Welcome to SportsCast! We all definitely know lots and lots about the sports, and this time around we delve deep into everyone’s favourite, Rugby Eggers!
We run you through:
- Collecting the feathers
- Gloves or no gloves
- Results and reactions
Category: Chris
ABOFB 34: Animal Bites
Hot on the heels of episode 33, we have another lovely Breath of Fresh Beans™ for you. This one features:
- Chris’s Horse obsession
- Ian’s bad choices
- Kev’s topical (for 2020) decision
Nicknamenews
Approximately one billion years ago, when he briefly ran his own website that heavily featured the letter Q, our very own Ian Mac Mac Mac Mac McIver published a list of all the names by which he was regularly known, and for a man still in his late teens the list was hugely impressive.
I never thought of myself as a chap with a lot of nicknames (a term indicating a familiar name for a person that is not their official or legal designation, and which is short for the more descriptive “Nicholas Name”), but recently a series of new ones were bestowed upon me (thank you Bex and Zeb), with promises that they would all be used, and it caused me to count up how many I have now accrued.
Please enjoy this potentially exhaustive, and certainly exhausting, list of the nicknames that can be used to address me. If you can remember any others then please do chuck them at the comments section.
From family and related areas
- Kipper
- Kissifer
- Pififer
- Christopheles
From school
- Marshall
- Monobrow
- Christopheles J. Bartholomew
- Mackshall
From friends of various denominations
- Captain Numbers
- James
- Topher
- Virginia Woolf (not used very often)
- Criss Crimz
- Crich5156
From work
- Chris B
- Crispy
- Chuckles
- Charlie Chuckles
Newly added this week and now available for use
- Chris Army Knife
- A Swing and a Chris
- Chrispy Kreme
- Chrismas Cake
- Going the Christance
- Long Christance Relationship
- Chris Congeniality
- Chrisalis
- Chris from a Rose
- French Chrissing in the USA
- The Chrisard of Oz
- The Ipchris File
- No More Christer Nice Guy
- The Long Chris Goodnight
- Christal Maze
- Chris and chips
- Chrission Impossible
- Chrississippi
- We Built Chris City on Rock and Roll
Newsboost – Consider me considered
The July 2024 ‘Consider Me’ movement released by unsuspecting labouring footstool peddler, Chris Marshall, has seen momentum over the last few weeks and things seem to be getting more and more interesting.
By the end of July, three new people had already considered him. The day after, two more people had thought about considering him and after a few arguments it was decided that thinking about considering something still counts as considering something.
A couple from Pitsea read the article and were more than happy to consider him and did so with great gusto.
Hebburn Town Women’s football club were rumoured to be considering Chris but only if the weather allowed it. Reports have since come in that they turned down the idea of considering him after considering a weekend away in Amsterdam instead, which seemed the better of the two.
Experts have predicted that at least a dozen more people have considered or will be considering him over the next few days, with figures expected to double by this time next week.
How far will this ridiculous campaign go? Only time will tell.
Consider me!
One from the Archives – “Lyrics”
What do you do when you have a habit of keeping almost every scrap of paper that either someone wrote something on or drew a silly picture on? Eventually you have no choice but to sift through that paper and determine what stays and what goes.
As a parent, I was duty bound to keep a lot of Reuben’s pictures. Some were merely because they were cute and reminded me of simpler times, others were because they were downright weird and prompted referring to a psychiatrist for confirmation as to whether it was time to call the men in white coats. Shame you can’t call it a looney bin anymore because it’s not politically correct. It’s not a real bin full of loonies, how would anyone ever confuse a large building full of crazy people with a bin? Silly. I suppose looney building doesn’t have the same ring to it. “I’m going to put you in a looney office,”
Mixed in with some frightening scribbles of monsters ripping people in two and an invention of mine called the ‘Scuba Umbrella’, I found some hand-written lyrics for two of the Papples most played / most requested / best loved songs of all times: ‘Mincey Beef’ and ‘(Do it)’, the latter of which is a lot harder to type at 11pm at night.
Does it offer an insight into the collective minds at work? Does it share the rare genius hammering out the hits during a prolific time in their career? Not really. The top left-hand corner reveals what I think I was trying to crowbar into the song: mince, beef (obviously), nen tosh, Shergar (?), Aberdeen angus and no neddy beef. The rest is pretty much the lyrics of the song verbatim with the odd tweak here and there, no doubt as a result of hours of sweat and toil in the recording studio working out the best arrangement.
Let us not forget the immortal words: “Beef is back, meat attack.”
‘(Do it)’ is less interesting because there was only two strips of lyrics and nothing on the back. These were probably used as the starting blocks of the songs because they were transferred to somewhere more permanent, a larger piece of paper or a notebook, or maybe even a word document. It’s hard to remember the long ago times as we all know.
Where are the Marcus Rashfords of British tennis? The truth is they’re still not welcome
I expect you’ve seen it by now, but my article was finally published in today’s Guardian.
As you know, I’m a coach supporting talented, underprivileged young players – and it’s no surprise so few of them make it to Wimbledon. But you’ll know that because I talk about it a lot.
Anyway, it would be great if you could read my article and let me know what you think. I spent ages on it.
40 things
I am now 40. That’s fine. The joke is that everyone has a mid life crisis when they reach 40, that it means you’re “over the hill” and all that. I think 30 bothered me way more than 40 did. What I can’t deny, though, is that I am noticing the effects of getting that little bit older.
Here are 40 things about being 40 that weren’t the case when I was 30.
- There’s several grey hairs on my chin. I suppose I’m old enough now to call these “whiskers”.
- There are also about five grey hairs on my temples.
- When I trim my beard I also have to trim some small hairs growing out of my ears.
- I appreciate Redbush tea now.
- If I put my feet up, and leave them in the same position for too long, my heels hurt and I have to shift them around.
- I can pull a muscle in my shoulder just by tying my shoelaces in a reckless position.
- I can sense a cold coming on days in advance.
- The level of mental arithmetic that my grandparents wanted me to have aged about 8 is very nearly mine. I reckon I could probably have a stab at my times tables now if I had to.
- I can no longer run up three flights of stairs and then immediately hold a conversation.
- The cleanliness of my car’s interior bothers me less, though that might be to do with owning a dog.
- I listen to quite a lot of Radio 2.
- I don’t mind hearing music I don’t like. I used to be very tribal about music and hate songs and bands that weren’t my taste. Now I don’t really care.
- Eating an egg will have a noticeable effect on the speed of my digestive system for up to 24 hours.
- I have moments of nostalgia for very ordinary things from my past, which sometimes are quite unexpected.
- There are things I saw my dad doing when I was a child and he was 40, which I now involuntarily do myself.
- If I have to get up off the floor I need to put my hands on my knees to brace myself on the way up.
- I give much less of a toss about whether or not people like me.
- I feel much less need to make jokes about everything.
- All my friends live a long way away. The nearest ones are an hour’s drive.
- I’m quite good at DIY now. I thought I was before, and would have said I was when I was 30. But now I actually am.
- I appreciate early mornings more. I’m rarely awake for them, but when I am I like them.
- The fact that the lawn is mostly moss and buttercups genuinely annoys me.
- I don’t care any more who knows about my hobbies and geeky interests.
- If I don’t want to wake up stiff in every muscle in my body, I now need to consider warm up exercises before doing jobs in the house or garden.
- I am working with people who were born when I was doing my A-levels. Some of our apprentices were born while I was at university.
- I need to moisturise my hands every now and then to prevent them taking on the texture of sandpaper all over.
- I own a pair of Birkenstocks.
- Old people moving slowly are much less frustrating to me.
- The type of chair I sit on matters much more, and if I have a choice of chair I will give it careful thought.
- I can see the appeal of cricket. However, I don’t understand it or watch it any more than I did before.
- If I find an item of clothing or a pair of shoes I particularly like I’m quite likely to buy several of them, because finding something that suits you and fits well is not to be taken lightly, and you’ll be sad when it wears out.
- I prefer a regular hoodie to a zip-up one now.
- I have developed better coping strategies for making small talk with other men who expect me to have a grasp of either football or sports cars.
- It’s no longer possible to switch to cider when I decide I’ve had enough of beer at the end of an evening, because the sugar will keep me awake all night.
- I’m more willing to have a go at new stuff.
- I like Motown music.
- One very big meal will fill me up for the whole day, regardless what time I eat it.
- I’m much better at remembering to wear a hat when in the sun.
- I have a dog now.
- When I trim my beard and my ears I also have to do my nose hairs.
Unchanged since I was 30:
- The 2012 Olympics were, I’m pretty sure, about two years ago.