Against all odds both of my lads got up fresh and ready for school today, signalling the end of our alleged summer and as they left the house, rather poignantly, the rain fell from the cool Autumnal air, leaving me to reflect on the somewhat fortunate respite between the downpours during my short holidays to Swanage and Cornwall. Otherwise this summer, quite frankly, has been another one of disappointing weather, the fourth in a row, it’s lucky that us Brits are a stoical bunch, it keeps the suicide rate down. My mood has been darkened further by the revelation that after standing on a pair of scales at the weekend, my weight has catapulted from a near average of twelve stone to nearly thirteen in the space of six weeks. It is no coincidence that during this period my visits to the gym have been sporadic whilst my consumption of pasties, ice cream, sausages and alcohol have been common place, lending weight (if you excuse the pun) to the theory you really do have to burn off what you shove in.

So, as well as having to deal with nasal, ear and eyebrow hair that is threatening to turn me in to Dennis Healey, I now have a weight issue that needs addressing quickly before I start purchasing elasticated nylon slacks from the Sunday Express, it really is depressing stuff. Somewhat ironically (here’s one for you Alanis) apart from the soles of my feet and the palms of my hands, my head is the only part of my body that has decided it doesn’t need hair. Research has told me that this caused by a male hormone called dihydrotestosterone, a really nasty bastard of a hormone that increases nasal and ear hair whilst reducing it on the place where you most need it…..your head. Thank’s for that one God, you’re a diamond you really are. The one silver lining is that the spiteful rumour “if you trim it, it grows back thicker” is thankfully, a completely false one. You can guarantee a woman kicked that little urban myth off.

So today, with a knee protector strapped on, I did a three mile run followed by sixty sit ups and a grilled chicken breast with salad for lunch, followed by a black coffee. I have had just three glasses of red wine (for medicinal purposes) since Sunday as I commence my fight to stay out of C&A for a few more years yet, and whilst I accept the road ahead is a long one, I am determined to get back to normal weight in the coming month, something that I used to be able to do just by getting up in the morning. When I was twenty one, I weighed eleven stone and despite constant abuse, my frame remained that way until I was thirty odd, allowing me to wrongly assume that I had been dealt a lucky hand and would always remain that way. Sadly, apart from running a daily marathon, the most effective way to lose weight in your 30’s and 40’s is to get divorced, unless of course, you run off with the Managing Director of Greigs.

Still, despite all these problems, at least I am not Robert Earnshaw today. Any of you stupid enough to bother tuning in to watch the English footballers’ latest attempt at ineptitude personified last night will have seen their pathetic display upstaged by a miss that will go down in history as one of sports greatest gaffes. To put it in to context, if my girlfriend was Welsh and if she had been selected to play against England last night, she would have equalised for Wales before wheeling away in celebration and getting mobbed by ecstatic team mates. However, she is not Welsh and as a consequence she was not selected, so instead, the ball fell to Robert Earnshaw, a prolific lower league goal poacher, three yards from an empty net.

What happened next will result in Earnshaw waking up screaming in the night until the day he meets his maker as, inexplicably, his foot turned in to a golfers pitching wedge and he spooned the ball over the crossbar. In a flash, what would have been the glorious pinnacle of his long career, turned in to a horror moment that will haunt him forever. Earnshaw claims he will never watch a replay of it, so one presumes he is intending on spending the rest of his years living behind a sofa on the North Pole, because I am afraid to say old chap, that miss will be beamed across all corners of the globe on Sports Quizzes that are hopefully and presumably more amusing than our very own Question of Sport where Phillip Tuffnell saying Sheffield United rather than Sheffield Wednesday results in Sue Barker and the audience from the local psychiatric unit uncontrollably pissing themselves with laughter.

The only downside of this moment of unfortunate hilarity was that it eclipsed the performance of an England side that are about as much use as Stephen Hawking in an arse kicking competition. Somehow the FIFA rankings system alleges that England are ranked fourth in the world behind Holland, Germay and Spain, but ahead of Italy, Argentina and Brazil…………honestly it does, I’m not taking the piss, look it up yourself. How on earth that happened I just don’t know……..go on try to work it out, then give up and attempt to solve the world debt crisis instead, you will have more chance. This is a team that somehow make Peter Reid and Ray Wilkins look creative, they are absolutely bereft of anything approaching entertainment. In reality I shouldn’t have wasted ninety minutes of life watching it, why I did it to myself is one of my great personal mysteries of modern times. I vowed after the South Africa 2010 beach ball and vuvuzala debacle that I would not watch England again, yet some distant sense of fanciful loyalty that dates back to the heroics of Italia ’90 made sit through it, what a deluded cretinous fool I am.

However, for just one day only, being a bald, deluded cretinous fool with nasal hair and a weight gain battle is better than being Robert Earnshaw.