The real "Stig"

Any of you who bother reading this will know that 90% of it is about Rugby, and at some point I will return to it. But, for the moment, I am going to tell you about what my son and his college friends are doing this half term. They are out in the Philippines, "how lucky" I hear you all saying, well maybe they are. But not for the reasons you believe. These young lads, 16/17 yr olds, are out there building a playground/refurbishing a school building for the children who live on the dump sites. Until today I haven't really given it much thought about what they would see out there, always avoiding the media pictures as only picking the really bad parts. Today though I saw the latest video they posted on the Grove Park site and I'm afraid it stunned me quite a lot. To think how any country could let their people live like that. They build shopping malls and tourist attractions in the cities. And where does the money from the tourism go. Well I can't see any at work where my son is.

I am going to finish with just this.
Jamie, Charlie, Jefferz, Tom and all of you. I feel so very proud to know you all.




If you get the time during a quite moment, pop along to the web site and see how they are all doing.

Catch up

Ok so it's been a while again since I posted anything. But besides little things that the wife posts about, nothing much else has been happening. England lost the World Cup final, but no real surprise there. SA were the better team throughout the competition.

As for me well, no refereeing so far this season as I have a hernia. That's what happens when you offer to load the camping trailer up on your own :( and it is going to be some time before a) they operate on it and b) before I recover from the surgery. So at the last society meeting I had what can only be called a "Brainwave". I decided to see about becoming an asssessor so that I could at least remain involved. So consequently this last weekend I get my first time out as an observer while our illustrious Society Chairman went through what really could only be classed as a MOT.

So I join the assessor as he goes through the after match de-brief expecting to just observe. This wasn't quite the case. Suddenly input was expected from me and I was caught like a rabbit in the headlights, totally unprepared, and with no notes to work from. So I joined in the conversation/de-brief with the tiny bits that I remembered. which really, the way the game was reffed, seemed more like nitpicking. Then I am informed that I need to write a report out for the match. so Sunday afternoon/evening is spent trying to figure out how to fill out the said report. It's funny though, when I actually sat down and thought about it, I could find a bit more to write about. Now I just have to wait and get feddback from the other assessor regarding my report.

As for this weekend, the assessor is our Illustrious Chairman. So I will wait with interest to see if he has anything to say about my report.

Scotland 07

We have just returned from a trip to Scotland to visit Len and Amber And what a weekend we had. Len and Amber were great hosts for our weekend and really looked after us, despite the fact that Len is suffering at the moment with Stones in areas that you really wouldn't want stones, and Amber had an accident where her Guardian Angel had to intercede they remained attentive beyond compare. We managed to visit some Castles (Keeps) Tracey was a bit dis-appointed at the size of Dundonald Castle and felt that this wasn't what she considered a Castle. Although the history of the "Castle" was interesting having been owned at one time by the Grandfather of William Wallace and also the Grandson of Robert the Bruce. It was still not quite up to the specifications in Tracey's mind. So we then decided to go and see Dean Castle and Country park. Now this time Tracey had it all worked out. If it was set in a country park then it must be a "proper" castle. Unfortunately this turned out to be a Palace rather than a Castle. The actual tour around the Palcae was very informative and the guide was good with a mixture of Fact fable and humour. It was still not what Tracey was looking for in a castle. So it was off to Loudoun Castle .... Now surely this would be a Castle we could look round and get a real feeling of a Scottish Castle. The signs were all good as we pulled along the driveway into Loudoun Castle ..... We paid Our(What we thought was an extortionate amount)entrance fee and proceeded into the castle grounds. And there it was
Now it looks good at first glance ....but....then you get up close, find that it is actually hollow ....and you can't even get in to take photographs of the inside..... But, on the bright side .... the other side of the castle is a theme park so a couple of hours riding the rides was in order. On our final night there Amber made an amazing meal (not even going to try and spell it) And no I am not saying that the Curry we had Friday night made by Len wasn't a good meal just that Sundays meal was something Tracey and I had never had before. The whole trip ended beautifully with the most amazing Sunset I had seen in a long time.

Dog shows and Camping.

Back in July we had our first camping trip together at Netley Marsh steam Show, which is only a few miles from us. We picked Netley Marsh to camp as Tracey and the dogs were taking part in the Agility display there with K9 K-os. The party consisted of Tracey, Stephanie, Jayde, Tyson, Bruno and myself. We had it all worked out. pitch the tent on the Thursday evening. Come back in 2 cars on the Friday. One consisting of the dogs, the other car carrying everything else.
So to start. We pitched the tent, as the instructions directed. Opened the door to the tent with the 2 zippers put the gazebo in there ready for the next day. Then closed the tent, at which point one of the zippers decided to come apart :(. 45 minutes later we were still unable to fix the zipper and decided that when we returned the following day we would bring some Velcro and needle and thread to at least give it some feeling of security.
So Thursday night it starts to rain (what a surprise)., and continues right through to Friday morning when we return to the site to continue the process of setting up camp. We arrive at the gate just past 08:00 as planned, only to be turned away for an hour and a half. Breakfast at McDonald's then, and back we go.

We were sent to wait in the main arena while arrangements were being made to move us to our camping area, this was by no means a quick turnaround. So after a couple of hours we decided to walk the equipment up to the tent and get ourselves set up for the coming weekend.
Well things got no better through Friday although we did manage to get one of the cars towed up to the camping area. We were joined by 3 other members of the team for Friday night, but, as we could not get the trailer with all the equipment in to the site, there was no display.
Saturday saw little change in the weather and still no equipment so still no display. 1 team member camping changed for another one. and that was the highlight of that day. Rain continued throughout the day and by 17:00 the show had decided to cancel. We stayed in the tent again for that night and Sunday got up bright and early to start packing all the equipment away. Tracey took the dogs on down to my car, which had remained in the main arena throughout the weekend, and managed to get out relatively quickly. Me, on the other hand, had volunteered to drive Tracey's car out from the top field. well after queuing for about 3 hours I finally got her car moving. Oh what great fun it was rally driving her car off the site. But ....what a mess was made.







Stephanie and Jayde sat in the tent

Getting Older

You only realise you're getting older when you start looking at your kids. It was my sons Prom the other week and to see him dressed up the way he was and looking so respectable was a shock. We tried for days to hire a Limo to take him and his friends there but, even though we were calling 3 months in advance, there was not one available. So Dad here comes up with this bright idea. We'll hire a car to take them. Good idea you may think, but, when you hire one car, and then get given a different car you can start to foresee problems arising. Truth be told we arranged to hire a Chrysler 300c, you know, the Bentley look alike, as we figured that no one else would think of going in one. Unfortunately though the hire company had stopped doing them and we had to be satisfied with a Mercedes E200 series. Luckily the lads thought it was great. With the added advantage that they got to be picked up in it as well as dropped off. Which their parents thought was great.!

R U Being served!!!!!

A young man named Gordon bought a donkey from an old farmer for £100.00.The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next day, but when the farmer drove up he said, "Sorry son, but I have some bad news... the donkey is on my truck, but unfortunately he's dead. Gordon replied, "Well then, just give me my money back."The farmer said, "I can't do that, because I've spent it already. Gordon said, "OK then, well just unload the donkey anyway. The farmer asked, "What are you going to do with him?" Gordon answered, "I'm going to raffle him off."To which the farmer exclaimed, "Surely you can't raffle off a dead donkey!"But Gordon, with a wicked smile on his face said, "Of course I can, you watch me. I just won't bother to tell anybody that he's dead." A month later the farmer met up with Gordon and asked, "What happened with that dead donkey?"Gordon said, "I raffled him off, sold 500 tickets at two pounds a piece, and made a huge, fat profit!!"Totally amazed, the farmer asked, "Didn't anyone complain that you had stolen their money because you lied about the donkey being dead?"To which Gordon replied, "The only guy who found out about the donkey being dead was the raffle winner when he came to claim his prize.So I gave him his £2 raffle ticket money back plus an extra £200, which as you know is double the going rate for a donkey, so he thought I was great guy!!Gordon grew up and eventually became the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and no matter how many times he lied, or how much money he stole from the British voters, as long as he gave them back some of the stolen money, most of them, unfortunately, still thought he was a great guy.The moral of this story is that, if you think Gordon is about to play fair and do something for the everyday people of the country for once in his miserable, lying life, think again my friend, because you'll be better off flogging a dead donkey.

Weekend Rugby

Let's start with the most contraversial match of the weekend, which must be Italy v Wales. Italy beat Wales ..... Hardly a surprise as Wales have not been on form throughout this tournament. But of course it's someone elses fault. This time it's Chris White the Referee who when asked how much time was left told the Wales team 10 Seconds ..... Then he was asked if they could kick to touch ..... Yes was the answer ...... Now forgive my niavety here but with only 10 seconds to go ...exactly what did the welsh think they were going to achieve ...... thay hadn't really been able to out muscle the Italians throughout the match so the lineout option was the wrong choice. Anyway after a quick discussion the ball was kicked to touch. The time keeper (Who is now in charge of time at these games) then informed CW that time was up ..... Now CW could have overuled him but why should he ... .seems bloody obvious to me that with only 10 seconds left you either run it or take the 3 points ....providing you can get it between the uprights of course. So the pic is for the Welsh team this week ..... who as I predicted earlier are well on their way to the Wooden Spoon.

OK Scotland V Ireland ....... Not really much to say about this one ...... Ireland won (as expected) but not without a rather close scare from the Scots.

Now England V France ....... England haven't beaten France since the Semi final of the world cup and were not expected to win, considering France recent form (Played 3 won 3) including beating the Irish at Croke Park. Add to that the 11 changes to the England team well everything seemed set for a French win ......