Today is Waitangi Day. The anniversary of the birth of our nation. The Treaty is particularly brief and yet can be studied for weeks in courses as diverse as nursing, teaching, and motorcycle maintenance in this country.
LOCAL NEWS
Politician Pita Sharples said there should be no politics on Waitangi Day. Read the sentence again. Definitely an oxymoron.
Someone drowned at Omaha beach, highly unusual, it is usually pretty tame there.
Some teen hurt himself leaping off a 22 metre rock into the water at Piha.
Eleven people survived a vintage plane crash and still went to the rugby sevens in Wellington.
Bit of a fuss about the treatment of animals at the Whirling Brothers Circus, after a young monkey died.
A Nelson man was arrested for the only murder that ever happened on Norfolk Island four years ago. His family don't believe it, there's a surprise.
A woman was hit in the head by a microlight aircraft. Her husband was the pilot. Hmmmmm. An accident? I think not.
A coroner has blamed over-protective parents for teen suicide, because kids don't get to learn about failure, disappointment, and life's problems until too late. Interesting concept, but bollocks if you ask me.
WORLD NEWS
The Islamic world needs to get a life over those stupid cartoons. We even had a protest march or two here over them. People love Allah more than they love their sons. Funny, they didn't mention their goats, camels, or daughters, not sure where they rank.
New Zealand film director Lee Tamahori was apprehended by police in US after propositioning one in drag. Not a good look. Diana reckons he was researching for a movie about a film director living a secret life, which is apparently not biographical. Now we get news of him leading a double-life. Weirdo.
The ferry sinking in the Persian gulf is another example of the double standards these guys live with. They happily board an overcrowded, top heavy, aging ferry because it is cheap then whinge when it sinks. The families are all grief stricken, as you would expect. But somehow this doesn't really reconcile with shooting into the air at every opportunity.
SPORT
Fiji won the Wellington Sevens.
Chelsea beat Liverpool 2-0, Arsenal beat Birmingham but they are still crap.Man Utd beat Fulham 4-2, Villa beat Middlesbrough 4-0, Everton beat Man City 1-0.
Super 14 starts soon, maybe next weekend. Just doesn't sound right.
REAL SPORT
Rory and possibly Hannah have two one-off water polo games in a couple of weeks, they start training soon.
MY SAD LIFE
The rest of the holiday in Paihia went well. We played quite a lot of tennis, swam a lot. Many days we swam twice and showered twice.
Kath and the kids popped in on their way home from Coopers, they found us in the pool, not much of a surprise. For two days we stayed at the complex we stayed in and didn't go anywhere else.
The biggest day was when we went to a trapeze place. Hannah was keenest, but interest was waning, and Rory wasn't keen, we nearly went kayaking instead. But we took another look and gave it a go. The trapeze was a bit of a non-event. But the high tightrope sparked their interest. It was about five metres up and six metres long. The tried over and over again to get across, but to no avail. Finally, Rory got there. He was very happy, but that didn't stop him. He kept trying. He made it across about 15 times before Hannah finally got there. She looked better than him, but couldn't quite get there. She did it just the once, but she was happy. Rory came off badly, hitting the ropes on the way down. He grazed himself on the upper arm and legs but kept going. Final tally was 17 successful crossings. They both must have climbed the ladder about 60 times or more. Rory said his feet felt like they were on the rope while he was sitting in a chair. They were sore the next day.
After we got home, excitement about new schools built rapidly. Hannah also wore everything in her wardrobe about four times because she had been away from it for a week.
Sunday was the day that Hannah's room got painted. The house was chaos. She also had her friend Bonnie come over and stay the night.
Rory's friend Nick Paine has started school already at Auckland Grammar. He is in E stream, the grade boys academically from A to M or something. Another Nick, Nick Phythian, who was in Rory's water polo team last year, is in D. Something isn't right there. Nick Phythian is a space cadet at best, I have coached him in soccer, and Nick Paine is very clever and was in enrichment class at Ponsonby whilst the other Nick wasn't. Sam, who has been at Grammar a year, said this when we were on camp: "I was talking with these two guys outside the Dean's office. Then I found out they were in M. They seemed quite normal, like they didn't walk into poles or anything." I am not sure that streaming all the way down and listing every boy from top to bottom at the end of the year is such a good idea. Not bad if you are #1, not good if you are #500.
B2 is definitely Maria.
Jono, did you mean to say anything when you replied last week?
So Hannah starts at Ponsonby tomorrow, and Rory starts at Western Springs on Wednesday. A very big week for the kids.
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