News from Nelson - July 2018

Hi everyone,

Well: we pick up from where we left off last time: we are still busy.

The funeral home who arranged my Father and Uncle's donation to Otago Medical School arranged a tree planting, so we all turned up at Saxton's Field one cold July day to plant some natives. We planted a Rimu for my Uncle, and a Tawai Whero (Red Beech) for my father. Well, Mike and Jan did the planting, and Donna, Mother and myself offered moral support. And paid for coffee across the road at Zinc afterwards :-)

Finn is growing up quickly, and is now larger and taller than Boo:

We had a lovely time with Lara and Otto during the school holidays when they came down to visit us for a week. My bedside tables turned up, so they put them together, which was great, along with Lexi from further down the road:

 

We went out for breakfast a couple of times:

 Walked up to visit Simon's new house on the ridge:

 And Lara went Op Shopping at the Sallies:

And we went to visit Dawnie, the cats, and her boarders from Germany & France:

Lambretta's opened again after earthquake strengthening. They have been closed for about six months, so it has been wonderful to go back there for wonderful coffee again! Hui-Ping and Mae came down for a weekend, and we caught up at Lambretta's, then went up to see Bill and Cornish:

Semester 2 has double the workload expected (we had 25 enrollments on my capstone paper one week out: then in the first week of the new semester I suddenly had 50 students). We have no ability to predict these numbers, and in the school itself have no idea how many enrolments are in progress. The unpredictability of the workflow is very, very frustrating. I have heard though that Deakin Uni in Oz are working with IBM's Watson AI programme to create a student management system. It would be great if the Ministry of Education here could licence that... it would certainly reduce of a whole load of planning and scheduling headaches.

I am struggling to get any work done on my PhD, and am having a bit of a panic about it. I think I might have to make some difficult decisions as my PhD defense is looming in October, and my workload at NMIT is significant. A colleague has been diagnosed with a brain tumour - picked up during a routine eye exam - so was suddenly whisked away for radiation therapy, and I and two of my other colleages have picked up her teaching load. We have absolutely no fat in the system, so any further crises, like people having a cold, become serious HR problems very quickly.

Jan is still finding his workload is not decreasing, nor is he managing to get rid of the collosal pile of admin that it generates. The job is not what it was advertised, and he is not happy about it. I think there is likely to be another job change earlier than expected. He has started the next paper for his Post-Grad Cert, having passed the first one for the year (which is great). However, he is also not enjoying the new paper, which is on Safety Ethics.

However, at least we have had some lovely sunrises and sunsets:

And we hope to catch up with you all again soon


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - December 2016

Hello everyone,

Welcome to the December edition of our family news... a fairly quiet month, which must come as a surprise to all of you :-)

It was Di M's Dad's memorial service early in the month, and my folks and I went to farewell him properly.

John has arrived back from the UK, and is staying with us until February, as the cottage in Waimea West has been rented out. Bonnie was beside herself to see him again.

Ian & Sharon came out for a weekend to go through our Nullarbor photos and videos. Ian and I spent the Saturday afternoon putting together a Momento photobook of our Nullarbor train journey in August, which I have since turned into a flipbook. This can be viewed here.

We caught up with the Cools's at our place for lunch in December, which was great. Renate always brings such GOOD cakes (though I simply admire their flawless construction now as I can't eat them - because of the no sugar, no grains thing).

Speaking of that, at this day of writing, 3 January, I am 210 days migraine free. I have also learned that even a small-ish amount of sugar will give me a headache.

Let me explain. I pretty much had a continuous headache since I was 11 until mid-May 2016. I would stop having a headache just before I got a migraine (actually, when I told the just-ex-neurologist from the Nelson Marlborough District Health Board - DHB - that, he basically told me I was imagining it. Cute).

From Angela Stanton's work (here), I am now aware that, as a migraine sufferer, I seem to have a fructose-glucose-sucrose intolerance, just a small amount will give me a headache. Justine kindly brought some Kendall Mint Cake out from the UK for me when she came in November. If I have one piece, I now find that about an hour later, I get a headache. So I salt (following the Stanton Migraine Protocol) and it goes away. I can eat a third of a piece with no ill effects at all, however.

I have been experimenting a bit with other things. I have found my limit for boysenberries. I had 12 boysenberries with plain whipped cream. About an hour later I got a headache (not a migraine). I salted to correct, and the headache went away. The next day, I tried 6 boysenberries. Got a headache an hour later. Salted. Next day, I tried 4. No reaction, so I now know I can eat 4 boysenberries a day without effect. That is my sugar tolerance... not a lot, but at least I know I can have some.

And I can still eat dark chocolate, providing it really is dark without much sugar. Mmm. Whittaker's Dark Almond...

We went up to Welly for Tina's birthday, staying at Jeremy's place. We went out to see Hartmut and Uta on the Friday night, then caught up with a load of friends - Hui-Ping, Mike & Birthe, Katherine and Craig, and Sam & Moose - at Prefab for Brunch on the Saturday morning (a GREAT place for food and coffee).

Jan & I also went to Te Papa and had a scout around at the Gallipoli exhibition.

It was great to see Jörg, Tony and Tanja who had flown in for Tina's 50th birthday party, as well as catching up with everyone else. John D did a great piece of verse about Tina, and both Jörg and Otto did speeches (Otto's was very polished for such a young man!), as well as a couple of Tina's school friends (Maryanne and LT).

Lara and I talked about fitbits, as she was keen to get one with her Christmas money. I talked about how I use mine, and how I find it useful, and where I find it not so useful. She got one for Christmas, and is now starting to use it. She is coming down later this week, so we will share how we are finding the technology works for us.

Jan had his first week with the DHB, and has enjoyed the difference. He is now enjoying the first Christmas - New Year period that he has had off in a long time. 

I got approval as a PhD candidate at Griffith, though I will have to have my proposal and a peer reviewed publication before confirmation (which will be 12 to 18 months in). It is an interesting idea, ensuring that there is already one publication out of the proposal before confirmation. Good hedging, on their behalf, and I can only see it as a benefit from my end too. An early test of ideas, rigour and method. 

Jan & I had a very quiet Christmas: we got in some boysenberries and sloughed around being lazy. watching movies and relaxing on our own. Jan also couldn't resist getting the chainsaw and the brushcutter out, and felling half a dozen pine trees ready for winter. It was Christmas Day that I learned that 12 boysenberries are too many for me.

Boxing Day we drove down to Christchurch and picked up Boo from Erik and Jackie. Boo is a retired show dog who, at seven, was needing a new home - Gr Ch Quasar Tit for Tat: or Boo, for short. While we were there, we had a BBQ at Wendy's place, with Geia and Tjibbe, so caught up with almost the whole family.

Boo seems very cruisy thus far - she and Bonnie seem to be learning to get along pretty well, but like most things, it will take time to find out how well. She is starting to get called Boosephine. Or Boozilla.

Sam and Moose came to visit while they were in Nelson, which was lovely. Gary and KB came to visit briefly, and took Jan away for a morning as their driver so they could go kayaking on the Motueka River. A great time was had by all.

We also hopped on the bike and went to Murchison to see Gary and KB for dinner at the Lazy Cow: and I invented a new game that I have dubbed "Rephrase Scrabble". When we arrived at the table, there was a wooden board with scrabble letters on it, saying "Six thirty, Karen". I grabbed it and reorganised the letters into different words, took a photo, and passed it to Jan. Each of us took a turn. It was really, really fun.

So on New Year's eve, we did the same thing when the party started to get a bit quiet (I asked people for a phrase to get us started - I got "Good as gold, eh" but I substituted 'aye' as it gave a wee bit more flexibility! My rules ;-D). We didn't have so many people here this year for our party: Stu and Anne, my folks, Glenys and Kevin, John, Nane (a young German woman who is spending 6 weeks travelling around NZ, the Cooks and Australia, and who came to stay with us over New Year), Jan, Renate, Kilian and Sarah, and a few others came for dinner and dessert: then we had a later influx of Rose Road people - Margot and Michel, with their relatives and children, and Ian M. However, we did manage to stay up until 1.30am :-)

New Year's day dawned a little cloudy, but was fine as the day progressed.

As mentioned, we have Otto and Lara arriving later this week, which will be great. Then we have lots of time for relaxing, and, in my case, thinking and writing.

Happy birthdays to Christian O, Kevin J, Andreas S, Tanja, John F, Nicki, and Tamara.

Take care, and we hope to catch up with you all this year!


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - July 2016

Hi everyone,
At the beginning of July, Jan and I went up to Wellington to attend a leadership lecture at  Victoria Uni from a set of Fullbright scholars and Sir Peter Blake Leadership trust award recipients. It was very interesting, and hosted by my old Master's supervisor, Brad Jackson.

Jan had to come with me to be my left-hand man, as I would have been unable to have gone without his assistance :-)

We got picked up by Brigitte & John, with Otto, and had a cup of coffee and a chat at the Ibis. We walked from there down to Vic law school for the lecture (and they gave us lots of canapes). 

After the lecture we got picked up by Jeremy, and taken to see his new place. We met DeAnne, and got a chance to catch up with Lara. All in all we had a very tight schedule, but we managed to fit in lots of visits.

It was great to go to the lecture, but my arm was jangling fit to bust by the time I got back to the hotel, and by the time I got home again after the trip.

A pity we couldn't see Tina, Hartmut and Uta as well, but there was such a short time. We could perhaps have caught up with Tina for breakfast, except I had already arranged to meet Brad at Astoria for breakfast, to talk about  PhD options.

Brad thought that I should try Griffith University in Brisbane, and that I should continue to pursue the idea that I worked up for AUT, rather than undertaking my original career leadership idea. Griffith apparently has a good - and growing - global reputation. As I had not considered Griffith before, this will take some investigation. 

Brad was quite dismissive of my original career focused PhD: and I think he has a point. This is a "safe" idea that won't rattle any cages, nor will provide the amount of challenge that my sports governance one will. 

After breakfast, Jan went to meet one of the HR people at WorkSafe (New Zealand's health and safety government watchdog). He wanted to find out more about the organisation, and DeAnne had put him in touch with someone to talk to.

Despite the Wellington trip away, I have been taking things very quietly. I have read a book a day since my surgery, which has been really wonderful. 

Jan has decided to take the opportunity to become a certified electrician, and is starting his coursework this month, with his final exam being in November, and a practicum in the first week of December. He is also hopeful of getting into a health and safety certification course, NEBOSH (and I've no idea what it stands for), which will be held in September and October. He is currently on the waiting list for that.

The Nelson Symphony Orchestra had their mid-year concert: America, held in the Nelson Cathedral. This was a very interesting programme, with music that was quite expansive and sweeping. Jan has also volunteered to play in the Nelson Choir's production of Stabat Mater, and in Nayland College's school production of Annie get your Gun (with performances in the first week of August).

We caught up with Glenys & Kevin for an afternoon of eating, drinking and talking (surprise, surprise) which was very entertaining. We also had dinner with Jenny, Tracey and Erica. 

We also had a mid-winter Christmas at the Hofman's which was great: we had "three lights"; three light courses - nibbles, soup, and cake for dessert. I had made a Nigella Lawson Christmas cake last year, but the recipe makes two, so I had put one in the freezer. I pulled that out and defrosted it. We took a sugar cone, and brandy, and turned the 'bladder' of Peckhams mulled cider into a burnt caramel, clove and cinnamon heaven. The nibbles were just fantastic: all the things we don't usually eat.

And no-one was too full. It was a really good night, with lots of laughs.

I drove for the first time three weeks after my surgery. to see the hand physiotherapist, for exercises and wrist support. my surgeon had said that I was OK to drive, and despite my reservations, I drove the automatic. The hand physiotherapist told me off quite thoroughly, saying that I should not be driving until the surgeon had signed the bone off as being healed. 

However, despite the driving, I got a good report from the physiotherapist. I have good mobility and had no pain at all from the session - she was very conservative, and focused on only what I could do until I started feeling a small amount of resistance. She was very happy with my mobility and movement, and gave me three small exercises to do five times a day each. My challenge was that they all needed to be done v-e-r-y slowly! She only wants to see me once my surgeon has signed me off, which will be next month. 

After I saw the hand physiotherapist, I went to catch up with an old friend, Di, who was able to drive us around that day, while we had a good gossip, drink coffee, and acted like we were ladies of leisure. 

So once more, Jan had to drive me into work, as I started teaching on the 18th. At least in the first week, I only had two lectures, as one of my other classes didn't start until week six, and the other was online.

By the last week of the month it was six weeks after surgery, and although I hadn't seen the specialist (because he was too busy off skiing and swanning around the world to conferences), I started driving again. Much easier.

We went to Alex and Caroline's Wassail celebrations this month, pulling in all manner of English traditions including the Black Morris to bring on the fruit for the coming year. Kev the Farmer sang a couple of songs again (he has such a good voice). Glenys and Kevin came along too, and we had a good chat about our planned weekend at McLaren's Bay next month.

We caught a movie at the Gecko Theatre in Motueka - Our Kind of Traitor - which was quite good. No major twists, but a good movie. We realised that we don't go to the pictures often enough, so have made a resolution to try to get there at least once a month.

I did a bit of digging and found that Griffiths was 39th in the world for sports management, so figured they could be really worth a look. I also realised that Graham Cuskelly was a professor in the business school at Griffith, and so I emailed him, and, despite being overseas, he replied straight away. So it appears that I may have my supervisor. 

Just like that. A new home across the Tassie for my project too.

Sam (and Jan)

What Otto & Lara got up to on their holidays

Otto and Lara came to stay, and I think they had a pretty good time with us.

What they got up to can be seen below!




We hope they can come and stay again soon, as it was such a pleasure to have them here :-)


Jan & Sam

News from Nelson: January 2015

Hi everyone,
We have had a busy month or more since I last sent a report. To see much of it in video, watch here:


We have had Lara and Otto to stay, had our New Year's barbecue, been to the Mudcastle Christmas Party and had the Rose Road Christmas Party at Daniel & Diana's. We went up to Wellington for Christmas, and John dog-sat during his tour (very well organised!). We stayed with Brigitte and John in Wellington, and had Weinachten and Christmas lunch at Tina and Jeremy's.

Hartmut & Uta are with us at the moment, visiting us and attending the Adam Chamber Music Festival. They have been on a tour of the West Coast, and have filled their hearts with lovely places, and now that the concerts have started, get to add a musical score to remember their trip by. It is the first time that Uta has visited our house, so has been quite special.

 We have the Sarau fair from mid-afternoon, which is more or less our local harvest festival. It celebrates the blackcurrant harvest. Although it is raining very, very lightly - what a blessing after a month of no rain! - I think the event will go ahead as planned. We will all go later in the day and wander around the grounds enjoying the local sights and sounds and catching up with our neighbours from further afield.

Jan, Warren and Mark (an NMIT colleague of mine) did a big day on the chainsaws and felled, split and stacked enough wood for three families for winter. Warren and his brother have, between them, a wood splitter which we were able to use. Fantastic. Otto & Lara were here at the time and helped for the day. It was a BIG workday for everyone. Mark has since been out for another session with Jan. I forgot to take any video - and some of those trees coming down sounded pretty dramatic!

When Otto & Lara were with us they went sailing with Craig and Katherine and Craig's two children, went to Tahuna beach for the day, went to Warren & Trace & Erica's, Lara made a charm bracelet with Erica - her Christmas present from us - at the Bead Gallery (while Otto helped Tracey weed the tunnel houses).

We had Magda and David to visit.We caught up with KT, KB, Bootie, Megan and Will.

We have booked our tickets for Brazil and leave NZ for Sao Paulo on 2 April, returning to Nelson on 20 April. Yay!

A busy month, having lots of fun. Talk soon!

Jan & Sam

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

News from Nelson - February 2014

Wow - where have the days gone?! I can't believe it is February already.

More sad news this year. My cousin Susan's husband Peter died recently. He has been battling cancer. Our thoughts are with her.

Susan & Peter on their wedding day

Jan has been very busy down in the gully putting in irrigation to the orchard, which is awesome. I have been busy pulling out pig fern again. I have also been waging battle on couch grass. Three months of daily attacks now, and I am finally starting to feel like I am making ground.

The tomatoes, courgettes and cucumbers are going ballistic in the garden. Once more it is that time of summer where you leave a courgette on the plant over night because it is just a tiny bit too tiny to eat, to find by the next day it has turned into a stonking great marrow. But at least we some great marrow recipes!

Speaking of marrow recipes, dice the volume of marrow/courgette with a half measure of diced mushrooms and a half measure of onions, liberally dose it with Maggi green herb stock and whirl it about on the barbecue. Delicious!

We have had Lara & Otto here to stay for a few days, just as Tina left to go to Germany. We had a great time, taking them to the Sarau Fair, Rabbit Island, shopping in town and to Founders. We had lunch with my folks at Founders Brewery (where Otto & Lara sampled the fruit juices, naturally, not the beer!).

We all took a trip on the train at Founders

Lara beside a sculpture at Founders

Otto & Lara outside the Horticulture exhibits, eating the old welcome to Nelson sign

Otto & Lara at Founders

Otto, Jan & Lara (distance) at Founders

Otto & Jan at Rabbit Island

Jan dragged out his old Märklin train set and he and Otto had lots of fun on the dining table. Maintenance was done. Switching was sorted. A very educational time was spent by both chaps. Lara did some baking, while I rode shotgun. She made a peppermint chocolate cake which was consumed very quickly - so can be considered a triumph. They also re-read all Jan's Tintin books, watched some movies and managed to get quite a few real fruit ice creams during their stay.

Otto with the train

While at the Sarau Fair they both got a henna design on their hands:

Lara's henna

Otto's henna

It was just a pleasure to have them here, and we are looking forward to them coming again. The dogs also loved the company and the extra attention. Perhaps in the winter term break... we will see what works out for Jeremy & Tina.

Otto & Bonnie, Lara & Coco

Tomorrow there is a family gathering in Germany to remember Oma Friedel, then Tina comes home on Sunday. Hopefully it is a healing time for everyone.

Jan has announced to the NSO Committee that he is stepping down as Chair at the next AGM, and stepping off the Committee. I was at the meeting, and there was lots of disappointment from the other committee members. They may persuade him to stay yet - it would make sense if he felt that he could do a 'Past-President' year. But we will wait & see.

The first two of our Niles speakers from the US have arrived, and Jan has installed them. They look fantastic. Only four more to go, and three sets of string lights, and the lounge is finished!

Two Niles speakers in the ceiling

We caught up with Sharon & Ian last weekend for a BBQ at their place and went home feeling like pâté geese. We were both so full we could hardly bend, and it was all our own fault. The food was just lovely. We had also had a fairly big night the night before at our place, as there are some German engineers visiting from Anthon in Flensburg. They came to dinner at our place along with Steve & his wife Linda. Jan barbecued, I made salads and bread, and we finished with a Cointreau chocolate mousse (Gerhard's recipe), shortbread and melon. We took the table outside and ate alongside our wilderness - and I guess tackling that lot will be our next job! A big weekend.

Eating al fresco at Roses Road

So, speaking of food (!) we have booked for the annual Suter Dinner which is a fundraiser for the Bishop Suter Art Gallery, and for the Kahurangi Long Lunch (where we will catch up with Alex & Caroline Peckham, as well as the other usual suspects).

I had a couple of days up in Auckland at the end of January, catching up with my AUT compadrés. It was a great couple of days. Learned and shared lots.

There will be a birthday party on May 24th at the Boathouse for my father. He turns 80, and we hope to make it a real trip down memory lane for him. There will be lots of people here (including our rediscovered cousin Kim and her family). If any of you can think of someone we should contact from here or overseas, please let me know.

Right, better get back to the thesis writing.

Jan & Sam