10 a.m. It isn’t a bad day today. I was hoping for the wind to have died away as I would like to take my boat Silverburn out on her maiden voyage this afternoon. Thankfully that is the case, so later we will circumnavigate Castletown bay several times. This is because I think there might be around 10 passengers and I only have life jackets for 5 or 6, so I will do it in relays.

Dad is very much in my mind today, as he usually called on Saturday lunchtime. At 12 o’clock it would be nice if I could do what the Government does and simply put the clocks forward by an hour. Still that does not help their cause and would not help mine either.

Well, I have just been listening to the radio and to some of the competitors who will be taking part in the London Marathon tomorrow. I have never represented my country in anything. It must be a truly wonderful feeling. I suppose I sort of represent my country with this blog, in as much as I communicate with folks from various parts of the world. At this point, let me welcome to the blog, Simon in Sweden who called me yesterday. You will get the hang of this thing as we go Simon.

Well as I was saying, I have never represented my country although I very nearly did once, back in the 1970’s. The Isle of Man dart team entered a team in to the British county league. It worked was like this. For each of the home matches, we picked our best players and consequently we won most of the matches. The away side usually turned up too drunk after spending all day in the Douglas pubs. However, the away matches were a different kettle of fish altogether. Most of our good players could not afford the fare so; the team was selected more on the basis of who could afford the trip rather than how good they were. On one occasion we even persuaded the bus driver to play for us even though he said he had never thrown a dart in anger in his life.

We all wore blazers with the IOM badge sewn on the lapel. I say we, because I was part of the team. I was considered as one of the team simply because I was the only away supporter. On one occasion we were playing against Warwickshire in Birmingham. It was decided that I should line up with the team in the passageway that lead on to the stage. The IOM team was on one side of the corridor and the Warwickshire team lined up on the other side. I lined up with our team sporting my blazer and badge with my hand on the shoulder of one of hour players who was also acting as my guide. As we waited to be called onto the stage to be introduced to the spectators, I clearly heard one of the Warwickshire players saying to one of his team mates. “Blimey mate, we should beat this IOM team easily enough, one of them is bloody blind!”

Well of course, he was right, however, the reason we went on to loose the match was not because we had a blind supporter; it was simply because the team had been on the beer all day and probably would have lost to the blind school anyway.

Now then, a question for you! This question was put to me by one of Britain’s top dart players of the 70’s, Alan Glazier. What is the lowest score, you cannot score, with one dart on a dart board? Answers by email and no prizes.

Until tomorrow then, this Tom Glassey, News at 10.30. about to walk the Silverburn.