Football is back! Hang on, that wasn't loud enough, let's try this... "FOOTBALL! YES! FOOTBAAAAAAAALLLLL! FOOTBALL IS BACK!"
And I, for one, don't really care.
I've not bought the papers with the free new season magazines, I've not renewed my Sky package nor have I got excited over the new BT rights deal that I'm guessing cost more than the Koh-i-Noor diamond. I'll not be investing in 3D Hd TV and I definitely won't be rushing down the Everton Club shop to buy the new Everton away shirt for fifty five quid either, the mugs they sell for twelve quid a pop aren't the only ones in the shop.
I've been a fan for nearly forty years, I used to love going the match, I loved the crowded streets, the queues at the bar, the banter in the pubs, the outbreaking of spontaneous song and the gulping of dregs before dashing to the ground. The click clack of the turnstiles and the old man taking my money in a box that seemed to crush him until all you could see through the bars was an overcoat and cap with a cigarette jammed in them.
I loved the darkness behind the stands and the queues for the bogs, the smell of pies filled with meat and potatoes mush that was so hot it steamed like a volcanic pool in Iceland.
"Programmes!" Echoed in a concrete cathedral shouted by old men who sat on wooden stools and smelt of tobacco and you bought one to read when you got home.
The steps up to the stand were my favourite bit, out of the grey and into the theatre of colour and noise and light.
Each step up showed you more of the pitch, greener than the lushest Welsh valley, tended by men with dirty finger nails and garden forks who seemed to know each blade by name. Before the game you would see them walking in a line, like a Police search team, stamping down with wellington boots every now and then as if they didn't believe it was there.
I've never smoked, but on night matches I used to love watching the clouds of spent tobacco rising up to the flood lights and then into the darkness beyond. The spirits of fans long gone looking down on the floodlit pitch below, the field of dreams.
I loved the Z-Cars theme, the cheers as the players names were read out, the teams rising up the tunnel on the other side of the ground at a jog splitting to their opposite ends and warming up. Gladiators roared on by the most partial of crowds.
I loved the silence that greeted the whistle, a micro second as thousands of people held their breath as one man in black breathed out and then the roar of the first two touches.
We're off, pass, tackle, pass. Running and shouting, pointing and pushing, looking and leaning. Players a million times better than me, living my dream, alive and sinewy like racehorses, top of their game performing for me, winning and losing and drawing for me.
Feeling my pain, feeling my joy, trying their best, honest and muddy, socks down, shin pads showing, injected knees with injected pace, Ford Capri's a pina-colada away from pulling the girls I always fancied but never dared to ask.
They hadn't had media training, they didn't have twitter, the only person who owned a Bentley was the Chairman and woe betide if anyone parked in his space in the car park, because he owned the club and was the most important person there.
If there was an after match interview there was probably a fire extinguisher behind them, not a sponsor's board, and strangely, I never ever wanted to go out and buy a fire extinguisher.
Instead of a hovering mic we actually got to see who asked the questions, and they were questions, with answers. Not pointless platitudes with press office punctuation.
Managers were normally northern with faces that had seen hard work, and when they were funny they WERE funny, not because the press thought so, but because we all laughed. Foreigners were called Johnny with silky skills and Arsene was something we thought you did to old warehouses.
Defenders tackled and forwards elbowed and when people rolled around clutching their knee it was normally because all that was left was a stump with a stud stuck in it.
And now? Well they'll tell me it's a global game and the "best league in the world". Football phone ins will "prioritise women callers" and the host will have gel in his hair and laugh a little too hard when Stuart Hall comes on. Adverts with Shakespearian speeches will sell me my fix like dodgy dealers and carpet baggers with snake oil.
People will tell me the game is better, the players are better, the stadia are better and the coverage is better and no doubt on Monday I'll stand in a pub before Everton v Man U. But this time there will be no glugging of dregs and dashing to the turnstile, I'll just have another pint and crane my neck up to a telly that is a big as my Mum's old dinner table surrounded by people shouting at players who won't be able to hear them, and probably couldn't understand them if they could.
I'll not really care if I miss it though, it's not a matter of life and death any more, it's less important than that.
Much less.