GOING UP ... VERY SLOWLY
An intolerant tea-timely email at the best of times, the Fiver has had
it with idiots who board the narrow escalator in Big Paper Towers
then stand there refusing to move, leaving us stuck on the step
behind them, fidgeting impatiently as it wends its way ever so slowly
towards the top. As Jerry Seinfeld once observed, an escalator is not
an amusement ride, although you could be forgiven for thinking
otherwise the way some women make such a song and dance about timing
their leap from terra firma on to their gradually unfolding step of
choice.
Not that everyone is in as big a rush to move up in the world as the
Fiver. Fans of Newcastle United are just pleased that their team has
finally stepped on to the escalator from the basement of the Premier
League and won't care how quickly it travels just so long as they
keep gliding upwards. And in the wake of his side's crucial win over
Middlesbrough last night, Magpies manager Alan Shearer was a mightily
relieved man. "There were some big, big performances from big men
tonight, they were brilliant," he way-ayed, in what would have been a
withering dig at the expense of Lil Mickey Owen if only it had been
intentional. "We were the better side. I told my players to enjoy
that winning feeling because it's been a long time coming."
A very long time indeed. Considering last night's victory was only
Newcastle's second win in 20 games, the previous one having come
against West Brom, the only Premier League side worse than
Middlesbrough ... apart from Hull City ... and Sunderland,
Newcastle's supporters know their Premier League status hasn't been
secured yet and therefore won't be getting carried away. "We've anny
won yen match, we're neet safe yet," said one street-trader outside
St James' Park who was doing a brisk trade selling "Messiah IX: This
Time It's Shearer" T-shirts to exuberant hordes of bare-chested men
who'll never actually wear them. "Aaal we've done is beat the
Smoggies, but at least we're ganin the reet wa," agreed another
Magpie, as he made for the tattoo parlour to be the first in Toon to
have "NUFC: Premier League Champions 2009-10" inked across his
expansive gut.