The Diary

21 August 2003: Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes - And A Mystery Solved!

Unfortunately, the weather?s also had quite an adverse effect on the old Dick ?Ed gardening front; last summer, we couldn?t move for leguminous crops, so bountiful was the harvest, but this time round, all our bean plants gave up the ghost, and as for our peas, all we reaped from the exercise was a measly 16 pods. The reason? Apart from the excessive heat, bloody slugs. I?m convinced the little sods that inhabit our garden used the tropical weather an a convenient excuse to indulge in a frenzy of molluscian sexual reproduction, which must have been interesting for them as slugs and their slimy ilk are hermaphrodites: i.e. they like it AC as well as DC. Not so good for the plants, though, as they swiftly denuded all our runners etc. of leaves one murky night when we weren?t there. Our tomatoes? To use that splendid Black Country phrase, ?Bloody Bostin?!? We have three bushes absolutely replete with cherry toms, and one positively sagging under the weight of their bigger cousins. The torrid conditions were just perfect for them. Anybody know any good chutney recipes?

Back to our favourite football team, then, and a strictly unorthodox look at Saturday?s opposition ? or rather, where they live. Before the coming of Elton John to those parts, the area was mainly known for invasions of the Roman and Saxon variety. Our Latin-speaking friends arrived with Caesar around AD43, and, as one of the theories goes, they gave Watford the name it rejoices in today. The other? The word ?Wath? is thought to mean ?Hunting?, and the word ?Ford? means not the former Albion deadbeat Tony, but a place where you can cross a stream with ease. You pays yer money and yer takes yer choice. Once the aforementioned invaders had all buggered off dragging their shields (and loot) behind them, the place - it?s mentioned in the Domesday Book ? became a peaceful market town, and quite a lot of tradesmen made their home there. In the 18th century a nice little old lady called Elizabeth Fuller set up a school to educate the poor children of the borough. I don?t suppose the urchins concerned were that delighted to be dragged unwillingly from the streets and made to learn boring stuff like maths and English. No respect, the youth of yesterday?.. Come the Industrial Revolution, first the Grand Union Canal, then the railways, helped increase the prosperity of the place, and by the end of World War One, the town had diversified into printing, engineering and brewing. The heavy stuff?s gone, these days, but there?s still plenty of printing concerns going full blast, also - thank goodness ? a brewery.

Famous Watfordians? Reginald Dwight apart ? and I can?t really count him, as he spreads himself around the world like jam ? Sam Costa, the former Radio Two broadcaster; Terry Scott, the male half of ?Terry And June? TV combo (hang on; are the town really admitting to that?); Fanny and Johnny Craddock, who were to Fifties cookery what Jamie Oliver and Ainsley Harriott are to the modern era. Both lots of cooks made their reputations on TV ? and that?s about as far as the similarity, goes, folkies. And, finally: ?SIT-TT!? No, not a new Megson method of keeping his troops in order, the stock catchphrase of my last Watford celeb. Barbara Woodhouse, bless her dog-lead and worming remedies. As she shuffled off this mortal coil yonks ago, presumably, right now, she?s sorting out the heavenly hosts with a bit of obedience training.

Thoughts of Saturday?s game bring me to the vexing question I posed the other night about the last time we?d managed two four-goal wins on the bounce. I?d thought we?d have to go back to the Ardiles era to find similar, but thanks to the researches of both John Wood (who, lucky sod, lives on Oz?s Gold Coast!) and Dave Watkin, I?ve since discovered the feat lies within the more distant reaches of time, 1979, to be exact. For those of you who were but a twinkle in your mum?s eye then, that was the year Three Mile Island nearly inaugurated a central-heating system all of its own ? the nuclear reactor there almost blew up ? Margaret Thatcher became the first woman Prime Minister, The Yorkshire Ripper was about and ? erm - ripping, and the inventor of the ?Bouncing Bomb?, Barnes Wallis, finally turned his toes up. No, they didn?t bomb a dam with the container bearing his ashes. Enough of such levity, now - this is Dave?s account of the whole business. Over to you, Maestro:

?I've just been alerted by my daughter Helen to your query, and I'm not surprised you can't remember, I've just worked my way back through the reigns of Megson, Little, Smith, Harford, Buckley, Burkinshaw, Ardiles, Gould, Talbut, Atkinson (the 2nd coming), Saunders, Giles (the messiah returns), Wylie, Allen (his 2nd spell) to the original Atkinson years before finding:

DIVISION ONE: Saturday 20th October 1979
ALBION 4 (Deehan, Owen, Robson, A Brown) Southampton 0
Saturday 27th October 1979
ALBION 4 (A Brown 2, T Brown 2 (1pen)) Coventry City 1

Unless I've missed something, that's getting on for a quarter of a century! Interestingly, the actual results are the same - 4-0 followed by 4-1, both at home. What you won't want to hear is that... well, never mind that, you just won't want to hear it...?

Bets on whether we can make it three this weekend, Dave? No, and I?m not that daft either. Thanks for that, mate, but the Cov score apart ? well, we always hammered ?em in those days - that last bit?s got me really intrigued. I?ve looked through all the reference books I?ve got, but still I?m absolutely banjaxed. Just what did happen after those two stupendous wins? Apart from Del Boy getting injured and being out for most of the season, I can?t recall anything amiss, and neither does ?Im Indoors. I hate hearing half a tale, so don?t keep me in suspenders, Mr. Watkin. Defaecate, or get off the pot, because if you don?t, I shall visit your place one dark night, and do unspeakable things to your grundling trunnions...

Another sign we aren?t regarded as Division One?s fall-guys any more?.. According to the official website, we?ve nearly shifted all 20,000 of our home season-tickets. As of yesterday, the bottom line was we have but a mere 400 of the things left to flog, so I would imagine there?s a lot fewer up for grabs today. Tremendous. Just think ? all that luvverly money up-front, and that?s not counting those ?parachute payments? either. What with the sharp contraction of disposable income due to reduced TV revenue, and quite a few Division One outfits in the financial equivalent of intensive-care, it?s looking, for once, as though we are now, fiscally, one of the strongest sides in this damn league. Sunderland, poor sods, are really looking as though they might exit the division via the bargain-basement, and as for West Ham, they?re twenty-odd million in debt, are having to flog star performers to keep the suits happy, and cheerfully admit their squad is down to the bare bones. If Big Bertha?s passport etc. gets sorted before the week?s out, that will mean around seven new Hawthorns recruits in the ranks over the summer, and providing Jeremy Peace?s assertion he?s not in the business of ?getting rid? holds true, on paper, at least, we?ll have a pretty formidable line-up with which to smite and slaughter our rivals on a weekly basis. Our club?s rapidly becoming ?sexy?, and we?re in danger of becoming a ?cult? (note the ?l?, and not ?n?!). Even the media now refer to our followers as ?The Boing-Boing boys?. Worrying, isn?t it?

And finally. One... I?ve finally located Anc, and the reason he?d seemingly gone to ground was because: a) He was late arriving last Saturday and couldn?t indulge in his usual Smethwick End soiree with us Dick ?Eds, and: b) You can now call our little Baggie tiler ?Admiral?! Apparently, he?s now the proud owner of a small craft, ?Baggie Buoy? berthed somewhere in Wales. Does this mean our bijou Baggie friend?s now going to indulge in the habits that made Blackbeard Teach, Long John Silver, and Henry Morgan infamous throughout the seven seas, cutlass, eye-patch monstrous beard and all? Masters of vessels bearing bathroom ceramics as cargo had better watch out, methinks.

Two... Just a thought. In view of the authorities clamping down on The Liquidator, and the apparent immunity given by these same guardians of our morals to supporters chanting ?ASS!? at poor old Berndt, perhaps one of our players should now do the decent thing by changing their name by Deed Poll to: ?F*** OFF WANDERERS??

 - Glynis Wright

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