Sporting Life

Things you should know:
1. In general, farmers are good at most sporting endeavours and are more than a little competitive.
2. I am neither of those things. 

I spent last weekend at sporting events – rugby on Saturday and curling on Sunday. 

Saturday was the annual Spice Cup, a local derby between Newtown Stewart RFC (based near Wigtown) and Wigtownshire RFC (based in Stranraer). Confused? Yep, me too... 

The venue alternates between the two and this year we were back at NSRFC. This is good because:

• I can drive home when the chat becomes dominated by 'Rugby games we have known and loved' and 'Here's a story that lacks a beginning, middle and end but I'll expect you to follow it even though you haven't had 8 pints in the last three hours’. 
• I know lots of people so don't need babysat. 
• I know who to ask when I want a cup of tea rather than alcohol. 

A lot of Ivie's farmery friends are fellow players from a golden age. From what I can gather, scrums were properly contested, only the captain could address the ref and you could tell what position someone played by their, ahem, physique. (“Aye, the good old days,” says Ivie).  

They all have amazing memories for games from 30 years ago, who they were up against, who took their clothes off on the bus home and, perhaps most importantly, who started the fights. I'm missing this competitive gene so I'm slightly bemused by all this but I'm really glad other people possess it otherwise rugby matches wouldn't be very interesting.

So, Saturday was fairly straightforward as all I had to do was spectate, wear my NSRFC bobble hat and go back to collect Ivie six and a half hours after I’d left him at the bar.

Sunday was a different matter entirely. I’ve somehow become involved with an entire family that is sporty and competitive (I refer you to the top of the page…). They choose to take part in sport for their Christmas get together! Sporty and coordinated people don’t quite understand how intimidating this can be. It’s a bit like me suggesting we do a page of algebra before Christmas Dinner since I was good at maths at school. 

Until about three weeks ago, I hadn’t tried curling before. Here’s how I got on…. 

Sunday was slightly better as I decided to stay still rather than try and glide. It’s quite hard when everyone else started curling at age 10, as opposed to 45 and it’s a popular sport in the farming community as, in theory, the winter is less busy. 

To be fair, everyone was very encouraging and I did really enjoy myself as we weren’t keeping score and expectations were low. I don’t think curling is my sport, though, so this will be my view from now on.