A Victorious Start to the Hols

Quiz Team Wins Charity Quiz

Charlton 2 Fulham 1

The end of the academic term at the Centre coincided with Quiz Night this year, so instead of joining our colleagues in the bar up the road, the team and I set off for the English (notionally Irish) pub, where, when we got there, it was almost half-time at The Valley, and Charlton were 1-0 up. Charlton looked OK, and more importantly, Fulham didn't.

However the basement area beckoned and we headed on down for the Christmas Charity Quiz, in which the contribution per individual participant is tripled, and the money goes to a good cause, this year a school in Sri Lanka, as far as I remember. There are prizes, but these consist of bottles of whisky donated by our much-loved landlady.

Tradition decrees that this particular item on the quiz calendar is conducted (and most entertainingly I must say) jointly by Luis and his team-mate David, David's wife Gitte joining one of the other teams for the occasion. This of course makes it rather easier for us to win, and indeed we have so done every year bar one for the last four. And this year was no exception. Not only that, but five of the six of us won spot prizes as well, the only unsuccessful team member in this department being myself.

However as Dave the barman had told me around 10.35 that Charlton were 2-1 up and the game was about to end, I had been able to nip upstairs for a couple of minutes and witness the final whistle on Charlton's third win in a row, and thus nine points have been gained from the the three matches that I mentioned a while back as being ones we were supposed to win. I wondered at the time whether I wasn't tempting fate with such a statement, but it seemed that fate was immune to temptation on this occasion.

So, no spot prize for me, but Charlton's win more than made up for it. Despite the scoreline, as at West Brom last week, it seems that Charlton were well worth the win, and Jerome Thomas, as I had rather expected, is going from strength to strength and in fact scored the first goal - his first for the club when playing at home.

The night went on for three more hours before we all made our farewells until early next year. Charlton are in action quite soon, but the next quiz is on our first day back at work, 10 January. All-in-all, a great start to the vacation.

So, after a quiet day at home recovering from the late night, I find myself with some days in which there is much I should do, a lot I would like to do, but nothing I absolutely have to do. A very pleasant state of affairs, despite the cold which I have been trying to stave off for three or four days now. I always find that at the end of term, if your body feels like being ill, the fact that you are too busy doesn't allow it to. But once the pressure is off, then the germs zoom in. I hope they don't this time. Maybe I should retire to bed with a couple of good books for a day or two.

No doubt I will be posting again before Christmas, as I have the time to do it, but in case you are off somewhere not accessible on the Internet, I shall indulge myself in a traditional phrase which I have long wanted an excuse to use: A Merry Christmas to all Our (all right, My) Readers.