Cod Almighty | Diary

When we weren't fab

23 August 2023

Our emergency replacement diary service has broken down somewhere near Mablethorpe, so while punctured egos are being fixed we need something to sate your desire for some mid-week diversion from the hum-drummery of the blank week before Walsall.

The World Cup of Space-filling is down to a final between a spare Only Connect wall, the one with just dates, or a legendary Mardy Diary. It's gotta be Mr Mardy from back then, a long time ago when things weren’t so fab. Bask in the dripping derision of a diarist scorned.

Mardy Diary writes: Really? Already? I can honestly say that I didn't think we'd have a Tell The Telegraph We've Not Been The Best Lately But We'll Get Better Now, Honest this early in the season. But there you have it. First up this season is Charles 'Don't Call Me Charlie' Ademeno, who assures us it's a 'blip'. It's a ten-year 'blip', Charles - that's the problem. Not that it's his fault - one of the few players to come out of the match with any credibility. I thought, even half-fit, he looked a bit too good for us. I can see why the tax dodger was so upset at losing him. But we are where we are - and Town are definitely one of the best teams in the land at puncturing supporters' optimism. They just like to help us with our expectation management. Five thousand fans against York - what's wrong with you? You know this isn't going to work out, we know this isn't going to work out, we'll just roll over to the minnows of the division and get that crowd back to a comfortable 2,600. And don't forget to bring your boovuzela.

And so to the diary postbox, and what's this - an email titled "Please publish". Well, how could I refuse such good manners. It's from Mick Needham, who says: "Can you tell me what the actual point of Codalmighty is? It used to be witty and took the piss out of the OS and the Telegraph. Now all you do is criticise them and copy the stuff from them. Do you not think that all Town fans go on the Telegraph and the OS ahead of your outdated poorly designed web-site? Why do you just do the links stuff nowadays? Where has the humour gone? Why are you constantly telling the few fans who come on CA that they shouldn't buy Mariners World? Do you not quite get it that the money earnt goes to our great club?"

Indeed, Mick - what is the point? You don't need to tell me. Look at Tony Butcher's match report for a start - it's just a copy and paste from the Telegraph with a couple of 'witty' and obscure Who references shoe-horned in. He's not fooling me. And don't get me started on Pat Bell and his wishy-washy "why I support Town" nonsense - it's just copied word for word from Teletext. Even worse is when you get to Andy Holt's piece on the All-Whites - I don't even speak New Zealandese, how am I supposed to understand that foreign? It's not even about Grimsby, and he's probably just nicked it from the Auckland Express anyway. The cheeky sod. No, you won't find me disagreeing with you there, Mick. You're bang on the money.

Mick goes on to say: "I'll stick this on the bottom to just make sure you don't publish it. You are a load of tossers, living in an ivory tower somewhere." Well, see there, Mick - I must take you up on this point. Some people may think that I'm not worth the £50k a year I get paid as a part-time Cod Almighty diarist, but sitting here in my ivory tower, sipping Moët et Chandon and wearing loafers made of gophers is hard work. I don't think some of you understand how much effort I put in to this ten minutes of diary writing. I'm worth every penny. But you don't need to worry your pretty little head about that Mick - 'big school' starts soon, so you just put your energy in to getting prepared for that. It's a big step-up you know.

So on that note... ugh...

You see Michael - I'm just sat here shaking my head now. Shaking my head in your general direction. I'm not tutting, no. I'm sighing. It's just so utterly tiring that all I can manage is a barely audible sigh. And I think... no, let me check. Yes, I'm right. I've phoned your mother and she's weeping. She's weeping, Michael. She's sobbing inconsolably at the sheer stupidity - on so many levels - of your correspondence. I think she's suicidal, Michael. I think we all are after reading that. And when I say 'we', I mean the entire human race. You see Michael, your mental deficiency is putting the existence of the entire human race at great risk.

Well, I hope you're proud of yourself.