Over this weekend Erin and I have been helping clear out Erin’s grandmother’s house after it became clear that she could no longer live on her own. Obviously it was a sad moment for her grandmother, moving out of a house that she has lived in for more than 40 years and raised two children in. But it has to be done as she was having more and more accidents and numerous visits to the hospital. We spent the whole of Saturday over there but wasn’t required on Sunday as we achieved more on Saturday than we expected. Erin’s brother, Michael was also in town for a few days so we went around for Sunday dinner and Conner was being a pain in the backside as he had been all day long. We have a theory about why he behaves this way; he watches so much television; he’ll sit in front of a screen for hours watching the same DVD over and over instead of wanting to get out of the apartment and play. We tried to take him to Toys R Us and offered to buy him anything he wanted (within reason) and he just wanted a DVD. We wanted to buy him a big Scalextric type (slot car) racing set but he wasn’t at all interested. Which was a great surprise to us as he is seriously into racing. It’s really worrying that all he wants to do is stare at a screen all day long, he never wants to go out or play with his toys. We are at a loss of what to do with Conner, hopefully when the baby comes along he’ll snap out of it, as his behaviour is very anti-social, it’s almost like he has reached his teenage years eight years too early!
Plymouth Argyle played their first game in anger of the 2009/10 season and the result; a 1 – 1 draw with Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park. Rather predictably Plymouth took the lead; but from a rather unusual source; big Hungarian defender Krisztian Timar smashing home Luke Summerfield’s corner in the fifth minute. Romain Larrieu made a series of excellent stops to keep things level until Alan Lee’s header finally defeated the Frenchman in the 63rd minute. Both teams had opportunities to win it but neither team could find the target with numerous efforts going wide. So it’s the same old shit, score first and concede late on. Plymouth extended their run of not losing an opening game since getting promoted to the Championship. A draw isn’t such a bad result away at Palace and only four teams managed to win their opening games so Plymouth are sitting in 13th place although I technically it’s joint 9th with seven other teams.
The English national cricket team need to be ashamed of themselves losing the fourth Ashes test in three days. England were bowled out for just 102 runs before half the first day’s allotted time was played. Eight of the Englishmen didn’t even make it into double figures and Matt Prior top scored with 37 not out. Australia piled on the runs over the next day and half with Marcus North top scoring with 110 backed up by Michael Clarke’s 93 and Ricky Ponting’s 78. The Aussies were eventually bowled out for 445; giving the Englishmen a target of 343 to force Ponting’s men to bat again. Inevitably England failed to hit that target falling 80 runs short meaning Australia have drawn level and the series goes down to the last test at the Oval. Australia are now in a strong position as a win or a draw will mean they retain the Ashes. England need to win the game to snatch the Ashes away from the Aussies. I wouldn’t be surprised to see quite a few changes in the batting order after the fourth test disgrace.