Normanton Lad

What I said about drinking at home was a bit harsh. I'm sure lots of people enjoy tasting wine and beers at home. There is nothing wrong with that in moderation. But we had, and still have, some alcoholics in my family and drinking at home was a bad thing for all concerned. However, they should not spoil the fun for the rest of us who can enjoy a drink without causing any trouble.

Turn your colour on on you computer  😁

When you put it like that it seems like a lot of fuss about nothing, but pensioners wandering around the park in the 1960s would have had memories of the park from the Edwardian era when most of the visitors to the park would have been very elegantly dressed couples and families strolling around together. If they wanted to sit then they would have sat down on a park bench and not on the grass. The sight of groups of men dossing around the gardens was a shock to many older Derby folk. These men were doing nothing wrong, but it was not the done thing. It’s a bit like a barely dressed Western woman wandering a town in Pakistan. Most of us would say that’s not respectful, but respect doesn’t seem to work the other way round.

A few days ago I saw a schoolboy about to make a bonfire with his old school papers. He said he’d just finished some exams. I told him a fire would not be a good idea. People have their windows open and their washing out. He could see my point and he chucked it all the recycle bin. When I said that people didn't start fires in their gardens in the summer he asked if there was a law against it. I explained that there probably wasn’t but it was just part of being a good neighbour, i.e. giving consideration to the rights and wishes of your neighbours.

He said his mother didn’t seem to know about this unspoken rule because she had no objection to his fire. I could have spent a good hour explaining all the rules I was taught about how to behave but which have been ignored by later generations. Newcomers to the UK have also never been told about these rules and that’s why there are so many disputes in multicultural areas.

Some of these rules seem pointless today. I was told you always walk on the outside of a woman on the street. That was to protect women from muck being thrown by traffic. Most older men still follow this rule. 

Some rules are not pointless. For example, you don’t spit in the street, play loud music in public and you don’t chuck rubbish all over the place. There is no doubt that you see more of this in multicultural areas. 

Multiculturism can only work if people respect the culture of the other. Unfortunately, cultures have conflicting requirements and preferences. That is why multiculturism doesn’t work. The man on Dairyhouse Rd wanted a house  that looked like his old house in Pakistan or wherever and his neighbour wanted all the houses in the row to remain unpainted. As soon as the bricks were painted sky blue and yellow I imagine all the neighbours who could afford to moved away. At that time a house on Dairyhouse Rd cost about £4,000, but Dairyhouse Rd had once been posh and so I wouldn’t be surprised if the neighbours sold at a loss. In the end all the cultures will live in their own parts of the UK. It is inevitable.
 

generally all busy towns/cities that are diverse and multi-cultural are dumps.

It just seems like yesterday when Leighton James signed for us. I thought he did well, but the Doc wanted him out. Leighton went on to have a very long career and I think it was a big mistake letting him go. I can remember listening to him on some kind of Desert Island Discs type show on Radio Derby around 1976 and thinking he was quite an old fashioned type of young man. He was a big Jim Reeves fan. There’s nothing wrong with that but it was unusual for someone his age. I followed his career when he left Derby and I was happy to see him do so well at Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley.
Leighton’s replacement on the wing, Gerry Ryan, also died not long ago. I have many plans for the future and I would feel cheated if I didn’t make it to at least 85 and so it feels strange to see footballers, who were once much fitter than me, passing away – especially when they are younger than me. It is possible that Leighton and Gerry didn’t keep fit after football. I don’t know. It could be that they were just unlucky.  Some people get off the train and some stay on. Eventually we will all get off, but some people have will have had very long journeys. Cliff Jones, who was another winger and who is a generation older than the above two, was giving keep fit lessons online during the lockdown.

It just seems like yesterday when Leighton James signed for us. I thought he did well, but the Doc wanted him out. Leighton went on to have a very long career and I think it was a big mistake letting him go. I can remember listening to him on some kind of Desert Island Discs type show on Radio Derby around 1976 and thinking he was quite an old fashioned type of young man. He was a big Jim Reeves fan. There’s nothing wrong with that but it was unusual for someone his age. I followed his career when he left Derby and I was happy to see him do so well at Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley.
Leighton’s replacement on the wing, Gerry Ryan, also died not long ago. I have many plans for the future and I would feel cheated if I didn’t make it to at least 85 and so it feels strange to see footballers, who were once much fitter than me, passing away – especially when they are younger than me. It is possible that Leighton and Gerry didn’t keep fit after football. I don’t know. It could be that they were just unlucky.  Some people get off the train and some stay on. Eventually we will all get off, but some people have will have had very long journeys. Cliff Jones, who was another winger and who is a generation older than the above two, was giving keep fit lessons online during the lockdown.

It just seems like yesterday when Leighton James signed for us. I thought he did well, but the Doc wanted him out. Leighton went on to have a very long career and I think it was a big mistake letting him go. I can remember listening to him on some kind of Desert Island Discs type show on Radio Derby around 1976 and thinking he was quite an old fashioned type of young man. He was a big Jim Reeves fan. There’s nothing wrong with that but it was unusual for someone his age. I followed his career when he left Derby and I was happy to see him do so well at Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley.
Leighton’s replacement on the wing, Gerry Ryan, also died not long ago. I have many plans for the future and I would feel cheated if I didn’t make it to at least 85 and so it feels strange to see footballers, who were once much fitter than me, passing away – especially when they are younger than me. It is possible that Leighton and Gerry didn’t keep fit after football. I don’t know. It could be that they were just unlucky.  Some people get off the train and some stay on. Eventually we will all get off, but some people have will have had very long journeys. Cliff Jones, who was another winger and who is a generation older than the above two, was giving keep fit lessons online during the lockdown.

It just seems like yesterday when Leighton James signed for us. I thought he did well, but the Doc wanted him out. Leighton went on to have a very long career and I think it was a big mistake letting him go. I can remember listening to him on some kind of Desert Island Discs type show on Radio Derby around 1976 and thinking he was quite an old fashioned type of young man. He was a big Jim Reeves fan. There’s nothing wrong with that but it was unusual for someone his age. I followed his career when he left Derby and I was happy to see him do so well at Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley.
Leighton’s replacement on the wing, Gerry Ryan, also died not long ago. I have many plans for the future and I would feel cheated if I didn’t make it to at least 85 and so it feels strange to see footballers, who were once much fitter than me, passing away – especially when they are younger than me. It is possible that Leighton and Gerry didn’t keep fit after football. I don’t know. It could be that they were just unlucky.  Some people get off the train and some stay on. Eventually we will all get off, but some people have will have had very long journeys. Cliff Jones, who was another winger and who is a generation older than the above two, was giving keep fit lessons online during the lockdown.

I used to think that the TV Licence vans really had "tv detectors". It seems that was another BBC lie. They just bully vulnerable people into confessing they watch TV. They have never used "tv detector" evidence in court because it doesn't exist.

It just seems like yesterday when Leighton James signed for us. I thought he did well, but the Doc wanted him out. Leighton went on to have a very long career and I think it was a big mistake letting him go. I can remember listening to him on some kind of Desert Island Discs type show on Radio Derby around 1976 and thinking he was quite an old fashioned type of young man. He was a big Jim Reeves fan. There’s nothing wrong with that but it was unusual for someone his age. I followed his career when he left Derby and I was happy to see him do so well at Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley.
Leighton’s replacement on the wing, Gerry Ryan, also died not long ago. I have many plans for the future and I would feel cheated if I didn’t make it to at least 85 and so it feels strange to see footballers, who were once much fitter than me, passing away – especially when they are younger than me. It is possible that Leighton and Gerry didn’t keep fit after football. I don’t know. It could be that they were just unlucky.  Some people get off the train and some stay on. Eventually we will all get off, but some people have will have had very long journeys. Cliff Jones, who was another winger and who is a generation older than the above two, was giving keep fit lessons online during the lockdown.

We haven't had a TV licence for over 2 years now... And get a bloody letter from them most months, threatening us with a maximum £1000 fine if we don't buy one, telling us they have opened investigations against us and asking whether we'll be in on [insert date].  As we've taken early retirement and are in most days, we know for a fact the buggers never come around!
A while back we filled in a form saying we don't require a licence, which stopped the letters for approx 6 months before they started arriving again.  Any other walk of life and it would be harassment.
We know the rules and genuinely don't watch the BBC or live TV.  If they did ever come around, I'm under no legal obligation to let them and and after hearing horror stories from people that have let them in probably won't despite the fact we have nothing to hide.  If we were 30yrs older or more vulnerable we'd feel under real pressure to pay for something we don't use or want.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/feb/29/tv-licence-fee-scandal-1000-people-week-casually-criminalised
 

I used to think that the TV Licence vans really had "tv detectors". It seems that was another BBC lie. They just bully vulnerable people into confessing they watch TV. They have never used "tv detector" evidence in court because it doesn't exist.

There are always exceptions to everything, but Clough's methods would not work on men as old as him. Just as a thought experiment imagine that Jack Charlton had still been at Leeds when Clough took over - he left a year earlier. What do you think he would have done when Clough told the Leeds players they can chuck their medals in the bin? Big Jack would probably have punched Clough. Jack was not much older than players like Giles, Bremner and Cooper. They had seen it all and they would not put up with Clough's abrasive managerial style. Dave Mackay was older than Clough and Clough knew he couldn't talk to Mackay in the same way he talked to the other players.
 

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Harry's Game
Edgar Wallace Mysteries

I have that same memory. For me, that's reassuring because I think many of our memories are made up. In my mind I can see him walking down the side of the pitch towards the Normanton End. At that game or perhaps a game against Charlton I have a memory of the ball going in and out of the net without a goal being given against us. That seems unlikely so maybe that's one of my false memories.

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I Claudius
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In the early and mid 1970s I used to work with Jack H, a very annoying old person. Although I was paid until 6 pm I could go home almost an hour early if my work was finished and as long as Jack finished his work. But Jack didn’t want to go home early and he dragged his work out until 6. We worked in a place where there was little natural light and after an hour’s walk home there was little sunshine left to enjoy and I blamed missing an hour’s sunlight on Jack.
I looked him up on the net the other day expecting to see an obituary from the 1980s but he was still alive according to the local paper in the mid 1990s. What surprised me is that I no longer felt any animosity at all to Jack. Part of this can be put down to “Time heals all wounds”. But I think there is another factor involved.
When you are old you don’t care so much about what other people do and say even if it involves you. For example, if someone on the street insulted me I would just walk on, but as I young man I would have challenged them. It’s not because I’m scared of getting hurt. It’s just that I don’t really care what they say about me..
It’s a bit like that on messageboards. There are always those who tell you that you are wrong and stupid even though I think I am probably right, but I no longer feel the need to challenge them. It’s a bit like the first verse of that great poem The Last Word by Matthew Arnold :

Let the long contention cease!
Geese are swans, and swans are geese.
Let them have it how they will!
Thou art tired: best be still.
 

Yes I watched every minute. If you have a weak attention span and little interest in the subject then it might seem boring, but it could never be as boring or pointless as an article in the Guardian. The first half hour or so is almost a monologue on the history of Russia and why that history is relevant now. Some would find that tedious especially if they have never had experience of listening to talks or lectures.

I find the opposite. Before Musk bought Twitter it just seemed full of lightweight nonsense, but X is stimulating reading. I follow about 30 posters and I get far more from their contributions than I ever got from a newspaper. 

I'm not sure if it's the cold climate or the enormous amount of food you seem to eat, but people from your part of Scotland seem to be very robust. Just reading about your travels makes me feel tired and cold. I've been watching some videos by one of your compatriots from Montrose and he is another trencherman who likes to spend a lot of time on buses and trains. 
UK's longest train journey
 

I'm not sure if it's the cold climate or the enormous amount of food you seem to eat, but people from your part of Scotland seem to be very robust. Just reading about your travels makes me feel tired and cold. I've been watching some videos by one of your compatriots from Montrose and he is another trencherman who likes to spend a lot of time on buses and trains. 
UK's longest train journey
 

I find the opposite. Before Musk bought Twitter it just seemed full of lightweight nonsense, but X is stimulating reading. I follow about 30 posters and I get far more from their contributions than I ever got from a newspaper. 

That model is only suitable for constant incremental growth like a child putting a pound in his piggy bank each week. With a 5% interest rate, a £10000 initial deposit and a £500 deposit every week you would become a millionaire in about 23 years according to the compound interest site I’ve just used. It would take much longer to become a billionaire, but they don’t get rich like that. The likes of Soros and Joe Lewis become billionaires through insider trading and other tricks. Only a few become billionaires by playing by the rules the rest of us follow and they are very clever and lucky people like Gates and Musk.
 

I find the opposite. Before Musk bought Twitter it just seemed full of lightweight nonsense, but X is stimulating reading. I follow about 30 posters and I get far more from their contributions than I ever got from a newspaper. 

I use ChatGPT instead of reading non-fiction books. ChatGPT allows you to cut through the waffle. Yesterday I asked ChatGPT to summarize a book about False Memory. I then asked various questions about the author's conclusions, e.g. "What examples does Dr Julia Shaw give in her book The Memory Illusion to suggest that memory is fallible." In 10 minutes I had the answers I needed. ChatGPT is a tremendous time saver.