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It’s 12^th December, 2012 (12-12-12) which is a pretty cool date since it will not re-occur again this century. In case nobody had noticed it’s the festive season, so it’s time for my pesky lists again, but only this time comprising twelve items with a Christmas theme:

Twelve Christmas movies:

1. It’s a Wonderful Life (about a man contemplating suicide because he is facing financial ruin.)
2. Love Actually (chance to see the Hobbit naked.)
3. White Christmas (Danny Kaye is flaming, but Bing sings “the song!”)
4. A Christmas Story (“Ralph, you will shoot your eye out.”)
5. Miracle on 34^th Street (great performance by a very young Natalie Wood.)
6. About a Boy (is Hugh Grant really a plonker?)
7. The Bishop’s Wife (original version is best with Cary Grant and David Niven.)
8. A Christmas Carol (1951 version starring Alastair Sim as Scrooge is classic.)
9. Elf (included this one because my son’s girlfriend likes it.)
10. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (Hysterical!)
11. The Shop around the Corner (stocking filler.)
12. Holiday Inn (another stocking filler. I was struggling to pick twelve that I liked.)

Twelve Things I have enjoyed at Christmas

1.  Roast turkey and all the trimmings. Turkey is available the year round but there’s something about the aromas emanating from the kitchen combined with the pine smell of a Christmas tree ably supported by a log fire.

2. My children and now grandchildren manically tearing the gift wrappings of their Christmas presents.

3. My wife’s trifle is filled with an effusion of fresh fruit (raspberries. blackberries, blueberries strawberries, bananas, whatever is available) and she only makes it at Christmas.

4. My mum’s homemade mince pies, and her Christmas cake coated with marzipan and icing.

5.  I received my big green egg grill last Christmas as a surprise gift from my wife. It’s quite awesome and I can cook anything on it, but I’m not quite ready to grill my Christmas turkey on the big egg.

6. Two years ago on Christmas morning I was sipping champagne with my wife in the hot tub surrounded by a thick layer of snow.

7.  I enjoy eggnog and mulled wine, and Christmas is the only time we have them.

8.   Creating Angels in the snow. My wife gave me a demonstration on a cold, dark, crispy New Year’s Eve when I was living in Swansea.

9.  I like cracking nuts (excluding my own of course) and attempting to prize out the nut whole. There was always a variety of nuts in the bag: hazelnut, walnuts, Brazil etc. It’s funny that shelled nuts are available the year round, but they don’t present the same challenge.

10. I enjoyed going to the pub with my dad  on late Christmas morning where we would enjoy a couple of pints and a fat cigar before staggering back home for Christmas dinner.

11. The BBC TV Christmas specials were not to be missed. Morecambe and Wise closely followed by Only Fools and Horses were my favorites. In recent times Downtown Abbey follows a great tradition.

12. Pantomime in which cross dressing is rife and audience participation is actively encouraged. My son was a performer’s dream. He lived and loved every minute of the show.

Twelve Christmas Songs ( not necessarily in any order.)

1.  A Fairy Tale in New York: The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl

2.  White Christmas: Bing Crosby

3.  All I want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth: Spike Jones and His City Slickers

4.  Baby, It’s Cold Outside: Louis (Satchmo) Armstrong with Velma Middleton

5.  I’ll Be Home for Christmas (if only in my dreams): Frank Sinatra

6.      The Night Before Christmas: Louis Armstrong

7.      The First Noel: Frank Sinatra

8.      The Little Drummer Boy: Bing Crosby and David Bowie

9.      Santa Claus is Coming To Town: Bruce Springstein

10.  All I want for Christmas is You: Mariah Carey

11.  Only You: The Flying Pickets

12.  Do They Know it’s Christmas: Band Aid

Merry Christmas Everyone.

I was recently accused of perceving life in terms of black or white values and I don’t have the capacity to accept there are shades of grey to issues. I was initially taken aback that somebody regarded me as being so dogmatic. However having mulled it over for a few days I take the accusation as a positive. I do have strong opinions and the older I get I am going to voice them.

I am passionate about many things; my wife, my children, my grandchildren, my favorite sports teams, politics, movies and occasionally golf. I do have shades of grey but they usually involve things that I am ambivalent about.

So anyway, to paraphrase my dear mother-in-law who is not in the best of health, I decided to run through a few likes and dislikes of mine and share them with you. When I was compiling my lists I noticed the dislikes far outweighed the likes, and consequently a little bit of editing was necessary to balance the books.

I like playing golf early in the morning when it is fresh and a new dawn may bring a good round instead of the usual inconsistencies that a weekend hacker like myself has to contend with. I like seeing the sun rise rendering a pink hew over the fairway which is still entrenched in a low lying early morning mist.

I dislike slow play and players who don’t respect the etiquette of the game. I do not like taking a break between the front and back nine. Consequently I like playing a round in 31/2-4 hours.

I like dressing in black; possibly because I read somewhere that black is slimming and I need every help I can get. I do not like wearing white; simply because I am one of the world’s great stainers (the spell checker doesn’t like that word for some reason.) Take a look at my white shirts and you will be able to tell what I’ve been eating and drinking the past couple of weeks.

I like honest, genuine people with a self-effacing sarcastic and/or silly sense of humor. I do not like people who take themselves too seriously, are insincere, or superficial. Americans hold the lion’s share in insincerity and superficiality, but fortunately there are one or two exceptions.

I like cooking, but I don’t appreciate dinner guests claiming they eat can anything and then turn their nose up at an exquisite fish dish. “Oh I’m sorry; I forgot to tell you my husband doesn’t like fish!”

I like watching football, NFL football, rugby, athletics, golf, baseball and cricket. I don’t like watching motor sports, swimming, ice hockey, basketball or wrestling. I’m indifferent towards horse racing and boxing. Ha Ha! I have shades of grey in watching sports.

I like going to the movies and losing myself completely in the atmosphere of a big screen. I can’t comprehend anyone who hasn’t seen “It’s a Wonderful Life” or “Gone with The Wind.” I’m revealing my intolerance here, but that’s bizarre to me that one can go through life and not experience two of the all-time movie classics.

I like sipping a glass of champagne in the hot tub on Christmas morning surrounded by a layer of fresh crisp snow on the deck. Honestly it did snow two years ago in Atlanta on Christmas Day. I dislike the fact that America does not celebrate Boxing Day.

Basically I’m a curmudgeon who doesn’t suffer fools gladly. For the record I cannot tolerate rudeness, I dislike pretentious people and have little time for the shirkers of this world. Nobody is perfect but some are closer than others.

Last Sunday (July 22^nd) was my wife’s birthday and she was presented with the wonderful gift of a third granddaughter. It is hard to fathom that they are born on the same day and separated by 39 years. Well my wife has been 39 years old and in a holding pattern for the last few years and if it makes her happy so be it.

Our granddaughter entered the world around 6.45am weighing in at 7lbs 12oz which was apparently a routine birth, and therefore I assumed my day would progress according to plan watching the final round of The Open at Royal Lytham & St.Annes. I was obviously naïve. My wife was running around like a banshee preparing to drive down to the hospital to visit her new granddaughter, and I was carried along in the wake created by her effervescent mood.

Not to worry; I decided to record the final round in the faint hopes of not knowing the result before I could return home. Anyone remember the episode of The Likely Lads with Terry and Rodney attempting to avoid a result of a football match in order to watch recorded highlights later that evening?

My plan proved to be very successful for several hours during our visit until we popped into a Mexican restaurant to buy a takeaway lunch for my stepson who had been holed up in the hospital for several hours and was now ravenous. On our return, he eagerly announced that “Ernie Els won!”

The question is did Ernie Els win The Open or did Adam Scott lose it? Ernie shot a final round of 68 while Scott shot 75. More to the point, Scott was leading the tournament by 4 shots, but proceeded to bogey the last four holes. More than any other sport, golf challenges a man’s psyche. It provides an insight into how man can deal with adversity, triumph, disaster in a blink of an eye. Typically, with a few exceptions, majors are won by great players capable of handling intense pressure. When the going gets tough; the tough get going which is my single cliché allowed today.

If we discount Scott Hamilton, Ben Curtis, Stewart Cink, and Trevor Immelman (who?) very good players earn a sumptuous living plying their trade on the various tours away from the media spotlight which brings me to another of my pet peeves. Luke Donald and Lee Westwood are ranked Number 1 and 3 in the world respectively, but have not won a major between them. Tournaments around the world are taken into consideration when the rankings are prepared, but who cares whether Donald or Westwood won the Malaysian Open on their way to exalted positions in the rankings?

English players irritate me. Underachievers like Rose, Casey, Poulter, Westwood and Donald are liable to shoot a good final round when they are no longer in contention and the pressure is off. The most recent example is Luke Donald. He never really threatened to win The Open but finished joint fifth with a final round of 68.

On day when ESPN should have been concentrating on the main sports stories in the shape of the final round of The Open, the forthcoming London Olympics, their breaking news headline for several hours revolved around the removal of the statue of former Penn State Head Coach, Joe Paterno. He failed to do the right thing when his former assistant Jerry Sandusky sexually abused at least 45 male college students over a considerable period of time.

 Sandusky was deservedly found guilty of the crimes and will be suitably punished, but Paterno conveniently passed away in January. However the main concern for talking heads in America is whether Paterno’s legacy is tarnished, and not how the lives of several Penn students were psychologically damaged.

We really need to get our priorities in order.

We always hear “The Rules” from the female side. Now here are the rules from the male side.

• Men are not mind readers.
• Learn to work the toilet seat. You’re a big (for big I mean mature) girl. If it’s up, put it down. We need it up, you need it down. You don’t hear us complaining about you leaving it down.
• Weekend sports; it’s like the full moon or the changing tides. Let it be.
• Crying is blackmail.
• Ask for what you want. Let us be clear on this one: subtle hints do not work! Strong hints do not work! Obvious hints do not work! Just say it!
• Yes and No are perfectly acceptable answers to almost every question.
• Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it. That’s what we do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for. 
• Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument. In fact, all comments become null and void after 7 days. 
• If you think you’re fat, you probably are. Don’t ask us. 
• If something we said can be interpreted two ways and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, we meant the other one. 
• You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you want it done. Not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself. 
• Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say during commercials. 
• Christopher Columbus did not need directions and neither do we. 
• All men see in only 16 colors like Windows default settings. Peach, for example, is a fruit not a color. Pumpkin is also a fruit. We have no idea what mauve is. 
• If it itches it will be scratched. We do that.
• If we ask what is wrong and you say “nothing,” we will act like nothing’s wrong. We know you are lying, but it is just not worth the hassle.
• If you ask a question you don’t want an answer to, expect an answer you don’t want to hear. 
• When we have to go somewhere, absolutely anything you wear is fine. Really!
• Don’t ask us what we’re thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as football, beer or happy hour.
• You have enough clothes.
• You have too many shoes
• I am in shape. ROUND is a shape!

 Thank you for reading this. Yes, I know I have to sleep on the couch tonight;

But did you know men really don’t mind that? It’s like camping.

The Atlanta Braves opened a home stand against the struggling Washington Nationals and provided their fans with an abject performance. They gave up 4 home runs and meekly left the field 2-9 losers against a team who had lost their previous six games.

What made my blood boil was the string of inept excuses trolled out by the sycophantic Braves sports commentators. The Braves were caught up in New York with the prospect of Hurricane Irene hitting the Big Apple over the weekend. MLB officials decided to postpone two of three game series against the Mets allowing the Braves to “high tail” out of the town.

What’s this got to do with the loss to the Nats you may well ask. Well I will tell you if you give me a moment. Including the official off day the Braves were inactive for three days, and the sycophants claimed that the break had upset the regular routine of the pitchers. Having played over 130 games this season and with the playoffs in their sights one would assume they would welcome a rest.

The Braves offense faired little better, but another lame excuse was trotted out. The Nats’ wily veteran pitcher, Livian Hernandez was on the top of his game and was almost unhittable. I have lost count the number of times Hernandez has pitched against the Braves over his long career (four times this season) so he is not an unknown factor.

By the way, they lost to the Mets on Friday 0-6 which according to the spin doctors was due to the fact they were anxious to leave town and were mentally unprepared to play the game. Speaking of which Tottenham Hotspur’s melancholy midfield player, Luca Modric, asked his manager two hours before Saturday’s kick off if he could sit out the game. I make no apologies if my words are dripping in sarcasm. The poor (not in the financial sense) man has been the subject of much transfer speculation and wants to join Chelsea.

He claimed he was not in the right frame of mind to play, and judging on his inept performance resulting in his substitution after 60 minutes, he probably had a point. He certainly didn’t help Spurs’ cause losing 1-5 at home to Manchester City. I was convinced that was the last time I would see him in a Tottenham shirt, but the club’s Chairman rejected a reported 40 million pound offer from Chelsea at the transfer deadline. Personally I don’t subscribe to keeping disgruntled players and 40 million was a tremendous offer. .

On a brighter note, Spurs managed to unload quite a few underperforming dead weights at the transfer deadline including Crouch, Jenas, Bentley, Hutton and Palacios. Unfortunately, they were unable to find assisted living for Huddleston and Lennon. Swansea City meanwhile have failed to score one solitary goal in their first three games in the premiership. Danny Graham was signed for a club record fee from Watford to score goals, but has failed to deliver. He was the top goal scorer in the Championship last season with 24, but my son warned me about goal scorers in lower divisions struggling to make an impact in the premiership.

 Apparently he hasn’t come to terms with his new environment as he is battling with a new language, (Cymru am Byth) inclement weather and all the temptations that Swansea night life has to offer. Meanwhile veteran defender Alan Tate broke his leg on a golf course when his driver (human and not the club of choice) lost control of their golf buggy and had an altercation with a tree. Details of the story have been carefully concealed and any mention of alcohol being involved is pure speculation. Needless to say he will miss 6 months of the season which could prove to be a blessing considering his deleterious performance in the season opener against Manchester City.

An article featuring sporting prima donnas would not be complete without reference to one Michael Vick; ex-Falcon, ex-con, and ex-dog killer. He is now weaving his web of trickery and smoking mirrors in Philadelphia, and the Eagles have just awarded him a bumper contract. Vick has gone from serving 18 months in Leavenworth to a six-year stretch worth $100 million. That certainly disproves F. Scott Fitzgerald’s theory that there are no second acts in America lives.

One could also discern that he went to the dogs and came back smelling of roses. He has also become the only athlete in sporting history to be awarded two $100 million contracts in a career. But as one old curmudgeon put it: there’s no substitute for class which he wouldn’t recognize even a rampaging line backer smacked him in the face with it.

I have been a Tottenham Hotspur fan for over 50 years and having watched their match against Manchester United, I am ready to dissolve my relationship with the Spurs. The pre-match comments didn’t really help my blood pressure. Spurs spiv, nee manager, Harry Redknapp was asked why Spurs have such a wretched record at Old Trafford. They have not won there since 2001, and his response was to say nobody does well there.

He also claimed that Spurs would be competing to finish fourth in the premiership which would be a great result for the club if achieved. Are you kidding me? He is telling fans not to expect anything better than 4^th. It’s time to get rid of the barrow boy mentality that Redknapp has introduced to White Hart Lane, and the same goes for his cronies. What exactly are Clive Allen, Tim Sherwood, and Les Ferdinand doing to justify their positions on the pay roll?

Okay, Spurs lost away to Manchester United 0-3. Predictably (if you are a Spurs supporter,) they more or less held their own for the first half, but the writing was on the wall. In the second half it was only a matter of time before United scored which they did, and the only question remaining was how many goals would they score against hapless Tottenham who ran out of steam well before the finish?

Two of the goals were scored from headers by Wellbeck and Rooney who are not the tallest strikers in the league. They were completely unmarked by the central defenders Dawson and Kabul who proved they are not good enough to lace the much missed Ledley King’s boots. Playing two attacking full backs who couldn’t mark a one legged man with a walking stick was also disastrous.

Redknapp’s attacking formation had as much threat as the “Charge of the Light Brigade.” Using Defoe as the main striker doesn’t cut it. He is happier playing off the shoulder of a big striker. Bale had a few moments but Lennon’s final ball predictably was atrocious. Due to injuries, United played a young back four: Smalling, Evans, Jones and the experienced Evra in front of a jittery young goalkeeper David de Gea, but were never under pressure from a powder puff Spurs attack.

I knew Spurs’ fans were in for a long evening when they announced the line up. Modric, subject of much transfer speculation, was left out because “he was not in the right frame of mind to play.” Forgive me, but I don’t believe his replacement, Livermore, touched the ball during the game before being substituted by the pedestrian Huddlestone late into the second half.

Redknapp assured fans recently that there would be as many as 10 players moving in and out of the club before the 31^st August transfer deadline. The 2011-12 season is under way and now he decides it’s time to make moves in the transfer market. Surely it makes sense to conduct transactions in early summer to afford a team time to gel before the season begins.

In an earlier post I addressed the weaknesses of this squad, and I felt a new goalkeeper was a priority. Redknapp apparently agreed with me and signed Brad Friedl on a free transfer from Aston Villa. Friedl is a solid performer at this level and earned the man of the match award against United, but he is 40 years of age for goodness sake!

Spurs usually have a plethora of midfielders to choose from, but Palacios and Sandro are injured while Jenas and Huddlestone are not fully fit as demonstrated by the latter’s indifferent late appearance to the game. Why are there so many players unfit or unready to play in what was Spurs’ opening game of a new premiership season?

Decisions have to be made with regard to the two best players in the squad: Modric and King. Clearly Modric wants to leave for richer pastures in West London and there is little point in retaining an unhappy player. King remains the club’s best defender but his chronic injuries cannot help the team in the long term. The squad is also carrying a lot of dead weight, but these are issues which needed to be addressed in the off-season.

Some protagonists would argue that even Manchester United was forced to sell their best player, Ronaldo, a couple of seasons ago, and as a consequence, now have a stronger squad. However, Spurs continually sell their best players: Berbatov, Carrick and eventually Gareth Bale only to be replaced by inferior players.  By the end of the game Tottenham’s players were consigned to chasing shadows, and the final whistle was music to their ears.