Great movie montages

I re-watched Rocky 2 the other night for about the tenth time and was wholeheartedly enjoying the training montage as always. I know it’s silly but I love the way it builds in intensity. If I remember rightly the one in Rocky 4 is pretty great too – that’s the one in the snow in Russia.

A great movie montage is an invigorating thing, especially in a sports movie, and it got me thinking about other great movie montages.

Here’s another classic.

…and here’s a heart warming one from the wonderful Slumdog Millionaire. These kids are so adorable. I loved this movie.

What are your favourites?

Football fever

Rory Fallon (in white) headers the winning goal

For the first time since Spain in 1982 the New Zealand football team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup finals by beating Bahrain last night in Wellington. The final score was 1-0.

Football doesn’t have a high profile here in NZ where it’s all about rugby, so it’s great that the sport will benefit from the increased exposure. Lots more kiwi kids play football over the last few years but when they reach a certain age the boys tend to swap to rugby  so comparatively few players reach the top levels unfortunately.

26 countries have qualified in 6 zones for the 2010 finals so far, while another 5 places are still to be finalised.

• Europe: England, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Slovakia, Switzerland, Italy, Serbia and Spain
• Africa: South Africa, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Nigeria
• North America, Central America and Caribbean: United States, Honduras and Mexico
• South America: Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Paraguay
• Asia: Australia, Japan, Korea (North), Korea (South)
• Oceania: New Zealand

The first games kick off in Johannesburg, South Africa in June 2010. Realistically we understand we’re minnows especially against the Euro teams and the big South American teams so we’ll no doubt be out after the first round but it’s just fun even getting there for us - who knows though what could happen?

Photographs by Getty Images

*EDIT* I just had a browse though a BBC forum regarding the New Zealand qualification. Some commenters there don’t share our joy.

Thank the gods for lazy carpenters

It’s a long weekend here in New Zealand, it’s our Labour weekend and we have Monday off.

The origins of our Labour Day are traced back to the eight-hour working day movement that arose in our very newly founded colony in 1840, primarily because of carpenter Samuel Parnell's refusal to work more than eight hours a day. He encouraged other tradesmen to also only work for eight hours a day and, in October 1840, a workers' meeting passed a resolution supporting the idea.

Because it’s our first long weekend in 4 months and it’s spring, everyone goes mental trying to get out of town.  Last night the news was full of traffic jams north and south of Auckland yesterday. The standing joke (among Australians particularly) is that the closest we get to a traffic jam here in NZ is fighting our way through sheep on the roads though of course we do actually have real traffic jams as well.

To demonstrate my point, here’s a cool photo taken by a chap by the name of Murray Douglas which shows traffic in Auckland.

Anyway I’m very pleased to be back online without being at Rory’s mercy. Especially pleased that my warranty covered a new hard drive so it cost me nothing. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do which I will endeavour to make a start on later today. Right now I’ll finish watching the Kiwi-Kangaroo rugby league test which is underway in England. We’re in the final quarter now and the Kiwis are ahead – go the mighty Kiwis!

*EDIT* The game was a draw :-(

Ain’t tennis great?

It was a strange end to a dramatic tennis match.

The much-anticipated clash between defending champion Serena Williams and 2005 champion Belgian Kim Clijsters, coming in after 2 and a half years in retirement, took place in front of a relatively small crowd at Flushing Meadows.

It was Clijsters, 26, who looked on top the best part of two sets, she broke serve to clinch the first set and when she was closing in on a sensational victory, the pressure told on Williams.

The Belgian was two points from victory when Williams, who had earlier been given a code violation for racquet abuse, was called for a foot-fault. That prompted the American to move towards the line judge in question gesturing angrily and verbally abusing her. Williams received a point penalty on match point and the grinder Clijsters advanced to the US Open final in dramatic circumstances.

It’ll be a great game between Clijsters and the 18 year old Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark tomorrow. My pick is that there is no stopping the power and experience of Kim Clijsters right now – she has her eye on the prize after many said she couldn’t make it back after taking so long away from the game after the birth of her baby in 2007.

Never say never.

Wound so tight

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What do you bet they don’t use any of these photos in the marketing material to get people into competitive diving?

 

 

 

 

 

Dude! You’ll burst a gasket.

 

 

Check out those thighs.

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On a more serious note…

I am deeply relieved that the sky did not fall in during President Obama’s speech to America's children.

Just finished reading the speech and I think it was well thought out and quite inspirational. I would love to know how many kids were kept home from school by their parents rather than risk having their brains addled by what might have been dastardly partisan politics.

Lost all perspective

The French rugby team have been in New Zealand playing a couple of test matches against our All Blacks.

After the first test a couple of weeks back French layer Mathieu Bastareaud, was reportedly set upon by half a dozen Maori or pacific island youths who beat the crap out of him as he was returning to his hotel in Wellington after celebrating their victory over the All Blacks. He was sent home to France as his fractured cheek and eye socket meant he couldn’t play in the second test. 

New Zealand was shocked. Though we’re far from crime free here, the idea that a high profile visitor could be targeted like that was horrible.  We were embarrassed. The story was splashed al over the front pages. How could this happen here?

Anyway…

The cops investigated and video footage taken from outside the hotel showed Bastareaud arriving home unharmed. They talked with him further and a few days later Bastareaud subsequently ‘fessed up and conceded he’d made the story up as a better alternative to admitting he’d fallen in his hotel room and hit his head on a side table. He didn’t want to embarrass his family by admitting he’d been drunk.

OK. Scum. Fine. We talked some trash about him and prepared to move on.

A couple of days later it emerged in  a French newspaper that it was in fact a couple of his team mates who’d given him the bash when he was p*ssed and acting aggressively after they’d arrived back at the hotel.

OK. What a dickhead. Life’s way too short for this rubbish.

This morning I read that Mathieu Bastareaud attempted suicide in France yesterday and has now been admitted to a psychiatric hospital where he will remain under observation for at least two weeks due to his fragile emotional state.

And now we feel like scum for talking trash about him. Sigh.

Regret

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.

Alexander Graham Bell

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I woke late this morning with quite a headache following the partying through to the early hours of this morning. A great night was had by all if the number of empty bottles and the mess are anything to go by.

To aid my recovery today, Rory and I took Bonnie for a walk to the top of One Tree Hill. It was a cold and showery day and I was feeling back in top form in no time from the fresh air and the exercise.

It’s great that tomorrow (Monday) is a holiday as it gives me a chance to knock the house back into shape.  I might even try and get in a couple of hours in my garden as the weeds are overtaking everything right now.

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You may remember me celebrating ‘my’ rugby team, the Chiefs,  being on the top of the Super 14 competition table?

Well the great run continued and they made it through the semi finals successfully and into the the final which was played in South Africa last night. The result; the Chiefs were slaughtered by the Bulls from Pretoria. It was a humiliating defeat. Less said the better.

The Mighty Chiefs

For those of you not familiar with the game of rugby union, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa are in the middle of the ‘Super 14’ competition.  14 teams from the 3 nations compete for the title each year.

Due to a quirk of geography my team is the Chiefs.  Even though the Chiefs home stadium is in Hamilton city which is 90 minutes away, Rory and I try to get to at least a couple of games every season.

They tend to build into a great team throughout the competition each year but towards the business end of the competition the wheels can fall off. The team then struggles along to the end where they only very occasionally make the playoffs.

This year though we’re seeing a rejuvenated and highly motivated team who are real competition contenders. We’re 10 rounds through the competition already and after this morning’s win over the Cheetahs in Kimberley, South Africa, the Chiefs are on the top of the points table. Yes, you read that right – the TOP of the table.

It’s freakin’ fantastic.

There’s 4 more rounds to go before the playoffs; 2 more games in South Africa (Bulls and Stormers)  and then 2 final home games against our own Wellington Hurricanes and the ACT Brumbies from Australia.  From these 4 teams, only the Bulls from Pretoria are in any kind of reasonable form.

There’ll be lots of fingers and toes crossed in this household. Go the Mighty Chiefs!

And in first place is Lou

In yesterdays post I facetiously mentioned ‘winning’ when writing about how many McDonalds restaurants there are in New Zealand.

It got me thinking.

I am quite a competitive person. Actually I might as well be clear from the outset – I am extremely competitive. Not about everything though, quite frankly I don’t give a damn if I lose a game of Scrabble.

No hang on, again I need to clarify.

I do actually hate losing at Scrabble so let me look for a better example to use. 

 

I don’t mind losing as part of my country. I’m not unnaturally affected by the All Blacks losing (unless it’s a World Cup or against the Aussi’s, or the English, the French or even the South Africans)  OK, OK… I guess you could say I really hate the All Blacks losing if we’re being that nauseatingly honest.

I’ll try again.

I’m part of a pub quiz team and it’s an environment where I’ve had to learn to accept losing as we’re not good at all. We regularly pick the wrong topic to play our joker and end up screwed. It pisses me off actually and I’m thinking about putting together a new, better team. OK, perhaps that’s not the best example either.

How about that I don’t really lose any sleep over the fact that NZ doesn’t win much sometimes? A couple of measly golds at the Olympics, we’ve only once or twice made it even to the 1st round of the Football World Cup. We barely make a blip in tennis or golf and forget about athletics (except for Valerie Vili and Beatrice Faumuina and their superhuman ability to chuck stuff). I can honestly admit that I don’t care too much about these things.

But seeing as I’m being honest, I guess that’s because I know that we are good at climbing mountains and yachting, at netball and let’s not forget we got our hands on the Rugby League World Cup.

Swings and roundabouts.

On Kate's site earlier today I made the point that when you factor in the competitive nature of the average New Zealander, it’s bloody lucky that New Zealand is the first ‘non-atoll type’ country* to greet each new day, every day (and yes, that’s out of the whole wide world!). 

I’m thankful for this as I don’t know where I’d have to be living otherwise. Actually I don’t know how you Aussi’s cope with being forever second.

* Kiribati  is actually 2 hours ahead of New Zealand but who cares right? Right?