THE diarist watched a programme on the idiot box recently called ‘Do We Really Need The Moon?’ which sounded more like a question that would crop up during a costcutting meeting in an office when a financial big-wig tentatively asks, ‘do we really need Doreen in Human Resources?’ Anyway, the moon thingymejig centred around some enthusiastic sciency woman who pottered around various global locations at extraordinary expense and asked other sciency folk about all things moon-related before deciding that, yes, we probably do need the moon after all. It was an exercise in pointless extravagance on a par with reversing a gold-encrusted Rolls Royce into a cabinet of Faberge Eggs.
There was more needless nonsense to pore over this week – well, in addition to this diary – as members of the Barrow Neurological Institute delivered their findings from a research programme that may as well have been titled ‘Lessons In Stating The Bloody Obvious’. After a prolonged period of digging here and delving there, boffins at said institute arrived at the mind-blowing conclusion that striving for a supercharged golf swing could have damaging repercussions for your back. And here’s me thinking it was bad for your eyes. “It is,” interrupted the sports editor. “Your swing should be behind a police cordon.”
In a paper published in the Journal of Neurosurgery: Spine, the experts opted for a radical case study in Tiger Woods, a man whose dodgy dorsal is an infamous as Quasimodo’s. The result? Well, his swing jiggered his back under a damaging process known as Repetitive Traumatic Discopathy. Regular readers of this diary experience a similar problem known as Repetitive Traumatic Antipathy.
Apparently, the Barrow Institute’s next project is exploring whether Rangers get preferential treatment from referees? So, just another exercise in stating the bloody obvious one would imagine . . .
*“WHAT do you know about Real Kashmir?” asked the sports editor. “No’ much, replied the diarist. “But I did buy a fake one at the Barras.” The Real Kashmir in question is the team managed by ex-Ger David Robertson ... and they are on the cusp of winning the Indian championship. Robertson’s son, Mason, has been a key part of the title tilt. Apparently, young Mason has appealed for 38 penalty kicks this season ... and has been awarded 42 of them.
*HELENSBURGH dooker Jade Perry is limbering up to compete in the International Ice Swimming Championship next month Brrrr-east stroke, freeze style? You name it, Perry seems to revel in the chilliness of her surroundings. The temperatures that she regularly plunges herself into can’t be any colder than the reception that greets this bloomin’ diary, mind you.
*OBVIOUS gags part 2,756. Police in Dundee have launched an investigation after greens at Camperdown Golf Club were damaged by vandals on motorbikes. In the wake of his well-documented tantrums on the putting surfaces in Saudi Arabia last week, the local constabulary in the City of Discovery have asked Sergio Garcia to pop down to the Liff Road Station to help them with their inquiries . . .
*WHO’S the daddy? In the wake of creating an FA Cup upset by beating Middlesbrough the other night, Newport County keeper Joe Day was captured on the box sprinting off the field while his team-mates celebrated in wild abandon on the Rodney Parade pitch Day’s hasty departure was down to the fact that he wanted to get to the hospital to be with his wife, who had gone into labour. Unbeknown to him, his good lady had already given birth to twins by the time the final whistle had been blown. Still, a fitba player running to his wife makes a change from the usual rogues running away with someone else’s . . .
*NO way Jose. It seems the slip ups are not behind Jose Mourinho just yet. Fresh from things going belly up at Manchester United, the Portuguese found himself going a*** over elbow again when he came a cropper on the rink of an ice hockey match recently. The Special One was performing some promotional duties ahead of a match between Avangard Omsk and SKA St Petersburg in Russia when he slipped on a red carpet leaving the ice and ended up in an embarrassed heap on the cold stuff. What Mourinho was invited along to do is known in ice hockey parlance as a puck up … which is pretty close to describing the job he performed at Old Trafford.
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