A whole week. Are you sitting comfortably......

I know, I know. It's been ages since I wrote, and comments have been noted. It's been a combination of nothing to report and being too busy to find the time. Eric's sister Ava-Lee who has a baby and a tot commented that it was nice that I had the time to write. I know what she means having done 2 babies in 12 months and then got sick for what seemed like about 3 years after, from which point Eric and I both went to Uni. Time just was something that just rushed by and one never had any of. I guess it's relative really. Pre-babies I remember thinking I needed at least 36 hours in a day. After babies I wonder what I did with the 24 hours I did have. Anyway then children are now emotionally very hard work but at least they can physically look after themselves - ish. And of course apart from those important rugby matches and the odd wintertime video we don't have TV. So my blog time is the time everyone else uses to watch TV I guess. Anyway if I ramble on like this you will be plagued with another long blog and give up reading half way through!

News here. Well with that dreaded report out the way I had a day to catch up with myself on Monday then Tuesday was out doing Clinical Assessments again. Wednesday/Thursday I was in Auckland for a days meeting then a days training. I drove up and had to find a hotel near the airport. Well I guess that had a actually looked at the road names/numbers on the map it may have given me a clue as to where I was. I've never used a map to get to the airport, just followed the signs. Now, when I did look at the map I assumed that I had come in on the big red road from the bottom of the page. No I had actually come in on the yellow road from the side of the page. Anyway hitting the airport and almost driving into the carpark I looked on the map, found the road again and decided I had gone the wrong way. Drove in the other direction and looked again to decide that the first route was right, but avoid the car park. I eventually arrived at the hotel feeling very sheepish. I usually pride myself on being able to use a map to find my way around. I can never rely on intuition for such things as I have NO sense of direction, as Eric will emphatically confirm. Anyway as there where so many of us (7) and we wanted a meeting room, they gave us the house at the back of the hotel. It was awful. I'm sure it had been locked up for the season and was very damp smelling. Lots of other things weren't right and we will never go there again. In fact I think that Loretta should be quibbling over the bill. The one thing about going away with IMAC is that you can usually be sure of a good standard of accommodation. This was very disappointing. After a day meeting we went over to Tamaki to put together decorations for IMAC's launch of it's re-branding the following day. It was 7pm before we got back. We had dinner in the hotel and although the meal was beautifully presented it was Yuk! The next day we had to get up at some ungodly hour to negotiate the morning rush hour and get across to Tamaki Campus again for training. Actually, although it was planning and management stuff I had done in the past it was very good. Most notably because the tutor had chocolate bars on hand! I stayed in the evening for the launch then went off to friends for supper. Don't know if I have mentioned Beth and Graham before. We met them through Lynne and Vaughn our last trip to S.Africa. We actually went to their leaving do as they were about to emigrate, spent the evening getting on like a house on fire and left with those 'If ever you're in NZ...' sort of comments and us thinking we'd never see them again. It was most odd to phone them 6 months later and say 'Guess where we live!!' We have kept in contact since, which is more than can be said for Lynne whom I love dearly but is the worlds worst at keeping in touch. Do you know when we were last out there something came up about us being Steffie (her daughter)'s Godparents and we didn't even know!!! Anyway I saw Graham briefly as he was off to a brand practice and had a great 'girlie' chat with Beth. Luke, their 8 year old, had a big treat of extended TV viewing that night for good school work and was oblivious to us girls.

Eric is at serious risk of completing the airing cupboard in under a month. I think all that is left is the final coat of paint and one rail to be put inside. Hurray!! He has also been putting the edging round the laminate flooring he laid about a year ago. I really do try not to rush the dear boy. He actually phoned home this week as his dad had a total knee replacement and he wanted to check all had gone well - it had.

Alice was very excited at being in the prose reading finals and Eric and I duely went along on Friday to watch. Having not been here the 2 evenings before I had not heard any renditions of her 'Big Bear, Little Bear' story. She started of brilliantly but seemed to change the end of the story and it fell flat. She was speaking from memory and it seemed like she'd forgotten her words and ad-libbed the last 5 sentences. So much so that when she finished people were not sure if she had, or whether she had totally forgotten her words, and there was that pregnant 'do we clap now' pause. I did , everyone followed and she shuffled off stage. She was very upset to not get placed. When I spoke to her afterwards and asked her why she changed the words and had she forgotten them, she said no she had changed them long before and this was what she had presented to get in the finals. We had tried to put her on the straight and narrow when she did this weeks ago, but obviously we failed and I'm afraid she paid the price of that 'I know best' stubbornness. I can't think where she gets it from!!!! Bless her. It took her a day to get over her disappointment and she got teased at school for being so grumpy in the afternoon. Her friend Samantha won and I think everyone expected Alice to be pleased for Sam. She did say Well Done but I think her disappointment swamped her enthusiasm.




Sat was netball. Harriette's team lost 17 - 10 and Alice's team lost 6-5. Alice's team played the other Hinuera School team and both teams kept forgetting who was who and throwing the ball to the opposition!

I had an amusing conversation with Sarah there. Sarah said that her dad (Richard) had told her to ask Eric did he want some milk (for the pigs). I said why. She said because we've had a slipped calf. Now I have to first explain (and feel free to correct me Bridget/Richard/Robyn) that a slip calf is an early arrival. Dairy farms milk for about 9 months of the year then dry the pregnant cows off a few months before calving. The calves arrive with great precision (usually) having been mated at specific times. Richard knows which of their cows will calve on which day and I'm sure he'd know to the hour if we asked. Anyway a slipped calf is one that arrives early. This one had died (I think they often do) but of course you are left with a lactating cow which needs milking. And of course as you are not officially 'milking' and as there is no milk truck coming to the farm, the farmer is left with excess milk or colostrum. To the colostrum is added a 'colostrum keeper' which stops it going off. (Bear with me this is relevant I promise). I'll also add here that many dairy farmers get in a few piglets at this time of year so they have something to feed this excess milk to. Anyway, Sarah is offering us milk for our pigs. She then says in all innocence 'It won't go off as it's Sally's milk'!!! I have yet to find what magical properties Sally possesses that stops her milk going sour. I suspect that what Sarh means is that it is colostrum to which they have added the afore mentioned keeper. But I may be wrong! (You may not be as amused by this as I was but at least you've learnt something about dairy farming!)

I took a few hours off on Friday and as the weather was gorgeous I worked in the garden, the flower garden for a change. God it is neglected. Mind you I feel that everything around here is! In the few hours that I was working I had a call from a colleague asking if I felt she'd been 'off' with me. Remember I said one of the girls had been awful to me in Auckland in April when I was sharing with her? Well it was her, and she'd been very odd again this trip up. So I said Yes she had, and told her all the things I had intended to say to her but had not found the opportunity to do (no I had not procrastinated, her father died very suddenly recently and she had to dash back to the UK so that had delayed things).Well it turns out she is VERY depressed, has been for ages and is having an awful time. I felt terrible once she'd poured her heart, and an apology, out to me. Trouble was I never knew her 'un-stressed' so didn't know if there was something wrong, or she was just horrible, or she just had taken a huge dislike to me. I'm sort-of glad there is some explanation for her behaviour but very sad that she is so ill.

On to more cheerful things. Dusty has disappeared out in the wet - Yes it's raining again. In fact we have had a huge storm this evening. We have had some good weather this week, and some heavy downfalls. In fact apparently when I was in Auckland there was a huge hail storm here and Martin Johnson, who was driving down to Te Kuiti for a bevvie with the boys from his old rugby club, was in a car accident during this same storm. He is fine apparently. And that is all I am going to say about rugby!!! The A.B's did thrash the Argies though which is good. At our local stadium as well, shame we could not get tickets.

You remember on my birthday we went to that vineyard to eat but didn't? Well we went back there today. It was nice, but not as nice as I hoped. The queue for the buffet was long and it put you off more than one trip, consequently you put a bit of everything on your plate and it did not necessarily go. I would have liked shorter queues and more trips up for small portions. There were a lot of 'oldies' there as well, not that I'm age-ist but I wondered where all the 30 somethings (oh alright 40 somethings) were. One little quirk to the trip though was that Eric recognised the name and said that Nooyans used to live in this house, and they were into wine and planted some vines around the house. I asked, and they were the same. The General Manger, a guy in his late 30's, lived here until he was three but remembered some of the trees and the concerts they used to hold here. We ended with a trip round the cellars. It is a relatively small family enterprise. A bonus of the day was I discovered a New Zealand white wine I actually liked. And that's a first. I think the white wines here are very dry, and I don't do dry.

So, there you are. If you are still with me you deserve a medal. But at least you are up to date. Next week I am planning to take Friday off as Harriette is having 6 friends here for a tea and sleepover on her birthday on Saturday and I guess I need to sort some cooking out.

Night night.