Out Out Out

A fitting way to watch the FA Cup final which - somewhat sadly - I really wasn't looking forward to all that much anyway. I was struck down early on Wednesday morning by some kind of gastric bug. I will spare you the gruesome details, but suffice it to say that I am still at the tail-end of the hideous fallout from it. On top of the rear end action, I was also feeling a little flu-ey: aching joints and head; slightly spaced out physicality, etc. No doubt compounded by the lack of sleep as I sat and stared at the tiled toilet floor in the middle of the night. So it was in this frame of mind that I crawled onto the sofa at 5 fucking 15 on Saturday, a can of beer unopened in front of me for nearly 45 minutes, listlessly watching the match unfold.

What can I say? I never expected - as so many fuckwits seemed to - that we would turn Wigan over. Just recently, we were extremely lucky to get away with a 1-0 win over them, and, unluckily mired as they are in the bottom three, they are still more than capable of playing some good football. I'm not calling him a fuckwit, but my cousin Steve predicted 4-1 City. I always (honestly - I'm not trying to big myself up) believed that it would be a low scoring affair. From the off, the Latics looked seemingly impenetrable in defence, though perhaps lacking in the final ball finesse to score, while we were lethargic and utterly bereft of ideas. A packed line of central defenders repeatedly stifled the darting runs of Kun and Tevez. Silva, on the rare occasions he did pick up the ball, was not playing at all well, and Yaya looked as if he was still suffering the muscle fatigue reported against Swansea earlier in the week. There was some hope rather than anticipation that we might click in the second half, but it was very short-lived and - truth be told - they (and particularly McManaman) came on much more strongly as the game progressed - cocking a snook at 'bloody' Roy Keane and his pearls of wisdom. I was too weak to shout, but that didn't matter as there was hardly anything worth shouting about. More and more often, Clichy was made to look an idiot down our left side, until their scoring seemed an inevitability, and then Zab got his marching orders, putting paid to any chance we might have had of (unjustly) nicking one to win it.

I'm no fan of Dave Whelan - in fact I think he's a Tory cunt - but I suppose I've got nothing in particular against their fans, even if they do like egg chasing more than the beautiful game. In any case, it's important to be magnanimous in defeat, so fair play to them, congratulations and all that.

We hear that Bobby is being treated in the now familiar shabby fashion that is modern football management, although swinging the axe on the very day that was the anniversary of our tremendous title win was classless in the extreme. The loss though, and the end to a potless and disappointing campaign, fits the mood of the moment - even as Sralex stands and cries in the middle of the Sty, sticking the knife in as the tears roll down his face. Wigan then, as much as City, deserved what they got, so it's time to look to the future and our exciting trips to South Africa and the USA. Time to consider life under a Chilean rather than an Italian.

Fat Man

I apologise if anyone took my tip and opted for a 2-1 final score at Stamford Bridge on Sunday. This was a truly drab game, and although I thought City played well enough in patches, they just lacked the killer punch. A bit (stealing from my cousin Steve here) like the sad Ricky Hatton in the ring the night before, although both teams were slugged and pummelled into a weary submission here. Neither side showed a huge amount of commitment or quality in front of goal, and frustrating was the only word for it. I have to say that if there had been a less lenient referee, the match might have flared into something more closely resembling a contest. He let the game flow and could easily have got up to a couple of reds if he had come down harder early on - though for once I feel Mario was hard done by for his yellow. Not that I wish for a dirty match, just that we might have seen a bit more gusto if it had happened. I think also the anger of the detestable Chelsea fans towards their new manager must surely have had an effect on the home side. Anyway, the less said about this poor excuse for a game of football the better, and let's hope we see something different at the home of Rugby League on Wednesday night. I fear we may struggle again, but this time I think that a 2-1 to City scoreline might be the result this time.

Now, on to the next thing. I've mentioned it once already, and it becomes increasingly hard to ignore as time goes by. Yes, Christmas is just around the corner.

This year, operating the way I do in my personal life, is particularly tricky as the Big Day falls on a Tuesday. My place of employment is being typically anal and seeking to control everyone minutely, so it feels as if there is hardly any room to breathe. For a festival which lasts one - maybe two - days, Christmas causes an awful lot of heartache. Retailers are sweating their arses off hoping that folks will shell out ever-increasing amounts on the latest tat; families are frantic with worry about the presents, the cooking, the inevitable interaction with people they hardly ever see; sad milestones are marked with depression; even the telly isn't what it used to be, what with all the guff you can get on the internet and elsewhere all year round.

I have one simple proposal (and it has probably already been suggested by loads of people) which - though not a cure-all for the Yuletide disease - might do a little something to help. Why not follow the Easter pattern and make Christmas day the Friday after the last full moon in whenever (I'm sure the theological doctors could come up with something which meant it was always the second-to-last Friday of December) on some ridiculous religious calendar somewhere? Boxing Day could then fall on the Monday after it and we would get a four day weekend. You'd have to make sure that New Year's Eve was untouched of course, because I feel that people won't put up with moving that around, but surely it makes sense from all angles to have the Christmas event better managed? I mean, there is no real evidence to suggest that Jesus ever lived at all (old scraps of papyrus don't count for me) so why get hung up on the 'fact' that he was born on the 25th of December? In any case, the whole thing was hijacked from the pagan agricultural/astronomical festival, which was devised at a time when most people didn't have to get the tube into work five days a week. Just a thought.

Anger

Came into work boiling today, despite being liberally doused with rain. I wanted to toss off this piece in the heat of that anger, but ended up on the phone addressing the issue for half an hour, so now I'm here, retrospectively annoyed, tapping away.

My thoughts were to experiment with anger and writing, to see how it might come out, and although there is a lingering simmer of pissed off-ness, most of the initial seething has subsided, so that experiment will have to wait another day. The subject of my ire: the boss, of coss! Standing in the pissing rain, waiting for a bus, I checked my BlackBerry, to find there a message accusing me (to cut a long story short) of poor customer service, albeit through a member of my team.

'For fuck's sake!' I hissed, as I slopped through a puddle into the mass of steaming commuters on the 24, my mood immediately sent nosediving by this stupid message. Head down after I disembarked, taking the incessant heavy drizzle full in the face on the short walk to the office, I mulled over my response. Temporarily toying with writing something along the lines of:

'Do you think we're all fucking stupid or something? How dare you accuse me of this, when I only found out about it late last night, and have already told you that I would investigate? How fucking DARE you, BITCH?!', I nonetheless didn't bother, and instead penned an anodyne 'I'll look into it' before making a phone call. I'm glad to say that I was vindicated by the call, and have heard nothing in response as yet, although the danger of course is always that some other attack (and let's face it, everyone has at least one vulnerability in their work. If the powers that be really don't like you, it can be difficult to avoid an inevitable crash) will mount. Let's wait and see.

So now that's over with, time for a bit of football talk. Though not a good win, a win for all that on Monday night against an anaemic Wigan side. Dzeko, despite scoring, still looking more of a donkey than a world class striker. Aguero unlucky again, with a fantastic work ethic, great speed and strength. De Jong alarmingly short of his previous form, and really should have been a more comfortable scoreline, even without Yaya. So it's on to face the magnificent Spurs at the weekend, and do I spy (geddit?) a cracking match? My prediction, 2-2, which wouldn't make me too angry, or perhaps 3-2 City, though perhaps old 'Arry will be taxed (geddit???!!) by events at Southwark Crown Court the following day.

Gaah

I have to admit that it was an excruciating last 10 minutes.  The interminable added time in particular seemed endless as I watched blurry figures scurry around accompanied by the threnody of drums and utterly banal (at least I think so - the sound was of an underwater quality, so it was hard to say with any accuracy) commentary on my computer monitor.

Tevez has had a haircut. Jo (what's with the sudden hat over the o?  I can't even be bothered to find the right font to depict it properly) is unremittingly shit. Balotelli remains closeted in his game chair, along with Boateng (another one with irritating circumflexes).  Still no sign of Michael Johnson.  And the Europa League grinds on and on and on.  I'm glad at least that I'm not a Salzburg fan, because that was pretty abject for a home performance.

Back in the EPL, it already seems a curiously fractured season, even so early in the day, and I'm finding it hard to engage with the City cause, though I am somewhat Hart-ened (geddit???!!!) by the stubbornly familiar moments of high farce.  City till we die and all that.

Tomorrow the Pope is going to fuck with my journey home and next week the Trade Unions are going to fuck with my life in general.  In between, I hope we're going to fuck Wigan. Up the shitter.

Gute nacht.