22 December – At last out from the daily grind

In every contest, someone always wins. Even if it’s not the person you want to win. But also someone has to come last. It’s not always the someone who perhaps should come last. Lots of these last places are accidental lasts.

Back in 1984, we were in the nugget of a country that is Luxembourg. Remember them? Anyway, amongst the 19 hoping to win was today’s birthday girl Anita Spanner. She gave it a good go, and had a certain Mr Gary Lux on her team to give her the boost that she needed. But even with him, she didn’t quite get the votes she wanted. In fact sh scored a massive five points from the 18 countries that could vote for her. One point from Ireland and four from Denmark. What could have happened was that our Anita was every other jury’s 11th favourite song. As we know, that’s the unluckiest place to be, as you beat a whole host of people but end up with nothing. Anita was last seen in the Eurocafé in Vienna, just going to show that she’s still a popular bunny.

Anita is 59 today.

Frohe Geburtstag, Anita!