So the football did not work out quite the way we hoped. City did their bit by beating Blackpool, however QPR managed to win at Sheffield Wednesday, clinching their promotion and condemning us to the uncertainty of the play off’s yet again. Although all City fan’s can look back on many occasions this season where we allowed points to slip away, I don’t think that we can begrudge QPR their success. In particular we have to give due respect to the brilliant job done by Ian Holloway. Now Mr Holloway is a much derided figure in the red half of Bristol because of his connection with our city rivals, but when you look at the financial mess that QPR have been in during his time in charge, it would be churlish in the extreme not to acknowledge the fantastic job that he has done for his team.

The match itself was a slightly surreal experience, as soon as city established a 2-0 lead midway through the first half, our job was done, so for the next hour myself and 19,000 close friends spent our time reacting to the various rumours and factual updates coming to us regarding the Sheffield Wednesday – QPR game. As always on theses occasions the misinformation was much more fun that the facts, but for the final 20 minutes or so we all knew that we were destined for 2 games against Hartlepool rather than the fast train to division 1.

In amongst bouts of work in the garden this weekend, I finally managed to finish the sprawling Jonathan Lethem epic “The Fortress of Solitude”. Much like Bristol City’s season, this was a partial success. Lot’s of brilliant interludes, but I found it rather disjointed and lacking a convincing conclusion.

I also read a couple of fascinating articles on the contrasting fortunes of two brilliant women connected with the arts in America. Firstly Saturday’s review section in The Guardian featured a absorbing piece on Maeve Brennan. Apparently a striking and brilliant figure on the Irish American literary scene, she suffered a prolonged and painful decline into mental illness and obscurity, whilst the staff of the New Yorker magazine attempted to support her as best they could. Then in that very magazine I read a marvellous piece on the effervescent Dorothea Tanning, born 10 years earlier than Maeve Brennan in 1910, she has enjoyed a very different life storey. Orynthia and I were only aware of her intoxicating picture “A Little Night Music” from 1946, which we came across by chance in Edinburgh several years ago. What an amazing character, she now describes herself as an emerging poet, not bad for someone who is in her 90’s.