Wednesday 12th September 2012

Once back from the Hare and Hound on Sunday evening, we put the TV to watch the closing ceremony of the Paralympic Games. It was a wonderful evening, perfect to celebrate was has also been a wonderful games, full of joy and human endeavour. It may sound demeaning, but the levels of competition in both games were wonderful, and supported by record numbers of fans. It has been some five weeks, the like of which we will never see again.

Thankfully the overwhelming success of the games, the venues, the staff and the transport links along with the coverage of the Olympics by the BBC were nothing short of sensational. This meant that the probably already written editorials bemoaning the usual British failures were never published, but the games and Team GB went from success to success.

And the rest of the world has looked on at the show we and the athletes put on and I hope that they were as enthused as were in Britain.

Now of course, life goes back to something close to normal. It has been a sport-filled summer; The European championships, Wimbledon, The Open, international cricket (when it wasn't raining, which wasn't often), The Olympics and the Paralympics. It has been non-stop, then coupled with the Queens Jubilee, for those that like that sort of thing; bunting and flag makers have had a good year.

And just as we thought things couldn't get any better, Andy Murray won the US Open in the early hours of Tuesday morning in New York. To put that in context, this is the first major a Briton has won since Fred Perry won Wimbledon in 1936; that is 76 years.



Since Sunday, I have been ill, and on Tuesday got another head cold and was really fir for very little other than sit on the sofa. However, we have made two Christmas Cakes as well as complete most of the chores we had planned. so that will give us a couple of days to really get out and do stuff.