LOCAL NEWS
The budget was delivered this week, which was another non-event. Lots of supposed help for low income families but I couldn't be bothered figuring it out as we don't qualify as low income. They really muck around with things like tax-relief for working parents paying childcare, which is a big issue because most people have to pay for childcare out of tax-paid earnings
Someone has been lighting cars in East and South Auckland, sometimes six in a night. No obvious pattern, but they must have done over twenty by now. Anyone living in Auckland who wants to claim their car on insurance is heading east with a tin of petrol.
Herc (short for Hercules) the dog (a dog that looked a lot like my dog, Turk) died this week. He was seen in a number of TV commercials including the "bugger" ad.
WORLD NEWS
Drama in Saudi showed us their shock-troop anti-terrorist squad getting gingerly out of a helicopter. The first couple jumped, the rest looked like they needed to be pushed. Glad I am not there.
The Pope is said to be recovering from his brush with the Anti-Christ. Helen Clark seems to have survived the encounter undamaged.
REAL SPORT
Rory had an inter-school soccer tournament on Thursday, he played in goal. Their team drew their first four pool games, lost their last one 0-1. They didn't make it through. The final was between the team we drew 2-2 with and the team we lost to. The winner was the team we drew with, so we actually did pretty well. There were kids from Rory's club team playing in four different school teams.
Rory's water polo team had an easy 11-1 win on Friday night. He scored a hat-trick (two in the third quarter, one in the fourth, was in goal in 1st and off in the second, so not a bad game).
Hannah's team were playing the other Western Springs team in our group. They had their first win the week before so we should have won. We scored early in the first half, and the girls kept saying "we're going to thump them" but they didn't. We nearly conceded a goal once or twice but managed to hold them out, final score 1-0.
Big news this morning is that Hannah's team has been put into Division 1 after the grading, which I am not happy with. They will get thumped all season and it's just not good. I have sent an email to the junior club captain, girls captain, chairman, the lead singer from Echo and the Bunnymen, and Ryan Giggs in the hope they may change their view.
I thought there were dramas last week in soccer, but this week was even worse for Rory's team. They had only 12 players, and Patrick broke his wrist (same bone as Diana did a while back) before the match and Billy got a whack on his knee and was practically carried from the field. They lost 0-2. For some reason, the coach played most of the team out of position for the first half and that set the scene for an upset loss. They are not playing well, as a team, I think Rory is doing okay but not happy with the results. He was really annoyed with Patrick for getting himself hurt.
SPORT
It was a good week for blonde female New Zealand sportspersons. Firstly Sarah Ulmer won her pursuit race at the World Cycling Champs to qualify for the Olympics.
Then the Evers-Swindell sisters did the same at the rowing in Munich.
The North Harbour Netball team beat Southern Sting convincingly in an upset (not sure if there are many blondes in the team).
We lost the cricket. I guess Daniel Vettori isn't blonde enough.
MY SAD LIFE
It's been a busy week. I am sure I will forget something.
The soccer tournament was supposed to be on Tuesday, Brett was going to come along but it was postponed due to dodgy weather. So Brett and I went to the museum. At the front door we watched an English woman try to shred her toddlers by feeding them slowly into the revolving door. I just couldn't stand it, the stupid woman had no idea. I used my umbrella as a barrier to prevent it nearly happening a third time and just managed to stop myself from asking if she had tried feeding them to the lions at the zoo. Brett and I looked at the exhibit of photos by the North Vietnamese during the war, and then wandered around a few other areas. It was a good chance to see Brett, and was a nice change of pace for me.
Hannah made another chocolate pudding on Sunday night. She makes them when Diana does lasagne to use the hot oven. Rory and Hannah cooperated and made Russian fudge the other night.
Rory's feet continue to grow, and are frighteningly close to mine in size.
Hannah's cross country on Friday was postponed to tomorrow. She has two dance exams next week.
We went to the movies yesterday. Hannah and her friend Julia saw a different movie from us, and again Rory and friend sat about ten rows away from us.
We saw Sophie the killer beagle on Saturday. I can barely type, my hands look like they could be used in a leprosy commercial. Cute, but clearly underfed. I don't know how Judy survives, to be honest. I think I am becoming a cat person.
Rory has made zero progress this week on the science project which is due in three weeks. Discovered homework that was due in today, this morning.
I hear Shin has had a high temperature. No mention of Ben's health so I assume he's fine.
Catie broke her wrist on Monday, I think. Didn't get told if she was in fibreglass cast before they left.
Gavin's thumb is recovering well, been back at work two weeks now.
Penny & Craig are away, somewhere vaguely near where Ross & Kath have gone, I think. Port something or thingamy island. North Queensland way, I guess.
Hannah has been funny with me lately, fooling around a lot, very giggly. Ollie continues to cling koala-like to her. Kitty playhouse collapsed on Ollie when Pandora got in the second story. Rory seems to want to fight a lot, said he won the arm-wrestling in his class the other day.
Diana and I waded our way through a walk this morning, it's been wet.
31 May 2004
24 May 2004
One arrives and another departs - 24/05/04
LOCAL NEWS
The government has backed down on a change to the law which would allow consensual sex between people aged 12 to 16 as long as they were within two years of age and there were only two taking part (more information than I would want to know). Funnily enough, Diana wasn't keen when she realised that would be Rory in just over two months.
Police issued a record 400,000 traffic infringement notices (tickets) last year. Glad to know I was doing my bit in helping them set that record. It includes 41,000 for not having their license on them.
Big news in the paper today, a near miss between an Air New Zealand plane and a Qantas plane (800m horizontally, 125m vertically, require considerably more) but it happened in March and whilst in Indonesian air space.
An estranged husband, subject to a non-molestation order, killed his ex-wife and baby, seriously hurt two other kids and killed himself (slowly, he was in hospital a couple of days before he died). The courts were absolutely speechless, pointing out that the piece of paper should have protected the family and they couldn't understand why it didn't work. Perhaps if they started printing protection orders on bullet-proof jackets, it might help. As Gavin said, if you would take notice of a protection order, then one probably isn't required.
Helen Clark met the Pope. Not sure which one was further from the far side of death's door. I guess it is fair to say that they both had equivalent status with the person they serve. It was a short meeting, as the Pope's ventriloquist guy was feeling ill.
An elderly woman was run over by a police car on the way to a callout near Nelson. The car's lights were flashing at the time. I wonder if it will be like the woman that was killed by an ambulance. I guess she didn't look both ways.
A string of arsons in Gore (a pretty small town) may have been slowed by the arrest of a 37-year old man (with only half a packet of matches on him).
A woman has been arrested for the murder of her husband, reported missing 16 years ago. Police have finished digging up the garden in the house they were occupying at the time. The reinstatement will feature on a celebrity gore version of the gardening show "Changing Gardens".
Lana Coc-Kroft has been in hospital nearly a month since returning from Celebrity Treasure Island. The early return is probably more interesting than the show itself, I suspect.
WORLD NEWS
An airport terminal collapse in Paris proved to be terminal for six people.
Fahrenheit 9/11 won in Cannes, the Palm D'or I think. Should help George Bush's re-election no end.
REAL SPORT
Rory's team won water polo on Friday night, 9-2. Rory made two good intercepts that the team scored from, but didn't score himself. He spent one quarter in goal and barely touched the ball.
Hannah's team could have won on Saturday, but they lost 0-1. That's okay, one more match before the end of grading and we have a good cause to be in division 2.
Rory's team played the top of the table team and lost 0-2. It was an awful game for his team, I am very concerned about how they are playing. We've had some issues with the coach this week and I am not sure what we can do about it.
Rory plays inter-school soccer on Tuesday, and we are both going to watch.
Hannah has her cross-country race on Friday, I will try to be there.
SPORT
Man Utd did the business and beat Milwall 3-0 in the FA Cup final, as they should. Giggs set up two of the goals, which Van Nistelrooy scored. Ronaldo scored the other.
The Brumbies beat the Crusaders in the Super 12 final, as I sort of expected. They were about 16-0 up after 12 minutes. I didn't watch it, had Sky set to record the FA Cup on another channel.
The first cricket test between New Zealand and England is now at the end of day four. We looked good at the end of day one, they looked good at the end of day 2, by the end of day 3 we had our nose in front. With one day left, the poms need about 280 to win, Richardson got a ton in the second innings after 93 in the first (his average is already pretty good).
The Warriors won, the Rabbitohs must be utter crap.
MY SAD LIFE
Soon after sending my email last Monday, Brett Furlonger made the trip from Perth to Auckland to be with his mother. She died on Wednesday night. Funny, I checked the paper Friday morning, almost by accident, and she was there. Her funeral is today. Brett, our thoughts have been with you this week. I had a few beers with Brett and Allan on Saturday. Luckily, no pet was hurt (last time we did that, Allan's dog Meg died while we were there).
Jonno's significant other, Emma Young, had her book come out this week. Called, "The Astronaut's Survival Guide" is a children's book. BTW, Jonno, spoke to Steph this week, she seems well.
I forgot to mention I got some sales figures on my book last week, nearly 400 copies since January, which is way better than I expected. There should only be around 500 copies left, so another version could be possible.
Rory had the afternoon off school on Tuesday, due to a teacher stopwork meeting. I picked him up and we went bowling and played pool. It was kind of fun.
I had lunch with a guy that went to the Liverpool Manchester United game a couple of weeks back. He got to meet a couple of Man United players and got their signatures on two programmes from the game, he gave me one of them. They were signed by Tim Howard and Ronaldo (the young one, not the Brazil international, but he scored the first goal in the FA Cup final on Saturday night). He was going to take his Dad to the game but he was too sick to go and took his brother instead.
Work on Rory's science project has continued. It's a long way off finished but we made good progress in getting some data. Had some interesting results so far. Been shooting CDs with an airgun. The results have been quite interesting. Rory has learned a bit about scientific method as well as ballistics and the transfer of kinetic energy.
The government has backed down on a change to the law which would allow consensual sex between people aged 12 to 16 as long as they were within two years of age and there were only two taking part (more information than I would want to know). Funnily enough, Diana wasn't keen when she realised that would be Rory in just over two months.
Police issued a record 400,000 traffic infringement notices (tickets) last year. Glad to know I was doing my bit in helping them set that record. It includes 41,000 for not having their license on them.
Big news in the paper today, a near miss between an Air New Zealand plane and a Qantas plane (800m horizontally, 125m vertically, require considerably more) but it happened in March and whilst in Indonesian air space.
An estranged husband, subject to a non-molestation order, killed his ex-wife and baby, seriously hurt two other kids and killed himself (slowly, he was in hospital a couple of days before he died). The courts were absolutely speechless, pointing out that the piece of paper should have protected the family and they couldn't understand why it didn't work. Perhaps if they started printing protection orders on bullet-proof jackets, it might help. As Gavin said, if you would take notice of a protection order, then one probably isn't required.
Helen Clark met the Pope. Not sure which one was further from the far side of death's door. I guess it is fair to say that they both had equivalent status with the person they serve. It was a short meeting, as the Pope's ventriloquist guy was feeling ill.
An elderly woman was run over by a police car on the way to a callout near Nelson. The car's lights were flashing at the time. I wonder if it will be like the woman that was killed by an ambulance. I guess she didn't look both ways.
A string of arsons in Gore (a pretty small town) may have been slowed by the arrest of a 37-year old man (with only half a packet of matches on him).
A woman has been arrested for the murder of her husband, reported missing 16 years ago. Police have finished digging up the garden in the house they were occupying at the time. The reinstatement will feature on a celebrity gore version of the gardening show "Changing Gardens".
Lana Coc-Kroft has been in hospital nearly a month since returning from Celebrity Treasure Island. The early return is probably more interesting than the show itself, I suspect.
WORLD NEWS
An airport terminal collapse in Paris proved to be terminal for six people.
Fahrenheit 9/11 won in Cannes, the Palm D'or I think. Should help George Bush's re-election no end.
REAL SPORT
Rory's team won water polo on Friday night, 9-2. Rory made two good intercepts that the team scored from, but didn't score himself. He spent one quarter in goal and barely touched the ball.
Hannah's team could have won on Saturday, but they lost 0-1. That's okay, one more match before the end of grading and we have a good cause to be in division 2.
Rory's team played the top of the table team and lost 0-2. It was an awful game for his team, I am very concerned about how they are playing. We've had some issues with the coach this week and I am not sure what we can do about it.
Rory plays inter-school soccer on Tuesday, and we are both going to watch.
Hannah has her cross-country race on Friday, I will try to be there.
SPORT
Man Utd did the business and beat Milwall 3-0 in the FA Cup final, as they should. Giggs set up two of the goals, which Van Nistelrooy scored. Ronaldo scored the other.
The Brumbies beat the Crusaders in the Super 12 final, as I sort of expected. They were about 16-0 up after 12 minutes. I didn't watch it, had Sky set to record the FA Cup on another channel.
The first cricket test between New Zealand and England is now at the end of day four. We looked good at the end of day one, they looked good at the end of day 2, by the end of day 3 we had our nose in front. With one day left, the poms need about 280 to win, Richardson got a ton in the second innings after 93 in the first (his average is already pretty good).
The Warriors won, the Rabbitohs must be utter crap.
MY SAD LIFE
Soon after sending my email last Monday, Brett Furlonger made the trip from Perth to Auckland to be with his mother. She died on Wednesday night. Funny, I checked the paper Friday morning, almost by accident, and she was there. Her funeral is today. Brett, our thoughts have been with you this week. I had a few beers with Brett and Allan on Saturday. Luckily, no pet was hurt (last time we did that, Allan's dog Meg died while we were there).
Jonno's significant other, Emma Young, had her book come out this week. Called, "The Astronaut's Survival Guide" is a children's book. BTW, Jonno, spoke to Steph this week, she seems well.
I forgot to mention I got some sales figures on my book last week, nearly 400 copies since January, which is way better than I expected. There should only be around 500 copies left, so another version could be possible.
Rory had the afternoon off school on Tuesday, due to a teacher stopwork meeting. I picked him up and we went bowling and played pool. It was kind of fun.
I had lunch with a guy that went to the Liverpool Manchester United game a couple of weeks back. He got to meet a couple of Man United players and got their signatures on two programmes from the game, he gave me one of them. They were signed by Tim Howard and Ronaldo (the young one, not the Brazil international, but he scored the first goal in the FA Cup final on Saturday night). He was going to take his Dad to the game but he was too sick to go and took his brother instead.
Work on Rory's science project has continued. It's a long way off finished but we made good progress in getting some data. Had some interesting results so far. Been shooting CDs with an airgun. The results have been quite interesting. Rory has learned a bit about scientific method as well as ballistics and the transfer of kinetic energy.
17 May 2004
Another Ben arrives in the world - 17/05/04
Roger and Shyn are now the proud parents of their son Ben, 3.9Kg, on the 11th of May (I think, not sure about time differences). Congratulations to parents, uncles, grandparents, etc.
LOCAL NEWS
It just feels like nothing happens around New Zealand these days. We don't make pyramids out of prisoners or anything really interesting.
A man was beaten to death in South Auckland on Friday. Another man has been charged with "beating a man to death".
The moth spraying campaign is officially over. We haven't been sprayed for ages. The more dramatic people out there have said that the moth spraying "ruined people's lives". It is fair to say that it ruined the lives of a number of moths, and woke a lot of people up earlier than they may have liked.
The idea of a tunnel under Parnell to help Auckland traffic has been thrown out. Meanwhile, they seem to keep coming up with new ways of charging people to drive around Auckland. This is mildly bizarre given that everyone pays heaps of tax for their petrol anyway. I don't really understand why they need more money when the Government is said to have billions of dollars spare.
The spectre of passport free travel between Australia and New Zealand has been raised again. I don't see why, I thought New Zealand was considered an easy security border and this would allow Mossad and Al Qaeda easy access to Australia. The theory is that it would encourage tourism. I reckon people would enter one country on visitors permit and go live in the other one.
The Green Party have decreed that thou shalt not use disposable nappies, because each baby creates 2 tons of landfill with disposables. They don't seem concerned about the cost of cleaning cloth nappies, the use of water, etc. I am so glad we have them out there looking after our best interests. Their bill for the compulsory wearing of caftans and the banning of plastic supermarket bags is in Parliament next week.
The government is planning on introducing changes to allow people to be prosecuted again for the same crime. It is limited to situations where they are found to have perjured themselves or threatened witnesses that affected the outcome, or where new evidence comes to light. I think where they get off due to some technicality that could be remedied should also be considered.
A Palmerston North man had boiled eggs explode in his face after microwaving them. I guess people forget what you can and can't do. Can't dry off your hamster in one, that's for sure.
WORLD NEWS
The Royal Danish wedding got plenty of coverage in Australia, because an Australian is marrying the next king of Denmark.
I am sure other things are going on, but we just don't seem to hear much, other than the prisoner thing.
REAL SPORT
Rory's water polo team were without two experienced players and they got hammered by another Ponsonby team 9-4 or something. Rory and a couple of other players stayed on for the whole game, rather than having two quarters off, he was stuffed.
Hannah's team had a tough ask. The team they played had scored 45 goals and conceded none. I told them I didn't expect them to win, but I wanted them to go out there and have a go, have a bit of fun. Well, they slogged very hard, keeping them out for about 12 minutes before the first goal. It was 0-3 at half time, and I said I wanted a better result than the 0-7 a few weeks back. Final score was 0-5 (and one was offside). That is the second worst result for the team we played and second worst for us, too. We came damn close to scoring once or twice, too.
Rory's team had another draw. I should get to see them play, finally, this weekend with games scheduled at home at 10 and 11.
SPORT
The Crusaders beat the Stormers and the Brumbies beat the Chiefs and the final is in Canberra.
Man Utd won 2-0 over Aston Villa, despite having two players red carded towards the end of the match. Arsenal were 0-1 down but came back to win 2-1 to be the first team to go unbeaten in a premiership season since about 1888-9 (when they only played 22 matches). Portsmouth had a big 5-1 win over Middlesborough, and Newcastle drew with Liverpool 1-1.
The FA Cup final is this weekend, Milwall versus Man Utd.
MY SAD LIFE
It has been really wet this week, never thought soccer would be on. Then it came right and was perfect all weekend. Spent a lot of time outside on Sunday, in the sun. Saw the first hot air balloon of the season this morning, it's very still and clear. They float around quite often in winter (is it because hot air works better in cold air?).
Rory must have been quite ill on Wednesday. He stopped Diana before she left for work and asked is she thought she was properly dressed for work. This caused much hilarity as he was the person voted least likely to know when he last changed his clothes in the family.
Hannah fell down some wet stairs at dancing mid-week, but she is okay. She complained about varying body parts for a day or two then forgot about them. She got booted in the thigh by a team-mate with little vertical control at practice on Thursday, to add to her woes.
Hannah's cat decided to pee on Rory's bed on Wednesday, for no obvious reason. First offence, hasn't been repeated. Rory took it quite well, considering. And worse, I saw him drink out of the toilet this morning, he gets inside the bowl, it's quite bizarre, he might think he is a dog.
I think I did quite well not saying that Shyn had a Ben in the oven. I never said that when Penny was pregnant first time around, either.
Diana and I went to see Troy with Rory and Adam (a friend from school, first time he's done something after school with someone from Ponsonby) on Saturday afternoon. It wasn't a bad movie, in fact it was quite good. It got two stars in the Herald, but then they did give "The Thin Red Line" five, so I haven't taken any notice of their reviews since.
After finally finishing one homework thing (myths and legends) Rory had to start on his next big thing (science project). It isn't going well, we have to nag and harass the whole time.
I'M SORRY, I'LL WRITE THAT AGAIN
Forgot to mention that the issue of PC World with Ross's gleaming fizzog came out last week. It was an incredibly boring piece on using contractors, and they needed a real person. Ross was all I could find. Interestingly (for me, at least), they didn't put my pic in it's normal place, except at the back next to a pic of the lead singer of Alien Ant Farm, who somebody thought I resembled.
LOCAL NEWS
It just feels like nothing happens around New Zealand these days. We don't make pyramids out of prisoners or anything really interesting.
A man was beaten to death in South Auckland on Friday. Another man has been charged with "beating a man to death".
The moth spraying campaign is officially over. We haven't been sprayed for ages. The more dramatic people out there have said that the moth spraying "ruined people's lives". It is fair to say that it ruined the lives of a number of moths, and woke a lot of people up earlier than they may have liked.
The idea of a tunnel under Parnell to help Auckland traffic has been thrown out. Meanwhile, they seem to keep coming up with new ways of charging people to drive around Auckland. This is mildly bizarre given that everyone pays heaps of tax for their petrol anyway. I don't really understand why they need more money when the Government is said to have billions of dollars spare.
The spectre of passport free travel between Australia and New Zealand has been raised again. I don't see why, I thought New Zealand was considered an easy security border and this would allow Mossad and Al Qaeda easy access to Australia. The theory is that it would encourage tourism. I reckon people would enter one country on visitors permit and go live in the other one.
The Green Party have decreed that thou shalt not use disposable nappies, because each baby creates 2 tons of landfill with disposables. They don't seem concerned about the cost of cleaning cloth nappies, the use of water, etc. I am so glad we have them out there looking after our best interests. Their bill for the compulsory wearing of caftans and the banning of plastic supermarket bags is in Parliament next week.
The government is planning on introducing changes to allow people to be prosecuted again for the same crime. It is limited to situations where they are found to have perjured themselves or threatened witnesses that affected the outcome, or where new evidence comes to light. I think where they get off due to some technicality that could be remedied should also be considered.
A Palmerston North man had boiled eggs explode in his face after microwaving them. I guess people forget what you can and can't do. Can't dry off your hamster in one, that's for sure.
WORLD NEWS
The Royal Danish wedding got plenty of coverage in Australia, because an Australian is marrying the next king of Denmark.
I am sure other things are going on, but we just don't seem to hear much, other than the prisoner thing.
REAL SPORT
Rory's water polo team were without two experienced players and they got hammered by another Ponsonby team 9-4 or something. Rory and a couple of other players stayed on for the whole game, rather than having two quarters off, he was stuffed.
Hannah's team had a tough ask. The team they played had scored 45 goals and conceded none. I told them I didn't expect them to win, but I wanted them to go out there and have a go, have a bit of fun. Well, they slogged very hard, keeping them out for about 12 minutes before the first goal. It was 0-3 at half time, and I said I wanted a better result than the 0-7 a few weeks back. Final score was 0-5 (and one was offside). That is the second worst result for the team we played and second worst for us, too. We came damn close to scoring once or twice, too.
Rory's team had another draw. I should get to see them play, finally, this weekend with games scheduled at home at 10 and 11.
SPORT
The Crusaders beat the Stormers and the Brumbies beat the Chiefs and the final is in Canberra.
Man Utd won 2-0 over Aston Villa, despite having two players red carded towards the end of the match. Arsenal were 0-1 down but came back to win 2-1 to be the first team to go unbeaten in a premiership season since about 1888-9 (when they only played 22 matches). Portsmouth had a big 5-1 win over Middlesborough, and Newcastle drew with Liverpool 1-1.
The FA Cup final is this weekend, Milwall versus Man Utd.
MY SAD LIFE
It has been really wet this week, never thought soccer would be on. Then it came right and was perfect all weekend. Spent a lot of time outside on Sunday, in the sun. Saw the first hot air balloon of the season this morning, it's very still and clear. They float around quite often in winter (is it because hot air works better in cold air?).
Rory must have been quite ill on Wednesday. He stopped Diana before she left for work and asked is she thought she was properly dressed for work. This caused much hilarity as he was the person voted least likely to know when he last changed his clothes in the family.
Hannah fell down some wet stairs at dancing mid-week, but she is okay. She complained about varying body parts for a day or two then forgot about them. She got booted in the thigh by a team-mate with little vertical control at practice on Thursday, to add to her woes.
Hannah's cat decided to pee on Rory's bed on Wednesday, for no obvious reason. First offence, hasn't been repeated. Rory took it quite well, considering. And worse, I saw him drink out of the toilet this morning, he gets inside the bowl, it's quite bizarre, he might think he is a dog.
I think I did quite well not saying that Shyn had a Ben in the oven. I never said that when Penny was pregnant first time around, either.
Diana and I went to see Troy with Rory and Adam (a friend from school, first time he's done something after school with someone from Ponsonby) on Saturday afternoon. It wasn't a bad movie, in fact it was quite good. It got two stars in the Herald, but then they did give "The Thin Red Line" five, so I haven't taken any notice of their reviews since.
After finally finishing one homework thing (myths and legends) Rory had to start on his next big thing (science project). It isn't going well, we have to nag and harass the whole time.
I'M SORRY, I'LL WRITE THAT AGAIN
Forgot to mention that the issue of PC World with Ross's gleaming fizzog came out last week. It was an incredibly boring piece on using contractors, and they needed a real person. Ross was all I could find. Interestingly (for me, at least), they didn't put my pic in it's normal place, except at the back next to a pic of the lead singer of Alien Ant Farm, who somebody thought I resembled.
10 May 2004
Sometimes I just can't think of a subject worthy of mention, this is one of those times - 10/05/04
Dramatic improvement in the weather.
LOCAL NEWS
More issues with the foreshore and seabed debate. The Hikoi (a land march), in this case a huckory hikoi (because they only walked through towns and used buses and things in between) arrived at Helengrad on Wednesday. Helen made herself look small and petty on Monday (again). When asked why she met that bloody sheep (that shall not be named) outside Parliament but wouldn't meet the Hikoi she said tritely "the sheep is better company". Labour were in throes of losing another Maori MP this week, which would trim their majority to the smallest you can have and still have a majority (ie 1). Meanwhile, some of the "dignitaries" of the Hikoi chose to spit on the ground in front of the MPs who were willing to come out from Parliament to meet them. The whole thing was pathetic.
The woman that deliberately ran into a crowd and killed a person outside a party with her car was found guilty of manslaughter. How that was possible, I don't know. Manslaughter is accidental and the only accidental part was she was trying to hurt someone else instead.
An unlicensed Chinese man that killed a woman in a car accident received a sentence of 21 months in prison. The family of the woman were not happy.
A young teenage boy died of a gunshot wound in Morrisville on Sunday.
An accident involving three cars and a truck has seven people in hospital, but only one was seriously hurt. Must have been quite an accident.
The eighth fire in Gore in a week has resulted in a country music museum being destroyed. Now, a lot of people don't like country music, so this isn't all bad news. No one was hurt.
I'm not really sure what the local news agencies will do to fill the gap once New Zealand Idol is finished tonight. The girls in the soccer team are always talking about it. Sensible people ignore it. There should be laws against the mistreatment of good music (and even bad music). The winner is announced tonight.
WORLD NEWS
The "torture" photos were published in the paper this week. They were kind of funny. I really don't see what the fuss is all about. They were anonymous, it could have been worse. It certainly won't make the American soldiers any friends, but I am sure Saddam's death squads did worse.
REAL SPORT
We arrived at polo practice late this week because Rory, like half the other 11 year olds, didn't read the notice that said who was in their team and what time practice was.
Rory had his first water polo match on Friday night. He scored one goal, made some good intercepts and set up some other goals. They only play two quarters each, but he said they needed the rest in between. His team won 12-0.
Hannah's team were playing a team they should have beaten. They beat a team that beat the team they were playing. They certainly had more attacking power, but just weren't getting close to the goal. It was 0-0 at half time, and while we were attacking a lot, the defenders were coming out too far and the opposition defenders were hanging around off-side waiting for a break. Finally, in the second half, we scored a goal (Hayley, who plays goal in the first half). We had some close moments where we nearly let in a goal in the second half but not as many as the wet game the week before. Another win, three out of four, they are going to be shocking at training.
I didn't get to see Rory's game (even though we had two home games, they were at the same time on separate parks, I am a bit grumpy about that because I asked a week earlier if a game could get shifted and there was nobody playing on the field before Hannah's team so they could have started at 10 without hurting anyone), but it was a team they should have beaten, too. They were all over the opposition but weren't finishing well. Final score was 2-2.
On Sunday afternoon, we had a practice game. The girls had a great time. They went for nearly an hour and half. It was with the other two girls teams, neither of which has had a win yet, and you could see them improving over the game with the practice.
SPORT
The Crusaders had already made the semi-finals so they got beaten by the Hurricanes 37-20. The Blues got their win with a bonus point, but needed other results to go their way, which they did except the last one, so the Blues finish fifth. The Chiefs needed a point from their game against the Brumbies, which they got in a low scoring match they lost 12-15 but it was enough. The semi-finals have the Chiefs playing the Brumbies in Canberra, and the Stormers playing the Crusaders in Christchurch. This is the first semi-finals for the Chiefs ever.
Warriors lost again. They always lose to the Cowboys.
Man Utd drew 1-1 with Chelsea, the Arse beat Fulham 1-0 and are almost unbeaten for the season now, Newcastle drew 1-1 with the Wolves, and Leeds had a 3-3 draw with Charlton. Liverpool beat Birmingham 3-0. Leeds are now bottom of the table.
Triathlete Torrenzo Bozzone stopped to help an New Zealand team mate in trouble from an asthma attack during a race, costing him a chance to compete for the title.
MY SAD LIFE
The cats have been interesting. They discovered Jim next door this week, and are now visiting him regularly. Pandora seems to especially get on well with him. She was on the garage roof on Saturday, then leapt from the top of a post on the playground to the trampoline about eight feet away (and got a shock when she discovered the tramp was soft). Ollie continues to venture down the driveway despite attempts to put him off the idea.
Rory got his first school report, and the bad news was his parents didn't comprehend a sodding thing in it. What the heck are "statines"? We had no idea if he is doing well, poorly, or what. Wonder what it will say on our report card.
The kid that burned his face off with a firework last year took a lump of wood with seven nails hammered through it to school this week. He didn't take it out at school, but proceeded to hit random objects with it on the way home off the bus. He told the principal it was a "massage device". Fatal massage perhaps?
No news on Ben the bump, but he's due within a week or so now.
Diana disappeared on Thursday, went to work, then straight to a shopping spree for work to fit out an apartment. We found her at home after training, then she disappeared to the book coven. I ended up driving all over the show to get stragglers to soccer practice, had a full car, dropped four kids off, went away and picked up another one, came back (if Diana had been home, could have used her car, would have been heaps easier). On the way home Rory asked Stephen where he was from (he's Samoan, also had Amanuel, who's Ethiopian in the car) then proceeded to tell jokes about Maoris and KFC (I pointed out later that Samoans really like KFC too) but Stephen was laughing at the jokes so I suppose it was okay. Rory also sang "I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts" in an Indian accent). It was a bizarre trip in the car. Hannah helped out with the song, as well, so it was in stereo.
Gavin's thumb has improved considerably and he is returning to work today, with caution. He was sounding a lot happier the day he got the good news, he even came over the other day for the first time in ages.
I had to get a passport photo taken (mine ran out a year ago), and Diana said I had to get a haircut first. So I went into the Barber's, explained what I wanted. I then went and got my photo taken. While it was drying, I returned to the Barber's and got the mohawk down the middle of my head shaved off. The barber didn't mind, he said the second trim was the quickest $10 he's ever made. I was inspired by Marc, from Stuttgart, who's passport photo has to be seen to be believed. Mine isn't too bad, but it made me feel good. The kids thought it was funny. Diana wasn't impressed.
The kids did breakfast for Diana on Mother's Day, then we went to Mission Bay for lunch, had pizza on the beach. Saw a few kids from Pt Chev there, the place was pretty busy. Rory and I did some throws, water polo style, of a soccer ball. Hannah found a coconut washed up on the beach, she wanted to open it so I biffed it against a rock and it just burst. Rory was playing with a large stick, then after he left it on the ground a dog came and dragged it off (the same dog went over to Diana first, shook the water off himself, and wandered away, was kind of funny).
We are starting to use the new outdoor furniture, which has had plenty of rinsing in the last fortnight. Had dinner at it on Friday, the kids played monopoly on it on Sunday. I don't think the lawn mowing guy is too happy about it so we should move it onto the deck (which was the plan, anyway).
It is my Mother's birthday on Friday, also George Lucas's (he is three years her junior).
Yesterday we finally booked a trip away. We are going to harass Paul in San Francisco, and so if he is wise he will go into hiding about mid-September. Rory will be an adult by then so the airfares are horrendous (unlike some people, we have to pay money for out flights). We've been mulling it over for ages, and I wanted to do something big and this is about as big as it gets without getting another mortgage.
Well, better go, Diana wants to read this before she has a shower so she knows what she's been doing.
LOCAL NEWS
More issues with the foreshore and seabed debate. The Hikoi (a land march), in this case a huckory hikoi (because they only walked through towns and used buses and things in between) arrived at Helengrad on Wednesday. Helen made herself look small and petty on Monday (again). When asked why she met that bloody sheep (that shall not be named) outside Parliament but wouldn't meet the Hikoi she said tritely "the sheep is better company". Labour were in throes of losing another Maori MP this week, which would trim their majority to the smallest you can have and still have a majority (ie 1). Meanwhile, some of the "dignitaries" of the Hikoi chose to spit on the ground in front of the MPs who were willing to come out from Parliament to meet them. The whole thing was pathetic.
The woman that deliberately ran into a crowd and killed a person outside a party with her car was found guilty of manslaughter. How that was possible, I don't know. Manslaughter is accidental and the only accidental part was she was trying to hurt someone else instead.
An unlicensed Chinese man that killed a woman in a car accident received a sentence of 21 months in prison. The family of the woman were not happy.
A young teenage boy died of a gunshot wound in Morrisville on Sunday.
An accident involving three cars and a truck has seven people in hospital, but only one was seriously hurt. Must have been quite an accident.
The eighth fire in Gore in a week has resulted in a country music museum being destroyed. Now, a lot of people don't like country music, so this isn't all bad news. No one was hurt.
I'm not really sure what the local news agencies will do to fill the gap once New Zealand Idol is finished tonight. The girls in the soccer team are always talking about it. Sensible people ignore it. There should be laws against the mistreatment of good music (and even bad music). The winner is announced tonight.
WORLD NEWS
The "torture" photos were published in the paper this week. They were kind of funny. I really don't see what the fuss is all about. They were anonymous, it could have been worse. It certainly won't make the American soldiers any friends, but I am sure Saddam's death squads did worse.
REAL SPORT
We arrived at polo practice late this week because Rory, like half the other 11 year olds, didn't read the notice that said who was in their team and what time practice was.
Rory had his first water polo match on Friday night. He scored one goal, made some good intercepts and set up some other goals. They only play two quarters each, but he said they needed the rest in between. His team won 12-0.
Hannah's team were playing a team they should have beaten. They beat a team that beat the team they were playing. They certainly had more attacking power, but just weren't getting close to the goal. It was 0-0 at half time, and while we were attacking a lot, the defenders were coming out too far and the opposition defenders were hanging around off-side waiting for a break. Finally, in the second half, we scored a goal (Hayley, who plays goal in the first half). We had some close moments where we nearly let in a goal in the second half but not as many as the wet game the week before. Another win, three out of four, they are going to be shocking at training.
I didn't get to see Rory's game (even though we had two home games, they were at the same time on separate parks, I am a bit grumpy about that because I asked a week earlier if a game could get shifted and there was nobody playing on the field before Hannah's team so they could have started at 10 without hurting anyone), but it was a team they should have beaten, too. They were all over the opposition but weren't finishing well. Final score was 2-2.
On Sunday afternoon, we had a practice game. The girls had a great time. They went for nearly an hour and half. It was with the other two girls teams, neither of which has had a win yet, and you could see them improving over the game with the practice.
SPORT
The Crusaders had already made the semi-finals so they got beaten by the Hurricanes 37-20. The Blues got their win with a bonus point, but needed other results to go their way, which they did except the last one, so the Blues finish fifth. The Chiefs needed a point from their game against the Brumbies, which they got in a low scoring match they lost 12-15 but it was enough. The semi-finals have the Chiefs playing the Brumbies in Canberra, and the Stormers playing the Crusaders in Christchurch. This is the first semi-finals for the Chiefs ever.
Warriors lost again. They always lose to the Cowboys.
Man Utd drew 1-1 with Chelsea, the Arse beat Fulham 1-0 and are almost unbeaten for the season now, Newcastle drew 1-1 with the Wolves, and Leeds had a 3-3 draw with Charlton. Liverpool beat Birmingham 3-0. Leeds are now bottom of the table.
Triathlete Torrenzo Bozzone stopped to help an New Zealand team mate in trouble from an asthma attack during a race, costing him a chance to compete for the title.
MY SAD LIFE
The cats have been interesting. They discovered Jim next door this week, and are now visiting him regularly. Pandora seems to especially get on well with him. She was on the garage roof on Saturday, then leapt from the top of a post on the playground to the trampoline about eight feet away (and got a shock when she discovered the tramp was soft). Ollie continues to venture down the driveway despite attempts to put him off the idea.
Rory got his first school report, and the bad news was his parents didn't comprehend a sodding thing in it. What the heck are "statines"? We had no idea if he is doing well, poorly, or what. Wonder what it will say on our report card.
The kid that burned his face off with a firework last year took a lump of wood with seven nails hammered through it to school this week. He didn't take it out at school, but proceeded to hit random objects with it on the way home off the bus. He told the principal it was a "massage device". Fatal massage perhaps?
No news on Ben the bump, but he's due within a week or so now.
Diana disappeared on Thursday, went to work, then straight to a shopping spree for work to fit out an apartment. We found her at home after training, then she disappeared to the book coven. I ended up driving all over the show to get stragglers to soccer practice, had a full car, dropped four kids off, went away and picked up another one, came back (if Diana had been home, could have used her car, would have been heaps easier). On the way home Rory asked Stephen where he was from (he's Samoan, also had Amanuel, who's Ethiopian in the car) then proceeded to tell jokes about Maoris and KFC (I pointed out later that Samoans really like KFC too) but Stephen was laughing at the jokes so I suppose it was okay. Rory also sang "I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts" in an Indian accent). It was a bizarre trip in the car. Hannah helped out with the song, as well, so it was in stereo.
Gavin's thumb has improved considerably and he is returning to work today, with caution. He was sounding a lot happier the day he got the good news, he even came over the other day for the first time in ages.
I had to get a passport photo taken (mine ran out a year ago), and Diana said I had to get a haircut first. So I went into the Barber's, explained what I wanted. I then went and got my photo taken. While it was drying, I returned to the Barber's and got the mohawk down the middle of my head shaved off. The barber didn't mind, he said the second trim was the quickest $10 he's ever made. I was inspired by Marc, from Stuttgart, who's passport photo has to be seen to be believed. Mine isn't too bad, but it made me feel good. The kids thought it was funny. Diana wasn't impressed.
The kids did breakfast for Diana on Mother's Day, then we went to Mission Bay for lunch, had pizza on the beach. Saw a few kids from Pt Chev there, the place was pretty busy. Rory and I did some throws, water polo style, of a soccer ball. Hannah found a coconut washed up on the beach, she wanted to open it so I biffed it against a rock and it just burst. Rory was playing with a large stick, then after he left it on the ground a dog came and dragged it off (the same dog went over to Diana first, shook the water off himself, and wandered away, was kind of funny).
We are starting to use the new outdoor furniture, which has had plenty of rinsing in the last fortnight. Had dinner at it on Friday, the kids played monopoly on it on Sunday. I don't think the lawn mowing guy is too happy about it so we should move it onto the deck (which was the plan, anyway).
It is my Mother's birthday on Friday, also George Lucas's (he is three years her junior).
Yesterday we finally booked a trip away. We are going to harass Paul in San Francisco, and so if he is wise he will go into hiding about mid-September. Rory will be an adult by then so the airfares are horrendous (unlike some people, we have to pay money for out flights). We've been mulling it over for ages, and I wanted to do something big and this is about as big as it gets without getting another mortgage.
Well, better go, Diana wants to read this before she has a shower so she knows what she's been doing.
3 May 2004
The end of the golden weather - 03/05/04
Well, the rain has arrived, with a vengeance. It has been virtually dry the last two months and on Friday that all changed.
LOCAL NEWS
There was flooding in West Auckland (Henderson Valley) on Saturday night. It was pretty wet.
I am not mentioning the certain sheep that was given a haircut on live television both here and in various other places around the world where it was a slow news day. I can't believe the other channel tried to get in to film it. Heidi said it was on in Holland. Couldn't they cover something important? It's now off to meet Helen Clark - and not as a casserole (shame).
Richard Prebble, leader of the Act party and intermittent MP since 1975, stepped down this week. His claim to fame was waking up Rory as a baby outside our house in an election campaign whilst he was still with Labour. For that reason, we didn't vote for him and he lost. Not sure that it taught him a lesson. He was known as "mad dog" for a while.
Some git who posed as an adviser for the "Antiques Roadshow" program in the UK has been arrested for fraud locally.
Minister Tariana Turia resigned from the Labour Party and was sacked as Minister due to her issue with the foreshore legislation. Must have been hard to give up all the perks for something you believe in. Shenanigans this week avoiding the press were bizarre, she arrived at Parliament one day lying on the back seat of the PMs security car (maybe someone had left pizza in there, I don't know).
A Tauranga man was jailed for posing as a Saudi national to sit a pilot's exam.
The woman found guilty of attempted murder (why attempted murder, her mother died, isn't that just murder?) has been sentenced to 15 months in prison. She has so far refused home detention as an option.
Local celeb (she lives quite near by, although I have never seen her or Stacey Jones) Lana Coc-Croft has been in the news regularly, something about her being sick. She was brought back from Fiji from some celebrity treasure island thing and is in critical care in hospital. They don't seem to know what it is.
WORLD NEWS
Photos of US soldiers beating up prisoners have done nothing for their image in Iraq.
I really haven't been aware of overseas things lately, not sure why.
REAL SPORT
The rain made play uncertain and then cold and horrible. Despite that, the girls got out there and got warmed up, looking nowhere near as professional as the other team who were going through some drills and looked like marines. As the game started, it became clear that the other team wasn't quite what they appeared. They had their moments but just weren't well organised (neither were we, at times). We scored first, and then the other team equalised. In the second half we scored twice, then the other team scored a second and they could see an equaliser on the way. They hit us pretty hard, or more accurately we just didn't seem to get the ball away from our goal. The last 14 minutes felt like a wet week. We held on, to win 3-2. An awesome result after the drubbing last week and the girls are now two wins from three matches. Hannah didn't score, but she worked hard, did one awesome kick of the ball in the air sideways. After the game, they were buzzing and went on the playground and made huge splashes at the bottom of the three slides where there were large pools of water. They were already soaked, so they were let loose and they had a lot of fun. Neither of the other 11th grade girls teams have had a win yet, so we are are doing very well.
Rory's team were playing a team that lost to a team they had beaten, so they should have won comfortably. They all struggled in the conditions but they won 4-3 in the end. They are top of their table with three from three, but still no clean sheet for the goalie. Again, I didn't get to see it because the games were at the same time, hoping for the coordinator to juggle something for me so I can this weekend, at the moment they are both home games at 11, but a wangle might be possible.
The boys Div 3 and 4 teams also had their first wins of the season, which was great. Just need the Div 2 team to get one now.
I reckon I must have had/made fifty phone calls about soccer on Saturday.
SPORT
The Chiefs beat the Bulls narrowly in Hamilton to increase their chances of being in the semi-finals. The Blues came from behind to get five points from the Sharks in South Africa. The Crusaders came from an 8-9 deficit at half time and only 14 men (one was red carded for a gentle headbutt) to win 24-9 (which is pretty impressive, playing one short for 50 minutes). Then the Highlanders did the same thing and beat the Waratahs 29-28 with a man sent off for punching. The Hurricanes lost to the Brumbies.
Only a handful of games left in the season now. Man Utd lost to Blackburn 0-1, but Man City beat Newcastle 1-0. Wolverhampton beat Everton 2-1 as well, putting big pressure on Leeds. Roll on the FA Cup final on May 22nd. Liverpool won 2-0 over 'borough. The Arse remain unbeaten with a 0-0 draw with lowly Birmingham, and Leeds have stumbled yet again, losing 1-4 to Bolton after Viduka scored then got a red card (without Viduka they are crap). Leeds are now second to last on the table, behind the Wolves on goal difference. They are going down, baby.
There was V8 supercar racing at Pukekohe but races were cancelled due to rain on Saturday. Murphy came second on Sunday, not sure what in.
The Warriors had their first home win of the season. The Storm must be crap.
MY SAD LIFE
No majors with the cats this week, Pandora got her stitches out. Her ID tag broke, and she is now in stealth mode because her bell as fallen off, too. They have not enjoyed going outside in the rain, they come out with me when I go to my office at about 6 to 6:30am, it has become a ritual for them.
Rory was very bouncy on return from school on Monday this week. He has since calmed down. Hannah announced she has a new best friend when she came home from school on day (a new girl in the class) but haven't heard about her since.
Gavin is continuing to go everywhere with a thumb in the air. You just don't realise how hard it is until you see him doing shoelaces with one and a half hands and battling to eat dinner (carefully selected to be edible without a knife). He still has most of his sense of humour.
Ben the bump is nearly due to stop being a bump. I am sure Roger will let us know when the bump escapes. Enjoy your last days of freedom guys, it's never going to be the same again. Knowing previous history with Ben and Caitlin, this Ben will be born later today.
Heidi and Ad are off to Mallorca (I reckon that place has more spellings than hummus). Ad spent time recently dressed as a bottle of something in a play. I am worried about him.
Jono, you alive or what?
Diana and I took the man with the funny thumb to go see Kill Bill 2 on Friday night. It has some slow patches but is quite good, clever as well.
Did another radio spot yesterday, went fine. Am becoming a seasoned campaigner. It's not nice thinking about all those people out their listening with their gear off, though, so I don't do that any more. Ross & Kath listened to it a bit and said it bored Catie.
Tried to set up a new PC for the Goodins yesterday and it got a really nasty virus/worm called Sasser, it's out there and very aggressive. Gavin got it twice in the afternoon as well. The Goodins have their new 41" flat wide screen mounted on the wall in the kitchen, long story but they got it with purchase points for about 10% of the points that it should have cost. It's pretty cool.
This week, aliens invaded Rory and he decided he wanted to cook something. His parents were both very concerned. It was a chocolate slice thing, which he then managed to scrap with Hannah over how much she got. She got revenge later in the week with some chocolate fudge that used about half a year's supply of icing sugar.
The outdoor furniture we got about a week ago needed to get wet a few times for the natural oils to come out, etc. I reckon that's why it's rained so much.
I'M SORRY, I'LL WRITE THAT AGAIN
I forgot some things that happened last week.
Gavin went back to the surgeon and they reckon he could be off work for another 60 days. He wasn't too happy about that.
His cat needed the vet too, after she got some cuts on her neck which were abscesses from previous action in battle.
We went to the Bambi Baby Birthday last Saturday, Sasha is now one year old.
The kids and Diana went shooting with Bambi, at the Youthtown range. Diana had a go with a pistol and enjoyed herself a little too much, I fear. Hannah stuck to the rifle, don't remember if Rory used the pistol. Would have been fun to go.
BACK TO OUR ADVERTISED PROGRAM
Don’t forget tomorrow, May the 4th be with you.
LOCAL NEWS
There was flooding in West Auckland (Henderson Valley) on Saturday night. It was pretty wet.
I am not mentioning the certain sheep that was given a haircut on live television both here and in various other places around the world where it was a slow news day. I can't believe the other channel tried to get in to film it. Heidi said it was on in Holland. Couldn't they cover something important? It's now off to meet Helen Clark - and not as a casserole (shame).
Richard Prebble, leader of the Act party and intermittent MP since 1975, stepped down this week. His claim to fame was waking up Rory as a baby outside our house in an election campaign whilst he was still with Labour. For that reason, we didn't vote for him and he lost. Not sure that it taught him a lesson. He was known as "mad dog" for a while.
Some git who posed as an adviser for the "Antiques Roadshow" program in the UK has been arrested for fraud locally.
Minister Tariana Turia resigned from the Labour Party and was sacked as Minister due to her issue with the foreshore legislation. Must have been hard to give up all the perks for something you believe in. Shenanigans this week avoiding the press were bizarre, she arrived at Parliament one day lying on the back seat of the PMs security car (maybe someone had left pizza in there, I don't know).
A Tauranga man was jailed for posing as a Saudi national to sit a pilot's exam.
The woman found guilty of attempted murder (why attempted murder, her mother died, isn't that just murder?) has been sentenced to 15 months in prison. She has so far refused home detention as an option.
Local celeb (she lives quite near by, although I have never seen her or Stacey Jones) Lana Coc-Croft has been in the news regularly, something about her being sick. She was brought back from Fiji from some celebrity treasure island thing and is in critical care in hospital. They don't seem to know what it is.
WORLD NEWS
Photos of US soldiers beating up prisoners have done nothing for their image in Iraq.
I really haven't been aware of overseas things lately, not sure why.
REAL SPORT
The rain made play uncertain and then cold and horrible. Despite that, the girls got out there and got warmed up, looking nowhere near as professional as the other team who were going through some drills and looked like marines. As the game started, it became clear that the other team wasn't quite what they appeared. They had their moments but just weren't well organised (neither were we, at times). We scored first, and then the other team equalised. In the second half we scored twice, then the other team scored a second and they could see an equaliser on the way. They hit us pretty hard, or more accurately we just didn't seem to get the ball away from our goal. The last 14 minutes felt like a wet week. We held on, to win 3-2. An awesome result after the drubbing last week and the girls are now two wins from three matches. Hannah didn't score, but she worked hard, did one awesome kick of the ball in the air sideways. After the game, they were buzzing and went on the playground and made huge splashes at the bottom of the three slides where there were large pools of water. They were already soaked, so they were let loose and they had a lot of fun. Neither of the other 11th grade girls teams have had a win yet, so we are are doing very well.
Rory's team were playing a team that lost to a team they had beaten, so they should have won comfortably. They all struggled in the conditions but they won 4-3 in the end. They are top of their table with three from three, but still no clean sheet for the goalie. Again, I didn't get to see it because the games were at the same time, hoping for the coordinator to juggle something for me so I can this weekend, at the moment they are both home games at 11, but a wangle might be possible.
The boys Div 3 and 4 teams also had their first wins of the season, which was great. Just need the Div 2 team to get one now.
I reckon I must have had/made fifty phone calls about soccer on Saturday.
SPORT
The Chiefs beat the Bulls narrowly in Hamilton to increase their chances of being in the semi-finals. The Blues came from behind to get five points from the Sharks in South Africa. The Crusaders came from an 8-9 deficit at half time and only 14 men (one was red carded for a gentle headbutt) to win 24-9 (which is pretty impressive, playing one short for 50 minutes). Then the Highlanders did the same thing and beat the Waratahs 29-28 with a man sent off for punching. The Hurricanes lost to the Brumbies.
Only a handful of games left in the season now. Man Utd lost to Blackburn 0-1, but Man City beat Newcastle 1-0. Wolverhampton beat Everton 2-1 as well, putting big pressure on Leeds. Roll on the FA Cup final on May 22nd. Liverpool won 2-0 over 'borough. The Arse remain unbeaten with a 0-0 draw with lowly Birmingham, and Leeds have stumbled yet again, losing 1-4 to Bolton after Viduka scored then got a red card (without Viduka they are crap). Leeds are now second to last on the table, behind the Wolves on goal difference. They are going down, baby.
There was V8 supercar racing at Pukekohe but races were cancelled due to rain on Saturday. Murphy came second on Sunday, not sure what in.
The Warriors had their first home win of the season. The Storm must be crap.
MY SAD LIFE
No majors with the cats this week, Pandora got her stitches out. Her ID tag broke, and she is now in stealth mode because her bell as fallen off, too. They have not enjoyed going outside in the rain, they come out with me when I go to my office at about 6 to 6:30am, it has become a ritual for them.
Rory was very bouncy on return from school on Monday this week. He has since calmed down. Hannah announced she has a new best friend when she came home from school on day (a new girl in the class) but haven't heard about her since.
Gavin is continuing to go everywhere with a thumb in the air. You just don't realise how hard it is until you see him doing shoelaces with one and a half hands and battling to eat dinner (carefully selected to be edible without a knife). He still has most of his sense of humour.
Ben the bump is nearly due to stop being a bump. I am sure Roger will let us know when the bump escapes. Enjoy your last days of freedom guys, it's never going to be the same again. Knowing previous history with Ben and Caitlin, this Ben will be born later today.
Heidi and Ad are off to Mallorca (I reckon that place has more spellings than hummus). Ad spent time recently dressed as a bottle of something in a play. I am worried about him.
Jono, you alive or what?
Diana and I took the man with the funny thumb to go see Kill Bill 2 on Friday night. It has some slow patches but is quite good, clever as well.
Did another radio spot yesterday, went fine. Am becoming a seasoned campaigner. It's not nice thinking about all those people out their listening with their gear off, though, so I don't do that any more. Ross & Kath listened to it a bit and said it bored Catie.
Tried to set up a new PC for the Goodins yesterday and it got a really nasty virus/worm called Sasser, it's out there and very aggressive. Gavin got it twice in the afternoon as well. The Goodins have their new 41" flat wide screen mounted on the wall in the kitchen, long story but they got it with purchase points for about 10% of the points that it should have cost. It's pretty cool.
This week, aliens invaded Rory and he decided he wanted to cook something. His parents were both very concerned. It was a chocolate slice thing, which he then managed to scrap with Hannah over how much she got. She got revenge later in the week with some chocolate fudge that used about half a year's supply of icing sugar.
The outdoor furniture we got about a week ago needed to get wet a few times for the natural oils to come out, etc. I reckon that's why it's rained so much.
I'M SORRY, I'LL WRITE THAT AGAIN
I forgot some things that happened last week.
Gavin went back to the surgeon and they reckon he could be off work for another 60 days. He wasn't too happy about that.
His cat needed the vet too, after she got some cuts on her neck which were abscesses from previous action in battle.
We went to the Bambi Baby Birthday last Saturday, Sasha is now one year old.
The kids and Diana went shooting with Bambi, at the Youthtown range. Diana had a go with a pistol and enjoyed herself a little too much, I fear. Hannah stuck to the rifle, don't remember if Rory used the pistol. Would have been fun to go.
BACK TO OUR ADVERTISED PROGRAM
Don’t forget tomorrow, May the 4th be with you.
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