Listing Badly

Well that was a surprise. Just watched Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett sing a duet of The Lady Is A Tramp and it was brilliant.
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Perhaps the definition of devotion is standing in the snow watching your son's football team go from 3-1 up to 4-3 down by the final whistle while you freeze your nuts off.
Or perhaps it's to then go to Spurs and watch a dull 1-0 win in the cold while freezing your nuts off.
Still, it was lifted by the bloke behind mentioning that the Sunderland striker Stephane Sessegnon reminded him of Kenny Lynch. That led to half of those around us nodding sagely and the other half (who are aged 40 and under) simply going 'who?'
That's the trouble with young people. They haven't heard of Kenny Lynch. Probably have no idea who Harry Fowler is either, I dare say. Or Peter Wyngarde. Tsk.
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Not one but two Christmas parties this week. And I haven't got the stamina anymore. But seeing old friends in the surrounding of a pub does entail a wonderful evening of anecdotes.
My mate, who shall remain nameless, has a ghostly wan not helped by constantly finding himself unexpectedly drunk and prey to the occasional dodgy 'e' (whatever that is).
Because of this, and a similar surname (there's a clue I suppose) he has recently been mistaken by the barman of a posh London hotel for the father of Twilight star Robert Pattinson after once signing for his room number.
He has decided not to put the man right. Mainly because if he goes to this bar in this very famous trendy hotel he gets free cocktails. Each one costs around £20 normally.
At the end of the night, the barman mentions that he is going to get the nightbus home because he cannot afford a cab.
So my mate gives him £25 on the basis that he's had £100 worth of booze for that price.
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I'm 50 next year and have accepted the fact that I won't complete any of those '50 things to do before you're 50' lists. Frankly I'm not bothered.
If I have to consult a list to find things to do, then something's wrong. So it doesn't really matter than I'm unlikely to go bungee jumping or spend a night in jail over the next 12 months.
And there's other things I have yet to do and can't see myself doing either.
I have never seen Downton Abbey, played Angry Birds, been to a rugby match or visited a lap dancing club.
I have never tried skiing, eaten lobster, been to Belfast, had a tattoo or seen Blade Runner.
I've nothing against any of most of these - though there are principled reasons behind the lap dancing and lobsters. And I may yet try one or two of the other things purely out of curiosity.
The point is, if any of us really wanted to do any of those things we probably could. But only if we want to, rather than to merely tick boxes.
Besides, some the things that seem to appear on all these lists are not worth the wait, if you ask me.
Take swimming with dolphins. Tried it and, quite honestly, all it did was remind me that these wonderful animals are better off in the wild than brought up in captivity and then made to perform for humans.
One of the dolphins we were supposed to be swimming with decided to throw a moody and wouldn't come out and join in. That's when I realised that perhaps they didn't enjoy it quite as much as the handlers had claimed.
Next day we went out on a boat and saw a couple, in the wild, jumping out the water and it was much more thrilling, and cheaper, than the day before. Plus we never felt that we were getting in their way, impeding on their patch or altering their normal way of life.
That's not to say some of the items on these regular lists are not worth trying. Parascending was exhilarating, but water skiing was a letdown. Though that was my fault for trying to ski on the bottom of the seabed rather than on the water I think.
 The Great Wall of China and The Grand Canyon were truly breathtaking and, for my money, worth seeing in the flesh. The Sistine Chapel though, was too crowded and lacked atmosphere. And seeing the Mona Lisa in the Louvre is possibly less exciting that seeing it in a magazine on the sofa.
Of course it's all personal. I could make up my own list about things to do before you're 50 based on my own experiences. It would include seeing Jurgen Klinsmann score his first goal at White Hart Lane and having sex in a Ford Cortina outside a pub on the Kennington Road but I don't expect these to appeal to everyone.
So go and do what you want, and work out that if you were going to die tomorrow, compile a list of 50 brilliant things you've experienced and then tick them all and consider it job done.
Happy Chanukah....Solly