The last tango in Christchurch - 22/06/04

The weather has been pretty horrible in Auckland.
I told you it would be late, send refund requests and complaints to sod_off@email.co.nz

LOCAL NEWS

News services were confused about a car load of teenagers that went over a cliff. Two bodies were found on one station, three on the other, then they decided there was only two before the end of the piece. Meanwhile, the cliff varied from 80 to 140 metres in height, as they do. Five days later they still hadn't found two of them.

I saw this old shaved head cop on the news talking about a fake documentation shop that had been supplying fake degrees, birth certificates, and lotto tickets to mainly Chinese immigrants. I realised he was a guy that was in my class at school (Koos, it was George Koria). He was quoted in the paper the next morning.

The Warehouse (a low-end department store) have been told off for selling a very big Easter egg with an advert suggesting that children can "pig out for hours". I totally agree, let's ban Easter eggs.

A New Zealand boxer going to Athens has been revealed as having been previously convicted of the manslaughter of a five month old step daughter.

Latest polls have Labour catching National and the rest of the parties well within the margin of error. The new Maori party started life with 2% support.

WORLD NEWS
(more this week because I watched CNN in the room when there was nothing else happening)

There are concerns about shortages of cars in Iraq for car bombs, and recent membership drives for suicide squads are struggling for success.

The death of Paul Johnson in Saudi was another example of the media taking something too far and overdoing it. I am sure the hostage takers were pleased with how much coverage it got on CNN. Again, you would think this guy was an ex-president or war hero with the fuss they made. The fact that more people in the US die per hour choking on a chilli dog than die in a week in Saudi from having their head cut off is beside the point.

SpaceShipOne has been to space and back. If it goes again within ten days they win the $10m prize.

I think the world should ignore the Bill Clinton book. He was a lying b*st*rd and people shouldn't buy his book.

REAL SPORT

Rory scored a goal at training at Water Polo, but complained about sore knees all week afterward. I think it is growing.

At training for Hannah on Thursday, the girls finally beat the boys team they play. They were low on numbers, only ten of them there, so they did well. Was only 1-0 but a win is a win. They've drawn twice and lost about three times.

Rory's water polo team lost 1-9 to a team from a swim school. Rory though that was a bit unfair.

All soccer was cancelled for the weekend due to bad weather, first cancellation of the season. I was very disappointed, even though I wasn't there to see it. Just about went to watch complete strangers playing in Hagley Park in Christchurch anyway (that is one big park).

SPORT

The Euro soccer has been great. Greece has made it through, as has Portugal (by beating Spain for the first time in ages). In our hotel, we could only get Sky Sport 1, which had the sodding golf on all weekend (so the only time I couldn't get Euro on Sky Sport 1 was when I couldn't get one of the other channels, typical). Italy need a win tomorrow, and Germany and Holland are competing for the last place in Group D the next day, playing different teams.

England beat Croatia 4-2 this morning, after being 0-1 down. France go through after beating the Swiss 3-1, it was 1-1 for a while. England play Portugal and France play Greece.

The All Blacks beat the Poms 36-12, in a game that England had a player sent off in the tenth minute (cheating sod, he deserved it in the first game, too). The ABs lost a player for ten minutes at the end, and still scored a try in that time. Missing a player in the scrum upset things for quite a while, as the Poms were deliberately letting the ABs collapse the scrum. There is nothing more dull that a scrum be re-set over and over again.

MY SAD LIFE

I can't really remember to what happened last week now.

We went to see the latest Harry Potter movie on Wednesday night, but was pretty stressed getting everything organised as Hannah comes home late from dancing. Movie was good, I suppose. Saw a trailer for the new thunderbirds movie and it looks like it really sucks. Looks like Spy Kids 4.

Rory got high distinction in a baby geek computer test that he did at school. Only three Year 7s got it and four year 8s. We have documentary proof he is a geek. We found out on Friday when we were already in Christchurch.

No results for Hannah's dancing yet.

Nanny looked after the kids while we were away. They all went to see Shrek 2 on Saturday with Gavin. Granny came and had lunch on Sunday with them. Rory beat Gavin in Warhammer at Games Workshop.

Diana is currently enjoying her last day as a 30-39 age group person. Big day is tomorrow, but she's working so it will be a bit of a non-event.

WHAT WE DID IN CHRISTCHURCH

It was busy getting ready for the trip to Christchurch, but we got there in the end. Only just made the plane, parked in the wrong car park, couldn't find a car park, etc. Once we got on the plane things calmed down a bit. I went to HP for a tour and a meeting then met up with Diana at the apartment.

Christchurch is an interesting place. The city really is built around the cathedral in cathedral square. Everywhere you go there is another sodding stone church (AFG syndrome for those that know). Lots of stone buildings, huge old schools and churches.

The don't seem to really know about road rules, in fact they don't seem to know what a road is. Around the cathedral there are footpaths that seem to be okay to drive on. We never felt safe outside. Even in the botanic gardens the occasionally car would whizz through. Funny, they honk their horns to say thanks if someone pulls over out of their way.

We did the tourist thing on Sunday and went to Akaroa, a small village on the harbour in Banks Peninsula. Went out on a harbour cruise, saw penguins, gannets, petrels, an albatross, a seal, tons of shags, terns, seagulls, and finally three Hector's dolphins (funny little grey and black ones). In a place called little river we saw an old red phone box, still being used (these days they have been retired most places, they would get vandalised a lot). At birdlands we stopped and collected small rocks from a beach that is covered in small round rocks. They had all been washed down from the alps across the alluvial plain and into the water and then the ocean pushed them back onto the beach. There was no sand on the beach at all. We had fish and chips at a little place in Akaroa. Diana wanted tomato sauce, and decided everyone else did too. When she opened the packet it burst like a ripe red fragmentation grenade and went all over herself, me, and passing tourists. If someone had yelled "bang" when it happened, there would have been people lying everywhere screaming "I'm hit!".

On the bus back from Akaroa, there was a horrible obnoxious American woman that giggled the whole time for no obvious reason. It was most disconcerting, I am surprised the woman next to her didn't try to move. Diana was ready to go strangle her. I would had to think what sort of noises she would make in other circumstances.

The Maori new year was being celebrated in Cathedral Square on Saturday, lots of traditional Maori things took place. They had Maori Idol (where they sang), and Maori Fear Factor. This whole Maori new year thing is pretty new, haven't really heard of it before last year. There is talk of Queen's Birthday weekend being replaced by a day around the shortest day of the year.

On Monday morning we didn't really have time to do anything too serious so we went and watched Shrek 2 in a warm movie theatre with four other people then went to the airport. We were pretty glad to get home. I missed the kids a lot, sad but I did.

We picked the kids up on the way home, Rory from drumming and Hannah from a friend's house. The cats didn't seem to have missed us.