What a strange and surreal and wonderful weekend that I had full of magic moments and ironies.

Not least of which was the fact that I buried my mother on Saturday. A year after her death.

She’s been sitting around all that time probably tutting as her family took their time to lay her to rest. But what with her estate, the incredibly stuffed flat that took months to clear, the engraving on headstone and the 300 bucks it cost to get the Waikato District Council to dig a little hole in the ground our family already owned, meant that time ticked by.

And so on Saturday, my brother and my families gathered in Tuakau. Said some words. Had some silence as rain skudded by and the wind whipped through the manuka, and then we laid Mum to rest. It was moody, sad, funny and touching.

Sunday was spent listening to the rain which came and came and came. With perfect timing. Why does it pour whenever there is a king tide? It’s like Mother Nature wants to flood us away.

In a rare break in the weather we walked the dog down at the local park. A park that had only just been tidied up after the last big storm. How heart breaking for the working crews to see three big trees down. Two big macrocarpas snapped in two.

Coincidentally, or possibly ironically, the storm coincided with a new study on Kiwis attitudes to climate change, undertaken by the insurer IAG. Of the 1000 New Zealanders polled, 88 per cent think we will see more severe floods, storms and inundation as a result of climate change. 84 per cent agree humanity is able to reduce climate change, but just 10 per cent think we will take appropriate action.

But the best thing about the rain was the ability to watch the sport and what sport it was

Over two days I saw some of the best tennis I’ve ever seen from two of the best players ever; Djokovic and Nadal. The match took over five hours. Thank heavens that it was broken into two episodes by Wimbledon’s scheduling rules.

The fact that the best tennis and one of the longest matches was being played by two of the oldest players was a delicious irony. The fact that both semi-finals went to final set advantage rather than tie breaks is a big debating point. My feeling is that the tie breaks should kick in from 12 all in the fifth.

And then the final of the Football Wold Cup, which saw the best team win the tournament but in a frenetic match. Having lived in France, I understood the delicious irony in this match. France is a funny old nation. Both extremely liberal but also conservative. A country full of immigrants who are hated. The Arabs and the blacks are confined to the banlieue, the outer suburbs, and many packed into high rise ghettoes.

But for generations now their football team has had a certain make up. In this world cup 80 per cent of the team were immigrants mostly from Africa. 80 per cent of the team is not born in France. And one third of them were Muslims.

And the same could be said about the Belgium team as well. Immigration maybe the scourge of Europe but they turn a blind eye to it if it means you win a World Cup.