Grand final weekend
Wait, don't stop reading. Hardly any of this post is actually about football.
I decided not to watch the Grand Final this year. Sure I was happy for Geelong (after all, I used to live there), but I suspected that Port Adelaide were in for a very bad day and this would only remind me that had Collingwood kicked one more goal the previous week, they would had been clear favourites to break their own 17-years-and-counting premiership drought.
Of course, I didn't anticipate the extent of the absolute one sided pantsing that the match turned out to be as most of the Port players were apparently affected by some sort of cursing of the Petrificus Totalis variety and Geelong spent the final quarter living it up Normandy Style, but the scoreline just served to underline the point, really.
Instead, my parents came around for the afternoon and we spent most of it in the garden, weeding, finding bicycles and planting a lemon tree.
The lemon tree is likely to bear bitter fruit consistently for the next 30 years. This reminds me irresistably of the decision I made as a sweet innocent four year old to support Collingwood.
At least, in the case of the tree, the fruit in question can be used to make scallopini.
We also skipped the NRL Grand Final, despite my secret fondness for all things Storm. It seemed a much better idea to take the family to dinner at the Aspendale RSL. For the real highlight of the evening, you'll have to read this blog over here, but apart from freaking out on arrival because it looked exactly the same as the RSL in that small town I used to live in, there was much to be impressed with.
For a start, I love any place that has about 7 items on the menu, including three kinds of schnitzel, but finds room for a Chicken Jambalaya in there too. I was equally happy with the three course soup/acres of roast meat/pavlova combination for $15 each.
Even better, though, was the endlessly old school nature of the entertainment, provided by one dude who spends most of his time playing in a Johnny Cash tribute band, and by said dude's wife, who it must be noted does have an excellent voice.
This dude was a bit obsessed with Gracie's 80th birthday celebration, which meant that we started the show by all singing happy birthday to Gracie. Then we sang it again after the second song. And after the fourth song. Dude of entertainment then sang it himself in the style of Johnny Cash, after first noting that they had tried to get the Man in Black himself to come and sing it but "We couldn't dig him up. He lost the plot."
Seriously. Old. School.
In between various other songs, many of them from the '40s, this dude kept us entertained with, among other things,a few jokes about the latest series of Big Brother. He was aware that the show is not on at the moment, but he cunningly introduced the gags by claiming that he had taped the last few episodes and he was going to go home and watch them after the gig.
He completed his tour de force of mystifyingness by approaching me in between sets and asking me which of the elderly folk was actually Gracie the birthday girl, despite the fact that I was sitting on the far side of the room from Gracie and her friends and there was not a reason in the world to suspect that I might know the answer. I guessed and pointed.
We will be going back soon. Oh yes, we really, really will.
I decided not to watch the Grand Final this year. Sure I was happy for Geelong (after all, I used to live there), but I suspected that Port Adelaide were in for a very bad day and this would only remind me that had Collingwood kicked one more goal the previous week, they would had been clear favourites to break their own 17-years-and-counting premiership drought.
Of course, I didn't anticipate the extent of the absolute one sided pantsing that the match turned out to be as most of the Port players were apparently affected by some sort of cursing of the Petrificus Totalis variety and Geelong spent the final quarter living it up Normandy Style, but the scoreline just served to underline the point, really.
Instead, my parents came around for the afternoon and we spent most of it in the garden, weeding, finding bicycles and planting a lemon tree.
The lemon tree is likely to bear bitter fruit consistently for the next 30 years. This reminds me irresistably of the decision I made as a sweet innocent four year old to support Collingwood.
At least, in the case of the tree, the fruit in question can be used to make scallopini.
We also skipped the NRL Grand Final, despite my secret fondness for all things Storm. It seemed a much better idea to take the family to dinner at the Aspendale RSL. For the real highlight of the evening, you'll have to read this blog over here, but apart from freaking out on arrival because it looked exactly the same as the RSL in that small town I used to live in, there was much to be impressed with.
For a start, I love any place that has about 7 items on the menu, including three kinds of schnitzel, but finds room for a Chicken Jambalaya in there too. I was equally happy with the three course soup/acres of roast meat/pavlova combination for $15 each.
Even better, though, was the endlessly old school nature of the entertainment, provided by one dude who spends most of his time playing in a Johnny Cash tribute band, and by said dude's wife, who it must be noted does have an excellent voice.
This dude was a bit obsessed with Gracie's 80th birthday celebration, which meant that we started the show by all singing happy birthday to Gracie. Then we sang it again after the second song. And after the fourth song. Dude of entertainment then sang it himself in the style of Johnny Cash, after first noting that they had tried to get the Man in Black himself to come and sing it but "We couldn't dig him up. He lost the plot."
Seriously. Old. School.
In between various other songs, many of them from the '40s, this dude kept us entertained with, among other things,a few jokes about the latest series of Big Brother. He was aware that the show is not on at the moment, but he cunningly introduced the gags by claiming that he had taped the last few episodes and he was going to go home and watch them after the gig.
He completed his tour de force of mystifyingness by approaching me in between sets and asking me which of the elderly folk was actually Gracie the birthday girl, despite the fact that I was sitting on the far side of the room from Gracie and her friends and there was not a reason in the world to suspect that I might know the answer. I guessed and pointed.
We will be going back soon. Oh yes, we really, really will.
posted by I'm not Craig at 9:20 PM
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