This is, I know. You don’t even have to say. This is super nerdy. But still.
As it has oft been cited, “The English-speaking world is divided into those who have read ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and ‘The Hobbit’ and those who are going to read them” (Sunday Times). [On a side note, it’s interesting that this quote gets quoted so much (Google it) without precise citation. Wanting to be thorough, I looked for the actual review in the Sunday Times (and while I’m sure if I dug deeper I could find the reference), this seems to be one of those quotes that has almost taken on a life off its own.]
Anyway, in honor of the world-wide release of “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” or the <<Хоббит: Нежданное путешествие>> as it is called here, I will do 7 days of celebrating different parts of New Zealand. I posted about this before but here are some pics from the sheep farm where the Shire was filmed. Maybe you’ll recognize some of these places when you watch the film? 🙂 For a fee (at the time, I think it was about approx. $45 USD), you can hop on a bus at the one tour agency in Roturua that runs these and get a tour of the farm. These were taken after all three films had been out for a while but before The Hobbit negotiations had started.
Trivial Information: The owner of this sheep farm was in the middle of watching a futbol game when Peter Jackson and another person knocked at his door to ask him for permission to film the Shire scenes for the LOTR on his farm. The sheep farmer, so engrossed in the game, almost sent him away. #GameChanger.
Newbie Academic in a 'Stan 
lol that is a good fact, also I didn’t know that you can watch futbol on tv…are you talking about that table top game or something else?
Actually, now that I think about it – I think it was actually a rugby match… but anyway, yes, outside the US (with the exception of the World Cup), you can frequently watch soccer/futbol/football matches on tv. 🙂