Dear Tim,

Your site is absolutely awesome. I’m trying my hand at blogging over at ZOMGILOVEARSENAL.com could you please give me some advice?

Yours Truly, A. Blogger

Blogger, I get this type of letter all the time and my advice is always the same:

1. Spelling matters — sure you can make a few typos, even the greats like me make misteaks, but that’s why the gods invented spell-check. Use ot.
2. Use proper grammar — Sentences should not prepositions end in. Neither should writing be passive voice in. Unless you want like Yoda to sound.
3. Use irregardless, A LOT, it is a word and it gets me at least 300 hits a day.
4. Boobs, lots of men like them and even some girls don’t mind them, who knew?
5. Find your voice. To do this, I created a character; he’s part sci-fi nerd, part Anglophile, and part Arsenal obsessive. He’s also 13 years old and laughs at words like cock a snook, cock sandwich, and cuckold. Oh and he likes boobs, who knew?
6. If you’re going to write an Arsenal blog, you should probably know something about Arsenal and football. This last point is often confusing to the new blogger because if you look around at some places like Arsenal News Review you might think you can get away without any understanding of the game and the sad fact is that you can’t. Unless you want to be a laughing stock

Dear Tim,

Who is your favorite Arsenal player on this team? Of all time?

Yours Truly, A. Fan

Dear Fan (if that is your REAL name) I’m caught in a bit of a dilemma with my favorite player on the current side because I like Alex Song and Thomas Vermaelen pretty equally. If you’ve read the blog you’ll know how important I think  Song is to the midfield this year. He doesn’t make too many spectacular passes (though he did set Eduardo up for that side-footer against Burnley last year) but rather he’s sort of the glue that holds the defense and the offense together. Thomas Vermaelen has simply transferred from Ajax and come straight into the Premier League and done a really nice job all over the pitch; scoring goals, mopping up defense, attacking, heading the ball, and generally being Arsenal’s hard man. Tough choice there. I’m going with…. Emmanuel Eboue.

Favorite player of all time? Patrick Vieira.

Right, keep the letters coming, if you need advice on anything (how to buy a home, relationships, family problems, Arsenal, etc) just use the “contact me” form above or simply send an email to 7amkickoff care of gmail dot com. I try to respond to all of the fan mail I receive, unless it’s really untoward (you know who you are).

Cheers.