Weekend Wrapup: Football, The Haka & Critters

Today was quite the Sunday in the Smithson/Blankenheim house. We started the day with some serious football watching. My 49ers pulled off another win - so exciting to see them at 3-1! While the game was on, I worked on an apple pie. It really has been forever since I took some time to bake - and while my crust was not fantastic and my pie is not beautiful, it sure does taste good! Once all of this wedding stuff is over, I'll need to brush up on my technique!

After lunch I took a lovely nap... we had all the windows open and the breeze was wonderful! When I woke up, I went out and noticed that football was no longer on TV (seriously, that's blasphemy on a Sunday). Instead, it was rugby. As it turns out, the World Cup was on... New Zealand was playing Canada. For those of you who don't know, Charlie and Mike played rugby all through college... so he was really into this. I sat down to watch and I must say, it is a really interesting game.

The most interesting part of it all, was the New Zealand All Blacks team's pre-game ritual. They perform the haka:

Yeah, they do this before every game. And the other team is just expected to stand there and watch. You have to admit, it's a little intimidating! Apparently, the haka is a traditional war cry and/or dance of the Māori people of New Zealand.

Finally, we ended our day with a little walk down to the game camera. I'm telling you, we hit camera gold today.

Black Bear

Mountain Lion Dragging A Deer

Here's the crazy part... the picture of the mountain lion dragging the deer happened on the night that I was up because my alarm was on the fritz - and right around the time that I heard awful noises outside. How crazy is that?! I find that I'm completely fascinated and completely terrifed all at once.