A weekend full of rugby

Our gorgeous Saturday afternoon was perfect for the annual accounting firm rugby tournament in Kilbirnie Park. You may remember this event from last year when Jake's promising rugby career was cut short.

With the four top accounting firms competing, they call this the "Firm of Origin", which is a play on the name of the Australian "State of Origin" series. This may not mean much to our American readers, but I think it's probably a pretty clever name if you're from here.

The pitch (field) was pretty muddy, and more than once I saw big chunks of mud and grass flying through the air when the guys tackled each other. Jake didn't play but several of his KPMG colleagues did, and they ended up in second place out of four.

We gathered for a few drinks after the last game before the guys headed to the stadium to watch the Wellington Lions play some rugby, and the girls went out for dinner. This arrangement seems to work out rather well for all of us, since I think the girls had seen enough sports for the day.

After such a long Saturday, we made it home at a decent hour and Jake brought home this Lions huggie (coozie). Thought I'd snap a shot of it along with some common NZ beers -- Tui is your typical stadium beer, and not that great but I'll drink it if that's my only option. I think we both prefer the Monteith's series.

Jake was up at 8 am ready to head over to a mate's to watch the All Blacks game. I guess the All Blacks (NZ's national rugby team) played in South Africa sometime in the middle of the night because of the time difference between here and there. So the boys are watching a replay of it now.

I don't want to ruin the surprise for Jake, but I read in the paper this morning that the All Blacks scored a dramatic last-minute try against the Springboks to claim the Tri-Nations title.