PSA At The Races

The Old Man has for years followed his own stable of horses: those whose names refer to our family's names, especially his grandchildren. I follow them too, on-and-off. We never back more than fiver each, normally a couple of quid. Anyway, here's a new member of the stable I found yesterday in the racecard at Yarmouth, Suzy Alexander. As you can see, it didn't cover itself in glory, exactly .

Anyway, he and Mam are on a bus trip to Scarborough, and I rang him up to tell him about this horse. He was in the local British Legion club and went outside to talk to me. The old club doorman had heard the conversation, and realized it centred around a horse. So he asked, half-jokingly, with his gambler's eye to free information, "Was that a tip you were getting?" Now, the Old Man could hardly say, well, not really, it's just a bit of horse-related family humour, because he would have looked a bit cagey, as if he was holding back, so he said it was and gave him the details, which the old fella wrote down. There's a bookie's next door to the club. By starters orders, the whole club was onto it, as it romped home to last place at 33/1. I notice it started at 50/1. I wonder if anyone wondered, "Who the hell is betting on this thing?".

We shall watch its career with interest.

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