> Big day, yesterday. New Zealand made history by becoming the only country apart from the US to ever successfully defend the America's Cup (yacht racing, for those who don't know). In 1995 NZ became the first team EVER to wipe out the competition five-nil, and yesterday we did it AGAIN. This is so far beyond "good" it gets closer to "insulting" as far as every other racing team for the last 149 years is concerned. I was never into crazed nationalistic fervour, but I have to say it. We RULE. :-)
>
> The number of people that rampaged down to the harbour here to see the boats get back in was unbelievable. A conservative estimate put the crowd at 70,000 people. And this was at 3pm on a working day. The official Cup presentation is tomorrow, and looks set to blow away the 1995 celebration in which 500,000 people (out of a city of one million) packed the main street.
>
> I took three rolls of film from yesterday and hopefully will get some pics up on my page soonish. The fireworks at night were spectacular and I'm hoping to have managed at least one decent photo of them, but based on my New Year's Eve attempts, I doubt it very much. :-)
>
> Anyway, the down side of FIVE-NIL is that tomorrow is my last day at work and I will therefore say goodbye to all my friends at RinkWorks. Not permanently, I promise, but I'll be concentrating on finding a new job and won't be checking in here all that often. Those of you who have my email address, that's going down too, but my new one is now on my home page. I'll try to check it as often as possible.
>
> On the employment front, I have been offered a not-incredibly-interesting but adequate job, and I got a VERY hopeful-looking email this morning regarding arranging an interview for a job that looks much better. Looks like the trip to Japan might be going ahead, too, but I'm still not 100% certain.
>
> One thing for sure, anything interesting that happens, you guys will be the first to know. :-) I'll be going nuts not knowing what exciting things are going on here while I'm gone, so email me if anything amazing happens! Hehehe.
>
> Brunnen-"by the way...FIVE NIL!!!!!"G

Strangely, I found myself rooting for New Zealand.
Did anybody ever explain why it's called the America's Cup, when the contestents are from all over? Like the "World Series" I guess. I watched some of it in the middle of the night with the sound turned down. Beautiful. I kept thinking about what you said about the thickness of those hulls. I suppose five nil is what we call a shut-out.
I hope the Japan trip is still go. I've always had a yen to go there.
Howard