Yule Be Right

Yuletide is a word rarely heard these days. It is archaic, and irrelevant, like Hamilton and Hone. Yet it is a lovely word that evokes a more pleasurable and innocent past. It smacks of logs on the fire and snow on the sill. It’s better than the more didactic Christmas, which is in reality two religious words stung together. But Yule (a pagan festival) and Christmas (another) are not about etymology, they are about serenity—the time in which the little pleasures of life reign over the self-absorption of other times of the year. A time to share good fortune with friends and family. I will have my brother staying with me, and that is the first time that has happened at this time of the year in, well, years. I have written of my brother before. He lives in Christchurch. He is completely unfazed by quakes, or anything else for the matter. He loves his dog, and to him that’s all that matters. The little pleasures. Serenity. Looking back on my own year, I have met more good people than bad, and again it has been a long time since that happened. It’s been a great year, and it’s going to culminate in a great Christmas…Yuletide, with friends and family. Here’s wishing the same for you, for everybody, even, yes, Hamilton.

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The Real McCaw

This morning the Prime Minister revealed on Radio Sport that he offered All Black captain Richie McCaw a knighthood in the New Year’s Honours List. John Key further revealed that Richie had declined because he (McCaw) felt it was too early for such an honour. Implicitly that left the door open for one later, and most New Zealanders would probably applaud that. Having said that, I can think of a number of New Zealanders who have accepted the honour who are far less deserving of it. The criteria of who gets a knighthead these days seems to be a lot looser than that of the Knights of Old and Knights of Bold. If we go back to those days, to gain a knighthood one had—generally—to be brave, chivalrous, to exhibit considerable prowess on the battlefield, and to be diligent in protecting the sanctity of a woman’s maidenhood. Well, if we replace battlefield with rugby field and acknowledge that protecting maidenhoods may be more honoured in the breech than the observance, nobody would be more qualified than Richie. But it won’t be this time. Richie’s decision. But when they do come knocking again—as they will, perhaps on your retirement Richie—accept it then. You deserve it. We deserve it. It honours you. And in some way it honours us, and who we like to think of ourselves as New Zealanders—the Real McCaw.

Footnote: In the same interview, the Prime Minister would not be drawn on whether Graham Henry had been offered and accepted a knighthood. We were simply invited to “wait and see.”

Whetu Solves the World's Problems

I hope I am not courting fate when I proffer the hope that New Zealand is in for a happier year in 2012 than it experienced for much of 2010 and 2011. Touch wood that the only residual dark cloud is nothing new and indeed is so prevalent and perpetual to be almost non-existent: the performance of the NZ national cricket team. It won’t get any easier for them, coming off an Australian tour and then having the South Africans here.
But elsewhere I detect that despite electing a government the majority of us wanted and winning a world cup that we needed—and note there the relative priorities—its still been a hard year. I think the government should make it mandatory that we all take a two-week break after Christmas to recoup and recover and marshal our ravished recourses.
The country can run itself for a while can’t it? Alternatively we could just give it to the Maori Party to run for a couple of weeks—by the time they had finished with the consultative hui etc nothing will have happened, a fortnight will have gone by, and the power base will have been restored. Or maybe we should just let Phil Goff have a go for a couple of weeks—bit like giving the retiring front row prop a kick at goal when the game is already won (or lost)—fun, a nice gesture but ultimately meaningless. Hone would be good except that he would probably be on the first plane to Paris for a fortnight. Then there is Winston—ah, Winston—what would Winston do if given power for a couple of weeks? Well, you couldn’t of course. He would never take it. Two weeks? Two terms more like it, that would be his negotiating position, and then he would be so contrary he would also demand the post of Leader of the Opposition, in opposition to himself.
So, if we did have an enforced break as a nation who should we put in charge? My mate Whetu says it should be him. He says he has the perfect panacea for our ills. He says he wouldn’t need to be prime minister for a fortnight. He would just take us all down to the pub on the first day, Treasury would shout a few Lion Reds, we would collectively solve all the world’s problems in one afternoon and then his government would send us all on hols for a couple of weeks—at their cost. Which is kinda where we started, eh? Go Whetu!