Sunday, March 6, 2005
What a week...

It's been quite a week, I set off for Yorkshire on monday to go to a couple of meetings and do a little teaching. On the way my car broke down. After sittign on the side of the road for what felt like a couple of years I evetually got the RAC man to come and get it started again. By the time it actually got to Yorkshire it died again and so I left it parked on a backstreet and headed off to a friend's to stay for the night. The next couple of days were a bit of a whirlwind, my old boss had arranged for all sorts of things for me to do and so I dind't have a moments spare time. In fact I didn't manage to get the car fixed until friday evening when I promptly drove back down south minus the majority of the contents of my bank account. Of course to top off my week I know have a chest infection and sinusitis that doesn't seem to be responding to antibiotics...

I'm feeling a bit crap. I have done approximately no writing (though I have a story slowly hatching in my head) and my entire left side aches. It could be worse though, after all think how bad it would be if I was an England Rugby Unionsupporter...

Oh

:(

Posted by Martin Austwick 2005-03-06 13:10:36

Sunday, February 27, 2005
Is Kaplan afrikaans for Biased?

It was a f**king travesty.

The legion of England haters will claim it's sour grapes but that match was a f**king joke.

I am appaled by the refereeing, first he disallowed a try because Cueto was "offside", despite the fact that he quite obviously wasn't, so obvious in fact that the linesman who was stood right f**king next to him didn't call it. How he thought he had a better view from the other side of the field I have no idea. On two occasions the Irish played the ball on the ground in a ruck well within their own half and England were penalised. Then to top it all he didn't even bother to look to see if the ball had been grounded or held up on the last possible England try, he simply awarded the scrum to Ireland.

That's a minimum of 10 points he wrongly took from England. a max of 20, either way enough for us to win.

How I ever thought we might win when one of their players has the ability to disallow our points I have no idea. I never really expected us to win I must admit, but I actually expected us to lose on our own lack of merits, or for Ireland to soundly beat us. I wouldn't have minded if we actually lost, the way we did against Wales, or if a couple of our players had thrown it away like they did against France, but that game was f**king ridiculous.

I am more than a little disheartened now, though I'll be interested to see Wales play them. I think they could win.

If they have an impartial ref.

Posted by Martin Austwick 2005-02-27 12:08:29

Thursday, February 24, 2005
Strangely nervous

That was me this afternoon. Odd really, I met a guy that shares a lot of attribute with me. He's got an obviously broken nose, comes from Yorkshire, likes rugby and fancies Zara Philips. Unlike me though he was in the England RU team that won the world cup. I am of course talking about none other than Mike Tindall.

He's a really nice guy. Currently off injured and raring to get back to it, but it looks like it'll be a few months yet. Hopefully he'll be back for the Lion's tour this summer, but only time will tell.

I was oddly nervous when I met him which is strange for me, I soon confessed that I was quite a fan and we ended up chatting about the state of English Rugby at the moment, he of course blames our misfortunes on his absence, he might be right...

He did me the honour of signing my England Shirt which by a strange coincidence I happened to have with me. Now of course I am wondering if it is in permanent ink or if I have to buy a new shirt. Either way I've been grinning ever since.

Posted by Martin Austwick 2005-02-24 16:32:32

Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Today I shall be mainly Blogging in rhyme

As I sit with wine in hand

I wonder why I find

That I can�t seem to understand

My recent state of mind

I want to write, I know I can

But then I never do

I think and plot and sketch and plan

And all my words fall through

I�ll get there one day I am sure

At least I hope I will

(this is your cue to reassure

and tell me I should chill)

The words will come, the book deals too

I�ll be the next big thing

They�ll call me Dickens, Chaucer too

The literary king

I�ll rock the world, I�ll break the bank

I�ll win the Booker prize

And I know I�ll have you to thank

for telling me sweet lies�

Posted by Martin Austwick 2005-02-16 16:46:03

Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Soup and despair.

I apologise now for the rugbyesque thread that will run through this blog. I don't think I have ever been so disappointed by a game. I have stood in thesleet and driving windand watch my team thrashed to within an inch of its life. I have watched us lose time and time again. I KNOW England is in a transitional phase, we are going to have to lose before we can start to win again. I know many of our most talented players have retired, been injured or just lost the commitment they need to play at top levels, but I simply couldn't belive that game...

We outplayed them at every turn. Against Wales we deserved to lose. Let's be honest we deserved to lose big time, I'm glad Wales didn't capitalise on our appaling line outs, or the fact that every time they had the ball they overlapped us by at least two player, but irritating though it is we deserved to lose to them.

Against France? It was a debacle. We threw and jumped well in the line outs, although we were under a lot of pressure from the French pack we held our own through most of the game. Our running game was as good as it could have been expected to be but we could not for the life of us kick.

I was ready to Kill Charlie Hodgson at the end of the game. I had to look on the net to see how many opportunities he missed. I know people are blaming Ollie too, but lets face it, he took the kicks our "kicker" knew he couldn't get... I think the thing that made it worse was that last missed drop goal. Every England fan has seen exactly that moment before, I was in the local pub with a pint in hand watching JW do exactly what Hodgson couldn't. I am simply not used to seeing a pro kicker miss a drop goal from in front of the posts. In all honsety I'm not used to seeing a kick miss at all, regardless of where it was taken from.

God I'm cross

So I made soup.

There is something almost Cathartic about making soup. Taking the old carcass of a chicken (I don't do veg, just meat...) and ripping it apart to make it into a wonderful meal in itself is just great. Today was Organic Chicken (Organic meat is simply miles better than intensive farmed meat, but that was a blog all of it's own) with Californian white wine, a touch of garlic, some coriander and a splash of dark soy sauce (trust me, it sounds odd but it REALLY works). I bought some fresh bread from Somerfield as I was feeling lazy and it took all the pain away.

Of course if I see CH I will kill him. How one man can lose a game the rest of the team have already won is beyond me...

Posted by Martin Austwick 2005-02-15 15:09:44