Short men are always getting into fights apparently. Overcompensating for their lack of stature, that kind of thing. One can only ponder at the atmosphere in the Jockey’s enclosure on race day, all those little blokes in silly outfits hyped up, practising their whipping techniques, some deciding in which furlong to chuck the race. So it was hardly surprising to hear that jockey Paul O’Neill has been banned from racing for headbutting. But that the recipient of his nut job was a horse called City Affair came as a shock! How did he reach? Did he jump?

The Horse Regulatory Authority obviously don’t look kindly on their animals getting nutted, so they banned O’Neill from racing… for one day. At least horses know that they can safely stroll about the paddock without fear of getting a Glasgow kiss from the Horse Botherer O’Neill for twenty-four hours. The ban obviously didn’t go down too well in the horse world, however. It seems that a gang of City Affair’s mates, including the champion hurdler Aromatic Underwear, jumped O’Neill one night as he was coming home from his Kick Boxing class, and hoofed him to within an inch of his life. Aromatic Underwear has been banned from racing for a day by the Jockey Regulatory Authority and O’Neill is considering a career change, with the French football team said to be interested in filling a recent vacancy.

The 18th century was good news for toupee manufacturers of Wigtownshire as the act of union between England and Scotland caused nationalist Scots to lose all of their hair. This sacrificial shedding came to be known as The Headland Clearances, celebrity ex-pat Sean Connery being a famous shedder. It led to the invention of the ginger wig, a now-familiar sight on the football terraces whenever Scotland are losing to some country no one has ever heard of and the jovial Scots show their superiorty over the thuggish English by laughing at their own ineptitude, rather than chucking seats around.

The original design for the Union Flag, rejected by the Scots

In the 18th century football hadn’t been invented so the plucky Scots had to come off gallant losers on the battlefield instead. Culloden was such a defeat, although many of the English stars were injured, ruling them out of the World Cup. The biggest loser, however, was Bonnie Prince Charlie whose nose was sliced off by the swipe of a bayonet causing him to change his name by deed poll to Minging Prince Right Charlie.

It wasn’t all fun and games of course. Smallpox was rife among the peasant class, who slept 50 to a newspaper, and NHS waiting lists were so long that large warehouses had to be built to read them in. Unless you had money you’d be lucky to see a doctor for generations and then he wasn’t allowed to give you medicine because it was banned by the church, like in some Southern states of America today. If you had scabby chops it was the way God intended you to be, so stop whinging you heathen! And stop scratching!

Of course the 18th century wasn’t all bad. Houses in the country were very cheap as people fled to the cities in search of prostitutes. There were few shops in the country however, and public transport was hardly better than it is today, so sun-blushed tomatoes were hard to come by. If you were driven by hunger to steal an ear of wheat from a landowner’s hedge you would be hung at Tyburn in front of a celebrity audience. This would be recorded for TV and repeated on Bank Holidays. Are you sure you’d rather live in the 18th century?

Person to be in the 18th century - A Wigtownshire wig weaver
Person not to be in the 18th century - A Highland hair stylist

Previous Living in the Past posts

As World Cup fever starts to take a grip, and England’s best players begin shooting themselves in their feet, tripping up in the shower, or eating dodgy lasagne, Blighty starts his new series focusing on the 2006 tournament. And what better way to begin than a good long look at the England squad - to see who’s still standing.

For those of you not cognisant with the intricacies of the beautiful game (ie Americans) GK is the goalie, he stops the ball getting into the netting stuff, unless he’s David James in which case he performs tricks. DEF is the defender, who breaks the legs of poncy forwards, or used to in the old days before referees. MID is a midfielder, who plays a key roll getting the ball up to the forwards, if you have any fit ones left. And FOR is a forward, who tries to get the ball into the netting stuff before doing some weird gymnastic stunt and putting himself out of the tournament.

Rooney still hoping to make the World Cup in three weeks

GK Paul Robinson: Main Attribute - Not being David James. Main flaw - Not being David James being his greatest recommendation

GK David James: Main attribute - Has two hands. Main flaw - They behave oddly.

GK Robert Green: Main Attribute - Is of humanoid form. Main flaw - Considered worse than David James!

DEF Gary Neville: Main Attribute - Getting on a bit Experienced. Main flaw - Can be distracted by Beckham’s flowing locks and dashing good looks.

DEF Rio Ferdinand: Main Attribute - Great skill for a defender. Main flaw - Bad defending for a defender.

DEF John Terry: Main Attribute - Good defending for a defender. Main flaw - Plays for Queen José’s Globe Trotters.

DEF Ashley Cole: Main Attribute - Has a lot of pace. Main flaw - Doesn’t always have the ball

DEF Sol Campbell: Main Attribute - Whatever he says, seen the size of him?! Main flaw - Scoring perfectly good goals that are disallowed and lead to England being knocked out on penalties.

DEF Jamie Carragher: Main Attribute - Can fill in anywhere, even washing the shirts. Main flaw - Doesn’t use Daz.

DEF Wayne Bridge: Main Attribute - Left sided player with a left foot! Main flaw - His right foot

MID David Beckham: Main Attribute - Great crosser of the ball. Main flaw - Often tackled by stalking paparazzi.

MID Michael Carrick: Main Attribute - Stylish midfielder, when he doesn’t have sick down his shirt. Main flaw - Has a weak stomach, especially in the big games.

MID Frank Lampard: Main Attribute - Central midfield dynamo who scores goals. Main flaw - See Gerrard.

MID Steven Gerrard: Main Attribute - Central midfield dynamo who scores goals. Main flaw - See Lampard.

MID Owen Hargreaves: Main Attribute - Plays in Germany. Main flaw - No English club wants him.

MID Jermaine Jenas: Main Attribute - Has a stronger stomach than Carrick. Main flaw - Has no European experience, and won’t have next season either.

MID Stewart Downing: Main Attribute - Has more experience than Walcott. Main flaw - Only just.

MID Joe Cole: Main Attribute - Good at keepy-uppy. Main flaw - Not so good when there’s an opposition wanting the ball.

MID Aaron Lennon: Main Attribute - No longer plays for Leeds. Main flaw - Used to play for Leeds

FOR Wayne Rooney: Main Attribute - Skillful, strong, aggressive, nimble, playmaker, goalscorer, can tilt the world on its axis and bring about world peace, probably the best player in the world ever! Main flaw - he’s not playing.

FOR Michael Owen: Main Attribute - Used to be really good. Main flaw - Now he’s so bad that he’s gone to the great big scrapyard in the sky north east.

FOR Peter Crouch: Main Attribute - He’s so tall he can reach over and return the ball if it goes out of the stadium. Main flaw - Prone to low-flying aircraft.

FOR Theo Walcott: Main Attribute - Secret weapon and there was no one else worth taking anyway. Main flaw - Some games could be played after his bedtime.

So, you can see that England have a strong team going into the World Cup, albeit without an attack. Of course, it would have been so different if Sven could have picked Thierry Henry, but he had Jermaine Defoe or Darren Bent instead. He had to choose from players we know are no good, or one that no one has ever seen play. Blighty congratulates him for choosing the more interesting option.

It was one of those wet, dark days you get in Yorkshire in November. You get them in December too, and January. February’s not much better either…
Anyway it was one of those days when the birds never get up. Except one wearing a transparent dress and deep red lipstick. She entered my office just after 9am, shaking her umbrella… and the rest. I watched the rest as she shook herself dry.

My office is actually one floor of a disused textile mill. The looms can get in the way, but they make a point of interest for clients at quiet, tense moments.
‘Nice loom,’ she said, after a quiet, and tense moment.
‘Thanks. There’s one just like it over there.’
‘I prefer this one.’
‘Ok.’ I leant against her favourite loom and took out a packet of cigarettes. I offered them to her. She took them.
‘Thanks,’ she said.
‘Don’t mention it. I was wanting to give up anyway.’ In fact I’d never started. I bought them last March after seeing a Humphrey Bogart film. They’d been in my pocket ever since.
She put one of the cigarettes in her mouth. It drooped like a drunken lover, odd considering its situation. ‘Got a light?’ she asked.
‘No,’ I said.
‘Oh.’ She threw the cigarette on the floor. Then she looked me in the eyes for the first time. Hers were dark brown and as big as an abyss. I’m not sure about mine, I couldn’t see them. I doubt they were abyss-sized though. She appeared thoughtful. Then she stuck her tongue out. She was obviously a complicated lady.
I asked her name.
‘Sylvia Black. How should I address you?’
‘Just use my first name.’
‘Ok… What is it?’
‘Smith.’
‘Smith is your first name? What’s your surname?’
‘Tony.’
‘Ok… Smith.’
‘So, what’s your problem?’ I asked.
‘Who says I have one?’
‘People who come to me usually have a problem.’
‘That must get tiresome. Does it get you down?’
‘It can get depressing sometimes. Only last week I found myself on the trail of an overweight farmer who was cheating on his wife.’
‘Grim.’
‘You didn’t see what he was cheating on her with!’
‘I’d rather not know.’
‘Very wise.’
‘Anyway, you came to me,’ I said.
‘Actually, I was coming in from the rain. It’s chucking it down out there. Hasn’t rained this much since… yesterday.’ She looked into my eyes again. Mine looked back.
‘Yesterday was bad.’
‘Have any cases?’
‘Some irate bloke with a leaking roof.’
‘You do leaking roofs?’
‘Wrong number.’
‘Bugger.’
‘I fixed it anyway.’
‘Oh. Well done.’
We exchanged small talk for a while, sizing each other up. I’d say she was a 36c, but I don’t really know what that is. Finally she said,
‘Want to go somewhere cosier? That echo is a bit disconcerting and it smells like damp clothes in here.’
‘That’ll be you.’
She looked down her own body. She didn’t seem as impressed with it as I was. Then she sniffed. ‘So it is. But I’d rather dry off somewhere warmer.’
‘There’s a Starbucks down the road,’ I said.
‘There usually is,’ she said.
‘It’s across the road from the other Starbucks.’
‘Of course.’
I followed her out of my office, mesmerised by the way she moved her hips. They could hypnotize a blind man…

The BBC signalled its commitment to the arts over the Bank Holiday by launching its new major series on the Impressionists. There was some confusion about this initially as the commissioning editor thought he had authorised a three part drama on 1970s TV star Mike Yarwood but, as they had spent half the budget on baguettes and croissants by the time he visited the studio, it went ahead anyway. For those who missed the opening episode Blighty can recall some pertinent moments for you here.

Painting by Paul Cezanne

The scene opens in a cafe in Paris. We know we are in Paris because we can see the Eiffel Tower through the window.

‘How’s the work going Monet me old chum? Getting anywhere with that plein air business?’

‘Well, Manet, I have something to tell you. I think I’ve invented Impressionism by jove! But I’m not sure what the Salon will make of it all.’

‘Really Monet, I’d hardly take any notice of your barber on the matter of art!’

‘And why not? Why shouldn’t the humble barber have an opinion on the arts? Or should we leave it to the damned bourgeoisies?’

‘Well, they are the only blighters who buy our work. What about you Cezanne? What are you up to? Still painting that damned mountain?’

‘I’m treating nature by means of the cylinder, the sphere, the cone… old chap. I’m sure it will have profound influence on the Cubists. All this wishy washy ethereal stuff Monet is piddling about with is destined for the chocolate box.’

‘I say old boy, that’s a bit strong. By the way, how’s Vincents lughole?’

‘I saw Gauguin the other day, down at the docks - he’s off to Tahiti apparently, to discover symbolism. Anyway, he reckons Vince is mad. He’s fuming because Gauguin refused to cook his tea. It will end in tears.’

‘His latest work is wild, it seems to give expression to his inner turmoil. And no wonder, he can’t sell a painting.’

‘I made an offer for a picture of some sunflowers but he said that he wouldn’t let it go for less than $39 million and to leave him alone to eat some paint in peace.’

‘Damn fool.’

‘Fancy another absinthe? My round.’

‘I’d say so!’

Next week a Degas pastel on display in the Salon is smudged by an outraged traditionalist. And Seurat sees an eye specialist when his vision deteriorates after looking at dots all day.

The largest cruise ship in the world has arrived at Southamton Docks, casting the south of England into shade and confusing local birdlife. Keen sun-bathers, heartened by the recent thaw, are said to be fuming. Judy Punchers from Dorchester was on the beach at Lyme Regis when the eclipse occured. ‘It was just getting warm enough to take my coat off,’ she said. ‘Then suddenly this shadow creeps along the beach like winter.’

The giant Cruise Liner

Freedom of the Seas has been likened to a floating city, boasting its own shopping mall, drug problem and twenty-three Starbucks coffee shops. And like any city of consequence, the rush hour traffic is atrocious, a bottleneck developing every morning outside the swimming pool area. The swimming pool being a giant lake surrounded by mountains and people with stumpy legs walking around in hiking boots.

It will leave Southampton on Wednesday, thereby giving the south coast back its tepid sun. Then it will head for New York where it will become the 51st state of America.

We must apologise for the recent lapse in blog entries but Blighty has been busy on your behalf. He has been undercover investigating that relatively unknown institution, The National School for Estate Agents. After failing to pass the entrance exam on three occasion, Blighty got 14 month old Blighty Jnr to take it. She passed, although worries were expressed on her ‘innate feel for photographic composition’ and ‘ability to communicate her feelings tolerably well’. The head of the school said that they would soon train this out of her, however.

An A-graded photograph at the school

The first class was on the Art of Flash Photography. We were shown how to point the camera at the window with the flash switched on thereby creating a startling bright light in the centre of the image and throwing the room into complete darkness. Extra marks were given to students who included their shadowy figure in the reflection giving the impression of a psychopath lurking in the garden, or tilted the camera slightly so as to give the house the appearance of subsidence. Top marks, however, were reserved for those who managed to crop out any interesting features in the house. This was a tricky business as enough of the feature had to be showing for it to irritate the viewer. Blighty was marked down for almost getting it in focus.

The next class was The Art of Pros and how to Express Yourself in a Manor Sutable four yous in Estate Agent Literarchewer . We were taught how to use words and phrases not in common usage. Therefore a window becomes ‘a framed outlook with external features’, a downstairs bathroom becomes a ‘ground floor cleansing station’ and a large house becomes ‘deceptive’. Deceptive houses are a common occurrence, apparently, so you should check the shifty blighters out thoroughly before purchasing. You don’t want to buy what you think is a house only to find on moving in that it is actually an optical illusion.

The next class involved the students role-playing. They had to enter the class-room as if it was a property and irritate a possible vendor by repeating everything they said numerous times in slightly different ways and then pluck a figure from the air and, depending on the response, alter it by twenty or thirty percent. Students then proceeded to say that they were confident of selling the property as people wanted houses in this area, especially ones featuring walls and windows. ‘The front door will be of particular interest to a prospective buyer,’ they added, ‘as they will enter via it.’

Shortly after this class Blighty had to return home to show a buyer around Blighty Towers. Unfortunately they were after an optical illusion, rather that a 3/4 bedroom stone property, so they won’t be taking it any further. They said that the estate agent details were very deceptive.

As Blighty is away this week, and the blog is subject to a continual onslaught from poker site and penis extending spammers, comments will have to be approved until I get back. How will you all cope?!

Just when you get used to Helen Mirren being Elizabeth I up pops another skinny bird in a ginger wig to confuse you all over again. This time it’s the Beeb’s turn to haul out the bodices with their new drama The Virgin Queen. Poor old Liz, she was on the throne for fifty years, saw off the Spanish Armada, took Britain from minnow to status of superpower and now she’s mainly remembered for not getting a shag.

No doubt, as Elizabeth lay there in Richmond Palace, her last breath escaping her blue lips, she reflected on her life of celibacy and thought, ‘Well at least the prurient English public won’t spend their time discussing my sex life.’ How wrong she was. It seems even more unfair on poor Liz to be so burdened considering her father remains known as plain old Henry VIII. Why not the English Psycho, or Henry the Headcase?

Blighty decided to give this new drama a miss, having had enough of seeing Robert Dudley vainly struggling with Liz’s chastity belt during the recent drama on Channel 4. There’s only so much of Liz’s sex(less) life one can take. And let’s face it, it would make better soap opera if she’d killed a few husbands.

As regular readers will be aware (both of them) Blighty has rather a low opinion of the old British B&B, likening it to staying in a stranger’s spare bedroom, with the emphasis on ’strange’. This opinion has been arrived at after numerous occasions when tightfistedness came before comfort. So, it came as quite a surprise to read that a Blackpool B&B has been voted one of the best hotels in the world in an online poll.

Quite why a B&B should be voted any kind of hotel in the world is puzzling, never mind one in Blackpool. But the oddness doesn’t end there. Because the owner, Mr Hodson, claims that his B&B is ‘furnished in a very contemporary way and there’s no chintz.’ No chintz! Surely this precludes it from being titled a B&B at all. A B&B without chintz is like a hotel without loud plumbing sounds at three in the morning! It’s like Blackpool without the drunken groups of men urinating onto the beach! It’s like Cornwall without holiday cottages!

Perhaps all a B&B owner need do for his establishment to garner the title of ‘one of the best hotels in the world’ is nip down to Ikea for a car load of flat-packed furniture, tear down that weird netting stuff and paint the walls magnolia. Blighty is interested to know about the bed. Is it not like sleeping in a straitjacket on a pile of rubble with the blitz going on above your head? Could the B&B be changing forever? Let’s hope so. Next self-catering cottage owners will be finishing off the decorating!

It would be nice to see the British tourist industry drag itself into the 20th century. What’s that you say? It’s actually the 21st century? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves!