News from Nelson - December 2017

Hello everyone,
I hope you all had a lovely time with your whānau over the break!

When we came back through Aussie on our way home, we came through Christchurch airport, and saw Sue, a friend of ours... so teed up a catch up before Christmas. Jenny flew up to Nelson on the same night, and John was there too so we had a good catch up dinner. Except we over-cooked the fish and ended up with something that resembled kippers! Most entertaining, and will be forgotten by no one, I am sure!

Had the CDANZ end of year function, and nearly got a migraine driving home, but salt and water saw it off. I also ate some avocado when I got home (high in potassium) to ensure it stayed gone. It is staggering how easy it is to get rid of migraines, just through food. No drugs necessary.

NMIT's graduation went off well, now back in the Trafalgar Centre, with everyone all together. It has taken three years for the earthquake strengthening work to be completed, but it is done at last. It was lovely to see the students who have been working hard for three years gaining their undergraduate degrees. A day of celebration - though the street parade is darned hot in a cashmere gown in 25 degree heat!

Jan has started his new job with Port Nelson, and appears to be enjoying it so far. Time will tell, but it seems like they have a good culture. He will work through most of the break, but he had organised the time off to go to Dunedin before accepting the job, so at least will have had three mini breaks within three months. Then it will be a long haul through until he has leave again, at Christmas 2018. We are thinking about a holiday to Europe then, though. Providing he doesn't change jobs again, we should manage that this time!

We took Nadine into town for lunch at the Suter and looked at the exhibitions that were on. There was a great wall exhibition from Katie Gold that really were wall flowers. Gorgeous. We walked through the gardens, then came home.A lovely, lazy day. We caught up with Gary at the Upper Moutere pub, who was here from Port Headland for a couple of days. He came around to  our place for dinner, and we had a good catch up, on the same evening that John got back from Aussie. We have a house-full once more!

It has been dry and hot for six weeks (in fact, we left Brisbane at 31 degrees, and came back to 31 degrees in Christchurch!), but at last we had some rain. We watched the clouds gather, and then the thunderstorm started over Nelson way.

We had 17mm in a couple of hours, but despite a bit more drizzle, it wasn't enough to wet the soil more than a centimetre down. Thank goodness for having so much water supply - our tanks were three quarters full before the rain started, and full once the rain was over :-)

We will have a new addition to the family early next year: a boxer dog puppy we are calling Finn. When we go down to Sarah & Allan's wedding in January, we pick Finn up on the way home. Eric bred Libby and Finn is the sole result of the litter. Expensive lot of AI that was!

Nadine is going to house- and dogsit Boo and Bonnie while we go south with my Mother for the wedding, and to pick up Finn on our way back. The one thing I am wondering about is that our new couch and our new puppy arrive in the same month. I am hoping that these two things don't intersect in a bad way!

Barb came to stay for a week over Christmas, which was great. She left on New Year's eve. And, as you can see, we went all out on the Christmas decorations (the piece underneath is a pottery paua sculpture by Owen Bartlett):

Tessa and Izzy came down as well. Mr Busy Izzy had a good time, even though things were a bit spartan. We did have a tree – Jan cut down a pine tree which I had selected for early culling (growing on top of the septic tank!) and brought it in to decorate it for Izzy. Iz also got very attached to the only plastic present that he received: a batman mask and some kind of daggery thing (no idea about Batman - always thought his tights looked ridiculous). Christmas lunch was at our place with only nibbles, which was great. Tessa did a lovely platter of veges which got hoovered in double-quick time. We didn’t drink much (getting through just over one bottle of bubbles between us). No huge amounts of food, no one bloated and sleeping on the couch, and the fridge looking normal.

Izzy did the present allocation, which was quite fun in itself: and this year the theme was recycling. Regifting abounded, and then people swapped regifted presents as well. It was quite fun, and I think we all redistributed some stuff. However, we the family collectively got my Mother a fitbit to record her heart rate for the cardiologist - aside from things for Izzy, this was the only 'traditional' Christmas gift. We have stripped the commercialism out of this family time now, though it has taken us a good number of years to get there.

Jan made boysenberry jam after everyone went home from some of last year's fruit in the freezer, so at last we are getting some freezer space back. Jan, Barb and I all went for a late walk down the hill with the dogs to enjoy the sunset and some cooler temperatures.

We had a few lunches out as a family while everyone was here, with the traditional ice cream sundae (my Father always had one, so someone now carries on the tradition). Izzy ate part of the one below, delivered as plain vanilla ice cream, without nuts, sauce or sprinkles, so somewhat less sickening than usual Only the sundae glass and the wafer made it anything like a sundae, really.

Tessa starts her psychology degree at the University of Auckland in Semester 2 next year, which will challenge both her and Izzy: and be good for them both.

My last MOOC for the year, l'Ecole Polytechnique’s  How to Write a Scientific Paper, on the  Coursera platform, is now complete. This was a very useful course as it taught me a lot about writing my cover letter and how to ensure my artwork was correct, and all the appropriate declarations. As a result, I finally got one of my articles complete and submitted to the Australian Journal of Career Development. Now I just have to wait to find out if it is accepted for review, or if it is a desk reject. Hopefully the former after all the hours and hours of work, and twelve full rewrites...

Two of my NMIT office colleagues have just retired, which will make next semester very interesting indeed. It won't be the same without Ellie and Chris.

The rest of summer will be PhDing... and enjoying lots of dog walks.

We end this newsletter with our Christmas message. Have a safe and happy season!



Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - November 2017

Hi all,
Hopefully the year has been kind to you all: things are starting to return to normal for us, though we have been - as usual - fairly busy.

We began the month with the CDANZ Conference in Auckland as detailed in our October newsletter), and ended it with the SMAANZ Conference on the Gold Coast. We stayed with Tanja and Tony in Tan's new appartment in Bulimba: wow, what a great place, with awesome views. I had several days on the Gold Coast, commuting for the first couple, then staying for the last couple. Lars and Ann came up from Sydney on Friday night, and we spent some time with them over the weekend. Tanja and Jan spent some time together while I was away for the days. Some photos of our trip follow.

 

 

 

 

We spent some time in Brisbane, touring the city and the river; as well as a dinner and drinks at Q1 Skypoint on the Gold Coast, and a meander along the beach. We also went to Caloundra for the day on the Sunday before we came home, to see Ann's grandparents. There was a great thunderstorm that came through on our last night which gave us some fabulously moody photos. We got so well looked after we were almost tempted to stay :-)

On the plane I watched half of the second series of "Head of the Lake" on the way over, and the other half on the way back. This second series was set in Sydney, rather than in and around Queenstown. It was OK, but didn't quite hang together. I probably wouldn't bother watching a third series, unless it got rave reviews.

It was a total month of parties. Dawnie had her usual Guy Fawkes BBQ, which was great fun, followed later in the month by her birthday party at The Boat Shed, Mapua.

We had Glenys and Kevin's for Kevin's birthday dinner, which was a late night out (needless to say! It is always a late and hilarious night at the Mudcastle).

Tracey is moving into town next month: she has sold her share of Cotterel Road to Max & Karen who will now both farm full time. Erica will be going to Nelson Intermediate in 2018 - crikey, intermediate age already! - and Trace will be reinventing herself. Exciting times! We all had fish and salad one night with Tracey, Erica, Max, Karen, Jenny and John: on the first night that John was back in the country. Jenny was up for a family weekend, so it all worked out very neatly.

We caught up with the Cools's again: they came around for dessert and a movie (Hot Fuzz). It is amazing how quickly the year gets away on you though: we only live ten kilometres apart, but it is surprising how hard it can be to co-ordinate diaries.

Daniel turned 50, and had a big shindig up in his new shed. We caught up with our builder, Glenn, and his new partner (Beth) and some people from SA who are new to the district, and are beekeepers. A good night out, and a fair catch up with the neighbours. Margot and Michele told us that they are moving because Susie Lees is planning on moving back in with her new man - from the UK, aparently. That will be interesting.

Jan had the NSO Christmas BBQ at Eleanor’s place in Heron Grove, behind the old Templemore Gardens farm. They have a lovely house with a gorgeous English/Australian garden, designed for lots of shade, but all I could see was lots of work in keeping it beautiful! We took along things that I could eat - coleslaw, hummus, cucumber and broccoli, and marinated chicken. We were there in the garden for three hours... the time just melted away.

The Kanuka is flowering gorgeously.

Gorgeous sunrises again: and not much rain at all. It was so dry that we decided to put off planting most of our vege plants until we got back from Oz.

Jan has been getting the vege gardens ready for the summer, while considering that offer he was made that I mentioned last month. Negotiations have progressed to the point where contracts have been signed, and he has done a couple of hand-over days on his free Mondays. He finishes at the DHB just before Christmas, and goes to Port Nelson as Safety Advisor, starting the week before Christmas. He is looking forward to the change.

The little nana car hit 200000ks:

Along with John, Nadine from Ulm has come to stay too, and will help out John with the first couple of tours as a driver. It is lovely to see her again. She is in the spare room, and John is in the laundry!

I wound up my teaching, marking and results for the semester, and had the decks clear before heading off over the Tassie. There is still some admin to do next month, but I am pretty much done and dusted for the year, aside from supervising three full year project students who will continue their projects over summer, and attending graduation. That means I can get stuck into my PhD, which has been sadly neglected... largely due to the personal toll this year has taken with family illness and deaths.

This month's MOOC was a FutureLearn University of Reading course, "An Intermediate Guide to Writing", which was part two of the MOOC I did last month. It wasn't bad... and again, I learned something new. And then I managed to fit in another one to help me finish off my journal article: How to Write a Scientific Paper course, by l'Ecole Polytechnique on the Cousera platform. It too was free :-)

Boo looking after my Fluevogs:

And some people wear sunglasses inside!

'til next month!


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - October 2017

Hello again!
I hope you are all fighting fit? This month was a bit smoother for us than last month: thank goodness. Everyone has stayed well.

I have been clearing out my wardrobe a little: I have gotten rid of some unworn scarves, pants, jewellery, shoes and accessories... and even a very old laptop. While that has not made a huge difference to the space consumed, getting rid of stuff seems to make a difference mentally.

Doing yet another FutureLearn MOOC on “An Intermediate Guide to Writing” from the University of Reading. This is a two part course, which should be interesting.

Lara came for a week while Otto was up in Auckland at a hockey tournament, which was lovely. I took her for a leg wax and a facial... and she stealth shot me while having a haircut. Totally at my best!

Lara spent lots of time on with Lexie, walking, talking, playing pool, and even inner-tubing down the creek. She had a few baths with a bath bombs, and we did some cooking and watched a few movies. The dogs got walked a lot, which was great. We went Op Shopping to get her some gumboots, as her feet are now larger than mine, but had to give up. We bought some at the Warehouse instead. We have caught up with Dawn - Lara and I went to visit while she was here. She now has Pekin ducks - and a couple of those have cowlicks!

Our new couch has arrived (weeks ahead of schedule), and we have taken one of our old two seaters - the least worn one - to my Mother for her lounge. Now we are hoping that the L-shaped couch arrives too... but they did say the ETA on that one was the end of January. A while to go yet.

Boo and Bonnie are quite relaxed at home: and both have found good places in the sun, now that it has finally decided to stop raining.

Smudge, Scott's bulldog, adores tummy scratches. She trails around after Jan panting at him until he does his duty. 

The sunrises continue to delight:

Jan went down to Christchurch for a two day course in October and brought home a cold, bless him. That led to me having my first cold in 18 months, and ended up in bed for a few days. I missed Anabelle's birthday because of it, so Jan went on his own, as he had recovered!

I managed to strain my medical cruciate ligament, and thought that I could walk it off - and no you can't do that, as I have found - and now have it strapped. It seems to be very slow in healing, so instead of doing my 12,000 steps per day, I am just getting to whatever distance I get to without pushing it. One of my sport & rec students showed me how to strap it properly, so hopefully it will come right.

Jan has been approached by another organisation to see if he would be interested in working for them as a safety coach, and so he is exploring options. We will see how it shapes up.

We headed off to Auckland for a few brief days at the end of the month: I had a conference to go to, and we managed to squeeze in a couple of lunches with friends (one with Morv at Mojo, one with Doug at Bird on a Wire in Takapuna) and a night out with Janet & Shells at "Pleasuredome, the musical", out in Avondale. My advice on Pleasuredome: don't bother. It is pretty fragmented, and it took me quite a long time to work out where the songs came from. Most of them were pretty hard to recognise, and the storyline was very, very weak. The highpoint was the recreated New York street scene outside, which was pretty cool, however the prices for drinks and food was pretty steep. However, if you do go, and if you value your hearing, take earplugs. It was deafeningly loud. I stuffed chewed up tissues in my ears!

We booked an apartment in Lorne Street. It was very central, and - although it was getting quite worn - it had everything we needed. We did a lot of walking. Janet was awesome, picked us up from the airport and dropped us back again, as well as ferrying us to the Pleasuredome. We also did a spot of shopping at Sylvia Park (H&M). It was really lovely to catch up: it has been so long! 

The whole show was disappointing. Never mind: I am glad we went, because going is important. The songs included the Human League’s ‘Don’t You Want Me’; Bruce Springsteen’s ‘I’m on Fire’; Frankie Goes To Hollywood, ‘The Pleasuredome’; Diana Ross, ‘I’m coming out’; Lou Reed ‘You’re a slick little girl’; Luther Vandross ‘The Night I Fell in Love’; Grandmaster Flash, ‘White Lines’; Hall & Oates, ‘I Can’t Go For That’; George Clinton, ‘Tweakin’; Tears for Fears, ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’; Simple Minds “Don’t you forget about me'... I am sure there were more, but I didn't recognise them.

We caught the Devonport ferry on a bit of a day trip, and I visited the Anna Stretton outlet shop ;-D

Everything was going swimmingly at work, when a colleague from the IT degree died suddenly. She had leukaemia, but went downhill very quickly. One of my supervisory team was covering for the IT courses, and suddenly found herself with our colleague's entire workload. My supervisor is now off on stress leave, having tried to do it all without outside help. However, the rest of us have managed to pick up the slack, and to start the process of getting in an outside marker for the end of year reports. Thank goodness for having written up all the instructions last semester: it should make it reasonably easy for me to brief someone new. I have also been asked if I would be interested in developing and teaching a Master's course on Leadership. Oh, yes!

We caught up with Magda and David before they left for Aussie - QLD - to live. I hope to catch up with them when I am over for supervisory meetings. They don't go until the end of November, but this was their last trip to Nelson. Julie came out with Sterl and Siobhan as well. We had a great time, and though it is sad to see Magda move so far away, I am sure the move will be great for both of them.

Graeme and Julie, and my mother, have been out to Rose Road for lunch as well.  Allan and Sarah are getting married in Dunedin in January, so the family are planning a road trip south to help them celebrate.

More next month!


Sam (& Jan)