Wading in on #indref

One rung above the thing Scottish people may well loath most (public-school-educated, southern English politicians telling them which way to vote next Thursday) is any old English person telling them which way to vote next Thursday - 'aye' or 'ach no' to use a lazy, but invitingly easy, stereotype.
So, on we go, two penny-worth time.
There are countless things I'd miss about Scotland if it were to secede- a third colour which brightens up the Unions flag, charity challengers getting an easier ride by walking from Marshall Meadows to Land's End rather than John O'Groats and Twin Atlantic to name three.
But what I think I would dislike the most is having our clearly defined geographic landmass cut into two, separate pieces - much like across the Irish Sea though that was kind of the fault of we English anyway... like in Palestine...and much of Africa....and India and Pakistan....
Anyway, I've never been to Scotland and for all I know there could be a modern day Hadrian's Wall at the border complete with barbed wire, spotlights, sniper lasers and innumerable boxes of clinical, latex gloves to check people aren't smuggling Tennent's Super Strong Lager, heroin and the Daily Record.
But the idea that this landmass is split into two formally different countries feels me with a sadness I just can't quite understand, nor rationalise. It feels like my right arm - a pretty key part I'm sure you'll agree- suddenly deciding it doesn't want to be controlled by me anymore but has the distinct disadvantage of not being able to physically escape short of cutting itself off.
Perhaps a massive canal being built from coast-to-coast might be the solution should the 'ayes' have it next week so Scotland can drift off to shack up with Iceland in one of the most bizarre partnerships imaginable - Bjork meets Rod Stewart or Lazytown creator Magnis Scheving writing a show for James McAvoy.
However, despite the perceived support for the Union in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, we should not be allowed to have a say in the argument - it is the Scots' right to have their say on self-determination and if they say 'aye', what right do we have to hold them back like an older brother snatching back a stolen toy from a younger sibling? "Here you go...just kidding."
But if the Scottish were to vote for independence, there is a huge knock-on impact for the English identity. Being English is a concept I struggle with as apart from placing overwhelming, cloying and ultimately destructive faith in our sporting teams, what separates being English from being British?
If Scotland were to sod off, what we would be? The Dis-United Kingdom? Good Britain? Three loosely-associated countries, two of which probably have more in common with Scotland than they do England? Come to think of it, who would get custody of Wales?! Won't somebody please think of the Welsh.
An 'aye' may well be the springboard for Scottish pride and a reforming of the Scottish identity but an identity crisis would be left for the English - a cynic would suggest that might be a good campaigning tool for amateur Andrew Lloyd Webber lookalike Alec Salmond.
So whatever way you vote on Thursday Scotland, do it for the positive reasons and not the negative.
But if you do go, please take Gillian McKeith with you. Cheers.

Big Men In Little Shorts - the Six Nations and I

You know the feeling when something sounds really important - like the annexation of Crimea or what that woman from The Only Way is Essex wore to dinner last night - but you just cannot seem to give it the same amount of interest as say, freeing the sock fluff from in between your toes?
That is basically how I feel about Big Men In Little Shorts From Half A Dozen Countries Pushing Each Other While Being Terribly Polite About The Whole Thing - or to give it its official name, the RBS Six Nations.
I get that it's important in the world of rugby and usually I'm unthinking enough to buy into jingoism and Scot-bashing played out on grass in most other sports but...just...something...there is something about it that means I end up writing a blog that will be read by eight people at most while the tournament culminates.
It's the sporting equivalent of not watching Borgen or not listening to Yeezus by Kanye West - it probably is worth my time, but that doesn't mean I will.
Then again, I polished off Breaking Bad in the last six weeks, just started watching House of Cards and read all of the so-far-published A Song of Ice and Fire books in about four months so I'm just as mindless and sheep-like enough to follow the tempting, tempting crowd with their offers of social acceptance in those fields anyway.
Just for some reason, the sport really, really does not draw me in. Do you know where I was when England got to the World Cup Final in 2003 and 2007 - in a branch of Argos and at a dog-racing evening respectively which about sums it all up.
I'd watch golf in the form of the Ryder Cup over either code of rugby which I don't like typing, but that is simply the way it is.
All in all, it must be pretty much the same feeling that people who are ambivalent to the omnipresent, all-consuming monster that is football feel for the rest of the 45-odd weeks of the year - enduring the never-ending questions of "Did you watch the game?", "Did you see X fuck up?", "I hate Y so much; how about you?" and so on and so forth.
No I didn't watch it, can we talk about something else? Nope, thought not. I'll go back to de-fluffing my littlest toe.