Vocal Voices

by **cromwell** » 21 Sep 2021, 08:33

People will steal all sorts of stuff...

https://www.eadt.co.uk/news/police-appe ... en-2537136

by **TheOstrich** » 21 Sep 2021, 18:42

I've heard of stealing pot plants, but a whole hedge?

Mickleover managed to get their artificial pitch finished, and it was recently unveiled. Burton Albion FC and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbank (there's a blast from the past

) were there to open it.
https://www.derbytelegraph.co.uk/news/d ... ck-5719695

by **JoM** » 23 Sep 2021, 08:51

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink is definitely a blast from the past!
Hearing his name always reminds me of our Leeds supporting friend who joked while his wife was pregnant that he was going to call his son Jimmy Floyd.
22 years on and it’s just hit me that perhaps he wasn’t joking….his son is called James :lol:

by **TheOstrich** » 26 Sep 2021, 18:32

A quiet week for the bird as it recovered from its rather painful episode last weekend

. I was concerned midweek I might have been getting a reoccurrence, but thankfully it came to naught. It is, I guess, a mark of the Ostrich’s increasing ancientness that it has now taken delivery of a collapsible canvas chair to put in the back of the car and take to footie games where there’s neither seating nor railing to perch on ......

I am not alone in doing this, I’ve noticed.

Master O was present for most of the week, having arrived the previous Saturday on a State Visit. Honestly, it is like inviting Gordon Ramsay, Jeremy Clarkson and Len McClusky round for a tea-party :roll:

. On Wednesday, I left Master and Mrs O to it, happily winding each other up in the kitchen over the baking of scones, and slunk off to source some clotted cream (Aldi £1.39).

So to Saturday, and I was intending to start my rugby season today with a gentle overland trek up to Cheddar Valley, but, as we all know (and I’ve posted elsewhere), the Covidiots descended in force on Friday – down here, they totally cleaned out one of the two filling stations in town and laid siege to the other. So I decided to play it cautiously, not knowing when this current madness is going to end, conserve petrol and stay local. It’s perhaps more necessary in a rural area like ours, as petrol stations are scarce and you don’t to be making an unnecessary round trip of say 10 miles to East Stour to find out the pumps at the one in the village are also dry.

The Bird: “So you're saying everyone’s a Covidiot, but that didn’t stop you going out and driving round the town last night to see if the queues had gone, did it?” :mrgreen:

Me: “

"

So, a one-and-a-half mile drive to my first rugby match since January 2020 – 18 months ago! 8-)

Although there was no admission charge and no programme today at my local club, North Dorset RFC, (pre Covid it was £3 admission with programme), I spotted that the old ex-Blackpool FC Programme Kiosk (which I can only assume they found on EBay :lol:

) which arrived in 2019 and previously lurked at the car park entrance has now been renovated, repainted, re-liveried, and repositioned between the car park and the clubhouse, so maybe there will be something in future 8-)

. The club's 2021/22 Handbook was on display in the foyer of the clubhouse, however, and it made an adequate souvenir for the day; 28 pp glossy, quite informative, and not 98% advertising which most rugby club handbooks are. There’s a lot of talk in it about accessing “Spond groups” :shock:

, and helpfully, for elderly technophobic birds like Ossie, there’s a bit of an explanation on p26 as to what a Spond group actually is, including a helpful picture ….

They’ve reorganised the 25-acre campus during the Covid shutdown, so we now have 5 full pitches, two in front of the clubhouse (the main one is floodlit), two next door in the so-called Max Biles Field which they’ve acquired and redeveloped, and one over the road in the so-called Training field. The scoreboard on the clubhouse wall rather confusingly says: “Home” “Visitors” “Overs” and “Wickets”; to the best of my knowledge, the town has never had a cricket team, let alone up there at Slaughtergate. Probably something else they found on EBay ..... :mrgreen:

The other major recent improvement is the erection of an absolutely gigantic metal industrial barn :shock:

for tractors, machinery, mowers and other equipment, known colloquially as “The Shed”. You can't blame them given the amount of thefts from working farms in the area. It towers over the clubhouse, where today they were hosting the Club’s Platinum (70th) Anniversary Vice-Presidents Lunch.

North Dorset 1sts have always struck me over the years as a bit of a lightweight outfit; based on this afternoon’s performance, nothing much seems to have changed

. They started well with a penalty and converted try in the first 15 minutes, and looked resolute in defence, dealing effectively with Bournemouth’s probing kicks. But once Bournemouth managed to get up into second gear, the home team looked increasingly vulnerable and by half time it was 13-14, Bournemouth’s second try resulting from a storming run down midfield by their fly-half. This might have been Bournemouth’s “Thirds”, or Development team, but Bournemouth are a major club, and these were young, strong, fit lads.

For the second half, I positioned myself on North Dorset’s 22 - and so did Bournemouth for the majority of the rest of the game :lol:

. It was as much as North Dorset could do to keep them at bay; the home side rarely got across the half-way line and then they always looked vulnerable to the counter-attack. The final score from the visitors, making it 13-19, was a 70th minute unconverted try as the home defence started to miss their tackles. North Dorset did make one last foray deep into Bournemouth territory right at the end, but failed to make it count.

Overall, it was an absorbing rather than a spectacular game, but the closeness of score kept the interest going to the very end. I can’t see the North Dorset squad achieving much this season, I feel they lack a playmaker and flair. Still, it’s early doors, so we shall see.

25/09/21 – Dorset & Wilts 1 South (Level 8)
North Dorset - 13 Bournemouth III - 19
Admission: free
Programme: none
Refreshments: tray of chips from the clubhouse hatch £1 – frankly they were awful :evil:

. They were of the thin-cut variety, were blisteringly hot on the outside and raw inside. It was liked someone had passed a flamethrower over them for half a second. I did take a sachet of malt vinegar from the counter which at least imparted a modicum of flavour; I noticed a lady nearby me had actually purloined 6 sachets :lol:

! NDRFC’s catering was better than this pre-Covid …..
Attendance: 107

The collapsible canvas chair (Amazon £15). Let us hope it is “foldable” rather than “collapsible”, as the bird might need to go on a diet otherwise :lol:

. Master O suggested Mrs O stitch a rude word on the back on it :twisted:

. And it wasn’t “Director” :mrgreen:

. It should be useful, but I wouldn’t think it appropriate to take it to rugby matches however; in my experience, sometimes on the touchline you need to make a rapid getaway if a charging forward or three decide to head in your direction ….