Glasgow kiss

Ok you drivers out there. You will recognise this situation I'm sure.

You are patiently sitting in a long queue of traffic edging forward to a set of traffic lights. In the mirror you spot a car, generally long slung driven by a hairy youth sporting orange shades , screaming down your inside. On go the indicators and he forces his battered offside wing into the front of the queue.

Have you noticed that the same tactics are never employed in the check out line at Tescos.
If someone tried this on they would be politely told where to go - i.e. the end of the queue.

In certain parts of the UK, any abuse of territory is generally met with a punch on the nose - or a phenomenon which originated in the west of Scotland called a "Glasgow Kiss". Now you are probably aware that certain animal species employ head butting during courtship. In Glasgow "pittin the heid on someone" has no loving intentions. It's designed to rapidly put your lights out.

When I first trained as a tennis coach (in the days when Virginia wore frilly knickers), we told pupils to 'punch' their volleys. This is still effective with a slow ball at shoulder height - but in the modern game groundstrokes are hit with much more power and there's not enough time for the 'classic' volley.

It's better to use a 'block' rather than a punch, keeping a firm grip on the racket handle and squeezing it with your ring and small finger (keeping your elbow near to the body). In this way there is little movement of the racket head, but you're using the speed of the incoming ball to gain power.

So there we are folks - that's my little piece of advice for today.

Keep in line....... and don't follow through with your head when kissin' your better half good-bye!