Yesterday most of my technical team and I met up in the cold and frosty afternoon to watch a rugby game in Twickenham, a suburb of London. The day dawned utterly frozen and cold, so I decided to try to look "sporty" and donned a few layers, a bright pink hat, and striped gloves (maybe less "sporty" and more "I have no idea how rugby is played", but I tried anyway). I made my way to the train station to try to catch a train to London. Once there, it was a no-go. Trains weren't going in to London from our line due to engineering works. The ticket machine had been gutted by some vandals as well, and since there was money about and not an official in sight I decided to earn my merit badge and put the money back in the machine, attempted to close the door, and rang the police to tell them that various Southwest Trains monies were lying about.

That ought to get me a few hours out of purgatory.

I drove to my other project manager Ron's house and parked my car there, as he was a stone's throw away from the stadium and said we could just walk there from his place. I met his fiance and his 9 month old daughter, who was so cute and perfect it ripped whole new walls into my uterus. She sat in her bouncy chair, pumped her legs, and giggled with manic delight. When they let me hold her I played with her feet and as she shrieked with laughter I marveled at the utter perfect smoothness of baby feet, and the delightful smell they emit from the tops of their heads.

Ron and I dressed for the Arctic winter and, with two others from the team, we made our way to lunch and then to the rugby game.

Now, I have absolutely no idea how rugby is played. To me, it looks like a lot of strong thigh muscles and grunting as they crash into each other and hurtle themselves across throngs of other men. There seems to be a whole lot of ass-grabbing, not a common thing in most manly sports, and in general it looks like the closest you can get to rough-housing without getting sent to detention for doing so. Lucky for my complete ignorance of rugby, Rolf, one of my closest mates on my project team who joined the outing yesterday, is an ex-professional rugby player who retired when he felt he was too old and was getting injured too much. Rolf has a heart of gold and a nose that looks like it has been broken one time too many (he confirmed it was broken four times on the rugby field.) He's missing a tooth or two and, since retiring from rugby, has taken up extreme mountain biking, proving that once an adrenaline junkie always an adrenaline junkie.

I bought him a beer and, in exchange for it, he promised to explain the game to me.

(This was necessary. I was so utterly clueless about rugby that when Angus called and asked me what time the scrum up was, I told him I hadn't started drinking yet. He sighed and explained that a scrum up is to rugby what a kick off is to football. I despair.)

We made our way to the stadium and sat about 10 rows back from the field. The game had the local London team, the Harlequins, playing the Penzance Pirates (I swear to you, I am not making that one up. Many, many times I had on the tip of my tongue the song I Am The Very Model of a Modern Major-General but nothing says "ass kicking" like a smart mouth singing a song from a musical the Cornish probably find a bit insulting, especially seeing as we were seated in their section.) Some of the Cornish players were very tasty looking indeed, and I found myself fantasizing about tasting a bit of Cornish pasty.

Rolf settled in, and started explaining. He really had to, as from minute one the questions came out of me. Are they allowed to pick up people like that and hold them in the air to catch the ball? Doesn't that hurt when they do that? What does that referree signal mean? That guy's out cold! Will they let him back in the game if he comes to?

Rolf explained it all to me. I learnt about props and backs, handbagging and forwarding. First row and second row got explained, as well as defensive tactics and offensive rushing. There was great activity on the field just in front of us, so I got to see how scrums really work-the amazing thing is, men reach underneath the bollocks of men in front of them and hold on to their shorts. Seriously. Now, a woman? If she so much as twitches a leg muscle in a 5 mile radius of a man's crotch, he does the defensive jig and covers the crown jewels without thinking. But these guys? They have grown burly men reaching under their sacs and holding onto the waistband of their shorts, and they don't even flinch in fear of getting racked. Amazing.

I found I actually really enjoyed myself. Rolf's explanations had the game make sense, and as he explained the tactics people were using, I could see how the players' locker room coaching unfurled on the field. It didn't mean I didn't embarass myself, however.

The Cornish fans in front of us would invariably shout things to the players on the field. A Cornish accent isn't as difficult as some to understand, but it's not always easy. At one point, the man in front of me shouted to the field.

"The ref's a homo!" he shouted. "The ref's a homo!"

"Well," I said, my feathers ruffled. "In this day and age, that's completely ok! I don't see what his sexual preference has to do with his referreeing at all!"

Rolf was convusled into laughter. "Helen," he wheezed, tears coming out of his eyes, "I have to set you straight on this one. He said 'The ref's a home man.' Home man. A local. He wasn't calling him gay."

"Oh," I reply weakly. "Well, I guess that's all right then."

The game ended in a slaughter-the local team won 50-6. It wasn't a game so much as it was a sheer stomping. The rest of my team decided to hit the pubs, but I walked back to my car to come home to Angus, excited about my day at the rugby field-I'm still pretty hopeless and understanding all of it, but Rolf's tutelage helped me to enjoy the game and I don't think I'll ever forget the sound of grown men's collarbones smacking into each other at full pressure.

-H.

PS-to the bint who sent me the hate mail about Santa Claus-it's not even Thanksgiving yet, what are you doing surfing Santa Claus sites? I know Santa Claus isn't real. It's called irony. Go ahead and look it up, it might make your day. You're the kind of person who cheered when they shot Bambi's mother, aren't you?

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 11:26 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 1218 words, total size 7 kb.

1 WTF? Santa Claus isn´t real? What do you mean?

Posted by: Miguel at November 21, 2005 12:21 PM (EekVb)

2 Simply enough - football (soccer) a gentleman's game played by thugs, rugby - a thugs games played by gentleman. PS great use of "bint" ... that doesn't come out to play very often

Posted by: Rob at November 21, 2005 01:25 PM (9UJHr)

3 What do you mean Bambi mother is dead? I don recall seeing the shooting. I mean if they used the meat to feed their starving family okay...but seriously is bambi's mother dead?

Posted by: drew at November 21, 2005 01:31 PM (IR4lS)

4 I tried to watch rugby once. It was definitely high adrenaline enough to capture my attention but the actual game was mystifying. It seemed to be "smear the queer" for grown-ups.

Posted by: Jim at November 21, 2005 03:05 PM (tyQ8y)

5 The bar that I hung out in while in college was also where the rugby players hung out and drank after games. I went to see several matches, and always enjoyed the mayhem, though I'm still unclear on all of the rules. "Give Blood - Play Rugby" has always been one of my favorite bumper-stickers

Posted by: ~Easy at November 21, 2005 03:50 PM (LN5gS)

6 You mean you went out with your team from work? I thought you weren't allowed to even speak to them without your manager's permission. Geez. Hope he doesn't find out... Glad you had fun. Rugby is fun to watch, but I could probably do with someone explaining what the hell is going on when I watch it.

Posted by: amy t. at November 21, 2005 03:54 PM (zPssd)

7 Did the players elect a rugby queen at this match? Did your friend explain the concept of a rugby queen to you and do they have rugby queens in Britain? Just wondering...and fortunately, I was never appointed the rugby queen when I hung out with the players from our local team.

Posted by: Marie at November 21, 2005 04:30 PM (PQxWr)

8 Sounds like fun. wish I understood half of what you said.

Posted by: caltechgirl at November 21, 2005 05:27 PM (/vgMZ)

9 I.Don't.Do.Sports. Sounds like you had fun, tho'...

Posted by: sue at November 21, 2005 05:42 PM (WbfZD)

10 The only improvement would have been watching it in a nice warm bar. Wait a second, what do you mean they shot Bambi's mother? I always thought she was just sleeping! I clearly have to talk to my mother about this.

Posted by: RP at November 21, 2005 10:36 PM (fWrQ6)

11 I didn't laugh when Bambi's mother got shot. I DID go into hysterics when I was 16 when I saw Godzilla stomp Bambi into the ground, though. Is Angus as clueless about an American football game as you are (or were) about rugby? Oh wait, he does know what a kickoff is. Good start. I like babyfeet too. Especially tickling them.

Posted by: diamond dave at November 21, 2005 11:40 PM (ozLpm)

12 "Rugby is a game played by men with funny shaped balls" Those thighs - sheer heaven!

Posted by: Gill at November 22, 2005 10:26 AM (uDpoc)

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