Not quite as planned

In a parallel universe this would be one of those upbeat blogs.
We’d just about have thawed out from Press and Practice night; those who had invested would be clutching their spanking new Season Passes revelling in the knowledge that our newly-widened, levelled and painstakingly prepared track was going to produce the kind of thrills which would have the turnstiles revolving off their hinges.
Natty new race suits would have been unwrapped; Aaron, Jye and Nicolaj would have swapped tales from the operating theatre; Coty shown off his Argentinean title, Leon and new boy Kyle regaled the masses about their winter Down Under with world champs and Dany, well Dany would have been Dany.
An unofficial track record would have been set and, cobwebs duly blown away, we would have trooped over to the Black and Gold, those important enough been interviewed by Stevie Hayward, everyone done the Macarena, a quick Communards karaoke and then returned to plotting the downfall of Redcar, Glasgow and Newcastle on successive nights.
Maximum points, top of the league by Easter, an unstoppable force all summer; sunshine, crowds rolling in, Play-offs won on the last bend of the last lap of the final; KO Cup completes a clean sweep of titles after glory in the Fours and Pairs; there’s a Bandits’ one-two in the CRC, having won the first prize in five successive Bandits 5-1 Draws I “retire” my number to give the less fortunate a sporting chance (but, of course continue to pay my monthly tenner); Dick Barrie is elected to the Edinburgh Monarchs Hall of Fame.
That’s how it was going to be.
And it still might be – although we’ll have to fit it all in between June 15 at the earliest and the end of October after the latest delay to the start of the season announced on Wednesday.
As an eternal optimist I still say it’s do-able but this Covid-19 thing is proving to be a bit more of a problem than we first thought.
Having spent what is now 56 years doing my best to avoid being any kind of worker, far less a key one, I now find myself bracketed with the likes of bloggeague Sarah – a frontline nurse – and her hubby Chris, deliverer of post and parcels – genuine heroes, real key workers; a couple well worth a clap!
Instead, much against my better judgement, I find myself designated as a “key worker” which means that people who have panic bought for six successive days can be abusive to me for the heinous crime of pointing out that there’s no bog rolls or pasta on the shelves. Why? Because you’ve bought them all you half-wits.
Sadly, in spite of new guidelines, assault with a tin of spam is still a no-no in the retail sector. Morrissey once sang that meat was murder – I now understand but would claim that death by frozen chicken is, in the current climate; more manslaughter … with mitigating circumstances.
The longer I live the weirder the world gets.
Obviously someone wasn’t cc-d in on the “world’s on hold” group email as around 5pm last night the skies darkened, the Arctic wind revved up and what looked suspiciously like sleet and snow came down in stair-rods around 6pm.
Good old Mummy Nature remembered that it was a speedway night and did her best to wreck the best laid plans of mice and Courtneys.
For once we beat Nature … well sort of. Given the conditions on Saturday night track time would have been limited to say the least, if possible at all. In fact we probably wouldn’t have been able to do much more than take some team and mug shots in front of H-bar, so the worldwide pandemic lockdown did us a favour didn’t it?
OK even an optimist like me is struggling to find the sunshine in the bewildering murk that is twenny-twenny so far.
Your guess is as good as mine as to what shape the world will be in when the cost of the worldwide lockdown is counted and we return to normality.
As with all sport speedway will resume. What shape it, its supporters, backers and sponsors will be in surely depends on how long the close-down lasts.
Lessons will need to be learned both by sport and the world in general because there is a danger that this might not be the last pandemic that the modern world faces.
Those of us old enough to remember the Cold War remember when countries used to spend millions of dollars and thousands of hours on disaster planning. Stores of things such as rubber gloves, gas masks were stockpiled in secret locations, plans in place for worst case scenarios.
Then the accountants took control. Why should governments pay? Surely it would be better to privatise Doomsday and allow the private sector to organise the end of the world.
Not only would it be more efficient but there would be an opportunity for profit, tax avoidance and the odd Knighthood. Not to mention sub-leasing the logistics to somewhere in the world with a more realistic cost base – ie one that pays its workers pennies rather than a minimum, vaguely liveable on, wage.
Somewhere like … oh I don’t know … say China? A win-win scenario. What is there to lose? What could go wrong?
Who would have thought that capitalism could not – or would not – be the answer to a pandemic and that it would fall to central government, conservative ones at that, to bail out millionaires and low-paid workers alike along with everyone in between?
Who would have thought that a British health service systematically starved of funds and resources as part of a systematic political ethos would be understaffed and short of equipment when push came to shove?
Who would have thought that those undervalued, underpaid and branded “unskilled” by senior politicians less than eight weeks ago would now become key workers expected to service those who fundamentally fail to understand the twin concepts of isolation and essential shopping?
Who would have thought that a roll of Andrex would have more value than sterling?
And who will remember the lessons when all this is over?
Until then stay safe, stay sane, stay indoors and stay off the speedway forums – no good can come from being in close proximity to such a large number of obviously unwell people.