Days Of Wonder

OG forced to withdraw
 previous comments

I have spent today pootling around getting one of the cars (Rachel's precious Fifi, not the precious Jag) fixed and all the time keeping an ear to the radio or an eye on the television.  Australia 60 all out (yes that is correct, 60 all out) and, as I type, England already a good deal more than one hundred ahead. Stuart Broad (and yes I hold my hands up I did in the past call him a show pony) took 8 for 15. Bloody brilliant. It's coming home, it's coming home, it's coming, cricket's coming home.

I've bored you all to death about American standards of service so it is only right that I should shout just as loud when the British get it right.

The today that was has become today's yesterday. By which I mean that I was disturbed at the end of the last paragraph and that it is now the morning after the night before as I resume. And by now England are 250+ ahead but losing wickets all of a clatter this morning. Surely we cannot snatch defeat from the jaws of this victory.

Back to that question of service and, not for the first time I have to commend National Tyre Service at Mere Green who sorted out the exhaust on Fifi. A very loud mention also for the staff at Cambaz the Turkish grill in Sutton Coldfield. We dined there for the first time on Tuesday and if we had encountered it in Oregon I would most likely have raved about it so  will do the same here. Top grade chicken in particular, enjoyed by both OG and the Groupie. Cambaz

I took the precious bike out for a spin this morning and managed about two hundred yards before another sodding puncture. Precious though it may be I am temporarily retiring the machine and will get it booked in for a service and hopefully a diagnosis of the cause. Instead I hauled my ancient mountain bike (vintage 1997) out from the back of the garage and did my old timed loop which I used to do as part of my training pre ownership of the precious. According to the watch (which doesn't lie) I am about 15% less fit than I was in those good old days. The factor I try to ignore is that I am also a meaningful amount older. Eheu tempus fugit.