We're All The Same.

On Sunday night my next door neighbour had a massive heart attack and died immediately. He was alone in his living room and never had time to shout out for help.

It really shook me up. I've had 2 heart attacks myself and so having someone I know die from one made me think.

It reminded me that I've twice been given a chance to do some things differently. I'd been fixing my supper when the ambulance pulled up and when I found out what had happened, I cut my supper portion in half ! I know it was a knee jerk reaction but once again, I'm determined to eat more healthily and exercise more too.

As if having had my own heart attacks wasn't enough of an incentive !!

Ikram, my neighbour, was a lovely man. A family man with 3 kids who are a credit to him. The oldest is 22 and just finished at University. He'll now be the man of the house.

The boys are quiet, polite and the family have been wonderful neighbours. They cut my lawn and look after my mail when I go to America for 6 months every year. We've never been "pop in for a coffee type" neighbours but we've known each other for about 15 years so I've seen the boys grow up and they've never caused me any concern. Far from it.

This afternoon I went to see Ikram for the last time. He was a Muslim and so to see him and say goodbye, I went to his mosque. This was a first for me and originally I hadn't planned on going in - just being outside to pay my respects.

But when the family were told I was there, I was asked in. There was a long line of people slowly passing the open coffin with the family members standing at it's head. I made my way to join the line but my name was called out and I was asked to stand with the family. People spread out to let me get to the coffin and I was able to say my goodbyes to Ikram.

I was just a neighbour. I was a Christian. But I was treated as someone special at a time when I could easily have been overlooked and left as an outsider in this Muslim world. Everyone who spoke to me was kind, polite and hospitable. It was an occasion I will never forget.

With the funeral over, there now begins a period of mourning. Gradually the friends and extended family members will leave. On Monday morning, when the body was taken to the hospital for a post mortem, the boys and their mother left to stay a few streets away with Ikram's brother and they've not all been back to the house since then. When they do and are once again surrounded by tangable and atmospheric memories, I think it will finally hit them that a husband and father has gone forever.

We all have our own attitudes about other nationalities, cultures and religions and these can be influenced by what we read in newspapers or see on tv and the headlines are always made by extremists.

Extremists are just that, extreme. Even though, by their dramatic actions, they can lead us to think they represent much more than they really do, we should always remember that the vast majority of people everywhere are not like that.

Ikram raised his family to be decent, honest and hard working. And Muslim. I admit I'd been swayed by the media and numerous news reports into having a negative attitude towards Muslims and it has taken his passing to redress that attitude.

I feel that's a legacy worthy of the man himself.

More Spurn Pointers

Ok now where were we......oh yeah. I'd just burst through the vegetation at the very end of Spurn Point and was finally on the beach.

Oh in case you need to catch up, go to my blog post from Saturday and have a read.

But if not, here is a brief synopsis : sunny day, drove to Spurn Point, saw a lighthouse, walked through a maze and got to the beach.

Right, off we go again.

This is that beach.

No, I'd not gone to Normandy or travelled back in time to 1944 either but I could understand it if you thought both.

It wasn't much of a beach but then it wasn't really supposed to be. It was just the end of the land and as such, there was sand.

Poetic.

You see Spurn Point is a constantly moving peninsula. The waters on the North Sea side wear away the land and deposits on the Humber Estuary build it up again and this effectively 'moves' everything, slowly, over the decades. Actually the waters can wash completely over the land in places and a 'new' point is created and then built up again but this is done over a period of centuries.

"Ok enough of the serious geography stuff already." Righty o.

There is also a lifeboat station at the Point. Built in 1810.

And here is the lifeboat. All ready for action. Isn't it nice ? Isn't it very orange ? Yes it is.

Not sure how they get out to it when it's needed for that action but I'm sure they can.

Interesting fact ("about bloody time too") - this is the only lifeboat station in the UK with full time paid staff.

Not a lot of people know that.

So Spurn Point has a lifeboat, a lighthouse, a beach of sorts and lots of birds.

It's famous for it's birds. Bit of a bird sanctuary actually.
Twitchers, sorry bird watchers, flock there (sorry again) to look for rare species that sometimes rest there on their way to nicer places. South of France maybe. North Africa. Places with decent weather anyway.

But I hardly saw a single bird. Oh I saw birds, yes, but no more than I'd see at home or at the seaside anywhere. Didn't see any twitchers either so maybe it was off season. Maybe the credit crunch was hitting bird vacations too and they were staying home and improving their nests.

There were quite a few people fishing and with expensive setups too. I didn't see any of them catching anything fishy but one had his line caught up in a ship propeller and he was last seen on his way to Amsterdam. Har har.

It was quite a busy channel and large tankers and ore carriers were passing by every few minutes.

Nobody was IN the water as, although it was a suuny day, it wasn't all that warm and the water temperature certainly wasn't conducive to swimming.

Not sure I'd want to ever swim in North Sea waters but that's another story.

I was walking back along the beach to the car park area and came upon this odd looking tower.

It used to be a munitions store during the war as Spurn Point was a key fortified outpost back then.

There was a military railway line that ran the length of the peninsula and due to the constant shifting that I mentioned earlier, the tracks criss cross the road and go off into the vegetation in places as it has stayed static while the land it was built on has moved. Bizarre.

There were also several wartime bunkers and concrete fortifications at the end of the Point and they still remain in some form or other. Most are crumbling away but enough of the structures remain to give an idea of what things were like back in the early 1940's when invasion was always a threat. Now we let anyone in !

3 young kids had used a surf board to paddle out to the tower and were enjoying themselves climbing up the lower part of its base and going all the way around.

At times the tower is on the beach but when I was there, the tide had come in and it was well out into the channel.

Before leaving Spurn Point, I went back to the vegetation for a last walk through part of it as I'd found it to be more interesting than the beach.

There were loads of butterflies and bees and I took photos of several of them and here is one of a cute little fluffy bee.

I know cute and fluffy aren't words that spring to mind when you talk about bees but enlarge this one and it's certainly fluffy. Maybe not cute.

I need a macro lens though.

And so it was back to the car and off back home.

On the way through the flat farmland East of Hull, I came upon a farmer on his combine harvester.

He stopped to do some maintenance and we had a chat before he set off again.

The weather has been so bad these last few weeks that he was taking this chance to get on with the harvesting and he said he'd be working all through the night to make the most of this dry spell.

I sped on as I wanted to get to the Humber Bridge for sunset to try and get some photos of it.

That meant going through Hull and I stopped briefly as the harbour also looked like a good location for some pics. It wasn't easy to find a parking place near the harbour but I could tell the evening light would be so good with the boats and water.

But there were really too many boats and they were tightly docked next to one another.

This made it a bit tricky and I almost left without getting anything worth saving.

Then I noticed a boat coming in from the sea and I positioned myself at the widest part of the harbour with a photogenic church tower in the background - and waited.

Thankfuly the boat came all the way across the harbour and I got this photo just before it disappeared to the left to dock. Nothing special but I liked the reflections and the light and if nothing else, it was a snap shot memory for me to enjoy later.

And then it was on to the bridge.

The 27 year old Humber Bridge held the record for the longest single span suspension bridge in the world for 16 years and it is currently the 5th longest. However it does still hold one world record. It is the longest bridge you can walk over. Good luck doing that. At 1.3 miles long, I decided to give it a miss.

Anyway, I got there at 8pm, just minutes before sunset. I drove down to its base where there is a swanky restaurant, parked up and got ready.

I'm not sure what happened but there was no sunset. Well not in a classic red sky way. It just went dark. And then, as is the way, it got bright for a while. I was bummed.

So as not to have totally wasted my time with this slight detour to the bridge, I decided to do something I do very rarely. I took a photo of myself.

It had been a lovely day out. The sun shone, I'd got lots of exercise and to end it all, here is that photo of me with the Humber Bridge behind me. Be nice now.

It's All Huff And Puff

I've been watching a bit of the Olympics and we've not been doing too bad really. As I type this, we're 3rd in the medal table (11 golds) and if you take away the genetically modified 'Dolphin Boy's' 8 personal golds, we'd be equal 2nd alongside the USA. Hurrah for us.

We seem to have got a crop of sportsmen and women who don't just want to take part but want to, and expect to, win gold.

How refreshing.

How un-British.

Of course this has coincided with our country being renamed and rebranded for the Olympics.

Great Britain is now Team Britain. Fab. I'll rush out and get my passport updated. Very trendy. Can we have a new National Anthem please ? I'm with Billy Connelly on this one. Ours is a dirge and we need a jolly upbeat one that Cliff can sing and get it to No.1. Oh and write one that doesn't mention The Queen and then she can sing along with it too and not feel silly having to sing her own name all the time !

And speaking of countries and passports, I was born in Northern Ireland and my passport says I'm a citizen of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Fine.

So where are MY sportsmen at the Olympics ? We're not part of Team Britain after all. Can't be. Is there a separate Northern Ireland team then ? Nope. It's not a country on the Olympic list. There is Ireland of course but as we all know, Northern Ireland isn't Ireland. Oh no.

There is a North and South Korea after all. So what do MY people have to do to play at the Olympics ? Become Irish I guess and that must piss off a lot of them. And rightly so.

Oh a little bit political there, Ian.

Anyway the real reason for this post is to have a rant about the BBC interviewing technique again. Holy crap people, we don't need to listen to out of breath sportsmen/women seconds after their event has finished. I know they get whipped off to receive their medals or slash their wrists so there is only a small window of opportunity to find out what they thought of coming first or last but give them, and us, a break !

Until the early hours of this morning I'd thought sticking a mic in front of the rowers was the ultimate in hearing gasps and wheezes, grunts and groans instead of coherent English. But when poor Paula Radcliffe was interviewed almost before she crossed the Marathon finishing line, the BBC reached a new low.

The fact she got to Beijing was amazing enough, given her injuries. Then she almost stopped (again) part way round when, as she put it, it felt like one of her legs gave way. Only having one leg left, it made the rest of the race a bit of a struggle and she came into the stadium looking quite distressed and in a lot of pain. Showing typical British grit, sorry Team British grit, she made it to the line with the frustration and disappointment etched on her face. It was as if she had been told Leeds United had lost yesterday, such was the evident dispair !!

She hugged one of her fellow Team Brit runners, one who had fallen during the race and was covered with bruises and had a suspected broken rib. What a sight for the cameras. What guts. What pure Olympic spirit. What the fuck is that mic doing there ? Oh my God the BBC are straight in there asking inane questions of a woman who has given her all and clearly is so emotional that she can't put two words together.

We might as well have tried to listen to Amy Whitehouse or either Gallagher brother. It was incomprehensible. A hand went out from the interviewer to console her. Sod that, pal.

"Take the bloody mic away and leave her alone, you ass-hoooooole" I suggested to my tv set.

What next ? Will John Inverdale and Steve Redgrave climb into the boats to interview the rowers over the last 100 metres ? You can just imagine a GB (or TB) press launch gliding up and those two boarding the coxless fours (what is this, the Eunuch Olympics ??) complete with mic and camera crew.

"Shove over lads. Now then, what's it like to be leading at this stage ? Oh you're 2nd now.....hang on, 3rd. Ok what was it like to come last lads ?"

We're in an age of instant reactions and super slo-mo action replays on tv. The viewers, that's you and me, appear to want to see things over and over again - often missing something more exciting while watching the replay. Then we get a replay of what we missed and again risk missing somet.......well you get the point. They can position cameras everywhere to give us all possible viewing points. They're up in blimps and remote controlled balloons. They're on top of helmets. Inside and all over the outsides of race cars. On top of football crossbars and underwater in swimming pools. They're even inside tennis balls. Oh no that was Bee Movie !!

All this I can appreciate and actually like as it gets us more involved in the sport. But these instant and inane interviews get me going. What can someone possibly say of any interest when asked what it feels like to come 1st or 2nd or umpteenth ? I mean dismissing the fact that they are knackered and incoherent (and if a boxer, this incoherence comes BEFORE the fight), they are either so eleated at winning that they are crying or they are so pissed off by losing that they're crying. And what can they say anyway ?

"Well Gary/John/Steve/Brendan, I'm, pant, so, gasp, wheeze, cough, just so, puff, puff, gasp, happy to be, wheeze, here today and I'd, puff, puff, like to thank my.............."

"Ok sorry we have to leave it there and return you to Sue in the studio as Team Britain are going for 23rd place in the beach volleyball. As you know this would be our highest ever position as, of course, although being an island race, we only have 2 clean beaches to train on"

So BBC, save us a bucket load of licence money and recall all the interviewers. Keep the comentators as I've tried watching sports without them and it just doesn't work. But the interviewers are just on a foreigh jolly and we don't need them.

Strap a camera and mic to all 311 Team GB athletes and we can hear them whenever we want. And more to the point, when THEY want. Let us call them up on Skype or something so we can talk to them after every event too. That's the way forward.

And it's not just the Olympics. Oh don't get me going on footy interviewers.

Just don't.

Spurned Pointers

Don't panic, this isn't going to be a post about my sad love life. I don't do one sentence posts.

No, this is about my day out yesterday at Spurn Point, or Spurn Head as it's sometimes called.

First, lets have a little map.

The picture-in-picture shows England. Bet you didn't know it was THAT small ? And empty !

Anyway, as in the case with these sorts of map thingies, the circled bit is expanded to show the details - but you knew that already.

Sorry.

Being a clever sod, I've added Leeds myself as the map didn't show it and it's kind of crucial to my story, being my starting point an' all.

"Well children, do you see Spurn Head ? Hands up. Yes, Timmy, we all know it looks like a willy but thank you for saying it out loud."

Actually to be anatomically correct, it's a bit of a sad, limp willy and as usual the Americans have a much better one, a sort of viagra peninsula, called Cape Cod. Showoffs.

One reason for wanting to go there was because the drive would take me past The Humber Bridge which is a big, big, BIG bridge over, ah, well, The Humber. Google it. I'll get to it later.

I set off at 11am as, lets face it, I wasn't going to miss a lie-in. Sun or no sun.

So by the time I got to the end of the world and realised I'd better get some lunch before totally leaving civilisation, I came to a lovely pub.

This pub in fact.

As you can see, the road, although hardly a 4 lane highway, is at least paved and can take a car in either direction.

This view is looking back the way I'd come and you can just make out the water on the left. If we went up in a hot air balloon, we'd soon see water on the right side as well - as we're now at the start of the peninsula.

If anyone cares, I had a steak and ale pie, chips, peas and carrots. Yum.

A few hundred yards further along, I came to a sign. As it told me that there was an entrance fee, it wasn't a good sign. Literally.

I thought about it long and hard but as I'd driven for 2 hrs to get there, I wasn't going to go back now.

As anyone who knows me will tell you, I HATE paying money for scenery. Well I don't mind too much if the money has obviously been ploughed back into the place to make it better for the paying customer - but this was not immediately obvious at Spurn Head. Or Point. Or Willy.

And the sign said "Private Road." Private it may have been, but road it certainly wasn't.

Oh before I go any further in this post, I think it would be a grand idea to show everyone what Spurn Head looks like.

As my hot air balloon never turned up, I've had to nick an aerial photo from Wikipedia and even then it's from 1978.

With erosion and other weathery technical stuff that I wouldn't expect you to understand, there isn't quite as much of it as we see in this image.

I've also cleaned up the photo and added a couple of arrows to make things easier to explain.

Right now we're at Point 1 with the sign and the handing over of money and the start of the private 'road'.

This road, nay track, led to Point 2 and lets just say that along the way, I lost a couple of fillings and my car now needs new shocks.

It was only wide enough for one car and when I held my hand out the windows I was able to high five the grass stalks. If you DID meet a car coming the other way, it was up to one of you to find a passing area and thankfully there were plenty of them. An SUV would've lost a coat of paint. A truck would've lost it's wing mirrors and an RV would've lost the V.

At the end of this 3.5 mile track, there is a simple black and white lighthouse which was built between 1893 and 1895. It's just a shell now as it closed in 1986.

Daphne had told me that when they went to this area some years ago, they were able to go up inside the lighthouse. No doubt some kill joy from Health & Safety came for a visit and said "oh no, no, no. This will never do. Someone could jump off the top and hurt themselves.
Whatever next ? Base jumping ?"

And so the doors are now firmly locked and no one can get a lovely view of the peninsula without renting a helicopter or a basketball player.

I left in a huff.

There was a car park area at Point 2 and although the 'road' went on for about two hundred more metres, only official coastguard vehicles could use it to get to their buildings.

I parked up and walked.

I could've headed right and onto the sandy area which goes all the way around the 'head' but I wanted to get to the VERY end of the peninsula. This involved following a convoluted path up and down through the vegetation and often this path, which was simply made by the footsteps of thousands of visitors over the years, split into more paths.

I couldn't see too far ahead and tried to pick any path that I hoped would take me to the end. On one occasion I managed to return to a place I'd passed before and I got a bit of a panic attack as I'm not at my best in a maze. I'd not brought any jaffa cakes.

Suddenly I heard the sound of waves breaking on the shore and I literally burst through the last of the vegetation and came out onto the very point of Spurn Point. Feeling like Dr. Livingston, I sank to my knees in the soft sand and thanked God for my safe deliverance !

Then I went back to the car and drove home.

The End.

Well no, but I know my travel posts can be a bit long at times so I'll leave the rest till tomorrow. It's late and I'm off to bed............

I Think I've Got A Tan !!!!

Yes folks, the sun showed itself this morning and so it's time to rejoice. Hurrah.

Like other UK bloggers, I've been moaning recently about the lack of global warming reaching our shores and to be honest, nothing much changed today as far as some decent summer temperatures are concerned.

But being part of a nation that generally regards a glass with a dribble of liquid in it as being half full, I need to give credit where it is due and for whatever reason, we got sunshine this morning.

So slapping on the sun cream and wearing my summer thong for the first time, I headed out for a long walk to make the most of the sunshine. By the time I got to the end of the drive I decided I'd been conned by that sunshine as it wasn't that warm at all. Mid 60's (18c) in fact.

So I came back inside and reappeared 5 minutes later wearing a much more sensible shell suit and my Hogwarts scarf and gloves set, a Christmas pressie from a distant relative. Well not quite but I did have a thick t-shirt on and went back to my jeans. Ah well. At least I was outside.

I went to my usual rural path, Manor House Lane, that leads past the local golf course and on out into the countryside.

Having been sat on my backside for the last few weeks, I didn't want to overdo it on my first walk outdoors - so I really just wanted to get out into the fresh air and any exercise I got from it would be a bonus.

I love this narrow road as it's so close to my house and yet it immediately takes me away into a world of peace and quiet, a world of simple but relaxing views.

Just a few hundred yards along the road, it bisects one of the holes on Alwoodley Golf Course as you can see from this link. I've placed a red circle just below a bunker/sand trap which is almost totally hidden by the trees in this aerial photo map.

This is because I took a photo of this gentleman playing out of that very bunker and both of us were glad he managed it at the first attempt.

Later, when we met as he crossed the road to get to the next hole, he said if he'd known I was taking photos, he'd have got a hole in one.

Bless.

I told him that next time he should just assume I'll be there - see if that helps his score !

It looked like he had the course to himself as not only was he a solo golfer but I never saw another golfer anywhere else. I guess the shock of dry weather had still to sink in with most golfers or else the wives had dragged them off shopping.

(Well, gotta get a sexist comment in somewhere.)

I was still just over a mile from my house and as the sun was still shining, on I went. I was intoxicated with the fresh air I think but after almost 2 miles, I decided enough was enough and turned around before I came to the main Harrogate Road.

On the way back I came across a line of huge sunflowers and as I'd never taken a photo of one before, I did this time as it seemed to sum up how I was feeling.

And here it is. Not exactly a Van Gogh effort but good enough for me today....and a lot cheaper.

Back home after my 4 mile walk I rested up and looked out the window.
The sun had gone and a huge black cloud was heading towards the house.

It must've veered off as the rain never came but once again I was back to looking at a dull, overcast sky.

But I'd seen the sun, albeit briefly. Long enough to get out and have a lovely walk.

Considering the crap summer we've had so far this year, never mind being half full, my cup had overflowed.

In the words of a hundred Elvis lookalikes, thank you very much.

Quack Quack

I am sooooo sick of this weather. When it's not raining, it's still cool and overcast and just plain miserable.

Hello ! It's August. It's supposed to be summer. Where is the flaming global warming then, eh ?
God knows we Brits must've sent enough carbon dioxide into the air to deserve a bit of warming. It's not fair. I've just inspected my carbon footprint and I'd put it up against anyones. So what's going on ?

Even the advertisers have given up. No ads suggesting a glass of cool, ice filled Pepsi on OUR screens. No ads for bbq sets from Argos. No ads encouraging us to 'book early' for the joys of a Butlins seaside holiday at Bognor Regis or Skegness. Mind you, were those holidays ever joyous ?

No, we now get ads for Connect 4 and Kerplunk. Good indoor games. Sales of Playstations and Xboxes have gone through the roof. Parents are tearing their hair out trying to keep the kids occupied inside. Or give up and send them out in the rain to beat up pensioners or stab anyone who looks them in the eye. I think London is running it's own Hoodie Olympics in preparation for 2012 and stabbing is being introduced as a trial event.

One way to ensure we get a gold !!

But I digress................

I went shopping this morning. Two amazing facts in one statement there. I hate shopping and I don't DO mornings. In fact I'm not usually up in time to DO mornings.

Anyway off I tootled to Sainsburys and entered the great insurance claim zone that is their car park. It's amazing how many cars there bear the metalic scars of previous visits. I'm not sure if it's the fact that most supermarket shopping is done by women but you put your no claims bonus on the line every time you go there.

Heyyyyy that's not being chauvanistic. Well not really. Even women admit they can't park for toffee.

Inside it wasn't much better and I can see why most carts have wonky wheels. I was 'hit' on several occasions just getting through the fresh food aisle as, women again, have this habit of seeing what they want and just abandoning their carts while they make a beeline for it.

More worringly though, they don't seem to care if their own little 'Madeline' is left sitting up on the cart while they scramble for the tomatoes or apples even though there are plenty to go around. I don't mean they park the cart near the product and reach down or across to get it. Hell I do that and I have nothing more than a well fingered FMH magazine in my cart.

No, these mums leave the carts mid aisle and often take the chance to gather up a plethera of fruit and veg while on their mini excursion and only return to their carts when they've more cabbages in their arms than a Crackerjack contestant.

Crackerjack !!!!

I guess they know that no one would take a child from a shopping cart in a busy supermarket. They don't earn Nectar points after all !!

I got my basic groceries and got to the checkout. More stress. Yes you've guessed it. The woman ahead of me was of the shocked 'you want me to pay?' genre. Her goods were scanned, she bagged them up and loaded them back into her cart. Then she seemed to realise she had to pay for them and so put her gigantic bag up onto the checkout, dug inside for her purse and after a good rummage, brought it out with all the gusto of a magicians rabbit.

After deciding which colourful credit card she liked the best, she asked how much her bill came to. WHAT ? Does it matter ? Put the pretty card into the machine you muppet !! I'm growing a beard here !!!

(Ok that's not really fair in my case but I was only talking in my head anyway. My sarcasm doesn't have to be truthful in my head.)

Being a man (told you, Kate) I had my card at the ready and was well ahead of the game. No hold ups. No worries. Groceries were bagged and I swiped my card with the announcement of my bill total still on the cashiers lips. Yes I'm that good.

I got to the doors and looked out....and what a shocker.......it was raining. Not just raining. Oh no, this was a deluge of biblical proportions. This was rain to scrape the top coat off my car.

I pushed my cart towards said car hoping it would still be the same colour as when I'd bought it.
Well it wasn't so much pushing it as propelling it like it contained a classic round black bomb with a short fizzing fuse. If Linford Christie had been shopping this morning, I'd have left him standing.

There are few things worse in this life than transfering items from a shopping cart to your car boot when it's pis........chucking it down. Eggs ? Fuck 'em. Bread ? Sod it. 24 yogurts. Get in there you bastards. I slammed the lid boot shut while the cheese slices were still in mid air and hurled the empty cart across and into the collection bay. Did it get there ? Did I care less ?

I dived into the car. It was time to leave. Where were my keys ? WHERE WERE MY KEYS ????!!!!!!!

With rising panic I searched my body and the surrounding area, spraying the passenger seat and dashboard with raindrops. Then it hit me. The cart. I'd placed the keys on the cart 'shelf' when opening the boot lid !! I had to get out and thankfully was able to retrieve them before the next customer picked my cart but by now I was drenched and totally miserable.

I sat in the car for ages, dripping onto the seat with my glasses misted up in that annoying way they do when you really need them the most. I even turned on the car wipers and was mildly surprised when they didn't clear my glasses too. Renaults are useless !

I'm soooooo sick of this weather. And supermarket shopping runs it close.

It's That Time Again !!

Hardly seems like we've had a break from footy this year what with Euro 2008 and all the games going on somewhere around the world.

Now, today, we have the start of the footy season in England....well except for the high and mighty Premiership 'big' boys who start next weekend. La-di-da. They need the extra week to count the money in their Swiss bank accounts.

So it's another season for me to support my local team Leeds United - a team who were recently voted the most hated team in the country. Lovely.

I've never really understood why this is the case, but I know it to be true. Many say it goes back to the 70's when we were known simply as 'dirty Leeds' which again 'they' say was down to us being a very strong, successful team who did well in Europe too. Yes we were hard but so were most teams then. They use the word 'professional' as if that is some sort of negative description.

Leeds United played some of the most impressive, attacking, creative, skillful football back in the 70's and what happened.....dirty Leeds ?

Anyway, I try not to discuss those days or even these days as like with refereeing decisions, no football fan has ever been known to change his mind. If you hate Leeds, nothing I can say will change your mind so why bother ? So I won't.

Last season we started our campaign with a savage penalty of -15 points for being naughty boys but we wiped out that deficit after 5 games as we won the lot. This season it's a lot different as we've started with the same points as Britain gets now every year in the Eurovision Song Contest (that would be nil point) so it's a level playing field, as we say.

With an irony that only seems to happen in football, we were forced to kick off at noon today, 3 hrs before everyone else and as we won against the mighty Scunthorpe United (yes that's how far we've sunk), we are now top of the table. Last season bottom, this season top. Albeit for just a few more minutes when the rest kick off.

But still. Hurrah.

I've not been to a Leeds game for several years. I couldn't name ANY of the current team. I wouldn't know any player if I tripped over him in the street (he'd have dived anyway !). I do know the manager though. He was a player from the days when I DID go regularly you see.

But they are still my team. My lads. My home team.

These days I don't get suicidal when they lose. My weekend isn't ruined. I get over it after a few hours.

After all, it's only a game. Not life and death.

Sod that.

Played 1. Won 1. League position 1.

COME ON YOU WHITES !!!!!!!!!!!