Did I have a bad day yesterday? Yes, I did. However, I tend to ignore that side of things. I expect it, I’ve been brought up to ignore the bad bits and, most importantly, nobody wants to read a blog post crammed with bad stuff. I expect, in one way and another, everyone has more than enough negativity in their lives and, having coped with it, don’t need to read more about it.

So, in Holmesian style, having eliminated the negativity, whatever remains, no matter how small, is positive. I started the day with ideas for several poems and had several more as I went through the day. I had toast and marmalade twice and successfully hid my delinquency from Julia on her return home. And finally, I had a great hour in the afternoon researching Eric the Eel and reliving some of my Olympic memories, which, as you can guess, are not about winners.

I also spent some time reading up on Alf Tupper – “The Tough of the Track”. He was the runner of my youth, tough, uncompromising, fair and, unfortunately fictional. Despite this lack of actual flesh and blood he is till real to me, and his spirit lives on. In a world where private education still confers an advantage. Seven percent of the British population is privately educated, but over 30% of our Olympic medallists come from private schools.

I’m very tempted to tell you the story of how, against all odds, Number Two Son formed a rugby team from a bunch of misfits at his inner city state school before leading them to win the City Championship and reach the final of the County Cup, defeating several private schools on the way.  But I won’t.