Monday 19 March 2018

Back (to my spiritual) home

A big day - my beloved Saints are back home, Moorabbin Oval (or RSEA Safety Park, if you prefer, but I can't believe any Sainter will call the place by that name!). OK, I've never been to Moorabbin - in fact, I've never been to the Southern Hemisphere at all, and don't expect to - but, as far as I'm concerned, it's my team's home ground, and always will be. For someone who's been a St Kilda fan for more than 30 years, I'm really quite emotional today. Go Sainters!.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Wednesday 14 March 2018

Hawking

In these times, of 'celebrities' and 'reality shows', Andy Warhol's mantra about '15 minutes fame' is all too depressingly familiar. There are a few people, though, for who it is virtually impossible to overestimate. Stephen Hawking has been one of those people. Not only was he pre-eminent in his field, but also battled against almost insurmountable odds in terms of his horrific illness. One of the most remarkable men in my lifetime, as far as I'm concerned.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Monday 12 March 2018

Sammy

A friend, someone who became one of the very, very few people knew about the link between my 'blog life' and my 'real life', once asked how my pseudonym came to be. Given that the name 'Sammy B' predated my blog, I guess it's a fair question. The answer, in a nutshell, is fiction, both in terms of reading and writing. I've long wanted to write, at least in phases, since I was in my teens, but I never really did anything about it, apart from a series of notebooks and, later, diaries - my 'Dear Diary' phase lasted for almost a decade, pretty much every day, from the late eighties into the nineties - but, eventually, they were all destroyed, for various reasons, albeit that, with hindsight, I regret their loss now. By the late 'noughties', however, I found the writing bug once more, and with it, a new genre of reading as far as I was concerned - online erotic fiction, with, of course, boys 'starring' predominantly. But starring far more in love stories than purely sexual ones (although I won't deny that many have turned me on, too!). And of all those stories, my favourite is The Geppetto Project (I'm sure anyone who wants to find the story will be able to readily enough), in particular the relationship between two of the main characters, a man and a boy. And, surprise, surprise, the boy's name is Sammy. When I decided I wanted try to write stories of my own, and decided to venture into 'blogland', too, I thought about whether and if I should construct a nom de plume, and the name immediately stuck out, partly because I was so fond of the character, and partly because I've never known personally anyone by that name. The letter 'B' came about was going to be a fictional surname, but the name was to be an unusual one, referring to a Cornish placename, and I decided that it was too close to the place I was living at the time for security reasons, albeit I was being a bit paranoid, really. So 'Sammy B' became it was, and still is. Why mention my nomenclature now? Because I'm in the process of re-reading The Geppetto Project for the first time for something four years - and I still love it. And Sammy.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Thursday 1 March 2018

Gone, all gone

There's been something that I'd forgotten over the last couple of days. The fact that it's now more than two years since my old local closed, February 28 2016, to be exact. And that also means that it's more than two years since I last saw Cammy. I doubt that he would remember me now, but I've never forgotten him. He could been my boy (and no, I don't mean that I wanted him sexually, he was far too young, and still would be), but that will never be. Thanks a bloody lot, Wetherspoons.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B