Poor deprived football fans

Okay, Football. More specifically, the World Cup. Everyone's talking about it. So what is there left to be said by someone such as myself, who has absolutely no interest in the game whatsoever. Well, nothing, as it turns out, and I wouldn't be bothering if it weren't for a man by the name of Charlie Brooker.

Now Charlie, as we all know, writes a bit of a column in some newspaper or other, I forget which one, in which he talks about whatever rubbish he feels like talking about. Which is fair do's, he's a funny guy, people like to read his thoughts, everyones a winner. Anyway, he wrote one about the World Cup. Or rather, he wrote one about his lack of interest in the World Cup, the oversaturation of advertising themed around the World Cup ,and the nauseating faux-patriotism that is the inevitable by-product of the World Cup.

In this column he said everything I think about the bloody World Cup, and did it much more elegantly, succinctly and above all amusingly, than I could ever dream to do. So if you want to know my views on the World Cup (unlikely I know, cos why would you want to know my views on anything?), then track down his views and pretend I wrote them.

Which leads to the question, why am I bothering to type any of this. Well you see, I was inspired by his column, or more accurately the reader comments that followed his column on the interweb site of the newspaper in question. Several people agreed with his point of view, which tells me that they are right thinking individuals who have managed, against all the odds, to retain a modicum of the taste and common sense they were born with. Well done them. Others however, disagreed. Vehemently and with nobs on. It is these people that have got me typing.

You see, they have taken offense at the article. They have not all taken offense at the same portion of the article but there are 3 main, bones of contention, shall we say. I should point out that I am not writing this in defence of Charlie Brooker. On the one hand I doubt very much that he cares what people think about his views and on the other hand, he's more than capable of defending himself if he is. No, this is me defending MY views.

Anyway. One of the problems people had with the article was that Brooker finished it with a reference to the fact that he would be out of the country for the duration and therefore would not have to endure to much of it. This got certain people hot under the collar because he was rubbing it in their noses that he could afford to go on holiday while they couldn't. He's a snob, in other words. I know what I think about this complaint but won't say, because this is about defending me, not Brooker, and I most certainly can't afford to leave the country for the duration of the Cup. But Fuck off, seriously, if that is how you took that comment, you humorless little shits.

Point 2 is back to something I can relate to. The faux-patriotism. Now, leaving aside the imbecile who insisted that our armed forces were fighting and dying for our right to participate in a football tournament, the main problem people had was that the patriotism, in their minds, is not false. No, they hang flags from their bedroom windows, stick them on their cars and temp-tattoo (I hope) them on their kids 365 days a year. Proper flags too of course, not those cheap rip offs that don't even have ENGLAND written across the middle. English until I die, opined one. Excellent mate, well done.

Except it's not that way is it? No, for the most part, we whinge and we moan and can't be arsed to vote (I know more people turned out this year but it was hardly a huge majority of the populace was it). We complain about our public services and then we complain about our taxes. We are, lets face it here, a nation of people who, if we are honest with ourselves, are incredibly unpatriotic. In as lazy a way as possible. We don't firebomb the Houses of Parliament and chop off her Maj's head or anything.

The final point is the one that realy made me laugh. I simply could not believe that anyone could say this with a straight face. Maybe, just maybe, the first person to post it was being ironic. Possibly. Didn't stop a shedload of people from agreeing though. The complaint was essentially "Why do people who don't enjoy football feel the need to shove it down our throats? Just don't watch it if you don't like it. It's once every four years, just let us have our time."

I say once again, Fuck Off. Seriously, people who don't like Football shove the fact down peoples throats? Really? We live in a country where you are, especially if you're male, considered somehow sub-normal if you don't like Football. When I was a trainee at my old place of work I was ordered to fake an interest in Football because neither the staff nor the regular customers would accept me if I didn't. I didn't and they did. After about 5 years. And it never went away, but rather became a running joke among them.

I would never dream of walking up to a stranger and announcing that "I did not watch the game last night because all fotball is shit". Care to hazard a guess how many times strangers have come up to me and started talking about a match? How often do you think the phrase "I don't really follow it mate", a phrase that hardly shoves my loathing of the game in their faces, has been enough to end the conversation?Never. Because people simply can't accept the fact that you aren't interested in watching a bunch of blokes you don't know kick a pigs bladder around a patch of grass for 90mins.

And, "let us have our time". Jesus. Because of course, outside the 4 yearly World Cup the poor deprived footy fans have absolutely nothing to watch have they? No, they are sitting in a dark cloud of depression, shaking with the agony of withdrawal as they stare at the calender, willing the endless days to pass so that they might once again eat their fill of footbally goodness in 4 years time. I mean, it's not as if there is an annual League tournament, FA Cup, European Cup and various International friendlies. Or even various foriegn League tournaments that are covered across Lord knows how many channels. Oh, whats that you say?

On second thoughts...

I've decided that all that telly stuff I talked about last night deserves a dedicated home, rather than being lumped in here with my self pitying rubbish. So was born The Impossible Quest.

This place will be reserved for my occasional whinges.

So check out the other one. Or don't. It's up to you.

A POINT AT LAST

Okay, so I decided that this blog needed a point. I weighed up the many and varied subjects upon which I am a noted authority. I came up blank.

Cut to now, many moons later and a decision has been reached.I have for quite some many years been engaged in a pointless, doomed to failure quest. One which has seen me endure countless hours of mind numbing tedium and toe curling embarrassment, but also many moments of teary eyed emotion, floor rolling laughter, and edge of seat tension. Yes, I have vowed to watch every episode ever made, of every television show ever made, in the sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres.

It's hard, especially since the miracle that is Sky+ has been stripped away from me for quite some time now and there is no telling when I shall have it back, but I have persevered.

Don't get me wrong. The sci-fi genre is not my only TV love. I also have a similar completist mentality in regards to American Prime Time Soaps, Cop/Doc Shows, and Sitcoms. Sci-fi comes first though, and if it comes down to a choice it will always come out on top.

So I shall post on here, at no particular time, on no particular day, about whatever random progress I've made on the quest. Some of the shows will be current household names, others will be more obscure but hopefully I can be half way interesting about nearly all of them. Even the shit ones.

Of course, there will also still be occasional posts that have nothing whatsoever to do with TV, and are just me whining about something no-one cares about.

A warning. There will be no screen grabs on this blog. There will be no embedded video clips. There will be no bright shiny colours at all. There will simply be big reams of text. Sorry, but there is a very big, very important technical reason for this. I haven't the foggiest clue how to do any of that stuff. At some point down the line, that may change but knowing my technical capabilities the way I do I wouldn't hold my breath.

Inane Witterings of the Rich and Famous

Well, I have succumbed once more to the lure of the fad. To add to the myspace page I haven't been on since the night I set it up, the facebook page I've been on once since I set it up and this blog which I've posted on all of half a dozen times since I set it up, I now have Twitter.

Yay.

Am actually using it though, at least so far. Fun to point and laugh at the inane witterings of the celebrities I'm following. Picked a few at random and my God do they lead dull lives. Almost as dull as mine. Either that or they're messing with us plebs for their own amusement and are 'tweeting' (can't believe I actually typed that word, ugh) about parking tickets and hair dressing appointments while they're actually wrapped around each other in wild drug fueled orgies.

Yeah, thats probably it.

Whats this blog about?

So I've decided this blog needs some kind of theme. Coming on here every few weeks to type some variation of "nowts happened, my lifes boring" is getting, well, boring.
I toyed with the idea of some kind of review system whereby I'd give my views on tv shows or comics or books or whatever but I thought "nah" cos everyone and his dog does that.
So I'm not sure what it's gonna be. I've got a few ideas and I'm not posting again until I've picked one.
Well, thats it for tonight. So long for however long.

Dull Dull Dull

Well, it's been a month since my last post and still my life has not gotten any less dull. So I'm sitting here thinking random thoughts about semi naked celebrities and pizza (don't ask) when I'm hit with it. It's my own fault. "Fucking do something with your life and stop moaning about it you loser."

This lasts all of about 20 seconds until I realise that someones posted on the forum I'm constantly logged on to. Oooh, must see.

God my life is dull.

Near Death Experience

So I'm thinking to myself "You've started the Bloody thing, you've gotta put something on there, it looks pathetic" but having no clue what cos I lead such a fucking dull life, when it occurs to me that I could talk about my near death experience of a few days ago.

I'm walking home from the shop right, with a carrier bag in one hand and a pizza in the other when I come to the junction of death. This junctio, Christ, you've seen nowt like it.How it's never been on BRITAINS DEADLIEST ROADS or some other pile of shite of that ilk that ITV pass off as television these days I'll never know. It kind of tapers to a point where two roads converge but it's fed by 2 other side roads and the footpath kind of narrows down to nothing 10ft before the corner so you're essentially forced to walk across 4 lanes with cars coming from all sides.

Anyway, I'm lucky enough to get there at the same time time as a couple of cars that actualy treat it like a junction and not some training course for their F1 dreams and so they actually slow to a stop. The second car is actually driven by the girl who served me in the pizza shop 5 mins previously. A smile and a nod and a wave and she's gesturing me across in front of her. Now what happened next was totally my own fault. I was so engrossed in giving her a nod of thanks and moving quickly to get out of her way sooner that I never thought to check for traffic coming the other way. Schoolboy error, totally my fault, no-one to blame but myself. Came within inches of being splatted. Only a very graceful (though I say so myself) little hop and spin saved me from oblivion. And kept my pizza level as well, for good measure.

Now the guy in the car had stopped and he had his windows down so I thought fairs fair I'll apologise. Wish I'd not bothered now. Hand gestures and cursing and snarled threats of violence were the response to my " sorry mate, my fault".

Now, as I say,I was in the wrong. I apologised. I thought that would be the end of it. When it wasn't I saw a little red. and gave as good as I got in the old cursing stakes. Normally I'm a craven fucking coward so I suppose the adrenaline must have kicked in. Never acted with a spine before, hope it doesn't become a habit.

So there you have it. My NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCE in which I almost talked myself into being kicked to Death by a road rage psycho.

Pizza tasted lovely when I got home.