Cod Almighty | Diary

See you round the clubs

29 November 2021

At least the gritters got blessed before the snow fell.

I know, I know, you only came for a smile even though you're really not into my style, but as your replacement diary service strolls into town this is all there is. It's my way or the information superhighway to Hull.

So there your Deviant Diary was, halfway through a sausage bap, when Twitter rumours turned into an actual fact. One of our top team of diarists had gone to Hull to watch the Australian Pink Floyd. Oh, and Town's game was off as bits were falling off the Findus. Town, eh, structural damage, but not much damage done in league terms.

It could have been much worse: Town didn't lose, no-one got injured and no Borehamwoodite has yet called Town tin-pot because the ground fell apart in the wind.

It's gonna be a whole lot better, for today is the biggest day in world football, when stars stand in bars to see who they've drawn in the third round of the FA Trophy. Hang on, where is the draw? It's live on Disney+ isn’t it? That'd please you Mickey Mouse fans. Oh, no, Hollywood hasn't called. How about Talking Pictures TV with its parental guidance warning before every programme and either Sid James or dear Johnny Mills in every British black and white film ever made? Mmm, don't forget Bernard Lee. No, much like the 1970s, it's two blokes in a room somewhere in England fiddling around with a bag of balls.

Do you need more diary doodlings to divert you from a spreadsheet? OK, let there be trite. What did you do in the great void of soccerless Saturday? Carried on tippling in Message in A Bottle? Turned round on the A46 and had a Big British Breakfast at the last roundabout in Lincoln? Sorted out your dad's broadband? I carried on eating my sausage, but I just couldn't get vegan sausages out of my head.

I want to say just one word to you. Just one word. Are you listening?

Ersatz.

No, not a bloke from 'Essle appealing for an LBW, but vegan sausages and tribute bands. This world is ever more ersatz, filling up with fakery as we're ruled by a rube, politics reduced to a performance by plastic pillocks. If you want to eat a sausage then eat a sausage. If you want to hear Dark Side of the Moon, play the record on your record machine, daddio. Why pay to watch a photocopy? Tribute bands are very much the vegan sausages of entertainment. No matter how well done, it's still not the real thing.

And finally, Cyril, we can exclusively reveal that there'll be no match report next week unless someone can be bothered to go and be bothered to write one. We promise to be bothered to publish it. The usual scribbler of arbitrary references to Val Doonican and the Goombay Dance Band can't be bothered to go, so get your bids in early to be the rail replacement service. We don't need no education nor enigma variations, just words that you'd find in a dictionary. As Lord Fictioner says: Your county needs you!

Ooh, ooh and don't forget, a fantastic new music documentary is on BBC4 next Friday: The Real Sausages of Rock'n'Roll. Narration by Rick Wakeman? Yes! Or is it the tribute act, Dick Fakeman?