Two or three early risers may have wondered why today's blog is late.
I have to hold my hands up and say I just couldn't get up as early as usual today after a very heavy but enjoyable day yesterday which involved a visit to Great Yarmouth, a visit to the races and then a gig at Carrow Road in the evening.
Yes you read that correctly. I went to a rock concert at the football ground. I stood on the hallowed turf. Well actually it was covered in plastic so I didn't actually stand on the turf. I did stand along what would be the touchline and looked at the faces of all the people sitting in the stand (what a strange phrase - you sit in the stand but you don't stand in the sit). It was a strange feeling to see how close people were and that must be the way footballers feel when they are playing there. At least I wasn't subjected to abuse!
Mind you at my age standing for over three hours is a touch problematic, particularly after such a busy day. Sometimes when you are of a certain age and most of the audience (if not all) are younger, you might solicit a few strange looks along the lines of "what is this old geezer doing here?"
I have to remind these people that we are the generation that rocked to Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, Genesis, Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones and many many more (and that's without mentioning the Beatles and the Mersey sound that revolutionised music). We were at the cutting edge of rock music.
And so are the main attraction yesterday - The Killers. Despite their name, this band spread joy and love. They come from Las Vegas which just seems to be a strange place for a rock band to come from (I have no idea why I wrote that because Vegas is probably an ideal place for a rock band to come from).
Anyway their show was very good. Lasers, oodles of streamers, a fantastic light show and backdrops all helped to make it a memorable evening even if some of their songs seem to merge into each other.
I find that one of the problems with today's acts. After a time they become samey without too much light and shade. But that would be nit picking as far as The Killers is concerned. It's certainly something that could be labelled at the support act Blossoms. They are a British rock band from Stockport but every song they played sounded like the previous one. On other parts of the tour Killers have been supported by Sam Fender or The Manic Street Preachers. Both would have been much more enjoyable than Blossoms - a second rate British band with little real future.
Before the concert, we spent the day in Great Yarmouth and it looked really good in the sunshine. I know that Yarmouth is a marmite place - you either love it or hate it. But it does seem to have been spruced up. It will be good when the former Winter Gardens are brought back to their former glory. These are something I have written about at length in the past.
Then it was off to the races and one of those rare occasions when I came away with more money than I started with thanks to a couple of winners (actually got four but gave one of the tips to the other threequarters who backed it and the other winner was such a short price that I didn't bother to bet on it). It was a nice day watching a sport I am still enamoured with but perhaps not quite as interested in as I was.
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Still on the subject of sport. Did you see that top golfers are being lured away for a series of matches supported by big Saudi money? The website for this group says that it is looking to modernise the game. What it is looking to do is chuck shedloads of money to entice the world's best players away from the American and European circuit and the golfers are falling for it.
Some like Dustin Johnson are trying to justify what they are doing in golfing terms. Others like Brits Ian Poulter and Lee Westwood faced the cameras at a press conference and refused to answer what they referred to as "hypothetical questions." It has been referred to as a civil war in golf.
Take Phil Mickelson for instance. Mickelson is 51 years of age. In other words he is in the twilight of his career. He can talk as much as he likes about the golfing reasons for joining this tour but I would suggest being given £106 million (or it might be dollars) probably made the decision for him. My reading is the first tournament is worth around £2 million to the winner which is chickenfeed concerned with the amount of money they are being given just for appearing.
No wonder Poulter and Westwood looked sheepish when asked questions they refused to answer one of which was "If Vladimir Putin organised a golf tournament would you play in it?" In other words would you sell your grandmother for a pile of money?
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I haven't had time to process my photographs of Great Yarmouth but will feature some of them tomorrow.