Monday 1st July, 1996

I watched the final between Germany and Czech Republic yesterday and felt sad. Not as sad as the Czech goalkeeper after he punched Bierhoff’s shot in, but sad nonetheless. It should have been England. We were destined to win this tournament. If only Gazza had got a toe on that cross. My brother and I wanted to bleach our hair to look like Gazza but my mum wouldn’t let us. She made a compromise and said we could put lemon juice on our hair and sit in the sun, but it didn’t work. I also tried using Jif washing detergent because it was lemon-flavoured but that didn’t work either. It just made my scalp itch.

I missed the first half of the Germany game because of our school play. We were doing Yanomamo and I was playing the role of a dancing spider called Theraphos Blondi. I was wearing tights on my arms and legs and also had tights stuffed with newspapers Sellotaped to my sides to give me four extra legs. Me and a classmate, also dressed as Theraphos Blondi, sang a duet about how dangerous a spider he is.

He is very dangerous.

Just before I went on stage, a guy in Year 6 came backstage (my classroom) shouting that England were 1–0 up. The game had only kicked off 5 minutes ago and he had a reputation for lying so I told him to shut up. He swore on his mum’s life and told me that I was the one who should shut up. I warned him that I was the largest living spider and he should stop being a liar. He then said that my mum was a liar. I don’t think this is the case and my mum’s trustworthiness didn’t seem relevant to our conversation.

My performance went well, although the crowd seemed to be laughing more than looking scared. Returning backstage, one of my friends, a more reliable source, informed me that it was now 1–1. Kuntz had scored for Germany. My friend was a logger and the Yanomami people hated him because he was single-handedly destroying their rainforest and putting many animals at risk of extinction.

The play finished at 8.30 pm so a bunch of us went to my house around the corner from school to watch the rest of the game. The TV was working again, thank God. Five minutes before the quarter-final against Spain, my mum had inexplicably decided to clean the TV with a damp cloth and it zonked out. We started shouting while my mum frantically called my friend’s mum who

agreed that we could watch it at theirs. My mum had tried to claim that the cloth wasn’t damp, which was obviously a lie so perhaps that guy in Year 6 was onto something.

It was a great atmosphere in my living room for the second half. As well as my friends from school, some of our neighbours were there too, crammed in and huddled around the TV. England played so well — we were just unlucky. Even when it went to penalties, I thought we were going to do it. After Moller scored and our guests had flooded out, I sat on my upstairs landing and started crying. I nearly started crying when Leeds United lost 3–0 in the

Coca Cola cup final a few weeks ago too, but managed to contain myself. It’s tough being a football fan. Maybe Leeds will win the league soon and England will win the World Cup in 1998? That would be brilliant, wouldn’t it?

At least it’s nearly the summer holidays. We are going to Chamonix in France again this year. I’m looking forward to it. It’s a beautiful place and last year, we had a great time, going hiking, cycling and swimming. I jumped off a 10-metre diving board and landed badly, winding myself. I told my friends at school that the diving board was 15-metres because this makes it taller than

the one at Barnsley Metrodome. Everyone has jumped off the one at Barnsley Metrodome. Only I have jumped off the one in Chamonix. Well, my brother has but he goes to high school now so it doesn’t count.

During one of our hikes in Chamonix, I lost my footing, slipped and started skidding down a steep snowy hill. My mum was terrified but our tour guide, a man called Kevin with a Canadian accent, came down the hill and helped me, so it was fine. Kevin said it wasn’t serious and started laughing. I don’t think my mum liked Kevin after that, even though he’d saved me. Some of the

other mums on our trip seemed to like Kevin in spite of him laughing at me. I imagine Kevin has no problem finding girlfriends.

Later, during the same hike, we were walking down a winding path when a massive rock flew from the air and narrowly missed the head of a Chinese woman in our walking group. It might have killed her. Everyone looked up to see where it had come from and a kid, about my age, was stood further up the mountain, at the edge of a vertical drop, getting shouted at by his parents.

Had he kicked the rock? What was he thinking, the lunatic? He was inches away from being a murderer. Even Kevin wasn’t laughing this time. He waved his fist at the kid and shouted something in French.

My pen pal, Sebastian, is French. He’s from Lille. Lille is on the Deule river and has an urban population of one million people, he told me. I don’t care about this. I don’t like Sebastian, I think he’s a div. I was jealous when John got a pen pal called Remi but Remi is cool and writes about pretty girls in his school. Sebastian is Remi’s younger brother and does not write about pretty girls in his school. He writes about Lille’s urban population. I might be sad about England losing to Germany but France lost to the Czech Republic so Sebastian can’t say anything. France are rubbish. They will never win anything.

Thanks for reading! Please take a look at my Facebook page for regular blogs and book updates.