Hungerford Town

I went to watch Mangotsfield play away to Hungerford Town on 1 September 2012. It was an easy drive down the M4, taking about an hour. To get to the ground, you drive through the centre of Town which is littered with antique shops, then through a housing estate and you are there. Not a massive amount of parking is available, but for a big crowd, parking on the adjacent streets appears easy.

It is a nice ground with small stands on each side, so plenty of cover is available. The pitch has a steady downward slop, and on the day, there was a steady wind blowing up the slope.

Main stand at the ground

Smaller stand at the ground

As I ended up being busy talking to lots of people (!), I did not have a chance to walk all the way around the ground. Consequently, I did not spot a tea, fast food outlet. I presume they have one. On the other hand, they do have a nice sized bar with a decent selection of beers. perhaps the bar doubles as tea outlet?

Anyway, I must say that everyone I met at Hungerford was very friendly. A few of our travelling fans had tipped them off they were arriving early, and so opened the bar specially for them. Top marks all round then!

As for the game, well, Hungerford won 2 – 1. Everyone at the ground agreed that the officials spoilt the game, and I understand a complaint is being lodged. In all the years I have been watching football, I do not think I have all 3 officials have a mare of a game at the same time. Multiple bookings, 3 sending off – including the wrong player and the Mangotsfield manager – along with a player striking another player to the head in front of the ref, and being unpunished. Think that gives you a decent picture of what went on!

Whilst I try not to be biased, the Mangotsfield players never game up and easily deserved a point. It was a day for the captain to do his thing and he did a fantastic job. I really cannot speak highly enough about him.

For me the final disappointment was the crowd. a meagre 90 people and Mangotsfield must have accounted for at least 1/3rd of the gate. Given all the chimney pots surrounding the ground, and the standard of play, where was everyone? Oh yes, pawing their way through the antique shops…..

Maribor Trip Sept 2011

This is a personal diary note of my trip to Maribor, Slovenia. I left home at 6.30am on 28 September and unlocked the back door at 2.35am on 30 September. It was a VIP trip with Birmingham City FC to watch the away match against Maribor in the Europa Cup League Game.

Having pre-booked my parking ticket in Long Stay 1 at Birmingham International Airport, I found parking quite difficult. It’s a truly massive car park that was 99.9% full. Eventually found a spot and was grateful for the courtesy bus to turn up so quickly as I was cutting it fine given the earlier M42 traffic jam.

Into the airport and quickly found Adam from the club. Bag was soon checked in and I stood back and watch the players and manager arrive along with the other 50 VIP’s. Needless to say, two TV crews were lurking and Chris Hughton, the manager was soon being interviewed. No rest for the wicked then!

Chris Hughton being interviewed after checking in at B'ham Int Airport

It was easy to spot “Big Zig” our Slovakian centre forward as it is a bit difficult to hide when you are 6′ 7″. He was soon accosted for signatures and duly obliged. As in fact did all the team.

Having managed to get a window seat, I took the opportunity of grabbing a couple of pics during the 2hr flight:

English fields near B'ham International airport

Classic puffy clouds from plane window. Probably SW France below

Sat next to me on the plane was Keith who was well know to lots on the trip. He totally outgadgeted me. In one hand he had a Blackberry and an iPhone was in the other hand. He was like that for about 20 mins while awaiting take off, then he tutted as his 2nd Blackberry rang.

Having left in sunshine and pretty good warmth, we arrived to a  clear blue sky and warmth of about 24C.

Maribor Airport sign

It is a small ramshackled airport that somehow added to the charm. You picked your baggage off the trailer yourself. Then onto the coach and off to the 5* hotel which was only about 20 mins drive away.

City Hotel. Not exactly a great looking building!

It is a brand new hotel, having opened in July 2011. The inside was magnificent. On checking in, I was in room 301, so needless to say, I pressed button 3 on the lift. Err, wrong. Quite wrong. I did what everybody else did and failed to look at the buttons a little more closely. I was on level “P”. And the 5th floor for the restaurant was reached by pressing button “2”. Clearly a local quirky thing!!

Oh yes, the confusing lift buttons

As you walk straight out of the hotels main entrance, the river Drava is right in front of you. It’s a proper river as well given it is well over 100m wide. These pictures should give you a good idea:

As you can see, it's a decent sized river

There is ample parking all along the riverside, and it was a nice surprise to find a modern ticketing machine.

Solar Powered Parking Ticket machine

Close up of water feature

Water feature underneath road bridge

So a nice gentle walk to the right along the riverside and the first item of note is…………a sex shop. And next to that what looked like a lapdanding club. I’m as confused as you as to why I didn’t pop in! Anyway a little further and there are several bars to sit down, enjoy the view and sample the local beer.

One of the local beers. It's pronounced "Onion"

And then a little further on, an by now I’m only 400m from the hotel and you find the oldest vine in the world.

At 400 years of age, this is the oldest vine in the world

Oldest vine in the worls plaque

Now I do like my wine, but I’m no expert. It turns out that Slovenia is one of the top 5% of quality wine-producing regions in the world. As it is a small country, production is small which probably accounts why I do not recollect seeing any in my local shops. So if you ever come across any, indulge yourself. I believe the better ones are of the white variety.

Rather than use scarecrows to keep the birds off the fruit, the locals developed a wind rattle. mightily impressed with that thought process.

Wind rattle. Better than the usual scarecrow??

Having arrived at about 4pm local time, that was pretty much it for the day. Found a nice pizzeria and wondered back to the hotel via a bar or two. I had no language problems at all with the majority of people speaking excellent conversational english. I found out that about 20 years ago, the official second language was German. This was then ditched for English.

The evening ended in the hotel bar where I asked for the local lethal spirit, There were big smiles on the bar staff faces and was given a shot of the local clear brandy free gratis. Guess they don’t get many requests then!

And so onto the day of the game. Brummies everywhere. Blue sky, and nice and warm. the centre of the town quickly filled up and I took some video coverage.

All the VIP’s gathered at 3pm at the hotel and then we had a fantastic meal together before the game, How about this for a menu:

Pre-match menu at a first class restaurant in Maribor

Blues players (wearing yellow away kit) warming up

The stadium is only two years old and was built on the site of a cemetery. Plenty of history then! The locals had warned us that their fans were notorious for all the noise they made. Whilst they started off in good voice they gradually became quieter and quieter. I subsequently had an email from a Maribor supporter who said “you didn’t out sing us, we were a silent movie”. What a great comment!

As for the game itself, we let a silly goal in and were losing 1 – 0 at half time. All the fans were scratching their heads wondering how on earth we were going to score. Thankfully, the second half was much improved and we won 1 – 2. Total astonishment. Our first away trip in the Europa Cup League format and we only won. What a great way to end a trip.

With that it was straight onto the coach outside the ground. Just to show how small the airport is, we were given our boarding tickets on the coach! A happy trip home is always welcome and the time just whizzed by. We landed at 00.30am on Friday. Then back to the car and drive home. Opened the back door at 2.35am feeling utterly knackered. A quick cuppa to relax then I hit the sack. Trouble is some bugger rang me at 9.50am, so I felt groggy for the rest of the day. Cannot wait for the Brugge trip!

My videos are on you Tube and can be found here. I finally finished this blog somewhat late as it is now 16 October. At that date, all the following videos had been viewed a total of 2,220 times:

The Oldest Vine in the World http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3Oqwtaaa0s

Players after the game http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZle55fC39s

Maribor Stadium http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcogImM9QBk

Maribor Centre Square http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2Q3R6NCs9A

City Hotel View  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBgk9uHkIvI

City Hotel Room http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msEkBkjkBJY

City Hotel Lobby http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVTDjP2HOCg

A Month in My Life – May 10

The random happenings in my life during May 2010.  The names of the guilty have been changed. But they should know who they are. I might even be subject to some retribution…….

The General Election duly happened and no less than two parties won. How long will the ConDem Pact last. Well, my 10p is way less than the 5 years they are hoping for! Whilst I was bombarded with leaflets through the door, no one formally popped round to canvass me. What a shame: I was really up for a full blown row!

I used my time wisely on General Election Day. I emailed South Glos Council with a complaint over the state of the roads near me. Then I told my Parish Counsellor who only lives 100 yards away from me. I think this is conclusive proof that I have officially become a Grumpy Old Man. Yes, I’m proud of it as well.

So, what happened following my complaint? Well, not a lot. South Glos have never got back to me and my local Counsellor is a little slow at replying as well. To follow the story and see the emails, click on this link: https://smarty09.wordpress.com/2010/06/01/patchway-potholes/

If your car has been damaged by potholes, visit this site: www.potholes.co.uk

As for the ConDem pact I have a thought provoking point. Whatever your politics, you have to admit that David Cameron is a very bright chap. So if the pact works, he takes the credit. But what if it fails? Well, surely that will suddenly become Nick Clegg’s fault? So he can neatly sidestep any failure. After all, that’s what great politicians do. Don’t they? So in other words, whatever happens, David Cameron gets re-elected next time round. Mmmmmm, we will find out later if I’m talking out of my…….

For a reason that baffles me, Burger Boy decided to go up in a small plane and jump out. I paid him to do it mind. A week before he was totally bricking it….. And afterwards? Well he wants to do it all over again that’s what he wants to do for his 18th! He obviously enjoyed that particular moment “wooooooaaa, what a rush”.   He raised £515 for Wings of Hope. If you click on this link, a PDF file should open with more info Burger Boys Skydive

I do not watch Question Time too often, but there are still debates over the Iraq war. For goodness sake, we will find out the true answers in 100 years time. We will all be dead. So let’s move on. What has happened cannot be changed. And for what it’s worth, my best bet is that there were genuine reasons why the Government believed so strongly on them having WMD. We soddin well sold them to Iraq in the first place! The issue was we did not know how many they had left over after using them on the Kurds and the Iranian Marshland people.

Have you ever played the supermarket game? What you do is pack your bags, get to the car and drive off, before the person at the check-out queue in front of you does. I’ve done it loads of times. It’s great fun and the expression on some people’s faces is priceless! Go on, give it a whirl……..and email me with your own supermarket stories!

Finally we had a few days of solid blue skies. Very nice to. And at long last I got the full benefit of my Power Monkey Solar Charger. Ooodles of free power for my gadgets.

I went to a local fundraiser and stumbled on jars of local honey. Needless to say, I indulged and is well, worth the price. At least I now have contact details for the future. Local honey should help reduce any hayfever systems, so we will see. But in the meantime it is delightful stuff to put on freshly baked bread. YUM.

The month ended with my one and only niece turning 17. Bloomin ‘eck, where did that time go? I vividly remember seeing her when she was just a few hours old. As it was a very difficult birth, her head was egg shaped with massive bruising. Thankfully no long term damage was done.

Whilst thinking of family stuff, I know what my Old Man was doing 70 years ago. He was at Dunkirk digging graves on the beach. That, my friends, is the reality of war. Because of his duties he was on the 2nd to last boat out. And to prove it’s a small world, I know the son of the Dunkirk Beachmaster – so he was last man off the beach. Remember. War is just mans inhumanity to man. Nothing else. 24 million people lost their lives on WWII. Remember that with a tear in your eye. 

I have cable TV and I am thoroughly indebted to Virgin Media for consistently re-booting at 11pm. Right at the important points in movies etc. It’s a good job I’m a relaxed laid back cool dude (!) otherwise I would be going purple with rage and having a right ‘ol rant……..and it only happened 6 times on the trot!

On the camera front, I treated myself to a new Macro Lens. That’s a specialist lens that takes close up pictures. Had a good play with it and experimenting like crazy. He’s a sample (pornographic) shot:

Mating time

Mr Ranter finally found his way back to Bristol on a Thursday night and we went out for a Friday bike ride. I had not been out for almost 2 months, so a bit of trepidation on my part. But I survived and managed 21 miles. I could not feel my legs after about the 16^th mile. So on that basis, it did me good. Mr Ranter took it all in his stride as he’s out as often as he can as he is planning to ride up Mt Ventoux this year. It’s a famous mountain climb that the Tour de France use most years.

On the last weekend of the month, I finally “ticked another box” and went to New Road, Worcester to watch Glos v Worcs. If you don’t know, New Road always makes the Top 10 prettiest cricket grounds in the world. Well, it’s certainly the prettiest I have ever been to. It was a nice weather day, great food and fabulous company throughout. And it was great to hear so many people talking with a brummie accent. Lovely. But I have a rather unexpected highlight for you. I was taken aback with the sign “chip butty £2.85”. In fact I was mesmerised. Don’t think I have ever seen a sign for a chip butty! That brought back memories. Chip Butty = food of the gods. Is your mouth watering right now?

New Road is also famous for its home made cakes, and I was not disappointed. Lydney Bob only had 5. Nowhere near his all time record of 7.

Would you believe the month ends with me taking charge of two hamsters whilst PALS go on holiday? Hope the little rascals behave themselves in front of the camera.

General Randomness

No new articles written this month. and only a few jokes as well. Must have been working lots then!

Sports News

The month started with the crowning of a new snooker World Champion. Well done to Neil Robertson. He’s an Australian by the way. And rather good looking as well. Am I allowed to say that?????

On the football front, the Premier League champions were Chelski. They also won The FA  Cup. The teams to get relegated were Portsmouth, Burnley and Hull. Yea, gads, I predicted these three last September. Wish I had the courage of my convictions and popped down to the bookies! Oh well, never mind.

And then, in the middle of the month something quite remarkable happened. England were crowned Twenty20 cricket World Champions. That’s the first time the cricketers have ever been World Champs. And they beat the Aussies in the final as well. Nice. Very nice. To paraphrase a rather famous piece of commentary “Kylie, Jason, Dame Edna, Rolf Harris, Don Bradman. Your boys took a hell of a beating!”

In the world of Rugby, Exeter Chiefs won promotion to the Premiership. They beat Bristol in both of the 2-game finals. Exeter were definitely the best team, Bristol making lots of errors.

I will leave you with a picture of a spin bowler in a rather awkward position. I took at at my trip to New Road. Till next month 😉

The awkward shape of a spin bowler