WELL, I managed to half watch the World Cup opening ceremony (minus commentary) while hunched over my keyboard slogging away on the Citizen.

But even if I had been glued to the TV set for the entire half-hour or so, I don't think I would have been able to make head or tail of it. What was it all about?

In the couple of quick glances I managed I saw what looked like insects on stilts and some kind of bugs being lowered into the stadium in clouds of smoke. Oh, and some green things and giant footballs.

Yes, it was all very colourful, with some very nice colours indeed. A bit of a bore though if you are colour blind - or were watching on a black and white telly.

I wouldn't complain so much had France learned only a few days earlier that they would be hosting the world's greatest sporting extravaganza.

Then they would have had some excuse for producing an opening 'spectacle' that generated as much excitement as waiting for a number 9 bus on a wet Friday night - in Blackburn.

IN case you haven't realised, I am a bit of cynic. But I must admit to being brought down to earth by a story in one of the Sunday papers. It was about an 11-year-old lad who had just died from leukaemia and had bequeathed all his favourite toys to his best friends. He made his will with the help of his mum just a few days before he passed away. Very sad. How does a parent cope with the death of a child? I suppose they never ever get over it. The story made me realise just how awful life can be.

AND still on the subject of the World Cup.OH to be young, free and single, indeed to be young or free or single. Any would do me, in any combination.

The reason for my yearning is that I was listening to a downmarket radio station (as I usually do) when a girl from Nottingham was being interviewed on the phone by the DJ.

The girl was bemoaning the fact that there were no spare, good looking chaps in Nottingham, the problem being that there were more females than males.

Apparently, I read somewhere that men are now well outnumbered by the ladies, which struck me as being a bit of a bonus.

So I ventured out into Blackburn town centre one lunchtime to cast a critical eye over the standard of the local ladies (journa3listic research). Well, there definitely were more women than men around, but the overall standard of womanhood on display was, well, not particularly impressive.

In fact, I spotted a couple of real horrors; if ugliness had its own Richter Scale then Blackburn Cathedral and the rest of the town centre would have been reduced to dust a long time ago.

I came back to the office rather dejected - and wondering if there were any vacancies on the Notingham Evening Post.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.