Long day

With the current cold snap my three year old son has taken to forsaking his bed for the relative warmth of his parent's bed, usually at around 3 a.m. and usually when his feet have reached the zero degrees Kelvin (-273C!!!).

He proceeds to try to warm his toes on my back, my backside and my legs while his mum shuffles in the opposite direction and the opposite side of the bed. So it was this morning as I tried to get back to sleep, having woken 5-6 times already in the night as my mind turned over firstly the performance of the referee I had assessed in the afternoon and secondly, my lesson plan for today's participation in the Basic Course for New Referees.

Having tried (and to a certain extent fallen short of the required standard, note not failed) to assist on the callback evening for the July course I observed, I was determined not to repeat my less than satisfactory delivery. I had prepared very thoroughly, run through my presentation 3 times and noted where I could save time, if I started running over (a cardinal sin and my downfall last time out).

So when the clock crawled around to 6.30 I got out of bed, bathed, shaved, kitted myself out and headed to the County FA for the 8.30 pre-course meeting. I was relaxed and alert - no surprise after being awake for 5 hours and having 2 cups of black coffee within the first half hour.

Only as my allotted time slot approached did I find my nerves begin to come back and when it was time to step up to the plate, everything went almost as well as I had planned. Mr Steve again assessed me and picked me up on two points. The first was my fonts were a little small (which was something I'd pointed out to Jimmy2Bob when we first popped the presentation on screen) and I had very little audience interaction. I wasn't surprised about the second point as I had deliberately planned the session like that. The reasons were simple ... I didn't expect much interaction that early in the day and after getting interaction in my last outing, I hadn't controlled it very well and ended up running over by a significant amount.

So I've taken those development points on the chin and hopefully I've achieved the necessary standard to get nominated for the national course which would, on successful completion, see me qualified to deliver continuation training and earn the title of Licensed Instructor. If I don't get nominated, I'll just keep working at getting better, which must surely happen with more practice.

We headed outside and I provided support to Deefor for his session on pre-match preparation before delivering another session, this one on Assistant referee signals. I was supposed to be on a half and half session with half on Assistants and half on Referees signals but I eneded up looking after both flag waving sessions. It was very enjoyable and the groups seemed to respond well.

After lunch, some more support work with Jimmy2Bob this time and then we reached the end of the day meaning it was time to clean up and get tidying. When I got home dinner was just being served and Mrs Baldy, aka Specks was pleased as punch with her latest trial recipe, ham basted in Coca-Cola! Yummy dinner and set me up nicely for the evening which consisted of converting my notes from yesterday's assessment into coherent comments with motivational and development spin employed throughout.

I think I've done a fair job and the points I've identified help the referee concerned. I'm sure he'll take things on board and improve his game as a result. Now it's time for a relaxing drink and watch a little tv, but I suspect I'll be piling up the zzzzz before too long ...