Connect Fail

Last week I had the absolute pleasure of attending my good friend AJ's 40th Birthday celebration. It was held at a bar/restaurant in Royal Oak,  called The Zoo Keeper's Son. It seemed to have been quite recently refurbished and was very nice! The whole upstairs was set aside for the occasion, which gave it a nice private feel. My girlfriend and I had dinner downstairs beforehand, which was great but very filling! Somehow we managed to down two whole pizzas between us, as well as a side of chips. I was certainly bursting at the seams after that, but in a good way! Anyway after dinner we went up and met AJ and his friends and family. 

Not Too Shabby!

The theme for the party was 'Suit Up,' and the guests didn't disappoint. There were some very snazzy outfits on display, as well as some other 'alternative' options just for fun. One in particular was a very clever girl's suit bedecked (mind the pun) with cards, to match the 'suit' theme. Very clever. I had to borrow a suit jacket- I will one day get my own!- and wore a really cool Cricket tie that I have, since AJ and I are fellow Cricket umpires! I even donned my special pair of Cricket cuff-links that I got for Christmas. 

Anyway, you may be wondering what this has to do with the title of this post. Well, for some reason (I keep forgetting to ask!) there were several board games at the tables at the party. This was quite a nice move actually- it kept the guests entertained, rather than making them have to try and talk to each other- shock horror! But seriously, it made for an excellent ice breaker and a comedic medium. As I have mentioned previously, I have quite a thing for board games, though I hardly ever get to play them. Eventually I was tempted by a mini set of Connect Four, and (foolishly) challenged by girlfriend to a game.

Go On.. Click To Enlarge

Well, the first game went down to the last few pieces, but in the end I lost. I was on the back foot the whole time, but at least I dragged it out a bit. Which is more than can be said for the next game; I had even more foolishly asked for a rematch, which was a big mistake. I soon realised that I had hardly ever played the game, and I pretty much had no strategy at all. It's not the most difficult game to learn, but becaus of that you assume it will be easy to play. It's not the simple. But that's no excuse for losing after just five moves. No one should ever fail that badly, yet... the evidence speaks for itself. My shame was palpable. And trust me, it was impossible to get the damn thing out to retrace my last move, so that was that...

However, my shame was not strong enough for me not to pull the 'first to three' card, which anyone who has had to paper-scissors-rock for something will recognise as the penultimate move of desperation. So, for a third time I foolishly tried to bluff my way through a game, only to meet the same, agonising fate. Ok, it wasn't that bad, I was getting used to it by now. 3-0, but at least the third game was longer than the second. Definitely time to give up now, yes?

Age 6+ ...

No. The final move of desperation. The 'one more, winner takes all' call. A foolish thing to say, but more foolish to accept. Well, I didn't get a definitive answer on the winner takes all part, but I did manage to get one more game. And finally, it started to go my way. I was on the front foot the whole game and rightfully won in convincing fashion. I triumphantly claimed that since the winner takes all, I had won for the night. The look I received gave a very different impression! Which is fair enough, I deserved to lose. More than that, I deserve to be riled and humiliated for being such a novice. 


On the bright side, I think I will retire from my Connect Four career and go out on a winning note...

Q.E.D. 

On A Roll

Those of you who are lucky enough to have been reading my blog for some time will remember my discourses about my holiday to Melbourne. The astute ones among you might even have noticed that I regrettably failed to conclude the story- I still have all the details, but it's a bit late to write it up; still, I might get round to it (Spoiler Alert!! I made it back ok). Anyway, there was a time when it seemed that my trip might not even go ahead at all. A couple of weeks before we were due to fly out, my father asked if he could have my passport to make a photocopy. No worries, I'll just get it out of the place where I keep it, I thought. Alas, it was not there. No need to panic, it will be somewhere in the room. I'll look sometime. Days pass and it hasn't turned up on its own accord, so I decide actually to look for it. No luck. 

Now I start to become worried; having basically turned the room inside out and upside down, the situation seems more and more desperate. Not helping this was the fact that my brother's 21st was around the corner and I hadn't yet found him a present. This resulted in many long nights pondering the two issues, amongst others at the time. These got longer and longer until one night, at around 1 in the morning, it happened. It clicked; I had the perfect idea for a present for my brother. So perfect in fact that I didn't have to buy anything and it would only take a few minutes to make, but it was still meaningful and thoughtful.

I was naturally very happy about this; it put me in a good frame of mind. So much so that I thought, for some reason, I should get up out of bed in the middle of the night and check for my passport while I was on a roll. My mind turned to my jacket hanging on the wall, unused for some time due to the warm temperatures. My hand was drawn towards its pocket and a great feeling gripped my body as I felt something inside. Magically, I pulled out my passport. Mentally I did a celebratory dance. Even in the dark of night, in my own room, behind a closed door I wouldn't actually do one. But it was a huge, huge relief to me. 

I soon realised how it had come to be in there, and how simple it seemed now I knew it was there. It was with a great feeling of satisfaction that I showed it off at breakfast the next day. It was certainly a fantastic night. I had killed two birds with one stone. All of that, because I was on a roll and I realised it. It's one thing to have things go your way, but if you start to believe that, then you can actually make it happen. It's perhaps a chicken and egg thing, but either way, once you get the roll on, it's a wonderful feeling. Never underestimate what a bit of positive thinking can do!

Q.E.D. 

Under The House

Soon I am about to move houses; the house we are moving into has been in our family for over 40 years, and consequently needs a fair amount of clearing out. For me, this meant going underneath the house to find things that had been stored there for eons. By under the house I don't mean a basement or a storage room, I mean a 'space' big enough for me to fit in (just) which is literally the gap between the floor of the house and the ground. Boy, what a fun time I had. I spent what seemed like an hour in there, though time was irrelevant. I was lucky enough to have some plastic to slide on and some foam to rest on, so it wasn't too painful. In the end I emerged, dusty, dirty, covered in cobwebs and with eyes full of crap, but at least I did get out.

Anyway it got me thinking. It was in fact the first time I had been under the house, despite spending much of my childhood holidays in the house, as well as several years living there. In fact, it was really the first time I had even seen under there. It's not that no one ever went under there, it's more that it was really off-limits to me as a child. Which is fair enough- letting kids go in there would be like giving them a pile of sugar-like crystals which are actually dangerous narcotics- not a good idea all round. That cavernous space would be like a wonderland for the young mind, and it would be oh-so-easy for them to get lost or hurt themselves in there. And so rightly I was kept well away from there. As it is with kids' logic, when things were no longer around I concluded they must have gone under the house. Alas that wasn't always true.

That very evening I was sprawled on the couch recovering from a very long day, and on tv was a documentary which, among other things, explored an ancient Mayan cave. The local historian explained, of course, that the Mayans thought these caves were portals to the under world. This of course immediately reminded me of the caves at Cumae, which will should be familiar to those who have read Aeneid Book VI. The Romans of course thought that the entrance to the underworld was in this area, in a large crater. Which is interesting for many reasons- not just that it was ironic that the underworld the Romans had pretty much stolen from Greek mythology just happened to be accessible in their own neck of the woods.

So where's all this getting to? Well, the common theme to all this is small, dark, cavernous spaces. And having spent a lot of time in one, with the aid of a artificial torch, it's easy to see why people with ancient superstitions believed these places had a divine connection. Any cave that is deep enough and big enough will seem endless to all but them most skilled and prepared spelunkers. The natural progression of that thought is that if the cave keeps going back, and down, it will eventually go far enough to reach the underworld. It's one of those arguments so loved by religions- they say it's there, and it's too difficult for you to prove it's not, so you go along with it!

I can see how some people would get a thrill out of caving and all that, while I can also see how it easily scares the bejeesus out of most people! One cannot conceive of too many worse fates than to be trapped or lost in a dark, scary cave, alone and with no hope of survival, waiting to die. Which makes me feel just a little bit easier about crawling a few metres underneath my house. After all- what could go wrong? ...

Q.E.D. 

Cricket Fiction Is Atrocious

Bad Idea

Do you remember the last time you went to the fiction section and found a good novel about Cricket? No, me neither, and there's a reason for that. It's virtually impossible to write an interesting, realistic narrative about a fictional game of Cricket. Some have tried, but the results have been spectacularly awful. A very good example of this is a novel written by the great Gary Sobers himself, name 'Bonaventure and the Flashing Blade.' The book is cloying to the point of making you sick. I recommend if you ever come across it, you head in the opposite direction as quickly as possible. Great though he may have been on the Cricket field, Sobers was not the same class with pen in hand.

Though it is hardly his fault; the genre is almost non-existent and for many good reasons. I have put some thought into why Cricket fiction is so appallingly bad, and these are some of the answers I have come up with. Firstly, the audience is uncertain. Sobers' book was aimed for children, which gives it a very inane tone throughout. Children's stories have to have general moralising elements and everyone should get a fair go. If you were to aim it at older readers, you would be hard pressed to keep them interested. You would have to make the Cricket a secondary element to the book, with main plot and character developments occurring, for the most part, away from the game.

Secondly, you face a problem with characters. Every game of cricket requires at least 24 people- two teams of 11 and two umpires- plus everyone else involved. It leaves the author in the difficult position of striking a balance between keeping his description realistic and not overcrowding the story with players. Furthermore, when it comes to the action you don't get the same one or two people doing everything- Cricket is a team game, but players contribute at different times, in different games, and it's all very random. Trying to portray this accurately without being repetitive is another challenge.

Thirdly, there are only so many ways you can describe the game itself. Sure you can have commentaries on Cricinfo that give you endless descriptions of every ball that keep it relatively interesting; however a lot of that is the other things they talk about, rather than the very matter-of-fact descriptions of the game. A novel could not simply go on describing the action of a game forever, it would get tedious. It would require very fine balancing of how much to talk about, how much to leave out. On the flipside, a very general description can be equally boring and vague. So it's not an easy task. 

Finally, the game is stranger than fiction. For anyone who doesn't believe that, could you have even dreamt of an international captain biting into a ball in an ODI, or could you have invented a character as complex yet simple as Chris Martin? There's just no predicting what can happen in the game and that makes it remarkably hard to recreate in a fictional setting. Anything new you make up will seem outlandish, anything old will seem boring. 

So that's a fairly grim outlook for anyone interested in writing some Cricket fiction. On the other hand there is a vast multitude of journalistic, quasi-journalistic and satirical writing about Cricket in the world. Satire seems to be one medium where even fictional Cricket writing can be acceptable. Take for example the play Outside Edge by Richard Harris, of which there was fantastic version made for TV with Paul Eddington and Prunella Scales. This was a humorous play based around a cricket game at the village green. However, the action on the field was coincidental and the plot moved around the characters off the field. Attempts to make it into a Sitcom seem to have been very misguided.

Anyway, my advice to aspiring Cricket writers out there: don't try to make it up, it will sound awful. If you do want to write something, have a dig at real people, it's much more fun!

Q.E.D. 

Pen Pals

When I was in Year 3 at school, our teacher one day asked if anyone was interested in having a pen pal. Naturally there was quite a lot of interest and I too put my name forward- at that time, making any friends was an achievement for me! So we all said yes please and wrote down our addresses and that was that. Quite literally, that was it. We never heard about it again. No one really thought much of it; being young and easily distractable, the thought hardly occurred to me again. I did one time think about it and wondered why nothing came of it, but thought nothing further of it.

Jose R Canales

Wind the clock forward to Year 9 and I am starting my Secondary School education. Coincidentally, that year I moved back into the house I was living in in Year 3. Anyway, one day a letter appeared in the post, addressed to me, from the United States of America. I was rather taken aback by this and it took me some time to work out how someone on the other side of the world had obtained my name and address. The letter was from one Jose R. Canales, from El Paso, Texas. The letter was written in very nice handwriting and was set out exactly how you are taught to. It began: 

"Dear Benjamin, What's up!" 

Not a great start... He proceeded to tell me how he had a father named this, a brother named that, and so on. Then a whole lot of stuff about his hobbies, his school and all that sort of stuff you find interesting when you're eleven. It concluded with the agonising phrase "write me soon." Well, for a little while I thought about responding- you do feel a little guilty if someone makes the effort and you don't respond. However, I had since moved on from wanting to have a 'Pen Pal' and decided not to respond. I kept the letter though- probably for the interesting stamps. So that was that.

Eric Struhl

Until later that year, when I received another letter. No, not from the same person, from a different one. This was written by Eric Struhl, from Andover, Massachusetts. This one worried me slightly more, because he quite quickly stated that he was soon to be on a school trip to New Zealand, and he had look up my address on mapquest.com... So I didn't really want this guy snooping around my house, if you know what I mean! However, the rest of the letter convinced me he was not worth my time, when he asked "I read in a book penguins live in Australia. Have you ever seen a penguin?" This is of course completely correct, but confusing our two countries was unforgivable. So that went away too.

Racheal Anderson

Not long after, another came in the mail, this time from Frewsburg, New York. This was written by Racheal Anderson, who included a photo of her smiling self as well. She stated that she was 12 but proceeded to write as if it was half of that. I may sound harsh but sentences like "Mine family is alway's bisey" are really asking for it. I was almost moved by her request to send her a 'pitcher' of me (not), but she did sign the letter with "Love, Racheal Anderson." Awwww.... *cough*

Mike Ahearn

Once again I let that be- it was getting easier each time- and there was no sign of an Eric Stuhl snooping around that year. Fast-forward a couple of years to 2006 and I have moved out of that house, but still get the mail. And behold, I receive another letter, this time from Mike Ahearn (at least I think so, his writing is barely decipherable). The letter is typed out, apart from the signature and the address on the envelope. It is very Lord Denning-esque; short, sharp sentences, to the point. He writes "You live in New Zealand (good to know!). Have you ever seen an alligator or a Kangaroo?" (*sigh*). He then asks for a "postcard, or money (???), or something",  in exchange for which he will send me "something." He goes on to state the "The United States is the best." Good of him to inform those not quite fortunate enough to live there. And the rest is just the usual.

By this stage of course, I'm not even entertaining the idea of replying. I'm not mean-spirited or anything, it's just that I was happy to do so when I signed up for it, not 5 or 6 years later. Still, they have provided me with some amusement over the years and I kept them for that. I had to share them though, because they are quite funny in places. I'm not trying to look clever and make other people look dumb, that's not the point. I just find it interesting how the same old things crop up and how Americans just can't seem to work out that New Zealand and Australia are two completely different places! Ah well, maybe if I had replied I could have 'educated' a couple of them!

Q.E.D. 

If Degrees Were Pokemon...

In the spirit of the current 'Pokémon Week,' I thought I'd share this somewhat strange thought I once had with you. Let's face it: everyone up to a certain age has either played, watched or in some other way experience the Pokémon phenomenon. Even I, who was forbidden from having anything to do with them as a child (apparently they're evil), managed to get in on the craze. Like it or not, Pokémon have shaped an entire generation, whether by coincidence or design. Unfortunately, people seem not to have grasped the enormity of this and thus have failed to take advantage of the potential benefits. Here is one of my ideas:

Shape Tertiary education in the Pokémon mould. Ok, so that sounds a little far-fetched (no, I'm not deliberately trying to make puns on Pokémon names); however, if you read on and consider my idea, you will see some merit to it, if only hypothetical. Ok, so to start with, your degree is like your Pokémon. You have to train it by studying. Each course you take is like a part of the quest, and as you go you gain 'experience' by studying for that course. Every assessment is like a 'battle' and you gain more points depending on your mark. The end of each course culminates in a battle with the gym leader (the final exam) where you fight to win a badge. This badge lets you progress further in your quest. 

ZuBAt

Your courses progress in difficulty until you face the 'Elite Four' (or something similar). If you can pass them, you are welcomed into the hall of fame= you graduate. Then you can continue your quest and train your Pokémon further- such as taking a Masters paper or doing a PMD (A Pokémon Master Degree, instead of a PhD). Just as Pokémon can have different types, you have different types of degrees. And they can be a combination of two types- a conjoint- making them more impressive and diverse. Your Pokémon can also have special abilities depending on your Major. And so on, and so on.

BuLLBasaur

You see there is some merit to the idea, whatever the essentials are. People are by now used to the idea of 'levelling up,' which can make something seemingly mundane interesting by adding the element of challenge. Add to this competition against peers and you are well on your way to encouraging students to learn. And let's face it, none of the things anyone had tried in the past has really worked. So why not give this a shot? Of course the difficulty would be in trying not to make it look lame or nerdy, but actually genuine and fun. After all, learning isn't fun for most people and people who tell you otherwise are just trying to trick you.

So don't scoff at my idea- it's only an idea, but there is something worthwhile underlying it. Education as a whole is lacking a general motivating factor- academic success just doesn't cut it for most- so there is a need to find new and innovative ways to couch it. Making use of ideas already well-known and enjoyed by students could be the way to go. But in saying that, teaching by rap music or the like is completely inexcusable and those attempting it will be shot. That is all.

Q.E.D. 

50* Retired Hurt

Sunday was my last game of the 2010/11 Cricket season. For those of you who don't know- shame on you!- I am a Cricket umpire. It's been a long season- basically October through March- and I am glad to have come out the other end ok. It has had some high points, and a few too many low points for my liking, but just as the fact that the sun will rise again each day is a comfort to many, there is always the next season to look forward to- a fresh start.

Anyway, at the start of this campaign I thought I would conduct an experiment. I had read an anecdote about an English umpire who would take a note of every dismissal he gave, and thought this would be an interesting thing to do. So, at the beginning of the season I took my notepad and drew up a little table in which to note dismissals. I had to create a few rules to start with- for example, I would only include those decisions where I had to give a player out. If he walked or it was patently obvious the batsman was out, I would not write it down. In this way it gave a fairer reflection of what I actually had to do. Furthermore, I only took record of proper games- Club and Schools cricket- and not things like the Indian T20 competition or House games at school. This meant the standard was of a decent level.

As the season went on, I kept an eye on how the numbers were going. The two main ones were caught behind and LBW, with run out and stumped less prevalent. When I could tell fellow umpires that I had already given, say, 12 LBW decisions for the season, they were quite shocked. However, I told them, if you keep track of them, you'd be surprised how quickly they tally up. I certainly wasn't firing them and I felt like I was giving a lot more close ones not out than out. Which goes to show how interesting this exercise was.

Anyway, I had reached the last day of the club season that I was free to umpire, when I tallied up the number of dismissals I had given. I was surprised to find that I was on 49, a rather unfortunate score in cricket terms- I didn't want to be left stranded. 24 of them were LBW decisions, so one more LBW would give me a nice round 50%. It was not to be however, and at the end of the day I was still stuck on 49. Since it would be nice closure, I tried to umpire a school game for a little while the next weekend, but the whole day was rained off. It seemed fate wanted to leave me 49 not out.

Then on Friday I got a call, asking if I could possibly stand on Sunday on the second day of a promotion/relegation match for Prem Reserves, between Parnell and Papatoetoe. Finally I had my chance- although I don't mean this in a spiteful way at all, and I accepted the offer for other reasons than this alone. So I turned up on Sunday, to the news that 16 wickets had already fallen- which suggested I would indeed get my chance. As it happened, within 9 overs in the morning, the last 4 wickets of the Paptoetoe innings fell- at the other end. Nothing much was going on from my end at all.

Perhaps a change of ends might help? Of course now the game situation was different- the side batting for its second time simply needed to bat out the rest of the day- if there weren't any more wickets, there was a real possibility of an early finish. As it turned out, I didn't get a half decent shout for quite a long time. Wickets did start to fall, but I still didn't have to give a single decision. In an effort to break through, Papatoetoe brought back their gun strike bowler, who had taken a 5-for in the first innings.

He had bowled one batsman earlier from my end, and soon put a yorker through the defences of another. Still no work for me! Finally- an appeal for LBW! But since he was bowling away swingers to the left hander on strike, it was going to be difficult to pitch one on line and have it go on to hit. He was bowling mighty quick though, and had three successive appeals- none of which was close to being out. Then finally he slipped a full yorker in; the batsman tried to clamp down on it, but his boot got in the way. It struck him just inside the line of leg stump, going on to smash middle stump. I gave it a long, hard look and finally raised the finger.

I had finally raised my half century! When I told the batsman at tea, he jokingly said it was an honour to be my fiftieth victim of the season. By that stage the game was meandering to a draw, Parnell over a hundred ahead with wickets in hand and there weren't enough overs left to chase it. Of course, the Papatoetoe

Thank God For These!

It took me a few seconds to register the pain. Boy, it smarts! Very luckily for me, the blow was somewhat lessened by the contents of my pocket. I had my pad- yes the same one I kept my tally in- and pen, which were right in the firing line. After I had hopped around for a bit and run it off, I examined the contents of my pocket. The pen was smashed in the middle and the spiral binding of my pad was flattened. The batsman jokingly informed me I had cost him a boundary. I didn't find it as funny, but I was tough enough to keep going. It didn't hurt too much, but I had a bit of a headache so my concentration wasn't at its best.

Fortunately the game did not last much longer. The light was not good enough for quick bowlers, and the spinners were getting smashed. Parnell were thinking of declaring so they could try to bring on their fast bowlers and have the game called off for bad light. Eventually the Papatoetoe captain agreed to go off. Of course by that stage, the batsman had clobbered enough sixes to be nearing a hundred, so he said he wanted to keep going. Then the Papatoetoe captain said he would bring on his fast bowlers so we would go off. A bit of hypocrisy, no? In the end, the game finished rather farcically and we all walked off the field feeling a bit cheated. Ironically, within about five minutes of doing so, it began to pour down torrentially. 

I went back home and put my thigh on ice. You could see the red marks the spiral binding of my pad had made on it. It hasn't bruised too much but is quite red and very sore to touch. I've got a bit of a limp at the moment, but I'm sure that won't last long. Thankfully it's the end of the season though- I'm retiring hurt!

Q.E.D.

The Plot Thickens...

It appears my attraction of the emergency services is now beyond the realms of mere coincidence. Two nights ago, driving to Mission Bay and back, I encountered 6 separate Police cars and one Fire Police van. Not only that, but two of them had their lights flashing and had pulled over another driver- a clever ruse. But the most convincing of all was the one that followed me, almost to my house. It was so close on my tail I could see both officers inside. I had pulled up to the lights beside this car, only then realising it was a Police car. At once I went into defence mode, trying not to do anything slightly illegal. At least until the light turned green, when the lane merged ahead an in an effort to get ahead of him- as was my right- I probably got going a bit fast. The distance he lagged behind suggested this. So I slowed down, let him catch up and then decided to take a right turn up ahead, off the main road, just to shake the guy.


And guess what? HE MADE A RIGHT TURN AS WELL. I was pretty damned nervous by now. The next set of lights took an eternity, and I peered at them through the rear vision mirror. They seemed calm. I wasn't so much. The road veered up ahead and as I rounded the bend, I saw flashing lights. My heart skipped a beat, but it was in fact another Police car which had pulled over some truck. I thought perhaps that was where my 'tail' was going, he wasn't following me after all. I happily drove past (slowly) but to my dismay, my Police buddy stayed right behind me. Further up the road, he pulled into the lane along side me, and made a right turn. He was gone. I gave a sigh of relief. It was over, for now.

Very Hard To Capture On Camera

In the last few weeks, the number of Police cars, fire trucks and ambulances I have seen has been phenomenal. Some days I have even completed the 'trifecta,' including one where I saw two fire trucks, three Police cars and an ambulance. Furthermore, there is an increasing tendency for them to have their lights flashing. Just a couple of days ago, I even saw a Police motorbike- quite a funny story actually. At the University, the traffic can get quite heavy, and sometimes blocks up intersections. So at this one set of lights, this woman decided that it was already quite blocked, so she might as well drive into the middle of it anyway. After her light had turned red. Unfortunately for her, at the front of the lane which had just got the green light, sat the aforementioned motorcycle, which proceeded to flash its lights at her. She didn't get the message, or didn't want to, because she didn't pull over and every time he tried to drive up to her window, she would drive a little ahead. I could just see the cop getting angrier and angrier. Finally he drove right alongside her and made her pull over. Serves her right. It was lucky for me that this kept them off my tail for a while!

CAN Of Crims

As I have been thinking about this conspiracy, more and more examples come to mind. Last year when I used to make trips on the Train of the Damned, on the motorway before the train station we would always see these square white vans with CAN 01 or 12 on the back. We were rather puzzled, since it wasn't the same one every day, and it was quite a solid little thing. Then one day when walking past the High Court, what did I see but one of these pulling into the building, with no doubt criminals piled in the back. Of course, it was a Police vehicle. No surprises there. And they seem to gravitate just around where I go to university. What a fantastic coincidence.


So I can see the pattern emerging, but as of yet I can't see the overall and obviously diabolical scheme these instances form a part of. You may have noticed my absence from posting recently- rest assured nothing bad has happened, I am just busy. But if you don't hear from me again, you will know who's to blame...


Q.E.D.