News from Nelson - August 2 2013

Hi all,
We are both well - the temperatures are warming up, and we have had a good dollop of rain.

We have been busy transplanting more of our trees over the past couple of weeks - as I mentioned previously, we have loads of macrocarpa and eucalypt seedlings coming up where the sawmillers pulled our mature trees out five or more years ago, so we are moving them to places where will have room to grow - mainly around the hairpin bend on our driveway. Eucalypts on the inside of the bend, macrocarpas on the outside.

Jan has been having a great time using the hired digger to dig the holes for the trees!

Bonnie & Coco are both well, though Coco is still missing Fliss. She is quite tentative and very clingy with Jan.

Jan & I had dinner with Jax, last week, which was great, and Richard from NPIL. We went to a local Thai place in Richmond that proved very good. We also managed to have lunch with Jen the next day, as she was up seeing her folks, prior to starting her new job at UC. She has just had her first two days, which hopefully went well.

At the beginning of August we had a mid-winter Christmas with Kathleen, Frits and Amy. We had a lovely, relaxing weekend, and were amazed to find it 4pm on Sunday suddenly, with everyone needing to head home. I have no idea where the time went to.

Amy was - unexpectedly - our Father Christmas, and a damned fine one she was too! The dogs found it all rather scary to start of with but soon realised that there were doggy treats and became quite commercial about the whole costume thing.

The weekend after that we had the Children's Concert, which went well. Jan was in the paper in the lead-up to the event (an earlier post http://klinkehoffen.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/news-from-nelson-august-2013.html and http://klinkehoffen.blogspot.co.nz/2013/08/beauty-and-bugs-real-treat-nelson-mail.html). 

Jen was up this last week again, and we managed to catch up for lunch in Richmond, which was great.

I have set up a new blog for my musings on leadership - and anything else that takes my fancy - at http://actsofleadership.blogspot.co.nz/.The Masters study is going well - my experiments on my students start next week. I can't believe how fast it has come around.

Next month Jan is off to Rotovegas to give his presentation at the WoodExpo. He has it all prepared already so he only now need practice it.

Also as previously mentioned, I will be in Christchurch four days in the middle of October - 17-20 - for a Careers Symposium and CDANZ AGM. Would be good if we could perhaps catch up with a pile of the Cantab people on the Saturday night? Let us know if you will be in town, because it would be great to see you all.

The weekend after Jan is in Welly for the Naenae Reunion. I am not going, but will stay home with the dogs.

Jan is off to the US in November, leaving on the 5th of November for the US, then taking a side trip to Germany on his way home. He will be in touch with the German family to tee up catching up with as many of you as he can on his train trip from Frankfurt to Ottobeuren (where the next piece of NPIL machinery is being made). He will only have a couple of days, but wants to see as many of you as can perhaps get to one place to say "Hi". He is aiming for a weekend arrival - he will get in to Frankfurt on Friday 16th of November but has to be Ottobeuren on the morning of Monday the 19th. I think he will go up to Oma Friedel's on the Friday, then take the train straight to Ulm on the Saturday. But, as I said, he will be in touch. Unfortunately he won't get back to NZ by our wedding anniversary, and he will also miss the next NSO concert. I am sure he probably won't miss either!

Right - there is nothing else that I can think of at the mo. More news later :-D

Jan & Sam

View from the office today

Hi all, 

View from the office today. Not bad for winter, eh.

 And, sure, Mr Key. We Kiwis certainly care more about Snapper quotas than about your US buddy-buddy spy bill. Sure we do. Yeah, right.

Sam

News from Nelson - August 2013

Hi all,
Hope life is well with everyone.

It was the children's concert on Saturday this weekend just gone. It went well. Loads of the little lovies were absolutely spellbound by the Emperor and the Nightingale, which was just wonderful... including many real tots in the 'terrible twos'. There were three performances, leaving Jan incredibly tired – even I was tired, just from selling programmes.

Mind you, I managed to fit in some shopping, as I ducked into town after the house doors had closed on two performances and bought two new pairs of jeans (on sale too, I might add!). My old favourites, the only pair I had left 'unholed' had finally collapsed into holes two weekends ago, and while I have cobbled them back together, they are definitely now home jeans, not 'out' jeans.

We came home, grabbed a bite, then rushed off to a quiz night at the Upper Moutere School picking up Zig & Lib from further down our road and meeting Glenys & Kevin from the Mudcastle. Zig warned us that he had a head cold and his brain had fallen out; Glenys got there and said she had never been to a quiz night before and would be rubbish; Jan & I were so tired we felt we needed to be stuck with pins to keep awake! Great team, eh. But after a few wines, we did OK, finishing about halfway through the field of 36. It was to raise funds for the Upper Moutere Recreation Centre, which has had two fires in the past twelve months. They think the fires have been caused by rats eating the wiring. Jan & I helped repaint after the first fire, the centre was about to reopen, and there was a second one.

Actually, too many wines in my case: I woke in the morning with a slight headache, despite having drunk lots of water. The first touch of a hangover I have had in a long time! Luckily it was raining yesterday, so I did lots of catch up jobs like dubbining all my boots and shoes, taking up my new jeans, making tomato soup, tidying the house, doing washing and then finishing the day in a long hot bubble bath reading a book, while Jan slept in until 10 then watched films. We took the dogs out at lunchtime for a walk - only about 3k, but nice for us all to get out, and the dogs played like lunatics. Raincoats and gumboots are definitely things to be thankful for... as is a good day's recuperation. I can also say whole-heartedly "thank goodness for the rain" :-)

Where we felled our full grown eucalyptus trees to be architraves and floorboards in our house, we now have loads of babies growing up - and all growing on the access road to fell the pines on the next crop rotation (granted, 20-ish years away, but also in the way for a pruning gang to get to the pines). The guy Jan hired the digger from said that Jan could keep the machine until he gets another hire booking. So last weekend Jan dug out some of the eucalyptus and macrocarpa seedlings which have sprung up, and we transplanted them to the hairpin bend on our road. There are still lots more, and as Ken hasn't yet said he needs the digger back, we will probably transplant some more this coming weekend. The eucalypts are a really straight growing variety which mills very well with low wastage, so we are keen to have some more coming on. 


We also need to get the slope mowing man back to munch some more of our gorse, and plant our new pear and nectarine trees. Better buy in another truck load of compost mix for that too - and some alpaca poo!

We went to the Boathouse AGM a couple of weeks ago, and as we were walking along Rocks Road, this was the sunset we had the pleasure to see:

Tomorrow night we pick up Magda from the airport, as she is coming to Nelson for a few days. It will be great to see her.

Jan's work is going well, though he still gets the itch for more hands on work. He is speaking at a conference in a few weeks in Rotovegas, so is working on his presentation at the moment as well.

Jenny L is a whiz on the sewing machine: she has sent me three new merino tops this winter. I must have ten or more of them now, and I have worn them this year since April for that extra layer under much lighter clothes. While it doesn't quite mean that I can wear summer clothes all year round, it is close to it. Brilliant - thanks Jen!

I saw a gorgeous 1900s PR post the other day on the horrors of "men caring for babies", trying to stop the vote for women. Check it out at http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/08/men-caring-for-babies-the-horror-visions-from-the-early-20th-century/278392/?goback=.gde_4174358_member_264882939. There are also a couple of short posts below this one of other things which have caught my fancy. 

Best wishes to Neil L, Erik, Gary B & Uta this month :-D

Right - more to come in a few weeks. Take care, everybody


Jan & Sam

Beauty and bugs a real treat - Nelson Mail, 7 August 2013

Jan's famous. OK, well the children's concert is, anyway. And my programme notes, as the Nelson Mail reporter basically copied those too :-)

Sam

Le Petard "Howdy Jack", National Business Review, 25 August 1995

I was reminded yesterday of a lovely NBR column-short from way back when I was at Sealord. I used to have this pinned to my wall, as follows:

"HOWDY JACK: This letter was recently sent to an Australian paper, addressed to President Jacques Chirac:

"Mon cher Jacques,

“Je suis un petit fromaged-off avec votre decision to blow up La Pacifique Sud avec Ies Francais bombes nuclears. Je reckon vous must have un spot in la Belle France pour Ies explosions. Le Massif Central? Le Champs Elysees? Votre own back yard, perhaps? Frappe les crows flamboyant avec stones, sport. La Guerre Cold est fini. Votre forces militaries need la bombe atomique about as beaucoup as les poissons need Ies bicycles. Un autre point, cobber - votre histoire militaire isn't tres flash. Une bombe nouveau won't change votre tradition glorieux".

Don'tcha love it?!

Sam