When we flew in last night, we headed straight to the ground for a walk around and some general familiarisation. You can’t help but notice the massive scoreboard that sits directly behind the goals at one end. I’m glad I’m not a forward because it would be unbelievably distracting.
My brother Dave met us at the ground for a publicity shoot. It was awkward for him being there with the entire North Melbourne team wandering around. He kind of hid near the player’s race but eventually had to venture out to the middle of the ground for the photo.
The picture was back-page of the Gold Coast Bulletin which is great for AFL. The story was all about Dave and I going head to head tonight and I must admit, it will be interesting especially when I belt him at the first bounce like I used to in the backyard! Jokes aside, I’m pretty proud of him and how he’s handles himself so far this year but if the ball is there to be won, I know we will both crack in pretty hard.
I get a lot of feedback from readers of this blog and the most popular parts by far is the dirt I dig up on my team-mates. The captain has realised just how in demand this type of stuff is and tried to capitalise on it with ‘Boomer’s Banter’ but it doesn’t compare. Take this entry for example and I have called it the ‘Bumper Edition’ because I have so much gossip. I may even have to flick the ones I can’t fit in to Boom for his little blog.
Ah, where do I start and who do I start with? Spud? Pig? Humphrey? Fishy? CHOG?
Let’s go with Spud and cars. Last week, Spud had Shaun Atley and Luke Delaney in his car on the way to a school clinic and he broke down on the eastern freeway. Apparently I drove straight past them and ignored the fact that he was trying to flag me down. It wasn’t my fault though…I was on the phone in my Mazda 3 SP25 (thanks to my good friends at Mornington Mazda) and didn’t even see him. Maybe if he bought a decent car, like a Mazda, he wouldn’t have any trouble. Anyway, our masseur Luke ‘Flush-rubs’ Warnett was waiting at the school to chaperone the boys but ended up having to run the clinic one-out because they never made it. The worst part for Flushy was that it was a non-English speaking school and none of the kids had ever seen a footy let alone kicked one.
There must have been some kind of car curse that day because on the way home from our clinic in Kew, Aaron ‘Fishy’ Mullett’s car ran out of petrol. He called his host family for help but in a double blow, his phone ran out of battery. Making matters worse, he had misplaced his wallet and couldn’t hail a cab fearing he wouldn’t be able to pay for it. He had to run 5k’s home at about 7.30 at night in full North Melbourne gear.
Fishy only has a limited wardrobe, but it was more than what Levi (aka Pig) had available to him the other day after training. Spud thought it would be funny to dunk all of his clothes in water and leave them in his locker. It just so happened that it was one of the coldest winter days on record and Pig was left with sweaty training gear to go home in.
While we are talking about The Pig, it’s great that he has just signed a new deal to stay at North. He is a great player and is crucial to our plans for a fifth premiership. Now we have to go to work on a few other blokes and make sure they ‘stick fat’ and stay ‘staunch’ as Donald McDonald would say.
It’s a great nickname that; ‘Pig’. However Levi claims not to know where it originated. There are a few theories floating around. One is the obvious one that he is just generally messy, another suggests it’s because he eats like a pig, but the one I believe is that his ex-girlfriend used to call him ‘Piggles’. The story goes, that Alan Obst went around to Pig’s house one day and went in through the front door. Pig’s girlfriend thought Pig had returned home and yelled out ‘Piggles?’ and Obba replied, ‘Nearly…’ (as in not quite but almost) hence the first version ‘Piggles Nearly’. It has since been cut down to plain old ‘Pig’.
The nicknames can get pretty confusing at times, just ask Cam Pedersen. He has been calling me ‘Spinner’ since arriving at the club not knowing it is actually ‘Spitter’.
Shaun Atley’s nickname ‘Humphrey’ has stuck but I’m not quite sure he understands why we call him that. Ben Speight sent him a photo of Humphrey B Bear and Atts said ‘I don’t even look like Humphrey!’. He totally missed the point that we call him Humphrey because he never says anything. In fact, most people are up on the Gold Coast to celebrate Boomer’s 312th game but most of us will be looking for a win for Shaun’s milestone. If he says just seven more words, he will crash through the 300 words spoken barrier since arriving at Aegis Park in November last year. Following on from Boomer, Nike (his boot sponsor) was going to make him a commemorative boot with ‘Humphrey 300’ stitched into the side.
Speighty though also has a new nickname ‘meatballs’ because he is always the substitute when we play. The connection you ask? Well, the following equation applies: Substitute=Sub=Meatball Subway Sandwich=Meatball.
But Subway is a touchy subject for some, especially Lindsay ‘Boof’ Thomas. Matty ‘Flash’ Campbell filled out his Subway lunch form and ordered Boof a vegetarian wrap. When it arrived Boof cracked it and refused to eat anything.
Back on Boomer though, he is trying to cash in on his amazing games record achievement saying that we should now celebrate him every week because every game he plays from now on will be breaking the record. Nice try Boom, but in all seriousness, it is a phenomenal achievement and we are all so proud of you mate.
We have a great crop of young blokes coming through and it was great to see Jamie Macmillan at the club on Friday morning after having facial surgery. One side of his face looked fine, but the damaged side was so swollen and bruised. I couldn’t help but think that the Karma-bus hit had him and not Richard Douglas because at a recent clinic, J-Mac kicked a ball into the face of the Hunters and Collectors guitarist’s kid and the poor little man lost a tooth. Maybe Ben McKinley should watch himself too because when he threw a marking bag down on the ground, he bowled a youngster over with it.
Speaking of being bowled over, I was absolutely bowled over when I discovered that ‘Super Bob’ our IT guru, didn’t know what animal beef came from! Even better, he thought a male sheep was a goat! He also asked why African elephants were called African elephants when there were some in Australia! I think he needs to use Google a little bit more.
Here’s a nice little segue; elephants have massive trunks as does Brady Rawlings. The old man celebrated his birthday on Friday and denies (for obvious reasons) that the only two things that never stop growing are your ears and nose. Some of the boys actually think he’s older than Boomer because he has heaps of grey hairs coming through.
Still on noses and a few boys have been guilty of ‘brown-nosing’ of late. Apparently Hamish McIntosh and Nathan Grima went to our CEO Eugene Arocca’s house for dinner on Wednesday night. Mmmm, didn’t see that invite Euge, I’ll have to check the mail when I get home as I must have missed it.
Righto, it’s almost time to put my game-face on…but not before a nice little nap.
Thanks for reading, catch you all next time.
