In October 1983 a brand spanking new snooker centre opened adjacent to the Springfield Hotel on Durham Road, Gateshead. Being a big fan of the game back then, along with a few mates, I signed the dotted line to become a club member. With the exception of a dimwit called Nadger***, who’d regularly chalk the wrong end of his cue, my buddies and me were all roughly of the same […]
On Monday afternoon I took a first recuperative walk since being discharged from hospital, embarking on a short meander to the end of the street and back. Only a few hundred yards in distance and undertaken on flat terrain, it was hardly Hannibal’s trek across the Himalayas; however I was heartened to witness an improvement in my energy levels from Sunday. A day when I acquired a family nickname of […]
Around eighteen months ago I dabbled at extending my literary boundaries by trying my hand at writing poetry. All very pompous and tongue in cheek stuff, delivered in an olde worlde style, some of which can be found on my website writesaidfred.org under the menu title of ‘Pretentious Prose’. https://strachan.blog/2017/06/24/pretentious-prose/ These pieces of work were deliberately ostentatious and self-indulgent sonnets that left no stone unturned in my aspirations to make […]
There’s an old adage that ‘pride comes before a fall’ – A musing from folklore which yesterday I witnessed come to fruition. This incident played out when a friend downed twelve cans of London Pride beer and went ass over elbow on their front doorstep. Nothing was hurt apart from his pride…… Oh, and ‘lucky’ carton of eggs and china dinner service which accompany him everywhere. Despite these items clearly […]
Yesterday I was the recipient of a scented candle Christmas gift. When ignited, this wax fragrance enhancer apparently emits an odour of wild mint. A welcome change from the usual cinnamon aroma that is generally the ‘go to’ candle scent chosen during the festive season. As yet I’ve not lit the candle; as a result I’m currently unable to evaluate the beauty, or otherwise, of it’s odour. Consequently, I’ve no […]
After concluding this narrative, I face a day of cleaning my humble abode, walking into Crossgates to re-negotiate my daughters mobile phone contract, a trip to the bottle bank, and (time allowing) watching a classic Christmas movie. I’ve not decided which movie to watch, but intend to be more selective with my festive season entertainment than yesterday. When I spent an afternoon viewing both The Exorcist and Psycho. Concluding afterwards […]
Behind door number 13 of casa Strachan’s advent calendar lays a throwaway self-penned topical headline. An epiphany manifesting from the recesses of my mind – A notion that this morning belligerently queue jumped to the forefront of my conscious thoughts. Unceremoniously displacing an idea I was forming about re-visiting incomplete literary projects of yore. These the unfinished children’s stories I began around a decade ago, which I indifferently abandoned after […]
