I was top tier in the temporary seats for 2011 final.

When Cruden got injured and tehre was a delay, i nipped down to get some beers ... in my haste to get back, I tripped over entering the stand (beers were ok though), and as I stood up and continued walking in, the cop/security guard standing there, put his hand out to stop me. I was expecting all sorts of shit, and questions as they were being pretty hard on drunken behaviour. Started panicking about kikicked out etc. Instead he slowly turned his head, looked me dead in the eye and said

"Before you go back to your seat, you need to know that Stephen Donald is now on the field"

SA Rugby In Shock After TMO Correctly Rules In Favour Of The Away Team

Shockwaves went through SA rugby today, when a TMO (television muppet official) correctly ruled against the home SA team for the first time ever in a televised game. Late on in the match, with the Lions looking to close out the match it looked for all money that the Lions had scored with time almost up to put the game beyond reach. Despite the ball clearly having not been grounded, expected transmission began with the assistant referee running in to let the referee know that the ball had indeed been grounded correctly, and he'd had a clear view.

However things began to unravel shortly after, when the referee decided that it was worth another look, leaving all viewers confused. After looking at 3 angles, of which the clearest had correctly been blocked by a spectators head, the TMO then sent seismic waves through the community by correctly saying the ball hadn't been grounded. The Blues then went on to score a last minute winner, although replays clearly showed there were at least 5 potential reasons for the referee to completely fuck up and call it back.

Lions coach Johan Ackermann when asked about the incident was inconsolable and somewhat confused. "I didn't really see it and haven't had time to review it, as like all good coaches I wasn't looking at the 42 live screens in front of me all showing the replays. This is however a huge shift change for SA refereeing, and I'm wondering if there is any point in even having home advantage anymore. Fans don't turn up, and if the referees are going to police things correctly and without bias, then we may as well just play away".

Team captain Warren Whitely concurred, simply saying "it's not my job to comment on referees decisions, but if the home teaming isn't getting all the 90/10's, let alone the 50/50's, it's going to be tough from here on in"

Blues coach Tana Umaga was delighted with the result, the first time in his tenure that his team actually did anything decent. "It's great to get a win against a well coached and strong Lions team, although I don't have time to talk right now, as I've got to help Sonny Bill get a flight to Port Elizabeth - he's got an old pal or something there he wants to catch up with".

SA referees were approached for comment, but politely declined as they, quite rightly commented that like all controversial decisions their view is firmly to have their heads up their arse.

And she's finished ... What a labour of love that was. I can't drive it properly yet as it needs to go through the Caterham check, then the government check (IVA), then registered etc. All of this is expected to take around 6-8 weeks, so it should be ready right about when spring is really kicking in. Perfect timing.

I did take it for a quick spin around the block though ... and the front wing fell off! Which I guess is good, as it gives me something else to fiddle around on.

It's been an absolute labour of love, full of swearing, foul language, frustration, irritation and pure anger.

But look at her. Isn't she beautiful. I can't wait to go and hang the arse out.

All this talk of respect - seriously, fuck off.

Year and years of Richie's a cheat, New Zealanders are classless, the constant fucking moaning against everything NZ rugby, the pissing and bitching from Aussies during RWC visit, I'm totally fucking over it.

I really can't be fucked with insults & advice from Australians about respect in sporting circles.

On the whole, I've done my best over the years to provide some reason where I think we are getting ahead of ourselves / shown arrogance / demeaned the opposition. But over this weekend, there has been a clear narrative to do everything in their power for global "neutrals" to demean the fantastic achievement of 18 wins in a row and divert attention away from it. The usual shit of Ab's offside (we were, we got penalised btw), AB's favouritism from refs, and then the final nail if this shower of shitness, the global attention on Chieka's whinge being FAR FAR greater than that of the achievement of this bunch of blokes.

And people want to talk to us about respect, or lack there of.

@stargazer said in All Blacks v France Test #2:

@tim Good to know that basically nothing has changed since last weekend. Hope the media (esp those of the NH), which generally either lacks intelligence or pretends it lacks intelligence, understands it, too.

[tin foil hat]

Don't be so naive. The NH media has really ramped things up, and you want to know why? Because Gosper, Pichot and co, LISTEN TO THEM. They write unbelievably one-eyed biased bullshit, and will continuously attack attack attack at points which are not really relevant to the context of what happened in the game, to divert away from anything which could be written as positive. And, "co-incidentally" enough, it's always NZ, or if not NZ, at least the SH, which is in the bad.

It's fucking bullshit and frankly, for all that is written about NZ, rule leniency etc being a "blight in the game", it's the cancerous journo's who really are the blight on the game. Here's a short list I've compiled:

Luke Pearce, the English ref. Apparently in test one, he was "let down by his TMO peers", or "leaned by the pro AB crowd", or "succumbed to the world rugby sponsored view that the AB's play to different rules".

Paul Williams, the NZ ref for Ireland - Aus "a disgrace to the game" - this was tweeted DIRECTLY at Gosper. Wanna know why? Because he didn't give Ireland a yellow card for continual Aussie transgressions. Maybe a point, but a DISGRACE? Especially after a week of continual media hum drum about the "unfair yellow" (where the poor young outstanding english ref was let down by everybody around who wasn't english) ruining the game in NZ.

Gardner - "should have certainly taken ALB's run into account", "a red card for ALB shouldn't have been out of the question given his part in it" ... this isn't from rabid one eyed fans, this is from JOURNALISTS ... who are sending messages to Gosper!! Seriously, here's the fucking video:

ALB did JACK SHIT. His eyes were on the fucking ball too, it doesn't even look like he touched him, let alone ran from 50 yards away to directly push poor skinny Fall into Barrett to milk the red card. The world rugby media release here is COLOSSAL BULLSHIT, written purely to appease the same NH media they infuritated with their COLOSSAL BULLSHIT media release from a week earlier about Ofa.

And you want to hear the ultimate shit in the face ? During the England - Tunisia football match, Harry Kane was tackled in the penalty box, rugby style .. One Walrus wrote ... "Some of the high tackling on Harry Kane in the Tunisian box would have even got an All Black carded. Lord Harry I should say"

Not a big deal really, for the pompous alanis morrisette style irony fellow, but you know who liked it?

His BFF Brett Gosper.

[/tin foil hat]

@antipodean said in Bledisloe I:

we don't have many right wingers running around,

Try the politics forum.

@booboo said in Black Caps v India - Semi Final:

For the Ganguly fans.

Fried bum face.

https://t.co/dMqC576nlE
(

I’m a bit drunk but I have zero criticism of Smithys commentary there.

His chin, yes.

I'm not sure I'm ever going to feel well again. Shit got real in Singapore. I'm going to tell the story from the start.

When you let an almost 40 year old male with 2 young kids off the leash, in an Asian city for 48 hours, at which time, said male will attend a concert of a 90's rock icon ... I'm not sure what you are going to expect. But it happened.

Blasted down on Friday early doors, straight into a pub to watch the cricket, rugby, consume, consume and consume. At 2am, I was done, having taken about 250 selfies with people due to my red bandana, axl sunnies, and gnr singlet. I walked in in standard white man attire, polo, jeans etc, but somehow at some point, acquired some kit - I have no idea where from to this day. Little was I to know that at current figure, how much I actually did look like the singer - well, when standing on the scales anyway. Anyway, woke up Saturday on concert day with probably the worst hangover seen since the sevens a few years ago. Had crashed on the floor of a mates hotel, after my accomodation source had trap doored earlier on whilst I was busy signing off a bar tab for rining the bell at Mogambo's and subsequently buying the whole bar a shot.

So, as I raised my weary head, and casually checked my wallet to make sure my GnR ticket was still intact, the thought occurred to me that today was going be rather tough. To cut a long story short, after a casual lunch, an hour getting a foot rub and a long shower I started to turn for the better, so casually made my way to meet the boys at a hawker centre for pre loading. The food went down well, the ice cold beers, gentlemen jack less so, but then at 6pm, a mate of ours called Dave announced that our bus was here. So we trudged off and about 50 metres from the car park started to hear the relaxing, dulcet, calming, measured sounds of SWEET FUCKING CHILD OF FUCKING MINE. Our transport, was proper, proper baller. Decked out van, with a sound system Jonah would have been proud of, complete with ice boxes loaded with piss, a smoke machine, a light show and leather chairs .. there was a pole too, but I'm not sure what that was for ....

So we get in, in front of a crowed of about 100 people, and make our way out. Took for fucking ever due to the retardeness of Singapore to hold a 35,000 person concert (apparently) in the middle of nowhere with no public transport. Think Eden Park ... but in the middle of Karaka. Anyway, so fianlly get there, the drivers like I'm gonna fucking own this, and drives right through the crowds of people to drop us off about 2 metres from the entrance. It was fucking epic.

Anyway, get in, make our way to in front of the sound box, have about 15 mins to get some beers in , before they come on stage. So, I guess I should now right about the concert.

Nigh on 3 hours of their greatest hits. Fucking epic set list. Yeah, Axl is fat, and his voice is pretty bloody ordinairy these days, but the band is as good as they have ever been. Slash is just a god, Duff still has it (in a truck driver with egg on his shirt sort of way), Fortus is more of a lead guitarist than an Izzy, but he let nobody down, and Ferrer is arguably a better rock drummer than either Adler or Sorum are (to give credit to Adler though, the Appetite sound is lot to do with his drumming). They didn't miss a beat. The light show was awesome, the rig and setup was great. If I wanted to complain, I could say it wasn't even close to loud enough, but if you read the above, I was ok with that. And maybe the setlist was perhaps just a little too long ... don't get me wrong, but when you play November Rain (complete with about 5 minute intro of Layal), Coma and Estranged in full ... well, thats about 45 minutes right there. I would have happily sacrified a bit of knockin on heavens door, chinese democracy songs, and etc to really hear more of Axl giving it top beans as opposed to saving his voice. 90 minutes of old Axl, would shit on 2hrs 45 of new. He did his best on the jungle intro, and gave it shit for parts of Nightrain, Paradise & a couple of others .... but you know, he's old, he's fat - there's lawns to tell kids to get off these days and cheeseburgers to eat.

Annyway ... so it finished up at around 11:15am ... and given the complete clusterfuck of traffic, we were wondering how it was going to work. Litttle did we know ...

The driver of the baller-mobile, had basically ignored a whole bunch of Singaporeans cannot, and blasted his beast right through where you were supposed to stop and parked up EXACTLY where he dropped us off. People were streaming out everywhere wondering what the fuck this van was - he had paradise playing this time, with full light show, full smoke effects literlaly right in front of the main fucking gate. Oh, and he'd fully restocked the bar with fresh cans of beers, vodka, mixers and kit. I asked him if he had a cheeky durry ... at which point he leanded over and casually flicked open the glove box to see a selection of MArlboros finest. Unbelieveable.

Anyway, the boys piled in, and after rejecting about 5,000 people looking for a way home who were asking to join, trundled off through the crowed. We had the windows down, GnR on full tit, beers flowing for the 90 minutes it took to get back, literally crawling through swathes and swathes of people slowly trudging back to their cars/buses. IT WAS EPIC.

Anyway, the rest sort of peters out after that ... it was another late night and slow start yesterday, but nobody wants to read about that.

So, in summary ... yeah, GnR still have it, Axl less so, but fuckin hell, he gives it a go. Singapore is not a great place to go for a rock concert, but if you organise things right ... there is simply nowhere better.

It's not worth doing any analysis on the Cane uproar.

Fact of the matter is that if that exact tackle had been done by the Irish, nobody, on either side would give a shit. All these "neutrals" would be quiet and there would be no demanding of anything.

It's a contact sport, these sorts of things happen - everybody knows it, everybody agrees it. Until it's the AB's and then suddenly it's a big issue.

Call me tin foil hat, whatever. As far as I'm concerned that's fact.

First Blood (Rambo)

'twas on last night when I was about to hit the hay, but as we all know, first rule of being a man is that when Rambo is on, you watch Rambo.

5 Rambo's out of 5 Rambo's.

Because Rambo.

@R-L said in Lockdown Check In:

@taniwharugby Not good. Don't ask.

Where are you based? For some reason I think near me ... if need anything delivered, just say the word snd will see what I can do

End of March update (no run tomorrow) ...

Now 30k (33k due Saturday) -> 26k - Longest run
Now 64k (66k scheduled this week( -> 61k - Most km in a calendar week
No change -> 77k - Most km in a 7 day period
Now 234k ... if wasn't a leap year would have been 260k! -> 190k- Most km in a calendar month
No change ... ran a 1:51:30 by myself tho which is my fastest non-compete by about 6 mins -> 1:47:27 - Fastest half marathon
No change -> 49:01 - Fastest 10k
No change -> 23:25 - Fastest 5k

So ... what to do now. With Covid, obviously everything has changed. I've been pushing on, although the diet has suffered a bit as mentality changes can only do so much. Not too bad, but having access to snacks all day certainly doesn't help.

The issues I'm facing these days are more mental. And they are proper first world issues to have (from a running perspective). Looking at the distance runs, I have to run on the mental fact that there is NO emergency services. This isn't necessarily true, but if I did need them it's then a) it's a poor use of their time right now b) they should rightly be pissed at me for using this resource un necessarily by pushing myself so hard and c) I'd likely need to go to a covid intense area putting myself at greater risk. It's a bit much I know, but these long distances are a real push on myself.

Secondly, is the increase anxiety around symptoms. It's Spring here now (although you wouldn't know it today, it's bloody freezing) which means hay fever season is starting. I get seasonal hay fever, and occasionally I need an inhaler. So I might hear a wheeze on my breathing, it immediately elevates concern and BOOM, I'm back at the previous paragraph again.

I have no solution at the moment. Just thought I'd write here to see what others thought, if anything. Maintaining fitness is extremely important to me, so stopping running isn't an option. It would be a mental health destroyer. This weekends 33k is the longest training run I have, with the next longest being on the 26th April, the full marathon. So comfortable with all other runs (awesome to be comfortable with a half!), we shall see.

@Victor-Meldrew said in Coronavirus - Overall:

@barbarian said in Coronavirus - Overall:

My fellow doctors should zip it and let the experts fight this virus

The bloke who's leading the UK response, Chris Whitty, is one of the top epidemiologists in the world and was responsible for containing Ebola in Africa. We are lucky to have him.

Doesn't stop rentaquote doctors with minimal qualifications telling us all that he's got it all wrong.

Sells newspapers / clicks. Sad to think that this is still the cash for a lot of media during this time when their job is so incredibly important.

Nothing wrong with questioning tactics / theories etc - quite the opposite. However it does get scary when those far less qualified act like they are of equivalence, and then click hungry outlets publish the same.

@JK said in My Turn ... Running Down A Dream:

Keep sharing mate. Its awesome!

Im finding WFH pretty hard as feel so lethargic despite doing the same amount of exercise, so I'm having to do more! Its all that extra activity that you dont immediately recognise as actually being activity.

Yeah, it's a very good point that. Im doing my best to reduce calorie intake as all the additional stuff I'd do now, a lot of it is defunct. As an example, in my commute there would be 2 5 min walks, and 2 12 minute bike rides. Then add in a 15-20 minutes walk at lunch, multiple walks to meeting rooms / other desks at work and the occasional client visit ... It's pretty rare my Garmin would be less than 6-7000 steps by the time I got hime (plus the bike rides).

As of right now (11am), I've done 114 steps in total. I started work at 7 and have taken one break.

Thats a colossal difference which I need to take into account.

Interesting stuff. So, last week a 21 year old died here of Coronavirus - with no underlying conditions. She was then effectively used as the poster-child for everybody to take note of the govt requirements to isolate etc.

However, apparently her death had nothing to do with Covid. NHS staff who dealt with it have been dubious as to where this information came from.

Note the guardian article has been removed pending investigation. All a bit odd.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/03/27/chloe-middleton-the-coronavirus-death-that-wasnt/

Only ever had cassoulet once. It was too rich for me, although I suspect a nice light one would be epic.

Gets a windy later on tho. By bit, I mean Cyclone Bola with flavour.

@voodoo said in Coronavirus - Overall:

@MajorRage said in Coronavirus - Overall:

The lifestyle website I used for marathon training (Kenzai) had a blog today about dealing with the psychological demands of this which was great. In a nutshell it said

1. Set aside 30-60 mins a day to keep informed. Morning is best
2. Communicate using apps with others a LOT
3. Do not talk about the virus / media when speaking to others. Talk about life, strategies for kids etc.

So, one week into lockdown, I've stopped reading media / opinions / commentary from people that aren't experts and reverted to speaking more routinely with my friends / family and keep the focus specifically on life, social distancing with kids, exercise etc.

And it works.

So where does that leave the Fern....

See Number 2 ...

The lifestyle website I used for marathon training (Kenzai) had a blog today about dealing with the psychological demands of this which was great. In a nutshell it said

1. Set aside 30-60 mins a day to keep informed. Morning is best
2. Communicate using apps with others a LOT
3. Do not talk about the virus / media when speaking to others. Talk about life, strategies for kids etc.

So, one week into lockdown, I've stopped reading media / opinions / commentary from people that aren't experts and reverted to speaking more routinely with my friends / family and keep the focus specifically on life, social distancing with kids, exercise etc.

And it works.

Looking at it from a third party point of view, NZ seems to be over reacting, whilst Oz seems to be a little bit relaxed about it.

The only thing I'm sure of, is the the number of cases is a completely irrelevant statistic, unless every single person is getting tested every single day. The statistics coming out of countries are on the whole, garbage. Italy doesn't have an 11% mortality rate and it doesn't have 100,000 cases. It has 100,000 positive tests and 11% of these people have died. Not died from it.

Australia does seem to have done cracking job of getting big numbers tested though, whilst NZ seems to be treating this as some sort of a competition, which they are winning. Jacinda's global PR team is using it's own exponential graph.

Taumalolo
Fitz
Kees
Ian Jones
Keith Robinson
Messam
Richie
Zinny
Cowan
Barrett
Lomu
Kahui
Bunce
Savea
Smith