wimbledon.

for those of you who havnt been monitoring the english weather, we've had a heat wave over here for the last 2 weeks pretty much, been really nice sunny weather getting up to around 30 on the hottest days, and i had friday off last week, so i thought, great weather, day off, grand slam tennis tournament on just down the road. woohoo. so i headed off to wimbledon, i didnt have a ticket so i had to wait in a the queue. it was 1.2km long. i ended up standing there for 3 hours 45 mins, but it was actually pretty fun cause i was standing next to a guy from london, and another guy from denmark, they were both heaps funny- so we were there laughing the whole time. the sun was blazing down the whole time we were standing in the line- the moment, i pay for my ticket and step thru the gates, the clouds start rolling over. i raced over to Henman hill,( a hill with a giant screen where all the people who can't get into centre court sit to watch the big matches) and managed to watch the last 3 points of lleytons win over some dude (whoever he beat in the 2nd round). there was heaps of aussies on the hill so it was a great atmosphere for the 50 seconds i was there. i then raced to one of the outside courts, and there was mixed doubles playing, i hadnt heard of any of them, but the standard was really good, some top points- its great on the outer courts because you can literally sit about 1m away from the players, so your really close to the action. they make impossible shots look so easy. it was 4-3- on serve- in the first set when it started raining. and that was the last tennis i saw. i would have loved to have been able to watch tennis all day, even the people youve never heard of are so good, its cool watching anyone. if you go to wimbledon you have to be prepared to queue. you have to wait for everything-to get in, for food, for autographs, theres even a 20min line to get into the gift shop- its crazy busy, but an awesome experience, hopefully one day ill get to go back for a full days play.

after coming home from the tennis, there was a few of us looking for soemthing to do, and as there is an ice rink about 50m from our hotel, we decided to give it a shot- turns out we went on the wrong night, as there was about 300, 12-17 year olds there, and i was like a disco on ice thing. you can probably imagine. i hadnt skated for a couple of years, so i was a bit dodgey. i was doing pretty well until about 5 mins from the end of the session. when i got my skates i asked for the speed skates(because im speedy)...but i got those dodgey bluse ones with the jagged pointy bit on the tip of the blade(same as the ones at boondall.) so i was going along, really fast(because im speedy) and the tip dug into the ice and i hit the deck, and kinda landed on my knee and hip, kinda hard, but i was ok. because it was the end of the session all the ice was churned up and slushy, so i was like sliding across a lake, if thats possible. but all in all it was a great day. it probably doesnt sound to good as your reading it- with wimbledon getting rained out and me stacking it on ice. but it was. smile. andyb