Der Himmel über Berlin

As Brad and Rob know, my weekly Sunday game of football is utterly non-negotiable - I will not miss it for something as trivial as guests coming to visit. Row was offered the chance to have a sleep in and catch up with us later, but she decided to come along for a giggle.

I wasn't playing particularly well when a loose ball broke free. Completely unmarked, I attempted to control the ball with my right when I suddenly lost balance, turning very hard on my left ankle. I heard a crack on the way down and my ankle was already the size of a tennis ball.

Strangely, there was no pain. The only pain I was experiencing was the thought that my mountain-walking trip to Poland in two weeks was not going to happen, and even Mont Blanc in September was improbable. And that was rather significant and made me cry.

Got driven to the hospital by a friend, accompanied by the wonderful Row, who got to wheel me around the hospital in a wheelchair. By this point I had banished the idea of not having mountain fun for the foreseeable future to the back of my head and was enjoying being treated like a lord.

Got the X-ray done remarkably quicky and the news was mostly good - no breaks or fractures, but the ankle was far too swollen to be properly examined. The doc reckoned that it's either a really bad sprain, in which case I'll be grand in two weeks, or it's tendon damage, which will need an operation.

So the only option left available to us was to take a taxi home and drink booze and watch Peep Show. Which we did. Bloody hell, Peep Show is the greatest. When we had watched all of Series 5, we went back to Series 1. Eventually though, it was just too much to take so we played a hard-fought game of Scrabble. I don't want to talk about the result, except to say the QI is NOT A WORD, ROW! NO! And it turned a nine-point victory for me into a two-point mugging. Growl.

Still, shouldn't complain, I was supplied with beer and cool packs for my ankle all afternoon. I felt guilty about it until the Scrabble incident.

Then, of course, more football. We were joined by some buddies, who thoughtfully brought along food for the housebound folk. We had earlier made a short foray to my local doner shop, widely recognised as the best in the whole world, but it was such bloody hard work with crutches that we took a decadent taxi back. On the way to the doner shop, I got to wave my crutch at a car filled with Spaniards - they were beeping at the Italian colours that we had covered ourselves with. Crutch waving is excellent. Made me feel like the grumpy old man I can't wait to be.

The result? Well, I don't want to talk about that one either. Suffice to say that if Luca Toni was really the pregnant giraffe he appears to be, he would have been put down long ago for SEVERE USELESSNESS. I felt that I would have been more effective, even with an ankle the size of San Marino. Oh, and AJ, the TV was saved by the fact that I was utterly immobile.

So this morning, we had a well-deserved sleep in before commencing breakfast. It had begun as a co-operative operation, but my wobbliness and clumsiness soon banished me to a seat at the table. I think everyone benefitted from this, the scrambled egg with tomatoes and zucchino turned out very satisfyingly.

I armed Row with a guidebook and an itinerary, including the amazing chocolate shop of Fassbender and Rausch. Row assured me that if she doesn't return, it's because she died and went to chocolate heaven. I'm sure blogland will forgive me if I inadvertantly sent one of our best bloggers to her death.

After much pottering around, I headed out to see a nearby orthopedic doctor. Arriving to the surgery bathed in sweat (it's hot and crutches suck), I was upset to find that doctors are on strike for the next week. What fucking marvellous timing, assholes.

So here I am. Bored. Better get used to it; I'm going to be immobile for a while.

The wonderful Row has been resident in le Hotel du Rampage since Friday. We have been having lots of fun. She just left to ramble around town a few minutes ago, and I am lounging around my room with my feet up doing nothing.

She cooked me breakfast this morning, and spent all of yesterday afternoon and evening fetching me beers and pretty much everything else I demanded.

Is he really that bad of a host, I hear you holler. Well, yes and no. But to explain that would be skipping ahead in the report of this weekend, and frankly I have enough time to tell you all about it in exhaustive and uninteresting detail. So get comfortable.

Friday evening was spent in a Turkish beer garden with hundreds of enthusiastic Turks watching Croatia v Turkey. Pretty dull game until two minutes from the end when Turkish dreams were shattered. Luckily they were repaired a minute later, to set up a potential civil war here in Berlin on Wednesday - Germany v Turkey in the semi.

Turks are so wonderful to watch football with. They get so excited and are not aggressive afterwards, because most of them don't drink. And, flatteringly, a couple thought I was Turkish since I was wearing my Turkey jersey. This was especially wonderful since I was once told by a Turkish kid that I look like death because I'm so pale. Who's a laughing Turk now, Turkish kid? EH?

Saturday involved a day trip to a small town outside Berlin called Werder. It was my friend's birthday so a small gang of us brought food, booze and games along, found a nice spot on the shores of a river and ate and drank the day away while trying not to look at the fat old men in speedos or the naked kids frolicking.

There was a monumental game of Monopoly which was dominated by the utterly ruthless team of Rampie and Row - we* managed to piss off one of my friends so much that she lost her cool and hurled her remaining pennies and properties into my face. It was fine, we got to keep them.

Of course there was more football, the Russkis strolling though against the inneffecive Dutch in their stinkingly ugly orange yuk jersey. After celebrating my buddy's birthday in a playground (his request...), it was back to Berlin where a hot Swiss girl I am vainly trying to sleep with was having a house party. I proceeded to drink lots in order to have the courage to talk to her, but got distracted and ended up chatting with Row and Berlinlights for most of the time.

Fine, fine, I admit it, I did try to chat to her, but she actually just walked away from me. I mean, actually walked away mid-bloody-sentence.

As Berlinlights had missed his train (AGAIN! That guy...), we had another blog sleepover chez moi. There was a lot of farting, which was unusual as Kelly wasn't there. Not sure of Row or Berlinlights was to blame, but I can assure you all that it definitely wasn't me. Investigations are ongoing.

That's enough for now. You'll just have to wait until later this afternoon to find out why I transformed into the world's worse host. Time to bate your breath.

* I say 'we', but it was really just me being an antagonistic bastard. Row behaved with impeccable decorum, and restricted her unsportswomanlike behaviour to successfully distracting other players when we landed on their squares. A sure-fire success in the business world.