Hostage dramas in sleepy Auckland - 06/06/05

Weather has continued to be variable, plenty of intermittent rain. It is the 61st anniversary of D-Day today.

LOCAL NEWS

There was an incident where three people were taken at gunpoint in their car from St Lukes mall and they cruised around up the North Western Motorway. Rory and I saw the motorway shut, north of where we got on at Te Atatu, and the traffic was particularly jammed but we were luckily heading away from the trouble. Nobody was hurt, but the car chase was quite sad and the footage of the chase from a helicopter looked like a slow version of OJ's non-escape.

A Te Aroha man and his son were critically ill after eating night cap mushrooms. Sad, try to save a few dollars and end up needing a new liver. Very silly. The 3 year old boy will recover. Whilst it reminds one of the joke about the husband not eating his mushrooms, it isn't funny. The man was a recent immigrant from Vietnam, although what he did to deserve living in Te Aroha, I don't know.

A 13 year old boy held up a lotto store with a bb-gun and then bragged about it to his friends and got caught. The owner of the store was Helen Clarke (with an e, so not the prime minister).

Meanwhile, the real Helen Clark has been visiting China and Japan and places Eastern.

Iraqis have been fighting back against Winston, which reveals him to be sniping at anyone Iraqi with little proof. Not sure it is enough for voters to see sense.

A new poll has National just ahead of Labour. Not sure when the election is to be held yet, but could be anytime between about September and November. General feeling is that Labour has had too many blunders and are starting to pay. Meanwhile the Greens are looking particularly stupid and vulnerable and a couple of other parties are risking falling below the 5% they need to survive.

A couple that sell a dodgy weight loss product called "body enhancer" have been found guilty of breaching fair trading rules. I don't really know whether this sort of rubbish should be banned or people should be allowed to buy any old industrial waste that is meant to enhance your lifestyle.

The magnitude of the Lions tour became more obvious when it was revealed that the Barmy Army had hired a thousand Maui campers (mobile home things) for the tour. That is a lot of campers. Rory's reaction was funny when I told him they were going to Rotorua for the first game - he said we should drive there and then turn around and come back the other way (in car cricket, campers are worth six points, so you'd get a pretty high score).

WORLD NEWS

The Indonesian Embassy in Canberra was "attacked" by a "biological agent" (meaning they were posted an envelope with washing powder in it). This was in reaction to the Schapelle Corby sentencing. Brett said her brother just got charged for drug offences, too. She's either as guilty as buggery or a victim of Australian baggage handlers. Shame we can't find out either way for sure.

Brett said there was an amusing article in this week's Bulletin about a scenario of President Bambang of Indonesia coming to visit Australia and being 'caught' with drugs, firearms, porno, and a panda in his suitcase - and his subsequent treatment. His 'trial' would involve Australia's finest narcoleptic magistrates, and a jury randomly selected from Bali bomb survivors, East Timorese refugees, and Corby family relatives.

The "Non" vote on the European constitution made big news here, as did the same thing in Holland (except I don't know Dutch for no).

The revealing of deep throat this week was also big news, although somewhat late in the piece. Not sure it was keeping me awake at night.

A Chinese guy defected in Australia, very publicly. He said he feared for his life but not sure about telling the world. Maybe he was hoping that the publicity might protect him.

REAL SPORT

There was no real sport this week at all, due to Queen's Birthday weekend (water polo) and fields being closed (soccer).

Rory has been trialling for club teams in water polo, the first session was nearly two hours in the pool, he was knackered. Because he hasn't done much swimming in the last couple of weeks because he has been sick. He had another session on Sunday and another this afternoon. This is to see whether he gets in to U14 A or B team. I think the B team will be pretty weak, not sure that getting in there will be a good result for him, we will probably know by the end of the week what is happening.

SPORT

We've had rugby coming out our ears but they are all non-event games with a probables versus possibles (all black trial), Maoris versus Fiji, Lions versus BOP. Some won, some lost. Nobody really cares.

MY SAD LIFE

I don't remember if I mentioned it last week, but 1st June marked nine years in our current house.

I somehow sprained my right arm lat weekend, which made swimming difficult for a couple of days, but I recovered sufficiently to keep do my weekly swimming. I did a hundred lengths in 24 hours over the weekend, which knackered me.

The inorganic rubbish was collected quite quickly, early in the week, so the curb crawlers went away. Didn't quite get everything out that we wanted to but certainly did get a fair bit.

Hannah's leg is improved, but she missed the exam on Wednesday. The family health has improved, although I am still coughing, but things are much better. Hannah has her speech thing this coming Friday. In between water polo trials, Rory has been busy with homework, but not really busy enough.

It is Ross' birthday on Thursday and Craig's on Friday. That means Diana's birthday is soon, so bollocks, I suppose I need to find a present.

Paul is back from Kiev. Gavin leaves for Ekatarinberg on Tuesday. He flies via Hong Kong and Moscow. It is just East or the Ural mountains, which is a sodding big mountain range.

Well, I am sure I have missed something important, but can't think what it is so this will have to do.