A funny old week really - 20/09/99

The news was fully of Apec, Timor, and Bill early in the week.
Forgot a classic joke, Bill was going to play golf with Sean Fitzpatrick:
"Now, Jenny, that's not what I meant when I asked you to tee me up with a hooker"
Timor continued to entertain, Thursday night Tank Commander Shipley decided to send a thousand-odd NZ troops to their possible deaths. Remarkably, all parties supported the move.
Ansett has been copping flak big time with their pilots in a scrap over conditions. They are arguing about conditions and have been cancelling flights all over the place. People who have supported the airline are starting to stop doing so, it will cost them dearly in the long run I think.
Troops left NZ and Australia over the weekend. Stories mostly seem to suggest the rebels are going to have a go at the Aussies, as the "big brother" next door I suppose. The NZ force will possibly guard a telephone box or similar sized area.
Pam Corkery has done a book on life inside the Alliance. Jim Anderton has been painted a bit of a despot. Not sure what the book is trying to achieve, can't say I will buy it.
A family of dorks attacked the tree on what is now called Half a Dead Tree Hill. The spirits told them to, not sure if it was Jack Daniels or Johnny Walker.
Spotty the sperm whale was found dead near Kaikoura, someone hacked a chunk of his jaw bone, but probably after he died.
A bit of action on Friday night, a man holed up with a woman in South Auckland, didn't hear how that ended. Someone was murdered outside a hostel in Wigram, haven't found that person yet.
Melbourne and Illawarra/St George through to NRL Grand Final. NZ player Steve Kearney will be cited for a careless high tackle and be suspended just long enough to miss a test or two I bet (plays for Melbourne now).
Didn't spot much of the NPC, Sky no longer comes to our house as of Thursday. Northland upset things by beating Canterbury (now two wins in one season). Otago was thumped by Auckland, North Harbour beat Southland, Waikato only just beat off a shield challenge from Wellington, Taranaki whipped Counties. I think there is about two weeks to go until the World Cup. Oh, and 102 days until the new millenium.
Using a cellphone in your car may be bad while driving, but last week some guy got out of his car to get better reception on state highway 2 and was killed by a truck. So, stay in your car.
Netball World Champs starts this week in Christchurch. With that, the rugby WC, the Under 17 soccer, the Football Kingz have their first game Oct 1, the America's Cup challenger series starts in October, the sports people are going to be knackered.
Big news late last week, after a little tiff between Sky and TVNZ over the Rugby World Cup, TV3 will show rugby, cricket, and league from December 1st. TVNZ said this will free up about $30mil to spend on locally made programs. I suspect their sports coverage is now going to heavily lean towards competitive face painting, rythmic gymnastics, and gaelic football.
We (me, Rory, his friend Ryan, Allan, Paul, and Paul's friend Donatello or something) went to see the Chatham Cup Final at North Harbour stadium on Saturday night. Dunedin Techical who lost the game the week before (and the final last year), played Waitakere City who beat Central United early on to get to the final. Dunedin Tech won 4-0, was 2-0 at half time. Still some hope for Waitakere until the score hit 3-0, then it was mostly all over. Waitakere supporters were what I would term "particularly vocal" except for a few minutes after each goal.
Diana went to see "Waking Ned Divine" with Jackie while we were soccering.
The big week continued for us, with Hannah having her leaving at kindy, which I attended for a while. Then it was off to school on Wednesday, I came along for a little while for that too. She had a pretty happy few days. Rory kept an eye on her, she got hit in the head with a ball once and Rory took charge. Fooled around with her on Friday morning at school as well. Now she is on holiday for two weeks for her second term begins.
Saturday was party day, Hannah was so excited about that. We had eight or nine little girls running around the place, plus Guy and Rory. Bluebelle entertained them, Rory supplied heckles from the back, and Bluebelle handled him pretty well (used him for the finger chopping off trick). Girls were all pretty well behaved. Some are already at school and many are about to start. We had tears once, and that was all, so not too bad all things considered. We are seriously thinking of sending Rory somewhere else for next year's party. We could just lock him in a cupboard I suppose.
Sunday was mostly quiet, rain came. Diana and I rearranged the sleepout in preparation for the shift from the office, which is not due to complete until 31 October. Will be busy until then between that and building (none this weekend).
No news on Thomas, Charles, as he is on holiday in Australia. Forgot they were away, rang the house, Sue answered, I got dead confused. They were all tired after the huge party they had on Saturday night and the carpet cleaners will still trying to get a couple of stains out (oh, by the way, some local carpet cleaners had to try to remove a loo bloo stain on Air Force One last week, talk about your fifteen minutes of fame - "famous bits of carpet around bogs I have cleaned" is the new book coming out).