As a family (well, 2/3rds of it anyway) we had a brilliant time at London 2012 seeing athletics and horse action in the same day (can you tell I’m not an equestrian expert?!)

And this interest has been maintained by watching the current Commonwealth Games on TV (not sure why we didn’t apply for tickets this time – regretting that now!).  The kids have really enjoyed watching it and cheering on the home nations.

Today we were watching the lawn bowls – which whilst it’s a Commonwealth sport is not, to date, an Olympic sport.

Way back in 1999 I was on secondment in Sydney, Australia with the accountancy firm I then worked for.  One of my fellow secondees, Nick from Nottingham, was a lawn bowls player and had, in fact, represented England at it.  We were working with a (very attractive) local colleague called Xena (she wasn’t the actual warrior princess – but was not dissimilar in stature) and she rowed for Australia. When she told us this, I commented that I was the only one on the team who hadn’t represented their country at a national sport – to which Xena asked Nick what sport he’d represented England at.  He was embarrassed to admit that it wasn’t a very sexy sport and it was lawn bowls (and was mortified I’d made him tell her!!)

Having thought about it – I might not have represented my country at sport – but during that 3 month secondment, I did drink Aussie beer and wine for England!!!