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Thread | The Warky off-season Report: Tel's holiday
at 11:12 8 Jun 2025
Tel's on holiday in Greece with his in-laws. Mykonos. They all left from Stansted on Tuesday last week. Business class, so he got more legroom and better seats and stuff. Hardly seemed worth it for a four-hour flight. Still. Their money, I suppose.
I'm looking after his house, although I've been there exactly twice so far, once on Wednesday evening to check everything and water a few plants, and yesterday to chuck out milk and bread which was slowly decaying. And to do his bins ready for Monday collection. Not that he had much to put out. So I took the opportunity and took mine over to fill it a bit more. Mine aren't due for another week or so. The car smells all vegetative as a result.
Curiosity has long been my curse in life and it got the better of me on Wednesday. I had a quick nose around. He'll never know. He doesn't come on here at all, and even if he did, I've covered my tracks well enough that I could be anyone and, more importantly, talking about anyone.
I ignored the wardrobes. They'd taken a load of clothes with them anyway as they're gone for two weeks and the remaining contents weren't illuminating. He didn't have a secret stash of Seventies/Eighties porn mags and the odd items left; shell-suits, old gnarly pairs of Converse sat gathering dust, the odd broken belt, weren't of much interest. I didn't wear a pair of Mrs Tel's knickers on my head as I looked. I'm many things, but not a pervert.
Their photo cupboard was of massive interest though. I moved a few albums and boxes out to view them, carefully noting where they went back so I could replace them without either of the Terries wondering why they'd changed position in the meantime. Not that they probably would, but you never know. I've seen the film Misery enough times to know people can be strange in these ways.
The photos were mainly of the Kodak Instamatic type; grainy colours from the late Seventies and early Eighties, with unknown (and presumably dead) folk dressed in grey lounge suits with huge knotted ties at some sort of celebration. There was nothing on the box to say what celebration, until I rooted a bit deeper and found it was Mrs Tel's 21st, made obvious by the 'Happy 21st' sliver banner on a table, her posed with what I assume was family members, holding a glass of something to the camera. Her feather cut hair proclaimed the age, as did her dress, which was slit to the knee, showing fishnets.
Tel appeared, wearing a Mister Byrite shiny suit and sporting what could be described as the start of a mullet. In one, he was pictured with his arm round Mrs Tel, kind of easy-ish. You could imagine them dancing to a bit of Barbara Streisand, him kneading her arse with his right hand in a long, slow circular motion. In another, his Dad (who I'd previously seen pictures of) with her Mum (again, seen before so recognised) engaging in a sort of formal tea-dance, although God knows what music they played for that. She'd had her hair done in sort of rinsed curls. His bald spot caught the disco lights.
It went on and on, clearly half-cut folk grinning and mugging for the camera, blokes with handlebar moustaches and Kevin Keegan perms, women in pastel pinks and blues, hair kept on head by massive hair clips. The older generation in their Sunday best, up feeding from the buffet, paper plates filled with cocktail sausages and vol-au-vents and chicken legs. The blokes holding pints of Double Diamond or IPA. Their suit trousers sagging badly at the arse.
I didn't go right through the photos. There were a lot of black and white ones of his dad or her dad, younger and virile-looking. I put them all back as I found them, feeling guilty at the sheer impertinence of it, violating their memories like that. But that was all I saw. They'll probably show me those photos when they remember to at a future gathering. I must remember to act surprised.
Quick call from Terry yesterday. They've tried water parachuting and he got sun burnt on Thursday. They've eaten kebabs and fish and tried retsina. Perhaps it is back to the Eighties after all? Oh and he forgot his other pair of sunglasses. If I find 'em, could I put 'em back in the kitchen draw. It's the cheap pair he wears for sunbathing. He's bought another cheap pair out there. Weathers been good so far. Bye. Bye Tel. For another week. He's back next Friday.
Little snapshot of my own, only this one doesn't contain Farahs, tashes or chicken legs. See you all soon!
Warky - June 2025 |
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Reply | Fish and Chips
at 12:02 5 Jun 2025
We went to Snape Maltings after - bloody hell, their food store is nice but pricey! I bought an unusual curry sauce, a hot massaman one to have with new potatoes and cauliflower tomorrow night and some chicken thighs.
Difficult to get parked as it's so popular. Ended up right out the back of the site.
Aldeburgh v Southwold - which do people on here prefer? |
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Reply | Fish and Chips
at 18:25 4 Jun 2025
I was in Aldeburgh today with my Dad - we didn't bother with the chippy but had a dish of cockles each and ate them on the beach. Lovely with vinegar and white pepper! |
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Reply | Who actually watches Doctor who?
at 09:43 2 Jun 2025
I'll never get over people covered head to toe in cling film and silver spray pouncing round a BBC studio while Tom Baker mugs wide-eyed at the camera.
That said, the Daleks were alright and I had a soft spot for the Cybermen. |
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Reply | Congratulations Trev...
at 06:38 29 May 2025
He's not coming back, is he?
Bloody hell, Flynn Downes, Trev....it'll be Andre next..... |
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Reply | Evan Ferguson
at 12:15 26 May 2025
Wouldn't mind Summerville from them. Struggled to fit with WHU, but Leeds might be looking at an offer as well? |
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Thread | The final Warky Premier Report for a while: West Ham (H)
at 11:50 26 May 2025
Bubbles were blowing. Tel, reminded of his early life in East London, running his dad's empire of news outlets, delivery companies (noos-papers'n'assorted rubbish) and hard-selling, dressed in tank tops and bell-bottom jeans, reiterated his hatred of the 'ammers and their cockney barra-boy followers.
He's off to Greece in a week, small island, 40 degree June, retsina, all the mod cons except British-owned expat boozers and ham, egg and chips for lunch. It'll be Sandy, he said. For a moment I thought he meant the beaches, but I'd not let him finish. It'll be Sandy and Tony with them. Tony has now officially retired from the building game, although he still keeps ownership of the company he founded so takes a not-inconsiderable amount of money for his troubles. The jobs are done by contractors he pays. They sound like the sort of people you wouldn't particularly like to be let into your home.
Sunday 4pm kick-off saw us comfortably ensconced in an Ipswich pub by 12, me on the Pepsi Max as I decided to drive in, not trusting the trains. I collected Tel at 10 and we hammered the A12, encountering the odd claret and blue car sticker en-route. With relegation confirmed a month ago, we were sanguine about chances of a final win to overhaul Leicester for that third-bottom spot. West Ham had good players. We both acknowledged the fact in the car. Then Tel said "Why'd ya drive by the way? Can't 'ave a drink now ya wally" and I made something up on the spur of the moment, not yet willing to admit that I've had enough of the drink as my latest blood test showed liver deficiencies of the type that I'd have laughed at thirty years ago.
Parked up and paid, we retreated to the pub, him to savour a pint of lager, me to sip with distaste the too-sweet and sparkly by half glass of diet chemicals plonked in front of me. I later changed to Guinness 0.0, which was a bit better.
Greece was the main topic. Mrs Tel had already started the ironing. He needed a trip to Colchester for sundries; another pair of tailored shorts, a new plug for his charger. They haven't been to Greece for years, preferring Spain with its myriads of seafood, drinkable lager and less fierce sun. They fly to Chania from Stansted on Monday 2nd and return on Thursday 12th. Tone was driving so I haven't been asked. I was meant to be joining them on the 2nd as I'd booked a week off but then I thought about it and decided to have a week at home, catching up on odd-jobs and taking Dad for his doctor's appointment, that sort of thing. You can have too much of Terry after a while and it's nice to be the master of your own ship now and then.
Besides, we're off to Marbella before the kids break up in July, me, him and Mrs Tel, hotel booked and flights sorted. That'll be an interesting week. I've booked two weeks off after it to use up my leave for the year, more in mind of restfulness than any other reason.
3.45 came around all too quickly and we left to the sound of a raucous "Bubbles" from somewhere in the town. Just like their dreams, it died a quick death. I heard West Ham fans moaning that we 'wasn't Landan" in the small knots we met as we strolled. Some had found the pub prices a bit steep in Isaacs, which was staggering considering I was charged £8 for a pint of Guinness in a pub in Stratford.
The game, well. We tried. Ultimately we weren't good enough and Tel agitated to meet me outside for the drive home long before the players exited and then came back out for a lap of cheering and polite applause. Tel thinks he knows how many won't be there next season, counting them off on his fingers as we negotiated the Wherstead Road and out, back into familiar country all the way to Brantham. He said Luongo (obvious), Chaplin, Delap, Hutchinson, O'Shea, Burgess, Cajuste, Morsy, Phillips, Enciso and Tuanzebe. He thought we'd keep Broady. He hoped we'd keep him, anyway. Nearly a whole team. It led to a bit of depression. Surely we'd keep Chappers unless he's really not good enough? The rest, well, apart from Hutch and Morsy, I'd not be too bothered about, frankly.
And that was that. Not too bothered. Which, given the ending of the two previous seasons, is as anti-climactic as a BBC drama you'd engaged with. No open-top buses this summer, and parties in Christchurch and summers spent idly wondering who we were signing, just back to the punch and the grit of the Championship, with its winnable games and its unconventional results and low-block teams.
We're looking forward already, although, as the saying goes, you never know your luck in that league. It'll be interesting to see how we strengthen and progress. For surely we will. KM wouldn't be saying all the right things publicly if we weren't.
Have a great off-season, see you all soon.
Warky - May 2025 |
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Reply | Things that are good about living in the UK
at 22:46 21 May 2025
People who are genuinely funny in normal conversation
Access to decent education
The varied, non-deadly wildlife
Allowing true eccentricity to flourish
Bacon sarnies
Marmalade
Tea with milk being such a widespread and widely enjoyed beverage
Pubs
You can walk without a) killing yourself in traffic, b) meeting another soul for a while despite only being a small island and c) without instantly becoming prey to annoying insects, mad heat or bears |
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Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Brentford (H) and Leicester (A)
at 08:38 19 May 2025
There used to be a telly programme called 'It's a Knockout' when I was a nipper. It dominated Friday evenings in our house. We'd get fish suppers from our local chippy (Large cod, medium chips, the odd wally for Dad, which is what they called a gherkin). Curry sauce was unheard of. You put the vinegar on first before the salt. It was wrapped in magnolia-coloured greaseproof paper. The bloke who cooked it wore a white coat like a doctor. No-one wanted 'scraps'. My mum never even ate the batter. It came straight off and went in the bin. Dad and I felt guilty eating ours after that.
Big pot of tea on the table. Cork table mats, no sauce bottles allowed because it looked working-class, and Mum had an innate fear of looking working-class. I don't remember ever having tomato ketchup (as we called it) on fish'n'chips (sorry, missed the 'and' out. That was punishable by death by my Mum). Woe betide me if I even THOUGHT about a dash of Daddies brown sauce. We had tartare sauce instead. Or they did. I wasn't allowed tartare sauce for fear I'd start imbibing it on everything.
Supper over and plates, cutlery and whatever else had breathed the same air as the chip bag washed up, it was 'It's a Knockout' on telly. Stuart Hall, later disgraced like Savile and Harris, barked whooping laughs as contestants dressed as comical giants, penguins or polar bears tried to negotiate coloured liquid across an obstacle course, frequently falling over and dropping their load.
I thought of those early 1980's days whilst watching us puff and pant to another Premier defeat at PR last Saturday. True, we were unlucky. True also, I was very, very drunk. But we played portions of the game like an It's a Knockout event, lumbering around, Brentford faster to loose balls, not dropping their red and white-striped liquid unnecessarily in the final third. Had we played wearing comedy giant penguin costumes, we might have won the sympathy vote. But that's what unnerves me a bit about our forthcoming Championship season; we're just so easy to win against.
Everyone says Luton as a stark reminder that relegations can easily follow each other, and whilst I'm positive we won't suffer that, you do struggle to see what the signs of progress are, along with the quality we'll need just to make the top six next season. Even Terry, who can't now make West Ham because he's going for a weekend away with Tony, Sandy and Mrs Tel to Brighton, even he, disillusioned by the Premier League, embittered by some of the recent performances and the lack of seeming fight from very well paid playing staff who just don't seem able to cut out the mistakes, even he said "Might make play-offs next year I reckon". In tones of acceptance. What the heck?
It's a blow upon a bruise yet again. All those years when mid-table in League One came to be the pinnacle of hope. I was there in the late 1990's when we couldn't win an end of season play-off home tie to save our lives. That was disappointing. This is just rudderless, uncertain and unyielding defeat. I expected Albert Steptoe to score against us yesterday. It was what the media wanted, it was destiny. Yet, when it happened and I checked my phone, my first thought wasn't shock that we were losing, it was acceptance. It barely made a dent.
Perhaps we've been spoilt? The suddenness of our rise, the excitement of holding off Leeds and Southampton last season for second place, the open-top buses, the keenness of players like Chaplin and Burns and Woolfy and Burgess and Morsy to get back out there and show the PL what they could do, unburdened by slogs in Accrington and Morecambe and Lincoln, the quality of a Championship success still glimmering in the sun on an Ipswich summer day. And then......? Well, that was a let-down, wasn't it? I didn't expect too much, but I did expect a bit of nous, a bit of fight. And now we just look like an expensive team of strangers, don't we?
I'll miss Terry at West Ham. But I don't blame him. It's been a strange season after all. Perhaps accompanied by a Stuart Hall whooping laugh as we close the door firmly behind us after letting Leeds and Burnley through. I can't foresee the future, more's the pity, but when I think about next season, I'm not quite as blasé as I was. Interesting summer here. Very interesting. |
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Reply | Life can really hurt sometimes can’t it
at 06:28 15 May 2025
Rommers - listen to the advice already provided on here - don't beat yourself up over this. Instead, console yourself with the thought that, as it hurts, it shows you are fundamentally a decent person who will progress from this and be stronger.
You didn't do anything wrong and I hope you find it within yourself to realise that. It sucks, but not everything in life is always plain sailing. Take care.
Warky |
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Reply | Lampard going a bit Arteta
at 06:37 14 May 2025
Sunderland were bloody awful and will get hammered in the final.
But....if they don't, and somehow win, do you reckon they'd be back in for Jack Clarke? £30 million? |
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