Its like watching Teenage Kicks, it why the best pop songs are under 3 minutes, its why "Candyskin" by the Fire Engines will always have wee Jocky Wilson connected to it in my head. Its the soundtrack of my 18th year.
It should've been the Skids, Jocky was from Kirckaldy and just along the road from the Dunfermline mob, but it wasn't. It was Candyskin. I kept my darts in a case made of, Candyskin, that's what I told them. Rarer than snake skin, rarest of the lot.
I've never watched the Darts live, but I've watched it on the TV in the pub and those two to three minute games that can be as short as 9 darts are the ultimate in pop sensation. Sometimes there's no middle eight, just crash straight to the finish. They rarely fade out, its always "wow, what an ending!
Interspersed, as they were back then, with the incomparable Sid Waddell offering us history and cultural lessons while commentating, this is what the New Year is all about.
Who else could compare Alexander the Great to Eric Bristow, and yet he did, in that infamous comparison.
You could picture them on a talk show as Parky interviewed them,
"and so, turning to you Alexander of Macedonia, how old were you when there were no more worlds to conquer. 33 eh? How about you Eric, 27, Oh I think he's got you there Alex...."
Later when darts players got slimmer, there was still plenty meat on the bones of Sid Waddell's commentary. Phil Taylor being at Hastings in 1066? I'm sure Sid was right, they would've sent the Normans packing if Phil had been there that day. Had Sid been around today a whole generation would google 1066 to find out what happened back then, learn there was a battle, and be stunned to find out it wasn't a darts match in the Bayeux tapestry.
His commentary lives on in and lines often come out in the Edinburgh Festival. Like Shakespeare, these one liners were never owned by Sid, they were often lines he'd heard or made his own.
"He's about as predictable as a wasp on speed" has been used many times since and "its like trying to pin a kangaroo down on a trampoline" are wonderfully creative images that have graced the Udderbelly since.
If you watch the darts, you should issue bingo cards with Sid's sayings. Its a great game, and you cross them out as opportunities allow you to regale the company. This year if MVG goes all the way, I'm sure the comparisons with Alexander of Macedonia will be heaped upon him, but look who's now in his way. The old Dutch master himself, Auld Barney.
All will be revealed in the next day or two and so I leave the last word to Sid and that famous Scot from the Kingdom of Fife both of whom I pay homage to today.
"Jocky Wilson....What an athlete"
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