Friday morning was an early start with Una waking up just before 5 to get an early train out to Gatwick and then head off to Portugal for a few days with the family. I decided for a weekend of rugby instead, starting off with the opening ceremony and opening game between England and Fuji which I watched down in The Durell Arms in Fulham. Since it was going to be rather busy full-on weekend I left just after the game and headed home to save myself for the Saturday and Sunday.

On Saturday morning I met up with the other jukkas - Will, Mark, Dan, Shawn and a few others - over at Clapham Junction and headed down to Brighton, getting in around half 12. After walking down to the beach front, we decided to stop in at The Cricketers pub briefly and then head over to the fan zone where we met up with Haig, Caitlin and Warwick. After a bit of time in the sun in the fan zone we caught the bus over to Brighton Community Stadium for the SA vs Japan game, with kick off being at 16h45. And then, what came as a massive shock to everyone, Japan outplayed us and pipped us at the post, beating us by 34 points to 32. As you can imagine there were shockwaves around the stadium, after all... getting beaten by Japan?!? Really?!?

After the game myself and Will headed for there bus and landed up getting straight onto one which was a bonus, until we realised it was a park-and-ride bus and not the Brighton bus. Excellent. So after staying on the bus and returning to the stadium, we queued up and caught the correct one back to Brighton. Once back we grabbed dinner at the American Diner and then met everyone at The Cricketers until Will, Mark, Shawn and Double Dee decided to head for the train back to London. Myself, Haig, Warwick and Warwick's mate Blane then decided to mission back towards Hove and settled in nicely at Bottom's Rest for the remainder of the night.

Yesterday was a fairly quick wake up and leave the house to get back to Brighton Stadium in time for the USA vs Samoa game which Caitlin was very excited about. Unfortunately USA lost 25-16, so not much luck with the rugby teams for us all this weekend! After the game I headed back home to watch the New Zealand vs Argentina game from the couch, and that's where I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening, chilling out on the couch, relaxing in front of the TV :)