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Diary - Friday 6 July 2007

6 July 2007

Your Guest Diarist woke up this morning to the sad realisation that life was going to have to proceed without the best surrealist flâneur of them all, George Melly, in it. A character whose favourite party trick was to take his clothes off, get down on all fours, and rearrange his genitalia to impersonate a man, a woman, and then a bulldog. A man who started out homosexual, enjoyed many years of bisexuality, and ended up as very camp heterosexual with a long-suffering wife and a string of mistresses. A bloody good all-rounder, then, who deserves a salute from slackers like us in these over-earnest times. So raise the next glass you fill to the bloke who overcame the suffocation of the middle classes to become the male Bessie Smith.

The Grimsby Town official website has a cracker of a story headlining today. Running to one thousand, five hundred and eighty-two words, you might think it on the long side. It is actually only half that length, owing to the whole thing being repeated by those clever editors on the OS (just in case you weren't bored witless by the piece first time round). Apparently the club has made two complaints to Ofcom about Radio Humberside, which has caused the BBC to suspend negotiation on commentary rights pending the outcome. Oh, and someone called Billo is sorry for ruffling the club's feathers without asking them first. So now you know (in forty-two words, I make it). Mr Fenty, I will not ruffle your plumage today - I just can't be arsed.

Boston United season tickets have gone on sale - a snip at £250. The new owner, in a long-winded and emotional press release in which he admits that the Pilgrims have become the most disliked club in the world, wants a queue all the way back to the Boston Stump. The question is, will Farmer Dan the Boston fan stump up? OK, you want Town news. I refer you to the BBC sports web page dedicated to Grimsby Town FC. This was last updated on 14 June with the gripping headline Dagenham face trip to Stockport. But the Town youth are back in training and the grown-ups will amble in, I believe on Monday. So the Diary will have news of all those season-long injury woes by Wednesday, I'm sure.

Oh, hang on - the squad numbers have just been announced. Twenty grown men each with a number. Mr Clarke is nervously donning the number two while young Master Bennett gets the coveted number five. I hope he wears it successfully for many seasons to come, don't you? And in another vote for youth, Danny North gets the number nine shirt whilst Isiaiaiaih Rankin has to make do with twelve. So much for the conspiracy theorists to chew over, eh?

Have a nice weekend then folks - although without Doctor Who, football or decent summer weather, it gets harder doesn't it? See yer.