Home again, and all is well - 18/04/05

This is a bit late because I had to wait until I got home from Wellington before I could send it.
Brett, ignore the bits with a * next to them (please note this is not a service I plan to extend to other readers or to Brett in future weeks, it is made mostly in the hope of a small comedic effect).

LOCAL NEWS

The weather continues to be pretty damn good. The best summer I ever had was autumn in New Zealand.

The Labour caucus forgave John Tamihere, which was bizarre but I suppose the only sensible option so close to a general election. He's still a plonker but he's a definite liability beyond the election (should Labour win).

* Helen Clark had a near-life experience when a door on a small plane she was in came off mid flight. It was an unpressurised cabin so it wasn't so serious as it would have been at higher altitude in a pressurised cabin. Rumours of John Tamihere being seen near the air craft shortly before take-off were unsubstantiated.

The older voter has been courted the last couple of weeks during the grey power conference. The parties all peddled their bribes. The best one is no practical test for over 80's like there is now. Doesn't really reconcile with road safety policy but what the heck.

A woman in Taranaki was killed in what I think can only be accurately described as an ironic or freak accident. She was hit by an exploding fire extinguisher. Poor woman, can't bloody win, usually you get killed by not having a fire extinguisher.

A young woman was found naked and dead in Christchurch. Police had limited ability to identify her so asked people to report women who didn't make it home on Friday night.


WORLD NEWS

The PC Nazis have revamped Cookie Monster on Sesame Street. Instead of "C is for cookie, that's good enough for me" it's now "Cookie is a sometime food". How incredibly lame. I am surprised they haven't complained earlier about the waste of food when Cookie Monster drops massive crumbs given the state of world hunger and poverty.

REAL SPORT

Hannah's team began the week at the top of the table for their division, not bad, never been there before.

Hannah's team didn't play this week. Long story but the game was right next to the Pukekohe raceway which was expecting 80,000 people. We asked for the game to be shifted but got no joy so we said sod it and defaulted. We didn't want to play the game with half a team while the other half sat in traffic.

Rory's team were up against a good side, were down 3-2 at half time but lost 7-2.

Rory has been picked for Team 1 for the school water polo team. Not much of a surprise. Not sure that his team will be as strong as his team last year, but we shall see. They start playing in a couple of weeks, first week of Term 2. Good news is that his training is later, which was a problem as it conflicted with soccer so that is sorted.

SPORT

The Blues won against the Sharks and got the bonus point they needed, although it was touch and go until about ten minutes before the end. The Waikato Chiefs won against a crap SA team (Cats maybe) and scored four tries before half time, Hurricanes had a bye, the Waratahs beat the Brumbies and George Gregan hurt his knee. Not sure about Crusaders.

Arsenal beat Blackburn 3-0 in one FA Cup semi-final, Man Utd beat Newscastle 4-1 in the other. NZer Ryan Nelson plays for Blackburn, so it is a shame they lost. Not sure that MU will beat the Arse but it would be nice.

In a game between Inter Milan and AC Milan, some tosser hit the goalie in the head with a flare. He wasn't badly hurt but they stopped the match, not sure what the result was, FIFA had to decide.

The Warriors came back from behind to beat Andrew Johns' team (I can't remember their name) but he broke his jaw.

The Black Caps won the second test against Sri Lanka by an innings and 38 runs, Lou Vincent got a double century which put the pressure on the 'lankans.

Greg Murphy won the V8 race that stopped the girls playing soccer, maybe more than one. I wasn't interested.

MY SAD LIFE

The kids finished school for term 1. Rory had a disco on the Thursday night. I too a photo of him ready to go, looked very grown up.

* I disappeared for the weekend to baby-sit my Vader and generally geek. This was our first Armageddon since Ross died eighteen months ago. I roomed with friend Chris, who appreciated Diana's advice about the earplugs (I had to use mine one night because his bloody phone was going flat and I couldn't find it). Matt and Kristy stayed in the same hotel. It was fun, had some annoyances with dubious members of the public, but generally was a good time. The hotel was nice enough, I had one swim in the pool, which was good. It was very weird to do it without the family. Hannah said the house was very quiet. Didn't really get up to anything too exciting, spent most of our time in the convention or in the hotel, which was only about 200m away. An actor called Ray Park was there, he played Darth Maul in Episode I and Toad in X-Men. He used to teach kids gymnastics and martial arts and when he got people up on stage and taught them things (various "moves") you could tell that he had done a fair bit of coaching. The approach was very familiar to me (sort of "that's great, now let's try it again and do this a bit more"). One of the convention personnel took a liking to Dean, a guy we met up with in Wellington, and that was entertaining. Vader survived and I was much happier once I packed it up ready for the trip home. No idea what will happen to it now, Diana doesn't want it in the house.

Rory sat an exam for St Kentigern College on Friday. The facilities of the place are pretty impressive. We were leaning towards giving it a miss but now aren't so sure. It's a very long way from home, out towards Pakuranga in the Eastern Suburbs.

Hannah is off to stay with a friend in Coromandel for a few days, the house will continue to be quiet.

Matt and Kristy are off to Celebration III tomorrow, this is like the star wars convention from hell. It is in Indianapolis. I did consider going but decided against it. Too far away, too many queues, and too much cost.

It was my father's birthday yesterday, his second since he died.

On the plane, I learned that typing on the notebook is bloody difficult. I can't fit my elbows in if typing with the notebook in front of me. Tried working on a spreadsheet on the flight down and it was hopeless, as I was wedged in between two other people.