Another Load of Cobblers ....

[Workingman]

... tiddley a cha-cha..

He can pay £1 for a chocolate bar
and spill his chips in the owner's car.
but he never buys drinks
in the clubhouse bar
that ostrich in a Tutu.

[TheOstrich]

[Kaz]

Loved the video Ossie, but that tutu will never fit if you eat too many pasties

[TheOstrich]

More sombre news on the High Street front this week as a further two stores look set to shut – this time, though, in Shaftesbury. Shaftesbury has always been regarded as the toffee-nosed neighbour up the hill, and has traditionally hosted all the artisan shops and posh hotels (as befits its celebrity status, Gold Hill, the Abbey and all that), whilst Gillingham has traditionally been the poorer cousin, all pubs and trading estates.

Both closures are stores we’ve used. Parfitts, the shoe shop, was a fusty old place down at the bottom of the town, although they did stock a reasonable selection, including Hotter, which we like. Mind you, finding the sizes you wanted was always the luck of the draw, and they never seemed that keen to order in . We’ve found some bargains there, but also had our disappointments. It's the last independent shoe shop for miles around; now we find we’re going to have to look at TOFS (The Original Factory Shop) which always seems to me to be 85% cheap trainers, or, Heaven forfend, Clarkes Shopping Village over at Street .

Hine & Parsons was a good old-fashioned department store, a family owned business going for at least 70 years, and prominently situated opposite the Town Hall and Gold Hill itself. Furnishings, clothing, haberdashery, linens, drapery, kitchen knick-knacks, you name it – we’ve purchased all our table place-mats from there, amongst other things. There’s rumoured to be a ghost in the attic , and an air-raid shelter in the cellar! The owners are finally retiring (the father is 89) and the store is up for sale as a going concern for £700,000 – not expensive in the scheme of things, but who’d want to take it on in the current climate?

All very unfortunate.

Another unfortunate thing this week when I found a business card had been pushed through the door, late one afternoon and under the cover of darkness. From the “Senior Negotiator” of a local estate agents, but handwritten on it was the cryptic message “Please phone re Mrs B”.

Now we know estate agents get up to all sorts of marketing tricks, and I don’t mind the flyers through the door or the letters saying “We’ve just sold one in your road and we’ve got lots of other interested buyers – would you like a free valuation?” or similar; they just go straight in the recycling bucket . But this seemed more personalised and at a different level - and it just so happens that the previous occupant of the Nest was a Mrs B …..

So Ossie, having fretted about it for a bit, decided to phone them up.

“Can I speak to the Senior Negotiator, please?”
Bright young man: “Oh he’s out at the moment.”
“Is he now. When’s he due back?”
“Have you had a card through your letterbox?”
“Yes, what’s it about?”
“Well, we have a very interested customer who really wants …….”
“Stop right there! Is this a marketing ploy?”
“Well yes, but …..”
The rest of the conversation may be happily left to your imagination. Phrases such as “flagrant con-trick”, “despicable hook-in “and “cheap advertising ploy”. You can say a lot in a 40 second phone call!

Having made his point, the avian banged the phone down (well, thumbed the End Call button in practice ).

“Ossie, you keep going on like that, I’ll have to send you on an anger management course,” I laughed.
“%&£$”*@^$!” said the Ostrich.

To Saturday, and another short trip - to the Marnhull Rec, a ground last visited back in 2019. Approaching Marnhull from the north on the Sturminster Newton road, as you reach the 40 mph signs, you take the first turning right towards the village, which is the entertainingly-named Sodom Lane . I’m not quite sure what they get up to there, but there is an old Free Chapel building at the top of the road. Turn right by the Chapel and almost immediately right again up a driveway and that takes you into the rec’s spacious car-park. All the usual village rec facilities are on site – a large village hall (already with a decorated Christmas tree in the balcony window ), a separate changing room block for team sports, tennis court, kiddies play area, skate park, and cricket pitch. And there’s also, for this area, the inevitable bucolic views across the Blackmore Vale towards Bulbarrow Hill, although lowering clouds and spitting rain made them not quite so attractive today.

There’s no football furniture and no cover around the soccer pitch, although at a pinch you could use a conveniently-located wooden shelter about 50 yards away from the action if it were inclement. The pitch itself slopes from side to side, and markedly so all along the near touch line, where 10 feet in, the ground level suddenly drops by a foot or so. Not quite an escarpment, but ….

The table-topping visitors Crossways Spitfires (Crossways is a village down Dorchester way) totally hyped themselves up before the kick off and swaggered up to the centre line like a tribe of Tyson Furys . Unfortunately for them, bottom of the league Marnhull started like Real Madrid and only reverted to being Marnhull after the first quarter-hour, by which time they were three up and it could easily have been more. Marnhull were direct and clinical, Crossways’ defence couldn’t get to grips with them; the first goal came on 4m with M.17 swivelling in the area and firing home from 10 yards; the second on 11m saw M.6 get the better of a one on one with the keeper and slide the ball past him. The third, a minute later, was from the penalty spot - one of those 50/50 challenges in the area where some referees might have waved play on, but this referee was being monitored today, so spot-kick it was.

There was a brief break in play as someone found some dog poo on the pitch , an occupational hazard at village rec grounds, I’m afraid, So the Dog Poo Shovel had to be located and brought onto the field of play, and the referee, having completed collection duties, hared towards a startled Ostrich on the side-line!
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to hand it to you, ” he said, depositing the laden implement next to the bird, before resuming the match. I spent the rest of the match trying not to trip over it!

Anyway, once the Crossways manager had managed to calm his keeper down, who was threatening the defence in front of him with all sorts of retribution for the goals conceded , the away side managed to pull themselves together and the remainder of the half saw them regularly pressing forward, but they didn’t look like they had much cutting edge up front, and the Marnhull keeper dealt efficiently with anything that looked threatening.

The second half started with Crossways pushing forward again, and they eventually got on the scoresheet on 63m with a penalty of their own; this one a bit iffy in my book , but the referee clearly signalled a nudge in the back. Oh well, a deserved consolation goal, I thought – and boy, did I get that one wrong! Five minutes later, a Marnhull defender slipped allowing C.22 a clear attempt at goal, which he converted. 3-2. The game was starting to get tetchy, Marnhull rather nervy, and the referee increasingly pedantic. An equaliser began to look inevitable, and on 74m, Crossways levelled the score when a C.8 shot was helped into the net by the home keeper, and Marnhull promptly lost a player to the sin-bin for words presumably of an impolite nature to the referee . Then on 77m, C.8 tried a speculative 20 yarder - and the home keeper missed it. Ossie had to move with some alacrity to avoid being engulfed by the ensuing Crossways touchline celebrations!

Marnhull had a couple of chances to equalise in the closing few minutes, but Crossways cleared one off the line and the other sizzled across the goal with no attacker able to deflect it in.

As a masterclass in how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, this one will take some surpassing!

20/11/21: Dorset League Division 4
Marnhull 3 Crossways Spitfires 4
No admission charge, and no refreshments available on-site (I did enquire!). Still, fear not, foodies, I did have with me a pack of Delicatessen brand Finest Quality Hot and Spicy Meatballs (produce of Germany), acquired from the town garage for the princely sum of £1 …..
Attendance: 19

[cromwell]

Poor Marnhull!
But an entertaining match one way and another.
The house market has gone crazy round here too Os. One of MrsC's many cousins sold her house recently and has been outbid on one new build house and found herself 19th in the queue for another!
Great read, as usual.

[Workingman]

Ah, yes, defeat from the jaws of victory - been there, done that, but never with a poop-scoop.

Also done German meatballs - Schwein ballen. The local Imbiss did them in a lightly spiced / herby rich sauce. Veal or pork as I remember.

[Kaz]

Bet they don't get dog poo on the pitch at Man U!!!! How sure were you of those meatballs Ossie?

[TheOstrich]

Don't ask, Kaz!

Mild entertainment at the local pharmacy on Monday when I attended to pick up our monthly prescriptions (Dorset NHS insist on no more than a month to be handed out at any one time, compared with other authorities allowing prescribing for three months, thus tripling the workload for the surgery, the pharmacy, and the patients) . A small, grumbling queue had formed outside and there was absolutely no movement into or out of the store. The problem appeared to stem from the pharmacy chain’s “no more than 2 punters in the shop” rule; this means things grind completely to a halt when two successive customers hand in their paper prescriptions and elect to wait for them to be made up. They settle down inside in the warm, leaving subsequent customers queueing for up to 20 minutes outside – the pharmacy equivalent, I suppose, of hospital bed-blocking! When I eventually got into the store, half-way through my stay some edict must have come in by phone or internal memorandum read, and suddenly the “no more than 2” sign was ripped off the entry door and it was announced that all restrictions had been immediately lifted! Cue about 6 frozen people then piling into the shop, totally crowding it. I beat a hasty retreat once I’d secured our pills.

Anyway, this halcyon turn of events lasted for less than a week – thanks to the latest Omicron restrictions, we’re now back to “2 punters only” again!

A glum looking Ostrich announced on Tuesday we’d run out of bird seed. I usually carry about a year’s supply for our feathered fiends, but the bird was right, somehow we only had dregs left. So a quick walk into town to the local independent pet food suppliers cum engravers and cobblers (!) and just over £6 secured a couple of large packs of wild bird seed, three slab cakes flavoured with I hate to think what , and around a dozen fat balls. It didn’t take long for the jackdaws to find the latter, and the ever-hopeful wood pigeons were noted trawling the ground underneath the feeder for the scrappings. No real sign of sparrows or smaller birds yet, though.

Mrs O occasionally has a trawl through the Waitrose magazine and picks out some of their more outlandish offers for Ossie to track down. This week, it was British Chicken Garlic and Herb Casserole With Leek, Mushroom and Bacon, at £4.25 or 3 for £10, selected stores only. The last bit usually means, “Kensington, not North Dorset”.

“I’ll keep an eye out for it, but should I find it, we’ll have just the one,” I said suspiciously, “I want to see what it’s like ….”

Surprisingly, it was in the local store, a bit hidden away though, so as promised, I bought just the one. We had it on Friday night. And it was most peculiar.

Mrs O followed the rather convoluted cooking instructions to the letter.
“It’s on the bone, you know”, she said.
“Oh, gawd ,” said the Ostrich, imagining a lot of tiny bones to pick out of it.

Well, what it turned out to be was four large pieces of what I can only describe as Kentucky Fried Chicken, two wings and two thighs in a spiced breadcrumb coating, not at all what you would call a casserole. All the rest, the sauce, merged into a sort of vegetable mush. We had it with a baked potato each. In fairness, there was plenty of chicken meat on the bone, but frankly I’d have preferred a KFC Bucket. The whole thing was OK, but overpriced, and I wouldn’t be looking to buy it again.

After a week off for Storm Arwen, a quick revisit on Saturday to the Marnhull Recreation Ground for the visit of Salisbury-based DI United, a team which has no social media presence as far I can see and therefore I know absolutely nothing about, although rumour has it it’s something to do with the Devizes Inn in Wilton. I can report there were no changes to the ground since I was last here two weeks ago, apart from more leaves on the grass and a lot muddier underfoot. And an absence of dog poo. Probably because it was buried under the leaves.

We started off with scenic views of sun-dappled countryside across the Vale and up Duncliffe Wood, but there were plenty of towering clouds on the horizon, and the decidedly breezy, chilly afternoon deteriorated when a short, sharp hailstorm hit us midway through the second half, sending the bird scurrying under the shelter of an oak tree behind the goal which thankfully had still retained a fair covering of leaves.

A fortnight ago, I saw bottom of the table Marnhull take a three goal lead against the league leaders Crossways Spitfires, before managing to blow it in the second half. This week, their opponents were the second placed team. Marnhull failed to conjure up anything like the same performance today, and looked disjointed from the start. United’s ruthless (but entirely fair) midfield worked a long hard shift and effectively stifled anything the home team tried to put together. The outcome looked inevitable from the early stages; United were 0-3 up at the interval with the goals coming on 14, 21 and 44m; for the first, D.26 got a lucky break in the area, shot and the keeper reacted a bit too slowly to an effort he might possibly have saved, the second was a close-range header, and the third was scored by D.4 after he’d initially looked like he’d missed his opportunity.

Play was more even in the second half as United understandably eased off, but Marnhull failed to create any real chances and the away keeper was barely troubled. United’s fourth was a thumping header from around the penalty spot by their captain; the home goalkeeper could only push the ball into the roof of his net. One unfortunate incident involved a United substitution – the referee acknowledged it, the player went off, but his replacement, who had been running the line, was still trying to divest himself of his tracksuit. The referee had waved the sub on, but then changed his mind and decided to restart play as the sub at that point had his boots entangled in his tracksuit bottoms! Having finally freed himself, the sub came on to the field of play – nowhere near the action, I might add – and was promptly booked for doing so! Tiz the law, but a tad harsh in these circumstances, methinks. The referee was our old friend Mark Chinnock, and he is a bit of a stickler.

So, still winless this season, Marnhull remain bottom of the league with just 2 points in their 8 games to date. I shall no doubt be back!

04/12/21: Dorset League Division 4
Marnhull 0 DI United 4
Free admission
Refreshments: there was some sort of choir rehearsal going on in the adjacent Village Hall for a performance tonight, so the Ostrich hung around, looking pitiful. The bird was duly accosted and asked what he was doing lurking around outside the door, but when he pleaded for a cuppa tea on a raw day, he was sent packing!
Still, Ossie can give you a food review from Gillingham’s newest up-market eatery, visited earlier in the day: A pack of 8 hot Spicy BBQ Chicken Bites (£1.90) from our Greggs, no less, which is part of the new petrol station / Budgens complex by Aldi. Delicious with mayo!
Attendance: 14

[Workingman]

How disappointing this review is.

I was expecting a Yeovil v Stevenage triumphal narrative from the FA cup. Ah well.

Ossie, do your own BBQ chicken bites - Google is your friend, recipe wise. Forget the mayo, go for a spicy salsa.

[Kaz]

That dog poo anecdote made me laugh! I pointedly avoid piled up leaves for that reason - even if it means stepping off the kerb