I thought he was dead...

So to give a bit of background to this picture of the back of someone's head...

Hibs have won The Scottish Cup for the first time in 114 years and everyone connected with the club in any way shape or form has headed back to Leith for the party to end all parties that everyone had dreamt would happen.

People are raving on the zebra crossing outside The Harp and Castle, buses and cars are getting covered in every carbonated alcoholic beverage from Babycham to Prosecco and while I caught my breath, I tried to have a chat with one of the police officers who had arrived en masse with their batons drawn just in case the exuberance got a wee bit too exuberant for Police Scotland's liking or The Rangers released another statement, whichever came first.

Later on we head back to a mate's hotel for a bit of a private party where I developed a taste for a bottle of maple flavoured Jim Beam that had been brought along for the occasion. I never normally drink whisky or bourbon straight but the maple took the edge off just enough that I was able to do my best Tinie Tempah impression by drinking from the bottle.

There's an internationally known author in the bar who I'd met once before in Sweden after Hibs were knocked out of Europe by Elfsborg. I remember him because he told me to cheer up (not to mention I've read his books) but he doesn't remember me and he hasn't read my blog. I know this because my mate's later told me that I asked him.

At some point during this exchange I've gone to the toilet and gotten locked in there. In the dark. I've done my best to get down on my hands and knees (by falling off the toilet) to find the pieces of the locking mechanism that I'd heard scatter onto the floor behind me as I came in. I finally had to admit defeat when my mate tries to talk me through the intricacies of putting the lock back together before he finally kicked the door in after I allegedly admitted to being scared of the dark, which is where he found me with my trousers round my ankles, the toilet seat in one hand and the remaining parts of the locking mechanism in the other.

I've gone back to the bar after this and struck up a brief conversation with the author again before the maple flavoured Jim Beam has the effect of rendering me unconscious. The author asks my mate if I'm OK after I've slumped to the floor and my brother announces to everyone that they should ignore me as I'm just attention seeking before I'm gently kicked into the recovery position which is where I remain until sometime later when I'm helped to bed (albeit, apparently, with a brief stop after half a dozen stairs to allow me to 'rest').

I wake up a few hours later and the first question that came to mind when I woke up wasn't 'Where am I?' or 'Who am I in bed with?', it was 'Where are my shoes?'. I eventually found them at the foot of the bed after returning from the same toilet I'd wrecked the night before for an early morning wee.

The effort of getting out of bed, going down and then climbing back upstairs proved to be too much for me and I realised that I was going to throw up. What was worse was that I also realised that I wouldn't make it back downstairs in time so I did the only thing I could and carefully took aim at what might be the smallest piece of porcelain masquerading as a sink and emptied the remainder of my stomach down the drain.

After getting back into bed I realised that throughout this entire event and all the commotion I'd made, the person I'd shared the bed with who I had never laid eyes on before in my life, has never moved a muscle. I'm pretty sure he hadn't taken so much as a breath and I started to think he was, in fact, dead. On the other hand I was merely dying so I made my peace with the situation and got back into bed to try and recover in time for the Cup Final Parade down Leith Walk.















*As it turned out the gentleman in question wasn't dead but was in fact the heavy sleeping actor Tam Dean Burn who had a small part in Scottish soap opera 'River City' and is a long-time friend of internationally known author Irvine Welsh who kicked me into the recovery position and still hasn't read my blog.

Champions League Pie, Beans and Chips

The Champions League Final is the culmination of hundreds of thousands of hours of human effort.

Throughout the course of the tournament the finest players European football has to offer (with the exception of Hibernian Football Club's personnel who decline to take part on a frustratingly regular basis) are on show displaying incredible levels of skill and athleticism for millions of fans around the world.

Every season the competition takes place there's drama, controversy, elation, jubilation, dejection and heartbreak that only ratchets up a notch the closer the team you're supporting get to lifting the trophy. I mark the occasion of the Champions League Final by hosting a 'Champions League Pie, Beans and Chips' night.

I don't know if children of the 50s, 60s and 70s were dished up pie, beans and chips by their parents but everyone that was born in the 80s and even some children of the 90s that I know love pie, beans and chips. We could argue all day as to whether the beans should be Heinz, Branston, store brand or from the budget range and no-one can be in any doubt that a crinkle cut chip adds a certain gravitas and je ne sais quo to proceedings but the one undeniable fact about what goes on your plate is that the humbler the Scotch pie you serve up (by which I mean the greater the mutton's arsehole and eyelid ratio to actual meat) the better - and this ladies and gentlemen is where I got it wrong this year.

You see, I've lived in a flat for a number of years so I've had to rein in my enthusiasm for having mates over because there are only so many people you can accomodate in the living room of a two bedroom flat. This year though I'd moved to a house with a garden, three bedrooms and toilets upstairs and downstairs. I could accomodate as many people as I wanted and still have room to anything I wanted.

I'd invited my two brothers, my two mates, my son and my brother in law and because I'd gone up in the world I thought I'd splash out and show off a bit and contribute a little to the local economy in one fell swoop by getting half a dozen steak and gravy pies from the butchers up the main street. To help pay for this extravagance I went into work to do some overtime and asked my wife if she wouldn't mind getting the half dozen pies I wanted.

While I was at work my wife messaged me on WhatsApp to say that the butcher didn't have half a dozen steak and gravy pies so she got three sausage rolls, two bridies and a steak bake instead. I told her that Champions League Sausage Roll, Bridie or Steak Bake, Beans and Chips was a bit more of a mouthful than Champions League Pie, Beans and Chips but that it wasn't a problem and we'd roll with it - after all, how much can I complain when I've got other people running about after me or providing others with a free feed? Besides, I'd already mentally planned my bit of showmanship to gloss over the fact that there were no pastry encased seasoned arseholes and eyelids.

I thought no more of it until later that night when my mate turned up with 12 Scotch pies and 4 Macaroni pies. Unbeknownst to me my wife was out with my mate's girlfriend who phoned him to ask him to get some pies. In the meantime my brother-in-law asked if he could bring one of the boys we play five-a-side with. "No problem" I said "I'll need to go out another pie for him but the more the merrier, it'll be a laugh".

In addition to the two pies I bought for the late arrival my brother-in-law brought four pies which was in addition to the sixteen pies my mate had brought which was in addition to the assortment of six sausage rolls, bridies and steak bakes.

Then, when my wife got home with my mate's girlfriend, they'd brought another four pies.

WHAT IN SUFFERING FUCK WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH TWENTY SIX PIES, THREE SAUSAGE ROLLS, TWO BRIDIES AND A STEAK BAKE?!

Now this is a story all about how six of my mates brought twenty six pies and I'd like to take minute just sit right there I'll tell you how I became the owner of my own Gregg's franchise..

Hampden holds no hoodoo, since Gray got the winner on 90+2…

“Hibs are going to Hampden” are five words that have become as familiar to Hibs fans as the sound of our own breathing, the rising of the sun and every word spoken on Time for Heroes – including the bit where you had to listen really hard Anthony Stokes when he described The Rangers defence as “fragile” given the molasses like thickness of his Irish accent.

It’s become so familiar that after Hibs 3-1 victory over Ayr United fans took to Twitter and amusingly commented that they were making enquiries into getting a season ticket at the national stadium (A.K.A Easter Road West) while others noted that there are plans to build a third dressing room so that there’s one for Queens Park, one for the visiting team and another for Hibs.

If the record books are correct then this is an entirely unique situation for Hibs in as much as we’re going into the Scottish Cup Semi-Final as holders of the Scottish Cup for the first time in our history. The briefest of research reveals that in Season 1902/03 Dundee knocked Hibs out at the third time of asking at the Quarter-Final stage (the original fixture and the replay not being enough to separate the two sides) and while Wikipedia is a bit scant on detail when it comes to Season 1887/88, it’s complete enough to know that Hibs didn’t make the Semi-Final and a team called Renton won it.

This is also the first time, at least in recent memory, that Hibs have gone into a Scottish Cup Semi Final completely unburdened by our history in the competition. It bears repeating (not like anyone has forgotten, not that we’ll let anyone forget) that Hibs won the Scottish Cup for the first time in 114 years on 21^st May 2016, the magnitude of the event being something that only Hibs fans truly understand the meaning of, something we’ll never tire of hearing, seeing or reading about. It’s one of the reasons I’m writing this right now because the circumstances of this competition, of this Semi-Final and what it could lead to are so, so different.

When Hibs faced Dundee United in last year’s Scottish Cup Semi-Final we were coming off the back of a defeat against Ross County in the League Cup a month earlier and in the midst of a pretty poor run of form. Three defeats on the spin preceded the League Cup Final followed by two draws and two defeats before we played Dundee United in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final. LLLLLDLD.

I remember my friends and my brother and I all walking to Hampden on 16^th April 2016 with a blasé attitude. We’d had the customary couple of drinks before the game but the atmosphere was subdued when you take into account thatHibs were in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final. There was no pre-match excitement for us, no running about in the weeks before ensuring we were on supporters and. There wasn’t even the usual scramble for tickets. We went through on the train, had a quiet couple of pints and made our way towards the ground knowing that, no matter what, we were going out for tea afterwards as we had all simply dispersed after the Ross County game and made our way to our respective homes. I couldn’t remember exactly why we felt that way, particularly since events of 21^st May 2016 have coloured everything since so I asked my friend why he thought that was. I didn’t ask if I could use his full name so let’s just call him Budgie.

He said “I honestly think the League Cup Final against Ross County had killed the optimism that you usually attribute to an appearance at Hampden.

The disappointments I can consciously remember are blinded by the League Cup Final in 2007 and winning the Scottish Cup in 2016 but I think before the Semi-Final against Dundee United we had a real concentrated period of repeated disappointments. You had the Hearts debacle in 2012 followed by the Celtic final the following year where we were never in the game. Then there’s the Falkirk Semi-Final which we inexplicably lost followed by Ross County where we maybe didn’t deserve to win but definitely didn’t deserve to lose.

On top of our relationship with Hampden, Hibs had conspired to get relegated. One win in 19 games would have seen us fine. One win. Relegated in the same year as Hearts went on to run riot in the league while we got knocked out of the playoffs from a Rangers team we were much better than. How could you have possibly been optimistic after experiencing all that in such a short space of time?

Going to Hampden on 16^th April 2016 we knew that Oxley was suspended following a booking for wasting time / losing a contact lens, it transpires later that Virtanen has shat it during the week and Logan’s in goals. Everyone is thinking ‘look at the nick of him’, Cummings lobs the ball over the goal with his penalty. Mixu was in charge of them, Rankin was playing and Anier was in the squad. It was all adding up to another disappointment so rather than wallow in self-pity about it, we made a conscious decision of not to give a fuck about the result”

When Cummings missed his penalty and after our jaws had joined the rest of our face from of the floor, one of us remarked that “this is how it happens”. Basically, this is how we make a mess of it, this is how we lose and this is how the Scottish Cup eludes us again, without ever reaching the final. It was to turn into a running joke for the remainder of the game. Every time United were through on goal, “this is how it happens”. When Rankin has his dig at goal “this is how it happens”. When Anier was introduced late in the game “this is how it happens”. Logan, however, defied all our expectations and was simply phenomenal during that game saving everything that was put his way including two penalties in the penalty shoot-out. In the space of an hour or so “this is how it happens” changed from this is how we get knocked out to “this is how IT happens”.

Given our league form at the time of the Ross County defeat I said to my friends that Hibs needed to focus solely on the Scottish Cup the reason being that no-one would remember if we got promoted whereas no-one would ever forget if we did the unthinkable and won the Scottish Cup. Hibs didn’t focus solely on the Scottish Cup but instead professionally went about trying to gain entry into the Premier League via the Championship Playoffs while continuing to battle for the Scottish Cup.

Hibs fell short in the league and finished third behind The Rangers and Falkirk which meant two ties against Raith Rovers who we beat on aggregate over two legs before eventually exiting the competition following a two-legged aggregate defeat against Falkirk. I remember coming away from The Falkirk Stadium trying to console my brother (again) who was thinking of jacking the whole thing in and giving up his season ticket (again) and thinking out loud that David Gray hadn’t had a great game and that Niklas Gunnersson might be a better choice at right back for the Scottish Cup Final 9 days later – can you imagine how different the world would look now if Stubbs had listened to my pish? Unthinkable.

Our form at the start of this year has been mixed.  We had reason to be optimistic following four wins in January but it was followed by mixed fortunes in February that continued into March. A draw against Ayr preceded a nil-nil draw against Hearts in the Scottish Cup tie at Tynecastle. Hibs then shared the points in another draw against Raith Rovers with the Hibs team putting in a performance so poor that Neil Lennon gave a scathing critique of his players in his post-match radio interview which seemed to have the desired effect as Hibs then absolutely demolished Premier League opponents Hearts in the Scottish Cup replay 3-1 at Easter Road, a game where Andrew Shinnie replaced the injured Chris Humphrey after just a few minutes in an unfamiliar left-wing position but delivered as good a performance as anyone else on the pitch.

Hibs then had a quite stunning collapse against Dunfermline at Easter Road after going two goals up (which in my opinion had as much to do with Liam Fontaine’s injury, leaving Hibs with only one fit centre half and Dunfermline sensing we were there for the taking) before losing 2-0 at St. Mirren in a midweek encounter in Paisley.

Is it perhaps understandable then on seeing the odds of Ayr United beating Hibs / qualifying from the tie at 10/1 and 11/2 respectively that I thought they were a touch generous and put a reluctant fiver on each? Not that I wanted Hibs to lose because I never want Hibs to lose but I felt that injuries (Hanlon, Forster, Fontaine, McGeouch, Humphrey), suspensions (McGregor) and a loss of form (Fyvie) had simply taken their toll on a Hibs team previously depleted by injuries to key players and it might in fact benefit Hibs not to have to face any additional games.

And yet…

Hibs put their inconsistent league form to one side to beat Ayr 3-1 in a tie we never looked like losing and have now made the Semi-Finals for something like the sixth time in the last 10 years.

Maybe it’s because winning the Scottish Cup felt like (and was celebrated like) a once in a lifetime deal that I hadn’t given much thought to winning it again and had allowed myself to be side tracked by other so-called ‘priorities’ (E.G. The league) but our history with the competition means that the idea of winning it again must surely occupy the same part of the brain where all the memories of 21^st May 2016 reside. This is for the time being at least, OUR cup and it took so long for us to get our hands on it that this Hibs side and the supporters have zero desire to let it slip from our grasp without a fight…or a party.

The noise that Hibs fans have generated since that opening tie at Tynecastle, but from the full house at Easter Road in the Scottish Cup replay under the lights in particular, has been nothing short of breath taking and the party atmosphere that follows Hibs in the cup is something that I think has been instrumental in our performances and in getting us to the Semi-Final once more. Graeme Hunter’s “We are Hibs” (Hibs, woah-oh-oh-oh-oh Hibs, Hibs) has quickly cemented itself as a Hibs anthem. The original recording was a fantastically creative bit of song writing and Graeme deserves credit for recording it and uploading it to YouTube. I wonder how he feels hearing his own voice coming over the speakers at Easter Road? And does he sing “Fuck your 1902” with as much GET IT RIGHT FUCKING UP YE as I do?  

A recent and classic bit of Hibs footage shows cult hero ‘King’ Dom Malonga scoring a sublime solo effort. He takes a long clearance from John McGinn in his stride on the halfway line, ghosts between three players and calmly slots the ball past the stranded goalkeeper. Malonga’s plying his trade in Italy again however our opponents in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final, the team King Dom scored against and helped Hibs knock out on our way to the League Cup Final are none other than Aberdeen.  

We’ve got a good record against The Dons in cup competition in the last few years and we no longer have the weight of history holding us back. We can play without fear. We could beat Aberdeen and we could make the final.

Could this be how IT happens…again? 

Happy Birthday, Lewis Stevenson

The first time I remember seeing you in a Hibs shirt was when John Collins sent you on as a second half substitute against St Johnstone in the Scottish League Cup Semi-Final on 31st January 2007.

You'd played for Hibs before that but your ability, versatility and work ethic would help lay the foundations that would cement you into Hibernian folklore as the only Hibernian player to lift the Scottish League Cup and Scottish Cup.

You're painfully shy and public speaking isn't your forté but you're incredibly well thought of by your team-mates as evidenced by the fact that you are surrounded by them and receive a standing ovation from the crowd on the odd occasion you score - credit where it's due by the way, I haven't seen you score a tap in.

At 29 years young it's been my long held belief that a footballer of your age is at the peak of his abilities. I don't know why this is exactly, it's just one of those things that gets handed down and assumed as fact such as The Great Wall of China being the only man made object visible from space. Perhaps there is some truth in it from the point of view that while you will undoubtedly continue to learn as a footballer, it'll just get that little bit harder for you to the respond to the physical and psychological demands that the game will place upon you.

Advances in medical science, diet, lifestyle and surgical techniques mean athletes are performing at the peak of their abilities for longer and to the best of my knowledge you haven't spent a great deal of time on the treatment table so if you manage to avoid serious injury and keep the heid doon, I reckon you'll be good for another 6 years. I wouldn't want to see anyone else occupying that left back position at Easter Road in the meantime.

Happy Birthday, Lewis. Don't ever change.

With all my love, Wild Bill.

The Eternal Battle Between Spiders and Humans

I was sitting at home the other night playing Fallout 4, the latest instalment in the post-apocalyptic wasteland computer game. My wife was at work so I was free to waste some time and immerse myself in the building of a settlement or freeing a farm from the clutches of gangs of raiders or super mutants.

The last thing I remember doing was making sure that the two pink plastic flamingos adorning the grass outside my ramshackle house were just right because immediately afterwards and out of the corner of my eye I saw movement on the carpet and watched as a relatively large spider scuttled across the floor and cunningly attempted to camouflage itself against the floor to ceiling wall unit we have. Spiders don’t have the ability to camouflage themselves against floor to ceiling wall units or any other types of units to the best of my knowledge (which I hope remains that way because the alternative is a terrifying prospect) so perhaps it had momentarily stunned itself or was admiring my pink flamingos.

Either way, now that I had the spider in my sights I began plotting to catch it and free it into the wild via the window but given the sheer size of the arachnid and the fact that I’d recently read that the changing seasons meant spiders were moving indoors and were horny, I didn’t want it to know that I knew it was there, so I pretended to continue playing the game while I kept one eye on the spider’s movements and another on trying to find things in the living room that I could use to catch it, lest it suddenly find me attractive and try to mount me.

With the glass that was next to me in one hand and a bit of cardboard from the back of a Deadpool comic in the other, just as I stood up the spider seemed to recover its senses and made a move for the relative safety of the darkened corner of the room. Maybe it’s because I’m 6ft 5”, walk on two legs instead of eight and weigh about 17 stone depending on which way the wind is blowing but my lunge with the glass was too slow and I succeeded only in trapping one of the spiders eight legs. I didn’t know what to do next as I was no further forward than when I started. There was nothing I could use to capture the remaining 90% of the spiders body and legs against the curvature of the glass and I know I wouldn’t like it if someone had pinned one of my legs so I let him go and watched him scuttle into the corner he’d been trying to reach all along. I pretended to go back to playing Fallout 4  but I kept my wits about me because I knew this wouldn’t be the last I saw or heard of my 7-and-a-bit legged friend.

It seemed a reasonable assumption that if the spider was going to come out of the corner and lie in wait before trying to catch one of us unawares, the most obvious place would be in the shadow of the blanket that was draped over a chair in our living room, so the last thing I did before leaving for work the next morning was fold the blanket thereby removing the shadow and denying the spider a hiding place. As I hadn’t actually told my wife about the large, horny spider in our flat I thought that if it was going to come out of its hiding place and make itself comfortable (the spider that is, not my wife) then at least she’d maybe get a head start if she had to run away from it.

We exchanged these messages on WhatsApp the following day

"By the way" she said "I killed a massive spider in the flat today, I moved the game chair and it got crumpled underneath it. Like, HUGE".

"YASSS!" I said "I tried to catch that fucker earlier in the week but it got away. I did injure it though which might have helped you catch it and I've been keeping an eye out to go round two with it ever since".

"Are you fucking joking? she asked "It could've got me!".

This isn’t the first time I’ve ran into a spider who didn’t miss leg day at the gym. A few years ago now I stayed in a flat on Slateford Road in Edinburgh and one morning I woke up in a daze (to be fair, I wake up in a daze most mornings, who doesn’t?), went into the bathroom for a wee and out of the corner of my eye saw a large, unfamiliar presence in the bath. I did the only thing I could; pretended I hadn’t saw it, finished my wee and tucked myself back into my boxers before turning on the shower, hoping to flush the spider down the drain.

Imagine my horror as I watched the spider spread its enormous legs over the plug hole, brace itself and then start power scuttling towards the opposite end of the bath. “I’ve just tried to drown my spider flatmate” I thought. “If he makes it to the shower and turns it off he’s going to ask me to leave. I’ll be out on the street at 8am in my boxers because there’s no danger I’m hanging about for that conversation. There’s only one thing for it, I'll need to fight him to the death”.

In an effort to cheer myself up and fill the long, lonely hours at home after breaking up with my girlfriend, I’d been watching a lot of war films that I’d picked up on DVD out of ASDA; Saving Private Ryan, Full Metal Jacket, We Were Soldiers, Kelly’s Heroes and Where Eagles Dare to name but a few. None of these helped in actually defeating the spider since most of them were about defeating Ze Germans or the Vietcong but I did have Richard Wagner’s ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ from Apocalypse Now in mind as I turned the shower up, closed the plug and started water bombing the spider into submission with cups of water that I filled from the sink. “You can run from some water” I said, chillingly “but can you run from ALL the water?”.

Daa-da-da-da-DAA (SPLASH!)

Da,da-da-da-DAA (SPLASH!)

Da, da-da-da-DAAA (SPLASH!)

Da, da-da-da-daaaaaaa (SPLASH!)

Instead of standing outside in my boxers looking every inch the embarrassment to the top of the food chain I was, I danced around the flat paraphrasing Robert Duvall’s character from the same film. “SPIDERS DON’T SURF!” I shouted “I LOVE THE SMELL OF TOILET DUCK IN THE MORNING, IT SMELLS LIKE LEMON FRESH!”

After a while the spider stopped moving but I continued to watch it intently just in case it had been watching over my shoulder when Owen Wilson’s character from Behind Enemy Lines plays dead under a pile of bodies in a mass grave.  Satisfied that I’d won (and if you wanted to get really philosophical, are there ever any winners in war?) I opened the plug and watched the spider make its final journey.

And then swiftly closed it and every other plug in the flat for the next three weeks.

Punching babies in the face

***Originally posted on the Hibees Bounce website in response to a discussion about a 5 day old baby getting punched in the face by a 63 year old man in a branch of Tesco in Manchester - felt I had to share it with a larger audience***

I read about this at work yesterday and laughed in spite of myself. Then I told someone else at work about it and they laughed in spite of themselves too.

It reminded me of a situation recently where I was tempted to clout a wee shite on a train or plane I was on. They'd been causing all kinds of grief on my particular mode of transportation and I thought "Fuck this, I could just skelp the wee fucker. No-one will be more shocked than the bairn or the parents. No-one will believe what they've seen and with the right amount of confidence I could probably get away with it. Skelp your bairn? Fuck off. Who does that?" It'd be like the flashy thing in Men in Black but a balled fist of punched your bairn in the face induced amnesia instead. 

See if the old boy had stuck with the "I never punched your baby" line, it could have been one of those stories he told on his death bed "Pull your chair closer young man, let me tell you about the time I punched a baby and got away with it". Instead he's probably going to die old and lonely because he punched a baby in the face.

It's not funny but it really really is.

Disclaimer: I do NOT condone punching babies in the face.

The Naked Attraction

The Naked Attraction is a minefield of a show and I've absolutely no idea what to make of it. Culturally speaking I can't decide if it's a good or bad thing for television, dating, society, men, women or anyting else for that matter. Not that anyone would actually listen if I could.

It is, however, a great opportunity to see folk in the scud that you wouldn't normally have had the opportunity to. That's the attraction of the show (pardon the pun), the free pass for everyone sitting on the sofa to have a gander at whatever Channel 4 have served up for your viewing pleasure. Big knobs, wee cocks, shapely breasts, big tits, labia, scrotums, nipples, the whole shooting match. Only the people with a thing for bleached arseholes or otherwise miss out.

I understand the premise of the show, you strip away everything until all you're left with is a physical attraction and a desire to fuck the naked person standing opposite you with none of the other things that make us reject potential partners getting in the way. Which is fine but no relationship will ever be sustained that way because it removes the key element that can often see two people bumping uglies  - a decent bit of chat. Yeah, Channel 4 get them dressed and send them all on a date to the same bar they sent all the other 'couples' to but the only way any actual fucking is taking place is if these people get along.

Maybe it's the enforced nakedness causing some nerves, maybe it's the cameras leaving people tongue-tied but some of the chat on offer doesn't leave me with a lot of room left to wonder why these people have resorted to enforced nakedness to try and get their Nat King Cole. What's the last of your last resorts, folks? Payment?

Tracy, a mother of two and 'contestant' on the show, hasn't been in a relationship for three years and described the dimensions of her vagina as being a bit of a jam jar. I don't care what you look like (blonde, pretty, nice smile), how fake your tits are (credit to her surgeon, good job) or how big or small your vagina is (strawberry preserve apparently), if I'd been one of the two well hung gentlemen she'd whittled her choice of a date down to, I'd have simply walked the fuck off the show because that sort of chat is absolutely brutal and I wouldn't want to put my cock anywhere near her (from a visual point of view) self-described "beef sandwich". 

21st May 2016 - The Wait is Over!

114 years of waiting came to an end for Hibernian Football Club on Saturday 21st May 2016. 33 ½ years of waiting came to an end for me.  Anyone that says I’ve not been a hibby since I exited my mother’s birth canal singing “Glory Glory to the Hibees” is a liar.

There is arguably no competition, no trophy in the sporting world that meant as much to someone as the Scottish Cup did to Hibs and their fans. It’s been so tantalisingly close yet always so agonisingly out of reach from having the team name engraved on the trophy for the third time. Hibs might win the competition again but you’ll never see celebrations the likes of Saturday’s ever again.

We few, we privileged few witnessed something so incredibly unique that no-one alive has seen it. Take stock of that for a second; no living person had seen Hibs win the Scottish Cup until Saturday afternoon. We witnessed history being made in front of our very eyes. This was the moon landing for Hibs. This was our “Where were you when you heard JFK was shot?” and while I wasn’t the second gunman on the grassy knoll, I’ll never forget where I was on 21^st May 2016 when David Gray bulleted home the header that clinched it for the cabbage. I was stood at Hampden with my mates and my brother watching a 114 year old curse being laid to rest.

When Stokes sent Hibs second goal into the roof of the net I turned to my right and practically threw myself at my brother David who was sat on his seat, head in his hands, tears falling from his eyes and we fell to the floor. “It’s fucking 2-2” I shouted in his face “Get your shit together, we’re still in this!” and I went off to reassure my pals he was OK. It reminded me of that famous footage from the 1990 World Cup where Paul Gascoigne has just been booked (a booking which ruled him out of the World Cup Final if England should have made it) and Gary Lineker motions to Graham Taylor that Gazza’s having a wee bubble to himself, only everyone’s wearing Hibs tops and it didn’t go to penalties.

My brother has put up with some amount of shit watching Hibs. We all have in some shape or form at one time or another but most of us can at least conjure up one memory, one period, one group of players to give you a wee bit of a lift and remind you that it won't always be this bad. David’s not had that, he’s had relegation, disappointment, managerial merry go rounds and a raft of bang average players to contend with and it’s pretty much all my fault. His dad was a jambo that never went to games so when David saw me coming home absolutely buckled from trips to see Hibs he thought to himself “I want a bit of that”. Thus, it fell upon me to take him to his first Hibs game, a drab and bad tempered affair against a John Hughes Falkirk side where Hibs had a couple of players sent off and lost 1-0. Welcome to Hibs, pal.

When we were at the League Cup Final a few weeks earlier, it would become apparent that my brother thought (and we all wished) that this would be his moment.  The older but not necessarily wiser heads among us retained that feeling that it could all go tits up having been there and seen it happen on so many occasions before. Needless to say Ross County took the lead after 25 minutes but Liam Fontaine managed to snatch one back on half time which was just enough for the floogdates on the emotion of the day to swing open and David burst into alcohol induced tears.

In the end, it’s the hope that gets you because lo and behold, Hibs succumbed to a late winner from a Dutchman wearing what appeared to be a sports bra. Being a Hibs fan just isn’t fair at times and the tears were replaced with an impotent rage because there’s nothing you can do in that kind of situation. You have so much passion and fire and nowhere to channel it because you’ve got chocolate ankles and never donned the famous green and white of Hibs.

As the fourth official held up his board a week past Saturday to signal four minutes of added time there was a roar from the Hibs fans. The Rangers seemed quite happy to run the clock down at 2-2 and take it to extra time but Hibs had other ideas and David Gray challenged Dean Shiels, forcing a throw in from in front of the dug outs.

If you watch the replay you’ll see Liam Henderson and Fraser Fyvie surge forward. David Gray throws the ball long for Fyvie who drove at the Rangers defence before slipping in Stokes who beat Tavernier (was there ever a time where he didn’t beat Tavernier last Saturday?) and flashed a shot across the goal, forcing the Rangers ‘keeper into a save. Liam Henderson delivered an almost identical cross from which Hibs scored their second and when David Gray connected with that beautiful forehead of his and the ball rippled against the back of the net, Hampden went ballistic.

After 114 years and ten previous appearances in the finals since winning it last, we knew, we just knew that this time we’d done it. The Holy Grail was coming back to Leith and the remaining few minutes were a mere formality. At the final whistle I hugged perfect strangers who responded in kind and we exchanged knowing glances with people who looked at us as if they were acknowledging that our singing and banging on the roof of the stadium had somehow contributed to the result. My brother, meanwhile, was now lying flat out on his back looking in utter disbelief at the same roof I’d been leathering with the palms of my hands for the previous 90 minutes.

My brother looked at me the day of the League Cup Final against Ross County and shouted in my face “You’re the reason I’m a Hibs fan, you’re the reason I’m here”, so full of hope and expectation (and Peroni) that the years of grief and disappointment and shite football and Matt Done's of the world that he’d endured would finally be worth it with a cup win. He couldn’t have known then but Hibs would keep him waiting a little longer for the succour he needed.

As much as I’m the reason David’s a Hibs fan, he’s a big part of why I’m still going. After Hibs had lurched from the ‘Players at Petrie’s hoose’ debacle to John Hughes, Mixu Paatelainen and Colin Calderwood and never actually getting to the root cause of why Hibs were so fantastically and routinely pish, I’d had all of Hibs I could take. I love Hibs but because I’m so pig headed and because they continued to hurt and disappoint me in ever new and imaginative ways, I couldn’t stand to be miserable anymore and rather than be the guy who said he wasn’t going back to Easter Road or wasn’t renewing his season ticket without following through, I simply stopped going.

When Hibs beat Hearts 2-1 at Tynecastle with Leigh Griffiths and Ross Caldwell goals, I was up Ben Vorlich with another mate (who has since started coming to Hibs games and saw Hibs lift the Scottish Cup within about 6 weeks of going to his first game) and only found out the score afterward in a bakers in Callendar where we stopped for post-Munro bacon rolls and carrot cake. That’s how far away I’d gotten from Hibs. I cared enough to check in on the score but not enough to be anywhere near Edinburgh while they were playing. 

Gradually I began going to see Hibs again and sat in the East Stand with David who convinced me to get a season ticket with him. I was there for Fenlon’s ill-fated tenure and realised I’d fallen in love with the team again on the day of that Cup Final despite coming home and my fiancée telling me I looked like I'd been told someone had died.

Being a hibby isn’t just about winning and silverware, it’s about community and camaraderie and one of the things that struck me as I looked around a sea of faces displaying a myriad of emotions last Saturday was that it was about so much more than simply winning the Scottish Cup. It was about sharing that moment with the people closest to you and perhaps most importantly of all, remembering and thanking the people who didn’t live to see it and had probably gotten you the ticket for this 114 year old journey in the first place.

Football has a funny way of throwing up strange coincidences. One of my best mates was married in 2007 shortly after Hibs won the League Cup so it was a strange quirk of fate that Hibs would reach the League Cup Final the same year I was due to be married and we exchanged a wry laugh when we realised I might emulate his slightly unique honour. I would never have dared imagine that the trophy Hibs would lift in my wedding year would be the Scottish Cup.

It’s been a long time coming, Hibs. You have given us all an irreplaceable memory, something no amount of money can buy so you can do whatever you like for the next 114 years and it won’t matter.

 

GGTTH

Mass Hibsteria League Cup Final Special - The Unpublished Article

I've been fannying about with old blogs I never meant to publish and likening them to Oasis' B-Side album 'The Masterplan' when I should in fact be writing something for the Mass Hibsteria League Cup Final Special.

I've no idea why the powers that be allow me to do this because all my writing to date has been a random collection of pish that I continue to force upon friends, family and a small circle of Hibs fans I've never met but befriended on social media anyway. The poor bastards probably wish that Hibs don't make a Cup Final because they know as soon as the Semi-Final whistle is blown and the Cup Final Special is announced, I'll be keener than Adam Johnson with a fans phone number and a signed shirt.

If nothing else tonight's wee flurry of activity might have actually forced me to get the finger oot and get writing. I've been trying to get something, anything down on paper for a few weeks now but various other things have gotten in the way; basically everything that doesn't include writing. Hey, look, a squirrel.

For everyone else submitting an article there are 96 hours (give or take) until submissions are due which in reality is 24 for me because I'm at the Hibs game on Wednesday night and fly out to Berlin on Thursday morning for my stag do so if I don't do it now then there'll be no appearance of the Clown Prince in your MHLCFS .

There's a teeny-weeny part of me that thinks "fuck it, dinnae bother because the last time Hibs were in the League Cup Final you weren't in Mass Hibsteria either" and I'm really superstitious about not doing anything to harm Hibs chances which in itself is a powerful incentive to re-insert my index finger back up my rectum.

The other selfish (so, so selfish) part of me thinks "You could be in Mass Hibsteria when Hibs win the cup in the same year you get married" which is the same bastard that said "You could be in Mass Hibsteria when Hibs beat Hearts to lift the Scottish Cup" and we all know how that worked out.

I've spent as long thinking as it's taken me to realise that absolutely nothing I do will impact on the outcome of a Hibs game. Not the music I hear, the route I walk to the ground, the 'lucky' green socks I wear or the programmes that I refuse to buy because a Hibs losing run ended when I stopped buying them and haven't bought since.

The only thing that will matter is that a good Hibs team takes the field on Sunday 13 March 2016 and plays full tilt, baws oot, Cup Final fitba. If Hibs can do that then we're all going back to Leith, baby!

'Mon the fucking Cabbage!!!

Shopping trip

Was in Lidl earlier for a couple of bottles of Crabbie's Ginger Beer and vanilla essence and ended up coming away with pretzel rolls, bananas, cashews and chocolate chips as well. The cashews at 95p per 100g were the most expensive item and it turns out that two large scoops is about 469g. Much cheaper than cocaine but not nearly as good a night in (so I'm told).

I've got a really bad habit in supermarkets of looking at what people are buying because it allows me to imagine the kind of lives they lead. I observed a guy recently who bought two 100g bars of chocolate, two bags of kettle chips, two bottles of pepsi max, two french sticks and a single punnet of cherry tomatoes so I imagine he was single, a virgin, probably an internet troll and if not diabetic now it was definitely in the post.

I got to the checkout and started loading up my essentials and impulse buys when I notice the woman ahead of me is midway through packing her shopping so I discreetly had a look at what was in her trolley; milk, bread, cleaning products, small boy of around 7 years old, carrots, pizza....what the fuck, a small boy of around 7 years old? She must have got the last one because I didn't see them anywhere.

Poppies

Opinions are like arseholes, everyone's got one. Whereas in the past these arseholes didn't have a medium through which to express themselves nowadays they have cheap and easy access to the internet and social media in particular.

Maybe I'm becoming less inclined to entertain bullshit the older I get but it seems to me that whenever you log on to Facebook or Twitter for a bit of lighthearted relief you find that where there used to be videos of monkeys falling out of trees after smelling their own shite, someone has shared a Britain First post. It's all become a bit tiresome* so thank goodness for blog writers, am I right?

The big debate as we approach Armistice Day is poppies. Why we should wear them and those who choose not to wear them justifying their reasons. National treasure (I.E. Used to be on the telly but no-one gives a fuck about you anymore) Barbara Windsor thinks you can "sod off" if you don't wear one. And now that that's been cleared up we can carry on with our lives.

Except it hasn't been cleared up. All it does it create unnecessary division between people and forgive me for saying but, isn't that how wars start and lives are lost?

I don't wear one and I haven't worn one for some time but that was more to do with the fear of stabbing myself in the finger or chest than any ideological point of view I might have. I did have a small and simple poppy that I'd donated some money to the salvation army for and had left sitting in my car as an almost permanent reminder but it had started to curl at the edges quite significantly, so when the car went in for its M.O.T. I binned it (the poppy, not the car). Shame on me, eh?

I reckon my abandoned poppy is probably doing fine though because everywhere you look these days poppies are bigger, brighter and more elaborate than ever. That didn't happen by accident, so poppies have obviously become self aware and created a support network that'll show an abandoned poppy how to iron out its curls and find a new car to sit in. It might even have advice on how a poppy can become one of those enormous poppies that are so big that they dominate the fronts of cars and vans, so much so you'd be forgiven for thinking it was a Comic Relief Red Nose and that they feed on exhaust emissions. Curiously, they do seem to be bigger on Volkswagens.

It seems to me nowadays it's not enough to show your respect, you have to be seen to be showing your respect and what better way to do than with a poppy so large and deep and round that if you lay on your back in the mountains of Puerto Rico and pointed it at the sky, it could double up as a radio telescope and scour the universe in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Yes, lady in Costa coffee this afternoon, in the highly unlikely event you're reading this I'm talking about you.

Wear one or don't wear one. It needs no more discussion than that really.

*I say this fully aware that during the referendum campaign I saturated Facebook and Twitter with pro-independence articles and opinions and I was a tiresome bore also.

One liners

There's a guy at my work who was prescribed codeine for a cough that he'd developed along with his cold. The doctor said "One of the side affects of taking this medicine is constipation". The guy from my work replied "As long as I get a full nights sleep I couldn't give a shit".

I was talking to my fiancée the other morning and we were discussing the boiled eggs we'd been taking to work with us for our lunch. She said "Have you noticed they leave you quite full?" and I said "Well, when you think about it, you're eating a whole chicken".

And I was talking to a girl at work today about films and games and comic books, how I'm going to the Fallout 4 midnight launch and I'm really excited to have learned that Deadpool will be shown on IMAX. She told me she loved The Big Bang Theory and recently visited Forbidden Planet where she discovered comic book stores were much like what she'd seend on TV. I agreed with her and said "Yeah, you'd be surprised at the number of sterotypically socially awkward nerds that go there...and that's just me".

Only one of these got a laugh; can you guess which one?

Medium coffees

I worked in an office years ago that had so few people in it we could boil one kettle and make a cup of tea or coffee for everyone without having to refill it. The only problem was that the inconsiderate bastards I worked with drank tea and I preferred coffee hated the stuff.

I really couldn't stand tea but for reasons I've never quite been able to put my finger on. The best way I could describe the taste of a cup of tea to me then was lukewarm and bitter which was the complete opposite of a cup of coffee that was piping hot and full of flavour.

In contrast with my colleagues I was not an inconsiderate bastard so it made sense (to me at least) that if they were going to make four cups of tea they might as well make five instead of four cups of tea and one coffee. That's another thing about making tea, it's a bloody cumbersome process of letting the hot water soak into the teabag, giving it a squeeze with a teaspoon and then fishing it out so you can chuck it in the bin. Contrast that with giving your cup of Carte Noire instant coffee a quick but vigorous stir and you can see why I wouldn't want to go to all that extra hassle of making something bitter and lukewarm.

Since then however I've grown quite fond of tea and it's probably got a lot to do with the time I spent in that office. It's better for dunking biscuits in for a start (not that I don't dunk biscuits in coffee but tea is better suited)  and you don't have to worry that it'll keep you awake all night if you drink a cup an hour or two before bed.

I still enjoy a good cup of coffee though and one of my favourite things to do to is just go out and drink a cup while I let my thoughts and the world drift by. It was while I was out having a cup recently that I got to thinking about the size of coffees. Costa do three sizes; Primo, Medio and Massimo while Starbucks call theirs Tall, Grande and Venti. All fancy schmancy names for small, medium and large.

Small is probably what you get at home, medium is probably more than you need and large is probably going to give you an irregular and irreparable heart rhythm if you keep chucking it down your neck in those kinds of doses.

Imagine for a second though you went into a coffee shop and asked for a medium cappuccino / latte / americano then found yourself a seat and sat down ready to let your thoughts drift when you hear a small voice that says:

"Sir, can I have your name please? There's a woman sitting right next to you"

There's no-one else in the coffee shop except the staff so you say "I'm sorry, did you say something" to the barista behind the counter. He says no so you carry presume you imagined it and go to take a drink when a little more impatiently this time you hear the voice again and it says "Sir, I'm talking to you, yes you with the puzzled look on your face, what's your name? There's a woman sitting right next to you who wants to talk to you". The cappuccino you ordered is unmistakably and inexplicably TALKING TO YOU AND ASKING YOU FOR YOUR NAME.

"Uhh, my name's John" you say a little hesitantly as you realise you're talking to a cup of coffee.

"Great, now, you've lost someone recently who wants to talk to you and let you know they're OK and that the dog you lost when you were four years old is in one piece now even though the bus that hit it left it splattered all over the road".

"Hold on" you say "You're a cup of coffee, why are you talking to me about dead people, much less talking to me at all?"

"Well" it says knowingly "you DID order a medium coffee".

What women say...

"Do we have any more kitchen roll?"

And what women actually mean...

"Go and get the kitchen roll that I know is in the cupboard".

Just get to the point already, it's not hard.

X Marks the Spot

You know that scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade where X marks the spot and Indy starts somewhat concidentally striking the floor in time with the librarian (who bears a passing resemblance to Albert Einstein) stamping books? It doesn't matter if you don't, I've attached it to this blog. Incidentally, I wonder what he'd have done if he'd been caught bashing a hole in the floor of a library "Yes, I'm sorry about the criminal damage officer but I simply must find The Holy Grail. You understand, don't you? Oh, you don't speak English. Do you understand an All-American punch in the face? Of course you do".

So anyway I've come out to have a coffee and a croissant this morning and I've just heard the exact same sound of steel striking stone; half boom, half crack, one third ping and a hint of bong. I know that doesn't really add up mathematically but you try attaching numbers to sound, it's not easy. 

I'm quite a curious guy anyway but now that I'm all jacked up on caffeine and all butter croissants (for which I was offered even MORE butter and jam for the additional price of fifty pence - "I'll take it plain, hen, I've got a wedding to save for") I'm like an adrenaline junkie trying to find another way to put my life in danger. "Fucking naked bungee jumping chainsaw juggling, yeeeeeeah, let's do that!".

I'm not sure where this journey will take me (or where the blog is going to be honest, it started off so much differently) so if you don't see me for a while I've sent my journal charting my quest to one of you in the post. Use it to come find me but be wary of any hot, blonde, friendly German women who try and seduce you for your secrets; you should definitely give in to her temptations though because hot, blonde, friendly German chicks might be Nazis in die straßen but they're freaks in die blätter and I wouldn't want to deny you that experience; besides, I want to see the look on your face when you discover she had sex with your dad too!

https://youtu.be/dvywOjh_hdY

I'm fornever blowing bubbles

Because I'm in the 'wearing rubber bands on my braces' stage of getting my teeth all straightened out, I occasionally find when I put them on that my saliva has formed a bit of a seal - the kind you need when you've got a little plastic (I've just realised I don't know what they're called?) dipstick for dunking into soapy water to blow bubbles from.

And it got me thinking how cool it would be if I had Fairy Liquid (other washing up liquids are available) for saliva; I could just spit into the sink when there was dishes needing doing and for laughs I could blow teeth shaped bubbles. 

The knock at the door

So I'm standing in the kitchen after getting home from work and I've just dunked a chocolate digestive in a cup of tea when there's a knock at the door.

My door never goes. Well, not never, but rare enough that it's the next best thing.

I open the door with the nearly finished biscuit still in my hand and discover a woman standing there with a clipboard and automatically I'm thinking "charity" while preparing my excuses for not signing up to a regular direct debit.

"Mrs Thompson?" she asks in a strangely quiet voice and I'm thrown for a second while I try to remember if that's the same person that Scottish Power have been sending bills to at my address.

It takes me a second but I realise I'm in the clear at least as much as Scottish Power are concerned so I say "Yes, I'm Mrs Thompson..." and look at her quizically for just long enough to be awkward for her before saying "Nah, I'm just fucking with you, there's no-one here by that name!".

Gregg's Macaroni Pies - No sympathy

I have zero sympathy for people who are unhappy at Gregg's doing away with their macaroni pies because Gregg's have been doing this to me for years and not one of you thought to start a petition to save the maple and pecan swirl, the caramel and pecan shortcake (there's a pecan pattern developing here) or the third thing whose removal upset me - not enough to remember what it was but enough to remain bitter about.

With all that being said, allow me to paraphrase Martin Niemöller here...

First they came for the caramel and pecan shortcake, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not like caramel and pecan shortcake.

Then they came for the maple and pecan swirls, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not like maple and pecan swirls.

Then they came for something else, and I did not speak out—
Because I didn't know what it was.

Then they came for the macaroni pies —and there was no one left to speak for me.

Spelling sympathies

I totally sympathise with people who struggle with dyslexia. There are certain words in the English language that absolutely should be spelt the way they sound.

Take "yacht" for example. What sort of narcissistic self loathing society do we live in where we could spell something exactly as it sounds but decide to fuck with people by making 'ach' an 'o' sound?

The Boaby

I was having a laugh with a boy from work yesterday about my rapidly approaching stag party after he sent me an email with a picture of a man stuck to a lamppost with little more to keep him warm than a bobble hat and some cling film.

He said "Idea for your stag do?"
I replied "Just give me something to keep my extremities warm!"
He said "I'll find you a thimble"
And I said "From your collection at home?"
He replied "My old man used to tell me "You can only pish with the cock you've got!"
I said "And my old man used to tell me "Son, with great power comes great responsibility!"