Huge crowds wait for public transport outside the Britomart Centre in central Auckland after the opening game of the Rugby World Cup. Photo / Alan Gibson
Dear Jackals (and Jillals)
Fair suck of the pav, guys. Don't spoil the party. Don't bleed on the parade. Well, a bit, maybe, so's you can look your chums in the eye when you're busy hacking phones, but not a haemorrhage of horror, team, not a blizzard of blood.
Let's not be leeches, eh, sucking all the pleasure out of this slightly quite enormously big Rugby World Cup party.
Us ordinary plonkers was looking forward to it, you see.
For months, we've been getting ready to pack up our troubles in our old Black bag and smile, smile, smile. Have a bit of fun for a change. Stick a flag on the car and a sausage in each ear and forget the whole wheezing, wobbly, woe-betide world for awhile. Heck, we've been hunkered down in the bunkers of gloom for yonks, jackals. And they're starting to pong. Old socks, dashed hopes, hard times, big bills - they're all piling up in the corner, getting more malodorous by the moment.
And we thought the Cup would be a chance to wash those moans right out of our hair. Give fate the finger and party up. We were looking forward to getting the neighbours round and the guitars out and having a few laughs and singing a few songs ...
We have a band of men
And we all know they are the best
We come from miles around
When the All Blacks play a Test
In public bars, we watch our stars
Play it fast and tight
And if they win the Cup this year
Well, strewth, mate, SHE'LL BE RIGHT!!!
And we'll cheer, cheer, cheer for Henry's stars
You'll hear the party all the way to Mars
'Cos we're one big team and that is why we say
"C'mon, Black! Black! All Black all the way!!"
Yeah, okay, from a jackal's point of view, it's corny, soppy, silly stuff. And you don't do corny. Or soppy. You do mean and rotten, awful and ba-a-a-a-a-a-d!!! Grim is good in your world. It's the jus in the media menu. Grim spices up the news something fierce. There's nothing like a stonking riot or some political slap and tickle to get you fizzing at the bung. And when there's nothing like either on the horizon, well, hey. You do what jackals do - turn a minor dust-up or the fluttering of eyelashes across a crowded House into the story you want but haven't got.
Fair enough. Last thing you need is a no-bleed lead. Gore is more. We understand that you've got to be piranha, not pandas. Us ordinary plonkers aren't stupid. We know your job description means you've got to to be all tough and macho - especially if you're a girl - forever hunting scandals in the jungles of silence then, once you've bagged one, carrying it out like a slain Captain Cooker, to be mounted at the top of the news as evidence of your killer instinct.
And that's okay. But seriously, guys, all joking aside, you have gone just a teensy-weeny bit completely over the top about the Rugby World Cup opening. All week, you've been ladling out words like DEBACLE!!! and FIASCO!!! and WORLD'S GREATEST CRISIS SINCE THE LAST GREATEST CRISIS!!!
Relax, jackals. Chill out. Snort some coke or whatever you do when the workday's done. It wasn't a DEBACLE!!! or a FIASCO!!! Yes, there were glitches. And problems. The experts underestimated the crowds at the Fanzone. But that's what experts do. And things went off the rails on the rails in Auckland, where some trains didn't get where they were meant to be on time. No surprise there, either. That's what trains do, for crying out loud. That's why we have them. To remind us we've invented much better ways to get around. Us plonkers know that. We know the middle class demanding more trains only want them as a place to store the unruly lower orders. That's why we drive.
Look, jackals, in the end, most of it went more or less to plan. Not entirely, but we didn't lose. No terrorists struck. Thirty-four people didn't get to Eden Park at all and 400 others arrived late. But pretty much everybody else had a b****y good night. So give us a break from the beat-ups. Like Len said on Friday night - having sensibly used a car to get where he needed to go "the world is in the house". And it's come for a party, not a bloodletting.
It's okay to give us good news, jackals. Don't be ashamed. Chuck in a couple of shocks. For some weird reason, we seem to need them. That's why you supply them. Go troppo then, by all means. But, for now, just focus on the fun, okay? Trust us. We'll love you for it.
Yours sincerely, Joe Public