An email hits my inbox from Sticky's favourite craft ale brewer, Neon Raptor, who are based in Sneinton, two miles from my crib. I rub my hands with glee, get all excited and do a little jig. Five minutes later Ms Moon waltzes into the lounge to find me in a flood of tears. She passes me a box of recycled Marks and Spencer tissues, they are as coarse as sandpaper and make my nose bleed. I suggest she'd be better off fetching the mop and bucket from out of the garage, as I've proper cried me a river.
Tears dry up and my mood quickly switches to anger. The email contained bad news, folks. It said "We have stopped production of beer, and have no available or planned beer due to COVID-19." I have to act fast as my stash is running low; almost empty. I source 10x cans of Doctor Galapagos mango milkshake and 10x cans of Liquid Zoo from Left Field Beer in Birmingham. I pay a king's ransom for my booty, but it's worth every penny, as on the black market some of Neon Raptor's beers are going for a ridiculous £7.50 per can. I tip off two mates: 'Dog' and Alex.
Apart from an early wobble on Monday morning, my performances on Ken Bruce's PopMaster are much improved, and averaging around the 21 mark. Ms Moon beat me twice on Monday. I make excuses and say I was concentrating on work. I have a Sam Smith strop on. Deep down inside, I'm seething folks. I don't speak to 'The Princess' until an hour into Steve Wright in the Afternoon - sore loser or what?
It's Thursday teatime and it's been a gorgeous sunny day. I saddle up on my Boneshaker bike and head out to Netherfield before jumping onto the Colwick Loop Road. I cross over Lady Bay Bridge and turn off down some steps that lead me onto the banks of the River Trent. I stop outside the Trent End, at The City Ground, gazing and reading the messages on personalised bricks and stones on the 150th Anniversary Wall. Some are heart-wrenchingly sad, as loved ones, who devoted their lives to the Tricky Trees, have passed away.
I reminisce about some of the games I saw in the Trent End, back in the late 70s, when supporters were treated like cattle; crammed in and fenced in. I was a big (still am) Lincoln City fan at the time and was green with envy at my schoolmates revelling and soaking up Forest's unexpected success. I was ridiculed for supporting my hometown team, who were turning heads and breaking records in Division 4, under the stewardship of rookie manager Graham Taylor.
I used to jump onto the Barton Keyworth 6 bus and join my mate, Ackers, in the Trent End. I was mesmerised, spellbound and obsessive about dumpy winger John Robertson, who I'd seen struggling for form under the previous manager Allan Brown, a dour Scotsman. I loved wingers and he was the best left-sided player I'd ever clapped eyes on. He hugged the touchline and the ball stuck to his boots like glue. Two-footed, he could cross the ball onto a sixpence. To this day, I still couldn't tell you what his stronger foot was (the same with Stanley Victor Collymore). He used to terrorise Aston Villa full-back John Gidman. His jinking, dazzling dribbling skills left many a full-back feeling dizzy and sat on their backside.
I fell in love with the second side Clough built. I can hear the roar now as Stuart Pearce emerged from the tunnel, running straight to the crowd, who are chanting "PSYCHO, PSYCHO PSYCHO" as he flexes his muscles and clenches his fists. A hushed tone would then descend on The City Ground, as the crowd waited with bated breath for one of the greatest managers of all-time to appear, resplendent in his trademark green sweatshirt; always giving the lads and lasses the thumbs-up - it sends shivers down my spine, just now, thinking about it, as I cycle down the banks of the Trent, past the Nottingham Boat Club, a venue where I saw The Associates, Orange Juice and Bow Wow Wow play back in the early 80s for £2.50 per ticket.
Talking of music, I can hear some toons blasting out from a barge that's moored up adjacent to Nottinghamshire County Hall. A guy is basking in the late evening sunshine on the roof of his boat. He looks a rum 'un and so does his Heinz 57 variety snarling dog. He plays a decent set though, including 'Would You?" (Go to Bed with me) by Touch and Go and a Traveling Wilburys track.
I head over a suspension bridge and pay my respects at the Victoria Embankment War Memorial. The Great War Memorial names the 13,482 people individually who died from Nottinghamshire during the First World War. It was opened on 28th June 2019, 100 years to the day since the Treaty of Versailles was signed.
I pass Notts County's famous old Meadow Lane ground. A sign on County Road says their next game is against Harrogate Town. Lord knows when that will be. When we moved from Lincoln in the late 60s, Dad took us to both Forest and the Magpies. Secretly, I know he was chuffed to bits that my brother and I chose to support Lincoln City. But we both enjoyed our trips to two clubs separated only by a river.
Wily old Scotsman, Jimmy Sirrel, was putting down his marker as a shrewd spotter of talent when I first started watching Notts. Jimmy loved a winger and had a great scouting network North of the Border too. Stevie Carter and Ian Scanlon were the two on the flanks at the time. I remember, once, when we got free tickets, through school, to watch County v Sheffield Wed in 1974. Little were we to know that history was to be made that day. Mercurial and eccentric Scottish winger, Scanlon, scored a hat-trick in 165 seconds. My Dad, a reporter on the Daily Mirror, covered a story about Scanlon years later when he made false claims to have inherited a large fortune. He disappeared back up north, seeing his days out at Aberdeen and St Mirren. That day, though, stood with Dad on the Spion Kop, with its quirky scoreboard, is etched in the memory forever.
I enjoy a few hours of football quizzing and drinking copious amounts of beer and gin on Friday evening as I Microsoft Team-up with some friends that I've known for over 30 years or more. I struggle with the quiz, as the gin kicks in, but love the craic with the lads, who I miss dearly. Well done Bobby.
I'm back on the bike on Saturday morning, after a couple of rounds of cheese on toast for brekky. I pedal up Gedling Road, past The Gedling Inn, and turn right at the roundabout, which the All Hallows Church towers above. I noticed a cycle track sign to Burton Joyce the other day, whilst we were on our daily walk. I ride up to the back of Carlton le-Willows School. I clock a new state of the art 3G pitch - Sticky doesn't do 3G folks and it cost £1 million to build too .. Wow!
I have to slam the anchors on when I reach a barrier with a no entry sign plonked on it - they are building a new Gedling Access Road that will link the B684 on Mapperley Plains and A612 Nottingham Road. Disappointed, I head back and chance upon a dog walker squeezing through a gate at Gedling House Woods and Meadows. He advises me to ride through the woods and says it should bring me out onto the road near Burton Joyce. It's like a scene from Last of the Summer Wine as I take a tumble from my bike on two separate occasions over dead tree stumps. I've been in these woods for chuffing ages now, it's like a scene from The Blair Witch Project. Crikey Moses, I don't believe it, everywhere is sealed off because of that bloody access road. I trudge back to where I started from, past the startled dog walker, who I blank as the red mist descends upon me.
I reach Burton Joyce without further incident(s). You'd need some serious lolly to live amongst its 3500 residents. No pub really takes my fancy. Gavin and Stacy actor, Matthew Horne, who's from the village', was 'struck by a train' on the crossings, as he stumbled out of the nearby Lord Nelson, in December 2018, after a few too many cans of Shandy Bass. I have a mooch about the place, but there's not much to report apart from a queue at the Co-op and a nice church on the main road, whose view is blocked by a huge Cedar tree.
I pull open the curtains at the crack of 8.30 a.m. on Sunday morning, shower, shave and grab a couple of apples and head out towards Carlton Hill. There's the odd jogger or elderly gentlemen returning from a newsagent with Sunday papers tucked under their arms. There are no queues at hand car washes or the humming of bus engines at the Nottingham City Transport depot.
I blank the Neon Raptor Taproom as I swing a left onto Pennyfoot Street as there's a blue plaque I'd like to see. In 1961, Stewart Adams, OBE, was part of the Boots team who developed the painkiller Ibuprofen. It's now one of the world's best selling drugs and another reason why Nottingham folk should be proud of where they're from.
Man of the Match: No man of the match, but I can't get out of my head that nearly 14,000 people, from our county, lost their lives in the First World War.
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