Short-Sheeting...Cheaters and a Shit load of Baking!

Dads 65th Birthday was a blast.  Lots of family and friends congregated at Waitarere Beach to celebrate the occasion.  Pretty sure the locals knew we were coming due to the exhaust on my brothers car.  A common theme with any of my family get togethers is a car rally by my mother.  These are not just haphazardly thrown together.  A lot of work goes into each and everyone.  The beauty of living on a different island is that I have only had to participate in 2 in the last 5 yrs.  Ask the rest of my DNA matches and they will groan and probably have to use two hands and a foot to count them all.  These very competitive Rallies involve about seven cars full of teams of four, driving the streets solving clues.  We are easily identified as the people parked in the middle of the road ignoring any traffic around bent over a map pulling our hair out when no matter how hard you look or how many times you drive up and down a street you can not find 3 red fish on a fucken trellis.  Its also quite helpful when after 6 cars had already stopped at the local dairy to ask where the bloody Rest home was,  I was stopped before even uttering a word by the shopkeeper saying in an exasperated voice "There's no rest home in Waitere" I must of had the look of a desperate Car Rally enthusiast by the clipboard and map I was carrying as I sprinted past the coke machine pushing aside the old duck waiting to pick up her newspaper and a hokey pokey ice cream.  I shouted back a "Sweet As" and bolted back out the door to my waiting get a way vehicle.  We were being timed and the pressure was building.  Even being passed at a  Round-a-bout by going around it the wrong way gave some people a few seconds of precious lead.  The worst bit is when your only half way through the list of clues and you pass your cheating brother with a smug look on his face heading back to Rally Headquarters.  Bastard.
After the Rally there is always a quizz or 4 and just for future reference the answer to "What ingredient do you put in a Christmas pudding" Clue is 'an old sailor' the answer is not 'semen' its 'salt'.  Good to know.
The other out of control thing that goes on at gatherings like this is people think its freaken hilarious to Short-sheet other peoples beds.  Yes this is funny if it doesn't happen to you.  Twice.  In one night.
So there was short-sheeting happening everywhere you looked.  It made me very suspicious of anyone going anywhere near my bedroom even during the day.  Sorry Aunty Daphne.  Trust no-one became the weekend motto.
Amongst all the noise and crazy I got to play a pretty decent amount of Tennis on the courts straight outside our door, which is surprising as I am generally pretty un-co at Tennis but suddenly when its 4 on each side and your playing opponents were aged between 3 and 16 suddenly I was channelling some pretty impressive Venus and Serena Skills.  Could have also been the ciders I was downing in the sunshine all day.  My poor niece paid the price for my newly found sporting prowess and got thwacked straight between the shoulder blades on more than one occasion by her racket weilding maniac of an Auntie.  She was cool with it and there doesn't seem to be any lasting damage.  I think more tennis balls went over the fence and into the Horse Paddock than we actually hit but it was nice to have such an efficient ball boy as Uncle David to retrieve each one for us. Thanks for that.
So a big Shout Out to my Ma for all her hard work keeping us so entertained for 4 days and for all the awesome baking we got to indulge in to keep us sustained.  Also to everyone who came along.  Thanks for all the laughs.  Lets do this again real soon.