London Town http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lmoym_Zr6HY

 
It is not easy getting up in the morning in the eye of a hailstone!

It was a cold and wet morning when pellets of frozen rain, from cumulonimbus clouds, began to hit the ground. It was well-nigh eight o'clock and the country was rising in its two legs to go to work. What a crush at the station and I was hoping that everything would go off without a hitch that morning but I couldn't be more wrong; as I reached Crystal Palace Station, where I hail from, I head for the waiting-room.  It was still snowing and the heating had been switched off, supposedly, to reduce spending in response to the loss of prosperity and all that jazz, and to crowd it all, trains into London were not running owing to snow on the tracks. I looked up to the Heavens and it flashed with lightning; the sparkle hushed me but the waiting-room rang with laughter.  How was anything suppose to worsen that?, I asked myself.  Still, I often come across with people from different parts of the world in London who feel frustrated by the meteorological conditions in the United Kingdom during the baseball and cricket season.  Worst of all, it  exasperates many to realize that the weather is Great Britain's favourite topic of conversation.  Indeed, everyone talks about the weather and it is almost impossible to get away from its corollaries. Having said that it takes great courage to leave one's country  and settle elsewhere in the world. The boozy gabble of the gaggle made it impossible to hear myself thinking and as I kept a weather eye on the sky, I wondered what made the weather tick to churn out freak thunderstorms, high temperatures, wind,rain, snow and fog. On the podium, weather forecasters an scientists keep telling us that the general weather conditions are changing at steady speed for the worst but they have not yet given us a full reason for this happenings.  In fact, there has not been an emphatic statement by a boffin on this subject and it is no use to trying to call them on the telephone since their lines are always busy.  That is the state of play and the unpredictability of the weather and its dispositions. All of the sudden, there was a breach of the peace in the waiting-room and my wallet and cash deserted me in the blink of an eye.  It is said that extremely crowded waiting-rooms and trains are the favourite haunts of Pickpockets and kleptomaniacs . I was cold, wet and stranded at Crystal Palace Station, but there was no way, I was not giving in as I was determined to go to work. Certainly, I was getting on a bit for all that but I was not an oldie yet. Just then I heard a young lass said: "Let the old dear through". She meant me. How dare! She stood out from the crowd, an ambitious staff. Clearly, there was a young woman itching to succeed and go places. A young Japanese lad with specs and a camera around his neck was staring at her. "What a ghastly weather", she muttered. "Tomorrow it will be alright", I said.  "Even in Spain the weather is not up to much at the moment", she added. "At ten I was tucked up in bed last night but I hardly sleep and I got up at forenoon feeling tired and in a bad mood", I said. There was a young busker singing and once he had finished his song he came over to pass a hat round. Suddenly, a policeman made an appearance at the station and the young busker disappeared at the speed of light to avoid inconvenience with the law.  I did up my trainers after the busker left and I could see the copper looking at me. The policeman swaggered up to me and, as he rolled his shoulders, said: "Those buskers are all hard of hearing, aren't they?". He struck me as a highbrow snob and a hoity-toity individual. I wanted to tell him that my wallet had vanished from my pocket in mysterious circumstances but I thought better of it and chose not say a thing since I was pretty sure that he thought that I was in cahoots with the busker. Anyhow, I needed to get to work come what might and I decided that my best bet was to go back to my flat and fetch a pair of snowshoes so that I could get to the office by noon. The weather was sinking into depression when I set off for work for the second time that morning. Hard-going and a hell of a sweat but I made to work before noon. "All is well that ends well", I said to myself. Having said that I could not help noticing that the building had been cordoned off and I wondered why there were so many coppers around the place. It appeared that a man with a glowing face and his family had unlawfully occupy the building and the police could not evict them without the support of a legislative body. I had no other choice but to face the long journey home; it had been one disaster after another and I was not amused.

P.Figueras

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jg_4I8f8jI Basketball at White Hart Lane - HR

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgWQMnjrByw Basketball at White Hart Lane - HR