A Saturday Posting for a Change

Another Sunday morning. I should be working on my course but instead I'm here. I am doing a 'Graduate Diploma in IT in Education' (GDITE). The first module is online and I have not really got into it. I have gone weeks without looking at the site and am really busy at work so it keeps dropping down on my list of priorities. It is also very primary school teaching focused and so not relevant in that sense to me (I teach adults). Anyway, I will press on with it.

It's a long weekend here. Yesterday was gorgeous. I went on a bike ride up Taotaoroa Rd and back. It's 15km long and seriously, and I mean seriously, hilly and windy (going round bends windy not weather windy!). It is the first real ride I have done this year. The hills nearly killed me. I could have easily been sick at the top of one of them, but coming down was so exhilarating. I got up to 60km/hr on one :-) . I am meant to be doing an 80km section of the Round Lake Taupo challenge http://www.cyclechallenge.com/index.php?id=34 in late Nov and have to get some serious training in to get fit enough for that :-( I then spent the day pottering in the garden. I weed sprayed the drive (350m of it) and strimmed the paths in my veg plot and started tackling the huge amount of weeds in there. As we are away for 6 weeks from Christmas I am in a dilemma as to whether to plant lots of veggies that we won't get to eat or put large parts of the plot to rest and have nothing when we get back. I am advertising for a house-sitter for the 6 weeks we are away do hopefully we will have someone in who will keep on top of the weeding (assuming I can get on top of it first!!)

Today we are vacillating between another day at home (I will go out with the peddlers, Eric will kill a few sheep for the freezer) or a day ticky touring around the Coromandel. I think the former will win and we can go out tomorrow.

Tsunami Horror

We have been shocked by the earthquakes and tsunami's hitting the pacific region, mostly the ones in Tonga and Samoa. Lalamonu is the worst hit area of Samoa, which is where we stayed in July. In fact if you go to this link
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/image.cfm?c_id=1&gal_objectid=10601073&gallery_id=107687
and scroll down to picture 64 (4th up from bottom in left column), the guys are standing at almost the exact spot where our fale stood as far as we can work out.

It makes my winging about last weekend, when we had real water problems at Cedar Lodge, seem pathetic.

It also sounds like 2 sisters, in their 20's, from Matamata may have been killed in Samoa. I feel sick with sadness for all the loss and suffering.