TOON LOONEYS

A feast is certainly in store. My old mucker Dennis Priestley certainly has not had any Sloppy Head problems and starts the night in top spot. Den puts his form down to regular high level play and serious practice. One thing is sure, he will not be on a local beach shovelling sea coal at dawn. This was one of the stunts we did for the Samson.

I predict a brilliant match with Adrian Lewis, who last week started with 12, 13 and 16 darts against Colin Lloyd.

The other belting match will be Manley against Taylor. Pete will want to get rid of bitter memories of his 7-0 thrashing by Barney in Holland. And Phil will come out like bull at a gate – no pun intended – to jump in early with a 105 average. He had a pathetic 93 average against Terry Jenkins last week, and Manley could feel a Power surge.

BOOKS BEFORE BREAKFAST

Just like Ernie Wise and his master scripts – ten chapters before tea and toast – I have just finished one book and started another in the last 24 hours.

BELLIES AND BULLSEYES is off to the publishers at 99,923 words. Yes, I counted them. I think it is a good mix of the funny and the serious sides of our sport

SID WADDELL’S GEORDIE DICTIONARY, due out early next year, is now 200 words long. I have been researching Geordie words and have found that ‘hacky (dirty) and ‘bairn’ (child) were used by my Viking ancestors 1300 years ago. So far there is no sign of ‘oche’, the etymology of which is very uncertain.

I am also making notes for WOR SID, the tale of a little lad from a proud mining family. It won’t be as sad as ANGELA’S ASHES but it will pull no punches about the fact that nobody did the Waddell mining clan any favours. My lot were hard grafters.

Eat yer heart out Willie Shakespeare.