celticman's blog

The Second World War is a fading memory and America rules the world. Bill Bryson (2007) The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kid: Travels Through My Childhood shows how it was won and it’s not on the front cover with a kid with a hard plastic hat painted silver, aerial attached, Pegasus’s ears pasted on, his face screwed up as he points a plastic ray gun of brightest gold, while behind him sparks fly and a surreal red and white star explodes,...

We create connections where there are none, Elie Wiesel’s acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo in 1978, was in the winter months and fell on the same day as my birthday. Night is a slim volume, able to be read in one sitting. But it is a holy book, and in these increasingly dark times, it asks the hard question of what happens when. I dreamed my elder brother stood by my bed and mouthed words of warning. Ghosts speak and what our...

I predicted 4—1 to Celtic before kick-off. My predictions usually hit the bar and go out for a corner, so no great surprise there. The bookies were laughing, yet again. Celtic’s hundredth-trophy win, fling in the Scottish Premier League that’s one-hundred and one and if it’s as easy as this then it won’t be long until the Scottish Champions hit two-hundred. Aberdeen got a boost before the game with the omission of Scott Sinclair who has went...

Lionel Messi was meant to be a sick note, not a seen it, done it message– he only scored two goals in just over ninety minutes here, one a penalty, which doesn’t really count. His first came from another tax dodger currently under investigation by the Spanish authorities (why can’t we do that here?) Up until that point Andy Rat and me had been celebrating each ten minute spell that passed without Barca scoring, me with a pint. Andy with a coke...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/group/b083bjdv I’m a big fan of BBC 4 and Nordic noir. This feels like cheating, get into dialect and ask yourself how the fuck can we have Aussie noir, when everything is bright and breezy and the action takes place within spitting distance of Bondi beach? But here we have the usual motifs, an outsider in the police department, looking to prove herself Tori Lustigman (Yael Stone) a pint-sized cop, an Aussie Sarah...

If we exclude the launch party for my debut novel Lily Poole , where I didn’t have to do anything much, but go to the bar and buy drinks and get a couple of selfie-styled photos, then yesterday’s outing in Dalmuir Library was my first outing as an author. There were only two things made me more nervous than losing something on a flip of the coin. A heads up (i) There would be an audience. (ii) No audience. The tale of the latter was far more...

Hyperbole: hyperbole hʌɪˈpəːbəli/Submit noun exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally. synonyms: exaggeration, overstatement, magnification, amplification, embroidery, embellishment, overplaying, excess, overkill. Pre-Trump becoming the 45 th American President and post-Trump, taking up tenure of office and becoming United States President, is not will Donald J Trump, last the four-year term, but will the world? That may...

I’m not sure how to write reviews. Usually, I start by saying something about the writer, such as I knew nothing about Gay Talese until I read an interview with him in The Observer Review, which focused on his latest book, the name of which I can’t remember, but the story centered around a man who ran a hotel and peeked through the ceiling at the room below and the couples that had sex in them. That piqued my interest. Next up, an online...

Those with long memories can remember a certain Ranger’s goalie being virtually unbeatable, Celtic doing everything but score and Brian Laudrup galloping up the park and winning it for Rangers. Matt Gilks played a great impression of Andy Goram, but there was no great Dane to run away with it for the underdogs. Leigh Griffiths, in 87 minutes, set up the other best striker in Scottish football, Moussa Dembele whose sublime touch won the game for...

Underneath the title on the cover, in brackets, is a dictionary definition of what The Revenant means ( n . one who has returned from the dead). Every actor after every new release must also return from the dead. Leonardo Di Caprio banked another $20 million, and got the added bonus of an Oscar as Best Actor playing the part of frontiersman Hugh Glass, a man that just wouldn’t lie down and die. This is a novel of derring-do, with a lot of daring...