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And thirdly, Canada.

The Oakville tournament has some interesting parameters, and one of them is the concept of rules. The way it is played is that Canadian rules apply to matches between Canadian teams and WCF rules apply to matches between non-Canadian teams or Canada and "non-Canada". For example, the coach of the Horton team we played this morning (it was the third Canadian team in a row) generously allowed us to change positions in the team as part of a player substitution during the game. Apparently he had no idea what the international rules of curling stated. Overall, over the years we know that Canadians' awareness of WCF rules is low. The highlight was a hilarious extempore from the 2014 Olympics where the Canadian team said they might as well take a time-out because they were going to have another one anyway. The umpire patiently pointed out to him that there is only one time-out in a match. They were very surprised by this, even though it has been a rule for many years. On the other hand, it is customary here for the players to measure the stone for the advantage of the last stone in the first end and help each other out. The end of the tournament did not go our way and after playing six ends against Horton we decided that today was not our day. We compensated in the afternoon in the gym and in the evening with a lively discussion on curling topics.rnrnPhoto: Beth at the measuring