Footy Fever

Our family had a rare and unusual moment last night. All four of us in the same room at the same time watching the same thing.

Almost-unheard of in our crew.

The usual practice is all of us spread out across any number of rooms and electronic devices (or heaven forbid- a book).

But last night was State of Origin.

While the big fellas of football were battling it out, state against state, mate against mate, our little team was plate against plate as we squashed onto the sofa, transfixed by pizza and the television. And a beer for my Beloved.

Working the ridiculous number of hours that he does, my Beloved has to stick with a 0.0 alcohol limit. And I seemed to have missed out on the Irish Drinking Gene so only imbibe on rare occasions, much to the disgust of some of my relatives. The kids of course are too young to indulge in the beverage of choice for sports punters the world over, but have now reached an age where they can appreciate the finer points of football (that's NRL). Or so we thought.

The Melbourne Cup may well be The Race That Stops A Nation (not sure if there's supposed to be a ® or ™ there) in Springtime, but the annual State Of Origin series captures the imagination of about 11.8 million Aussies- roughly half the total population- for three nights mid-winter. Even those who don't seriously follow the footy (like me) can get caught up in all the excitement.

It's NSW in Blue and Queensland in Maroon as they battle it out for the honour of a trophy and title of Origin champions. Sadly, the boys in Blue haven't been on the winning side for about 7 years now (leading some feisty footy fans north of the border to suggest we should sell the Trophy Cabinet. Rude.)

Sports lovers know the go: the pre-match sledging, the settling in period (read: a bit of biff between blokes), and the post-match recriminations: "We was robbed" an infamous (and grammatically incorrect) war cry. All set amidst a soundtrack of screaming supporters in their relevant colours alongside the field.

The usual position for home viewers is pizza and beverage on hand, tv remote under the control of the alpha male, and various missiles within reach when disagreeing with the ref's decision (lesson learned- only have soft options available).

For us, it was one child sitting on one parent apiece, snuggled up in our flannelette pjs (well it is winter) with my Beloved proudly wearing his NSW footy jumper

First try came barely 5 minutes in, with NSW crossing the line much to our jubilation (and relief). Not even having to stop and explain the penalty and scoring system to our offspring every few seconds dampened the mood.

Until Queensland came back with a vengeance. "Shepherd! Shepherd!" cried both my Beloved and I as the player in question dodged behind his team mate and crossed the line to ground the ball. The NSW mob just stood there like sheep and let him do it, obviously thinking it was, well, obvious. However the video referee didn't agree with us, upheld the try, and the converted goal put the opposition in front at half time.

Sadly, our little team of two also fell at the halfway mark, and despite waiting patiently for all the commentators to commentate, and advertisers to advertise, for the entire 20 minute break, barely 10 minutes into the second half we had to send the players off - to bed.

Since it's been such a long time that my Beloved has been able to sit, drink, and enjoy a game, I was on kid-duty again, and could only participate from afar, listening to the exclamations coming from the direction of the living room as the game continued.

So you can imagine the disappointment the next morning when the kids awoke to the bad news that NSW lost the game, and this year's series, by just one point.

Imagine my Beloved's belly after all that beer and pizza, and not enough sleep.

And imagine the reaction when, after all that quality time together, our son declared that he really enjoyed watching the Soccer with us.

Better luck next year.

Jx

©2012

Just Add Water

Science states that the human body is up to 70% water.

Evolutionists say that life as we know it crawled out of the ocean some 3-4 billion years ago.

You only have to watch what happens when particular humans are placed near a body of water to see that it's true.

Take what happened to us late last year.

I noticed our front garden was looking a little lush, considering the lack of attention we give it - first a bit of extra moisture, then a trickle, then a faster flow into the carport beside.

It got to a point that the men of the neighbourhood did as men do, stood around and discussed the matter. After a suitable length of time, and appropriate number of beers, the menfolk decided a natural spring had sprung up in the midst of the front foliage.   

And left it at that.

Until the local Water Board left a little card in the mailbox saying our water usage was "higher than usual".  Still my Beloved thought it nothing of consequence, it was summertime after all and kids being kids had been splashing about a bit in recent times.

When the Water Board left a message on the phone that our bill was on its way and it was, again, a little higher than usual, I felt a trickle of concern.

It turned into a full blown flood the day the bill appeared- December 21. Whereas our regular bill was around the $400 mark, this one came in at $4521.18 (was that 18 cents really necessary?) I mean to say: Four Thousand, Five Hundred Dollars!! A "little higher"? Yes, like Lady Liberty is a little statue!

A discussion with the Water Board had me trying to track down a plumber to come take a look. Good luck with that, 4 days before Christmas. 45 minutes and countless phone calls later I still had not found a tradie willing to come before the holidays; the earliest any of them offered was the 4th of January!  Forget the sugarplums, I had visions of dollar bills running down the driveway. So back to the Water Board I go and beg them to help me find someone suitable to assess the situation. Finally a company agrees, for only $150 call out, plus $90 an hour. 

There go the kids' Christmas presents. I need a Secret Santa, stat!

Anyhow, plumber comes at the crack of dawn next day (pun fully intended, you know what tradespeople are like) and there's me out in the garden in my pjs, with him saying "You need someone with underground detection gear to find the pipe and save a lot of digging". I make no assumptions on the intelligence of the plumbing profession, but Einstein he ain't. So, why, I ask, did your company not send someone with said gear? His advice was to get someone else to do the dirty work, unless I was willing to pay two blokes the hourly rate apiece. Yeah, no.

Armed with shovels my Beloved and neighbouring blokes started shifting soil.

4 hours later, 6 feet down and 8 feet along, they found where the water was coming from.

But we seemed to have misplaced our menfolk.

Instead we had mud monsters of various shapes and sizes, three grown men had a total and terrific transformation back to boyhood, they were having so much fun playing in the mud. 

Our actual children, on the other hand, stood well back from the filth, in their gumboots. 

The womenfolk were standing a little further back again, armed with various  cameras and recording devices, capturing the moment for posterity...just in case one of the aforementioned fellas did something that might win us the big bucks on those Funniest Home Video Shows.

Sadly, while there was a lot of laughter, cursing, and occasionally squealing from 'the pit' (yes, squealing), there wasn't any footage worth submitting. Happily, they found where the Water Board were making their money, and after more swearing and squealing, they were able to clamp it off until the plumber could come back - using a system that would have made MacGyver proud- a bit of wire, a rubber glove, some duct tape, and a plastic bag.

They caused such a spectacle that the neighbours across the street had set up deckchairs and were sitting, drinking, and cheering everytime the water got turned back on and the men started their swearing and squealing again.

After much mirth and way too much mud, the boys reckoned their rubber glove/duct tape/clamp combination would do the job until the professionals came back (at the crack of dawn the next day). Surprisingly, it did.

Now all we had to do was unearth (literally) our spouses, by way of the garden hose on the lawn- no way was that much mud coming inside our homes.

And after a bit more begging, pleading, and form-filling for the Water Board, they accepted our submission that the original water pipe had simply given way due to old age (happens to us all), and they reduced the bill from 4-and-a-half grand, to a mere 500-hundred-and-something.  Plus the plumber's bill.

The kids got their Christmas presents after all.

The neighbours got a new drinking game out of it.

And next time the neighbourhood needs a bit of cheering up, we'll just add water.

Jx

©2012