Just Like My Dreams.....

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

As I've mentioned before I am until Sunday in Essex helping out my mother in a few things. But having time to spare and knowing then I'd would be able to try my hand at seeing whether I could get a ticket for West Ham's game against Wolves on Saturday.

I took the Underground to Stratford and went through the Westfield shopping Centre on my way to the London Stadium.

As an aside I'll say this. I've come to the view that I don't like Westfield, because it's not so much a shopping and more of a town centre in itself. I did wonder wandering through the place how many businesses outside the centre have suffered because of it, as given the number of people there when I went my views are very much in the minority.

Anyway the West Ham shop that was in the area was closed. Which meant I had to walk to the London Stadium. Past views of the high rise and the being built high rise skyscrapers in nearby Docklands. This of course included their daddy Canary Wharf. As I'd a look at that building thought "I worked near there" many many years ago.

To think in a parallel universe I didn't move to Wales. You wonder how things turn out in your life if you made a different choice when a clear crossroads  comes along.

Anyway to the London stadium

The New Home

The gift shop was nearby. The first thing I did was to ask whether there were any tickets available.....the answer was no.

It says a lot for West Ham fans that despite being bottom of the Premier League table with three defeats in the first three days the (large) stadium is still full. I also knew that the chances of obtaining a ticket this late in the day were slim. Still it was disappointing in a "I'd expected it but still sad" kind of way.

I wandered round the shop. Was going to buy a few things but not in a stupid kind of way. I eventually left with these.

It's Hammer Time

The book was two pounds from an original price of ten. Everyone even now uses pens. And as for the exercise book no idea why I bought that.

And yes I felt like a ten year old boy.

Ah well I just have to wait for March 9 when they face Cardiff City in Wales. I'll be prepared then.

Until the next time.

In Which I Take Kim Edwards To The Dentist And I Contribute To Murdoch's Coffers To Say Goodbye To The Boleyn

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Well my long delayed appointment to the dentist eventually happened today (Tuesday). As you remember it was postponed twice when I was under the weather. I took the Penguin paperback I've been reading. The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards whilst I was waiting to be called in.

Of course Dentistry has gone beyond the days where pre waiting entertainment constituted a few worn fashion and motoring magazines. Now they give you a TV to view. However it's daytime TV which means mainly something along the lines of property/emergency services/ benefit scroungers/antiques/collectables/people with domestic disputes resolved in a mock court or an emotional bear pit that make you feel you're watching prewatershed MMA/progammes you like but was first shown decades ago/ general cheap trash.

Which all meant that TV was not a distraction.

It is you know a very emotional book. I find myself more amenable to such novels the older I get. A couple of years ago I found myself surprisingly affected after reading Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan. If this was in my twenties I'd have just shrugged. Age does that to you.

Things went OK at the dentist. Especially as she had seen me make the effort to come earlier this year even though I was unwell (so that was cancelled). So when I admitted that dental hygiene was the last thing on my mind during the past month I was spared a lecture.

Rupert Murdoch is a little bit richer this month. For this afternoon I had Sky Sports added to my TV package with BT. It costs £22 a month and a month is all I want. Because tonight (Tuesday) West Ham were playing Manchester United in the last ever game being played at the Boleyn. And I had to watch it.

Before I go on, and give the impression that this is not so much a post more of a eulogy for a much loved stadium. I'm not going to make any excuses for the drunken apes that smashed the Manchester United coach on the way to the ground. It didn't matter if the result was 8-0 and gave the Boleyn a memorable send off it will be this that it will be remembered for. They've disgraced the team,the memories and the majority of the supporters. Not only that but rival fans will throw tonight at our faces for a long,long while.

That all being said. They are the team I have supported as a child. I've fond memories of going to home games. Think the one that sticks in my memory of the games I went to was the first home game after the death of Bobby Moore. It was against Wolverhampton Wanderers. Before the beginning of the match there were emotional scenes as a wreath of a West Ham football shirt with a number six on it being brought on the middle of the pitch

Remember Mike, (or was it Gavin?) Small missing a chance that I could have scored without my glasses on. Wolves scoring first. It was Steve Bull (I mean who else would it be for them in that period?). West Ham won though. One of the goals was a Julian Dicks penalty. And if there was one certainty in football at that time it was that goalkeepers never saved a Julian Dicks penalty as he kicked it with a force that I've never seen before or since. They just avoided the ball.

Also, as I've mentioned before. Friends and family aside the one thing I have truly missed about moving to Wales was West Ham United. So I wasn't going to miss this match.

I have a collection of twenty football shirts,which I'll explain about in another post (though probably twenty, to a real collector, will evoke laughter bordering on mockery). There are two rules to this collection. One is that full price is never paid and the other is that it's just one per team. Of course these rules are broken for West Ham (I've four of them). This was the one I bought for its original cost and it seemed fitting I'd wear it today.

The Legend that is Dagenham Motors

Well you probably know that West Ham won memorably after having been 2-1 down. It was a wonderful game. But the final show after the match to celebrate the history of the Boleyn did make me shed a few tears I must admit (though in a manly way of course).

Let me apologise to Manchester United and their supporters for the actions of a few drunken apes...but I'm happy we won.

Until the next time.