Life – Page 20 – Middle Age Fanclub

It’s time for a new teaching year…and I’m stressed out already!

backtoschool

From next week thousands of people will be returning to a place that they most likely have a love hate relationship with. A place that, while it brings them fantastic highs and untold joy, will also land upon them terrible amounts of stress and enough moments of disbelief in a typical couple of months to last a lifetime. Sounds like a cross between a crack den and a soft play centre, doesn’t it? Well in fact, I’m talking about school.

After 6 weeks of summer holidaying – or if you’re British, dodging downpours – us teachers (and other school staff) are set to return to work. Most, for any number of reasons, will be dreading it, which is something that lots of non teaching folk and those who don’t work in education simply refuse to understand. Well, allow me to explain.

You’d expect that after six weeks worth of holidays that we’d be fully relaxed, re-invigorated and enthusiastic to go back to work. And I’ve no doubt that some staff are exactly like that. These people are not to be trusted in my humble opinion. Wrong ‘uns, the lot of them.

This next academic year will be my twentieth in teaching. It’s a job I love – no two days are the same, there are highs and lows aplenty, there are some great people – we’ll leave the not-so-great ones for later – and working with kids will always make you smile. But I’m not one of the teachers who don’t mention the pull of the holidays. Thirteen weeks a year and I can honestly say I genuinely think that it’s still not quite enough. Every half term will leave me exhausted and so any time off is largely spent recuperating, rather than enjoying myself. I’ve never spent 6 hedonistic weeks in Ibiza or somewhere partaking in copious amounts of drugs and free love. More likely, I’ll watch a bit more telly and try in vain to do jobs around the house. For me, the holidays are vital.

So conversely, I find the going back to work bit quite the ballache. Now teacher or not teacher, I know what you’re thinking. Or at least the kind of thing you’re thinking. It’ll be within a ball park that contains outrage, a feeling of negativity towards my perceived ingratitude and probably the odd utterance of that strange phrase ‘Man up‘. I don’t care. And furthermore, I have plenty of colleagues and friends who don’t care either.

An old Head of mine used to compare teaching to being on an oil rig. The feeling being that mentally, we’d be completely out of reach for our families during term time, as if we were offshore, almost. It was a particularly challenging school, by the way. As each term ended she’d tell us to switch off, go back to our families and loved ones and spend precious time with them. So if you don’t like my trepidation about going back to work then you’re heartless; I’m off to a bloody oil rig, for Christs’s sakes.

Psychologically, the problems with going back to work can start at any time during the six weeks holidays. And we’ll all have suffered with it. I’m talking of course about the anxiety dreams. You’re sitting in front of a class who just won’t listen. They’re all laughing hysterically at you, even the nice kids. Especially the nice kids! Whatever you try, fails. And try as you might these kids just won’t listen or do what you ask. You might even end up in tears in front of them, pathetically calling out things like, ‘Guys?‘ (always as a question). Inevitably you’ll wake up in a cold sweat, heart racing and possibly in need of a parent. But that parent can’t help. You’re going to repeat that dream – possibly exactly the same dream – a good few times before stepping back over the threshold of your school again in September.

As a rule, I don’t suffer too badly with the anxiety dream and the out of control class. In fact, I usually save mine up for one big nightmare on the eve of my return to work, resulting in me going back looking worse and more exhausted than when we broke up for the six weeks! This year though, has been different. I’ve had a number of these dreams and every last one has left me sat in our bathroom, sweating and trying to yoga-breathe my way to some kind of tranquil mindset that will enable me to sleep again.

The worst one actually started quite well. I’m in control of the class, cracking the odd joke, everyone enjoying their learning and Mr Crosby is kind of a big deal around these parts. And then, slowly but surely, things fall apart. The odd bit of calling out, some general low level disruption. And just when it looks like I’m about to wrestle back control, a boy the height of a giraffe gets up and wanders into my cupboard before emerging again wearing a lampshade as a hat and wandering aimlessly around my room. Every time I try to get to him, he appears back in the cupboard. Try as I might, Giraffe-Boy Lampshade Head just will not listen. And you don’t get that in your council office, your accountancy practice or your supermarket. It’s not you sitting naked – sorry, fight that image, think of giraffe boy – sweating on the edge of a bath considering doing warrior pose or downward dog in order to get back to sleep.

The next thing that can contribute to a dread of going back to work seems like a nice thing, but in fact, it’s not. As an adult, I thought that those signs telling me that it’s ‘Back to School’ soon were no longer applicable. And then I went into teaching and found that every summer the lure of those Back to School signs and their promise of stationery was to prove all too much. Stationery is a huge part of life as a teacher. At least I hope it is and that it’s not just me clinging on to shiny notebooks and refusing to grow up! Even now, after nearly twenty years in the job, I still get a little bit excited at the thought of new pens, highlighters, markers and the like come September. And I still enter Asda with a spring in my step at the prospect of a rollback on notebooks and plastic wallets.

However, while the acquisition of such things is a delight it will quickly lead to stress. Now I’m aware that this is probably just a particular foible of mine, but there is a possibility that somewhere, within the educational community there are more of us. So let’s see how many people find themselves nodding along to this. The fact is I get ridiculously precious about my new stationery and as a result I tend to stockpile it. I become like a stationery squirrel, with drawers of pens, pencils, notebooks, folders and files that are so lovely I’ll allow no one to us them; including me. Sometimes the teacher in the adjoining room to mine – a friend I’ve known for years – will pop in searching for a pen and I reluctantly agree to get one, slowly ripping opening the packet with a rictus smile spread across my chops as I attempt to hide the fact that this is killing me! Lately pupils have started to ask if they can have a plastic wallet, something I have hundreds of. They need them to carry certain notes around and I then have to pretend that it’s no problem and that of course they can have a plastic wallet, when really, hidden just beneath the surface the real Mr Crosby is screaming, ‘GET YOUR OWN PLASTIC BLOODY WALLETS!’ But of course I look forward to going back to work and of course I’m sure that my behaviour is fairly normal. Whichever way we look at it though, the pursuit of the perfect stationery can be a particularly stressful thing for us educators.

Another one of the stresses, one of the painful adjustments that needs to be made by people in education returning to work can be found with clothing. Imagine that, for a 6 week period almost everything you wore was casual. You got up in the morning, and dependent on the weather, you slung on a crumpled pair of jeans or shorts and a t-shirt. If you had to go out, you wore trainers, almost exclusively. And sometimes, just sometimes, you didn’t even bother to give your hair – and maybe even your make-up, although I personally like to spend at least a week in summer dressed as Ziggy Stardust, just for kicks – a second glance. Now you may not admit it, but this would be a world of bliss. Except for the Ziggy themed days, which frankly can be a pain in the arse. Go on, give it some thought…

Nice, isn’t it?

I haven’t ironed a shirt for over 6 weeks. And, let me tell you, when I do iron a shirt I’m pretty damn precise. No corners are cut and each one can take quite some time. So my break away from this is absolutely fantastic. The same can be said for polishing shoes. I haven’t even looked at my work shoes for the entire summer. I’ve slobbed around in Stan Smiths, Nike runners and even flip flops without a care in the world. I’ve worn t-shirts and shorts for days on end – different ones, I’m not an animal. I’ve gone sockless, like some kind of ageing surfer. And now, within hours, I’ll be back in a routine of wearing a suit, shirt, tie and brogues five days a week. All of this formality – and I love to look smart – weighs me down. I don’t miss the days of suddenly remembering, I need to iron a shirt. But I’ll miss not putting a great deal of thought into what I wear. I know, that as an adult – almost a fully functioning one as well – I shouldn’t find any stress in this, but I do. And you would too if you were annually given a massive break from it.

Lots of people don’t realise something really, vitally important about the summer break. And when they find out the truth, it can prove difficult to handle. But, for the uninitiated, here it is. We get paid for the time off. It’s a question I’m quite often asked and when I answer that yes, of course we get paid it can lead to meltdown for some. And while I won’t go into the rights and wrongs of this fact here, I would ask this. If you got paid to take 6 weeks off work, every year and do anything you liked, or even nothing at all, would you miss that when it was gone? It’s simplistic and almost boastful, but I really, really like getting paid for not going to work. It’s not just what gets taken away that makes returning to work for those in education a stressful and sometimes even miserable time. Undoubtedly, what happens when you get there can grind you down as well.

After 6 weeks away from work we inevitably return to what’s referred to as a ‘training day’. Now without swearing it’s hard to express my negativity about these days adequately. But, suffice to say, I’m not a fan. Training days used to be relaxed affairs. You’d have an initial all staff meeting, a department meeting and then be left to your own devices to get organised. This meant that the pay-off for sitting through two mind numbing meetings was the joy of pottering. Bliss. And it meant that I had time to sort out everything I needed in order to be ready for the new term. But not anymore.

Nowadays, with education it would seem moving in a far more corporate direction, training days are…what’s the phrase? Oh yes…’a massive pain in the arse’. An all staff meeting can last hours while various people tell you about things like ‘vision’ and ‘missions’ while referring to you all as ‘guys’. So lots of my favourite words then. The schedule that you’re given might as well come with a match to destroy it as time and again people talk beyond their slot, so to speak. And that’s not necessarily a criticism – when talking in class or conducting an assembly or a staff briefing I inevitable run over time while getting carried away at the thought of just bunging in another joke or better still, talking about myself. But after 6 weeks away from the job, I’m not in the mood – or headspace if you’re under thirty – to be talked at. In fact, I’m probably not listening. And I’m not the only one. You, dear colleague, are probably not listening either, so that later when we get together in another meeting, none of us has the first clue about where we work anymore, let alone our ‘vision’.

On the first day back at work I will almost certainly be given a schedule of where I have to be at any given moment during the day. And, when I read said schedule, I’d bet my mortgage that I will whine like a small child something along the lines of ‘Why do I have to go to that?’ And this is because, after 6 weeks gone rogue, I have regressed to kidult. And now this kidult is being forced to behave like a proper adult once more. Three days previously I was playing Scalectrix with a ten year old or burying my face in a chocolate muffin while watching ‘A Place in the Sun’ or ‘Homes Under The Hammer’ and now someone far more skilled at adulthood is banging on about their mission. Don’t tell me that 6 weeks off is long enough!

It gets worse. At some point you will be faced with a mad scramble to gather together things like exercise books, a diary, a planner, pens etc. Bloody stationery again! Inevitably, you will get to a store cupboard to find it’s already been ransacked by the dreaded young, enthusiastic colleagues who were ticking it all off their desk planner while you stared at your classroom walls for a moment that turned into 20 minutes! But it’s OK, because you will rise above this stress and have the last laugh by entering their classrooms once they’ve gone home, to pilfer the books that you missed out on, while telling yourself that your 20 years service to the teaching profession allows you such privilege! Little do you know, that you’ve forgotten to pick up any of the set texts you’re meant to be teaching, because year in year out, you don’t actually look at your desk planner.

More stress will come in the shape of things that others have planned for you. For instance, I dread the Duty Rota email like no other email across the year. Even writing about it makes my blood run cold. Will I get outside duties again? Because believe me, winter in deepest Dewsbury is like, well…summer in Dewsbury really. Rain, wind and more rain. And then there’s the issue of who else is on duty. Will I share a duty, will I know this person, will I have to actually speak to them? This year I’ve been blessed in that although I’ve been outside I’ve had good company. Someone of a similar cynical mindset to me (cheers Paul). But what awaits me this year? In terms of conversation I only really do subjects like football, music, football and moaning. And so if I’m lumped together with someone, what do I talk about? I mean perish the thought that someone wants to talk about education. And what if it’s one of those younger members of staff, someone in their twenties? I can’t escape the fact that I may well have to stand on duty with someone who I’m old enough to be the dad of. What can I talk about? These people are off living a life, going out, travelling, seeing bands, while I’m inevitably battling for control of the telly with a teenager at home. It may well be easier to just see the doctor and get signed off with stress at this rate! (If you work in HR, that’s a joke. I’ll explain jokes at a later date, but I’m not going to get signed off work with stress).

And there may well be other surprise bits of responsibility. Because while I know that the Duty Rota is coming, it’s not beyond a more senior colleague to have a surprise up their sleeves with my name on it. In the past for instance I’ve been assigned as a ‘buddy’ for newer members of staff. That’s right, me, a buddy. Imagine being so shit at life that you got me as a buddy. I think I managed to catch up with this person twice across the year, partly because I’m fairly useless, but also because they had already been assigned a mentor. And so I spent far too much of the year worrying that I wasn’t really helping, while simultaneously wondering what my job might be as a buddy. If it happens again I truly feel for the poor thing that’s landed with me. I’m not exactly sociable or talkative, I’m fairly certain I can’t solve your crisis and I have a tendency to furtively leave the room when colleagues cry. I’m genuinely shy and don’t actually like meeting new people. Clearly someone sees something in me that I simply haven’t got. Some buddy! But this is the kind of thing that we face in those first days back.

Once the initial training day is over we’re then left with facing new classes. And this truly is a battle of wills. Pupils are trying things out to see how much they can get away with while I’m, as usual, maintaining a heavily sarcastic streak and well, seeing how much I can get away with, really. If I have a Year 7 class I always feel that I have to appear ever so slightly cheery and friendly, which again is quite the battle due to the fact that I’m not in the least bit cheery or friendly, but I have to make the effort in their early days at ‘big school’. After all, by the time they reach Year 8 I’ll simply be a familiar grizzled and sarcastic figure for them so the odd smile at this point probably isn’t going to harm any of us. It does add to the stress of the return to work though.

Further worry will arrive in the form of new seating plans and trying to work out just the right mix of pupils in order to keep classes stable. This is complicated by the need to have certain types of pupil sat in certain areas in order to keep any observers happy when they look at data. Ridiculous really. And another time consuming exercise that for at least one of my classes will be inevitable forgotten about for far too long, resulting in chaos every time they walk in and find that there’s still no seating plan. Later, I’ll kid them that it was a deliberate ploy, designed to allow me to observe behaviour, friendship groups etc in order to create the perfect seating plan…eventually.

So there you have it. Having had 6 weeks off work many of us will feel nothing like going back, however much we love what we do. And many more people will not understand the stress. But this time next week, I for one, will be back to being Scrooge, although I mot likely won’t have collected the texts.

Is it too early to start counting down the week until October half-term?

Parenthood: the dread of living with a teen!

Once upon a time it was Hello Kitty and Barbie. Now? Make up…just make up. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a teenager.

At the end of June another chapter of my parenting journey came to a close. The baby years have gone and the toddler times flew by. Then we tackled life at primary school and all of the hurdles that would bring. Next, double figures happened and the end of the primary years, which was all too quickly followed by the challenges of high school. And now, it seems we’re to be in possession of one of those teenagers.

In the most stereotypical kind of truth, my daughter has been a teenager for years. Or at least she’s acted like one. And I know that not all teenagers are the same…but for the sake of a good read let’s stick to the stereotypes. I’ll write this with a caveat though. For all of her faults, my daughter is a sweet, caring and loveable kid. I’m very proud of what she is and what she’s becoming and, despite the fact that we clash and no doubt find each other equally irritating, I adore her. That said, if what’s gone in the previous 12 years is any kind of guide, then these teenage years promise to be interesting to say the least.

As the teenage years begin I guess I have to face up to the fact that my little girl – for that’s what she always will be – is going to turn into a woman. This is a tough reality for me, as I’m sure it will be for the majority of fathers. But it’s a reality that begins with those dreaded teen years. As many girls of her age will, she’s already moving on with her interests. She’s never been particularly interested in boys, viewing them as some kind of necessary irritant. However, just a few weeks ago I was present when she declared that a boy was ‘fit’ and a little bit of my heart broke, never to be repaired. The words were enough, but the delighted smile that spread across her face was the killer. The boy in question happened to be Zac Effron, so at least I can comfort myself with the fact that they’re very unlikely to meet and thus she can’t begin to explore what ‘fitness’ means and leads to.* Big sigh of relief. But it confirmed to me that my little girl is, in many ways, well and truly gone. And I feel sure that this side of things will go rapidly downhill now that the age of thirteen has been reached.

She confided in my wife that in Year 7 she’d had a boyfriend, but this had only lasted for a day! So there’s good and bad in that – bad = boy, while good = her boredom at him following her around like a lap dog. However, her choice of ‘boyfriend’ had been appalling – a ridiculous name, seemingly always in trouble at school etc. The kind of choice that was never going to impress her school teacher father, hence confiding in her mother!

I fear that this is the kind of choice that she’ll continue to make though. As teenhood – have I just invented a phrase – approaches she seems to label any boy who does any actual work or shows any sign of intelligence as a ‘geek’ and therefore untouchable, which for now is fine, but in the long term I’d rather she was going for the hard-working geeks than the ridiculous, half-witted bad boys that she seems to be attracted to. For now though, she seems a little behind the times in terms of her interest in boys. I teach kids of the same age and lots of them appear far more advanced than my own darling daughter, – goodness me I hope so – especially the girls. You only have to be on a corridor with them and you’re sure to overhear something that you really didn’t want to hear and that means you can never look them in the eye again. I sincerely hope that my nearly teen daughter isn’t thinking along the same lines for quite some time to come!

One thing that she is definitely advanced with is make-up. This is one that is very much against our wishes as well. I say ‘our’ wishes, but I suspect that my wife is ever so slightly in cahoots with my daughter on this one. I’ve been there when one of them has unintentionally mentioned some make-up that my daughter was going to get or had been promised, so the rules have definitely been relaxed without me knowing anything about it! My daughter also went through what can only be described as an out of character phase where she was regularly making her bed, hoovering her room, putting washing away etc, in order to gain pocket money. Now despite the incentive of money, she’s never been particularly interested in this before. But then, all of a sudden she’d be pointing out that her bed was made, or leaving the hoover outside her room to indicate that she’d been busy ridding her carpet of small animal carcasses or whatever disease had festered there in the years since the last time she’d hoovered. (And if you think this is unkind there’s an open invite to pop round and have a look at her room – enter at your peril).

It turned out that what she was doing was earning just enough money to go out and buy the odd bit of make-up in order to supplement the small amount that she already had. And as a result of this she’d also decided that she could walk all over the rules – a much more regular occurrence for her – and come down plastered in make up for no apparent reason. We’ve managed to curtail this to a point, by repeating the message that she looks so much better without it, and image being so important to a girl of her age, she’s listened to an extent. Still though, if we’re going out she tends to disappear for much of the afternoon, before emerging early evening looking like she’s wearing some kind of tribal mask. I expect this very much to continue as she moves through her teen years and the mask to get more and more colourful!

For as long as my daughter has been able to express an opinion she has done so, forcefully. Now, as she enters her teen years, I fear that her level of perceived expertise is going to see her opinions go into a potentially dangerous overdrive. Don’t get me wrong, on important issues like race, sexuality etc she has formed good, liberal, accepting opinions. She’s against no one (well apart from the aforementioned geeks and me) which is not only good, but a lot less time consuming than if she was forming dangerous opinions. In fact, she’s more likely, if we have an opinion against anyone or anything, to defend them, however unreasonable. As a staunch Newcastle fan I’ve found it quite disheartening and disturbing when she’s routinely defended Sunderland fans. Maybe she’s just incredibly chilled out – she’s really not – or maybe she’s just wrong.

As she enters her teenage years though, the one thing she has strong opinions on seems to be style. Now given her formative years, this is quite the surprise – many’s the time she’s come downstairs in a variety of colours and styles that simply didn’t match – reds, yellows, pinks, spots, stripes, you name it. But now my daughter has developed some kind of style. She likes nice clothes and is constantly telling us how she’s ‘planning an outfit’. I suppose that this is to be expected, especially when she’s not paying for said outfits! But the worrying thing seems to be that she has installed herself as some kind of fashion expert. And this is where her opinions come in.

Recently she’s decided that she must have her bedroom decorated. Grey and pinks, dahling, don’t you know. And such is her sure and certain belief in her status as some kind of style guru that she literally won’t listen to anyone else’s opinion. The fact that she currently resides in a room that look like squatters must have invaded years ago doesn’t seem to occur to her at all. She simply cannot keep it tidy. And I won’t embarrass her here by detailing the levels of untidiness, but suffice to say, you need to take your own ideas and multiply them by around a million to even get close.

We recently went on a shopping trip – a speculative one where we were more looking for ideas than actually buying anything. We found countless grey items, probably in even more than fifty shades, and yet she rejected them time after time. And this is understandable for a short while, but when it becomes clear that this is just because she is adamant that she knows better than you do on every subject ever, it gets a little frustrating. And again, I can only see this getting worse as the teen years advance. I imagine we’re leaving behind the years of buying her clothes from George at Asda that’s for sure, which will leave me as the only one in our house still wearing stuff from that particular designer!

Which brings me nicely onto clothes. As a self identified style guru my teen daughter has also decided that it’s perfectly within her remit to be openly critical of what her family are wearing. In fact, she seems to be making it her business to pass judgement on the style decisions of almost anyone and everyone, family or not. The ‘wrong’ t-shirt will instantly – and loudly – be deemed ’embarrassing’, while she herself is wearing something like a crop top with a coat over it…on the hottest day of the year. But it gets worse. She sees no problem, no lack of simple manners even, in declaring an item of clothing ‘ugly’. And why? Well, because teen wisdom seems to dictate that she must know so much better than anyone else.

Worse than the loudly proclaimed opinions is the choices that she wants to now be making. As a toddler and even as a primary school kid, we could get away with sticking to a budget and to an extent dressing her head to toe in clothes from a supermarket. But then she began to grow out of this. And we tried to accommodate it, but it’s quite a balance trying to buy your kid the ‘right’ clothes while also attempting not to bring up a spoilt brat. So now we’re told (and she really does tell as opposed to asking), ‘I need a Tommy Hilfiger top’ or ‘We have to get me a pair of Adidas leggings’. And this becomes a problem for me, personally. I was brought up in a household where the things that I wanted were often out of reach of my parents’ pockets, so to speak. So I became used to not getting most of what I wanted and I quickly realised that there wasn’t much point in asking, but also that it was a bit unfair on my parents to ask anyway.

As such, my daughter’s demands cut no ice with me. I want her to have the types of things that I didn’t have, but I also want her to appreciate them. And her teenage way of demanding stuff can be quite difficult to live with. So again, it’s going to feel like an eternity seeing her through these next 6 or 7 years!

I hope that seeing my daughter through her teenage years will be a largely enjoyable and ultimately rewarding experience. I know that there will undoubtedly be trials and tribulations along the way. But I hope that she begins to see that we’re not the enemy and that she simply doesn’t have all of the answers. That way harmony lies. Let’s wait and see!

Just in case your reading this, Zac Effron, should you ever turn up on my doorstep, asking for my daughter, you’ll be given very short shrift indeed. Take your fame, your Hollywood riches and even your impressive pecs, and nick off.

Newcastle United – addressing the state of our nation.

This isn’t some kind of mock speech. It’s not an address where you’ll learn anything particularly new, but I do hope to add to what seems to be a growing number of fans thinking in much the same way. Because what needs to happen is going to take numbers. And I do hope to address the state of our club. And what a state it’s in.

Newcastle United are a proud club. We are 126 years old and as such have had a history that has been eventful to say the least. We’ve sat, several times, at the very top of the pile dominating English football and we’ve had our own personal rock bottom years too. We’ve never dropped into League 1, mind.

Sadly though, for the majority of the last 12 years, Newcastle United have been nothing short of a shambles and while there has been some relative success it has always been clouded by darkness, a lack of ambition and it would seem at times an unfathomable determination to do anything possible in order to alienate its fan base. We are a club stricken by disease and until we find a cure, Newcastle United cannot move forward and will continue, tragically, to be overtaken by the likes of Watford, Bournemouth and Southampton.

Mike Ashley ruined my club for me. His actions and his decisions made me give up on what had been a lifetime obsession. Born and raised in Newcastle I had followed my father in supporting our home town team. This had nothing to do with glory-hunting or bandwagon jumping; this was a decision made out of love, pride and blind loyalty. We were in Division 2 (the equivalent of the Championship) at the time. That was my story. That was the same story that many of us would have. But, having sat through so many highs and lows that I’d lost count I gave up my season ticket because of Mike Ashley and his cronies.

The infamous Hull City game made up my mind. It was September 2008, Kevin Keegan had just resigned and we were facing up to our first game without him, again. The atmosphere was toxic, the ground a seething cauldron of pure anger and hate. I sat, having previously been moved to a place in a different part of the ground away from people I’d spent years with, feeling alone and helpless to stop what was going on with the club. My decision was made that day. I would see out the season regardless of what happened – we were relegated – and I would never go back until there was no Mike Ashley.

I’ve never been back. It’s a decision that has been made slightly easier as I now have children and I live 100 miles away, but it still breaks my heart. As a kid and even as a young man, not going to St. James’ Park was something I couldn’t comprehend. But things change and people get older, move on and welcome other obsessions into their lives, like families. I had a family and had put some distance between myself and Newcastle. Neither reason would have stopped me going without Ashley though. I read the newspapers, watch the games and reports on television and scan through social media for news of my club. But it’s not the same. A chunk of me has been taken away.

So what started off as a small boy – I think I was 6 – going to home games with his dad and sitting fascinated by the colour and the noise and the fact that people genuinely got paid to play for my team, at the back of the East Stand, then blossomed into attending games with my mates and doing anything I could to scrape together the money to afford the ticket. As a teenager I started to travel to away games too, opening up a whole new world of following the Toon and just multiplying my adoration for the club. This continued as a young man and well into my late thirties. When I had kids I naturally assumed that this would be something we’d do together, like me and my dad had many years before. But no. Mike Ashley and his reign of neglect have forced my hand, like it will have done to many other fathers. So if you thought describing this whole scenario as heartbreaking was a bit over the top, then maybe now you can understand.

Recently, even following from a distance has been painful. We’ve had two stable seasons and the signs have been good. We’ve had a world class manager; a man who clearly loves the club, the area, the people. We’ve – sort of – broken our longstanding transfer record. We have a team that cares, and team that tries and who, it would seem, would lay their bodies on the line for our club. It had seemed like this never-say-die quality was going to be supplemented by even better players. But no. Despite meeting with his manager weeks ago and despite said manager providing a list of potential signings Newcastle United has ground to a halt. Rafa Benitez – he of Champions’ League winning, managing some of the top sides in Europe, Paul Dummett transforming, popping his glasses back in his top pocket after games, calling it a cloob, and telling us C’mon Toons! – has been dispensed with.

It came as a shock, but at the same time was no shock whatsoever. Whichever way you look at it the decision was the most Mike Ashley thing ever (until the next one) and had I been a betting man I could have cleaned up. The offer made to the manager was never going to match his ambitions and it would seem that this was wholly intentional. And in the end why would any manager want to stay at a club that wouldn’t let him manage?

Rafa Benitez will be a huge loss to us all. His arrival awakened the club and in truth it awakened something in us all, too. He brought vision, class, passion, expertise and understanding, where before we’d had John Carver talking about the guys at the club, Alan Pardew talking about himself and forever adding to a seemingly never-ending list of excuses and Joe Kinnear talking out of his arse. Rafa did none of that. Rafa gave us hope.

Rafa also helped bring back pride and dignity to not only our supporters but to the region too. It gladdened my heart to see the pictures of him and his staff taking in the local landmarks a couple of years ago, in order to learn more about their new environment. And then there was his work with the Newcastle United Foundation and the NUFC Foodbank – both causes that the likes of Pardew wouldn’t have touched with the proverbial bargepole. There will undoubtedly be lots more causes that Rafa took an interest in, lots more lives that he touched, that you or I will never know of.

Rafa Benitez got Newcastle United. He understood the people, the city and the region. He invested in us and although it’s a terrible cliché, he became one of us. He stands alongside Kevin Keegan and Sir Bobby Robson as one of the greatest Newcastle managers of the modern era, as well as one of the most popular. It’s nothing short of a crime that the powers that be at our club – it’s not theirs – have allowed his contract to run down and essentially dismissed him. I understand that he wanted to leave, but that has nothing to do with anything or anyone other than Mike Ashley and his gang of halfwits. These people have made our club into a shambles by taking backward step after backward step and all of it without any real communication with their customer base; the fans. While all of this has gone on, off the back of – relatively speaking – another successful season, the club have churned out ‘no comment’ after ‘no comment’. In the end, what was happening was as predictable as it was inevitable. Most of all, it was heart-breaking.

Meanwhile, somewhere in the background, a takeover has been brewing. Someone in possession of both a shedload of money and a modicum of common sense had seen the potential of our club. It was really going to happen this time, right?

Wrong. Even amidst talk of a takeover it’s been difficult to get excited. There was optimism for a short while; someone was communicating with the fans. We didn’t know who they were or whether they had the money to buy the club, let alone whether Ashley would sell, but these people were telling us it was on. But as with Staveley and Kenyon (Christ, even like Barry Moat!), the trail has gone eerily quiet. We’ve gone from the bookies giving us relatively short odds on signing Kylian Mbappe to the majority of people suspecting yet another false dawn in a matter of weeks. A Newcastle United story if ever there was one. Aye, another one! But just because it’s all so very Newcastle United doesn’t make it any easier to take. And the silence from the club – apart from the now universally mocked ‘ no comment’ – is simply astounding. Astounding and absolutely unacceptable.

So what exactly is the state of our nation. Well, as I previously stated, it’s nothing short of a shambles. And that’s being reasonable. The club is quite simply an utter mess. At the time of writing we may or may not be being taken over by a billionaire. There should be a sense of optimism at the prospect of being labelled the new Man City and preparing ourselves to ride the wave of success that would inevitably bring. But there can’t be, can there? In actual fact, we can’t even be too sure that our owner, who put the club up for sale, actually wants to sell the club. And the fact that even one fan might regard this as a possibility is completely ridiculous. I’ve found myself looking at the buyer’s name to try and work out if it’s an anagram for something else that would reveal that we were being cruelly misled. We’ve seen an interview from Ashley himself, discussing the possibility of selling the club on more than one occasion and still, he might as well be saying that he’s attempting to sign Mickey Mouse for world record fee (for a mouse).

As I write we have no manager. We had one. A world class one. But those in charge of the club decided that his help, guidance, advice and football knowledge wasn’t really needed anymore. Not exactly a forward thinking approach. However, add that to the fact that pre-season training starts in a couple of days and you wouldn’t get many sane people questioning you when you tell them you expect another relegation this season. On top of that we know that Lee Charnley is in charge of appointing the next manager, and I don’t think I’d be alone in finding that prospect as one that sends a chill down my spine. That said, I’ve got to the point where I’m actually not that interested anymore. Whoever becomes the new manager will still inspire the same lies, lies and more lies that any other manager in the Ashley era has been faced with. And whoever they are, you’d be surprised to see them get anything more than another lick of paint to the training ground in the next few year, let alone any stellar signings.

The transfer window has been open for quite some time now and we’ve still done nothing. No incomings – so little change there then – and plenty of ridiculous stories linking us with players who we simply won’t buy because of the finance involved, which is exactly the same as previous seasons. Think about it, last season there were several clubs in the Championship that comfortably outspent us. Christ, we haven’t even sold Joselu yet and from what we read in the press he’s been heading through the door for the last three weeks! But hot off the press comes new of Ayoze Perez’s departure and the seemingly strong possibility that Sean Longstaff may also be sold. And still, according to some in the media, it’s not Mike Ashley’s fault, he’s doing nothing wrong and us Newcastle fans are unreasonable.

We could go on and on, but frankly it’s worse than depressing. Some people believe football to be a waste of time and a triviality that they sum up by telling you it’s ‘only a game’ or ‘it’s just a load of people chasing a ball around’. Well, they’re wrong. It’s an obsession for lots of us. It’s might well be the thing you love the most and if it isn’t it’ll be right up there. In times where mental health is an ever-growing issue, football can be something that brings unbridled joy and a smile to many a face. And if someone wants to trivialise something as wonderful and pure as that, then maybe they’re the trivial one. I’ve experienced many emotions across the course of my lifetime and some of the most joyous could have only been provided by football and specifically by Newcastle United. The joy, togetherness, laughter…even the heartache. Let me illustrate. On one occasion I sat in an ice rink and held hands with my two best mates while chanting ‘We three are one’ in order to somehow help John Burridge save a penalty. Our held hands were placed on top of a cut-out-and-keep picture of Uri Geller’s hand and our feet on top of each other’s, just to add that extra layer of stupidity and detail. Burridge saved the penalty – joy. We were three teenagers lads holding hands – togetherness that was ahead of its time, I think you’ll agree. We still laugh about it to this day. It was the first leg of the play-off semi-final against Sunderland and we lost the 2nd leg and didn’t get promoted – heartache. You’ll read this and understand exactly what I mean. But Mike Ashley, Lee Charnley, Keith Bishop, Dennis Wise and any of the others at the bottom of life’s barrel don’t understand at all. They wouldn’t go to anywhere near the lengths we go to in the name of their football club. And that’s exactly why things have to change.

I’ve never understood why Mike Ashley wanted Newcastle United. Not on a human level anyway. I understand the desperate need to grow his business, but even then, his junk shop was hugely successful and he was rich beyond his wildest dreams, without Newcastle United. So, as we know, it comes down to a simple matter of greed. He cannot get any pleasure, any fun, any joy out of our club. He can’t get what we get from Newcastle United. And in that aspect he can’t even begin to understand what it feels like to be one of us. He rarely even watches them play. He quibbles about buying players and employs PR staff to peddle us lines about being unable to compete with mediocre sides and relatively small clubs in order to try and dampen our enthusiasm and optimism for this thing that we’ve been brought up to love. He treats us like idiots even though you don’t have to be Einstein to work out that the Premier League is awash with money. So where’s ours, Mr Ashley?

Why bother, Mike? You’ll never be accepted and never be taken seriously. Face it, even your friendly apologists are on the payroll in some way. Our club has been dragged through the mud by your regime, suffering under the hands of people like Jiminez, Lambias, Kninear and Wise – although little Dennis’s hands were only tiny. We’ve been lied to and strung along and this has to be the last straw.

So how do we solve a problem like Mike Ashley? I don’t have a grand answer in terms of the protests that we could organise or a guaranteed way of removing that man from our club, but I know a way that we can and should hit back. It’s not original, but I reckon it would be effective. And if me writing this gets even one person to take some action, then we’ve had some success.

We no longer give him our money and we expose his lies to the world by boycotting games. As I mentioned previously, I gave up my season ticket years ago. It wasn’t a decision that I took lightly. Newcastle United have been a lifelong love and I adored everything about going to games. The sense of belonging was something to cherish even when we were being hammered into humiliation; something I’d grown used to. But the highs made it all worth it. Every chant that made me laugh reminded me of what I had. Every goal produced a joy that largely went unmatched elsewhere. Climbing the steps to look out over that ground, that pitch and watching those black and white stripes emerge from a tunnel meant the world to me. But I knew that I had to give it up. And I knew that others would be like-minded.

It’s hard. It’s unimaginably hard to face up to the fact that you’ll not be in your seat when there’s a game. It haunts you and you dream of the day when you’ll feel like you can go back. Like everything has slotted back into place. Because there’s something missing without it. And it’s an absolutely huge something as well.

But you have to give it up. Only for now. A temporary necessity, if you will. To keep going is to perpetuate the myth that everything’s alright. And it’s not alright. It’s not your club anymore. The shell is the same, but there’s a cancer attacking what’s at the heart of it and the only way to fight is to stop feeding it. That man wants you in your seat because it feeds his ego and helps to publicise his shop. Thousands of people sitting around his tacky logo looks like thousands of people endorsing it. But you can’t. You can’t endorse Wise, Kinnear, the Sports Direct Arena, Wonga, Xisco, Pardew, price rises, wheelie bin ice baths, paddling pools being used for the recovery of professional athletes at the training ground, selling off your best players and not replacing them and cheaply manufactured strips that denigrate our name. And you can’t endorse a regime that gives you John Carver, but tosses the likes of Shearer, Hughton and now Rafa Benitez away like used toys. That regime don’t want a Newcastle united. To endorse that is to open yourself up to the fact that it’s going to just keep happening.

So give up that season ticket. Walk away – just for now – from this relationship. And for a while, don’t look back. Fill that void – just for now – with something else. Rediscover family and friends, take up a hobby, follow a new sport or a different team (nonleague, of course). Do anything – just make it lawful – but don’t go back until he’s gone. Because one day we’ll get our club back.

Leeds United: falling apart or ignoring the chaos and building a bright future?

So Tyler Roberts didn’t kick the ball out. Public outrage! For what exactly? What about the noble English art of sportsmanship? Do me a favour! But, but…Dirty Leeds? Well, no. Clearly not. From the outside looking in it looks to me that there’s a lot of blame being thrown around in the wrong direction. One thing’s for sure though; it was the start of a series of events that could shape the short term future of Leeds United.

To recap, during their final home league game of the season, against Aston Villa, when an opposition player went down injured, Leeds carried on playing and within seconds had scored the opening goal of the game. Cue hysteria! Sky pundits -who when they’d played the game themselves most likely were anything but angels – took the moral high ground so high they needed to parachute back down to ground level and the land we call ‘Havealittlethinkaboutthat’.

As the ball hit the back of the net there was a bit of a scrap between opposing players. Or, if you prefer the correct football media parlance, a melee ensued. The mass of bodies became a moving brawl, trundling across the field of play, pausing for a second or two before finding the strength, or the moral outrage to go again. Eventually, with the added excitement of stewards on the pitch – yes, on the pitch! – things calmed down enough for the referee to take some sort of appropriate action. Or so we thought.

The media and social media fallout since has been somewhat incredible. And as a football fan and a supporter of a team that, in my opinion, doesn’t get the rub of the green with the media, it’s made me wonder why. So, is it just a Leeds thing? If for instance Manchester City or media darlings Spurs or West Ham or God forbid, Manchester United had done the same, would it have been OK to play to the whistle? Would doing what you were taught as kids – play to the whistle – have been acceptable then? Because that’s all that happened really.

Oh, I know that if we slow it down it looks like he’s going to put the ball out, blah, blah, blah. And he might well have been thinking that. But he didn’t do it. And in doing so he broke no rules. None whatsoever. Or again, if you prefer media speak, he didn’t contravene any of the laws of the game. Fair enough, he broke some precious unwritten moral code. But how are we governing the game here? Because if it’s based around morals…well, football’s in more trouble than we imagined!

As for the goal scorer, Mattheus Klich, I feel sure that he wouldn’t have been aware of any fuss that might have been going on around him. What he did was what we all would have done. It was Boys’ Own stuff – he had a chance to score a goal in a huge game. His team were stuck in the middle of a bit of a goal drought. He was a professional footballer doing his job. And it was actually a good finish.

So did Leeds do anything wrong? Well, for me, no. Not really. Surely it’s just instinct to play the ball forward? And if we then look at the actual injury we might easily just think that there was very little to kick the ball out for. From my standpoint as a complete neutral there wasn’t even a foul. Both players went in for the ball, there was a momentary tangle and then Kodija went down. Yes, he was injured and subsequently went off, but I don’t recall a stretcher or a head injury.

We all know what happened next. Chaos ensued. Villa players took the moral high ground while also taking the law into their own hands, while Patrick Bamford took the opportunity to showcase his acting skills. Unfortunately, rather than winning an award he earned himself a ban. In fact, in many ways he was the only Leeds player to really do anything wrong. And if we’re punishing bad acting then some of those Villa players need pulling up for their impressions of modern day football hard men. I’m not sure the likes of Bremner, Clarke or Gray would have been too intimidated.

In among the moral outrage Bielsa emerged as the voice of reason, which given his language skills was quite some achievement. With a true British sense of fair play in mind he ordered the Leeds players – and yes, that does include you Pontus – to let Villa run through and score an unopposed equaliser. Villa then withstood the Leeds pressure to hold out for a draw, but that was never going to be the end of the matter. With a multitude of cameras covering any game these days more wrongdoing was uncovered and the scandal lived on. Bamford was banned, a Villa player was excused for punching an opponent and the debate about the rights and wrongs raged on.

Meanwhile the football season continued. Leeds stumbled into the play-offs with Villa a possible opponent further down the line. Another meeting would be compulsive viewing, but both teams have to make it happen. Villa have languished in the Championship for a few years now without ever realistically looking like they might get out, despite a play-off final last year. And their good run has to end at some point. Will their players cope with the pressure.

Elsewhere, Derby have stuttered through the season and only clinched their play-off spot on the final day of the season, while West Brom have only never really looked that convincing all year.

And that leaves Leeds. The biggest club left standing? Arguably, yes, although I’m sure Villa fans would argue otherwise. Personally though I’d love to see Leeds make it to the Premier League. It’s been a long time without them and Elland Road is the kind of ground teams and fans should want to be visiting. No disrespect to any team in the Premier League, but a club and a city like Leeds is bigger and more high profile than most and if this is the league that claims to be the biggest and best in the world, then you’d hope it would recognise the value of a Leeds over say, a Bournemouth or a Watford.

Looking at current form though, it’s clearly going to be an enormous challenge for Leeds in the play-offs. They aren’t in any kind of form. They’re not taking chances, despite creating a lot and they don’t seem to have a striker with that killer instinct that’s needed in such massive games. I genuinely believe that with someone like Dwight Gayle up front Leeds would already be planning for life in the Premier league. Without and they’re relying on Kemar Roofe, fresh back from injury, but yet to truly hit form. Furthermore, there are some problems in defence – as illustrated against Ipswich – with the absence of Barry Douglas proving crucial.

Leeds don’t go into the play-offs in great shape. However, there are factors that might just see them through. Firstly, there’s Bielsa himself. We know he’ll have done his homework, that’s for sure. Besides that though, he has a group of players that are not only capable of playing incisive and attractive football, but who are in clearly in awe of him as a coach. Bielsa has transformed Leeds’ fortunes and although the play-offs are a real test of his mettle and methods, his standing in the game dictates that he should still have enough to pull the team through. If you’re a Leeds fan, you’ve got to hope so!

Elsewhere – and maybe I’m clutching at straws here – I’d point to players like Kemar Roofe and Jack Clarke. Both, to some extent are returning from injury or illness and both searching for form. Could such major games inspire them? Roofe has scored goals while fit and you’d expect him to continue to do just that, while Clarke is a young player that’s likely to produce a trick and a moment of magic, things that Leeds are in real need of now.

Can the crowd make the difference? Well, you’d expect so. Leeds – like my own team Newcastle – have a loyal and long suffering fanbase and it can’t be denied that they make quite a racket, especially inside Elland Road. That should be inspirational; it has to be. These players must be desperate to get to the Premier League, given the season they’ve had and so the occasions that they’re going to be faced with over the next week or so shouldn’t frighten them. One of the key factors, you’d imagine, will be whether or not teams rise to the occasion. Anyone feeling intimidated isn’t going to attempt that killer pass, won’t play the ball first time and is liable to fluff the chance that comes their way.

Having spoken to Leeds fans there seems to be a split in opinion and feeling about how things are expected to go. Some are adamant that Leeds don’t do one-off games and have reverted to the safety of the pessimist. Others however have decided that Leeds’ play-off record has got to change sometime, that this group of players and this manager are good enough to handle the pressure.

It’s been an interesting season for Leeds. It’s been an interesting last fortnight. It’s could be an even more interesting next week or so.

Craft Beer: I can’t be the only one a bit puzzled, can I?

The past 6 or 7 years has witnessed a bit of a change in beer as those of us of a certain age used to understand it. We’ve gone from satisfying our pallets with things like Guiness, Boddingtons and other smooth brews to slowly discovering the birth of craft beers. I’ve seen them described as ‘a global phenomenon’, ‘a revolution and ‘a bubble’, all of which seem to mark them out as something quite mystical and exclusive. I’ve also seen them described as ‘a perfect example of the J curve concept’, but that just sounds a bit ridiculous and like someone’s making up a concept to make themselves sound clever. That way lies madness, as well as blue sky thinking, helicopter views, getting all your ducks in a row and more of the kind of corporate nonsense that makes me want to swear and throw things around rooms. Or stop watching The Apprentice.

Despite not being in my twenties, or in possession of an artisanal beard, skinny jeans or vintage brogues, I have still somewhat immersed myself in the phenomenon of craft beer. I’ve hurtled along with the revolution and floated with the bubble. However, unlike those who we may see in a ‘taphouse’ twiddling their freshly waxed beard and smoothing down their skinny jeans, I can’t just blindly go along with the hype for fear of saying the wrong thing. So here’s some thoughts on my odyssey through craft beer.

First and foremost, I think it’s great. For me, beer’s never been so tasty, varied and creative. It’s a wonderful thing to watch people with passion take a basic idea – beer – and run with it into a whole new world. And I can count myself very fortunate in being able to go along for the ride.

As craft beer reached my neck of the woods I was often left scraping around a bit in order to find it. Here, on the outskirts of Leeds there wasn’t a great deal of choice. Out in the studenty badlands of Headingley there was the brilliant Beer-Ritz, but a trip there would often take well over an hour and the thought of sitting in traffic either way was off-putting to say the least. There was also a fantastic place called Beer Huis in Ossett, but in truth I hadn’t heard of it and in fact it was my wife who introduced me to it when she bought me some birthday beers. So I’d shop local. This meant Asda where pickings were sparse, Morrisons where things got a little better or Sainsbury’s at the White Rose Centre where every so often there’d be a new beer to try or if you got really lucky they’d have a beer ‘festival’ that would showcase beers from smaller brewers from around the country. Now this doesn’t sound much compared to the way things are now, but I’ve got to be honest and say that I quite enjoyed the hunt for something different.

And then, a revelation. A breakthrough. I heard a rumour that our local B&Ms was sometimes a place that stocked craft beer. At a bargain price, of course. And suddenly there was more choice and different, more interesting beers to have a go at. But still not a huge amount of choice.

My sense of puzzlement with craft beer started, albeit in a small way, with the first type that I tried. As someone who’s go to beer was bitter, varied taste wasn’t always that high on the agenda. Until that is, the day that I spotted a bottle of Innis & Gunn Original Ale. I was fascinated to read that it might have a hint of a vanilla flavour to it and delighted that, when I tasted it, it actually did! Amazing, a beer with a hint of ice-cream! And so the journey into craft beer began in earnest.

But as my ‘journey’ advanced, so did my sense of bemusement. What were all of these hops that were being used and why did they make a difference? What was with the daft names for beers? Why did it cost so much? And why did all feel just a little bit conceited and a tiny bit of a closed shop?

I even puzzled myself a little bit. Never one to get overly obsessive about anything, I actually started to keep a log of the different beers that I was trying. I’d note the price, where I’d acquired it and make notes about the taste, before finally awarding it a mark out of 10, often deliberating for a while before awarding something ridiculous like a 6.8 or a 7.3. This wasn’t like me. And yet when I thought about it, it was actually just like me; only when I was about 12. You see around that age I was obsessed with Subbuteo (a table football game, if you don’t know it). So obsessed that I got beyond playing with real teams and instead disappeared into my own world, making up teams, creating whole squads of fictional players, recording results, scorers – you name it, I did it. I know, ‘Hello ladies’, right?

And now, here I was logging beers. I must have logged around 70 different beers before I realised that I was cheating myself. The truth is I’ve got terrible taste buds, so I’d be swilling beer round my mouth tasting little but beer, really. No hints of fruit, no sense of peat bogs, no oakiness…just beer. But it didn’t stop me writing tasting notes, because all I did was furtively look at the label and add a couple of things I saw on there to my notes. So if the label told me there was a hint of elderflower, then so did my tasting notes. Truth is, I don’t actually know what elderflower is! A wise, old flower maybe? I was only really kidding myself though and so I just gave it up as a bad job and a waste of time.

My confusion continued as I encountered proper beer shops. Now there were places that just seemed to specialise in craft beers, unlike the off licenses of my youth and the likes of Bargain Booze. However, I’d go into these establishments and feel under pressure. Should I have known exactly what I was looking for? I tended to browse, taking my time to look for something just right before taking my purchases to the till. But I always felt as though I was being scrutinised, judged even. I’m sure this was just my paranoia, but I would approach the till feeling wholly self conscious about my choices.

On my first visit to a Leeds store that I’d heard about I was asked, in a perfectly friendly manner, ‘Are you Ok there?’ and this immediately ramped up the pressure. I was fine. I just wanted to select some beers in my usual way, looking for eye-catching labels, reading the description and checking where it was from, but now I just felt stupid. Did I look like someone who drank Carling? Was that the problem? Like I say, the bloke was perfectly friendly, but I took his question to be some sort of ‘dig’ at my craft beer inexperience.

Don’t get me wrong. I understand that the problem here is more than likely me. It’s not the beer shop’s fault that I have such terrible search perameters when it comes to choosing beer. And if they stood there in silence while I looked around I’d probably be just as disturbed as if they spoke to me. But I’d maintain that in 75% of the specialist beer shops I’ve visited I’ve felt a bit of an atmosphere, almost as if the person behind the counter is sneering at my choices. And therein lies another of my problems with craft beer. There’s definitely a certain snobbery, of which I’m part. I’m not exactly vocal about it, but if I’m out and someone’s buying a Carling or a Budweiser for instance, I’m encountering a feeling of disappointment! So, with that in mind, if you work in a beer shop, with all your specialist knowledge, and someone like me walks in and chooses a selection of bottles or cans by looking for nice labels, while taking a good ten minutes to do so, then you’re probably entitled to have a little bit of a sneer!

It was on one of these visits that something else left me puzzled – the price. Now this is a problem I have with craft beer and it’s a problem that continues to grow the more I look around. The other day, in a beer shop, I spotted a can I liked the look of, by a brewer that I knew as having a good reputation. This was going to be mine. And then I saw the price. £8 for a can! £8! Eight of yer actual pounds! Now call me stingy, but £8 for a can of beer just seems a bit daft. I’ve paid less for t-shirts, for goodness sakes and probably a decade or so on, I’ve still got the t-shirt! In all honesty – and possible a little bit of ignorance as to what actually goes into making it – I cannot understand some of the pricing that I see. I mean, I like a bottle of wine and I’m not averse to paying double figures for that, but I can’t get my head around a similar price for a can of beer. When I look around the shelves at craft beer it’s becoming more and more rare that I see prices within an understandable bracket (for me) and a lot more likely that I’ll be looking at a can or bottle that’s going to cost me upwards of £4.

Before things get too negative I’ll re-affirm my feeling that craft beer is great. We even have a craft beer shop – hello Beer Thirty – in Morley now, meaning I can call round every so often to stock up or experiment a bit without any hassle whatsoever. It’s actually right next to my youngest child’s school, making it handy when picking him up, even if that is a little bit mercenary! More often than not though, a beer is more of a taste experience nowadays, rather than an excuse to hunt out the Gaviscon. With every new beer I discover I unearth a new taste and it really is a fantastic thing. I don’t tend to drink the same beers over and over again, preferring to experiment when and where I can. Beer drinking is fun again, in a different way. Where in my youth the fun tended to be found in the light-headedness that made me quite the smooth talker, but not the best walker, nowadays the fun is all in the taste. As a beer drinker of a certain age and with a bit of a health concern getting in the way, I tend not to drink to get drunk anymore. So the fun is limited to the taste buds, but it means I can wake up the next day and function. And although to some that might sound like no fun at all, I’d rather I was limited to one or two craft beers than one or two lagers or Guinesses.

Another craft beer ‘problem’ – for me, only for me, – is the types of pubs that are now cropping up. Sorry, did I say pubs? I meant taphouses. And this is where I look a bit weird and very old fashioned. You see – and to those who know me, this really isn’t news – I’m quite anti-social. I’ve covered this before, suffice to say that it’s not necessarily a dislike of people, but more a lack of confidence. Thus, I don’t really go in pubs anymore. I don’t have a local, partly due to the demands of my job and a lack of time and energy, and as such I’m limiting my craft beer ‘journey’. I must admit these taphouses look brilliant, but they’re just not for me. Nowadays I just have an aversion to pubs. Something in me seems to stop my legs from working when I get the chance to go in one and so, although handily positioned for going into Leeds where many of these new craft pubs are found, I just can’t do it. And as a result, I feel a bit left out with craft beer, despite my love of it.

I’m not entirely sure that one gets solved either. I’m now possibly a little too stuck in my ways to indulge myself and this is a real shame. I imagine that such modern bars – sorry, taphouses – are the absolute antithesis of the kind of places that I readily frequented as a younger man. Friendly, no air of threat or violence and with lovey beer to boot too. As opposed to the kind of place where you had to watch your back all night and listen to appalling music while drinking beer that inevitably left you so full of gas and air that you’d fear you’d burst! So in terms of the title of this blog, then yes, sadly I’m puzzled as well as missing out on something! Perhaps until the day I push myself a little bit more, I’ll remain puzzled. Whatever way you look at it, it’s clearly me that’s got the problem!

I’ll leave you with something I read in a magazine article about craft beer. The writer was indulging himself in a trip to Manchester – a homage? – to visit various ‘legendary’ craft pubs and sample, if I remember rightly, some quite mythical beer. It was a great read. But the best – and in a cringeworthy way, the worst – thing was when someone in the know told him the following.

“We’re nowhere near peak beer yet.”

I have to admit that this makes me puzzled and excited all at the same time. Still occasionally I’ll open a can or a bottle and have a sip and be absolutely blown away by the taste. I’m not sure I understand how it gets better, let alone how we’re nowhere near peak. But it’s sure to be exciting finding out!

My FitBit Revolution

When it comes to trends and fads, I’m usually almost immune, especially when it comes to technology. I have a phone, a tablet, a laptop etc, but none of them are what you’d call cutting edge. They’ve certainly not been bought to keep up with fashion. I’d like to think that I’m old enough now to trust my judgement and make my own decisions, without relying on what a magazine or a website tells me I should be indulging in.

That’s not to say that my judgement is always right. Often, especially when it comes to clothes, I’ve opted for the less obvious choice and then been left wishing I’d bought the same as everyone else. One of the most notable instances was buying a pair of Adidas Gazelles and going for the bright green and yellow pair rather than the traditional blue and white that thousands of others plumped for. I spent years trying in vain to match my trainers to my clothes and regretting my choice, while everyone else went out looking cool. I still didn’t learn my lesson though.

As such, I’d resisted the idea of a smart watch or a Fitbit. They seemed more a fashion thing than anything to do with actual fitness and I wasn’t interested in knowing how many steps I’d done in a day or what my heart rate might be anyway. And the idea that I could have a watch that also informed me when I was about to get some kind of notification on my phone just seemed like information overload to me. Call me old-fashioned, but surely I’d just check my phone to see if my phone had anything to tell me?

‘It also meant I could set goals…’

However, as I attempted to get back to some sort of fitness following a heart operation, I started running again and in order to keep an eye on distances I downloaded a running app on to my phone. It became quite a comfort to hear the voice of an unidentified American woman telling me how far I’d run and what my average pace was. She’s now my 5th best friend, just behind Alexa in fact. It also meant that I could set goals and track my progress, as well as inevitably informing friends on Facebook that I’d been out running and was knackered, coupled with a picture of myself with a very red face. It’s important that everyone knows these things, especially as it’s not cool to post pictures of your food anymore.

Then I got ill. Nothing serious, just the usual seasonal stuff – heavy colds, a chest infection – and I also damaged my back, meaning that I had to stop running for a while. In fact, I’m yet to go out for my first run of 2019 and it’s now April. But when my son got a Fitbit for Christmas I must admit I was intrigued. He’d tell me on a half hourly basis about how many steps he’d done. He’d point out his heart rate and tell me his blood pressure, like a very, very junior doctor. In fact, when he started advising me to do the same I was convinced he was turning into Doc McStuffins or Doogie Howser. And that’s a niche joke if ever I heard one.

‘It set me a target of 7000 steps daily…’

So when it came to my birthday in February I was pleasantly surprised to receive a Fitbit. My wife saved me the agitation of setting it up and when it was ready I strapped it round my wrist and went to work. It set me a target of 7000 steps daily, which I’m sad to say, I don’t regularly achieve. However, at the very least I am now aware of exactly what I don’t do in a typical day. And I must admit, as a recently discharged heart patient, being able to check my heart rate at a moment’s notice is still genuinely comforting.

While my Fitbit – if I keep mentioning it surely someone will give me some money – hasn’t totally changed my life, it has made me much more aware of my own fitness. This is of course very important as a man of a certain age who is more than a little bit conscious of his grey hair and slowly growing belly. Certainly, just looking at them wasn’t solving anything – to paraphrase Shakespeare, ‘Whilst I threat, my belly lives: words to the heat of deeds a big fatty bum bum belly gives’. So the Fitbit, at the very least, let’s me track my good days and bad days. It represents the first steps in my battle to not give in to a belly, slacks and comfortable shoes. And when I’m not at work it stops me from sitting on my arse all day.

‘It doesn’t make up for the fact that I am my age…’

For years I’ve had the pleasant experience of being regularly told that I don’t look my age. No, really, I have. It doesn’t make up for the fact that I am my age, but it’s pleasant all the same. However, lately the age that people tell me I look has been creeping ever closer to my actual age. ‘You’re 47? Ooh, you only look 45’ isn’t the kind of flattery that gets you everywhere. And this makes me quite sad. So another reason to Fitbit myself into action then. Can it reverse the effects of ageing and will people start telling me I look like I’m ‘only’ in my late 30s? I doubt it, but it might make me feel a whole lot better about myself. I’ll know whether I’m making an effort or not. And at least, when people look at me and weigh up how old I am, they might not be able to spot my belly or any sign of a double chin. At the very least, by tracking my activity a bit more I might be able to somehow convince myself that I look good for my age.

And the battle against ageing is very real in a different way too. When I look at some of my peers – those who are as old as me or a similar age – sometimes it terrifies me. At a previous school my department insisted on sitting me down for a department dinner, where everyone brought snacks and stuff in order to celebrate my birthday. And if this wasn’t uncomfortable enough, my Head of Department invited our Deputy Head, a man I loathed but that he was desperate to impress. Anyway, we got chatting over dinner and someone asked how old I actually was. When I told them, it turned out that I was about a month older than the Deputy Head, who looked at least 10 years older than me. I think this may have been the exact moment that the struggle for fitness and perhaps some version of eternal youth, became very real!

When I was a kid adults used to tell me that ‘in their heads’ they only felt about 18 and I used to think that was utter rubbish. I’d look at their terrible clothes, grey hair and wrinkles and think, ‘I’ll never get like that’. And now I am those people. I feel like I’m only 18, but I clearly don’t look it. And while it doesn’t exactly terrify me, I know that I still want to look better and feel fitter. Hence the Fitbit revolution. And yes, I understand that it’s not magic and that I have to actually exercise more, rather than just glancing at a watch all day and fretting that I’m 4000 steps short of my target. This is undoubtedly and easier approach, but I don’t think it’s going to be all that successful.

The worry lies with where the revolution stops. For a while now I’ve had some of the gear. The base layers, skins or running tights; whatever you want to call them. My wife even bought me a top made from bamboo, so I’m eco-friendly (unless you’re a panda) but also, in some way that I can’t quite put my finger on, high performance as well.

‘But did you know of a product called Runderwear?’

But could my Fitbit become like some kind of gateway drug? Where does one stop? Counting steps is one thing, but I’m still keen to resume running. And if I get dissatisfied with my Fitbit, how much do I have to spend in order to make myself happy and achieve even better results? As I’ve mentioned, I’m not immune to wearing a base layer, even though on my bottom half I end up looking like someone’s put tights on two golf clubs. But did you know of a product called Runderwear? That’s right; underwear for running. It stops chafing and general discomfort while also sounding like the kind of idea you’d expect on Reeves and Mortimer’s Big Night Out or The Fast Show. But how far does my revolution have to go before I consider Runderwear? Do I really have to be that serious about things in order to cling on to a tiny bit of youth and get rid of what really is only a baby of a belly? I have to confess though that a heath scare a year ago coupled with the running APP and the Fitbit has had me genuinely considering Runderwear! It’ll be a bike or a treadmill next and all the gear to go with it. I must be strong.

Furthermore, with a Fitbit there’s the temptation to track things like your blood pressure or your sleep. But in my case this could be both futile and damaging. Firstly, I’ve never really understood what blood pressure actually is. I’ve had it measured on countless occasions but never bothered to ask what it’s all about. It always just feels like the doctor’s trying to hurt me with the machine. So why I need to be checking up on it from a watch, well who knows? With sleep, I know I don’t get enough. I’m not the night owl that I once was, but I’m more than happy staying up late. So to be told by my Fitbit that not only wasn’t I getting enough sleep, but that it wasn’t of the right quality might actually worry me closer to greyer hair and the kind of comfort eating that could only enhance those love handles. So I’ll stick to just religiously checking on my steps, I think.

‘Personally I found it soul destroyingly embarrassing…’

In a way, I’d like things to just go back to the standards of the 70s and 80s when it was clearly OK to just become a middle-aged man, with no pressure whatsoever. Certainly, it didn’t take my dad any effort at all to start wearing Farah slacks or badly fitting jeans. No one batted an eyelid, apart his kids. Personally I found it soul destroyingly embarrassing, but to others it was perfectly acceptable. Men got to a certain age and just stopped trying a bit. But as a teenager whose parents were older than those of most of my peers, I wasn’t keen on walking round with a bloke who could well have been mistaken for my granddad, with his jeans and slip-on shoes. Or a retired golf catalogue model in casual slacks. Nowadays though things have changed and there’s a definite pressure to stay young in any way you can. Sadly, I’m not immune to it, it seems and my Fitbit revolution is just more proof of it. I think having young children is part of it along with a little bit of vanity. Whatever I put it down to, I’m not the only one who’s checking their steps and wondering where I can walk to at work in order to get closer to that target. I might be on my own in pondering Runderwear though.

So this revolution may not be televised. But it will definitely continue at pace until that belly starts to recede.

February: Making Every Day Count.

Ignore the bit about young people. This is some serious self-help business going down.

Self-help books. I’ve always wondered how, if you have the weight of the world on your shoulders, you would the time to read one. And what makes the people who write them right? Why should we take notice? Well, perhaps I need to have a closer look.

One of the best things about my job is the access to stuff that I have. Yes, I have incredible colleagues, teach great kids and it’s never dull. However, I reckon at least 75% of teachers will tell you that the most exciting part of the job is the stationary; the stuff. In late August every year stationers and supermarkets are packed to the rafters with teachers searching out new diaries, notebooks, pens and other stuff. And then when we get to school in early September, someone has ordered loads of other stuff that you’re practically encouraged to help yourself too. Over the years I’ve had countless pens, coloured pencils, planners, files, folders etc. Best of all though is the books. Sometimes people just send you books, giving you the feeling of an actual famous person who has stuff thrown their way daily. On other occasions you somehow manage to help yourself to books that are otherwise gathering dust in a cupboard, giving the feeling of an actual…thief.

Recently, while having a clear out of my desk drawers I discovered some bizarre stuff. Two self-help type books that I have no recollection whatsoever of acquiring. One called ‘Making Every Day Count’ which promises to help you solve problems, set goals and feel good about yourself and the other titled ‘Making The Most of Today’ which was much of the same. And so, I decided to try them out and blog about it as I go.

I’ve decided that I’ll be ‘Making Every Day Count’ but that I may well cheat occasionally in order that I’m ‘Making The Most of Every Day’. Depends on which book has the best advice, I suppose.

If I was cleverer and wittier I’d come up with a hilarious blend word to fit the occasion. You know, along the lines of ‘Movember’. But I’m not. So here we go on taking self-help advice for the whole of February. Self-helpbruary?

Friday 1st February

Today’s advice is to ‘Make a To-Do list’. Easy. My life is literally made up of a series of lists. So today, I learn precisely nothing apart from the fact that I’m already helping myself.

Saturday 2nd February

The book encourages me to talk about my fears with someone I trust. It’s a Saturday, a day for family, so I’m faced with a choice of my wife and partner of the last 24 years or my children, aged 12 and 9, neither of whom I could trust as far as I could throw them. The wife it is then. But then when I think about it, I don’t think I have any fears. Newcastle United getting relegated and Rafa Benitez leaving? Maybe, but I’d rather just shout at the telly or write barbed comments on Twitter than bother Louise. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to die any time soon – I was told only last week by my cardiologist that there are few fears there.

In the end, I give up on fears. It’s Saturday; there’s shopping to be done, football to be watched and probably countless jobs around the house to be tackled. Fears can wait.

Sunday 3rd February

‘I’ll focus on what I think of me’. Genuine self-help advice at the bottom of the page for today. Brilliant! Too easy. I think I’m alright, really. Despite my age I don’t think I look too bad, I’m fit and healthy and despite a burgeoning belly there’s not a lot that can’t be put right. I’m happy. In my head I’m the funniest person I know – if you know me you know that if no one else is laughing at my jokes, you can guarantee I most definitely will be. And as I proved yesterday, I have no fears that are getting in the way of just living my life. This self-help lark is beginning to look like child’s play!

Monday 4th February

Today we hit a snag. I open the book and read the following – Today I’ll think like an optimist. Oh.

Whether it’s the amount of childhood dreams that I’ve not achieved, whether it’s a lifetime supporting an under achieving football team or whether it’s being brought up in a distinctly risk averse environment, I think I’m much more of a pessimist. Or at the very least, a realist.

But, I try to be optimistic. Maybe I won’t have to almost constantly ask my Year 10s to be quiet. After all, they’re in a library. Maybe my Year 11 boys will just get on without any inappropriate language or silly, juvenile behaviour. And maybe, just maybe, when I get in from work there won’t be X-Box related shouting that forces me to retreat, wordless to the sanctity of our bedroom where I will sit and read, alone. Maybe, for once, the kids will hear the door and bolt from the living room into the hallway where they’ll smile as they shout ‘Dad!’ before engulfing me with cuddles. Maybe my wife won’t have had to work all day on her day off and she’ll be calm and happy and stress-free.

And maybe, as I discover when every optimistic hope is launched back at me with ferocious force, it’s better to be a pessimist and never be disappointed.

Tuesday 5th February

Today is the day that, according to the fresh page that I’m faced with, ‘I’ll find ways to use my talents’. Aah, my talents. These include dancing like Mick Jagger, signing slowed down, ‘club-singer’ versions of any song going and keepie-uppies with a football. Oh, and sarcasm. But that is already used heavily on a daily basis. And I don’t think my students would even know who Mick Jagger is, let alone want me to mincing, pouting and clapping my way around the classroom, telling them about my lack of satisfaction. As a result, I find no ways to use my talents.

Wednesday 6th February

I open the page and am immediately baffled. The instruction reads, ‘I’ll be grateful for a time when I didn’t get what I wanted.’ Sorry, what? Why would I be grateful for that? So I read the little parable that goes with it. To summarise, Ben Affleck is a big, big star, but once upon a time he had no money. Apparently he’s glad he didn’t get the part on Beverley Hills 90210.

Now I get it. As it goes I’m also grateful I never got a part on Beverley Hills 90210. I’d have never fit in. There’s no hope of me looking or sounding stylish, classy or posh and not only that but they drive on the wrong side of the road over there. Nightmare. Thanks for the advice, Ben.

Thursday 7th February

Today – my birthday – I’m told by my book that ‘I’ll solve a problem peacefully’. Now I’d like to think that I’m a fairly peaceful kind of person. When you’re built like me there’s little point in raging at everything, let alone getting into confrontation. And so, this should be easy.

My job throws up lots problems. If I’m perfectly honest I don’t think I ever get too stressed out about that. However, today, I’m serene. Like a millpond or a beautiful sunset. Even when a kid simply doesn’t understand what a gooseberry is, even though it’s been explained at least 5 times by both members of staff in the room. He’s still sure that it’s a sweet. Still, I smile and move on, even though this is a situation ripe – don’t you dare pardon that fruit based pun – for sarcasm.

Friday 8th February

Friday. The end of another busy week and the book suggests that I ‘ask someone I respect for problem solving tips’. Now this is difficult. Not because there’s a lack of people I respect; I’ve never worked with a better group of people.

No, it’s not that. My problem lies with the fact that I generally try to just quietly solve problems myself. True, sometimes that’s by ignoring them until the last second, but usually stuff just gets taken care of. I even tried this tactic with a heart problem and might have gotten away with it had it not been for that pesky doctor.

So, tired and weary, for today I’ll keep my problems to myself. But in the future, maybe I’ll try to share.

Saturday 9th February

It’s Saturday and I’m rushed off my feet. The sanctuary of work seems a long way away and I’m knee-deep in food shopping, washing and trying to plan for a meal out for my birthday. I’m ignoring the book and helping myself. Today’s advice can wait until tomorrow.

Sunday 10th February

Today, the Under 10s football team that I coach have a cup Quarter Final. And amazingly, the book tells me to think about my dreams last night and ask Are my dreams trying to tell me something?’ I dreamed of football. I generally do on a Saturday night and if I wake during the night I have to try really hard not to start considering tactics and team selection for the next day.

Clearly my dreams are trying to tell me that I’m worryingly obsessed with football and that I need to grow up…

In terms of yesterday’s advice, I was asked to do a good deed. To do today’s ref a favour I sub one of my players within seconds of him shouting at said ref about a decision. Good deed done.

Monday 11th February

‘I’ll talk to my teacher’. Instead, I talk to several teachers. Because I’m a teacher. Surprisingly, it’s mostly absolute garbage, but it helps. Well, that was easy.

Tuesday 12th February

Today the book asks, ‘Do your parents seem weird?’ and advises me to love them just the way they are. My parents are both in their late 70s (although my mother keeps her actual age a closely guarded secret) and they’re typical pensioners. So that’s an easy ‘yes’ to the first question. I literally have no idea how their minds work…apart from slowly. And while I could assassinate their characters in thousands of words – cantankerous, narrow-minded, grumpy, etc – I love them anyway. It’s written in the contract really.

Wednesday 13th February

My job has always presented me with a bit of a conflict. That conflict is this; I love my job, but I don’t really want to do my job. There’s no lack of commitment – I’ve been a teacher for almost 20 years – but it isn’t what I really want or wanted to do. It wasn’t a calling for me where I had a blinding epiphany. Truth be told I wanted to be a footballer or a journalist. Today’s life advice tells me to think about my dream job. I do. Every day. But I wasn’t good enough to do either and well, something has got to pay those bills.

Thursday 14th February

Predictably, today’s way to make the most of every day is romantic. ‘Today I’ll send someone a secret Valentine’ it reads. As a happily married man this isn’t going to make me feel good about myself. I feel the book has taken a bit of a turn. Will it be telling me I should jump off a cliff by the end of the month?

It’s safe to say I won’t be sending anyone a secret Valentine. For the sake of my marriage and several of my bones.

Friday 15th February

The book suggests I get a pen pal today, but given advancing technology and the fact that I am no longer 12, I’ll ignore it. Instead, I choose the task in ‘Making the Most of Today’, which tells me to ‘Be tolerant of others’. Now this is a challenge. However, promising myself a rewards trip to the beer shop tonight, I vow to rise to the challenge. I ignore the shouting out during my form’s House Quiz and I bite my lip rather than commenting that ‘No one cares’ when the Maths questions are both stuff about what ‘x’ might be if 3x is combined with another sum that for some godforsaken reason has brackets around it. Finally, faced with my last class of the week – who are also my worst behaved – I smile my way through the hour and try to gently encourage and cajole some of my most lazy pupils into putting pen to paper. I am Disney teacher. I have to say though, I feel a lot more relaxed at the end of the lesson. But boy, walking through the doors of the beer shop has never felt so good!

Saturday 16th February

Today it’s suggested that I ‘Start a feelings journal’. I come from the very far north of England where feelings aren’t really encouraged in the men. Thus, I will help myself to a day off today. I haven’t got time for feelings, let alone writing them down.

Sunday 17th February

Today’s advice plays right into my hands. In order to help myself I’m ordered to believe in myself with the simple statement, ‘I believe in me’. Job done. While I wouldn’t describe myself as confident, to use the modern parlance, I back myself. I don’t wander around telling myself you got this, because I’m not a complete idiot, but I have belief. And realistic expectations. I’ll grumble my way through a day, but I realised a long time ago that there’s no point in giving up. I don’t need an inspirational tattoo or a mantra, but I do believe in myself. Even at the worst of times I’ve got through, and sometimes that’s as much as you can ask.

Well, that was very serious, wasn’t it?

Monday 18th February

The first day of our half term holiday and the advice is perfect for me. I’m told to focus on how a challenge is working for me. This is ideal as today is the day we’ve chosen to head to the Peak District for a bit of a hike. I say a bit of a hike but we’ll be doing 6.4 miles. Quite the challenge for someone who had heart surgery 9 months ago.

Heading constantly uphill for the first mile through ever more driving rain, it’s difficult to work out how this challenge is working for me. My knees hurt and I’m soaked through. Self help, my arse. However, having stopped for a sandwich part way up the hill – it might be a mountain, I don’t know the definition – I take in the view and realise that yes, this is working for me. It’s inspirational. I’m not at one with nature or anything, but a little later on as we’re right at the top watching grouse fly over the moors and then observing a kestrel as it hovers close by, I’m utterly relaxed. And to top it all, by the time I reach the end of the hike, although I’m tired, I’ve more than done my steps for the day so my Fitbit can stop buzzing at me!

Tuesday 19th February

Another great piece of advice. I have to do something I love. I start by taking my son to the fields near our house for a bit of football. I’m his dad and his coach, so this one to one stuff also benefits the team. It’s warm and more or less deserted so we spend ages doing shooting drills – him shooting and me throwing myself around in goals. Definitely something I love with someone I love.

Later, I cram in some writing – this bit of the blog plus some more of another – while discovering new music. I listen to some Death Cab for Cutie, a band I’ve always been aware of but never actually heard until a few days ago. Turns out, they’re great.

I had to do something I loved. I love football, my kids, writing and music. Today was a good self-help kind of day.

Wednesday 20th February

The guide tells me that today I’ll admit my mistakes. Now I’d like to think I’m honest enough to almost always admit when I’ve made a mistake. However today was officially a bit of a rest day. I mean, we went on a 6 mile hike on Monday! As a consequence, apart from a visit to Asda we don’t really leave the house, preferring to sit in and watch ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story.’ It’s brilliant. No mistakes to admit.

Thursday 21st February

It’s Thursday and half term is drawing to a close. But it’s all OK, because my self-help guide tells me that I can exercise my right to make four big mistakes today. Bizarre. How does this help me? Is the book telling me that I’m Ok to go and rob a bank? That’s a big mistake. I don’t think I’d get away with that, book or no book. Could I run down the street naked? Perish the thought! No one would eat again for a week if they witnessed that.

I’m a fully grown adult. I’m going to make a decision here: I’ll just try to not make any mistakes today; big or otherwise.

Friday 22nd February

Today’s advice assumes I’m a shrinking violet; a humble man with no sense of ego whatsoever. I can’t follow today’s advice. But I assure you that I will absolutely follow it, to the letter, when the time comes. Today’s advice? I will take credit for my success. Of course I will! I might even shoehorn myself into taking credit for other people’s success as well.

Saturday 23rd February

Now I can’t lie, I love time alone. I don’t think that I’m ever more comfortable than when I’m simply on my own. It’s not that I don’t like people; I love being around people, although at the same time I wouldn’t call myself enormously friendly or effervescent. I’m just perfectly comfortable in my own company. So today, when I look at the relevant page in my book and it says I’ll spend time alone, I’m certain that this is advice I can follow. Consequently, I pop upstairs for a lie down to read my book, nip through to the kitchen to do some dishes on my own and then eventually head outside to wash my car, while listening to the match on the radio. Bliss. Bliss, that is until while crouched down to clean my wheels I pull something in my back and have to hobble around in agony before heading back inside to find someone to moan to. It would seem I can’t help my self.

Sunday 24th February

Apparently today, I’ll notice a problem and come up with a solution. I can’t help but notice a problem. I’m full of cold and am struggling to even walk due to a back problem gained while spending time alone. And yes, I understand how wrong that sounds, but even in pain I can see that it’s mildly amusing and suitably juvenile.

Regardless of my problem though, the team I coach have a game and there’s kit to be carried. Another problem. Luckily, two parents offer to carry everything when we arrive at the ground after noticing that the coach is walking like a hunchback. Strictly speaking this is not self-help, but it’s definitely a problem solved. I decide not to push my luck too far by asking for a cheeky massage.

Monday 25th February

Back to work. Or maybe not. I get up, showered and dressed, but while eating breakfast realise that I’m in the kind of pain that requires at the very least a little cry or preferably a lot of lying down. I’m not sure that my students would behave all that well if I was just lying down. Clearly, I can’t go in. I’m in genuine pain and I can’t really walk. Coincidentally the book tells me to notice changes in myself, so I take heed and call in sick. Then, I go for a lie down.

Tuesday 26th February

This self-help lark is easy. Although I’m still off work today’s advice is ‘I’ll let my mind wander.’ This is just how my mind works. It rarely focuses, but my oh my, can it wander. Wander, wander, wander, wander…ooh, the family’s home. Well that went quickly.

Wednesday 27th February

Tragically, today I’m told to suggest a family meeting. Unfortunately I have an acute aversion to any kind of meeting so I pretend that it’s Tuesday again and let my mind wander. And let me tell you, it’s much, much better than a family meeting.

Thursday 28th February

Sadly, it’s the final day of my experiment. I’ve quite enjoyed having a little bit of focus to my days, other than the usual stuff. However, I think what I’ve taken from this whole thing is that self help is OK, but it’s really too easy for everything else to get in its way. I have a family and a stressful job. I also have a life to get on with. Just getting on with stuff in general is my self-help.

Fittingly, the last bit of advice offered to me by the book is I’ll ask for help if I need it. It really is fitting because I generally don’t ask for help. I’d much rather soldier on and try to just solve problems myself. But, with middle age firmly upon me and an ever more busy life, from now on, I’ll ask for help if I need it. Bring on March.

Despite my age, I can’t explain…(the second in an occasional series as I get older and understand less)

A few months ago, in the first of this occasional series of posts, I speculated about the fact that wisdom came with age. Now I’m sure that this is very much the case with some people. Moreover, I have no doubt that all of us get wiser in some aspect, as the years tick by. However, as comforting as that might be, there are still too many things that I can’t really figure out. And I get the impression that this will continue to happen. I mean, I’ve got a blog to write…

I’ll start with an example that I cited early on in my first blog on this subject. I just don’t understand the categorisation of celebrities these days. When I was growing up there seemed to be only the two levels of celebrity; A-List (proper celebrities, big names, superstars of stage and screen, if you like) and everyone else. So you might have *showing his age alert* people like Bruce Forsyth, Michael Parkinson, Cilla Black, Morecombe and Wise, Bob Monkhouse and The Two Ronnies, amongst others in the A-List. Sinatra, Elvis, De Niro, etc would be in the American equivalent. We all knew they were stars. They proved it by drawing audiences of untold millions to whatever they appeared in and besides that, they just looked like and behaved like stars. And then in the everyone else category you had people who, although they didn’t have the elusive star quality of the A-List, had talent. They were good at something and that made them famous. One hit wonders were gone in a second.

‘…the saddest thing of all is that very few of them appear to have a modicum of talent.’

Nowadays this has changed. The goalposts have moved and I just don’t understand. Not only do we have A, B, C and D-List celebrities, we have Z-List ones too! And the saddest thing of all is that very few of them appear to have a modicum of talent. It appears that nowadays you can climb the celebrity ladder and make millions without really having any star quality at all. Sadly this doesn’t seem to stretch to people who write occasional blogs about the type of random garbage that pops into their heads on a daily basis. But I’m not bitter. Honest.

Reality TV ‘stars’, YouTubers, Vloggers, Instagrammers; it’s ridiculous. Most seem to be as thick as mince and in possession of the kind of personality that wouldn’t have got them a conversation, let alone a TV series twenty years ago. I wouldn’t recognise KSI in a KSI identity parade and yet a trip to Google reveals that he has 10.5 million subscribers to his YouTube channel, which has had almost 2 billion views. And what does he do? Commentate on himself playing video games. This. Is. Beyond. My. Comprehension.

But KSI is decidedly small-time. The most popular YouTube ‘star’ is PewDiePie – great name by the way; really showcases your talent – who does the same thing but has had over 39 million subscribers and over 10 billion views. Apparently he shouts a lot. And swears a bit. Talented lad then. Clearly intelligence is becoming a thing of the past.

‘No discernible talent on show, but she’s ‘fabulous’, apparently.’

And then we have the ‘stars’ of Reality TV. People like Gemma Collins, who seems to be more famous for talking about herself than anything. A woman who appears unprofessional at all times. And a woman who describes herself as things like ‘fabulous’ and a ‘diva’. A woman, who, as the old saying goes would eat herself if she were chocolate. If she could fit anymore in, that is. No discernible talent on show, but she’s ‘fabulous’, apparently.

I’m sorry. These people are not for me. I was brought up in an era where celebrities seemed like beings from another planet almost. Now, they’re just famous for being people. And what’s the point in that? I’m meant to be at some sort of wise old (middle) age, but sorry, I just don’t understand.

Closely linked to the current crop of Z-list celebrities is a creature called Cardi B, who the kids seem to dig these days. And yes, that’s right, I did just do a bit of youth-speak back there.

‘Again, no real hard work involved then.’

Cardi – I can’t actually confirm that her stage name is short for cardigan – appears to be some type of singer/rapper. From what I gather she became famous off the back of some videos posted to Instagram. Again, no real hard work involved then. I can’t confess to know too much, as I’ve barely heard a note she’s ever uttered. I find it quite difficult to get past her stupid name. I mean, Cardigan is a ridiculous name, unless you’re actually a piece of knitwear and B is clearly not her real surname. I bet that’s not what it says on her Nectar card.

To my knowledge, the one and only time I’ve encountered Ms B was via a video posted on Twitter. I can’t remember what she was railing against because I was so taken aback at the amount of foul language. Don’t get me wrong, I’m more than capable of a well-timed F-Bomb and not easily offended, especially by words. I’m a mother-flippin’ broad church, guys. I’m from the street. However, as someone who should be some kind of role model to people like my 12-year-old daughter, who worships Cardigan, she did not convey her message well. I have little doubt that her music will be the kind of dirge that seems to be on permanent it-all-sounds-the-same rotation on commercial radio, as well.

Now I realise I’m mere syllables away from sounding like my dad telling me he couldn’t even tell what they’re singing in the 90s, but Cardigan and her peers are a puzzle to me and I don’t really understand what it is they offer to the world. Maybe her siblings Tank-Top and Roll-Neck could explain.

Modern driving is another thing that I can’t get my head around. It would seem that while the test has got more strict, people’s habits when they’re actually driving have just got worse and worse.

‘A golden age of motoring it would seem.’

I learnt to drive in a time when the two broken lines across the end of a road before you got onto another road meant ‘Give Way’. Stop before you pull out and have a look to see if anyone else is coming along the road because if you just pull out, the person who’s already on the road may have to break sharply in order to avoid you. Simpler times. A golden age of motoring it would seem.

I’m also old enough to remember when you had to give way – there’s that alien phrase again – to the traffic coming from the right of you on a roundabout.

It would seem that it’s all changed. Every day on my commute to or from work at least one car will pull out of a junction pretty much right in front of me. And guess what? I’m the one left to break sharply in order to avoid their shocking version of driving. What winds me up even more about this is that the person will then inevitably stay on the road for about 200 yards before turning off onto another street. So their journey is so important that they risked a crash rather than wait a few seconds in order to pull out safely and drive along the road for a tiny distance. I didn’t realise there were so many very important people on their way to perform surgery on the roads in and out of Dewsbury. Who knew it was such a hub of life and death science that no one could afford to just stop for a moment and let a car come past?

Almost as bad are the people who, although they don’t just pull out, insist that they must edge out across the line. The theory seems to be that if they edge out far enough we’ll be duty bound to let them out. Whatever happened to waiting your turn?

‘…everyone wants to be Lewis Hamilton.’

Roundabouts are the same. Full of VIPs tearing around too busy to stop. Or undertaking round a corner because they have to get in front of you. Traffic lights seem to have the same effect. I must watch tens of drivers go through red lights every day. And why? Well who knows, but I imagine that they’re all just very, very important. Perhaps they’re on their way to see Gemma Collins or Cardigan B. Whatever it is, I don’t understand the hurry or the lack of consideration for other people’s safety. My commute is beginning to feel like something out of Mad Max and while I loved the films, I don’t want to live the lifestyle. I think I’m in danger of sounding like a grumpy old man, but then I remind myself that all I’m asking people to do is stop when it says stop and drive like there might be other people about. Instead it seems like everyone wants to be Lewis Hamilton. And Lewis Hamilton’s a tw*t.

Now, I understand the need to suspend reality a little bit every once in a while. I’ve loved the Star Wars films all my life, but I know that none of it’s even remotely real. And I watch The Walking Dead with a genuine fear, despite being safe in the knowledge that zombies don’t exist. So what is my problem with kids’ television then?

I have two children. A girl aged 12 and a boy aged 9. They both watch quite a bit of television and although the oldest is developing a penchant for programmes like Police Interceptors, a lot of what they watch is courtesy of CBBC or Nickelodeon. So they ‘inhabit’ worlds where reality is very much not key to the plot. But herein lies the bit that I just cannot understand.

Firstly, my age-earned wisdom tells me that children live with adults. Social Services are rather fond of this type of family arrangement and besides the formality of it all, it’s just kind of traditional. You know the drill. Boy meets girl, they get all fond of each other, have lots and lots of fun and lots and lots and lots of special cuddles, before they decide to make tiny humans together and then allow said tiny humans to live in their house, despite them inevitably being a massive pain in the arse and almost always the reason why the fun is harder to recover from than ever and the special cuddles slow right down. *And breathe*.

‘…there’s suspending reality and then there’s plain old bollocks.’

Anyway, where was I? Aah, yes. Children who live with adults. So, with the concept of families in mind, can anyone explain to me the phenomena in children’s TV whereby a group of kids seem to live together in an amazing house without the presence of any parents or in fact, any adults whatsoever? I mean there’s suspending reality and then there’s plain old bollocks. One of my kids’ favourites is a show called Gameshakers. I believe the phrase that describes it best is batshit crazy. Not the most literary description, but genuinely the most fitting. Watch it, you’ll see I’m right. What makes Gameshakers so batshit crazy is the concept behind it. Here we have three or four children who appear to be around the age of 10, not only living in some kind of plush apartment together but, wait for it, they also run a hugely successful company that develops games for mobile phones. A reminder; they’re about 10.

And just when Gameshakers was absurd enough for me to find myself in quite the pickle trying to believe it all, whoever makes it threw in another random fact. One of the kids does actually have a dad, who while hardly ever being present in his life, is also a famous (fictional) rapper. Because as we all know, the best rappers hang out with 10-year-olds and develop games for mobile phones in their spare time. Snoopy Dogg Dog is famous for his rapping, but what we don’t all know is that he invented ‘Snake’ for Nokia.

My lack of understanding doesn’t stop there either. In a similarly ridiculous vain we have the shows Jesse and Henry Danger. Jesse, I’ve only just found out, is nanny to three children who also have a butler…but yes, you guessed it, no parents. Now that’s not too difficult to comprehend. Until that is, you take a look at Jesse herself who looks, at most, 18. And then we’re left wondering what set of parents, who have done so well for themselves that they’re never home in their decidedly plush apartment overlooking Central Park, have employed an 18-year-old to be nanny to their three precious kids? And so, predictably, I just don’t understand.

‘It’s clearly the same kid.’

Henry Danger on the other hand simply toes the same line as other shows and films before him. However, it does this in an even more ridiculous fashion. The premise here is that Henry is just a normal kid who happens to also be a superhero. So nothing new there then. Think Superman, for instance. Henry is a high school kid who changes to a superhero when he puts on a red and blue jumpsuit and an eye mask, often appearing in the same place he’d just mysteriously disappeared from moments earlier. And herein lies my problem. It’s clearly the same kid. Literally no one should be fooled. In fact everyone should just be asking, ‘Why’s Henry dressed like that?’ At least Clark Kent had the decency – in a far more innocent age – to take his glasses off.

Despite my age, and at least a small amount of wisdom that I’ve accrued along the way, I just can’t begin to understand kids’ TV and rather than making me laugh with its many fantastical scenarios, it just makes me more and more annoyed!

The next thing that I just don’t understand might come as a surprise to some. I understand a lot about social media, simply because I use it and have done for quite a while. However, there are several aspects that just leave me wanting to crawl into a dark corner.

‘…he’s a hideous, attention seeking w**ker.’

Firstly, there’s the need to post everything. Pouting in your front room? I don’t care. Funny cat videos? Whatever. Asking if anyone remembers stuff from the 70s, 80s and 90s? No, maybe, just about. I don’t want to see what you look like before you go out – what you look like when you get in would probably be a lot funnier. Donald Trump has said WHAT? Admittedly funny at first, but not anymore. Piers Morgan said WHAT? Well, yes, of course he did. Because he’s a hideous, attention seeking w**ker. This, I can cope with though.

By the far the worst and most unfathomable part of social media is something I’ve only relatively recently discovered. Kids seem to have their own social media. A social media far removed from the miserabalism of Twitter, the nostalgia of Facebook and the…well the photos of Instagram.

I learnt about sites like ‘Musically’ and ‘Like’ via my daughter and not only was I perplexed by what I found, I was staggered by what it did to her. Now, she’s always been quite the attention seeker/drama queen, but this turned her into a monster of quite epic proportions.

The idea with such sites seems primarily to be that you film yourself miming along to a song. And with that come the inevitable actions, along with the adding of effects and editing. Now, I know, I know, I know, that it’s just a very girly thing to do and that as a result I should understand perfectly well. I mean, among those of us who are middle-aged, who hasn’t stood in front of a mirror with a hairbrush microphone before? (I’m asking for a friend, obviously). And essentially, it’s just an extension of that. Until you investigate a little bit or literally have to live with the effects.

‘I imagine it was what living with Mariah Carey would be like…’

Within weeks of downloading one of these APPs my daughter had turned into some sort of diva figure. She would constantly update you on her ‘likes’ and her ‘fans’. She’d walk around the supermarket making hand gestures, miming along to songs that weren’t playing and incessantly flicking her hair. I imagine it was what living with Mariah Carey would be like, only without the voice. She was always, always on her phone. The bedroom door would be slammed shut and she’d spend hours prancing about in there, filming herself. It was a level of ego that even I struggled to get my head around! But it was also a level of worry that I was totally uncomfortable with. This is the internet and social media; what 12-year-old really understands that? Furthermore, this 40-something didn’t understand it either. We live in an age of grooming and trolling and all manner of unthinkable things that happen online, so for a parent, the need for my daughter to want to seemingly devote her life to being some kind of mute internet pop star was utterly beyond me. Thirty second videos of someone doing the same thing over and over again, only with different music and subsequently turning into a monster with it. No thanks. Can’t 12-year-olds just be 12-year-olds again, climbing trees, larking around in fields and playing football?

My advancing years mean that I’ve witnessed many examples of the final example of things I don’t understand. The years haven’t helped. I still don’t understand it. And more to the point, it irritates the hell out of me.

Why do people insist on leaving crumbs in the butter? Or the margarine or other spreadable butter substitutes?

Currently, when opening up the Flora – other brands are available – in our house, you are inevitably confronted by patches of crumbs. The reason for this crumb infusion? Our youngest has been given a little more responsibility and is now allowed to butter his own toast. Now this can kind of be excused. His little hands haven’t quite got used to the action of dipping the knife into the spread and when he takes some out it’s usually not enough, meaning repeated visits to the tub. Hence the crumbs. My daughter does it too.

But not every house has children to blame. So why oh why do the crumbs seem to congregate in the butter? It seems so easy to avoid. And the thing is, it makes me not want to butter anything. I have to manoeuvre the knife through the spread trying to find virgin Flora and to be honest, it’s all a bit too much like hard work. But I don’t want to eat other people’s crumbs, even if I’m related to them! Surely, I’m not in a minority of people who magically makes crumbs stay on their bread?

Despite my age, I don’t understand.

Bling. Watch the point of it all?

Four buttons, some circles and a light = instant respect from the kids, innit.

I work in a job that is a minefield of contrasts. I mean, the fact that I can have days, hours, minutes even where I will absolutely love it and still end up hating it (and vice-versa), sums up the contrast nicely. But that’s teaching for you. For all the fun of showing off in front of a room full of kids – because that’s really all it comes down to – there’s the sheer hell of marking thirty essays, or worse still, pieces of creative writing. For every moment of breakthrough you have with a fantastic, thoughtful answer from a student there’s a terrible moment of realisation that there’s yet another meeting to go to.

And yet, as I’ve gotten older my job has revealed another area of contrast that is both a delight and a curse. I’m finding that working with young people both keeps me young – not literally, we’d all be flocking to the profession if that was actually the case – and makes me feel old. Very, very old. Because the older you get, the more detached you get from younger people and what’s actually current.

‘Meanwhile you’ve been attending foam parties…and accruing a debt so monumental that it would rival that of some Pacific Islands.’

I’m not sure that this is the case for every teacher. I feel sure that there are entire swathes of my profession that were middle-aged when they started out as teachers and always will be middle aged. Again, not literally. Some people are just old at heart. In many ways it’s the nature of the teacher. I mean, you can’t tell me that at 22 and fresh out of university you have a great deal more life experience than the teenagers in front of you. In your early twenties, having only just emerged blinking from the cocoon that it higher education, it could be argued that you know absolutely nothing. Some of your peers have been to war, held down steady jobs, are married, have children, pay bills and have genuinely struggled through the years since their own education ended. And boy have they learned a lot. Meanwhile, you’ve been attending foam parties, sleeping through lectures that you turned up late for and accruing a debt so monumental that it would rival that of some Pacific islands. And you most likely won’t pay it back. And still, often in my job, people at that age are stood in front of classes of teenagers lecturing them on life experience. And in many cases it’s because they’re almost born to the profession. They’ve little experience, but are often old before their time.

The thing that prompted this blog was a recent in class conversation. I was asked what watch I had. Now, I’m used to being asked what car I drive or even what label my suit is. But what watch? Who cares! Well, it turns out that boys care, that’s who. It’s vital if you’re going to carry off the right image. The boy in question was wearing a big watch. You know the kind; buttons everywhere, oversized face, more hands than it knows what to do with and the odd (fake) jewel or two attached. I’m describing the watch, by the way, not the boy.

The boy clearly saw having the right kind of watch as some kind of status symbol. I think the young folk still refer to it as ‘bling’. But what status can a watch give a 15-year-old boy? The answer is, I don’t know. Does it scream fake designer label? Does it say nice Christmas present? Does it say show me respect? Or does it really just say, I can tell the time? I still don’t know. Needless to say though, he wasn’t very impressed by my spanking new Casio digital watch. I pointed out that they made great calculators. He didn’t get the irony. Or the joke. I told him it had a stopwatch. He wasn’t impressed. I told him it had little circles on it and I was yet to figure out what they were for. He was blank-faced. In fact, when I played my trump card and told him – while also demonstrating – that it had a light on it – he still wasn’t at all impressed. In fact, he seemed almost personally affronted. And he still hadn’t got the joke.

‘He still wasn’t impressed.’

I pointed out that my watch (Casio, £10, reduced from £20, Argos) was purely functional, that I had a nice watch, but that for now I wanted one with a stopwatch and that wasn’t valuable to wear for when I was coaching football. He still wasn’t impressed. And this got me thinking about how middle age has made me quite comfortable in my own skin. I no longer feel the need to rely on a designer label or the right pair of trainers to make me feel good about myself. Yet I do worry about getting a beer belly or a double chin.

Meanwhile, on Planet Youth, what you wear on your legs, body, face and even your wrist still says something about you. And the more I hear about it the more confused I become. As I mentioned previously, it has the power to make me feel young and old all at the same time. Young, because in a way, I can still kid myself that I’ve got my finger on the pulse but also because sometimes it’s just quite amusing to be kept up to date with all that’s trendy in the world. Imagine my 12 year-old daughter’s confusion as dad is able to regale her with tales of Stormzy, high-waisted jeans or better still, tell her that I too love that track on Capital, because it’s “sick”.

‘…Stormzy makes no sense to me.’

Yet I also get to feel old, because I want to tell my students that it doesn’t matter what watch you’ve got or who your clothes are made by; there’s a lot more to being a well-rounded, respectable human being than any of that! The constant talk of which watch to wear, which music I should listen to, which shoes I should wear can grind you down and wear you out at my age! There’s also the fact that Stormzy makes no sense to me – I mean you can’t even hear the words – I’d look daft in high-waisted jeans and that I really, really can’t stand Capital radio.

Recently though, I’ve heard and discussed what we’ll refer to as image issues (because they’re not strictly ‘bling’ and I can’t believe that people still refer to ‘bling’) that have disturbed me greatly and led me to wonder what on Earth could be going on with our younger generation.

The first instance came during a lesson that I was teaching. I say teaching; I wasn’t. Once a week classes have access to laptops and some vocabulary building software, so they work while I ‘supervise’. This mainly takes the form of asking them to stop getting the laptop to say the names of their peers in its ‘hilarious’ voice and making sure that they’re actually doing what it is they’re supposed to be doing.

It was while I was doing the latter and policing the screens that I caught sight of something deeply unsavoury on the screen of a boy at the front of the room. And no, it’s not what you think…it’s worse. I had gone to the back of the room – you’d be surprised how much this will flummox even the brightest of classes – so that I could get a better view of the screens. All of a sudden my attention was grabbed by the fact that one screen was clearly on Google. Google Images, in fact. And what was he Googling? Rudey ladies? Naked men (it’s an LGBeeGeesandTs friendly classroom, after all)? The kinds of fast cars that he dreams of? No. No, he was in fact Googling pictures of Crocs. Crocs, innit?

Now Crocs have had a bad press. And you know what? It’s fully deserved. There can be absolutely no defence of this type of footwear. Don’t give me the line about comfort, either. Crocs are ugly…fugly in fact. And when did comfort come into things for young people? My dad – 79, corduroy and checked shirt wearer, keen gardener, grower of prize-winning leeks and other vegetables – wears Crocs. Argument over. He’s not channelling some young rapper, he’s just got no shame anymore. No offence internetless dad who has literally 1% chance of ever reading this.

The Crocs thing got worse. I drew attention to it, hoping to shame my young friend into realising that when we’re meant to be learning new vocabulary, we should do just that. But he felt no shame. Don’t get me wrong, he quickly shut the page down and returned to what he should have been doing, but rather than turning a particular shade of crimson, he actually tried to justify his Croc-search. Apparently, Post Malone wears them. Well that’s alright then.

‘Here we have a man at the cutting edge of popular culture…’

I’ve never felt so old and confused in a long time. Now, I’ve heard of Post Malone. My daughter informs me that he’s ‘sick’ on a regular basis. I wish he was. Might shut him up. Post – I’m imagining not the name he was christened with – is launching a new range of Crocs. And this is what I simply don’t understand. I’m sure that money comes into it, but really…Crocs? Here we have – so I’m led to believe – a man at the cutting edge of popular culture – setting the trends, providing the soundtracks for thousands walking to and from school, making memories for his generation who years from now will listen to him being played on a Friday night, after work on Absolute 10s and think, ‘Wow, I loved that track’. And then he spoilt it all by teaming up with Crocs for a chunk of money.

However, while feeling old about Post, with his ludicrous name and endorsements for ridiculous footwear for gardeners, I also realised that it made me feel young at the same time. Because while I feel entirely negatively about Crocs and, however much thought I give to it, will never understand their attractiveness, I can see why the herd are following. This kind of thing makes me feel young simply because it takes me back to my own youth and some of the ridiculous trends that were followed then too.

I was born in the 1970s. This meant that adolescence and early adulthood, and all of the bonkers decisions that one makes at that time, hit in the late 80′ and early 90s. And to borrow a phrase that used to be popular, ‘what a time to be alive’! In terms of what we’ll loosely call style, here are some of the major influences of the time.

‘…granddad shirts, batwing jumpers, Ra-Ra skirts, mullets and perms.’

In the 1980s we had the back end of punk and the start of the New Romantics, as well as Ska, Mod and, as the decade ended, the first real seeds of dance music. Among other things this influenced fashion trends like day-glo socks (often worn odd – and orange and a green one, for example), drain pipe jeans, baggy jeans, baggy trousers, granddad shirts, batwing jumpers, Ra-Ra skirts, mullets and perms. Then the 90s brought us indie music and bands like Oasis and Blur, as well as grunge and dance music and the emergence of the superstar DJ. And again, this influenced our style, bringing with it more neon, check shirts, loose fit jeans, leggings, Global Hypercolour t-shirts and anything that a Gallagher wore.

As terrible as it all might have looked, we all wore it. Me, with two hairy pipe cleaners for legs, wearing baggy jeans. Why? Because of fashion, that’s why. Same with loose fit jeans in the 90s, because after all, The Happy Mondays told us that it had to be a loose fit. I’m sure I still looked like a right tw*t though. I had a wedge haircut in the 80s and thought I looked amazing. And if you’re laughing, imagining me with a wedge, just wait. It gets worse. When the footballer Chris Waddle, who was at my beloved Newcastle at the time, had the back of his hair permed, I very quickly followed suit. That’s right; a back perm, as it was known. In my head I looked just like Chris Waddle. On my head, once again, I looked like a right tw*t.

‘…someone else told him they’re fashion/bling/peng…’

So my point is, that I kind of understand why a 14-year-old boy might be pricing up Crocs on the internet in my lesson. It’s because someone told him that they’re fashion/bling/peng and, bless him, he’s young and doesn’t realise how ridiculous he’s going to look if he actually buys and wears them. I do feel like I should have a word though, because in ten years time when he looks at photos of himself wearing them, he’s going to think he looked like a…well you must know what comes next.

The final style subject that made me feel old, young, happy and sad all at the same time happened in another of my lessons. We do actually work, by the way, it’s just that sometimes kids talk. Anyway, a student was discussing hair. Not exactly a shock, right? I mean when you’re young hair and its varied and often experimental styles are one of the main things that make you stand out. However, this wasn’t any old chat about hair. The boy concerned is the type who likes to feel popular. He hangs around with what are probably the wrong crowd and the right crowd all at the same time. And he’s very image conscious. But he wasn’t concerned with hair styles, as such. Here we had a 16 year-old boy asking about the availability, price, risks and everything else to do with hair transplants! Already, so early on in life, the worry of looking just right had stopped him in his tracks. No doubt he has the watch, the shoes, the trainers and everything else that he feels he needs to feel comfortable with himself and his image, but, such is the importance of the way we look these days, that this lad is already so concerned about losing his hair that he’s making plans to stop the rot. Unbelievable.

Needless to say, I didn’t really come out in sympathy. In fact, I told him that in order to have a hair transplant a surgeon had to slice open your scalp, like one would open a tin, before sewing the bits of hair in from underneath and then putting said flap of scalp back complete with new hair. It’s amazing what kids will believe if you keep a straight face.

‘Just for beards alone, there were 38 products available…’

I decided to conduct a little research to help understand the problem of image these days. I was astounded by what I found. Whilst doing some Christmas shopping online I was struck by the sheer amount of products available. I decided to investigate male grooming on the Boots website. Now, I haven’t got one, but I believe having a beard – and looking rather like a Geography teacher from 1982 – is de rigueur these days amongst young men. I even teach kids with beards, something that years ago, when I entered the profession, I would’ve never imagined possible. Just for beards alone, there were 38 products available, including stubble cleanser, beard balm, brush-in colour gel and a beard starter kit, which I thought we were all born with anyway. It’s just that some take longer to start than others.

If you then look at the category of male grooming in its entirety things become staggeringly complex. Unbelievably there are over 1500 products available on the Boots website alone! 1500 things for men to groom themselves. I still feel a little bit camp on the rare occasions I apply moisturizer, but imagine having that many things to choose form with which to make yourself like just right, imagewise. It beggars belief. Now I understand that some of these products will be in several different categories, but even allowing for a lot of that there are still probably well over 1000 male grooming products available on one website! These included 101 washing & bathing products, 162 men’s hair products, 54 male hair loss products, 497 aftershaves (497!) and even 115 male incontinence products, which frankly, made me want to wet myself a bit. This is all before you get to looking at things like Crocs and watches.

So while I can sit here, all rugged and handsome with my Casio watch on and possible wearing a t-shirt bought in a supermarket, it’s actually not that hard to understand why today’s young men can get so concerned with looking just right. I mean we haven’t all got my natural pizzazz, right? But still, the idea of sifting through over 1000 products to groom oneself before you even get dressed or are able to tell the time makes me feel like we might have gone a bit too far with this whole image thing. The right timepiece, the right car, the right shoes, the right tattoos – seriously, watch the point?

When did I get so old?

IMG-20180101-WA0000 — Young people, doing young stuff, yesterday. Possibly.

I decided to start a blog for a number of reasons – some serious and some just the usual inane knobheadery that sadly dominates my thinking. However, it occurred to me earlier this year that I felt old. Simple as that; not particularly bad, but definitely old. Stuff hurts when it never did before. The legs don’t recover so quickly anymore and there’s loads of things about ‘youth culture’ that either irritate me immensely or that I just don’t understand. I’m ‘only’ 46, but life’s definitely changed. So, rather than sitting moaning, I thought I’d write this.

So, when did I get so old? What makes me feel old? And why does it concern me so much?

‘my heart had been racing for four days…’

The main thing that made me feel properly old (and actually made me think there’s loads of stuff that I should get done, like a blog or taking a year off and backpacking to Machu Picchu, man) was falling ill. In March I took the unusual step (unusual for me, being male, Northern and like,totally macho) of going to the doctors. To be fair, there was good reason and I only felt a tiny bit wimpy about going. I’d felt rough for a month or so but now my heart had been racing for four days. Now I’m no doctor, but I know that your heart is much better when you’re not feeling like it’s trying to punch a hole in your chest. Every night during that time I went to sleep thinking that I’d wake up and everything would be back to normal. Every morning though, I woke up and wondered if anyone would spot my heart trying to escape from my chest as nothing had changed. Because, of course in my mind when people aren’t gazing into my eyes or checking out my sugarlumps, they’re staring at my pecs.

Anyway, I was forced to admit what was going on to my wife because frankly, I was getting a little bit scared. And so, despite my protests, she made me an appointment and I accepted my fate – to sit in a waiting room with Morley’s elderly, listening to lift music until way after my actual appointment time before going in to have a doctor listen to my chest and then look at me like I’d utterly wasted his time.

But then when I actually did go in something quite surprising happened. The doctor looked a little bit concerned. He touched me far too many times with his freezing cold stethoscope. He ‘ummed’ and ‘hmmmd’ a lot until it got to the point that I thought he was going to tell me I probably only had hours to live. But then foolishly gave me an option. Go straight to A&E to get properly checked out – no thanks – or wait for him to ring them and maybe arrange an appointment with the hospital at a later date – yes please. So, still convinced that it’d all magically go away I decided that rather than waste anyone’s time I’d just go with the later appointment and head off to my coach’s meeting. Job done, yay, I was still young and invincible!

Only, I wasn’t. About an hour later my phone rang and I had to excuse myself from my meeting after the doctor basically told me to get to A&E or he’d send an ambulance my way! I think I even heard him use the phrase ‘blue lighting’ and I was sure he didn’t want me to feature in a moody 80s music video. So, in a bit of a daze, off I went. (And in case you’re wondering, yes, Chuck Norris here drove himself to A&E, heart problem and all).

‘I was still in the same shape as I was in my early 20s’

A little while later and I was stood in the A&E department of the LGI asking myself the question, ‘When did I get so old?’ Still though, with a mixture of bravado and my head telling me that I was still in the same shape as I was in my early 20s, I was sure it’d just be magic tablets and getting sent home, wondering what all the fuss was about and worrying that Louise was going to make me eat more of those vegetable things she’s so fond of.

And then a nurse told me they were going to put a cannula in my arm. Now I’d heard that name on Casualty – cannula, not nurse, I’d heard of nurses ages ago – a cannula sounded serious! They tell you it’s going to feel like a ‘sharp scratch’ but it bloody doesn’t. It bloody hurts! Why were they wanting to hurt me? Nurses and doctors came and went, poked and prodded me, asked me many of the same questions (don’t these people talk to each other?) and still there was no sign of any magic tablets.

What happened next was definitely not expected though. A doctor came in and, with her best serious adult face on, told me that I was being admitted. Like, kept in hospital and given a bed on an actual ward. They left me on my own for an overly long time – enough to start really worrying – while I tried to carefully choose my words in texts to Louise. During this time another nurse came in to take yet more of my blood and when I told her about my magic tablets theory she replied with ‘Well, it’s a good job you came in, because if you hadn’t…’ and just left it at that! Now I really felt old! What? What would have happened if I hadn’t come in? She never did tell me.

Eventually I was allowed back out into the waiting area and Louise came in with an overnight bag. And if there’s one thing that’ll make you feel old, it’s the wife. Just kidding, it’s an NHS waiting area. I try not to judge (not really) but let’s just say that all human life is here. And at least 90% of it has dressed itself head to toe in Sports Direct and is no longer in possession of many of their original teeth anymore! Several of them also need to stop bringing pairs of police officers with them to hospital, but that’s another story.

‘…some bloke was wheeling me on to a cardiology ward in the middle of the night…’

Eventually I was taken up to Ward 19 of the LGI and while I felt perfectly able to walk to a lift and find it myself, our wonderful NHS had other plans. That’s right, as if I didn’t feel old and battered enough they were going to take me there in a wheelchair. A few days earlier I’d been chasing 9 year olds round a football field – I’m their football coach, not the Childcatcher or anything worse, don’t call Childline – and now some bloke was wheeling me on to a cardiology ward in the middle of the night with several almost dead pensioners. Probably.

And it was that type of assumption that led to my next bout of asking myself, when did I get so old. On the ward I got talking to a lovely bloke who had suffered a heart attack a few days earlier. We talked about the NHS, how amazing the staff were and what was happening to us. I realise now that I must have looked terrified and he was being incredibly nice and trying to calm me down. After a while though, I caught a glimpse of his heart monitor. His heart was doing something like 62 beats a minute. Mine? 148! Not the kind of race I want to win, however competitive I might be! WHEN DID I GET SO OOOOOOOOLLLLDDD? The bloke with the dodgy heart was seemingly perfectly relaxed while the aspiring Rafa Benitez here was more like Dot Cotton! He’d nearly died, but I’d been telling myself that some magic tablets would put everything right. I was old, I was poorly and worse, I was more scared than ever.

And so that was the thing that brought it all home to me and made me think, amongst other things, about starting to write a blog. I was allowed home the next day and took the rest of the week off work. I rested. I napped quite a lot. I read, watched telly and I did a lot of simply sitting about daydreaming. So, a lot like work life really, except that lots of people were nice to me, rather than calling me a dick all day!

A month later I was back in hospital, again for a short stay, in order to have a procedure where they inserted tubes into my groin and fired radio waves at my heart. But more of that thrilling adventure another time. I’d had a small scare, but now, a few months on I’m feeling like I’m getting better. I still feel tired, but I’m back out doing tentative runs, I’m back at work and I’m back coaching my team again. I can do dad stuff without feeling worn out and I’ve even dropped telling Louise ‘I nearly died you know‘ in order to get out of doing too much or eating fruit and veg. I’m even remembering to use my inhaler.

Best of all though, and despite the realisation that middle age is definitely upon me, I’m still here.