I am raging against the dying of
the light, as recommended by Dylan Thomas.
Old age, the great Welsh bard reckoned,
"should burn and rave at close of day."
In his case this meant marathon drinking sessions and
sleeping with a succession of eager female fans on a campus tour of North
America, but medical advice - not to mention the lack of any published poetry -
has more or less barred that route to me, so I am staving off dotage by
enthusiastically embracing new technology.
For instance, I always use the self check-out.
Granted, it's probably not as much
fun as a bunk-up in a Philadelphia sorority house, but I'm right down with the
kiddies when it comes to swiping a jar of Marmite.
Only very occasionally do I suffer
from 'unexpected item in bagging area' embarrassment and have to wait for a
helper.
Mostly, I just need the
assistant to confirm I'm old enough to buy alcohol, which is easily done with
my driving licence, and perfect recall of the West Ham forward line from the
1975 Cup Final.
On one occasion,
though, my impressively speedy swiping was halted because the machine suspected
I was loading up with more drugs than it thought I should.
J.Sainsbury, you see, is quite
happy if you buy one small packet of painkillers to deal with the inevitable headache
of walking round his shop trying to find stuff, but buy two and he begins to
worry you intend depriving him of a customer.
Mind you, I should have had a job fixing an unscheduled
meeting with my maker with what I had in my basket, namely two packets of
indigestion tablets.
"Are these a problem?" I
asked the supervisor, who explained that because they are from the
pharmaceuticals section, checks have to be made.
"Yes, I suppose youngsters might get hold of
them," I said, "And then you'd get gangs going round causing mayhem with
their dangerously settled stomachs."
I can't say for certain, but as my
sarcasm settled several feet above her head, and hung there, like Pele going up
for a corner in his 1970s pomp, I was probably on my smart 'phone downloading a
couple of tracks from Daft Punk.
And there's a lesson for those of
us trying to cling onto youth beyond our sell-by date.
I've been hacked.
I presume it's because I'm downloading songs,
checking emails, betting online, and so on, in cafés, and other insecure
places, that some scamps have got into my email and sent a message to pretty well
everyone in my address book, asking for money.
The email says I am stranded in
Greece, and urgently need money to settle my hotel bill, and pay for an urgent
kidney operation.
Spookily, it's
almost plausible as I have had some health problems, and am due to go into
hospital for an operation soon.
But I have no intention of going to Greece for
it, albeit the food might be better.
(What I don't understand about our health service is that the marvellous
medical staff and science fiction technology can achieve remarkable results
surgically, but no-one in there can come up with a piece of toast that isn't
like chewing into a face flannel)
I have now had to try and reinstate
my email with minimal help from Yahoo, and am busy writing to contacts to say
that I am not in Greece, but feel free to send money anyway.
Disappointingly, despite the borderline
plausibility of the spam, not one of my so-called friends rushed to send their
bank account details.
The damage may have been done, I
reckon, when I logged on in the pub.
What with the Dylan Thomas fast track to oblivion a non-starter for me,
I intended to achieve similar via England's friendly against Denmark, although
I have found a way of counteracting the usually suffocating ennui of England
matches.
By the simple expedient of backing
one of England's centre backs to score at any time, you can snooze through all
the midfield nonsense and then enjoy a small frisson of excitement every time
England win a corner or a free kick just outside the box.
On Wednesday, my money was on Gary
Cahill at 10-1, and he had a couple of half chances early on.
But he continued to go forward for every
corner, keeping me mildly interested until the final whistle, and as a night
out, while it wasn't exactly Dylan Thomas, it beat staying at home tidying up
my sock drawer.
My other bet was on Danish forward Krohn-Dehli
to score, at 5-1, and he had chances too.
You always get decent value on any opposition striker who doesn't play
in the Premier League, which has worked well for me over the years.
I still savour my triumph in an
international against Kazakhstan in 2010 when I had money on Rio Ferdinand and
on the opposition's Scrabble-busting Zhambyl Kukeyev to score, and both
obliged.
It doesn't happen often,
but the strategy has helped stave off coma through however many years of hurt
it is now.
Finally, when it comes to the
Cheltenham Festival, I tend to hold up my hand and say 'too much information,'
like the kiddies do.
I can't
compute it all, but if you're the slightest interested, I've got Vatour and Sizing
Europe today.
If you're foolish
enough to follow me, for heaven's sake don't do it in an internet café.