Andy Murray

There are, I'm afraid, certain people whom I dislike without having any credible reason for disliking them. Emma Thomson is one. And Andy Murray is another. Or, I should say, was another. Because after seeing him beaten by Federer on Sunday I felt a lot warmer towards him. I felt really sorry for him. There was a picture of his face in yesterday's Telegraph that, I felt, summed up the disappointment he felt. Well, not so much simple disappointment but it showed a man looking as if he was staring into the abyss.
Unlike Stephen Glover in today's Mail - together with millions of other Britains - I was not cheering for Murrray during the game; I was secretly hoping Federer would prevail. But after the game I realised what the loss had meant to the Scottish player and I suddenly felt guilty that I had not supported him (not that my support would have done him much good, sitting as I was on my settee at home).
But Murray had previously come across as a rather arrogant Scottish Nationalist, a man with little charm, a poor interviewee who didn't seem to want to be talked to, a bit of a bore in fact. Now he appeared almost human and almost likeable.
And he could have won. As Boris Becker (another person it's not easy to warm to) reported yeaterday, if Murray had broken Federer's servive in the second set when they were 40/40, he probably would have won. But he didn't. And that, said Becker, is where the difference between a winner and a loser rests: the winner can take the vital point at the right time.
It would do Murray good to not only have Ivan Lendl (there's another not quite likeable guy) as his coach but someone who could coach him in the social graces. Can't think of anyone offhand.

Chairs

Why are chairs in pubs so uncomfortable? Maybe so that you have to get out of them to get more drinks down you. All the pubs I have been in in the past few months have chairs that have struts across the back which stick into the bones in my back. And since I have discovered that I have a fracture in a bone there, the discomfort is worse. This pain due to a small fracture came about by.... I know not how. Maybe from sitting on pub chairs. When the doctor sent for an X-ray and told me I had the fracture I thought: "Osteoperosis or something! A gradual crumbling of my bones to dust! Slow death as my body loses all its muscular power so that I just fall slowly to the ground like a broken toy..... But after a test of my bone density I was told I had no crumbling, no osteperosis - nothing of the kind. What then? The doc didn't know. But I did: pub chairs of course.
I once heard a radio programme in which arty critics discussed theatre, films, books etc and, on one occasion, a design exhibition. They were going on about what wonderful designs the furniture had until someone commented on a certain chair: how wonderful its design was. Then up spoke the Joe Bloggs of the company: "I always judge a chair first on is it comfortable to sit in." Well done Joe, I thought. What is the point of designing a chair if it can't be sat on with pleasure? None.
So, I am in search of a pub that has chairs that are comfortable to sit on, not the ones I keep finding with hard struts in the backs that, for some unknown reason, are always the same height from the seat as my factured bone. Ouch!