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I should have also mentioned in my last post that Stephen Larkham's nickname in rugby circles is 'Bernie', which is a little weird considering the name of this blog. I didn't know that when I named the cat, or the blog.

Poor Steve had a tough day at the office on Saturday night, the All Blacks winning fairly convincingly and they didn't give 'Bernie' much of a chance to shine. In fact they worked pretty hard to keep him out of the play and out of the game. A sensible tactic.

My favourite Kiwi player, Jerry Collins, also had a difficult night as he got caught on camera taking a pee on the field just seconds before the game started. Apparently it was nerves .. when you gotta go, you gotta go ... The camera caught Jerry kneeling down, trying to be discreet! In front of 40,000 people and millions of tv viewers!! Poor Jerry.

We got to the pub early to get a good spot, and I was very surprised at how long it took for the place to fill up. I don't know whether the Australians are all 'sported out' after the World Cup soccer, or whether they just knew this game wasn't going to go their way ... but relatively few of them turned out to watch on the big screens at the Oaks. I've certainly been in much more enthusiastic, larger crowds in that hotel.

We got there early enough to have mussels and 'frites', sitting outside in the courtyard under the big Oak tree, in the warm winter sun. Lovely.

The cat, by the way, was named after Carl Bernstein, of Watergate fame. I got the idea from an episode of Murphy Brown, in which Murphy is trying to decide what to call her new child. She's trying out different names and in this episode, was experimenting with 'Woodward' - obviously referring to Bernstein's colleague Bob Woodward. I didn't think 'Woody' would suit the cat, so went for 'Bernie' instead. Given our household was concerned with journalism, and filled with journalists, most of the time, it seemed appropriate.

It was also not too far away from the dreadful 'Bertie' the woman at the pound had been using, so I figured the cat would not notice or mind too much. The pound lady was a very nice woman but she had an unexplainable fondness for Engelbert Humperdink. Hence Bertie.

Over the years Bernie got a few variations on his name, mostly 'Fat Bern' from my brother and 'Barney' from another friend who just likes to wind me up. It was my brother who took the photo that goes with this blog, and doctored it to include the FALSE measurements.

The speech bubble tho is probably fairly accurate.