We've got Football (they call it Gridiron). We've got Baseball. We've got Hockey.
They've got Football (we call it Soccer). They've got Rugby. They've got cricket (what is this??).
Now, Gen and I were fortunate (read: spent the money) to acquire two tickets to the most recent Rugby match in Auckland to watch the Auckland Blues battle the Johannesburg (sp?) Lions.
What an unbelievable game!! Unlike the stop and go action of football, or the slow pace of baseball, Rugby is truly the sport for spectators with ADD. The action is never ending, with a never-ending display of fast plays and hard hits. With two forty-minute halves, the action is rarely interrupted, so the whole game, including half time, only takes two hours.
Now, not only did Gen and I get seats, we go the best seats in the house. Never could we have gotten tickets like this to an Eagles game. Only rows from the field, we were sure that a stray ball or player would end up in our laps. And had Gen played her cards, right, that very thing could have happened. But we'll get to that later.
The game of Rugby is exciting to watch and difficult to understand. With the players averaging out at about 6'4", 250 lbs, these guys probably all have ironic nicknames like "tiny" and "little Jon" and "sweetums". These guys are so big that even from far away, they're still so big. But don't let them fool you; they're fast, too. The best way to describe the sport is the fast paced action of Soccer, with the hits from football, but no pads. Oh, and you're allowed to lift players up, which we think is very impressive, considering their mass.
It really was very cool just to be there, but even more so considering the seats that we got. And, believe it or not, the seats only cost $45 (about $35 USD)!!
But the real fun started when the game ended. Only after Gen, in an attempt to get the captain's autograph, almost got his phone number also, did we leave the stadium and fall directly into the path of a bachelor party. And, as I'm sure you can imagine, so goes the rest of the night. There was dancing. There was partying. There were clubs (some of which we almost didn't get into, cuz Jake's a slob). And then the sun came up. Good times. Congratulations, Vaughn, all the best in your marriage.
