(no subject)
I have a problem. I have, as I often do, an urge to write- God knows why but I do. This happens to me quite a lot of the time but, as is currently the case, the urge has failed to conincide with actually having anything to write about. That's not to say there hasn't been anything going on in the world on which I could decide to pass comment and judgement from my Ivory Tower (i.e. 2nd floor flat in Warrington).
I could write about Wimbledon, which has kept me nicely occupied for the past two weeks. I've actually kind of fallen out of love with tennis and it's annual jaunt to SW19 in recent years. When I was growing up, it was a fascinating opportunity for my young eyes to witness the horrors of intense, naked psychological meltdown as the likes of McEnroe, Lendl and Connors went utterly mental with every lost point and dodgy line call- raging against the dying of the light in a variety of ill-fitting shorts and tragically misguided hair. At the other end of the court there would invariably be some huge blond Scandinavian or German pumping the ball through the air with ruthless efficiency and detached menace. It was like Die Hard on grass and it was utterly spellbinding.
But, in recent years, those efficient players seemed to totally take over- their domination epitomised by Pete " " Sampras- a man so unremmitingly level-headed he made Tiger Woods look like Genghis Khan. In tandem with him would be a succession of plucky, unloveable Brits ready and willing to disappoint for their country in-between the rain-breaks. When federer arrived on the scene he appeared for a while be even more relentlessly dull than Sampras- he was even Swiss for God's sake. And then Rafael Nadal turned up. Dressed like a pirate dipped in Daz and made entirely out of biceps he pushed Federer close in last year's final and then, this time out, pipped him to the post in possibly the greatest sporting contest ever witnessed by anyone ever. It was so good even the persistent showers seemed to add to the drama rather than just get in the way as usual- it seemed God himself was orchestrating events from the heavens. I always thought seeing Steve Redgrave win his fifth Olympic gold was as good as sport got; but this year's Wimbledon final went a step further as, following over 4 hours of see-sawing battle, Roger Federer collected his runner-up shield with grace and humility all while wearing a preposterous cardigan and, incredibly, not looking stupid. Surely these two are Gods among men.
I could write about all this, but I won't. Simon Barnes, the suspiciously hippy-looking chief sportswriter for The Times, does it much better and you'd be well advised to check out his writing on this and any other tournament.
I could write about Euro 2008, a football tournament for once unsullied by English spot-kick tragedy and instead graced by goals in their thousands and a couple of games that cocked a snook at end-of-season tiredness by not kicking into life until deep into injury time. This was a tournament in which the right team won and Michael Ballack turned out to be a compelling titan who we were all willing to forget, however briefly, mostly earns his crust in West London at the heart of the least likeable team in the history of European sport.
Fascinating narratives abounded throughout. Fernando Torres, looking like a 14 year old schoolgirl in a squad of bronzed Ibeiran galcticos, lead the line with guile and brilliance and still got substitued in every match by his unhinged coach. Luca Toni paid back all his pre-competition hype by spooning an inglorious succession of six-yard-box chances high and wide in a series of increasingly bizarre and desperate ways- as though he was trying to win the Turner Prize rather than the world's third biggest sporting event. Gary Neville, in the ITV studio-cum-bunker, came staggeringly close to allaying all the antipathy usually aimed at him for his shop-steward badge-kissing persona by proving to be the sharpest pundit around- only to spoil everything by wearing preposterous facial hair.
I could write about this, but I won't. As with every footballing shindig there's been acres of writing covering every possible angle there is to cover and therefore there is aboslutely bugger all that I could add.
I could write about Gatley Festival, an extraordinary Sunday afternoon I recently spent in an outpost of Cheadle which could even make Abu Al-Hamza fall in love with the British summer-time. The highlight of the day's proceedings was a parade through the centre of the village featuring various pillars of the community, an assortment of dance troupes, Stockport County's League One play-off trophy and the mandatory terrified-looking Rose Queen. Clearly, many members of the community of all ages had put hours of work, entirely off their own backs, into preparing for this parade and putting on a bit of a show for their friends and neighbours. Moments before the procession was to get underway God, as a bi-product of his work on Wimbledon's Centre Court, felt the need to douse everyone with a shower that verged on the biblical. All that effort threatened to end in a sodden troop through the streets as the friends and neighbours for whom this event had all been prepared sheltered in the nearest pub.
Then, with seconds to spare, the clouds parted and the sun shone through- allowing the parade to set off in front of pavements suddenly six-deep in people and cheer. All was well with the world, all that earnest hard work by the people of Gatley was paying off. Then the Number 11 bus turned up. The bus was surprised to find it's normal, scheduled route through this particular part of South Manchester blocked by a line of dancing teenagers and football mascots- something which the depot had clearly not felt inclined to warn the driver about. Determined to stick to his timetable, he soon figured out an alternative route round the parade and embarked on a three-point turn which soon garnered the attention of the thronged masses who had been nicely lubricated by a crafty pint or two during the earlier shower. Suddenly, the parade which had been months in the planning was playing second fiddle to a bemused and frustrated Stagecoach Manchester employee wrestling with the laws of physics and a vehicle clearly unsuited to compicated manouveurs on a tight road near a drunken audience and a procession of twiddling batons. It was hard not to feel sorry for the organisers as the crowd left the spectacle they'd laid on to roar encouragement at the driver revving up for his latest battle with the forces of Isaac Newton; but not even the worldy might of W.H. Auden could have conjured up a more perfect vista of the summer months in these Isles than these precious moments in Manchester's posh bits.
I could write about this, but I won't. You had to be there, you see. It was one of those moments where the re-telling will never live up to the experience itself. Even if the late, great Dave Allen had been there and conjoured up a 20 minute routine on it.
I could write about job-hunting, the bane of my current existence and the sour taste in the mouth at the end of my PGCE course. Having spent a year gaining my qualification to allow me to show 'A Matter Of Life And Death' to successive generations of teenagers I now have to find an organistaion willing to pay me to do it. This involves a monotonous round of endless application forms onto which I have scrawled my name, address, qualifications and the fact that I have a driving licence and no previous convictions for third-degree murder.
In amongst all of this is the greatest challenge of all- the personal statement. It is impossible to write one of these without sounding like some deluded fuckwit from The Apprentice. You have to bang on about your achievements and brilliance which, as anyone who has ever had to fill in an apllication form in will tell you, immediately makes you sound like a tosser of the highest order. I nearly leapt out of a window recently when I realised that, in the course of cobbling yet another paeon to my invented magnificence together, I had unwitingly used the word 'paradigm'. The desire to trail off halfway through a sentence on why your degree proves you are capable of effective time-management and simply write "FOR FUCK'S SAKE, TALK TO ME AND FIND OUT WHAT I'M LIKE- DON'T JUST READ THIS UTTER BULLSHIT AND JUDGE ME. PLEASE JUSTIFY MY EXISTENCE TO MY EYES. PLEASE HELP ME. HELP ME" is often entriely overwhelming and I believe a knighthood should be forthcoming to anyone who could read their statement back to a roomful of people with a straight face and without slumping to the floor in a deluge of resigned tears.
Maybe this is the reason. Maybe these statements, their inanity, their pointlessness, their in-built default to hoodwinking is the reason why I have an urge to write something but no idea of what to write about. Whatever part of my brain controls writing has been forced, largely against it's will, to peddle reams of written tripe in the hope that it will persuade someone in a college somewhere to meet me face-to-face to discuss my potential ability to communicate to students almost entirely via the completely different medium of speech. Maybe that's why it's itching to write something but the rest of my brain can't think what to write.
Maybe that's why I could write about any of the things listed above, but I won't.
Because I can't.
I could write about Wimbledon, which has kept me nicely occupied for the past two weeks. I've actually kind of fallen out of love with tennis and it's annual jaunt to SW19 in recent years. When I was growing up, it was a fascinating opportunity for my young eyes to witness the horrors of intense, naked psychological meltdown as the likes of McEnroe, Lendl and Connors went utterly mental with every lost point and dodgy line call- raging against the dying of the light in a variety of ill-fitting shorts and tragically misguided hair. At the other end of the court there would invariably be some huge blond Scandinavian or German pumping the ball through the air with ruthless efficiency and detached menace. It was like Die Hard on grass and it was utterly spellbinding.
But, in recent years, those efficient players seemed to totally take over- their domination epitomised by Pete " " Sampras- a man so unremmitingly level-headed he made Tiger Woods look like Genghis Khan. In tandem with him would be a succession of plucky, unloveable Brits ready and willing to disappoint for their country in-between the rain-breaks. When federer arrived on the scene he appeared for a while be even more relentlessly dull than Sampras- he was even Swiss for God's sake. And then Rafael Nadal turned up. Dressed like a pirate dipped in Daz and made entirely out of biceps he pushed Federer close in last year's final and then, this time out, pipped him to the post in possibly the greatest sporting contest ever witnessed by anyone ever. It was so good even the persistent showers seemed to add to the drama rather than just get in the way as usual- it seemed God himself was orchestrating events from the heavens. I always thought seeing Steve Redgrave win his fifth Olympic gold was as good as sport got; but this year's Wimbledon final went a step further as, following over 4 hours of see-sawing battle, Roger Federer collected his runner-up shield with grace and humility all while wearing a preposterous cardigan and, incredibly, not looking stupid. Surely these two are Gods among men.
I could write about all this, but I won't. Simon Barnes, the suspiciously hippy-looking chief sportswriter for The Times, does it much better and you'd be well advised to check out his writing on this and any other tournament.
I could write about Euro 2008, a football tournament for once unsullied by English spot-kick tragedy and instead graced by goals in their thousands and a couple of games that cocked a snook at end-of-season tiredness by not kicking into life until deep into injury time. This was a tournament in which the right team won and Michael Ballack turned out to be a compelling titan who we were all willing to forget, however briefly, mostly earns his crust in West London at the heart of the least likeable team in the history of European sport.
Fascinating narratives abounded throughout. Fernando Torres, looking like a 14 year old schoolgirl in a squad of bronzed Ibeiran galcticos, lead the line with guile and brilliance and still got substitued in every match by his unhinged coach. Luca Toni paid back all his pre-competition hype by spooning an inglorious succession of six-yard-box chances high and wide in a series of increasingly bizarre and desperate ways- as though he was trying to win the Turner Prize rather than the world's third biggest sporting event. Gary Neville, in the ITV studio-cum-bunker, came staggeringly close to allaying all the antipathy usually aimed at him for his shop-steward badge-kissing persona by proving to be the sharpest pundit around- only to spoil everything by wearing preposterous facial hair.
I could write about this, but I won't. As with every footballing shindig there's been acres of writing covering every possible angle there is to cover and therefore there is aboslutely bugger all that I could add.
I could write about Gatley Festival, an extraordinary Sunday afternoon I recently spent in an outpost of Cheadle which could even make Abu Al-Hamza fall in love with the British summer-time. The highlight of the day's proceedings was a parade through the centre of the village featuring various pillars of the community, an assortment of dance troupes, Stockport County's League One play-off trophy and the mandatory terrified-looking Rose Queen. Clearly, many members of the community of all ages had put hours of work, entirely off their own backs, into preparing for this parade and putting on a bit of a show for their friends and neighbours. Moments before the procession was to get underway God, as a bi-product of his work on Wimbledon's Centre Court, felt the need to douse everyone with a shower that verged on the biblical. All that effort threatened to end in a sodden troop through the streets as the friends and neighbours for whom this event had all been prepared sheltered in the nearest pub.
Then, with seconds to spare, the clouds parted and the sun shone through- allowing the parade to set off in front of pavements suddenly six-deep in people and cheer. All was well with the world, all that earnest hard work by the people of Gatley was paying off. Then the Number 11 bus turned up. The bus was surprised to find it's normal, scheduled route through this particular part of South Manchester blocked by a line of dancing teenagers and football mascots- something which the depot had clearly not felt inclined to warn the driver about. Determined to stick to his timetable, he soon figured out an alternative route round the parade and embarked on a three-point turn which soon garnered the attention of the thronged masses who had been nicely lubricated by a crafty pint or two during the earlier shower. Suddenly, the parade which had been months in the planning was playing second fiddle to a bemused and frustrated Stagecoach Manchester employee wrestling with the laws of physics and a vehicle clearly unsuited to compicated manouveurs on a tight road near a drunken audience and a procession of twiddling batons. It was hard not to feel sorry for the organisers as the crowd left the spectacle they'd laid on to roar encouragement at the driver revving up for his latest battle with the forces of Isaac Newton; but not even the worldy might of W.H. Auden could have conjured up a more perfect vista of the summer months in these Isles than these precious moments in Manchester's posh bits.
I could write about this, but I won't. You had to be there, you see. It was one of those moments where the re-telling will never live up to the experience itself. Even if the late, great Dave Allen had been there and conjoured up a 20 minute routine on it.
I could write about job-hunting, the bane of my current existence and the sour taste in the mouth at the end of my PGCE course. Having spent a year gaining my qualification to allow me to show 'A Matter Of Life And Death' to successive generations of teenagers I now have to find an organistaion willing to pay me to do it. This involves a monotonous round of endless application forms onto which I have scrawled my name, address, qualifications and the fact that I have a driving licence and no previous convictions for third-degree murder.
In amongst all of this is the greatest challenge of all- the personal statement. It is impossible to write one of these without sounding like some deluded fuckwit from The Apprentice. You have to bang on about your achievements and brilliance which, as anyone who has ever had to fill in an apllication form in will tell you, immediately makes you sound like a tosser of the highest order. I nearly leapt out of a window recently when I realised that, in the course of cobbling yet another paeon to my invented magnificence together, I had unwitingly used the word 'paradigm'. The desire to trail off halfway through a sentence on why your degree proves you are capable of effective time-management and simply write "FOR FUCK'S SAKE, TALK TO ME AND FIND OUT WHAT I'M LIKE- DON'T JUST READ THIS UTTER BULLSHIT AND JUDGE ME. PLEASE JUSTIFY MY EXISTENCE TO MY EYES. PLEASE HELP ME. HELP ME" is often entriely overwhelming and I believe a knighthood should be forthcoming to anyone who could read their statement back to a roomful of people with a straight face and without slumping to the floor in a deluge of resigned tears.
Maybe this is the reason. Maybe these statements, their inanity, their pointlessness, their in-built default to hoodwinking is the reason why I have an urge to write something but no idea of what to write about. Whatever part of my brain controls writing has been forced, largely against it's will, to peddle reams of written tripe in the hope that it will persuade someone in a college somewhere to meet me face-to-face to discuss my potential ability to communicate to students almost entirely via the completely different medium of speech. Maybe that's why it's itching to write something but the rest of my brain can't think what to write.
Maybe that's why I could write about any of the things listed above, but I won't.
Because I can't.