Odds and ends

On Saturday I spent a really nice evening at my cousin's place. I hadn't been there for nearly two months - among other things, my cousin had been in America on business. My aunt and uncle were staying, so there were eight of us for dinner. I did some baking - it was nice to produce something that doesn't feature on Mohs hardness scale. I saw the photos from my uncle's funeral - it was a DIY funeral with no undertaker, and the grey (but thankfully dry) day somehow added to the atmosphere.

I played two board games at Tracy's place last night. The first game was based on the popular French story Le Petit Prince. Four of us played: Tracy's mum joined in. It was simple to play but there was more going on than initially met the eye. You had to build a planet and make sure it didn't have too many volcanoes or baobab trees. It was a high-volatility game, or that's my excuse for coming last anyway. We then played 7 Wonders, again. That game has less volatility, making it more likely that Tracy, who must have something close to an eidetic memory, will win. She did, with an enormous score. My second place, and reasonable score, almost felt like a win.

Rolf Harris got nearly six years. Had he been younger, and had his terrible acts taken place more recently, he probably would have got (and deserved) longer. Actuarially, the chances that he'll die in prison are very close to 50:50. That's assuming he'll serve his full sentence, and I'm not sure that actuarial "rules" fully apply in prison.

The Wimbledon finals almost passed me by this year. Kvitova’s win over Bouchard, to claim her second Wimbledon final, clearly wasn’t much of a contest, but I would have been worth watching just to see someone play that well. The men’s final, which took four times as long, was a completely different story. They’re two absolute giants of the game; it’s hard not to be a bit envious of them. Look how many languages they can speak. Federer has two sets of twins, dammit. Djokovic's first child is on the way. It's easy to say so now, but when my aunt asked me to give a prediction, I picked Djokovic's five-set win, and even correctly predicted which sets he'd win. Of course it very nearly didn't turn out that way.

As I watched the Netherlands–Costa Rica quarter-final go to penalties, I was in two minds over who I wanted to win. On balance I probably wanted the Dutch to go through. Costa Rica looked like they were playing for penalties from the start, judging by all that fist-pumping from their bench after a goalless 120 minutes. Holland, on the other hand, were desperate to avoid that outcome, but when it eventuated they didn’t just think “oh shit”, they actually made something happen by changing their goalkeeper. In the end it was good to see Holland – possibly the stand-out team of the tournament so far – make the last four, but this World Cup would have been far less enjoyable without the plucky Costa Ricans, and it’s sad to see them go.

The group stage provided one goal for every 32 minutes of play. In the first knockout round, we saw one goal every 48 minutes. In the quarter-finals, it took an average of 78 minutes per goal. Goals aren’t everything of course, but those figures are some indication that this World Cup, which began with a hiss and a roar, is in danger of petering out. Another factor is the (disappointing?) lack of upsets in the knockout stages – on several occasions the favourite was in jeopardy, but each time they just about squeaked through. That of course means we’ve got a heavyweight semi-final line-up, even without Neymar, and the legacy of this tournament will largely depend on what sort of show the remaining four teams put on. More 0-0 draws and penalty shoot-outs won’t help. Even if Holland win it, which I hope they do.

Rolf Harris and cracking stats

Rolf Harris. He was on telly all the time when I was a kid. I remember him most from Cartoon Time when he did all those drawings in between clips. In 1993 he did his cover of Stairway to Heaven, complete with wobble board, which was rather good (and at the time I didn't even realise it was a cover!). All in all, I thought he was a jolly good Aussie bloke. Now, at age 84, he's been convicted of indecent assault on girls as young as seven, and he's likely to die in prison. You do that sort of crime, you do the time, even if you're 84. But it's worth remembering that it was a different world in the sixties and seventies. Since the scandal surrounding Jimmy Savile (he was also on TV all the time when I was small, and he seemed like a very dodgy bugger to me even then), several of these celebrity sex abuse cases have come to light, and we need to be a bit careful before imposing today's standards on events that happened decades ago.

Kevin likes to talk about his past. He recently talked about a time his girlfriend was stoned and almost burnt the house down by leaving a pan on the stove in the middle of the night, with two kids under two asleep. They didn't have smoke alarms. Apparently he wasn't stoned on that particular occasion, and he rescued his girlfriend and kids from the smoke and flames. He thinks he's a hero - "no-one gives me credit for saving those kids' lives" - and I tried to play down his hero status. At 22, and mentally a lot less, he was nowhere near ready to bring up a family, and neither was she. Sadly, he hardly sees his son and daughter from one year to the next.

I've started reading Quicksilver, the Neal Stephenson book that I borrowed from Tracy. She might be waiting a while for it. I have a feeling it'll be too clever for me. I finished Angela's Ashes which had the effect of making me realise I'm alive, and living with Kevin isn't all that bad. It really was miserable stuff. It also made me think what an amazing thing (from a food point of view) an egg is. You hear about super foods quite a lot; an egg is pretty much the ultimate super food. So many ways to cook them, and they're good for you (if you happen to ignore the dirty C-word). I ate two eggs a day during my one-month paleo experiment last October, and it hasn't done me any harm yet.

We're down to the last eight in the World Cup, and the classic matches keep coming. All eight group winners made it to the quarter-finals - I guess not many of the fancied teams finished second in their groups: they either went through as group winners or, in the case of Spain, Portugal and Italy, went home altogether. Five of the quarter-finalists required extra time, and two also needed penalties. The last three matches all went to an extra half-hour; those games were all goalless in normal time, but featured a whopping seven goals between them in extra time. All eight teams who played in Manaus, and therefore clocked up the air miles, have been knocked out. One of those was the USA, who were glorious in their extra-time loss to Belgium. Or at least I hope that the concept of a glorious defeat exists in American society.

What I hope the semi-final line-up will be: Colombia v Germany, Holland v Belgium.

Diving - probably my biggest hate in World Cup football - was the hot topic this week as Robben "won" that last-minute penalty against Mexico. A part of me thinks, wow, hats off to him for getting away with it, especially when it's someone that fun to watch, a bit like my admiration for an loose-aggressive poker player pulling off a crazy bluff. But there's one key difference - bluffing is a perfectly legitimate play in poker (indeed it's part of the essence of the game); diving to win a free kick or penalty is cheating.

I've been reading a few articles on FiveThirtyEight.com. It's an American site, most famous for Nate Silver's very accurate US election predictions. But it also covers sport, economics, social policy, whether we'll soon be paying to use the loo on flights... Most impressive is their analysis of footballer Lionel Messi - with all those charts and graphs, you get to see how, um, off-the-charts, this little man is. It's good to see some proper football stats for a change. People have this idea that stats don't "work" in football. Bollocks to that, basically, even if it's harder to quantitatively analyse football than cricket or tennis. Which brings me to Wimbledon. A lot has happened. Nick Kyrgios saved all those match points against Gasquet, then caused a huge shock in beating Nadal. Then Andy Murray got beaten today. Serena Williams hasn't been far from the headlines in the women's. But I haven't watched any of it and have only taken a passing interest really. With the World Cup and having a flatmate, something has to give.

Today was a crisp, sunny, South Island kind of day.

It's got to end some time, Kevin

I got an email from Dad basically saying, jeez, I hope you didn't upset your flatmate when you said you wanted him out by Christmas. It's funny that both my parents seem more concerned with his well-being than mine. I took him on for the extra money, not out of the goodness of my heart, although I think I have been pretty good to him - I've given him a lot of leeway (probably too much, partly because his past made me a bit wary). He has it pretty good here, with all those cooked meals (OK I'm not that good a cook) and all that housework that magically gets done, often when he's still in bed. He has the whole place to himself when I'm out, and has almost free rein on the TV and whatever the hell else he likes. His classes are a ten-minute walk from here. It's all very convenient for him and I can perfectly understand him wanting to stay. But...

The World Cup continues to excite and surprise, not that I can watch much of it. I did catch some of this morning's game between Brazil and Mexico; the Mexican keeper was in inspired form. I still have my booklet from the 2010 tournament, with all the results filled in. The group games from four years ago look a bit dull now; some teams (um, England?) operated entirely in binary, with every game finishing 0-0, 1-0 or 1-1. I'd written in some notes from my hotel in Bali - "Channel 13 (reception awful) or 8 (not much better)" and names of countries in Indonesian that I'd picked up. Ivory Coast was "Pantai Gading", Greece was "Yunani", New Zealand was "Selandia Baru". Watching the action in a foreign country, and not having complications like work or flatmates to contend with, made the whole thing more interesting.

Warning: if you don't like maths or logic or tennis, or probably all three, please ignore the next paragraph.
Last year I promised to do a hypothetical calculation based on the Wimbledon qualifiers, and post the result here, so twelve months later... Qualifying for the men's singles at Wimbledon (which is going on now) involves winning three matches: two best-of-three-setters and a best-of-five. There's no tie-break in the deciding set of any match. The question was, how dominant do the servers have to be to make a best-of-three, on average, last longer than a best-of-five? The reason why that is even possible, in any situation, is because you're more likely to reach a long third set than a long fifth set. If you make that final set long enough (and you do that by making both players demons on serve), the greater likelihood of reaching the final set in a best-of-three starts to outweigh the fact that you've played two fewer sets to get there. If you assume that both players are equally dominant on serve, and their dominance is constant throughout the match, it turns out that we need the final set to last, on average, 14 times longer than each of the normal (tie-break) sets. That might sound ridiculous, but to achieve this the server "only" needs to win 86% (or more) of points. That's a very high percentage obviously, but you might expect it to be higher. The average length of a no-tie-break set rises steeply once you get above 80% of points won on serve. By the way, if both players are winning less than 14% of service points (and I've certainly played matches where it's felt that way!) that would do the trick too.

A guy at work is due to become a father next month. So at work today they had a baby shower (if that's what they call it when it's the father). I ended up spending over thirty bucks on this event, which is quite a lot when you don't really know the bloke. And it meant you had to talk and mingle and all that tricky stuff. And I realised that there's at least an 86% chance that I'll never have kids.

Miracles happen

The bloke who sorted out my laptop said it would now be "more faster" which indeed it is. He also said all my data would still be there. It's not. Thank goodness for flash drives.

So Andy Murray became the first British man to win Wimbledon for 77 years. I was wide awake at 2:30 so I got up and watched the rest of the match (and drank a gallon of coffee when I got to work). There were so many twists and turns, it didn't feel like only a three-setter. (There were eleven breaks of serve, Murray claiming seven of them.) That final game was high drama; if Djokovic had broken for 5-5 anything could have happened. I'm glad Murray won but not because he's British. He's not really playing for Great Britain, or for Scotland, anyway. He's playing for Andy Murray. If nationalities were that big a deal they wouldn't allow mixed-nationality doubles partnerships.

Murray's Wimbledon win is his second grand slam title from seven final appearances. I'm fairly confident he'll follow in his coach Lendl's footsteps in winning several more slams. Frankly I couldn't give a stuff that a Brit won but if more Brits play tennis as a result, that would be a big win. In the UK (when I lived there at least, and I doubt it's changed) courts were empty apart from the Wimbledon fortnight and possibly the week after. It was as if tennis didn't exist for 49 weeks of the year. I clearly remember a conversation (well, argument) I had with a woman at my local club; she said that tennis courts should only be built in wealthy areas because nobody from poorer areas could afford the expenses needed to become the next Wimbledon champion. As if that's what matters. As if people getting off their arses and playing a game that doesn't involve pixels isn't important.

While Murray's win was nice it didn't come as a shock, unlike Bartoli's victory which continues to blow me away. Six years ago she surprised everybody by reaching the final where she lost to Venus Williams. Surely that was as good as it would ever get. But getting to the final again and winning? Miracles happen, don't they? OK, Kvitova's win two years ago was a bit of a surprise, as was Sharapova's in 2004, but Bartoli isn't Bartova or even Bartovic - she was cast in a different mould altogether.

TV coverage of Wimbledon, what little I saw, could have been better. You'd see an incredible winner and where was the slow-motion replay? No, you'd see David Cameron instead. John McEnroe does an exceptional job in the commentary box though, it must be said.

On Sunday I played board games with Tracy and Tom. Sitting on Tracy's shelves are a dazzling array of weird and wacky games - there's no Scrabble, Monopoly or Risk (or anything anyone has heard of) to be seen. We played three games in all. First up was 7 Wonders. You had to build up your wonder of the world (say the Pyramids or the Hanging Gardens) using resources which you can buy and sell, or sort of, and it was the "sort of" that always confused me. I must have driven Tracy mad as I kept asking how much stone or glass I had, and how much it would cost to get more. In each of three "ages" a war took place, and it was by winning the final war that I won the game, without really knowing what I was doing, and with one of the lowest winning scores on record.

Then we played Takenoko, a Japanese-style game where you had to cultivate, irrigate and fertilise land so you could grow bamboo for a panda to eat. A really bizarre game if you ask me. And I did pretty badly - I came last by some distance. I kept having to buy irrigation sticks to water my land and hardly ever grew anything. I wanted to kill the damn panda but annoyingly that wasn't in the rules (which were quite complicated). Both these first two games were designed by the same person - you never would have guessed that as they were so different.

Finally we played Small World. By this stage I was longing for Community Chests or triple word scores, something I could get a handle on. Small World involves territories and armies, similar to Risk but more complicated. The armies were different races or beings, such as orcs or giants or tritons. Each race would have a special power or trait, like "flying" or "diplomatic". The races and powers would pair up at random and Tracy would get excited if a particular combination came up: "Alchemistic dragons, man. That's awesome!" Armies would kill each other until they were depleted when they would "go into decline". For me this was the most enjoyable game of the three, and I won with plenty of luck and advice from Tracy.

The illustrations in all three games were impressive; I liked the attention to detail in the way each race was depicted in Small World. Unlike the board games of old, these modern creations have been tested to the nth degree. But they struck me as being quite a niche market. There used to be a shop selling these kinds of games in the Old Bank Arcade. The games sold for around $100 and I was always amazed by how heavy they were. That shop closed down last year - they were selling obscure games in a fairly obscure location so I suppose you could see why. But it's still a shame. Also gone is the shop that sold coins, notes, stamps and war medals. In its place is yet another shop selling expensive household crap - mostly presents for people who already have everything. For $35 you can buy a side plate with either "bitch", "slapper", "wanker" or "tosser" written on it. Nice. The shop that used to sell candy and lollies has also shut down - it's currently empty.

I don't think I can make myself go to the Great Gatsby work function. Apart from some food, what is there to gain? Annoyingly it's only a five-minute walk from my flat, but I don't think anyone will care if I'm not there. The only person who might have cared was given the sack.

Good on her

Wow. Marion Bartoli really is champion of Wimbledon. Who would have expected that two weeks ago? I'm very glad I got up at 1am to watch the final even if Lisicki's nerves meant she was some way short of her best. Nerves play an even bigger part in women's major finals than for the men - the serve isn't as dominant so a soul-destroying run of say six losing games is much more common, and unlike for the men, six games is half the match. Bartoli was extremely determined and pumped up but all that adrenalin didn't compromise her thought processes in any way. Game two of the second set was huge psychologically, as was the first point of game three where Bartoli was well out of the rally but hit a down-the-line winner that would have been called out if Lisicki had challenged. Lisicki was struggling with her ball toss and by game five, when she chose a bad time to play a drop shot (people try that so often when they aren't thinking straight) she really just wanted to get off the court. I was happy that Lisicki staved off three match points for what would have been a harsh 6-1 6-1 defeat. For the next ten minutes she was a different player, but just as things were getting interesting Bartoli served out to love with a new racket and new balls, finishing on the right end of a crucial opening rally and serving an ace on match point.

That someone different like Bartoli can claim the greatest prize in the game must be a good thing. I really liked her speech as she held the trophy. She supposedly has a sky-high IQ (I saw someone on ESPN unsuccessfully try and trip her up on the Fibonacci sequence) and is also a keen painter. It took her 47 attempts to win her first grand slam title - that's a record: Novotna was older when she won Wimbledon in '98 but it was "only" her 45th attempt. As for Lisicki, she's got an excellent aggressive game which we only saw last night in that late cameo. I doubt it'll take her 47 tries to claim a slam.

The hard drive of my laptop is stuffed and it's costing me $340 to get it sorted. That's an expense I could have done without.

I was a bit tired today after getting up last night, and there's no way I'm watching the men's final tonight. Out of the blue Tracy invited me and Tom over to play some unusual board games this afternoon. This was fun even if I didn't know what was going on half the time - I'll write about it when I can do so less painfully.

A painstaking post about Wimbledon

I took my dying laptop into a place in Newtown to see if they can revive it. I then braved the market in the pouring rain. At one stall a woman gave me $10 too much change; a long time ago I might have pocketed the extra money but I wouldn't dream of doing so now.

So I'm writing this post on my phone which isn't an easy task. I'm playing around with the handwriting recognition thingy at the moment.

Right, so Del Potro was badly injured for his semi-final with Djokovic and would only last three sets. Or two or one or none. But as they got deeper into a long, intense game midway through the first set, all ideas of a quick match were out the window. The third set was a real belter. I was very impressed with Del Potro who produced 100 mph winners seemingly out of nowhere. Not only that but he defended brilliantly, staying with Djokovic in the long rallies which nobody normally does except possibly Nadal. All the time I was struggling to keep my eyes open and when Djokovic won that tie-break to go 2-1 up I hit the hay, fully (stupidly?) expecting the top seed to rattle
through the fourth set. Instead, as I found out this morning, Del Potro saved two match points in another tie-break and was only finally seen off after 4¾ hours, the longest Wimbledon semi-final to date. Andy Murray didn't exactly have it all his own way either, and I sympathise with him over the roof issue, but we have indeed got the final everyone expected.

With work the next day I couldn't realistically watch the women's semis. Had I watched them I'd have needed to pull a sickie, or in this case a Lisicki. I should manage to see tonight's final. I don't mind who wins - they're both fun players to watch and wonderfully grunt-free. If anything I'm probably siding with Bartoli because this might be her last chance to snag a grand slam whereas Lisicki (if her form this fortnight is anything to go by) should have plenty more opportunities. It's a tricky match to pick - Bartoli hasn't dropped a set in the tournament but has somehow avoided anybody above her ranking of 15th; Lisicki has had some very tight matches but has come up against the likes of Stosur, Serena and Radwanska. Should be fascinating. I just hope the crowd aren't too anti-Bartoli; I suppose she doesn't look like your typical tennis player and that's why some people don't take to her.

There's heaps of non-Wimbledon stuff I wanted to write about but writing on this phone is way, way too painful.

Oh, and last night I chatted to Richard for the first time in ages, which was nice.

A fascinating final four

The women's competition at this year's Wimbledon has been fascinating, not that I've been able to watch any of it. As we reach the final four, all the big names and familiar faces are gone. It reminds me of the men's tournament in 1996 (the year Sampras didn't win) which I found equally fascinating. Some people seem to think the loss of former champions like Serena Williams and Sharapova diminishes the competition but I don't see it that way. I think all the remaining women are a breath of fresh air. Agnieszka Radwanska beat Li Na in a great match last night and as she is seeded four and reached last year's final you can hardly call her a no-name. She plays Sabine Lisicki in the semis, a very popular player who has done well at Wimbledon before but really hit the headlines when she knocked out Serena. Also through (and yet to drop a set) is Marion Bartoli, who I've always liked since I saw her win the Auckland title in 2006. Bartoli plays two-handed on both sides and takes a lot of small steps during points to say nothing of all the bouncing around between them. In other words she's a bit mad. The crowd booed her throughout her win over Sloane Stephens last night; the booing was at its loudest when she wanted to stop play as the rain came down. Playing on grass with a grand slam semi and big money at stake, I'd want to come off too. Bartoli was runner-up in 2007 and she'll be up against Kirsten Flipkens, a name that's fun to say. Last night Flipkens beat Petra Kvitova, the 2011 champ, in three sets.

The men's tournament has seen its fair share of shocks too, but I still get the feeling that Djokovic and Murray are on a collision course to meet in the final.
Edit: I underestimated Verdasco a bit, didn't I? I shouldn't have done - he's a very good player.

Tonight there was a meeting about all the road works. I went along and peered through the window but left as soon as I realised it was a presentation which I'd already missed the start of. I didn't want to walk in and make a scene. I must say the communication to residents about all the work has been excellent. However I'd really hoped to meet some of my neighbours there and talk about the earthquake business which seems a more pressing concern.

My computer is playing up badly and I'm worried it might die on me completely.

Too cool

It's a fine Sunday in Wellington, even better than yesterday when I went on a tramp in the Orongorongo Valley. It was an easyish walk - we went at a fairly leisurely pace and there weren't any real steep climbs or descents. Only five of us did the trip - Danielle, who seems fairly weather-sensitive, pulled out at the last minute. The cool but dry conditions were pretty much ideal for tramping I thought.

I watched One News on Friday and was a bit puzzled by why Steven Adams' NBA draft was the number one news item. Not only that, but when they finally moved on from talking about his $2 million contract they said "in other news...", a phrase that's normally used after a huge news event, as if to say that everything else pales into insignificance. Yes, the NBA is a big deal internationally, and a Kiwi player landing a big contract deserves a mention. It's also nice to have a good news story for a change, especially when you add in the extra feel-good factor of his sister being a double Olympic champion. But in reality a seven-foot bloke making lots of money doesn't materially affect many New Zealanders, unlike Auckland's transport plan which (either directly or indirectly) affects us all. I would have touched on the Adams story at about 6:15 and only made a big deal of it during the sports section.

Talking of sport, Marina Erakovic's Wimbledon came to an end last night against Laura Robson (I followed the match on the internet). Erakovic totally dominated the early stages of the match, racing out to 6-1 5-3 in no time at all. But it seemed nerves got the better of her. (Even at the crappy levels I used to play at, I found that having a big lead against someone I didn't expect to beat could be nerve-wracking. At any moment my opponent could click into gear and steal the match from me, and I'd be powerless to do anything about it.) Erakovic double-faulted at crucial times and proceeded to lose eight straight games (despite having chances in several of them) to fall 4-0 behind in the third set. Robson hung in there, buoyed by the crowd who helped get her over the line as Erakovic mounted a comeback in the latter stages. Overall the Kiwi won 87 points to Robson's 81, proof that it's not how many points you win but when you win them. Erakovic maintained a high standard in all three matches; if she keeps it up she should soar up the rankings. I just hope that last night's loss (and she lost the match rather than Robson winning it) doesn't damage her psychologically.

This morning I had a coffee at Midnight Espresso on Cuba Street on the way to the market. There I read an article in the paper about the possible demise of Cuba Street as a bohemian enclave of Wellington. The word "gentrification" was used, and it was suggested that Newtown could soon be the cool zone. A new upmarket restaurant (which I could see from the café) has just opened where Peaches and Cream (a sex shop) used to be, right opposite an even more upmarket restaurant in Logan Brown. I think (and hope) that reports of Cuba Street becoming uncool are a bit premature. Today as I walked along that street on the way home, I caught sight of someone I guess was BMD, finishing off one of his spray-painted murals. He had long hair and a beard, much as I guessed he would, and I didn't dare talk to him as he was way too cool.

If anyone cares, this is my 400th post.

Some nice vistas (I hope)

What a crazy start to Wimbledon with Federer, Nadal, Sharapova and several other big names all out in the first round and a half. There have also been a record number of retirements (seven last night); the All England Club made a statement defending the preparation of their courts. Maybe the players, rather than the courts, are underprepared - the grass-court season is so short. In 2015 the gap between Roland-Garros and Wimbledon will be extended to three weeks (I've always thought the biggest thing that needs changing in world tennis is the calendar; that's a good start). I was reading an old Sports Illustrated article from 1975 advocating sweeping changes to the game. It could almost have been written today. I'm glad only a few of the suggested changes have actually come to fruition in the last 38 years. The sit-down at the end of a set (and not after the first game of a set) was definitely a positive change that came in around the turn of the century.

Now that Mum has some spare time, she watches a helluva lot of sport on telly, especially netball and basketball. Dad despairs at the amount of netball she watches - often back-to-back games - and I can see where he's coming from. I mean the game itself can be watchable but it's the competition that seems so contrived. So what if the Swing are thrashing the Sting. Dad wishes she made better use of her brain. When I was about eight she attended night classes in maths. She taught me some of what she learnt - for ages I thought "integer" rhymed with "beggar".

Dad has started getting bad headaches again. They're not quite the debilitating migraines he had for so long, but they're bad nonetheless. And they follow the same weekly cycle, starting on Wednesday, worsening on Thursday, peaking on Friday and tailing off over the weekend. If he starts getting full-blown migraines again, life could soon become intolerable for him, not just because of the pain but also Mum's total lack of sympathy. Many times Dad would be writhing around in bed in agony, and Mum would accuse him of "playing up" as if he were a disobedient child. She wouldn't pop in every now and then to see how he was. Nothing like that. And heaven help Dad if they were supposed to go out somewhere. All hell would break loose. I love Mum dearly but her attitude to Dad's headaches (or any other illness he might have) is something I can't forgive.

I helped Dad with his computer issues, or tried to (I'm no expert). Their PC is painfully slow. On several occasions Dad mentioned taking a hammer to it. Of course they've got bloody Vista, and as we all know, Vista means death.

Yesterday's flight from Timaru was a very pleasant one, although being on the sea side of the plane I missed what would have been a great view of the snow-covered mountains. As always the whole experience of flying from Timaru was almost totally stress-free.

A view of the mountains outside my parents' house in Geraldine yesterday. You could see the wind blowing the snow off.

This was on the way to the airport.

At Timaru airport yesterday. My brother's skydiving operation uses the same model of aircraft.

Shortly after take-off yesterday, from inside the 19-seater plane.

After a really nice time away (I needed the break) It was back to work for me today. I missed a lot of excitement with last Thursday night's storm: there was talk of windows blown out and screaming kids. The coast took a real battering.

Until I started talking to customers, I didn't realise how tight money is for so many people. For so many customers it's absolutely vital that we deduct premiums on the right day or else the money won't be there. We're often talking twenty or thirty dollars. Being paid fortnightly instead of monthly can make a huge difference. For me it wouldn't make a lot of difference whether I was paid quarterly or hourly. I don't earn much and I have a mortgage so why are things so different for me? The main reason is simply that I only have to provide for one person, not four or more. I did once earn considerably more (if not big bucks) and that has helped my financial position. I can also thank my parents who have always been careful with money; their attitude has rubbed off onto me. Plus, unlike most people, I rarely have the urge to spend. More stuff often means more hassle. Funnily enough, in my old job in Auckland, as my salary increased my discretionary spending went down. With each exam I passed and every step I took up the pay scale, I built another layer on top of my house of cards which could come crashing down at any time.

Mum turned 64 two weeks ago; Dad's 63rd birthday is tomorrow. To celebrate and to show appreciation for everything they've done for me (such as picking me up from Christchurch) I bought them six bottles of wine while I was down there. They didn't think I should spend money on them while I'm trying to pay off my mortgage on my current income. A few years ago I'd buy a case of twelve more expensive bottles and they wouldn't think I was being extravagant. They worry a lot about how much money my brother and I have (or not).

I played badminton last night in Karori with the anxiety group. The organiser was intent on making a competition out of it all. She wrote the scores down and covered up the sheet after every game as if it was all a big secret. Someone on the sidelines scored each game but lost track so badly it seemed points were being given out randomly. Of course it doesn't matter but I find it hard to concentrate when someone shouts out "six-all" and you know you should be a handful of points up (or down, as the case may be). We had some very good rallies; it would be nice if this could be a regular thing.

I saw an interesting article on the Guardian website, provoking (so far) over 1700 comments. Apparently so-called Gen Y-ers (I'm right on the cusp of that age range) are supporting the Tories. The article starts off by saying, "If you want a good idea of where Britain might be headed, go to Peterborough." I had to laugh at one commenter who said, in that case heaven help us. I lived in Peterborough for eight months before moving to NZ. My flat wasn't much to write home about (and that's being kind) and my job was poorly paid but I have quite happy memories of my time there.

Relaxing

I normally find it hard to relax, but I've managed to recharge my batteries here in Geraldine. Nothing much has happened here, and I've hardly seen anybody except my parents, but seeing lots of people and attempting to achieve things tends to stress me out.

After the cold snap that straddled the shortest day, we've had two lovely days here - those crisp mornings and clear days that you get so often in this part of the country. Yesterday we dropped in on my uncle, the one with terminal cancer. He seemed remarkably chipper, he hadn't lost any of his several interests, and had even regained the weight he'd lost. I never would have imagined he'd recently received a death sentence.

Mum and Dad have a variety of fruit trees as well as a vege patch, giving them an even bigger supply of homegrown produce than we had in England. It would be nice to have something similar myself one day. We've just been picking cooking apples which will go into a crumble. I made an apple and rhubarb crumble for my work colleagues last week (they were doing some kind of pudding week). They said they liked it but it's hard to tell what they really think. Dad mentions a time in the seventies when he brought homemade wine into work (making wine was a popular pastime back then). He knew it was disgusting but his colleagues politely drank it all.

Dad is getting a new website made up for his paintings. He wants a picture of himself on the home page (I agree that he should have one) and wanted me to take a suitable photo of him - an "arty, moody" one as he put it. "Just use your nous," he told me. But I've got no nous when it comes to arty, moody photos of people. Do you want the apple tree in the background or not? In fact I rarely take photos of people full stop, as Dad found out when he saw the pictures I took of my trip in 2010. I was peeved when he dismissed all the shots I took. He mentioned his cousin, a potter, who has made a living not from selling his pots so much as selling himself. There are photos of him, immaculately coiffed, all over the internet and in print. I accused Dad of being as vain as his cousin. I did take more photos and he eventually chose one. If I have a tinge of autism it comes to the fore whenever people-related photos are involved, especially arty, moody ones.

Yesterday morning I watched Dad fly his glider at Pleasant Point. He spends many an evening tinkering with balsa wood and glue - he enjoys building his planes and gliders more than flying them. He has excellent fine motor skills; of course his living has relied on them. Yesterday we met a young guy who had spent a fair sum on an impressive ready-made plane, and an 81-year-old bloke who grew up in St Ives. He remembers the town in wartime when its population was only 3500 - long before the sprawling estate was built - and everybody knew everybody. He's also an anti-bike-helmet advocate - he thinks helmets (which aren't compulsory in the UK or continental Europe) are a psychological and practical barrier to cycling in NZ, and the health of the nation is worse as a result. I think he's got a point.

Wimbledon, the greatest tennis tournament on earth, starts in a few minutes. The automatic entrants to the main draws were joined by a number of qualifiers. To qualify for the men's main draw you had to win two best-of-three-set matches followed by a best-of-five; there was no tie-break in the deciding set of any match. Because of the long final set and the fact that you're more likely to reach it in the best-of-three format, you would expect a best-of-three to last longer than a best-of-five once service dominance reaches a certain level. I'm guessing the cut-off point would be around 85% of points won on serve; I promise to do the calculations and post the figure here.

Engagement

My brother has got engaged. I saw it coming but didn't expect it quite this soon. He and his fiancée will be coming to live in NZ (in Christchurch I think) in late September; they're bringing their cat with them. My future sister-in-law's line of work involves providing equipment to hospitals (I don't know the ins and outs of that, so to speak); she's got herself a similar job over here. So I'll soon be seeing my brother rather more than twice every nine years.

On a loosely related note, there was a new face - a 23-year-old woman - at Wednesday night's depression group. Every time someone new turns up I hear the same thing. They talk about their anxiety, depression and difficulty in dealing with social situations. Then in the next sentence they mention their wife/husband/fiancé(e)/girlfriend/boyfriend/partner. If meeting people is so damn hard, how come they're all in relationships? I've got three theories:
1. For some (most?) people, they need sex almost as much as they need food. No matter how severe the barriers are to finding a sexual partner, they'll overcome them somehow.
2. The mental health of the people who attend the meet-up groups isn't that bad, otherwise they wouldn't go.
3. Compared to how they were one or two or five years ago when they were the life and soul of the party, they've seen a marked increase in their social anxiety. They've noticed a decline relative to their reference point, but they're still not all that bad.

Last weekend was very much an indoor one. I went round to my cousin's place on Saturday (I did invite them to come to my flat but they declined). They've now got Sky (in time for the Olympics) and we ended up watching the Crusaders play the Force. I couldn't have cared less about the outcome (which, after a couple of dodgy video referee decisions, was never in doubt).
I should mention Andy Murray's defeat in the final of Wimbledon. He gets very emotional after a big match, win or lose. Unfortunately, in his four grand slam finals to date, it's only been lose. I've heard plenty of people say he'll never win one. I think he's more than capable of winning a couple. I'd put him in a different league to Tim Henman (Britain's last big hope); he's just that much more versatile. Henman used to need five sets in the first round, then four sets, then five again. By the second Monday, Britain was a nation of fingernail-free tennis fans. That he so often survived to make the later stages says a lot for Henman's resolve, but Murray in contrast gets through the early rounds with ease.

My car failed last week's warrant in style. Supposedly both front shock absorbers need replacing as does the driver's seat belt; also a patch of rust on the roof needs looking at. I was handed a four-figure quote - I certainly won't be paying that. I'll try taking it in somewhere else (VTNZ?) next week but until then (and quite possibly after then) I'm sans wheels. Bugger.

So I won't be popping over to see Julie tomorrow - I normally see her every Tuesday. A lot (but my no means all) of her conversation is pretty negative; sometimes she talks about doing herself in. I try to cling onto the positives but I'm no counsellor so I feel hopeless at times.

I'm flying to Auckland on Friday night. I must say I'm really looking forward to it.

I'm flying to Auckland on Friday night.

In recovery mode

I haven’t been well the last week, physically rather than mentally, although they are intertwined to some extent. I’ve had a cold – runny nose, chesty cough, sore throat and very little energy. I probably caught it at work. I’ve always been quick to pick bugs up and slow to shake them off. It's worth noting that during my job-free spell (most of 2010) I was also entirely bug-free.

Last Saturday I joined five other members of the depression group to see Rock of Ages at the movies. For something with so much potential I found the movie a disappointment, and frankly I wasn’t in the mood anyway.

I took Monday off but worked the rest of the week even though I didn’t get much better (if at all). Today I really had to drag myself out of bed. Work itself, on the four days I turned up, wasn’t too bad. It’s been a pretty uneventful week apart from the excitement of Tuesday night’s tremor.

The big news has come from the other side of the world. My brother’s girlfriend has landed a job in Christchurch and they’re both planning on making the big move to NZ in the next three months.

This weekend I’m planning to see Phil who has come down from Auckland for a brief stay. That’ll be more than enough for me as I try to get better. I might also watch some of the closing stages of Wimbledon. The men’s semis are tonight, with Federer taking on Djokovic and Murray playing Tsonga. I think the Murray–Tsonga encounter is almost a 50-50 match-up but as much as I’d like to see Murray do it, I only put his chances of lifting the trophy at 10%. As for the women, she struggled a bit in the earlier rounds (as she so often does) but after slamming down 24 aces in her semi (that’s an enormous number for two sets), Serena looks nailed-on for a fifth Wimbledon title.

Predictions:

Djokovic to beat Federer 3-1

Murray to beat Tsonga 3-2

Serena Williams to beat Radwanska 2-0

Djokovic to beat Murray 3-0.

No great shakes...

At 3:35 this afternoon I felt my first ever earthquake. I was just sitting at my desk at work and it felt as if someone had jogged the table. I'm used to sudden movements now - the rickety lift in my apartment block greets you with a mini-earthquake whenever it stops - so I probably wouldn't have given today's tremor a second thought if the word "earthquake" hadn't been mentioned. It was a 6.5 (yes a biggie by the raw measure of magnitude) located just west of Taupo but 150 km deep. The depth explained the pattern on Geonet's intensity map - what looked like a random hotchpotch of greens and yellows over a wide area instead of a more concentrated Christchurch-style pattern. Here's Wellington's seismograph:



On Friday night I spoke to Gran (now in her 90th year) for the first time since I moved to Wellington. After endless answerphone messages and being transferred to nowhere by reception, I'd almost given up hope of ever getting through to her. She was very confused but at least she knew it was me and was looking forward to a plate of fish and chips. I think and hope I made a positive impact on her. Dad reckons that he and I are the only two people able to make such an impression; I'm inclined to agree, so I must make a persistent effort to call her once a week.

I happened to wake up at two o'clock on Monday morning in time to see Djokovic's virtual walk-on-water second set against Nadal, which he won 6-1 en route to his four-set victory in the Wimbledon final. With 48 wins and only one defeat this year, he really is operating on a different plane.

Tennis so good it sent me to sleep

Yesterday I was pretty much zonked. I watched the men's Wimbledon semis in bed on Friday night, or tried to as I dozed off at regular intervals. By the morning I hadn't seen much tennis and I hadn't slept much either, although to be fair I did see the first three sets of Djokovic's win over Tsonga and I'm very glad I did. The athleticism of both men blew me away; at one point they were both on the ground but were still able to continue the rally.

I didn't watch any last night's women's final. Wasn't expecting that result at all. Well done to giant-killer Kvitova whose "kv" combination is trickier than the "zv" of Zvonareva and Zvereva. As for tonight's match between Djokovic and Nadal, it promises to be a real barnburner - wouldn't want to pick it.

Last night I had a very tasty butter chicken curry from Taste of India on Cambridge Terrace, then spoke to Richard on the phone. He's now found himself a new flat - after two years in a far-from-ideal boarding house that's a huge relief. I look forward to seeing his new place in two weeks. (I had half-jokingly suggested he move into the spare room in my flat, and if it didn't happen to be a few hundred miles away he might have been keen.)

After picking up some fruit and vege (and a Boston bun) from the market I had lunch at my cousin's and spent most of the afternoon there.

Here's a first (I think) since I moved to Wellington: zero rain all weekend!

Putting my own job into perspective

Some not-so-great news this morning. My brother is off to Afghanistan. Mum and Dad only found out when a pile of bumph from the British army arrived in the mail. He's already put his body on the line enough thank you very much, which is why he wanted out of the army. But they recently persuaded him to stay by giving him a new (supposedly front-line-free) role. Of course my brother (thirty next month) is experienced and a very useful man to have on the front line, so they'd love him to go. My own job feels pretty damn good all of a sudden.

Last night I attended the Asperger's group, which took place at their offices in Thorndon instead of at a pub. There were five of us, a massive improvement on the previous turnout. Unusually for Asperger's groups, women were in the majority. The other bloke wasn't your typical Aspie at all (there's no way I would have picked him) - I wondered if he had ADHD instead. The two women I hadn't met before were both in their twenties and very easy to get along with. The topic of conversation changed at lightning speed; not every topic would be printable in your local gazette.

My car failed its WOF in style; I was quoted a ridiculous amount to get it up to scratch. I took it in on the way to work and was wearing a suit so perhaps they saw me coming. I don't trust car mechanics any further than I can throw them so I'll get it tested somewhere else, hoping all the "failure notes" didn't get permanently stored in the system, and see what happens.

Being able to survive without a car is one of the (several) great things about Wellington. It's also just as well I've got off-street parking or else I'd face a $200 fine. I'm amazed the local council can issue fines for expired WOFs - it should be a police matter surely. Parking fines for expired WOFs and registrations are a regressive form of tax for two reasons: people with lower incomes are more likely to have to park on the street and get clobbered with the fine in the first place, and of course if you earn less the $200 is a bigger proportion of your income.

Wimbledon is in full swing but it's not the big deal to me it once was. I no longer meticulously write out a draw sheet with all the winners and losers and scores. I no longer bring my bedroom TV down to the living room so I can watch two matches on different channels at the same time. My move to New Zealand didn't help. But still I've been keeping vaguely up to date with the action. The top women's seeds have been dropping like flies. Sharapova must be the favourite now, but I'm rooting for Marion Bartoli. Her unusual playing style and bouncing around between points make her seem completely mad. We need more of that in tennis. She plays her quarter- final tonight. After her last three matches (saving three match points, then winning 9-7 in the third, then beating Serena) she probably thinks she can't lose.

Update: I put the mockers on Miss Bartoli. All that bouncing around caught up with her in the end. She saved three more match points in the second set against Sabine Lisicki, then levelled the match on a tie-break only to lose the third 6-1. Sharapova on the other hand stormed into the semis, beating Cibulkova 6-1 6-1.

Best point ever?

I'm still watching the Berdych-Djokovic Wimbledon semi. I've seen one of the best points ever, certainly on such a big point in such an important match. Djokovic came up with an amazing rearguard effort on Berdych's fourth consecutive set point, hitting a perfect lob onto Berdych's baseline after maybe thirty shots. But it was called out! Djokovic correctly challenged and won another extended rally on the replayed point. Unfortunately for him it was all in vain. Djokovic double-faulted to lose the second-set tie-break 11-9 and is now two sets down.

It's 2am so I really should be thinking about bed.

Sport-related stuff

Before moving to New Zealand I watched a lot of sport. Football, cricket, tennis, golf, athletics, snooker, darts (is that a sport?), you name it. Even when I came here I got to know in which cities the various Super 12 (or 14) rugby teams were based. But in the last year or two I've largely lost interest. My attitude has been, who cares who wins? How can this bloody football match possibly matter any more than the winner of Ready Steady Dance matters? Of course a lot of this has been caused by my depression, and when I'm depressed very little seems to matter.

However, in the last two weeks things have changed again, due to Wimbledon and the biggest single-sport event on the planet, the World Cup. When you're overseas you begin to get some idea of how big an international event the World Cup really is. In Bangkok and Bali, both in countries without a team in the competition, people were going nuts. I watched a few of the games, mostly on a very grainy TV picture in my hotel room, though in Bali I'd sometimes see a game in a bar with a big screen while downing a Bintang beer.

Many of the games I saw were a disappointment but it was a delight to witness New Zealand's progress. I have to admit I got quite animated when they scored in the last minute to draw with Slovakia, but their shock 1-1 result against Italy was something else. I'd rate that match among the best in the group stages, bettered only by the States' comeback against Slovenia. When the All Whites returned to Wellington today following a third straight draw, they got the rapturous reception they deserved. A classic match (for all the wrong reasons) was Portugal's 7-0 thumping of North Korea, sorry, the Democratic People's Repuplic of Korea. I wondered what the hell it would be like to live in North Korea, and how many people in that country knew anything about the match.

As for Wimbledon, the first three rounds of the singles competitions have now been completed (yes, despite that match they really have!) so with sixteen players left in both draws I'll try and predict the winners. In the men's I'll go out on a limb a bit and pick Söderling; anyone who can hit the ball that hard, that accurately, and is in such a rich vein of form, must be in with a serious chance. On the women's side I'll play safe and stick with Serena.

I've still got the rest of my trip to write about. I promise I'll do that soon. I should also mention that tomorrow is Dad's 60th birthday.

"The greatest match ever": some analysis

The Isner–Mahut match at Wimbledon, which finally ended in Isner's favour with the monumental scoreline of 70-68 in the fifth set, seems out of place in the 21st century. It belongs in an era of unlimited FA Cup replays, timeless Tests and fight-to-the-finish boxing. That there is still room for this sort of encounter in today's quick-fix, penalty shoot-out, winner-takes-all world is I think the biggest positive that we can all take from what some have called the greatest ever tennis match. In terms of quality it probably wasn't that great (I only saw the last of its eleven hours, finishing at close on 4am my time last night) but in sheer size it was truly colossal; nothing before has ever come close. At times Isner could hardly move his legs, but somehow he was able to rely on his brutal serving arm. Both players were presented with a special trophy after the match, as was the umpire. You can find a priceless commentary of this match from the Guardian here.

Rule number one of successful blogging is that all content should be of interest to its audience, not just its author. I should warn you now that I may be about to violate this rule. First, here are a few facts and figures surrounding the three-day contest:

• Both players' ace counts hit triple digits, Isner serving 112 aces to Mahut's 103.


• The previous longest match lasted just over 6½ hours. Just the fifth set of this match exceeded eight hours.


• The number of points played in the match nearly reached quadruple figures, Mahut holding up his half of the bargain with 502 points while Isner managed 478. From what I could tell, Mahut made most of the running on the second day's play as those figures would suggest. He unquestionably looked the fitter of the two men, but he just could not find a way to break the Isner serve.


• Mahut had to win three qualifying matches to make the main draw. In the second of these he was pushed to a 24-22 deciding third set by Britain's Alex Bogdanovic, a marathon in itself. He then came from two sets down to win his last qualifying match in five.


• Thiemo de Bakker, Isner's second-round opponent, won his opening round match 16-14 in the fifth set.


• In 2007 Mahut had a match point in his loss to Andy Roddick in the final of Queen's. He had beaten Nadal earlier in the tournament. That would suggest he knows how to play on grass.


• Also in 2007, the six-foot-nine Isner burst onto the tennis scene by winning five successive matches, all of them in a tie-break in the final set. In last year's US Open he beat Roddick on a tie-break in the fifth and final set. Then at the start of this year in my home town of Auckland, he picked up the title by beating Arnaud Clément in the final on, guess what, a tie-break in the final set.

What I keep hearing is, "we'll never see anything like this ever again". Is that true? Well even though this match has obliterated every record in the book, given infinite time and no changes to the rules of tennis (more on that later), and that Wimbledon doesn't fall into the sea due to climate change, we will see something similar again, be it in our lifetime, our great-grandchildren's lifetime or some time after that. So it's really a question of whether tennis continues to be played as it is now, hundreds of years hence. If it does (and that's a really big if) how long will we have to wait to see a 70 in the games column again?

First it would be nice to know the chances that the Isner–Mahut match-up, in particular, should produce such a marathon. What were the odds that we'd get to 68-all? Even to do that I'll have to make a few assumptions:

1. Both players have the same chance of winning a point on serve, which I'll call p. As Isner had a far superior ranking (he was the 23rd seed while Mahut was ranked outside the world's top 100) this is a bit unrealistic. But Mahut had proven his ability on grass before and he was coming into the match on the back of considerably more grass-court play than the American. So this assumption, which implies that both players are of equal strength, isn't so far-fetched after all (as the eventual result showed).


2. Only this match is used to estimate p. Match-ups are so important in tennis. For instance Mahut's chance of winning a point on the Isner serve is surely smaller than against just about any other player, with the possible exception of Ivo Karlovic. Likewise the surface plays a huge part; even different grass courts play differently. So adding any other opponents or surfaces into the mix will only make my estimate less accurate.


3. The outcome of each point is independent of all other points, so p is constant throughout the match. Whether this is a realistic assumption I honestly don't know. My guess is that there are "momentum" and "crisis aversion" effects that come into play, as well as (in a match as long as this) a serious "fatigue" effect. Also, players may have a better chance when serving or receiving from a particular side of the court (left or right). That's for another investigation.

Of the 980 points played, 759 of them went with serve. This gives p = 0.77449, a figure much higher than the corresponding 0.66469 taken from all the matches in the first two rounds of the men's tournament combined.So what's the probability of the server winning a game?
He can win it to love [probability p^4], to fifteen [4*p^4*(1-p): there are four ways of winning a game for the loss of one point], to thirty [10*p^4*(1-p)^2] or in a deuce situation. The "deuce" case is a bit trickier as it involves an infinite series, but it works out to be:
20*p^3*(1-p)^3*p^2/(2p^2-2p+1).

Summing these four terms, the probability that the server wins the game (I'll call this g) is:
0.35980 + 0.32456 + 0.18298 + 0.09823 = 0.96556. Wow. So given how Isner and Mahut were serving, you could only expect a break of serve a little over one time in thirty. It's also pretty amazing that the most likely outcome of a game in this situation is a hold to love.

The probability that the match goes into a fifth set, given the assumptions, is 3/8. I'm sure this is a slight overestimate due to the effect of momentum (between two evenly-matched players, I'd imagine whoever wins the first set has an above 50% chance of also winning the second). Now what's the chance that a set goes to six games all? The probability of this is:
[g^10 + 25*g^8*(1-g)^2 + 100*g^6*(1-g)^4 + 100*g^4*(1-g)^6 + 25*g^2*(1-g)^8 + (1-g)^10] * [g^2 + (1-g)^2].

Plugging in our value of 0.96556 for g, that probability is 0.67854. So with two players serving as well (and returning as badly?) as Isner and Mahut, you could expect two-thirds of sets to reach 6-6. Contrast this with the tournament as a whole, where using the figure from the first two rounds, you'd expect just 28% of sets to reach 6-6 (and I'm sure on clay it would be even lower than this).

So the probability at the start of the Isner–Mahut match that it would reach 6-6 in the fifth, i.e. the no-tie-break "overtime" stage, is 3/8 * 0.67854 = 0.25445.

We can continue by working out the probability that the fifth set will run deeper than this:
12-12..........0.16837
18-18..........0.11141
24-24..........0.07372
30-30..........0.04878
36-36..........0.03228
42-42..........0.02136
48-48..........0.01413
54-54..........0.00935
60-60..........0.00619
66-66..........0.00410
68-68..........0.00357

So there you have it. These two would serve up (literally!) a 70-68 (or longer) fifth set 0.357% of the time, or once every 280 times they step onto the court.

I'm sure most people would think it was far more unlikely than that, somewhere in the thousands or even millions-to-one range. And they're probably (partially, at least) right. When I've watched marathon men's matches in the past, at around 10-all in the decider one man starts to cramp, or loses concentration, or serves a couple of double faults, putting a major dent in
his value of p and opening the door for his opponent. Remarkably, in the Isner–Mahut match, that never happened. If anything, both players' p-values seemed to rise as the match wore on, and it took two out-of-the-blue passing shots from Isner to bring it to an end.

So all I've done here is come up with a figure for one match alone, based on some dodgy assumptions. As for calculating a probability based on all the matches that take place in a tournament, you'd need a whole bunch of p-values for all the possible encounters, many of which are clearly not 50-50 match-ups, and I wouldn't know where to start! Here's someone who has started, and more than that.

This match has inevitably generated some discussion about a possible fifth-set tie-break at Wimbledon (and, for that matter, Melbourne and Paris). Currently the US Open is the only Grand Slam to use a tie-break in the final set. Personally I'm a fan of the "no tie-break" rule in the last set, at least not at 6-6. The Wimbledon finals of 2001 and 2008, as well as the Australian Open semi between Federer and Safin in 2005, are examples of classic matches that were taken "up a notch" by the lack of a deciding tie-break. The same can be said of some great women's Grand Slam finals, particularly at the French Open. But I wouldn't be totally averse to a tie-break coming in later, at least in the early rounds. There are three problems I see in a gargantuan battle like this. Most obviously the winner of the match, in this case Isner, is completely shot when he comes to play his next match. As it happened, Isner won just five games against De Bakker, and incredibly did not serve a single ace. Had Mahut won, I think he would have done better. Secondly it becomes almost irrelevant who wins, partly because the winner is unlikely to advance further. Finally so much attention is given to the match as to almost overshadow the rest of the tournament; in twenty years' time people may well remember this match but have no clue as to who won the final. I reckon a tie-break at 12-all would make sense (it's like an extra set) and as for the final, well that should definitely stay no-limit.

Fifty-nine all?!

I haven't been off the plane long and I'll post properly in the next day or two, but I just saw that John Isner and Nicolas Mahut are locked up at 59-all in the fifth set at Wimbledon. The match has been suspended for a second day after a total of ten hours' play. Quite unbelievable.

The Battle of 16-14

I didn't see any of the men's final. My guess is that it was a very good match, but nowhere near as good as a 30-game fifth set might suggest, and not a patch on last year's final. Of course I'm just speculating here. Last year's final was a real clash of the titans with one mesmerising baseline rally after another, and I'd be surprised if this year's match captivated the audience in quite the same way.

Some facts and figures I picked up from the final:

• Federer served fifty aces in that match, which is more than I've managed in my entire life.
• Roddick led 6-2 in the second-set tie-break but blew all four set points. If you're reading this blog Andy Roddick, you can console yourself that I outdid you in this regard last season.
• Federer won more sets (obviously), fewer games, but more points than Roddick.
• Last year's final had 62 games compared to this year's 77, but was half an hour longer (and that doesn't include the rain delays).
• Federer has played six tie-breaks in the last three Wimbledon finals and has won all of them.

It's about time the women started playing best-of-five in the Grand Slams too. Not from round one like Bazza suggested when I spoke to him last night, but certainly in the final and perhaps also the semi-finals. And if you (like Lleyton Hewitt) think women wouldn't last five sets, take a look at this article from 1990 about a match between Seles and Sabatini. Or maybe some women's US Open final results from more than a century ago. Or, for a bit of a laugh, this crazy match where a single point lasted almost half an hour!

Today I was invited to a Farrah Fawcett party which is happening on Saturday. Unfortunately there's just no way I could accept the invitation, which lost me at the words "dress up". If it had been a Michael Jackson party instead, I probably would have gone.

After work today I saw my psychologist. For the first time ever I spilled the beans about my messed-up adolescence (it was a totally different kind of messed-up to the one we all hear about, but it was messed-up all the same). I've been so lonely for so long, it's no wonder I've had depression. In fact I should be grateful things haven't been worse.