Aah, another wonderful morning on the trains. We really should play football more often. Half empty carriages on a train that is normally full, and plenty of seats on the tube at a time when you’d normally have to let three or four go before you could even hope of getting close to the edge of the platform.
The Today programme on Radio 4 reported the match in its usual understated way:
And finally in other news, England is playing Brazil in a game of Association Football in Japan. The score is currently one-nil to England.
The Independent had the best headline:
Latest score from Japan: England [_] Brazil [_]
(fill in scores where applicable)
The Mirror came a close second by placing a small England flag in the centre of an otherwise blank front page with the words ‘This page is cancelled. Nothing else matters’ below.
If I had wanted to keep up with the game, I could. A guy on the train was listening to it on the radio, without headphones, clearly in the belief the rest of us would want to follow it, too. Nobody complained, which seemed rather hypocritical when you think of the tuts and sighs a ringing mobile induces, and the frosty stares you get if you dare speak on one for more than a couple of minutes.
Anyhow, Brazil had equalised by the time we got to Liverpool Street, they scored a second goal while I was buying breakfast in Sainsburys, and as I arrived at the tea shop England was ejected from the World Cup.
I guess the trains will be back to normal by Monday.
To mark the Seville immigration summit, the BBC News site has produced an interesting OECD graph showing the number of people seeking asylum in the European states, which puts things into perspective. From the way the Daily Mail and some politicians shout about it, I thought Britain was the most popular destination for those claiming asylum:
Belgium and Netherlands, 12 seekers per 1,000 residents
Austria, 8 seekers per 1,000 residents
Ireland and Sweden, 7.5 seekers per 1,000 residents
Denmark and Germany, 7 seekers per 1,000 residents
Britain, 6 seekers per 1,000 residents
Spent the day writing reviews, and lunched with Mark at Carlucci’s. Very nice. Never been there before. Lots of people sitting outside in the sunshine with Mardi Gras 2002 folders beside their table. Organisers, I guess. There are some benches somewhere around there, which we tried to find, but admitting defeat we eventually returned to the office. iSketch is a cult lunchtime game, even if people with scary names like DevilWoman and SatanBoy join in uninvited.
I’ve brought home a stack of proofs to read this weekend, so started on them on the train home, but did my worryingly regular falling asleep act not long outside London and woke up somewhere between Ingatestone and Chelmsford. I never used to fall asleep on trains, and used to have difficulty understanding why people did. Perhaps I’m old. 28. Middle age.
Perhaps I need to be going to bed earlier.
Anyhow, a relaxing evening tonight. The computer will be switched off, the telly will most likely be switched on. I don’t have a clue what’s on, but I have a horrible feeling it’s Big Brother. From what I can tell the country seems to be fairly well divided into the fascinated and the bored this year.
I haven’t watched any of it since series one, and the more I hear about series three the worse it sounds.
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Nice game – isketch. How do these comments work?