News from Nelson - September 2018

Hi everyone,
Sorry for the long hiatus since updating you all: but I will go through and post the news month by month, despite the fact that the date is now January 2019.

At the beginning of September we got the terrible news that Jan's cousin Simone had been widowed. Her husband had been unwell for some time, but the news that Michael was gone was a terrible shock. Andreas and Simone are raw, but coping. We hope to see them in December when we are thinking we will go to Germany.

My work continued to be busy with this semester's students getting their projects underway: thought I would have to say that I had higher numbers of students at risk this semester than ever before. The supervisory team has been working really well, however, and are all doing a great job to lift the student game in double-quick time. We had one supervisor pull out, and the rest of us redistributed that supervisor's workload, but that seemed to work out OK.

Jan is still not enjoying his work, so has started firming up a commissioning job for German company, Dieffenbacher (which builds particle board, MDF and LVL plants and equipment). We don't know much yet about how long he is going to be away for, but he is thinking that he is likely to be away for two months at a time in the Americas, nor do we know a start date yet. Sometime in the New Year. I am not at all happy about it, but Jan is keen.

Argentina - the Pumas - played the All Blacks at Trafalgar Park here in Nelson. The Port Company had tickets which staff went into the draw for: Jan got two tickets. It was a great game. The weather was cold, but we were all dressed for it, and the crowd was partisan, but fair. We had left my little nana car over at the Port offices, so we walked to the park, then were able to simply walk back and drive home without the traffic over over 21,000 people all heading home at the same time affecting us too much. I almost lost my voice from shouting :-)

I am still working on the one year wardrobe challenge, and have rediscovered the outfit I wore to Lara's naming ceremony, which must be nearly sixteen years ago!

 Finn is growing like a weed, but still remains full of the joys of the world. He is a very happy dog to own (mind you, he has yet to hit those canine teenager times). Aunty Boo is keeping an eye on him, and keeping him in line. She runs a very good line in distraction tactics when he is misbehaving.

Jan & I had to clear out the ford closest to us a couple of times from the winter storms. Of course, all the working photos are of Jan, as someone had to take the photos...! From water level quite high with crap all over the fence...

To unblocking the drain under the ford...

To unblocking the drain on the uphill side...

To the ford going back to normal level and tidying up the last of the clumps of debris.

We got invited to a dinner at Shelley & Kevin's place, which was total foodie heaven. Shelley took on my dietary restrictions with gusto, and cooked things which I could eat, which was just bliss. A great night, with ex-Sealord colleagues Dawn (and Neil), Shelley (and Kevin), Karen & Tom, with much wine drunk! Even better, my old canteen of silver cutlery got a new home, as I realised that Shelley had the same service. My cutlery has been sitting in a carton in the back of the laundry for ages, and seeing the joy she got from using hers, it was an easy donation to make :-)

Jan went to Australia this month to attend a seminar run by his safety guru, Sidney Dekker. He said that the seminar was great, and he learned a lot. Interestingly enough he had a burst blood vessel in his eye while he was in a lecture session, seated between two paramedics who then checked him for all sorts before saying it was just one of those things. Couldn't have been in a better place for that kind of thing to have happened! He stayed with Tanja while he was there, which was nice for them both. He is currently working on his final essay for his Health & Safety course.

I have started a Maori cultural familiarisation course through CDANZ, which has been good, and have done a couple of Institute of Directors courses as well. I have been too busy at work to finalise my AJCD article changes, and realistically won't get to that until January now.

This month Jan also had an NSO concert, Opera Mania, which was be the last concert that the NSO will have at Old St John's. At long, long last the Nelson School of Music will be reopening next month. Opera Mania went well, with the Anvil chorus being repeated as an encore at the end. It was very, very good, despite a small dollop of Wagner!

My wee nana car crapped out this month: the first time it has ever broken down. The alternator died on us, on the way home (right outside the Richmond branch of the garage I use). Jan got in touch with a former colleague and he rescued us, gave us a loaner car, and we were off. However, this is making me think that it is time to start thinking about a replacement: it was first registered in 2006, now being a venerable 12 years old. I would really like an electric car, but I don't think they have the range yet for our driving requirements of up to 130km a day without a recharge. I will have to buy a second-hand electric car, which will have already lost some of its range. Also, Nelson has very few charging places - all of which you have to pay for. While I may be able to recharge, it will require an extension cord and a 'willing' power socket. Something to think about, anyway.

Plans are firming up for our German trip. It looks like it will be December. We will update everyone as we know.


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - August 2018

Hello again everyone,
And welcome to our family news update.

I don't think anything has calmed down for us since our last update. We are both still too busy. Jan is currently actively looking for another engineering job, which will probably end up being either overseas or outside Nelson. This will mean either an international commute' or a weekly commute: neither of which I am that happy about, but he is not happy where he is, so something has to change.W

Hopefully there will be an update about his next professional move soon... and with luck, it won't take him too far away.

And there is change for me too. After a lot of discussion I have made the difficult decision to withdraw from my PhD. On the last day of the month, I wrote my resignation letter to Griffith. This is a soft-close, however. I will keep working on my confirmation document quietly on my own, then, either in February or in July next year, I will reapply. 

In the meantime I have two other research projects to complete. I will finish both of those, and will not take anything else on. If I have only teaching and my PhD to do, I will re-enrol. If not, I will postpone until that is the case. Well: that's the theory, anyhow!

Jan is heading to Brisbane next month for a few days at a Safety workshop with Worksafe Australia, hosted by Sidney Dekker from Griffith. He is looking forward to catching up with Tania - and possibly Tina, too. I am still trying to decide whether I can go along as well, but I don't know yet if we can get someone to dog-sit... I have an Australia flight that I have cancelled from my PhD confirmation defense which I have to use before February. 

Jan's old school mates from Naenae are all heading off to Fiji for a joint 50th birthday party in July next year. Planning has already started, and Jan is really looking forward to it. I am more conflicted: not because of going with the Hutties (which will be great!) but because we will be putting money into a dictatorship ...which I am unhappy about. However, as Jan points out, at least we can find out from Tina the best places to go!!

Our next-door neighbour, Simon, has nearly got a completed house. It will now be a matter of weeks before his place is finished. 

And further down the valley, the land and house formerly belonging to Suzie and Kevin has been bought by a couple from Murchison - Alan and Adina - who used to run a boarding kennel. They seem very nice, and have horses. It is lovely to walk down the road and have an equine chat over the fence. Finn was freaked out the first time, but is thoroughly enjoying having nose to nose sniffs now.

Jan got part-way through getting his experimental speakers installed... and stalled. If he gets more time by having more leave in a new job, it will be good to get these finished off.

The days are getting noticably longer, with the sun still being up as we are heading home. It has got a lot warmer now, and we have stopped having a fire at night.

We are both in good health, and our immediate families here are in good health.

Hope to catch up with you all soon!


Sam (& Jan)

The One Year Wardrobe Challenge

I am doing a "wear everything in your wardrobe challenge", where you have one year to wear everything in your wardrobe, dresser drawers etc. The idea is that anything that I don't wear, I get rid of. After a year, often if I am not wearing things, I probably won't go back and wear them. Clothes get out of date, out of shape, fade, or get holes, so this regime is helping me find out what is dated, and helping me to take action about them. It also helped me understand what it is that I really wear most often. 

I have given things away, sold items, and donated things to charity. I have made a few small bag drops to the Sallies as I have found things that don't fit, that I don't like wearing, or that I can't mend or repurpose. It has made more room in my wardrobe for more Fluevogs ;-D 

And because we are doing this at the office, it has become really fun. We have had some really cool and off-piste outfits that have really entertained both lecturers and students alike. 

As the year has gone on, I have found it more challenging to wear particular pieces. Most stuff is mix and match, but there are a few things that need a whole outfit designed around them. I had one burgundy shirt in my drawers that I hadn't worn, so worked up a green and burgundy ensemble from all sorts of bits and pieces I have lurking in the wardrobe, and tied that to a pair Fluevog Hopefuls Esperanzas: the grape colour (photo above).

I was wracking my brains for what to wear with a silver lame T-shirt and a gorgeous grey, multi-coloured flower-embroidered jacket (they won't go with each other, and I have no grey vogs), but I found that some Fluevog Hopefuls Rosys, a black velvet bolero jacket and a black patchwork skirt that I have only just realised actually had silvery stripes in it to at long last co-ordinate with the silver t-shirt (photo above too). I like the creativity in having to use everything.

... but that doesn't stop me shopping for vogs, scarves, gloves, tights and earrings :-)


Sam

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)

Making tape laces

I recently wanted to get a pair of unusually coloured tape laces as a bit of a fashion statement for a funky pair of boots, and went looking for laces to buy. After a fairly exhaustive trawl through the net, I ran across a great post by Devon Iott (August 2015) on how to make our own shoelaces.

It was a surprisingly easy project, just using a little bias binding machine, fabric of choice, thread and clear nail polish, a good, sharp pair of scissors, iron, ironing board, and sewing machine. If we have a quilting ruler, that will make getting the 45 degree angle bang on as well, to cut the fabric on the bias for the laces, as well as a rotary cutter.

Devon's post clearly laid out exactly how to make our own tape laces, which I have repeated here, using snips of some of Devon's images:

1. Use a diagonal ruler (or a quilting ruler) to line up fabric to a 45 degree angle for making the tapes. Get the fabric as square as possible (it makes lining up your cut strips easier later)
2. Use scissors (or a rotary cutter) to cut the fabric into strips 5cm apart (that provides just under 1cm wide tape laces). Depending on your fabric width, cut either two or four strips (you need laces bout 1.2m for ankle boots).
   
3. If using two fabric strips per lace, cross the ends, right-sides inwards, and pin.
   
4. Stitch together at 2.0.
5. Press seam open, trim waste.
6. With the wrong side facing up (NB: may need to trim the strip to a point), run each strip evenly through the bias binding machine, ironing the resulting binding flat as we go.
   
7. Fold the wrong sides together, then press firmly. 
8. Sew down the length of the binding at about 2.5
   
9. Mark each lace at 5mm from either end and 12mm: this is where we are going to sew the lace off into an 'aglet'.
   
10. Fold the fabric into another two or three thicknesses.
    
11. Select zigzag at 0.75 and a width of 5 (or 5.5) and sew evenly across the width of the folded lace ('satin stitch'), between 5 and 12mm from each lace end.
    
12. Trim waste.
13. Squeeze the aglet to make it tubular, paint it with a thick coat of nail varnish.
    
14. Dry. Trim excess thread.
15. Paint again. Leave to dry (or we can replace the nail varnish steps by using Plasti Dip).

A reader also posted in the comment that "for aglets, I use 3/16 heat shrink tubing, available at any home DIY store in the electrical dept. Slip them on the ends and hit with a hair dryer or craft heat gun. Tah dah, perfect aglets!".


Sam

• Reference: Iott|, D. (August 2015). Sew Your Own Shoelaces. Retrieved from http://www.thesewingparty.com/2015/08/sew-your-own-shoelaces/

News from Nelson - June 2018

Hi All,
Another busy month is behind us, and we are both feeling like there isn't a lot of light at the end of the tunnel, which is worrying.

While Semester 1 is over for me, Semester 2 is looming, and I have been asked to mentor a new lecturer, which has added to my workload. I am also still mentoring full year students right through the break, as well as hammering away at the PhD. Jan keeps saying that his workload only gets bigger each day he goes into the office, and he is having to do far too much administration, rather than the hands on work that he was promised. I know how that feels too!

Jan played in the concert opening the upgraded School of Music (it took five years to get the earthquake strengthening up to code - and there is a separate post on this), and then soon after had an NSO concert, all of which has kept him pretty darned busy in his 'downtime'. And then there is the current course he is doing for his Post-Grad Cert...however, in a rare moment of quiet on a Sunday afternoon, the dogs and Jan can be found enjoying some peace.

Tania's surgery seems to have gone well and she has now moved into radiotherapy treatment. The reports on clear margins and the progress made seem very positive, which is very encouraging. Tina has done a stellar job as Tan's advocate. Thank goodness she was able to be there.

My mother is well too - and long may all that last. She is still driving out to have lunch with us a couple of times a month, and we have been catching up with other members of the family in between in Nelson for family birthdays and celebrations.

The neighbour has finally milled all of the pine plantation at the end of the valley. The image below shows the view of the last dozen trees being felled, taken from halfway up our driveway.

John has started his tour around North America on his trusty old Norton Commando and almost immediately ran into engine trouble. However, the network of past customers, friends and vintage bike afficionados have seen him right and off, enjoying the views up the east coast of America and into Canada.

We caught up with Jenny L this month when she was up in Nelson; and with Tracey, Erica and H.

Hartmut and Uta came to stay on their way down to the island to attend a conference in Queenstown. It was lovely to see them both. They came for a few days on their way down, then called in for a few days on their way back. Hartmut left us with some of his skillful woodworking - both Jan and I are the lucky recipients of some gorgeous turned pens.

I have been rationalising some of our stuff around the house: I got rid of a whole load of old kitchen stuff to the Salvation Army shop in Nelson. However, I have also been doing a little bit of purchasing. I was reading that cheap china is often cheap because the clay itself may have heavy metals contamination... and once it loses its glaze, it can contaminate whatever it is used for.  So I dumped our crappy old cups and bought new porcelain ones on sale at Farmers for $2 each. Then I decided that 17 years was enough time to wait for bedside tables, and ordered two flatpack ones from 1-day deals for $49 each. I hope when they arrive they aren't too junky!

As usual, we have been lucky enough to see some spectactular sunrises and sunsets:

In October I will be presenting some research at the CDANZ Conference in Wellington, so hope to catch up with some Welly people then (though I am only there for two nights).

Hope to catch up with you all again soon


Sam (& Jan)

If I had words for Saint-Saëns Symphony No.3 and Gareth Farr's Ripple Effect

Yesterday I attended the opening of the refurbished Nelson School of Music, which was a delight. I found the end of the first half and second half stronger than the beginning, which was interesting in itself, with the first half having two pieces played by the New Zealand String Quartet (a Beethoven and a Bartok). 

However, the first half ended spectacularly with Gareth Farr's composition gift to the school, "Ripple Effect", played by Nelson music students alongside the New Zealand String Quartet. This made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. I would buy a recording in a heartbeat. It was fabulous. What a Taonga Gareth has created for Nelson. The percussion sounded like the bells of Pikimai ringing through deepening fog to bring our ships safely to harbour...

Then into the second half, Nelson City Brass opened with the Fanfare for the Common Man; pianist Matteo Napoli with Liszt's Piano Concerto No. 1 alonside the Nelson Symphony Orchestra; followed by the NSO with a very polished rendition of Saint-Saëns Symphony No.3 in C minor featuring the Cawthron organ, which itself has had a close to million dollar upgrade. Ha, ha: I kept wanting to sing "If I Had Words" (taken from symphony's maestoso by Scott Fitzgerald and Yvonne Keeley way back in 1978, and it is famous itself for loads of mondegreens, including "Sister Moonshine", "if you are not deeply moved, child", and "If I had words to make your dream come true"). A couple of videos below:





If I had words lyrics were by J. Hodge, a UK jingle writer:

If I had words 
To make a day for you 
I sing you a morning golden and new 
I would make this day 
Last for all time 
Give you a night 
Deep in moonshine 

The concert closed with the Hallelujah Chorus form Handel's Messiah, sung by the Nelson Civic Choir with the NSO. 

It was a wonderful opening for the rebuilt school, but I would like to have seen a deputation from Wakatu Marae there, particularly for the investiture of the Taonga Pūtātara. 


Sam (& Jan)

News from Nelson - May 2018

Hi everyone,
Another month rolls around, and here we are, officially heading into winter. The fire is now on most nights, it is dark in the morning, and then dark at dinner time! Our house remains warm and cosy though, thanks to the high levels of insulation we invested in the building process.

Tania has had surgery, a lumpectomy and a lymphectomy, and is at home - and still working, though remotely to save her the added stress of a commute. In early June, once she has recovered from this first round of surgery, she will have a mastectomy and have the lymph nodes removed. Crikey, this is such a process for her. Thankfully once again Tina has travelled to Brisbane to be Tan's advocate, and to be our international correspondent. Hopefully everything will go well.

My mother seems to be well at the moment. She has been getting out and about a bit, having come out to us a couple of times for coffee or lunch. She had to go for a good long drive each week due a problem with her car where the reversing camera was permanently on and draining the battery. The issue took a bit of tracking down, and is now satisfactorily mended. Hopefully she will still want to come for a drive regularly, as it has been nice catching up at cafés around the district. With us focusing on paying off the mortgage over the past eighteen months we haven't been out much.

Jan has been in Auckland at a work-funded Safeguard conference, where he attended a workshop given by one of his safety gurus, Sidney Dekker (which he really enjoyed). Jan had hoped to catch up with Doug & Morv while there, but unfortunately was still feeling pretty low with a cold, and decided not to inflict his germs on the Booth family. A wise decision as he still had the cold when he got home, and it is only just tailing off now (in early June). I caught it from him, but mine, aside from losing me my voice for a few days, was gone pretty quickly. My voice was affected - I think - because the day it all started I had five hours of lectures from 8am to 1pm, and by the end of that I was down to a whisper. I was croaking for a week before I returned to normal, but that was my major symptom ...and not that much of an inconvenience.

John had left the country again, and is now preparing to ride across the USA on his trusty old Norton Commando. It has been shipped to the US and awaits his arrival. This has been one of John's bucket list items for many, many years... let the dream realisation begin!

Our neighbour, Ian B, has purchased a forestry block - but not the trees - at the head of our valley. However, Cyclones Fehi and Gita felled a number of the trees, and the tree owner is currently felling them. This means that Ian will be able to renew his pasture sooner than he had planned. The loggers have been working all month, starting at 5.30 every morning; but not on the weekends, which is nice. They have been doing major repairs on our driveway, having put in two new culverts already, and packing out the softer sections with loads of rock. We will have a very solid pan once they have finished... and all without ny of our own expense. Mind you, I have had three flat tyres this month, so perhaps not entirely without expense.

I caught up with Tracey a couple of times this month for coffee, and have had Warren and Erica come to stay, and Erica on her own. When Erica and Ollie came to stay, we took the dogs right up to the top of the felling area, watched Men In Black and had homemade fish and chips for dinner. Jan lost his broccoli plants (eaten by rabbits or birds), but planted some more under netting on the Western side of the lounge where the tomatoes were. Amazingly Ollie caught a bunny in the front enclosed garden while he was here. Jan now agrees that we need to tear up the front garden netting and re-lay it around the garden beds alone, as there is incontrivertable proof that the bunnies are getting in. 

Warren and Jan put in a base for Jan's set of recovered steel stairs to be footed on, which is what they are admiring at the top of the bank. We aim to have a party at some point where we get our guests to collectively lift the steps into place.

It is cold enough for winter shoes, and the Fluevogs are out again. I do so enjoy them, though am a bit sad this year as New Zealand's only retailer, TimelessSoles in Tauranga, is closing. They are apparently not getting the option to purchase much of a range and it is being limited more and more as time goes on, so have decided to pull the pin.

The limes and lemons are growing well this year: too fast for us to eat them. I might start taking them into work and selling them.

Tessa had her 30th birthday this year (seems outrageous!), and brought Izzy to Nelson to help her celebrate on what would have been my Father's 84th birthday. We had a memorial lunch in his honour, complete with ice cream sundaes, at Smugglers, followed by a shindig at Quebec Road. My voice was non existent, but I still managed to build castles with Izzy using the box of blocks that Mike had made for him.

Jan has completed his first Graduate Certificate in Safety Leadership paper and is waiting to hear if he has passed or not. He is about to enrol on the next paper. He is also currently practicing for two concerts: the NSO's Vienna concert, and then the reopening of the Nelson School of Music (which is now been renamed the Nelson Centre of Musical Arts - NCMA - for some totally obscure reason. People will keep calling it the School of Music until they change the name back, I would imagine).

I have been keeping busy too, with vocational opinions, teaching, research and study. My lectures have now finished and marking is yet to come. My research students are all well-underway with their projects, collecting their primary data, and I am currently almost finished planning for semester 2's intake (where I will have around 50 students enrolled at present and so will need to manage a team of four supervisors - two of whom are new and have never done a paper like this before... that will be another challenge).

Finally I have rewritten my research review article, and will resubmit it to the Australian Journal of Career Guidance early next month. My PhD research proposal is on-going, well-supported by an excellent Skype session with my supervisors mid-month. My next draft is due back to them mid-June, which should go OK as I have time to get the changes made before the last avalanche of marking descends.

Finn continues to grow, still very lean despite shovelling food into him, and now getting very strong. He is a sweetie though:

...and once more the sky has been providing us with a feast for the senses:

I have decided to go dark on Facebook. I will repost the family news on FB, but will not be monitoring, replying to or reading any threads. If you want to read why, my reasons are here. I will still use Messenger, and will repost articles and the family news, but other than that, expect silence.

This month between study and both doing our taxes we have watched Broachchurch series 3, which was very enjoyable, and firmly recommended. We have also watched a Spanish movie about a 'secret agent', called "Anacleto". It was slapstick but quite funny. I have discovered the books of Mavis Cheek, which I am finding a little like an uneasy marriage of Wodehouse (whom I like) and Danielle Steel (whom I don't). They are worth a read if you can get them from the library - as I am doing.

Hartmut and Uta come to stay next month, which will be lovely. 

Righto, time to do my GST. More next month :-)

Sam (& Jan)