We recently had the chance to holiday in New Zealand's beautiful South Island with the family in tow, and in looking for a car rental company, i had the choice between my usual Hertz (or Avis) or a smaller local company. For a change, i thought that it'd be nice to support the latter, especially after the earthquakes. The wifely person also did her part in what limited shopping opportunities there were in Christchurch. The downside to this is that smaller companies tend to be more problematic should any issues arise, and the following is an example which happened to me:
We got into a fender bender which left a scar/scratch with a dent in the driver's side door. It occured because as we were approaching a one-laned bridge, the car in front did not leave sufficient room (he had assumed wrongly that he had right of way), thus oncoming traffic could not squeeze through. Thus he had to reverse, but in doing so, he failed to check his blind spot and speed, and backed into my door at an angle. This was done despite my repeating honking to let him know i was behind. Then he sped off after the traffic had cleared. We made a police report at the nearest police station and gave a description of the car (dark blue early model Nissan Skyline) together with its rego. I also called the car rental company and spoke to the owner, who advised that we make the police report.
Returning the car, he charged us the full excess amount even though it was clear that the damage would not amount to half of that by my estimate. And when he communicated to his the quotation from his panel beater, it was less than a third of the full excess amount. We decided to file the insurance claim anyways, in the scant offchance that the insurance company could locate the other party.
Friday, 13 May 2016
Tuesday, 3 May 2016
laboured training
Thanks to the labour day holiday, i managed to go for soccer training on a Monday, especially since the offspring and wifely person was hanging out with Ms E, leaving J free to attend soccer training with me.
We only had 10 people for training, so we got to do quite a bit of exercises with coach Rafa. After a quick warm up, we started with the interval training which was standard slaloms and ball-based skills. Interesting rondo variations with an extra blank slot for players to move into after they play a pass, which meant for hijinks as people forgot to move or were caught in a move. Another variation was the players holding hands, which made for very quick one touch passes as well as some silky skills to get the ball past the monkey. Then we did one v one in the centre circle with Rafa being neutral and scoring is by stopping the ball in a small square marked by cones. Got paired up against a speedster, so it was really tiring but i managed to maintain a clean sheet against him, and even managed to score a goal, thanks to ghosting in behind him (he doesn't defend well) with a one-two with Rafa, short sprint with the ball and stopped it on the box. =)
Then we had another one v one, with defender and striker passing until the striker (with back towards goal) decides to take the ball through a set of cones while the defender goes through another set of cones and striker tries to score against a keeper. As the distance for the defender to cover is more, invariably the striker scores although the point is that the specter of the incoming defender looms on the striker's mind. Managed to score and then managed to defend cleanly.
Still one more drill, which was to flick the ball to Rafa's hands before receiving the high ball, chesting the volleying the ball, one bounce max. After a few goes, we tried to end the exercise on a goal, and after drawing a blank, i managed to do it within one bounce, as the ball wobbled and dipped into the top right hand corner. Wow.
The match itself was more even 7 v 7 with a coach in each team and we had Rafa. =) I played in defence and was pretty much busy from start to end, since the other team had speedsters. I even got caught out by one of them and a goal resulted, but then we were 4-1 up anyways. The goals we scored included a beauty from J, as i hit a diagonal high pass and J headed it in by changing the direction, leaving the keeper stranded. Lovely. Also scored one which was actually a cross to J (again). Overall a pretty good training session.
We only had 10 people for training, so we got to do quite a bit of exercises with coach Rafa. After a quick warm up, we started with the interval training which was standard slaloms and ball-based skills. Interesting rondo variations with an extra blank slot for players to move into after they play a pass, which meant for hijinks as people forgot to move or were caught in a move. Another variation was the players holding hands, which made for very quick one touch passes as well as some silky skills to get the ball past the monkey. Then we did one v one in the centre circle with Rafa being neutral and scoring is by stopping the ball in a small square marked by cones. Got paired up against a speedster, so it was really tiring but i managed to maintain a clean sheet against him, and even managed to score a goal, thanks to ghosting in behind him (he doesn't defend well) with a one-two with Rafa, short sprint with the ball and stopped it on the box. =)
Then we had another one v one, with defender and striker passing until the striker (with back towards goal) decides to take the ball through a set of cones while the defender goes through another set of cones and striker tries to score against a keeper. As the distance for the defender to cover is more, invariably the striker scores although the point is that the specter of the incoming defender looms on the striker's mind. Managed to score and then managed to defend cleanly.
Still one more drill, which was to flick the ball to Rafa's hands before receiving the high ball, chesting the volleying the ball, one bounce max. After a few goes, we tried to end the exercise on a goal, and after drawing a blank, i managed to do it within one bounce, as the ball wobbled and dipped into the top right hand corner. Wow.
The match itself was more even 7 v 7 with a coach in each team and we had Rafa. =) I played in defence and was pretty much busy from start to end, since the other team had speedsters. I even got caught out by one of them and a goal resulted, but then we were 4-1 up anyways. The goals we scored included a beauty from J, as i hit a diagonal high pass and J headed it in by changing the direction, leaving the keeper stranded. Lovely. Also scored one which was actually a cross to J (again). Overall a pretty good training session.
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