Between a Rock and a Hard Place

They have announced the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics by a year. Tokyo 2020 is now going to be held in 2021 but still called Tokyo2020. This represents the kind of of confusion that we are all feeling. I know that everyone is blaming the Corona virus pandemic but I think it might be my fault. Until yesterday they were still going ahead and then I wrote a blog suggesting alternative games that we are all in training for. The IOC must have got wind of it and decided it would be best to cancel.

It is a shame because I had been training for ‘Between a Rock and a Hard Place.’

Being socially distant is my preferred way of living. When they closed social spaces like pubs and restaurants people inevitably flocked to my places. All of a sudden canal banks and sea walls thronged with people. Those people suddenly wanted to talk. Frankly, it was a nightmare. The message of staying away from people hadn’t been given clearly enough and people thought spreading the illness was less likely if you were outside, so they rushed to the seaside and queued to climb Snowdon. Bob273 on Twitter got really cross and so the government made the announcement that scared most people.

We were caught between a rock and a hard place. My son was due to return from University on Friday because his holiday job in a supermarket were desperate for him to come back. My daughter, due to start a new job in Essex in three weeks was sitting in an empty flat in Leicestershire waiting to have the last bits of furniture that she had sold collected and her landlord visit to inspect and collect the keys. What should we do? There was no one to ask. The message was clear: No travel; stay in your own home; only go out once a day for exercise (the dog crossed his legs and farted). Bob273 on Twitter was furious at parents who had asked, “No travel? I want my children.”
He told them in no uncertain terms that they should stay where they were; that if they didn’t they would have personally killed millions of innocent people and that they should be shot by the army who should get put onto the street in tanks. We decided against the hard place and went for the rock. Keeping our family unit together and sane was the most important thing. Luckily, since then journalists have asked the questions for us and fact checked them. It turns out that Bob273 on Twitter was wrong.

As a claustrophobic, the suggestion of one walk a day is very difficult for me and I’m also not totally in control of when I leave the house. It’s only been one day but I’m exhausted and snappy from trying to negotiate this rock. Also, my house is full of people which is a pretty hard place.

At the weekend I was walking a canal path in Leicestershire before the message of keeping a distance and staying at home had been made really clear. It was 8am on a Sunday morning; a time when you rarely see anyone in a place like that but the path was heaving. I was not enjoying it. Eventually, I got far enough away from civilisation to start to feel calm and after a while thought I should head back. There were a family of four on the path ahead of me: a proper middle class Market Harborough family in Joules wellies and striped T-shirts, with blond tousle-haired kids holding a nature trail worksheet. I moved to the edge of the path by the water and they moved onto the bank. We should have been able to keep walking and just about keep far enough apart but they stopped and huddled together on the bank. I looked up, smiled and the mother pushed her children into the hedge.
“Gio! Angus! We’ve talked about this! Keep away! You don’t know who has the virus!”
I laughed at the time, thinking that those children are going to need a lot of therapy when this is all over. Now, I understand that they felt they were caught between a rock and a hard place.

Yesterday, I let the Long Suffering Husband come with me to walk the dog.  We walked to the sea wall and I suggested turning right, which normally takes you to a place with no people but the path was full, so we turned left.  Every time we saw someone come towards us we leaped up onto the bank.
"Are they the rock or the hard place?" he asked me. 

We managed the whole walk without being any nearer that 2 meters to any strangers.  Training was going really well.  It's a shame that the IOC have decided to cancel because I think we would have been medalists.

The Great National Sport of Teacher Bashing

Last Thursday, Rupert Murdoch tweeted, "No wonder China leading in medals while US and UK mainly teach competitive sport a bad thing. How many champions state school background?1" (sic)
Soon, this tweet had been picked up by the press, the lack of medals was entirely the fault of teachers in the state sector.  As I drove back from the Supermarket I was shouting angrily at the Jeremy Vine show, as people rang in with stories of how teachers had made their lives a misery in sports lessons. Agreeing that it was all the fault of teachers that we didn't have as many medals as China. Today, David Cameron has said, "The problem has been too many schools wanting to have competitive sport, some teachers not wanting to join in and play their part." (Not that this makes much grammatical sense but his meaning is clear - it's the fault of the teachers not the government!)

Teacher Bashing Olympic Sport - No medals for my drawing

Now, if we were to make teacher-bashing an Olympic sport we'd surely clean up.  No other country runs down teachers in quite the way we do.  The thing is the British are brilliant at running things down and everyone has experience of at least one teacher.  Most people have spent the majority of their lives interacting with teachers, either as a pupil or parent or grandparent and teachers come in all shapes and sizes.  I had a couple of maths teachers, who made me love watching Rugby because they taught me rude songs in choir and I also had a PE teacher who used to make me be her partner in hockey and would hit me round the shins with her stick.  I was never going to win an Olympic medal in sport, though.  I was quite good at music and never came across a single teacher in my whole time at school who didn't support and encourage me. Personally, I would be completely useless at providing extra sport in school as I have absolutely no skill I can share but I would encourage anyone who loved it.  I expect if you asked the Olympic medallists about their experience of teachers there would be a variety of answers but most would have been encouraged in their sport by their teachers on an individual human level.

Obviously, the winning of medals is far more complicated than the statistics can tell us.  It takes a talent, an interest, hard work, dedication, time, money and support of everyone around them.   Yes, teachers play a part but they are not wholly responsible for the success or failure of an individual.  Parents, grandparents, coaches, friends may have a greater influence.  

In schools, there is a great difference between inclusive and competitive sport.  PE lessons have to include everyone and yes I do think everyone should be made to do some sport each week. Keeping fit and healthy should be for everyone and it should be fun but those children that show particular skill should be encouraged to do more after school, or attend a club or compete in district sports. 

Thinking about Murdoch's original tweet the obvious difference between public and private school to me seems to be money.  The parents who can afford to pay for education can pay for private coaches and equipment (including the best horses!)   This is a sweeping generalisation but parents who send their children to private school are probably a bit more pushy and expect a lot from life and their children.  Also, boarding school pupils have evenings and weekends to fill at school and so are more likely to take part in sport after school hours, provided by highly qualified sports coaches (at extra cost).

Last Thursday the athletics started and the statistics have shifted, as all the athletics medalists are from state schools.  Loads of medalists are from Yorkshire, most are in their 20s, quite tall and have brown hair.  I blame the teachers, they are obviously favouring the brown haired students when suggesting who goes to after school athletics club.  As for the Yorkshire thing, well I can only guess they don't get a good TV reception up there (I am being sarcastic before anyone gets stroppy) and they probably have more children as well, as there's nothing else to do.

One of my colleagues wrote on facebook today, "It just drives me made that they constantly bad mouth teachers and then expect the pupils and parents to respect the very same people."  How right he is.  Maybe we shouldn't add teacher bashing to the Olympics, no matter how good we would be at it.

Loving the Limpics

Like the rest of the country, I've turned into a Limpic Couch Potato.  I haven't been for a swim all week, the dog has had shorter than normal walks and I'm even struggling to tear myself away from the TV for long enough to get a cup of tea.  I worry about what will happen when it's all over.  Will there be mass depression, the whole Country so lethargic they need to be surgically removed from their couches?  The organisers of the Olympics think that it will inspire everyone to go out and train.  They think we will be inspired to go and sculpt ourselves a stomach like Jessica Ennis.

The last time I was this interested in the Olympics was when Nadia Comaneci was getting perfect tens in the gymnastics.  That was the Summer of 1976, it was hot, you could only have a bath once a week and then you were limited to the amount of water you could have in it.  My Dad was looking after a small Telephone Exchange in a village about 7 miles from where we lived and we would cycle to see him, stopping on the way at the Ford to fish for Sticklebacks and paddle and to talk to the Tramp that lived under the bridge in the next village. The Telephone Exchange had a huge kitchen with a television in  and I remember spending hours there watching this brilliant gymnast.  This was the age when I spent most of my life upside down.

This passion for watching is how my son is with the Weightlifting.  It's so much easier for him, though.  We had one channel and could only watch what Aunty Beeb thought we'd be interested in.  Luckily, with the perfect tens flying around there was no question of not showing the gymnastics.

By the time the next Olympics arrived, I was a moody teenager who couldn't care less about sport.  Even the Steve Ovett and Seb Coe 'Clash of the Titans' barely caused me to raise an eyebrow.  I do remember it but for some reason, in my mind, it is linked with the Christmas when my Grandad drank too much, tried to walk along the kerb to prove he was sober, fell off and broke his arm.  

This year has been so exciting.  Bradley Wiggins and his sideburns, the gymnasts including the sweet little Nerdfighter gymnast, who nearly spliced herself in two on the beam, Tom Daley and his brilliant diving, rowing, sailing, horsey stuff.  I've watched it all.

But it is the names that really make me smile.  The Chinese athletes are wonderful for a laugh.  There are Yus, Haos, Dings, Pings Dongs and Wangs.  Dong Dong made me chuckle in the trampolining today.  If only he was Ding Dong and competed in the Ping Pong.

The long distance runner from the Seychelles must find it hard to be taken seriously in this country, no matter how well he does.

Gaylord Silly

But my absolutely favourite competed today.  A German diver called Katja Deickow (pronounced Kat Ya Dik Ov)

Sloe Sloe Quick Quick Sloe

I've been excited all day.

As it was still a bit frosty when I walked the dog this morning I thought it was the perfect time to pick the Sloes for my Christmas Sloe Gin.  For a non-drinker my excitement probably seems rather strange.

But I think it's about free stuff.  Those berries are there just waiting to be picked and turned into wonderful Christmas presents.

I must have looked like a bit of a nut, though.  There I was, rummaging through the bushes, with my i-pod on, singing along to the songs my choir will be singing at the Royal Albert Hall at the beginning of November, while the dog was off chasing rabbits.

With a huge 2012 event to plan for I have been trying to think of a good fun song to sing at the opening/closing ceremonies.  I've already rejected; 'The Winner Takes it All', 'Another One Bites the Dust' 'We are the Champions' and 'Born to Run' but I am considering 'We all Stand Together' and 'Celebration' (Kool and the Gang).  I made a suggestion of a name for the event that is happening in our town.  I hope they use it but I have a feeling it's too full of double-entendre.

Then I had an e-mail that left me bouncing like Tigger.  Three children from my choir have been chosen to sing a solo at the Royal Albert Hall.  Wow.  Even typing it is making my stomach do flips all over again.

My son has just suggested that they flick the ear of the critically ill patient on Holby.  Apparently, it always wakes me, his sister and the dog up!