AS: Life downunder

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Comments

  • Congratulations, Zappa! So happy for you.

    Best wishes for the unpacking, Loth.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Good news Zappa - and look forward to more details.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Zappa, excellent - and may I add about time too. Will a move in location be necessary?
  • Well if you are not going to be a bishop you'll just have to go with a biretta!
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Ah, but what colour?
  • Brilliant news Zappa. It must be such a relief to be back in employment in a role that feels right.

    @Lothlorien - it's fascinating how things you carefully packed away, when you look at them again having not needed them for six months, stop feeling quite so necessary.
  • TukaiTukai Shipmate
    Getting ready to leave on our big OS trip tomorrow. Preparations in the last two weeks have been somewhat hindered by death of my mother last week (see Aged Parents thread), and my pulling a back muscle a couple of days ago. Let's hope the first long trans-Pacific flight doesn't aggravate the latter too much.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    I hope you both have a wonderful time.

  • Sorry to read of the death of your mother. Safe travels, and a wonderful holiday!
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Safe travels, Tukai, and I hope your back behaves itself! -
  • Galloping GrannyGalloping Granny Shipmate
    edited October 2018
    Zappa— Hope this will be the start of a satisfying and uncomplicated period for you. And I hope it's in a climatically comfortable spot — is it far away?
  • @Tukai and @Marama have a fantastic adventure away. It's sad your mother has died, but she was incredibly considerate doing so in such a way that you had time to see her and say goodbye and could more or less arrange her funeral before you went.
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    Zappa— Hope this will be the start of a satisfying and uncomplicated period for you. And I hope it's in a climatically comfortable spot — is it far away?

    Not from where I am now. And, shall we say, it's certainly not Darwin.
  • Darwin's loss.

    I had a nice lunch with my former boss' family today, then my boss and I set off to walk up Huon Hills. I'm not as fit as last time, but it was great to catch up, see the surrounding countryside, and see a few kangaroos, a wallaby and a falcon diving.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Just felt a nasty wee shake, the first I've been aware of for months. It was centred in the North Island, 25 km SW of Taumaranui and 6.2, but felt from Christchurch to Auckland (as far as Geonet records it).

    Here it was rolling quake, but it might have been experienced differently elsewhere.

    Parliament stooped for a while. Anyone else in NZ feel it?
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    I saw a mention of it on Facebook - hope you Kiwis are all safe!
  • Oh dear. Hope you, and all, are okay Huia.

    I did forget about that aspect of NZ.
  • I rarely feel earthquakes but I got a wee short tremor this time. Most of the people who reported it 'severe' were around Wellington or Christchurch, well away from Taumarunui.
  • The neighbours are in the Halloween spirit.

    https://imgur.com/a/yrmEcQT
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Yes, I saw that. I would have described it as rolling, not sharp and weak to moderate, but it felt like it wasn't going to stop, which made me wonder how strong and distant it was. Reminded me to sort out my emergency stuff again, ho-hum.

    Climacus, since the Christchurch quakes laws have been changed and a lot if buildings all around the country have either been strengthened or demolished. NZ as a whole is safer that it was before 2010.

    I think this one got to me because I was not having a good day to sat=rt with and I was sitting in the same place as I was on 22.2.11
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    A rumbling that long would definitely get you on edge. Glad you're ok
  • I made my way today down to the pool cabana. A large structure with plenty of room for guests. There was a real blast from the past. An ancient fridge, branded Hallstrom, a name I knew from my childhood. Son has been reluctant to turn it on without a thorough check.
  • Have just returned from a wonderful parish picnic tea hosted by a parishioner couple on their bush property. After eating, and as it got dark, we were guided into the surrounding forest to observe the fireflies, which are only active for about three weeks each year. A fascinating experience, evocative of fairyland for some.
  • I'd long hoped for the Guy Fawkes fireworks to be transferred to Matariki, and I think that's what's happened as far as the city's big public display's concerned. But there's still a lot of crashing and banging near the house here. No point in going out to see where it's coming from because the configuration of our little hillside cut-de-sac means it could be from any direction.
    Rationale: Guy Fawkes, especially with daylight saving, means that it's late at night, when kids are normally in bed, before it's dark enough to get the full effect — and anyway, how many of the audience know or care why Guy Fawkes is commemorated? While Matariki is our own indigenous celebration in midwinter, effective in the earlier evening. And it looks as if the council's bread-and-circuses for the people really has been moved from November to (I think) June.
  • MaryLouiseMaryLouise Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host
    @Barnabus_Aus, nothing is more magical than fire flies in woodland on a summer evening!
  • I haven’t seen them in woodland but in the old railway tunnel over the Wolgan valley. Beautiful.
  • ClarenceClarence Shipmate Posts: 46
    This forum used to be a commentary, each week, on the outcomes of “Spicks and Specks”, our favourite ABC music quiz show.

    This week, the ABC screened a reunion special. Oh nostalgia! There are a few shipmates past needed now.
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    *sigh*
    Those were the days
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Yesterday the temperature reached 27c, today it was forecast for 11c, but only reached 7c and has rained all day. At least I have collected water to keep the garden growing.
  • It has been like that here Huia. High 30s one day. Low teens the next and snow on Victorian Alps.
  • Anyone going to the women's conference and workshops tomorrow in Chch?
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    I wasn't aware of a woman's conference. I haven't seen any publicity.

    Today I was at a herbal vinegar class, which only one other woman chose to attend, and tomorrow I'm signed up for an ongoing course.

    I tend to find conferences and workshops frustrating due to my hearing disability, even church can be a bit of a challenge due to the quakes disrupting the loop system. :cry:
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    Meanwhile I have started house-hunting for the Kuruzapps* in the Southern Realms™

    *well, actually with kuruzapplet #1 in university college in 2019, and kuruzapplet #2 heading to Ghana, sort of just kuruman and Zappa and twenty years of memorabilia, plus dogs, turtles, out door fish and indoor fish, really
  • Huia wrote: »
    I wasn't aware of a woman's conference. I haven't seen any publicity.

    I tend to find conferences and workshops frustrating due to my hearing disability, even church can be a bit of a challenge due to the quakes disrupting the loop system. :cry:

    My sympathies, Huia. I know what you mean.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Happy hunting, Zappa! I must confess I quite enjoyed house-hunting, although it got a bit frustrating as we discovered we weren't going to get what we expected for our old house, and our buying-power seemed to be dwindling away.

    Best of luck to you, Kuruman and whichever of the Kuruzapplets are involved in the hunt!
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Several posts from LKK in Kerygmania
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    Time for me to do that old lady thing of "the Kuru-Zapplets are that old!!!"

    Sometimes people refer to the time when the offspring move out as "the empty nest" but yours and Kuruman's sounds fairly full to me.

    Best wishes for the househunting and the move.
  • ZappaZappa Ecclesiantics Host
    :blush:
    Yup, life moves on at ferocious pace
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    edited November 2018
    Zappa wrote: »
    :blush:
    Yup, life moves on at ferocious pace

    And we're reminded of that every morning when shaving. Or at least some of us are.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    YaY, black scaups (Papango) the little diving ducks have come back to the river at the end of my street. The quakes raised the riverbed which has now been dredged. Also a lot died of botulism, so I didn't know whether they would return again.

    There were 2 pairs - now I will be waiting for the ducklings, which hatch later than mallards. They made my day.
  • How lovely, Huia, to have them return.

    I am wondering how many Australian 13 yo boys took leftover roast duck to school for lunch today? A birthday was celebrated here last night, so grandson packed up his lunchbox while leftovers were still around. He is a good cook and takes his turn doing dinner for us all. Imaginative and inventive, he seems to have inherited his dad’s ability to know just what flavours will work in any particular dish.
  • HuiaHuia Shipmate
    That's a useful skill Loth, it's one I don't have. I cheat by reading lots of online recipes as far as flavouring goes, and build on something that already exists.
  • Had my work farewell dinner at a local pub last night. A good time was had, and good food. I'm being encouraged to take a long group lunch and go home early on my last day, Friday.

    Still seems a bit unreal. May hit me when I land across the Tasman next Wednesday.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    Travel well.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Good luck! :)
  • Thank you. Did my rounds of the campus today thanking people who have helped me and worked with me, and said Goodbye.
  • MaryLouiseMaryLouise Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host
    Safe travels, Climacus -- I look forward to hearing all about it.
  • Hope all goes well and you find a place to live quickly. Stay in touch.
  • I am settling in to life with three generations of family. One big advantage is meals. Each of us gets a day a week to shop and cook.That leaves two days free, usually weekends and someone steps in to fill the gap. Smoked pork belly last night. It is great to get good cooking without having to think about it for every single night. Grandson is perfectly competent to take his turn and that is also satisfying to see.

    There is a very good butcher here away from shopping centre and a good greengrocer at the small shopping centre. We run a kitty at both shops, paying a sum in each month , then available to all. We are then notified if amount is getting low.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    That sounds like a very satisfactory arrangement, Loth!
This discussion has been closed.