4:40pm Wednesday 12th November 2008
By Dennis Signy
Can you believe what you read in the papers? I never thought I'd say that after a lifetime in the profession. I'm a simple soul, a poor old pensioner who promptly pays his bills, coughs up his taxes with just a touch of middle class moaning, has never had an overdraft and has brought up five children.
My main conversation on finance is confined to wishing a political party could evolve to fight on a platform against tax being levied on bank savings when you have already paid tax on that money.
I've also never comprehended the logic of the argument from Mrs S that she is saving me money by shopping in New York at Christmas when it has cost an air ticket to get to and from Bloomingdales in Manhattan,not to mention the cost of an hotel. I'm not THAT simple a soul.
I digress. The news on the media front is all doom and gloom. Global economy ... recession .. credit crunch. Yet I am getting e-mails and post most days telling me of huge amounts of money that people want to shower on me. The only problem seems to be sorting out the banks that can accomodate my good fortune.
My spam mail tells me that there are people around the world with legacies for me and lottery wins .. not to mention the dozens of offers of Viagra at cut-rate prices. Mrs S stands over me while I delete those. She thinks my excitement should be restricted to watching Barnet play.
Take Remembrance Day as an example. Firstly, a billet doux from my friends at Reader's Digest telling me that I am on the threshold of a £250,000 prize. "Prepare yourself, Mr Signy", wrote the president of the Prize Awards Distribution Committee.
Nicola, I am prepared. So is Mrs S. She's eyeing the next exotic cruise or another jaunt to the Far East shops with one or other of her spendaholic friends.
Whilst we were making our arrangements for spending the money, a redirected letter arrived for eldest daughter Julie, who departed for her annual visit to Goa last month. She, it seems , has won 650,000 Euros in a Spanish lottery. There's just the formality of forwarding her bank details.
And then, escaping from the ever-persistent 'Eggheads'on BBC 2, I clocked in on the internet to find that the day was ending with the arrival of an e-mail telling me that I have won one million US dollars. I'll work out in real money what that is when I have finished telling you of my good fortune.
Mrs S and I have decided that our lives will not change. I will remain stoic as Barnet FC reach mid-November with only one home victory this season; the lady wife will continue her quest to represent Britain at shopping at the 2012 Olympics.
She tells whoever will listen that she thought I had money when we married and is determined, even after 42 years, find out where it is.
There was one other letter in the post yesterday that I hastily pushed to one side - a statement from Natwest telling me that I am spending more each month than is coming in. I do hope Baroness Thatcher doesn't read this blog!
There's been some positive good news this week. Graham Slyper, who sits on the Barnet board of directors with me and is my honorary chauffeur to matches all over the country, arrived back from Cyprus at the weekend to announce that he and Gill had secretly married on their trip.
If that one million dollars comes through I'll certainly get them a present.
The night sky from the balcony of our apartment was graced yesterday evening by the magnificent lit-up arch at Wembley Stadium. The sight, surely,was a sign from above - no, I don't mean the third floor! - that all is not lost as Graham and I contemplate that long.long trip up the M6 for next Tuesday's Cup replay at Rochdale. Wembley is telling us that it awaits us!
Footnote: An even more compelling sight on TV than the Arsenal kids thumping Wigan Athletic came from Ypres - the very pro-British Belgian town where they have played the Last Post every day at the Menin Gate since the 1920s commemorating the dead of the first world war. Magnificent.
Lest we forget.
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