17 December 2007

A quiet weekend without Hannah in the house - 17/12/07

Is it just me or has bugger all happened in New Zealand this week?

LOCAL NEWS

A hair salon had a car driven by an elderly woman come through the shop window, nobody was hurt. They thought it was a mirror breaking before they saw the car in an unexpected place.

Convicted triple murderer William Bell got the bash in prison, and headed for hospital. Then turned out that it was an escape attempt, except his accomplice was waiting with weaponry at the wrong hospital, and the injuries were just a little too convincing. All quite bizarre, really. How they found a woman with a gun at North Shore hospital, I don't know.

Been some weird story about New Zealand First political party donated money to Starship but not sure how or why because it was a fine for election spending so I don't understand why they could give it to any old recipient. Starship gave it back. It's all quite confusing.

Two recent political polls show National are ahead of Labour, it's not really surprising. Labour have done their dash, too many things have really pissed people off.

A man died when a trench collapsed on him. Why do they ever get in them?

WORLD NEWS

Lots of coverage of a sentence handed down to nine men who raped a ten year old girl. They were all aboriginals, and most were also below the age of consent. No custodial sentences were given but some were given suspended sentences which required good behaviour for a year or so.

Oil spill in South Korea has been an environmental disaster, the cause was a real cockup too.

The Bali climate change conference was the biggest oxymoron of the decade. Thousands of people flying there to reduce emissions, sheesh.

The Spice Girls are playing in England. Many feared the reunion would happen, and it has. Their UK appearance has been increased from one to sixteen concerts. So much for reducing emissions. They were the first band in UK to get a gong from the Queen for their services to music for breaking up. I wonder is she will want it back?

Some odd news about Terri Irwin and Australia Zoo being in legal proceedings, not sure if it is bollocks or she's been naughty. Crikey!

REAL SPORT

Hannah had six polo games at the National tournament. General feedback is that she played pretty well. They won their first game beating Maranui 8-2, lost their second to Tauranga 4-6, drew the third 3-3 against Marist, beat North Harbour 12-4, Mountfort Park 8-1, and Rotorua 6-4. This put them 5th, which isn't bad I guess for a pretty young team, six of the eleven players will be there again next year.

The highlight for Hannah was being named as a trialist for the New Zealand under-15 girls team, thirty girls were named so there is a bit of a way to go but it is still quite an honour, especially as she will be u-15 for another year after this one.

Meanwhile the boys top team was expected to repeat the gold medal win from last year with five of the team from last year coming back. They had a shock loss in the semi-final, so ended up coming third.

Also, Hannah's other club team are playing in the B Nationals, and doing very well, having conceded two goals in their three games so far and scored about 40. Final is tomorrow.

SPORT

The Black Caps received an old fashioned towelling from the Aussies in a 20/20 game. Sportscasters tried to convince us that we had a chance but it was never going to happen. I stick to my previous view that they are underprepared and undercapable. We then lost the first ODI, then rain saved us in the second on Sunday. In South Africa they had an ODI shortened to 13 overs, how stupid.

Robbie Deans was confirmed as the Wallabies coach. I have a bad feeling about this. It made the news, a lot, before and after.

Wigan v Blackburn was a heck of a match, Wigan won 5-3, one guy red carded and two hat tricks. Man Utd beat Liverpool 1-0, didn't think they would win. Arsenal beat Chelsea 1-0.

MY SAD LIFE

Rory had activities days this week, not sure why they just don't send the kids home. He did paintball and windsurfing for two days. On a third day he went to the beach. Friday was prize giving, and what a total and utter waste of time that was (see below for general moan on the subject).

Hannah left for Wellington on Wednesday. I did not. Long story, but politics is completely lame and doesn't belong in sports clubs and I wasn't going to fork out $500 so someone could avoid offending someone else. Given that the potential offendee is largely offensive, it seems all the more ridiculous. This gave me more time at home than I was expecting, and was possibly a good thing. Hannah seemed to more than cope (like, I am not sure she would have noticed if I was there).

Rory and Maddie have been spending quite a lot of time together, but she was away in Christchurch for a wedding this weekend so he was at a bit of a loose end. This meant we dragged him along to Koos and Julie's barbecue on Saturday night, and he actually enjoyed himself. It was good to see everyone. Rory drove out there, actually got him doing a bit of driving over the weekend.

I mentioned the prizegiving earlier. Basically about 66% of the junior school got a prize. They called out each kids name (in alphabetical order), while they walked up they read out what they got prizes for (so if more than one, they got them all at once) and then they sodded off. So rather than calling out prize then winner, it was vice versa, which just seemed weird. The other problem was that some kids seemed to get a ton of prizes (Rory got four, three achievement in maths, media, and PE and application in English, application means effort, and god knows how he got the effort one because I am not sure there was a lot of effort involved) and others (one girl we know who is exceedingly hard working and talented) got nothing. So while they devalue the whole prize thing there is enough of a vestige of recognition to piss off those that have been weirdly unlucky. What a stupid concept. I have just about decided that prize givings are completely outmoded.

Saw Matt & Kristy on Sunday. Matt's cat Entrée died this week, she was a funny old thing, tended to moan a fair bit. Seemed quiet without her.

Hannah has graduation, prize giving, and a dance thing this week, when she returns from Wellington today. Rory has nothing at all, which is good because he needs to do some Christmas shopping.

Tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of us buying our first house. This is also the case for Ross and Kath who moved in to their first house the same day as us (well duh). I am not sure how this is possible because none of us are old enough for this.

Picked Hannah up from the airport. She was pretty tired, but pretty happy.

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