Mr Brightside

SOME people may think I've given up on this blogging lark, but the truth is my mind has been a bit preoccupied of late.
Having lost my job with the sinking of the good ship News of the World, I have now had to contend with my wife being made redundant.
With luck like that, it's not hard to believe that I also happen to be a lifelong Bristol Rovers fan. It gears you up to stare adversity in the face, take life's left hooks on the chin and somehow bounce back for more.
I mean, are any of our loyal supporters billionaires? Not that I've heard.
Where is our Jack Walker, our Sir Elton John or our Dave Whelan?
All these years of scraping the bottom of life's football barrel and I've yet to cross paths with one single super-rich Gashead.
I guess it's that feeling that we're all in the same rocky boat that somehow keeps us going.
And I have a positive thought amid the doom and gloom. It's the kind of thing that inspired Monty Python to write their old classic "Always Look On The Bright Side of Life".
Amid all the bad luck, I am a great believer that there is always something to balance things up - albeit briefly.
I may not have expected to find my personal circumstances in such dire straits but, let's face it, as a fervent cricket fan I never believed I would see the day when England were the No.1 team in the world.
Compared to that Bristol Rovers getting promoted, or at least achieving a play-off spot, shouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility.
Admittedly, the great Paul Buckle era hasn't begun with an almighty bang. As firework displays go it has been more like a couple of fizzles and pops with the odd catherine wheel flying off the nearest wooden poll and smashing you in the gut. Losing 4-1 at Crawley springs to mind.
But looking at the record it still reads won 2, drawn 3, lost 2. Seven games into the season, but with all the cup activity, too, you could be forgiven for thinking it's been a lot longer.
Now, two home games coming up - Shrewsbury tonight and Aldershot on Saturday. After those things could look a whole lot rosier or a great deal grimmer.
Questions are already being asked of Mr Buckle - his man-management of the goal-every-four-game striker Jo Kuffour and his decision to leave out and drop certain players.
But I'm not ready to turn on him yet. Everything he has done since he has arrived has involved getting rid of players who were a disgrace to the shirt last season and trying to engender a new team spirit, work ethic and a loyalty to the badge.
Things are bound to take time when you make such wholesale changes, and he deserves a period of grace just for the positive attitude he has brought to the club. A few bad results shouldn't make us feel that the whole thing has gone Pete Tong again.
So let's stick with the players and Buckle, give them our support without howling and groaning every step of the way.
There is a long way to go and, as always with the Gas, it will be a rollercoaster ride.
I may be penniless and homeless by the end of the season, but celebrating promotion would still give me a warm feeling as I sit under Broadmead underpass in my cardboard box.