Tag Archives: michael_H

Sunday 14th December 2014 – GRRRR!!!!

Guess who forgot to turn off the alarm this morning?

And serve me right too.

Mind you, a quick visit to the beichstuhl and then back to bed and back right into my travels at exactly the point where I had left off. That’s twice this week.

I’d been talking to David Cameron about his plans to leave the EU. I was driving a lorry with tonnes of EU papers for filing. He argued that none of that would be needed – it’s just a waste of space – and so I invited him to go into the lorry and throw out any papers that he considered unnecessary. he said that he was more than willing to do so but that he didn’t have the time – and spent an hour or so saying it.

I then ended up in a coastal town in the USA back in the 1880s. This town was on a promontory of a wide river estuary and on the other side of the river was untamed Indian country. However, a huge railway tunnel had been built under the estuary, and my response was that it was a superb avenue into the town for a marauding band of Indians. First through it though was a wagon train, pulled byn would you believe, reindeer, and they had a difficult time in passing through the tunnel as their antlers were too wide. We then spent a lengthy time discussing how to defend the tunnel against Indians. And do you remember that woman and her daughter who appeared the other night? They were back again too.

So after all of the excitement, I was up and about by 10:15 and had a very leisurely morning doing not very much at all.

This afternoon, FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 2nd XI were playing Haut Combraille. Somewhat short-staffed, Pionsat ended up playing Michael in goal. he was formerly the 2nd XI’s goalkeeper but broke his shoulder four years ago and has been forbidden to play in goal. Still, he bravely volunteered and showed everyone just what the club has been missing since those days.

This was a top-of-the-table clash and rightly so – Haut Combraille were the best team that I have seen in Division 4. They relied very much on speed against an ageing Pionsat defence and I really did have to run, rather than walk, the line this afternoon. So much for my cleanliness after my shower of Saturday.

Yes – running! I was linesman again!

Pionsat won 4-3 and quite rightly so. Anthony finally broke his duck with a brave and strong run through the right wing, and Florian, the young lad about whom I spoke the other week, scored another goal – again running on to a loose ball in defence like I’ve been telling him to do. Julien and Gregory scored the other two.

So a good weekend, finished off by my having to search out for some events to broadcast on Radio Tartasse tomorrow as, once more, they’ve forgotten to send us any.

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Sunday 30th March 2014 – THAT’S MUCH BETTER …

… from Pionsat today. the 2nd XI went down the road to play Le Quartier’s 2nd XI and won 3-1 without really breaking into a sweat either. And Apart from the three goals, they also missed a penalty and had countless shots cleared off the line too.

The irony of it all was that they were playing without an attack either. Up front were Michael the Ist XI reserve centre-half who was available today because he didn’t play last night, and Michael who played in goal for the 2nd XI until he broke his shoulder three or four years ago.

I don’t remember about the first goal now, but the second goal was a driven cross by Michael the 1st XI centre-half that hit Jerome on the knee and went straight in the goal without anyone being aware of what had happened.

The third goal was a peach. Michael the 1st XI centre-half again, this time laying off a ball about 25 yards out to Bertrand who was rushing in like a steam train. He hit it plumb on the volley and normally these go into the field behind the goal, or else into the garden at the side of the pitch, but this one, just for a change, kept low and hard right into the far corner with the keeper a very distant second.

Talking of the keeper however, a more-miserable bad-tempered keeper I have never seen. He started at the first attack, throwing the ball into the back of Michael the 1st XI centre-half. Of course Pionsat were playing away and it’s the home side that supplies the referee in Division 4, so we didn’t even have a penalty, let alone a sending-off. And then every time there was a 50-50 ball the goalkeeper would physically threaten the opposing player, and the referee would intervene to punish the attacker.

Home-town referee, as you can guess. This kind of thing is totally shameful and does no credit to Le Quartier’s football club.

But of course Pionsat’s players are far too naive for even this level of football. They need to learn more about the judicious use of the elbow during high balls into the area from corners. That would have kept the goalkeeper under control.

As for Pionsat’s defence, they were up to their usual antics but Le Quartier had nothing to offer up front. Nevertheless they scored a goal near the end when a sleeping Pionsat defence allowed an attacker through and he scored a goal with a delightful lob over the advancing Christophe.

Apart from that, the change to Summer Time didn’t bother me at all. I was up and about as usual by about 10:15 new time. And I spent a few hours writing up more for the web site.

After the football (which had a 13:00 kick-off) I emptied Caliburn as we have a furniture removal to do this week, and then wrote a pile of stuff for the Radio Anglais programmes.

A chat to Cecile and her mum rounded off the day and that was that.

Back to work tomorrow.

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Thursday 27th March 2014 – IT WAS ANOTHER DAY …

deer in field les guis virlet puy de dome france… when I wasn’t alone in the garden. For two days now in succession, just as the evening starts to draw on, some of Strawberry Moose‘s girl friends come to join us.

I have to keep on reminding His Nibs that the word is “stag” – spelt S-T-A-G. The second letter is not an “H”.


During the night I was at a boarding school somewhere in the north of the UK. All the kids were piling onto a bus to go somewhere.
“They will all be sold into slavery” I said to Michael the former Pionsat goalkeeper who had to give up about three yers ago when he broke his shoulder (and I’ve no idea what he was doing here). “It’s the white slave trade”.
“No it isn’t” replied Michael. “It’s a proven fact that driving around like this helps people relax and it will prepare the kids for their exams”.
“Ohh no” I replied. “I’m far too cynical for that. It’s the white slave trade”.

So after another early start and a good three hours on the web site, I went outside and after a really good day in the garden I’ve cleared and prepared another two raised beds. That’s 9 done out of the 12, and then there’s the mega-cloche and then the fruit bed to clear. And if I find the time, I want to dig another bed.

But one of the raised beds has disintegrated – or, rather, the boarding around the edge has. And there are a few others that look rather shaky. But I remembered that I have piles of those thin lightweight red bricks lying around. Now I know what to do with them.

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