Getting things in proportion is never easy. The first week of Wimbledon tests my patience. Amongst many irritations here are some lowlights:
- Bling. It’s bad enough that most sprinters have chains like anchors flapping madly as they heave their steroided torsos over the 100metre stretch but it surely can’t help the uncoiling torque of a service if 18carat’s worth of a love memento is bouncing round your chest.
- Andrew (this year Sue Barker is calling him Andy – probably confusing him with a sour-faced Scotsman) Castle, another ex-wannabe tennis-player, now commentator, is saucepan-screechingly annoying. ‘She was on her game from the Get-Go.’ Agh! ‘Her stats rack-up impressively.’ Aaarggh! Bring Barry Davies in from court 18 and give McEnroe more air time. He’s full of impenetrable jargon but I’ll forgive a genius anything.
- Players who walk off court without waiting for their opponents. Bad winners and bad losers. Get over it.
- Henman Hill. It’s a hill not a shrine to a nice man who never won Wimbledon.
There are plenty more where these came from but these annoyances don’t rank with what has happened in Tunisia nor the escalating situation in Greece. As my mother used to say when I wouldn’t eat my greens – there are millions starving in Africa – but Africa was a place we were never likely to visit so starvation was abstract. Greens were not. They were horrible.
As I ventured out for a spot of shopping, I groaned at the parking sensors beeping when I was miles away from any obstruction. They play a serenade when I brush a daisy but if Bruce Springsteen is on full volume I can crash into a brick wall. Then some jackass was bumper-close behind me on a winding country road. Naturally I slowed down to annoy him further and had to endure the single finger salute as he roared past me on a tiny straight bit before another bend. I didn’t reciprocate. He had tattoos.
Back in my hutch I got a text from a friend who has just broken his tibia and fibula, if you know where they are. He’s blogged about it(Compleatbirder – wordpress) – well you would wouldn’t you? Then I opened a letter revealing the annual accounts of my esteemed bank: Nationwide. Gosh they’ve made some money, even though they call me a member rather than a customer. I turned to the remuneration of the board. Four executive directors (all men) and eight non-exec. (2 women). Chief exec. Graham Beale’s package, including legacy (ie pension payments) is a staggering £2.4 million! The four top boys get £6.5mill. between them. The non-exec. (ie he doesn’t even work there) Chairman, Geoffrey Howe (don’t laugh) only gets £310,000. They tell me you can’t get this sort of talent just anywhere. The explanatory blurb was so confusing I couldn’t work out if these guys got even more through bonuses. I would quote from the document but I must keep a sense of FUCKING proportion.
I haven’t moved my money yet but my flexi-super saver account is bouncing along at .45% interest and falling nicely behind inflation while the Nationwide board get fat on my enormous contribution.
Andy Murray managed a beaming smile yesterday. He’s getting things in perspective. Me too.
Tunisia. A minute’s silence at Wimbledon today. The bling takes a back seat.
simplysorro 
Ahhh, Mr Meldrew! Come in! Lovely to read this funny good sense, as usual Sorro. The tattooed man with the salute reminds me of when, on the Stortford by-pass, I was overtaken (too) speedily, so flashed the headlights once. At the next roundabout, at which speeding car was stationary in a queue directly in front of me as I rolled to a stately halt (Hah!), I smiled. At which man got out, came to window and began a tirade beginning, ‘You’re a fucking arsewipe mate….’ He sported (in a very limited sense of that word) an England football shirt. Not a good sign. I didn’t, therefore, get out……. Trots x