Crinklybee

Precarious

Just when I was getting used to nine-to-five life in the Windowless Stalinist Shopping Bunker From Hell, I am informed (via an urgent edict hidden away on page 16 of the weekly staff newsletter) that I am to be uprooted as a matter of urgency, and shipped on- again-  to pastures new.  Any hopes of a return to my former bucolic existence hidden away in a once-grand civic building on the edge of a slowly crumbling Victorian market town, however, are swiftly dashed.  Instead, I am to be dispatched- along with other discombobulated refugees from Manchester's Sleepy Westside- to Not-For-Profit Agency X's brand-new corporate HQ- a futuristically renovated multi-storey office, which, not content with its business-friendly location slap-bang on the thronging doublecarriageway which connects the Westside to the Outside World, further advertises its presence by being balanced (a little too precariously-looking for my innocent tastes) on a set of twenty-foot high concrete stilts.   

 

The following morning at 8:55AM I chain my scooter to one of the stilts (ostensibly to keep the scooter safe, but also to assuage a nagging fear that, unfettered, my new many-legged workplace could take it upon itself at any moment to set off at an unsteady but determined canter along the dual carriageway in the general direction of Altrincham, crushing pedestrians and saloon cars in its terrifying, inexorable path), and make my way (via a revolving door placed, with dissappointing adherence to convention, at ground level rather than suspended in mid-air) into what appears to be the lobby of a Five-Star Hotel.  Here I am greeted by one of several impeccably groomed women in black corporate livery, whose twin functions (as I am able to ascertain during the course of the week) are to perch decoratively on swivel chairs in front of the switchboard telephones which never ring, and to chirp an appropriate phrase ('Good Morning Sir', 'Good Evening, Madam') at anyone in a suit passing their line of vision.

Slightly startled by this ostentatious show of corporate hospitality (the equivalent at the Stalinist Shopping Bunker was Steve the front-desk-boy, whose typical opening sally, regardless of whether he was simultaneously engaged with fending off the attempts of a  harassed-looking customer to engage him in a conversation about Housing Benefit, went along the lines of 'Morning John, see City last night, what a bag of shite'), I mumble an unintelligible response to the black-liveried ladies, and, narrowly avoiding a collision with a glass-topped chair adorned with glossy brochures, make a bee-line for the lift.

 

An hour later I have reached the safety of my new workstation (comfortingly like my old one, right down to my computer having been liberated from the Stalinist shopping bunker and shipped ahead under plain cover), but I still haven't done any actual work.  This is partly due to the computer not being actually plugged into any of the new Nerve Centre's 21st-Century communications infrastructure, with the result that I have spent the first part of my arrival in the Brave New World burrowing away under desks searching for sockets and becoming entangled in never-ending thick blue cables and piles of ladies' handbags.  But even when by some minor miracle I am able to get access to my inbox (again, rather comfortingly like my old one, in other words full of Staff Newsletters with urgent edicts directed personally at me and hidden away at the bottom of page 16, beside the wordsearch), I still don't get any work done.

This unproductivity can be attributed to the presence before my unaccustomed eyes of  windows, which were a feature of the office environment that the architects of the Stalinist Shopping Bunker had dispensed with entirely,  evidently considering them a bourgeouis frippery and liable to detract from the Workers' Appreciation of the Dignity of Labour.  Here in the new HQ a diametriacally opposed dogma appears to prevail, with the result that the budget has been stretched to accommodate the sort of uninterrupted, vertigo-inducing floor-to-ceiling window coverage normally only found within Airport terminals and public aquariums.  Perhaps understandably, this sudden reintroduction to the forgotten concept of daylight has reduced me to a state of goldfish-like awe, and I am reduced, for large swathes of the working day, to entranced, bug-eyed admiration of the passing articulated lorries which rumble along the double-carriageway far below like so many of Frankie's matchbox toys.

 

A rather agreeable existence, in short, although it clearly can't go on, not least because the sharp-suited executive class of Not-For-Profit Agency X are based just beside me in their own goldfishbowlesque side offices and have taken to bustling past my workstation at intervals in a way that suggests (at least to my perennially paranoid mind) that they may be taking a less than equivocal view of this odd scooterbound fellow who appears to test the concrete stilts of the building by giving them all a quick shake every morning before deigning to enter the HQ, where he proceeds to do what appears to be very little that could be described as actual work.

 

Well it serves them right for first denying me daylight for six months and then arranging for it to be served up in dizzying abundance by aggressively cheerful ladies in corporate livery, or at least that's what I will tell the Employment Tribunal when the time comes.  In the meantime, I swivel on my new office chair (unlike the old one, it has no arms, meaning I occasionally fall off and land in a pile of discarded photocopying or in the lap of a passing executive) and survey Manchester's leafy Westside in all its suburban glory.  Somewhere faraway, under the tree-cover, a half-forgotten Victorian market town sleeps peacefully, its once-grand civic buildings, now disused, crumbling imperceptibly in the unseasonal springtime sunshine. 

Up for the Cup

For no particular reason other than Frankie and Charlotte are off to a birthday party and I have the house to myself I've decided to do a minute by minute report on the FA Cup Final, you know, like those ones in the Guardian.  I mean it can't be that hard can it?  Now then where's the remote control oh it's under these cushions.  Now then...

Kick off minus 10 minutes.  Now then, turn on the TV and tune into BBC for- what the hell, Murder She Wrote? What the hell?

Kick off minus 9 minutes.  Panic over.  It's on ITV.  Adverts, then (as if we haven't had enough of toffs affecting to be down with the people this week) Prince William (or was it Harry, I am never sure) plugging the Respect Initiative and straightfacedly asserting his credentials as an Aston Villa fan.  Yeah, right.  

Kick off minus seven minutes.  The teams are in the tunnel

Kick off minus five minutes.  Now they're on the pitch, lined up and being introduced to (I am reliably informed by ITV's commentator) Prince William.   Chelsea are in their usual all-blue colours, Portsmouth line up in a natty-looking Poland-style outfit, white shirts wth red shorts.

Kick off minus three minutes.  The National Anthem is belted out by a pretty young opera diva in a ballgown.  We don't get the usual pictures of the players mumbling along embarrasedly while straining to get on with the real action.

Kick off minus one minute.  Preliminaries all but over.  Captains in the centre-circle, handshakes.  Last lingering shot of Prince William in the posh seats.  Portsmouth eleven gather for last - second huddle while Chelsea, already in position, impatiently wait for the whistle.

Kick off.  Chelsea get us underway, and knock it about in their own half, befoe a forward ball goes astray and Portsmouth get their first chance of a break.  Neither foray comes to anything.

3 mins.  Encouraging start for Portsmouth.  Three times they have dispossesed Chelsea and broken from deep, to no avail, but still.

4 mins.  Nearly one nil Chelsea.  Quick passing down the middle ends with a bending Lampard (who else?) efforts, which James may not have reached had it swerved another six inches and inside his left hand post.

7 mins.  All Chelsea now.  Switching from left to right looking for opening.  Cole breaks forward down left, headed clearance for throw near half way line, which comes to nothing.  James happy to take posession for Portsmouth and give his defence a breather.

8 mins.  Malouda tries some clever clever ball juggling on left, half way, gives away throw.  Dindane makes ground, wins throw in advanced position for Portsmouth, quickly followed by another.  This is better from the underdogs.

8 mins.  O'Haras' poor right wing cross brings Pompey's first little spell to an end, it's out of play behind the goal. 

10 mins.  Chelsea attack down left, Anelka, dropping deep, not for first time, stopped in tracks by sliding foul, free kick in promising position although probably too wide for a shot.  Lampard and Drogba standing over it.

10 mins.  Lampard had a shot at goal, scuffed it into the wall, Portsmouth break down left, ball ends up in hands of Cech.

12 mins.  Not a bad start to a Cup Final, this.  Portsmouth not showing thier illustrious opposition too much respect, even managing the odd breakaway.  If they can keep things level till twenty minutes in they might start to feel they have a chance.

14 mins.  Hold on a minute though.  First Lampard is just over with another long range swerver, then Anelka cuts inside from left and sees driven angled effort beaten away by James for a corner.  Looking ominous for Pompey all of a sudden.  'They need to try and carry a threat', says ItTVs Jim Beglin.  Easier said than done, that might be.

16 mins.  Another free kick to Chelsea, handball this time against Bouba Diop.  We're central this time, in Drogba territory.

17 mins.  Alex jumps the queue and hammers in a drive which is blocked by the wall.  But Chelsea are quickly back in the ascendancy, and Anelka's low cross needs a sharp block for a corner, which is cleared.

18 mins.  Portsmouth, in a rare break, win a throw deep in Chelsea territory, left side.  Then another.  They'll be glad of the breather.

19 mins.  First lunging tackle of the game, OHara on Ballack, who was going nowhere.  Ballack to his credit makes no meal of the incident, and Ohara escapes what could- should?- have been a booking.

20 mins.  Really good chance for Chelsea.  Drogba twice shoots from inside the box on left, twice denied by last ditch challenges.

21 mins.  Tremendous break from Portsmouth, Boateng meets right side cross with volley, needs a sharp reaction stop from Cech.  That came from nowhere.  There's a goal coming here, I'd say.  This is a wide open contest.

25 mins.  Pompey growing visibly in confidence, keep posession patiently on right, then switch to left, where Mullins attempts to gain ground.  His chipped ball forward ends up out for a goal kick, but that was enterprising stuff.

27 mins.  Open goal missed by Kalou!  Unbelievable.  He was three yards out and unmarked coming on to a rebound after James denied Cole from an angle.  The ball was slightly bouncing but he had time to pick his spot- somehow he managed to lift it onto the bar.  James, scrambling to recover his ground, grabs the loose ball.  That was a 'And Smith Must Score' moment.  Yes, that bad.

29 mins.  You start to think it could be Portsmouth's day here.  Chelsea have just hit the woodwork again- Terry with a header off the bar this time, with James beaten. 

30 mins. On the other hand, if Chelsea open the scoring you imagine the floodgates will open.  A Bury fan of my acquaintance was worrying this morning his club's claim to fame- their record 6-0 FA Cup Final victory of 1906-might be under threat if the favourites arrived with their shooting boots on.  There's an hour still to play here and I don't imagine he's sitting entirely comfortably yet.

32 mins.  Welcome respite for Portsmouth, a free-kick in their own half.  Short outbreak of handbags involving Ballack and half the Portsmouth opposition, quickly quelled by referee who is having a decent, no nonsense game so far.  What was that they used to say, if you don't notice the ref he's doing OK.  Of course now I've said that there'll be a twenty one man brawl and he'll send three off.

34 mins.  Real chance on the break for Pompey,  Dindane has time and space in box receiving low cross from the left, scuffs his effort which is blocked.  It sounds ridiculous given that Chelsea have hit the woodwork three times and seen several other efforts whistle just past James in goal, but Pompey aren't out of this.  Not while it's 0-0, anyway.

36 mins.  Ballack down for Chelsea, and staying down.  Apparently a bad foul by Dindane, although I didn't see it.  The Chelsea 13 is back on his feet now, as replays show him getting an almighty clatter on the shinpads.  Chelsea free kick, forty yards out, central.

38 mins.  We've had Smith 1983, now Hurst 1966.  Drogba's shot tipped onto bar by James, it drops- on? just over? the line, then out.  No goal the decision, two ITV replays and we still can't tell.  If that ball proves to be over, expect a lenghty and tedious debate aabout goal line technology, starting tomorrow and lasting until the World Cup and beyond.

40 mins.  The commentary team have just this second shut up about goal line technology, although to be fair nothing of note has happened on the pitch since The Incident.

42 mins.  The post again!  Drogba from an angle this time, James did just enough to force a rushed effort which bounces off the near upright and behind.  This is getting silly.

43 mins.  Crossfield ball to Piquione, who is adjudged offside.  If Pompey can just hold on for two minutes plus stoppage time.  If they can just hold on.

44 mins.   Ballack struggling- in fact he's being replaced- he never recovered from that challenge.  Jim Beglin, using the remote diagnostic powers that co-commentators nowadays seem to believe they are blessed with, reckons he'll be out for '10 days'.  Watch it'll be twenty minutes, or six months.

45 mins.  Another close thing for Chelsea, I didnt even see what happened that time.  and while I scratch my head Milouda has an effort blocked from twenty yards for a corner, that was headed for the top corner of James' net.  Can Pompey hold out?  Well, can they?  

47 mins.  Ashley Cole's speculative effort not only doesn't hit the post, but nearly hits the corner flag.  And that's the last effort of what the commentary team call 'the most absorbing scoreless half you are likely to see'.  I'm not arguing with that. I'll wager Prince William in the posh seats might even have stayed awake for the duration.  Roll on the second act of this one.

 

.....

 

45 mins (well 48 really but you know what I mean, I mean the start of the second half).  We're underway again, someone should tell the crowd, many of whom seem still to be tucking into their bovril and prawn sandwiches and haven't taken their seats yet.

46 mins.  Free kick to the underdogs in promising position.  Left side, crossed in, Drogba heads clear in clumsy challenge on Boateng, the commentators are arguing that could have been a spot-kick- not that this is entirely borne out by replays.

48 mins.  Three minutes into the second half and Chelsea haven't even hit the post yet.  Only a matter of time I'm sure.

50 mins.  Anelka on left touchline trips over the ball, Portsmouth eventually hoof clear- if that's their tactic for keeping Chelsea at bay for 45 plus minutes here, they could be in for a long half.  Even longer than the first one.

51 mins.  Mind you they've got a free kick in midfield now so what do I know.  And from it, Boateng is not far off with an angled volley after Chelsea's offside trap malfunctions.  That's the first chance of this half, but you'd still got to say Chelsea are favourites- wouldn't you?

52 mins.  Dindane's cross overhit, Cech easily catches.  Still, in the context of this game that counts as Pompey pressure.  Now they've got another free kick near the centre circle.  They'll not mind forty minutes more like this.

53 mins.  And another free kick.  Left side this time, in crossable territory.  Saying that they try to play their way in down the line, and are dispossessed.  Still, this is much better from the underdogs.

54 mins.  O'Hara jinks infield, his shot is blocked.  But Pompey come again and Dindane is fouled wide on right- penalty!  Stonewall penalty for Pompey.  Now hold on a minute this could start to get really interesting.

55 mins.  Saved by Cech!  Poor penalty to be fair from Boateng.  Down the middle, low, weak, stopped by the big goalie's trailing leg.  That surely will be Pompey's best chance of a result here.  Their heads could go down, and you could hardly blame them.  Crucial five minutes coming up.

58 mins.  Chelsea have a free kick in shooting position on left.  Drogba looks favourite.  Long run up, bending shot, James well beaten to his left, it's off the post- and in!  Well the script was written when the penalty was saved, wasn't it?  The goal is deserved, but you feel for Pompey here.  What price that 6-0 record now?  No you're right, that's being silly.

60 mins.  Pompey make ground down left, long throw coming in from Brown I think.  Here it comes, hooked away half clear from Lampard but Dindane has  chance to connect on volley as it's hoisted back in.  Cech claims though, and you do wonder if Pompey will have the quality to break down Chelsea in what remains here.  

62 mins.  Ivanovich in space right side of the box, crosses, Kalou's sliding connection goes just wide with James nowhere.  Could have been game over there.

64 mins.  Chelsea happy to hold onto posession, some patient interplay wins them a free kick near half way.  Pompey just need to hold on here and try and get a foothold.  Like I seem to remember saying in the first half though, that could be easier said than done.

65 mins.  The Free Kick came to nothing, and Pompey try to make ground down left, then right.  Terry brings down Dindane, and it's a free-kick to Pompey now, level with the box on the right. That was cynical from the Chelsea captain.  Pompey need to make the most of deadballs like this....

67 mins.   ... which they don't.  Now they're back in their own half. James is belting it seventy yards forward and Chelsea gain posession, Kalou's cross could have been dangerous if there'd been anyone on the end of it.  Chelsea looking the more likely here, without having to over-extend themselves.  Which is ominous for Pompey.

69 mins.  I dont think the underdogs heads have gone down yet, though.  OHara essays another of his jinking runs from wide left, only to be crowded out.  What was it Cloughie used to say- it only takes a second to score a goal.  If they can just hang on in there...

71 mins. Change for Chelsea.  Cole for (I think) Kalou.  Could be Cole's sort of stage this, he'll get quality posession down that left side.  And as I type that a break down that side ends with a goalbound shot blocked.  Oh it was Joe Cole who hit it- what did I tell you?

73 mins.  John Uttaka (Uttaka by name, Attacker by nature, quips our man on the ITV) is on for Pompey, it was Boateng, the penalty- miss man, who made way.  He'll sit in the stands now praying his teammates can make his error a mere footnote in the story of this final. You'd have to bet against that at this stage, though.

75 mins.  Fine run and shot by Anelka- having said that his twenty yard effort was always swerving away from goal, James (as befitting a man who has seen five efforts rebound back of his woodwork in the last hour) watches it nonchalantly drift past him, probably while daydreaming about his next groundbreaking haircut.

77 mins.  A lull in play.  The first there's been in what has truly been an enthralling cup final.  And with 13 mins left Pompey are still in this one, as long as the margin stays at the solitary goal.

78 mins.  Anelka, twisting Finnan this way and that, takes his sweet time about picking out Lampard with a bouncing cross.  Lampard connects first time but it's well over James' bar.  To be fair it would have taken some effort to score from there and he didn't have time to take a touch before being closed down.

79 mins.  Uttaka the Attacker tries to barge past a Chelsea defender on the narrow side wide left but only succeeds in running the ball out for a goalkick.  Avram Grant responds by warming up another attacker on the bench.  The ITV commentators are no doubt leafing urgently through the quip book as we speak.

80 mins.  Decent spell of posession from Pompey, but it's all in front of the Chelsea massed defence.  A free kick eventually though, before which we will see two subs from the underdogs. We've got Kanu on, and Bel Hadj, who's quickly involved, putting in two crosses, the second of which should really result in a goal from Dindane.  Corner to Pompey. No subsitute-related quips from the commentators during any of that, what do I pay my licence fee for?  Oh it's on ITV.  Fair enough.

82 Mins.  Uttaka the Attacker attacks a loose headed clearance but scuffs his twenty yard effort well wide.  Is this game going to come down to Chelsea's superior quality when presented with shooting opportunities?  Put it this way, you don't imagine Lampard would have missed that spot-kick.

84 mins.  Cech taking his time about restarting play, and I can't say I blame him.  Chelsea are on the verge of the double here unless Pompey can lift themselves, make one more chance... and take it.

85 mins.  El Hadj again- tremendous outswerving cross from the left, he should have been on from the start on this showing.  Again noone in a white shirt can quite connect.  But if Pompey are going to get anything they need to keep supplying the Algerian left side.

87 mins.  Ah.  I think it's going to be all over.  Lampard brought down in the box, not quite as stonewall as Pompey's one but not much argument from the defenders.  He's stepping up to take it himself...

88 mins... and misses!  Not even on target with the effort.  Well I will say right here and now I didn't see that coming at all, we all know Lampard is as near as you get to a certainty from 12 yards.  Don't tell me Pompey are going to snatch something here...

89 mins.  Subsitution for Chelsea, or at least it will be when they get a chance to make it.  Ball still in play with Pompey, who probe down the left through that man El Hadj.  This time it comes to nothing though, and Chelsea get a free kick and a chance to make that subsitution.  Sturridge for Anelka.

90 mins.  There'll be 3 more minutes of this.

91 mins.  Avram Grant is pacing the touchline looking intense, maybe resigned.  He can be proud of his men this afternoon though.  Remember, there were plenty who thought this would be a slaughtering for the underdogs.

93 mins.  And it's all over.  Cech intercepts a hopeful cross, and the final whistle brings an end to Pompey's brave, dignified challenge, and delivers a double to the favourites. 

Well done Chelsea-  and well done every player on that pitch.  An enthralling game from start to finish, if they're going to keep coming like that, I'll do a minute by minute on every one of them.  Thank you and good-night.

Swingometers, Swirly Staircases, and Sleeplessness in San Sebastian

It's little wonder I've become hopelessly obsessed with the election really, as it's only the second one in my voting-age life when polling day has come around with the result still in doubt.  What's more the previous time I wasn't even in the country- it was 1992 and I was in San Sebastian, northern Spain, where, in line with the default career choice of language graduates emerging from redbrick Polytechics into late-Thatcher Britain, I was carving myself out a niche as a TEFL teacher and trainee alcoholic.  Polling night found a group of us in a bar in the Reyes Catolicos district where in the absence of the yet-to-be-invented mobile phones or internet the only way to find out the result was to empty all the 25 peseta pieces out of our pockets and into the slot of the Telefonica booth by the cigarette machine and put a call through to whoever's parents were most likely still to be awake and in thrall to the BBC Swingometer.  

 

A Tyneside number was judged the most likely option, so it fell upon my mam to break to the San Sebastian TEFL community (or at least the half-dozen of them crowded into the phone booth in the corner of the Nueva Beri Beri) the heart-stopping news that John Major had defied the odds and somehow denied Kinnock's Labour of what had seemed a certain victory.  I remember the 'phone call quite vividly, and the aftermath (which featured me falling over the Beri Beri's posh swirly staircase bannisters in a vain effort to leave the bar and landing smack on my head on the top of the cigarette machine and having to be escorted from the premises by a Staunch Labour ex-librarian named Arsenal Nigel) not quite so well.

 

By contrast, last night I took in the results from the comfort of my own couch, was sustained till 4:30AM by nothing stronger than successively stronger cups of instant coffee, and succeeded at the end of the evening in avoiding falling over the bannisters.  But there were similar sinking feelings as the results started to come in.  I managed to stay up until The Humiliation of Rantzen*, by which time the spectre of a Cameron majority had been put to bed.  Five hours later I was back at work, where as is my constitutional right I spent the day in a haze of sleep-deprivation and caffeine overload, incapable of anything more useful than clicking the 'refresh' button on the Guardian Minute-by-Minute election page and trying to decipher the latest twist in the fast-flowering and utterly cringeworthy Cameron-Clegg Love Pact .

 

I do hope that unholy union (what the hell are those Liberals playing at, by the way, does anyone know?) is not consummated, as this time round, unlike in 1992, I don't have the option of hiding away in a rainy corner of the continent until it's all over and both New Labour and the internet have been invented and it seems safe to come home.  Only time will tell, but it's late now so I am off to bed where I will in all probability dream of Hung Parliaments past and present, and the Posh Swirly Staircase of the Beri Beri Bar in the Reyes Catolicos, San Sebastian.  I'm just glad elections like this only come round once every twenty years, as I'm not sure how well my delicate (and of course unwritten) constitution can cope with them.   

 

* Two 'That's Life' references in two successive posts.  Who would have thought it?