News from Nelson - May 2017

Hi everyone,
Another month has rolled around, and hopefully it will be less stressful than the last one.

We started with a bang: Jenny L came to visit - and stayed - which was great. Warren also stayed for a night with Erica. Warren helped Jan to get the pool table lights finished. Then Jan got one more spotlight to fit over the VERY last electric light wiring in our ceiling, and AT LAST the lights are complete: almost seven years after we moved in.

I decided that for this month I was not going to do any study or work other than that which was already booked: to give myself four weeks break. It was nice to have permission to play for a while.  Jan & I have taken the dogs for lots of walks, and I have been doing at least 11,000 steps per day.

My mother had booked a holiday before my father died: a two week bus tour of the far north. She decided that she would still take the time away, and enjoyed it. It gave her time to think, but also enough structure in her day to prevent brooding. A good balance.

While she had been away, she had all the carpets shampooed. We called around and helped her put her furniture back just after we dropped Warren off at the airport. My mother gave my father's stereo to Erica, who is now a real teen with her own music centre. Except for being ten years old!

I have rediscovered two crime writers: Louise Penny and Jo Nesbo. I now have pretty much all their books as talking books, and am working through them in order. It is proving quite restful. We also got a notification from the Tasman District Council library that the third series of the Danish programme "The Bridge" had come in on DVD. We picked it up and binge watched it.

Jan got access to John's Netflix account, and has been watching all kinds of things. We watched the Crown, which was quite fun. 

Jan, my Mother and I went to see the latest NSO Concert, The World’s Most Beautiful Melodies. It was a good concert, and the spinto soprano was very good in the Puccini ...except for her last two notes (which were screamed, as opposed to sung). Extremely enjoyable aside from just four seconds. There aren't many experiences you can say that about.

We went to visit Kathleen and Frits, taking with us a pair of Fluevogs - Investigators - that I was returning to Timeless Soles as they were too narrow for me. Kathleen got me to open them, saw them, tried them on, and bought them. They are gorgeous on her.

Barb is back in the US, spending time with Joe. She has been to visit the Fluevog shop in DC. I can't wait to see what she has on her feet at my Mother's 80th birthday party in July.

Justine came down for a visit for a few days. We spent some time talking about our experiences in having just lost one parent each, and how we are processing that. We went to small, out of the way places like the Macmillan Gallery and tried to call in on Vickie's Originals (but they were shut. Next time).

We had lunch with Sharon & Ian at the Moutere Tavern, eating inside this time. Another great menu and a relaxing afternoon. Sharon and Ian bought me a shrub to remember my father by, which was very nice of them.

Warren, who is up again to visit Erica, came for a visit in the afternoon with Erica, and we went for a walk down the hill with Ollie and Boo. Jan and Warren had a good chat, and Erica read quite happily. Jan has managed to get Netflix working on his tablet so he can download 50 episodes of Dr Who in preparation for his next hip operation in June.  

Donna suggested that we celebrate my Father's birthday somewhere he liked going, and everyone - aside from me - had a chocolate ice cream sundae in his honour:

Late in the month Uncle Norman had a couple of bad falls, and ended up in hospital with a fractured scapula and broken ribs. He is determined to get home, and is in the AT&R ward again already, undergoing rehabilitation to get him ready to return to his flat. However, when we went to visit him, he is floating in and out of reality: it doesn't seem to me like he can go home in a hurry.

I will be heading for Aussie in July for my doctoral induction, and to have a half-day planning session with my supervisors.

Take care - catch you all up next month.


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - April 2017

Hi everyone,
I hope you are all well, and that the year is treating you kindly.

We have had a big month again. I was just getting back into my PhD work during the study break, and following my illness last month, when my father took a turn for the worse. He went into the hospice before Easter for few days, as he was getting very breathless. They thought they would simply stabilise him, and he would go home again.

However, once he was in, they felt that he really needed to stay until after Easter because they were worried how my Mother would cope on her own with him. Then on Easter Saturday, they called me in the evening, and said that he was quite bad, and that I should come in. Jan & I drove in to the hospice, saw him, then called the family, and everyone came in. My sister was just back from the US, and she and Bella hopped in Bella's car and drove up from Christchurch. Tessa caught a flight down from Auckland. We spent the next five days camping out at the hospice, taking turns to sit with him, talk and share memories as he slowly slipped away.

Kim flew up from Dunedin to Christchurch, and drove from there with Aunty Diana. Aunty Jill came to visit. Graeme and Julie came to see him a few times. We have had lots of laughs, reflections, and shared stories. The family has probably spoken more about our impressions of past events in the past week than we ever have in the past. Various spectres have been laid to rest.

He died on 19 April, and, as he had chosen to donate his body to Otago Medical School for student learning, we had no funeral. Instead we held a memorial service at Club Waimea. Over eighty people attended. I MCed, and Barney Thomas arrived – serendipitously – and I asked him if he would do a karakea: which he did. It was just perfect. Mother spoke about father not giving in to his illness. I spoke about his desire for us all to learn. Barb spoke about lessons from hockey. Mike spoke about father calling him at aged 25 to ask if he had been 'playing' with his screwdrivers in the garden. Tessa did the housekeeping about the donations to the Hospice and St Johns, then told stories about how she would play Nana and Poppa off against each other, and how her son Izzy loved his Poppa. Diana told a story about her 'stink' money – she got 2-/6 per week for cleaning his sleepout. Kim talked about my father as being like a father to her. Various people spoke about his community work, his hockey and bowls dedication, his fundraising, and his work at MAF… it was really lovely.

Then Bonnie got diagnosed with a very aggressive cancer on her hind leg. We are simply going to leave it until the tumour gets too large, or she gets ill.

Jan went in for the first of his two hip replacements, and the surgery went very well. But it was still worrying. He is recovering very quickly, and is already in much less pain than he was in before the surgery. 

However, it is turning out to be a bit of a shitty year, to say the least.

I did get a bit of a birthday celebration, at The Grape Escape:

And I did buy myself a pair of shoes. Fluevogs, naturally:

More next month. Hopefully next month's news is a lot better.

Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - March 2017

Hi everyone,
I hope you and your families are all well.

However, this has been a tough month in a few ways for us through distance and illness. My sister got married in a private ceremony to Joe at Ocean City in Maryland, and, because my Father is not well, neither my Mother nor my Father were able to attend. I was teaching, so couldn't go either. However, they are both planning a public ceremony at a Renaissance Fair in a couple of years, which everyone is invited to. Hopefully that will line up with teaching, but even if it doesn't I will be there.

My Father had rheumatic fever at 15 which has now turned into congestive heart failure with a whole load of other complications. While he has been frail for some time, he's been fairly stable until this year. Since my last update he has deteriorated, and he isn't great.

The month ended with Justine's Mum dying in the Mary Potter hospice in Wellington. Justine came back to NZ and spent the last fortnight with her, but neither she nor Peter were expecting Betty to go so quickly. It is very, very sad.

And then on top of that, my workload has been pretty crushing. I am teaching four papers, and doing my PhD, which is pretty full on. I had expected 30 year 3 students in the capstone research project that I supervise, which in itself is a huge workload, to then turn up on the first day and find 55 students in my classroom. It took two weeks for NMIT to find three other supervisors, and in the meantime I had worked some pretty crazy hours to get these students up to speed and underway on their primary research projects (I had just spent four days grappling with admin, marking and pulling long hours. I didn’t eat properly. I wasn't sleeping well. My to do list was getting longer every day)... and I wigged out.

I completely lost the plot, having a “transient global amnesia” episode (TGA). My day went as usual until I had my 11.30 student appointment, then I appeared to lose what I was supposed to be doing next, what year it was, and my place in time. I was physically OK, but personally gone to la-la land.

One of my colleagues called my doctor, cancelled my classes, took me to my doctor's, called Jan, who came down from the hospital to see me at my Doctor's surgery.

They then took me to the emergency department, where I was for a few hours before being admitted overnight. They asked me lots of questions in the ED…  apparently I was quite blissed out. The ED department people were fascinated, because they had never seen anything like this before. I had very high blood pressure but was cheerful as all get out. I think I had put myself in a happy place, outside time, and therefore outside any additional pressure.

Apparently, my mother had a bout of TGA when my father broke 7 ribs and punctured a lung in 1980. I had completely forgotten that this had occurred for her... and this is apparently a condition which is more likely to happen for migraine sufferers (which she is too). Though nobody has any idea whether there will be any lasting effects, or whether it will happen again. But stress is known to be a trigger.

This was due to overload, I think: I was full to over-capacity. Because I'd lost my place in time, there was no pressure for anything. I'd created some "me" space. I spent a “long dark teatime of the soul” overnight in hospital examining my workload. I decided I would drop both my year 2 leadership papers. I was very clear in my own mind that I wanted to keep supervising the capstone research paper, but that I needed to free myself up for doing my Ph.D. study, which is really important to me.

However, my bout of TGA meant that we could not be at Brigitte's 75th Birthday celebration in Wellington. Which of course was two days after I went into hospital. It sounds like it was a great party.

I had a very frank conversation with my NMIT manager following all this. They seem quite willing for me to cut my hours and continue with a reduced workload, anyway. The whole thing has probably given them a bit of a fright. And it is a health and safety issue.

Now I am managing a team of four supervisors – they are great, all being supervisors on our postgraduate diploma in business enterprise – and have 16 students of my own to supervise. And by 16, I mean eight single semester students, and eight full year students (who are effectively a .5 each): so 12 full-time equivalents. Much easier than 55. Feels like a holiday!

Jan is still going to Men's yoga with Jan Cools: in fact, they are both pretty consistent in turning up. He is working on his pre-hab plan to prepare for his surgery, including work in the pool.

Later in the month my Father was able to get out and about a bit more again. My folks came out today to visit us, along with friends of theirs, Graham and Julie. They stayed chatting for two hours, then we all went down to the Riverside community for lunch and had a delicious lunch together.

Boo is settling in well, and Bonnie is enjoying the company - though Bonnie is spending quite a bit of time at John's little house in Waimea West, with Aniko, between bike tours.

 We have had a bit of early morning mist, which has made for some interesting photos in the mornings:

Jan had an NSO concert at Old St John's which went really well, called Transformations, and conducted by John Rimmer. This will be Jan's last concert for a while, as his hip surgery will knock him out of the next two concerts, and a musical that Nayland College is doing:

We visited Sue L in her little house in the Brook - which is lovely. Thanks very much to Tina who connected us when Sue transferred to Nelson.

And Tina has got engaged to Brad. We haven't heard anything about a wedding date, but hopefully they will make each other very happy. Jeremy is now considering work as a marriage celebrant, which is great.

More next month!

Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - February 2017

Hi everyone,
We hope all of you are in good health.

My father is still not well, and was in and out of hospital until the third week of this month. Once he got out, we have had a family conference at the Doctor's surgery to decide on our next steps. We are going to take the Hospice route of palliative care, as opposed to the Hospital route, where they are constantly running tests and trying to repair the unrepairable. My sister came up, which was great, so we were all there as a family to talk about everything (including my Father, of course). We have had a good talk about what will happen, and when, and built in choices for him.

Jan went to the specialist to get an opinion on his hips. He has been getting a lot of right hip pain, and, despite being on humira, the pain hasn't settled down. He was rather shocked to be told by the specialist that he needs two hip replacements. He thought that he would be nowhere near that bad yet, and was thinking that this would mean that he would need to have both hips done again before he meets his end.

But as the specialist said: each year there is only an extra 1% chance of needing another hip replacement: so in thirty years, there is only another 30% chance of a second replacement; or a first replacement. So why put up with pain now?

Good point. So we have tentatively booked in for the week following Easter for the first operation, and hope to have the second one done in June. Then he should be all set for the following thirty years :-)

Jan has been going to men's yoga in the Upper Moutere village, with Jan Cools. They both seem to enjoy it. Jan also has a pre-hab plan from Claire to help strength and flexibility prior to him having his first hip replacement. A great idea to prepare before surgery.

I have officially accepted my place at Griffith, which is great, though I do have to go for a post-graduate 'induction' session in July. Although I have tried to get them to video link it, to record it and upload it, or to allow me to Skype in, the admin team remain obdurate that all post-graduate students must attend in person. The sessions before July are all when I have teaching on, so I am hoping that the timing of the July session will fit in before the start semester two. Fingers crossed too that Jan's surgery goes well, and he is OK for me to leave when I have to hop across the Tassie.

I have been writing a piece on how long it would take a non-digitally competent person to learn enough digital skills to be work ready. This has been a fascinating piece of secondary research to do. Basically, no one has any real idea of how long it should 'reasonably' take the average person to learn a set of skills... which is staggering. So I am trying to put something together. I am nearly finished draft one. Two professors emerita have retired to Nelson, and have offered their services to NMIT. I have tapped into that, and am regularly asking for advice - simply for the price of a good coffee. Talk about epic value for money  :-)

Have fallen in love with Fluevog shoes, and have bought two pairs so far. Below are the flower patterned boots. I also have some cobalt blue boots which are gorgeous.

We had a few lovely catch-ups at the Upper Moutere Tavern this month, al fresco dining: with Sharon, Ian, David & Sue; and with Gary & Sandra; and with my folks. It was also my parents 57th wedding anniversary, which we managed to celebrate with a lunch for twenty of their friends in Richmond.

Barb was here for a few days while we were sorting out family things, and for my folks' wedding anniversary. She has started knitting me dreadlocks - or dreaddocs, as I am calling them - to be worn under my doctoral bonnet on/after graduation. The idea is to not take the whole thing to seriously. There is a PhD at NMIT who wears her doctoral bonnet with Christmas decorations hung off it, and I love that irreverence. My dreaddocs look disgusting, but will be so much FUN!

 

  

Had dinner at Nahm with Kevin & Sandra, which was lovely, including a spectacular view of a cruise ship exiting the harbour while we were waiting to order. 

Tracey, Erica and Jenny came around one weekend and we made Kesundi sauce and pureed and bottled tomatoes. A very productive weekend.

Had the usual spectacular sunsets and sunrises:

Hope to be in touch as the year progresses

Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - September 2016

Hello all,
We have had yet another busy month. Jan has been studying flat out, and I have been trying to find time to get my PhD application prepared and into Griffith University. It is now submitted, and I only need to wait to hear whether I will be accepted, or what changes need to be made.

Jan and I went to the Gecko Theatre for a movie a few weeks ago, and watched "A Month of Sundays", which was a really nice movie. OK, it was largely focused on death, but it had dignity and gentle humour. I liked it. And we had a nice view of the moon, Mars and - I think - Jupiter on the way:

 
We went to Jellyfish at Mapua for lunch on Jan's birthday, which was really nice. Max and Karen, Erica and Tracey, Mike and Donna, my folks, Dawn, Kathleen, Frits and Amy all came. We had a very good time.

One Friday night we caught up with the Cools's for dinner - easy-care fish and chips from the Upper Moutere Takeaway straight over the road. Fabulous. But Renate still made a fantastically delicious birthday cake for Jan that we all ate far too much of.

Getting some nice sunrises now:

The Subaru has been in and out of the garage with a steering pump issue... which turned out to be a blocked hose, in the end. That was after a reconditioned pump had been fitted. Ouch.

Jan has been down to Christchurch for the first half of a health and safety certification course, and has caught up with quite a few of the Cantabrians. He has been staying with Jenny, and goes back down in a couple of weeks for the next half, followed by an exam the day after Labour Day. 

I go down to Christchurch next week for a conference (I am presenting on some research that myself and a colleague have been doing on employer use of cybervetting), and I too am staying at 'Hotel Ladley' :-)

Speaking of Jenny, she, Tracey & Erica have done the Abel Tasman track. Jan & I picked them up at Marahau, after they had walked down from Wainui Inlet. They had had a great - and, despite the rain over Nelson-way this week, a dry - time. Well: maybe from Jen's point of view, an "OK" time!

Luckily, in the last week of the month, I had study break, which has enabled me to do some of that research for the CDANZ conference (to be delivered next week), and get on top of the administration tasks. Both my research and Sports PR students are now mostly well on the way with their projects, and I have finished with lectures on those papers, so now only student mentoring and marking remains. While lectures still continue for my Leadership paper, the load-lightening on the other papers helps to gain a bit of free (well... free-er!) time.

Our road has been graded, and, although the weather has not been that dry, our driveway is now looking pretty good.
  

Jan, my Mum and I went to the Nelson Symphony Orchestra's "Solo Spotlight" concert, where eight very talented young performers entertained us. It reinforces that here are some very committed young musicians and singers out there, and it was a privilege to be able to listen.

Happy birthday to Bertie, Robert, Becks, Jenny, Uta, KT, Ana Silvia, Guy, Barb, Kelly, Erica, Julie, Tracey, and Hartmut. 

We are really looking forward in November to seeing Holger, Dieter and Gudrun: can't wait!

More next month :-)


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - October 2014

Hi all,
Long time, no post.

Things have been a bit chaotic, this last six months, really: what with getting the thesis in and then what has practically been two full time jobs. I haven't done a family update for a LONG time. Things have been so busy here this year, that all sorts of things have slipped. A bit mad.

So let's roll the clock back and tell the story of the last six months.

Jan had a lovely birthday celebration with friends and my family at a German restaurant in Nelson last month. He got spoilt with lots of lovely presents, including a MS Surface (tablet) from me, and a copy of Bradshaw's Continental Railway Guide from 1913, complete with fold out maps. Very cute.

My Masters was submitted on 26 June, but I had not heard anything back by September. I then got an invite at the beginning of September from Auckland Uni inviting me to the graduand's dinner. So I contacted the PostGrad Co-ordinator and asked if my results were back yet - that I figured I would only be getting an invite if I had passed. Response was an "oops, that's a mistake", and a "sorry we haven't got your results back yet. As you weren't going to graduate until May next year, you got put [on the slow boat]". OK, so I have waited another three weeks, and just sent off a hurry-up email today. I hope all this delay doesn't mean bad news :-(

It was crazy in the lead-up to getting my Masters in. There were so many things to get done with the final report, my teaching, my brother's wedding in Rarotonga, my Father's 80th, meeting our 'lost' cousin, and the skullduggery of getting my Uncle here from Australia in secret for my Father's shindig, Joerg's birthday and having Otto & Lara here that I don't feel I have had time to draw breath since the gallop began in January. I have only been teaching one paper for NMIT, one for AUT per semester over the past two years, while I completed my Masters; that's about a half-time teaching load (as well as career clients). The idea was to have a staged return to work from July where I increased my revenue and got back up to full-time speed.

However, since the start of Semester 2 in July, I have been very, very busy working for NMIT. The Head of School resigned in February, and one of our Management lecturers, John, replaced him (a very good choice, too). John tried to keep teaching all his papers, but had to admit defeat due to workload, so a lecturer who was waiting for the bulk of his Postgrad courses to start in semester 2 (doing project work in the meantime), finished two of John's courses off. Planning immediately started on reallocating John's teaching and him only taking one paper per semester in future (he wants to keep thoroughly in touch with teaching practice, keeping it fresh and top of mind). This left three papers needing a home. One I coveted, and thought that would make a great addition to my two existing teaching papers. All good.

Then suddenly in the semester break, another Management lecturer resigned. Eeek! This meant there were now 7 papers needing a home, a week out from the start of the new semester. But wait, there's more! NMIT is reducing costs - they, like most ITPs, are being starved of cash by central Government. So either through attrition or redundancy, costs must be cut. So we effectively have a sinking lid policy, and didn't get go-ahead to hire replacement lecturers. Three management lecturers left: seven papers. I took on two more papers.

Things went from having a bit of a rest after the madness of getting my Masters in, to total chaos. I had to rewrite two papers 'in my own image' so that I could teach them: one online, and one face to face (now known as 'F2F'!). One had been an online paper that I had set up originally, but the world has moved on since that was done three years ago. However, previous incumbent had left it un-updated, disorganised, not in the current teaching model, using old technology, and worded in a very autocratic manner. This took me until a month ago to get up to current standards, well resourced, friendly and for me to get my head around the new requirements of teaching online, and au fait with the new tools and policies.

My second paper, a 30 credit research paper, has me mentoring year 3 students doing their capstone management research projects. I love it! But John, who taught this before me, teaches by telling stories, and had few resources aside from the PowerPoints from the textbook: he was the resource, and had very little online on the course site.

My teaching approach is to have a blended course: lots of resources online so students can seek their own resources from the resource bank, which includes recorded lectures, readings, exemplars and software. It took until mid-September to get this course written, resourced and the lectures recorded and posted.

Oh, and I have an NZQA moderation to prepare for on one new paper, and an external moderation on the other, both for this semester. So things have to be absolutely spot on for both courses. No pressure! I am so thankful that I habitually tweak my courses as I go to keep them up to date, because the two I already had at the start of this semester needed very little attention from me aside from me turning up to deliver familiar material. They saved me from total overload.

And then, to top things off, both Jan & I got sick. We both got the flu that was going around, and each spent four days in bed. Luckily I got the flu on a non-teaching day, Thursday, and only missed one day of lectures; the Friday. I was walking wounded for my next teaching day; Tuesday. I think I under-performed for around two weeks - dog tired, coughing, fevers, headaches - before I shook it off. Jan too took a long time to recover - and in fact is still suffering from phlegmy throats.

A month ago, at last, I finally got some time to draw breath. I had worked 50 days straight from the beginning of the semester before I got a half day off that wasn't a sick day. Now I am able to focus on marking, teaching and small course tweaks to keep everything up to date across the four papers. I also have time now for my other clients and my role as the Treasurer and Comms Director of CDANZ. Things are still busy, but are now do-able.

Jan too has been very busy. With the changes in the H&S in Employment Act coming into force next April, Nelson Pine has lots of things that need to be planned and enacted. Jan is also heading away next week on a residential NZIM management course in Chch, out at the Airport Commodore.

Other news: Warren, Tracy & Erica have moved to Nelson, and are living 15 minutes away in Cotterel Road. We have caught up a few times, including a wonderful Election Night Special with them, Murray, Julie & Janet at our place with cocktails, pool playing, music and half an eye on the election with the sound off. Great fun was had by all. Hopefully Janet will email some photos other than the panorama photo I took from the top of Christian's driveway.

We had a great time at Jörg's birthday party in Morrinsville earlier in the year (and hopefully some who were there will email some photos); my cousin has been up to stay from Dunedin (and hopefully will email me her photos)... hmm. Sound like a theme happening here?

We have caught up with Jenny L a few times, which has been great, and Kathleen, Frits and Amy came out and we had a mid-winter Christmas celebration in mid-July before the semester started which was very enjoyable. Otto and Lara came to stay in the break as well, and it was lovely having them here (we are hoping to have them here again in late December, early January for another week).

Magda had a car accident in August, being struck by a 4WD driver on a one lane bridge on the Lewis Pass. Luckily she was unhurt, though her car was written off. As she was heading off to Holland to visit family soon after the accident, she decided not to replace her car until she got back to Kiwiland. She got back last week, and is now in the exciting phase of road-testing new cars. I hope her good judgement is on hyper-sensitive!

I am also about to have an article published in the Canadian Career's publication, and about to start some new research on Applicant Tracking Software with a local HR company. That too should result in an article or two.

Dogs are well. Jan has a new Motorbike on the way (Triumph Tiger).

Right. I know I have forgotten lots, but that will do for this time. More in a few weeks :-)

All the best

Sam & Jan

Long time no post! Pictorial news from Nelson, June 2014

Hi all,
It has been a very busy quarter, and I have not caught up with anyone or anything of late. In fact, I don't think I have had as long a silent time on family updates in well over a decade.

So, because I am still busy, this time we will just do a quick pictorial update.

Happenings: weddings & birthdays

April: Mike & Donna's Wedding in Rarotonga

May: Father's 80th birthday at the Boathouse, with Uncle Lin & cousin Kim attending, plus all the other known reprobates

And some additional photos of cousin Kim's stay:

We went to John's Birthday in Wellington

We went to Sharon & Ian's 30th Wedding Anniversary:

Jenny Ladley made us plant plants (at last):

And we went down to McLarins Bay in Squally Cove last weekend with Glenys & Kevin:

Our next events are: June 28-30 Wellington for Sam (CDANZ planning retreat); July 4-6, Morrinsville for Joerg's 50th; July 8-15 Otto & Lara coming to Nelson; July 12-13 for mid-winter Xmas at Roses Road.

Proper news next time, at last!

Jan & Sam