor and needy, as mum's new flat is fully furnished and brand new. We then sat back and waited for the removal people.

As I write this, they are moving my mum into her new home, having earlier delivered all the unwanted car bootie from her house to Oxton. We will probably need two or three sales to clear it all.

The new home is about 20  minutes away from us, no longer a 5 hour journey if emergencies call. It has an in-house warden and is populated by about 25 other like minded souls looking for companionship, security and a bit of sea air.

So ends her 50 year relationship with Plymstock. Many of her good friends did not last as long, and those that are still there popped in to say goodbye, knowing they would never see her again, but would stay in touch by phone or letter, a trait still very common with the older generation.

She did not seem sad to go, and being blessed still with a sharp mind , she sees the move as a new adventure to be embraced as enthusiastically as that train journey on Brunel's mighty GWR  all those years ago.

Will I miss Plymouth?  No not really, its not been my home for almost 40 years, Although I made many of my strongest and longest lasting friendships there, those friends no longer live there.  I expect I will find myself down there again, not least when I have to reunite my mum and dad for the final time, but for now it's up the Argyle and  continue to try to master the golf course which is Wallasey.

Proper job.

NeverSeconds

Every now and then  there is a story in the papers or on the internet which makes you wonder where the genetic malfunction of the human race began. Today we have been treated to the news that Martha Payne , a nine year old from Scotland,  has been banned from photographing her school dinner, because she then uses it on her blog here.

Her headmistress acted on orders from her superiors at Argyll and Bute council who were concerned that press publicity was having a stressful effect on their dinner ladies, albeit the web site was set up with the blessing of the school as a way to raise money for a charity called Mary's Meals.

There has been uproar, and the good burgers ( no pun intended) of Argyll and Bute have conceeded they acted hastily and have allowed the young girl to carry on.

In the meantime the charity donations have gone from £2,000 to well over £20,000 indicating once again that there is no such thing as bad publicity.

Its good to encourage youngsters to start blogging. I look back over the five years of this blog and remind myself of things which are a distant memory, imagine when people can look back 50 years.

Light at the end of the tunnel

We embraced the start of the Olympic Games on Friday evening when the torch relay arrived on the Wirral. It came through the Mersey tunnel into Birkenhead Park at about 6pm and was carried by various runners with compelling reasons to make the short trip from one end of their section to the other. The standard celeb was sporty Spice, Melanie Chisholm, who carried the torch on part of the 'Race for Life' route. Here she is partly obscured by the torch, no bad thing eh!!

This is not the first time we have been in the company of the Olympic torch, as we were in Atlanta for the 1996 Games, and spent several hours in Buckhead on the outskirts of the City, the day before the event started. I must admit the controls in America were very lax, and the poor runner had to eventually be bundled into a van to complete his leg of the journey. We were on that trip with Dave Jones, sadly now the subject of the sad entry I wrote last month, and I recall we were very brazen in 'acquiring' a Olympic torch relay banner form outside one of the bars. It went on the wall in Twickenham RFC but has long since been lost to redevelopment.

I have had a very mixed relationship with the London Olympics. I have tried on numerous occasions to get interviews for salaried positions with them, and failed miserably. I am particularly grumpy as they have always advocated the uniqueness of the event and that people with previous experience would be well placed to assist.

I was also disillusioned at the whole ticketing situation and have now resigned myself to watching on TV. I am still available at short notice for seriously boozy corporate invites but I can't see it myself.

We were fortunate to be in the Olympic stadium in Atlanta when Carl Lewis won the last of his 9 Olympics Gold medals when he retained the long jump title. It was, however, eclipsed by Michael Johnson winning the 400m in his golden running shoes, which he then threw into the crowd.  I wonder where they are now?