26 November 2007

Less than a month until Christmas, big wins at Intermediate polo - 26/11/07

LOCAL NEWS

The controversial Electoral Funding Bill was rehashed rather quickly and released this week. It seems to have slightly nicer styled jack boots and the swastikas are now painted a friendly pink colour.

Clint Rickards can now prove that he is not a bent cop. He resigned on Thursday so now he is a bent civilian.

They still haven't found the missing tall woman Emma Agnew, who happens to be deaf. They have searched the rubbish dump and scoured a nearby river with divers.

You have to wonder what is going on in some families. A 14 year old girl had her eyes gouged in an attempt to banish the devil. She is a cousin of the woman who died a month ago when she was drowned in front of her family. This is beyond belief and out of control.

Two ferry workers were crushed between a pole and a ferry at Devonport. They suffered broken bones.

Woeful weekend on the roads with ten dead. Not even a long weekend. One accident killed 15 year old twin girls at Western Springs near us. Another probably shouldn't count because it was an elderly man who had a heart attack and hit a parked car.

Helen Clark is in Uganda at the moment. After Idi Amin, haven't they suffered enough? Perhaps she is at a zombie reunion, I don't know.

You won't believe this but the whole Ben and Olivia murder thing has been raised as seriously needing to be re-investigated. It's about ten years since they disappeared.

Meanwhile Taito Philip Field is having his day in court today, actually wanting to have to the trial to clear his name before the election. He could actually be innocent, you know.

WORLD NEWS

The cruise ship that hit the iceberg was in the news for a few days. It was interesting because there were New Zealanders on board.

Kevin Rudd is now the prime minister of Australia, John Howard ousted quite predictably and ignominiously. You gotta know when to fold, as the song goes.

Ian Smith, the former Rhodesian Prime Minister (not the New Zealand wicket keeper), died this week. Some felt he didn't do a good job, but looking at how Mugabe is running things, perhaps he did okay.

SPORT

England will not be at Euro 2008. What a shocker. Have to support another team now, which is a shame. I don't know why I want England to win, but maybe one day they will.

The black caps narrowly lost the first ODI.

The men's hockey team did okay against Australia, but blew a 3-1 lead in the last game to draw 3-3.

REAL SPORT

Well, on Friday the finals night was upon us, finally. Firstly, I have to get Rory's juniors through a 5-8th playoff game, which they won about 8-2. Rory scored two. The intermediate kids were all pretty excited and very nervous. Our first game was the girls final, against Rangeview who were unbeaten through this year, won last year, and I don't think they lost last year either. Anyway, the girls went in and did the business, 4-0 up at half time, final score was a healthy 8-2 win. We were very pleased, and I got a swim in the celebration.

Then the Marlins, Rory's team, won 6-2 again to avoid the wooden spoon. The Piranhas had their final, it was closer than I was expecting, but we still lost 1-5. This made them runners-up which was still good. Finally, the Sharks played in the Div 1 final. This was an exceedingly tight game, with the other team having one particularly talented player who is prone to brain fades. The Sharks worked hard to give him little room, and they did pretty well before he was ejected for a brutality (punching Miranda Chase in the head, like I said, brain fades). At 4-4 we got a penalty, Hannah took it, and put us up 5-4. We defended to see out the game and take the win. I got another swim, and the team, the girls who played in both finals especially, were delighted. Afterwards we went to Wendy's to celebrate and made a bit of a mess.

Hannah scored one goal in the girls final and two in the Div 1 final, including the winner from a penalty (no pressure). She worked very hard, but it was only the beginning of the weekend.

I won't bore you with the details of the rest of the games, but in summary, Hannah played five club games in 24 hours. She was pretty tired at the end of it. They won four games lost one. She played pretty well, spent a lot of time in goal. For posterity - Teal v Waikato B 19-0, Gold v Waikato 7-3, Teal v Tauranga B 15-1, Gold v Tauranga 6-7, Gold v Marist Blue 11-1.

I finished the weekend with the junior girls playing Albany at the bloody awful millennium stadium. There were two flipper ball games going on in the pool next door, whistles going everywhere and so much noise nobody could hear a thing. Albany defaulted because they didn't have a team, so we leant them a couple of players and then they beat us 4-3. Junior boys and girls have one more game each this weekend, but Hannah has North Island Intermediates tournament starting Thursday. I think that means about eight games this weekend starting Tuesday.

MY SAD LIFE

An unusual moth sat on my window in front of where I sit on Thursday. It hung around a bit. On Friday there were two. They were trying to be one, if you know what I mean. I don't remember seeing them ever before, this particular type. They are called Magpie moths. They were there for ages. I took photos. Is that wrong? Then one left, and the other one stayed. Perhaps it was tired.

Got a bizarre letter from the power company this week. Because we don't have heavy use devices, they can't turn them off, so we pay more. See, if we don't have heavy use devices, then they don't need to turn them off, so we are good citizens all the time. They don't seem to understand why their approach sounds so ridiculous to me. But if I bought a spa pool then I would qualify. Lunatic.

Rory has theoretically been studying for his science exam this Wednesday. Not sure how much he has actually done. He hasn't been particularly useful, although he did rearrange his room (as an alternative to study). He finally drove out to West Wave for the first time, somewhere we go at least three or four times a week.

Ross rang me at home on Saturday, and asked where I was. I am worried about him.

It is Ben Tucker's birthday tomorrow. Seven years old. Congrats, Ben.

I saw Sarah this week, who is pregnant with twins. She reckons she can still reach the keyboard at work. I reckon she uses a pointy stick. She's healthy though, which is good. They are due end of January.

Movember ends this Friday, I am not sure how quickly I am going to shave mine off but I suspect it could be pretty soon after that. I look like an old git balancing a dead piebald ferret on my top lip.

Next Monday is my birthday, so I have re-installed the larger letter box in anticipation of all the gifts. It is a small shed on a stick with a very large slot.

Well, I don't know how I find the time to do this these days, which could be a feasible excuse for the lack of quality, but then again it's never really had quality anyway, has it?

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