#300: AFTER THE EVENT

well here i am
fireseed
tired and weary
but still at the crease
300 not out
a veritable gary sobers of the blogging world
or perhaps a geoffrey boycott
a plodder rather than a flair man...
'better late than never'
so they say
well that's me all over
slow
and frequently late
as many a friend or acquaintance will tell ya
but i do deliver eventually
i almost always get there in the end
like the tortoise out of aesop
yeah
us wattons are slow n steady creatures
not generally given to flamboyant impulsive gestures
always last out of the changing room after games
always faffing
umming and ahhing
reflecting
reading up
mulling it over
rather than just getting on with it...
and yet
you can pretty much always count on us
if yer patient
and prepared to bide yer time
we get there in the end...
believe me
i'm not proud of this trait
though i've grown to live with it
it drives my wife round the proverbial bend at times
a while back i found this quote
by evelyn waugh or somebody
"punktuality is the virtue of the bored"
well i can definitely see the truth in that
but it don't make it any better
when i'm frantically rushing to some ron-day-view
or feeling guilty about missing a deadline or event
making someone else wait around
while i sort my life out
for instance
i completely missed a good friend's bidet t'other day
(john major gilt trip)
i even messed up my own wife's bidet
we was sposed to be marking the milestone this week
spending a few romantic daze in rome
on an overnight sleeper from gay paris
rolling through the tuscan hills
but could i get my act together?
no i could knot
first i gotta renew my recently expired passaporte
then i gotta transfer some dosh
from my 33-day notice shavings account
to my instant access currant account
so my wife's bidet has been n gone
but the trip on the orient express remains unbooked...
the same goes for music
i so wish i could have my finger more on the pulse
in 1980 i'm listening to los beatles
ten years after they split up
in 1986 i'm listening to los byrds, kinks, syd barrett floyd
twenty years after their stuff was released
in 1991 i 'discover' the smiths
seven years after hatful of hollow
why didn't i dig them in '86 when they still existed
when everyone at nottinghum uni had a morrisey haircut?
fast forward to april 2008
and i'm listening to teenage fanclub's grand prix
pristine power pop from 1994!
fact is
i reckon i got a built-in distrust of most things contemporary
artists or albums that haven't yet achieved classic status
in danger of being passing fads
call me a late music adapter
if ya will
on turdsday we are in cheltenham
a day trip to glostersheer to sellybrate j's bidet
we're in a cafe
and 'hello goodbye' comes on the radio
radio too i guess
now this record may be 40 years old
even older than me!
and it may not even be one of the fabs' better ditties
but it makes me marvel
cos though i've heard it a hundred times
it still sounds as fresh as a daisy
even though the boys were right in the midst
of their most drug-addled phase
post-summer of love
so maybe the watton way is not so bad after all
hare brain or tortoise mind?
i guess i'll take the tortoise...

ps: i wanna take back at least some of what i said
about st george's day
this weak end
brum council house is bedecked with red crosses
at the museum n art gallery
there are traditional george n dragon puppet shows
kids dressing up in medi-evil costumes
and lots of other stuff...
oh and how did i forget to mention the nhs?
now i guess that is something to be proud of...