The Dew Drop Inn Virtual Rugby Pub, Edinburgh

First topic message reminder :

Hello and welcome to the Virtual Rugby Pub, a place where you can come in for a sly beverage and discuss whatever's on your mind, or just eavesdrop on the regulars if you fancy a break from all the rugby chat.

The pub has made its way to Hopetoun House, Edinburgh - where the Management Team for the 2013 British & Irish Lions tour party to Australia was announced.

“This is the next chapter in the 2013 tour story," said tour manager Andy Irvine.

The only rule in this pub is one of mutual respect for everyone in it, oh and no tampering with the pictures of Warren Gatland,
Andy Farrell, Shaun Edwards, Kiwi Pete's Grandfather, Rava, Rodders, Andy Irvine, Graham Rowntree, Dr James Robson,
Paul Stridgeon, Kip Keino, Baggage Master Patrick O’Reilly and Lawyer Max Duthie above the bar.





Previous Pub: https://www.606v2.com/t37870p950-the-dew-drop-inn-virtual-rugby-pub-dubai

I'm not Gibbo you know

I'll say Phillips is missing stuff in the Connacht game, he's reffing in Murrayfield!

Evening Cari,

I've still got some shopping to do, that's a job for tomorrow. Put my tree up last Sunday and I'm still finding bits!

I always leave putting up decks until the 12th night. Speaking of superstitions, my sister has offended by mother by telling her that she had to bin the card my mother had sent because it had a robin on it. Apparently they're unlucky? First I've heard of them being unlucky.

Has anyone drown in Biarritz yet?

Evening ladies!

I didn't know Robins were unlucky. Aggressive little blighters but not unlucky. Maybe your sis could have just not mentioned the feat of the card.

I thought 12th night was January 5th, no?

Racing and Edinburgh down to 14 men. Still nothing exciting happening.

When I lived at home we had to wait until Christmas Eve to put our tree up. I always felt like I'd missed out having to wait that long. Since I moved out I've usually put it up in the first week of December.

I've not heard that about robins. But they're on loads of Christmas cards

Ah man my bad Glas!! MrsP no one drowned, ref is blowing up when they get near the worst bit.

Nasty injury for Poolman...caught a knee to head from own player and fairplay to Hari, he instantly stopped for the guy even though the game didn't.

Your bad what?

Got to love French commentary. Textbook take of a high ball "ah, superb, superb!"

Ladies, I just had a quick look and found this. Looks like there's loads of superstitions attached to robins. Didn't know any of them!

http://mygardenandme.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/robin-redbreast.html

What a strange muddle of superstitions!

I think it's unlucky to be superstitious!

MrsP - there was always a tradition in our house to put the decks up on the 12th night before Xmas and take them down on the 12th night afterwards.

Swanny - I'd heard of the story about the robin at the crucifixtion but I thought that was a good omen. Also knew about robins being popular on cards by the Victorians (they're responsible for a lot of Xmas imagery we have these days) because the robins' breast looked like the postman's uniform.

Just read what Swanny posted. Seems poor robin is an omen of death. I guess that's why my sister doesn't like them. Seems a bit daft to throw out a card someone has given you because of that though. Still, my sister's very superstitious. She gave me a "lucky" half a sixpence in my card too.

The Europeans put their Christmas trees up on Christmas Eve don't they?

The first time we were in France for Christmas we thought it would be nice to follow that tradition so I went down to the little town on Christmas Eve to discover there wasn't a tree to be had anywhere! I ended up asking a shopkeeper (in broken French) if I could take one of the branches he had cut off the bottom of a tree earlier and left lying outside the shop!

Our kids still talk about the year we had a Christmas Branch!

Cari, I've never heard of the 12 days before Christmas thing. I love how every family has their own little traditions around Christmas.

They are odd aren't they MrsP? The Yorkshire one I've never heard before, though in my defence I've never owned a cow so can plead irrelevance.

Cari, aren't the Victorians largely responsible for Christmas trees too? Fairly sure I've read that.

I'm glad I'm not superstitious, I love robins and will continue to do so regardless. We get loads of them on the feeders in the garden and they just make me

Oh is that it MrsP? My parents were being continental and I didn't realise!

Cari, it was Norway who presented the first Christmas tree to Victoria and Albert.

MrsP I used to do the 12 days before thing, still haven't even got a tree for my flat, being given one for free next Friday now!

Wasn't it Prince Albert who brought the tradition here?

Maybe I made that up!

We met a girl one year who was absolutely flabbergasted that we put tinsel on the Christmas Tree. She just couldn't fathom it at all. I don't think she could have been any more baffled if we had put strings of sausages around the tree.

The dog would eat them

It would have indeed except said tree and said dog were several hundred miles apart.

It would still have made more sense to Dani!

Oh, just had FB chat with my sis. Poor little Jacob has a tummy bug. She suspects it's norovirus Not nice! Poor bairn doesn't have a clue what's happening to him.

This is class: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fh8MstXNH4&feature=youtu.be

Hope he gets better soon Swanny.

Poor kid. And poor mum too.

I've just seen a wee clip that Sky Sports did with Ruan Pienaar on top of the huge cranes that are a feature of belfast's skyline. I'm sure you all know about Samson and Goliath the huge cranes at the Harland and Wolff Shipyard.

There is lots of symbolism thrown around in the clip about height reached etc but at one point the commentator talks about the cranes building the Titanic.

The Titanic was finished in 1912. The first of the cranes was built in 1969!

Facts...good story...

Thank you both, he's been poorly for the last 24 hours so hopefully he's through the worst of it now.

Sleep time for me, I'm so tired I can hardly focus on the screen time to admit defeat. See you all tomorrow.

Just had to pick MrsProp up from her Christmas do....safe to say it was the drunkest I've seen her....she's now been put to bed and I've opened a

Sorry to hear that about the littl'un swanny. I hope they get better soon and can enjoy the Season of Goodwill.

I'm flagging after two nice evenings with good friends. Another one beckons tomorrow after watching Ealing in the afternoon. I'm sure we'll be keeping an eye on the Amlin results as well during the game.

Cheers Linebreaker and Cari. Looking forward to it and as much as I like labouring on building sites it has started to get a bit cold and the jobhunt for an inside job will be on. Hope ya get good news LB.

MrsP, didn't know that about the cranes. Ya would have thought Sky would have done a bit of research.

Hound, a good nights sleep will have ya chomping at the bit for another night out!

MrsP, didn't know that about the cranes. Ya would have thought Sky would have done a bit of research.

Ah aha ahahahaha

Realised the stupidity of that aafter a few minutes of thinking, "What the hell is Glas laughing at?"

Yeah... Boss. Just yeah!

I must say Ruan Pienaar comes across a true gentleman every time he's interviewed. I have a lot of respect for the man.

Just got pulled over literally turning into my driveway. First time in ages. Luckily I hadn't had a drink. I wasn't speeding... it was just a random check. All clear.

One cop looked like a young JC van Damme... the other a bit like Usman Khawaja. He didn't say much. We all shook hands and wished each other a Merry Xmas after a couple of minutes.

It's a bit funny here you know. With all the convict beginnings - the general populous are very conservative (but very free too) and almost zero tolerance applies to most things but we are mostly pretty used to it. It's probably over-administrated in some respects but I guess that's the price to pay when you live in a really nice part of the world which attracts all sorts of people from all over the world.

Despite the glorification of crims on TV, in reality we have an obsession with 'the Law' and apparently are 2nd after California with the amount of litigations carried out in the courts. Maybe we can describe it as reverse paranoia or an over-reaction to the violent and humble beginnings of this place. Not quite a Police State but their presence (through TV ads and being out on the streets) sort of seems everpresent... but quite subtle in many ways too... at other times; not so subtle. Probably the right balance there.

Sort of bizarre really but I actually felt good going through the check, blowing into the device for 6 seconds and knowing that the local constabulary are doing a great job with the amount of lunatics running around this time of year.

Blydi convicts...

If it were not like that it would be as bad as Rio or parts of LA. Out of control!

Here, you can count the danger zones on one hand. Pretty small compared to US cities... only a few blocks south of the city and a few pockets out west.

I went with my sister to a birthday party at a rugby club once. My dad picked us up and we weren't on the road long before a police car appeared behind us, lights flashing. My dad just carried on going and the policeman had to turn on his siren. We shouted at my dad to pull over and eventually he did, saying he hadn't realised it was him the fuzz were after. He hadn't been drinking so they sent him on his way, but I could understand why they were stopping people leaving a rugby club at gone 11 at night.

I wish they were as vigilant when it comes to people texting and driving. What kind of idiot thinks that's safe?

Sounds like a good place to live Breaker. You better be careful talking it up or the other half of Ireland will decided to go over as well

Almost rugby time!!!!!!! Then a few tonight for me I think....good luck to all you respective team's playing bar Ozzy's

Notch wrote:Sounds like a good place to live Breaker. You better be careful talking it up or the other half of Ireland will decided to go over as well

Every 2nd person... just about... has a connection with Ireland. Loads of Irish everywhere in Oz. I worked in one office and there were about 6 or 7 - from Belfast, Armagh, Dublin, Limerick, Cork and a bloke from right down on the tip near Baltimore?

All were either builders, construction managers, quantity surveyors and they all were great to work with.

One guy was a little edgy and used to get wound up over little things which were no big deal (lots of swearing which got a bit tiresome sometimes but was quite funny to hear) but the others were more passive types, smart, quiet achievers who were always friendly and polite... always on the ball (with the job 100%) but also easy to talk about sport and other things with at the same time.

The Irish have done a lot for this country in so many ways... their huge influence is a core part of this society.

You are very adaptable and popular people!

Linebreaker wrote:

Notch wrote:Sounds like a good place to live Breaker. You better be careful talking it up or the other half of Ireland will decided to go over as well

Every 2nd person... just about... has a connection with Ireland. Loads of Irish everywhere in Oz. I worked in one office and there were about 6 or 7 - from Belfast, Armagh, Dublin, Limerick, Cork and a bloke from right down on the tip near Baltimore?

All were either builders, construction managers, quantity surveyors and they all were great to work with.

One guy was a little edgy and used to get wound up over little things which were no big deal (lots of swearing which got a bit tiresome sometimes but was quite funny to hear) but the others were more passive types, smart, quiet achievers who were always friendly and polite... always on the ball (with the job 100%) but also easy to talk about sport and other things with at the same time.

The Irish have done a lot for this country in so many ways... their huge influence is a core part of this society.

You are very adaptable and popular people!

Love it

Yeah, he was a giant... about 6'8"?

He played rugby, got selected for the Academy outside Limerick? (Stag told me once... something about schoolboy trials for the Academy or something... I forget the details). He quit though and decided to do some work over here. We worked on the super demo projects together.

He got posted down on the site and set himself up in a timber shack which was due to be demolished with about 50 other buildings on the Army base.

It was quite funny walking into his setup.
He was a very softly-spoken and cool customer. He had a lot of responsibility (he had to drive over regularly to another site and was always in demand from both!)

The phone never stopped bloody ringing and he just put a smile on his face and said "Hello?" (wtf's gone wrong now?!?)

Afternoon All.

Afternoon Cari.

Just gone midnight here.

Best time for an eight hour European rugby marathon then Breaker! Starting with this nervy O's match.

Don't want to jinx things for you Cari, but I'm getting the increasing sense of a win for Ospreys today.

If Toulouse are going to keep turning down points and going to the corner... they think they are going to win this by outscoring you on tries. Get more than a score ahead and the pressure on them... I guess it'll be decided by territory. Last week they were camped in your 22 and if that happens again you're licked, but so far its going well for the Os.

This doesn't strike me as being like the great Toulouse sides of the past who can score from anywhere unless those deadly outside backs pounce on one of your own mistakes. Low error count, good defence, good field position and accurate kicking and I think you'll take them.

My heart would love the O's to do well Cari...

...but on superbru I tipped Toulouse by low teens I think. I'd be happy to lose points for you though.

You've made the correct choice Breaker. I can't see the O's winning this. I hope it's not a drubbing though. O's doing OK so far. Conditions aren't great there. It's been raining heavily in South Wales overnight and today. Biggar's having a great game though, and I've got a box of Marks & Sparkes biccies to scoff for this marathon. Every cloud.

I'll fire up Gibbo's links then.

Such a long way for the signal to come but fingers crossed I can get a smooth one.

To be honest, everything is going right for the Ospreys.

This is exactly how they planned this game to go. Suffocating rugby. It might not come off, but their tactics are spot on.

I've got a couple of links if necessary. Toulouse down to 14 after a rather harsh yellow for their no.5. O's need to capitalise on that, but their own discipline has been a bit suspect as usual.

Got a few which work thanks Cari.
Just gone 30 mins, 6-3 to the Spreys.
Is that live or behind a little?

That's live Breaker, O's about to attempt another penalty.

Job done. 9-3.

Treviso leading 10-7 in their match apparently.

I think Swanny picked Treviso. Everyone else went for the Tigers.