Reasons and Excuses

As some of you may have noticed, I have been somewhat distracted for the past few months. I've had a few emails from concerned readers asking if I am OK, and another has become a very good friend through our shared love of Crystal Palace, helping me to obtain tickets for some of the club's away matches in Europe of which I have so far seen five out of six. These are memories which I shall cherish. When you support a club such as Palace, if they qualify for Europe it's an opportunity that can't be missed and I'm fortunate that this adventure happened in the sweet spot between retirement and decrepitude. If Palace (currently favourites) can win the UEFA Conference League, then it'll be more of the same next season in the UEFA Europa League. That's a big "if" though.  

My wife accompanied me on one of the trips (the Strasbourg match) as the game there coincided with the opening of the Christmas markets with Strasbourg one of the main such places, but her match experience wasn't great as she was knocked over during the surge when Palace took the lead, and tear-gassed or pepper-sprayed (I'm not exactly sure what it was in the air) on the way back to the hotel after being detained in a muddy, pot-holed car park before being funnelled out through a small gate. That Palace went on to lose after taking the lead didn't help, but I suspect that affected me more than her. She was quite pleased to have a photo taken with Mark Bright, who I also saw on the flight to Dublin and again in Bosnia before the game. He's going to think he has a stalker! Mrs Cassini doesn't seem in a hurry to come to any more games in Europe, but with Andy keeping me up until 3:30am in Bosnia watching me dribble half my dinner down my shirt, that's not really bad news. I knew I'd had a good meal, I just couldn't recall what I'd eaten. 

I've typically travelled to wherever Palace play early in the week to spend some time in the local area, and have seen southern Norway, eastern Poland (Lublin was my favourite so far, a city I had previously never heard of and an unexpected delight), Dublin and Sarajevo and Mostar in Bosnia. The Strasbourg game was preceded by a week in Rome with my wife, two days in Basel and followed by a few days in Baden Baden and Bruges. I've rekindled friendships with old friends and made new friends along the way too, some in the most unlikely of places. The Majdanek concentration and extermination camp at Lublin in Poland, the War and Genocide Museum in a still very divided Mostar, Bosnia and at Sarajevo Airport where several of us were delayed five hours and had an unsceduled overnight stay in Zurich. Being on my own, I was made very welcome by a group of fans there and while a lengthy delay is usually not the best news, I actually quite enjoyed the experience.

Unfortunately it hasn't all been good times, as we suffered a loss in the family to suicide last November which has been rather upsetting, especially for my daughter whose two year old son will now grow up and never know his Dad. The statistics are shocking. It's basically an epidemic with suicide being the leading cause of death in men under 50. I don't mean to sound trite about this, but if anyone reading this post is struggling with their mental health, please get the help you need. It's absolutely devastating to those left behind.

As regular readers will know, I am partial to a spreadsheet and when updating one of them a couple of weeks ago, had the rather unsettling experience of finding that £48,000 was missing from one of my accounts, and then find that another £30,000 was taken from the same account the next day - both transfers made to the same Charles Schwab account, and neither of which I knew anything about. Had I not spotted the fraud within two days and stopped it, I dare say other amounts would have been withdrawn until the account was drained. From what I've been told, the funds were recouped, but how someone was able to access my account this way is concerning. I was told to take my PC to be cleaned of any viruses which I did, but none were found, and I had to file a police report. The young officer asked if I wanted to prosecute the fraudster if they were found, though I suspect the chances of that are slim to none, with slim being out of town! 

Some positive news though, and I do have a new granddaughter born to my son and daughter-in-law last Friday, so we leave tomorrow for a trip to Surrey to see her with a few days in Faversham to follow. We will spend Easter in Berrynarbor, North Devon (my parents and maternal grandparents are in the churchyard there) before spending time with my older granddaughters on half-term holidays and taking in a couple of Crystal Palace home games and hoping to meet up with some old and new Palace friends. 

With one glaring exception, actually two as we had to say goodbye to one of our dogs last week - and as anyone who has been through this will know, it's very upsetting - but mostly the last few months have been busy and positive and betting has not been the priority in life that it once was. Another project has come along which has taken up much of my spare time.

Nevertheless I have made a start at updating the results for some of my systems, but I am told by Dr Tsouts that he has been following the:

"Greek draws and Serie A away wins and the results are good!"

while Peter wrote that he has:

"been enjoying a terrific run in the past month or so thanks to soccer and NFL. Draws aplenty in EPL :) have boosted my bank to a new high."

That's what we like to read, although that was back in January, so things might have changed, but next month I should be able to provide some updates.

It is quite remarkable how many hits a blog that hasn't been updated in months continues to get, which does make me feel slightly bad about my absences and lack of posts, but life is short and I've been having a lot of fun, which is really what life is, or should be, all about.