Come On You Wands!

On every listing and every posting page on this site you will now find this icon (pictured left) in the top right corner. But, what does it actually mean? Well, put simply, it is an icon that represents 'sharing' and you can click on it if you wish to share the article on social media (and I hope that you do!). For reasons I have given on the FAQ page, I don't 'do' social media but, I know that a lot of the visitors to this website do. It will only take you a few seconds to click on the icon and, either grab the URL of the article you are reading or, just click on each link in turn and be transported to the login page for Facebook, X, Pinterest or even email your pals. I don't expect every post to be shared but I would like to think that you would kindly share the links to the posts that you have read that interest you the most. This, I believe, is a much quicker way than copying the link in the browser address bar, going to the chosen social media site, logging...

Here's a fictional scenario. You have just moved to a new area and you are a football lover. You are suddenly 'a stranger in these parts' and, after researching how the land lies around your new home, you find that you have three different football clubs to choose from in the immediate vicinity. They are all within easy travelling distance of your new home if you drive to them . Let us assume that your adopted town or village is near somewhere like a fictitious place called Sidcup. Now let us assume that each of the three imaginary clubs that are almost on your doorstep are called Cray Valley Paper Mills, Chislehurst Glebe and Cray Wanderers. Let us further assume that, you do not like the idea of driving your car to football matches because (a) you don't like the idea of the paintwork getting 'door-banged' in the car park and (b) you like a bit of a tipple in the bar after the game, win or lose. You continue with your research and find that (a) the oldest of th...

The Kevin Costner film, Field of Dreams , is probably one of the most unique and iconic works to cover the sport of baseball. It features a story about a farmer in Iowa who cuts down his crop of sweetcorn cobs in order to build a baseball diamond, complete with floodlights - the field of dreams in the title - after he hears a voice whispering "build it and he will come" to him.  The film continues with the arrival of the ghost of "Shoeless" Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta) , a disgraced Chicago White Sox player who, along with seven other White Sox players, was involved in the 'throwing' (deliberately losing) of the 1919 World Series. The film pans out when Jackson brings along the spirits of the other seven disgraced players plus a rookie player called Doc Archie 'Moonlight' Graham (played by Burt Lancaster as the older figure) after Costner's character, Ray Kinsella, talks Terence Mann (James Earl Jones) into a cross-USA road trip in an old VW Kombi...

An online petition has been raised by Talia Wilson , Hospitality Officer at Cray Wanderers FC, for the purpose of bringing a much better public transport system for supporters to attend Flamingo Park in Chislehurst, the club's permanent new home. But, it is not just the Wands' men's team who play there. The club has numerous junior teams, consisting of both boys and girls, as well as a senior ladies' team. In addition to all those teams, Flamingo Park is also a hub for community groups and families to use the excellent facilities. It is an oasis, if you like, in a desert of busy roads and far away bus stops and train stations. Yet, how can supporters and users of the facilities on offer get to the place if they have no transport of their own, when the nearest bus stop is 20 or 30 minutes away from the ground and the nearest railway station is even further away? And those anomalies don't even take into account the elderly supporters of our football club, nor of disab...

Based on the overall stats for this blog site since I started it a few months ago, it would appear that many visitors do not go beyond the front page. I don't mean that they suddenly surf away as soon as they land on coyw.co.uk , far from it, because the stats clearly show that visitors stay around long enough to read the articles (or posts, if you prefer) that I have posted. And, new visitors arrive all the time, from around the world. That's very encouraging news and it is positive to know that visitors enjoy reading my mixed blend of topics that range from Cray Wanderers FC to Football In General and Daily Life to Everything Else. Basically, if there's anything to write about, the chances are I'll end up researching and scribbling away. I often add something new to the site, perhaps not every day but, whenever my carer duties allow. But, the front page of listed articles on this site is not the only page to explore. I have recently added a new section entitled 'F...

My wife is sometimes a little bit fascinated by the fact that when an old musical film is shown on one of the cable TV channels, or questions about musical films crop up on TV quiz shows, just how much I know about them. Sometimes I even surprise myself with such knowledge. Many of you reading this posting will either be too young or even maybe your parents were not even born when a radio show called 'Movie-Go-Round' aired on the BBC. I don't mean that unkindly, because I am talking about the early 1960s, although that's when I started listening to it. Not out of choice, mind. Back in the 1960s, we listened to the radio a lot and, I mean a lot . Daytime TV was a long way off from blighting our lives and my parents, like most parents of the time, spent most of each day in the kitchen. Which meant the radio was on all the time. 'Movie-Go-Round' had two or three presenters in its time and ran from 1956 to 1969. Back in those days, before the restructure of BBC Radi...