No, not the Jets/Bluebags. The Newtown Breakaways are the premiers of the SWAFL for 2004. That’s the Sydney Women’s Australian Football League.

Newtown beat Western Suburbs 10-12 (72) to 5-3 (33) in the grand final at Wagener Oval, Ashbury, last Saturday week. That’s about all I can tell you of the game because the otherwise unexpectedly fine SWAFL website doesn’t carry any more information than the final score. No details, no match reports, no congratulatory messages on the forum. And I don’t recall seeing any mention in any of the papers, which is a pity. The Breakaways’ own website hasn’t been updated since June, but at least they have a website.

swafl.org does tell me that Newtown also beat Wests in the 2003 grand final, as indeed they did in 2002 (which I believe was Newtown’s inaugural season).

Seven clubs competed in the SWAFL in 2004. Curiously, none of them are from north of the Harbour Bridge. The other five: Balmain, Eastern Suburbs/Uni of NSW, Sydney Uni, UTS/Darlinghurst and Camden.

Congratulations Newtown, let’s see the Breakaways make it a four-peat in 2005!

Father’s day is over for another year. It was my second father’s day. It was my first father’s day since the passing of my dad.

It was a nice day with Di, Adara and Bartholomew. I got some cool presents (including a plush Firefox) and had an enjoyable lunch at Dante Ristorante Italiano in the courtyard of Leichhardt’s Italian Forum.

But I feel I should dedicate Father’s Day to the fathers of Breslan, in southern Russia. Those hundreds of fathers who lost children because of that terrible atrocity perpetrated by rebels and mercenaries in their school. Children who were captured, locked up in oppressive conditions, and had their school building booby-trapped. On the first day of a new school year.

No cause, however noble or otherwise, can even begin to justify the capture and slaughter of innocent children. It was truly horrifying watching the gun battles and general mayhem on the news channels on Friday night. I can recall few acts of terrorism or war as sickening as this.