How I get my kicks

My bow of spare time is strung with many strings of hobbies and each new season and changing of the weather will lead to a different helmet being pulled out of the cupboard, another form of footwear and a differing type of glove.

Weekends in the last few months have featured, with varying degrees of success, whizzing down the ski slopes, belting a tennis ball (mostly into the net), running around muddy football pitches and zooming round the country lanes on the motorbike, all of which keep me occupied and away from the endless omnibus of Come Dine With Me on the telly ('I don't like fish but this fish is nice.... aaarrgghhh!').

These naturally go up and down in my affections (although skiing has remained king for 26 years now) but sometimes you really wonder why you do it. A week after another legendary 'Austria Oh' skiing holiday I was back in action at the heart of the defence for the mighty AUL Div. 2 title chasing Hibernians. Well in with a shot at the league themselves, the opposition, City Wanderers, were bang up for it and turned out to be one of those teams that leave you shaking your head in puzzlement.

The only wondering Wanderers seem to do is over which leg to kick you on and whether to label you with the 'C' word or another such colourful tag they picked up in some bar fight. Not content with barging you in the back the cheerful chappies would then berate you for having the audacity to fall over. As if this wasn't enough their buddies on the bench would launch into a tirade against you for mentioning it to the ref and then against their own player for not kicking you hard enough.

Naturally witty put downs and clever remarks don't hold much sway with these apes as they are usually not evolved enough to understand you are ripping the piss out of them but it does at least leave you with a smug little grin as you pick yourself off out of the muddy patch you've just been dispatched into.

The Evening Echo's Man of the Match

So why do i do it? Do I enjoy it? Why do they do it? They certainly don't look like they're having much fun. Yes I'd rather be skiing in the great alpine outdoors but that's not so easy in Ireland and anyway, once the final whistle blows it's all forgotten about and with a shake of the hand we're all best friends, apart from the ref that is who always manages to achieve the seemingly impossible and infuriate both sets of players. Why the hell they do it is anyone's guess.

(plus we won 2-1 with a last minute penalty so whilst enjoying the relative safety of the blogosphere, 'Up yours City Wanderers!' I bet none of them can read anyway)

How the Evening Echo saw it