by Today is Dad’s 69th birthday. He isn’t doing an awful lot, and I can’t blame him. His recovery will take time.
Right now he’s struggling to go to the loo properly, and asked me what my record is for time between visits. When I was eight, I once went 18 days. Then another 16 days. Then 15 days. Or something like that. But the first figure I know is accurate. Yes, back in 1988 I really did go two and a half weeks without a poo. All the prunes, and jars and bottles of this or that liquid from the doctor, just wouldn’t shift it. The pain was excruciating. When I finally went, holy shit.
After last week when I could hardly keep up, this week my load is much lighter. (I’m talking about work now; I’ve moved on from the previous paragraph.) As Dad said (and he’s had four decades of experience) that’s what happens when you’re self-employed. It’s either feast or famine. You can’t win. On balance I’m grateful for the reduced volume; having to trek around the city to give lessons isn’t a lot of fun when temperatures soar well into the 30s.
I’ve watched a fair bit of grass-court tennis on TV. The most compelling matches have been at Wimbledon qualifying. The stakes are just so high. Yesterday I saw Liam Broady (a Brit) in the final round, where the men play best of five sets. Broady was off like a rocket, leading 6-3 6-0 in no time at all, but sadly that was all the time it took for his higher-ranked French opponent Grégoire Barrère to click into gear. For two sets he’d been nowhere. Barrère simply had more firepower – his backhand was particularly pacy – and he reeled off the last three sets. The other match I watched yesterday involved Sabine Lisicki, runner-up to Marion Bartoli in 2013 (what a wonderful match-up that was). Six years is an eternity in tennis, though, and Lisicki has practically zero recent form. I wanted her to win yesterday against Lesley Kerkhove from the Netherlands, and she started almost flawlessly, storming through the first set 6-0. But her level dropped and Kerkhove had just enough composure to capitalise, winning each of the last two sets by 6 games to 4. That was a shame. This morning I hit against the wall next to the courts in Parcul Rozelor. I managed to fall over on the concrete and graze my knee, and hit a woman on the head with the ball. Not my best session. (Normally there’s nobody else there to hit.)
On Monday I had a lesson with Octavian, who will be twelve next month. It’s natural on a Monday to do the “How was your weekend?” thing. After he told me about his weekend, I proudly showed him my photos from 2000-plus metres. His impress-o-meter wouldn’t budge. “Yes, I’ve been there. Yes, I know. You don’t need to show me that!” I slapped my phone down in anger. Look mate, I know you travel business class to Hong bloody Kong with your dad and have been there and done that, but you’re being quite rude. The rest of the two-hour session went absolutely fine.
Here are some pictures from last weekend. I hope you’ll be a bit more impressed than Octavian.
