So sorry to have been slow in getting back you again. Things have rather caught up with us again this year.
Jan's sister Tanja has breast cancer and the process of her getting started on chemo has been fraught with difficulty. I don't know why the hospitals and specialists in Brisbane don't seem to know what each other is doing, don't talk to each other and don't have a clear treatment plan, but I can tell you from the patient end the breast health service is fragmented and lacks cohesion.
We endured Tropical Cyclones Fehi and Gita without too much damage, though we did lose some bank by the water tanks and a dozen trees on our Western boundary to Fehi. No biggie though. Where our bank came down, a lot of purple berry grasses (Dianellas) were dislodged. I helped Jan with transplanting them into our corner garden by the garage, and they were still doing well by the end fo the month. Epic!
As a result, we have lots of downed timber which has now been cut up and stacked to dry out, ready for 2019's winter. We already had this coming winter's firewood sorted. Nice to be ahead.
Golden Bay was isolated for ten days after Cyclone Fehi, with the Takaka Hill road looks like it will take a while to re-open completely, though they are running transport convoys across twice daily. Very sensible approach (I rather think we learned a lot of processes as a nation with the Kaikoura road being knocked out for nearly a year). The road has been very damaged by slips.
PhD is going pretty well: the Griffith Uni library is proving to be a bit of a treasure trove (I am like a kid in a lolly shop). I have had my first 'official' supervision meetings, and am progressing well with writing up content from my for my research proposal... I seem to be getting back on track.
Finn, the new puppy, is taking up a lot of time, with toilet training, obedience training, feeding, walking and having-eyes-in-the-back-of-your-head-ing... he is generally a very good wee puppy, but he does catch you unawares with eating thing at unexpected times. Usually my short sport socks. I can only thank goodness that I do tune in very quickly when he is quiet and go looking for whatever the trouble is that he is getting himself into...
We have been catching up with a few friends. Ian's tenant, Miranda, from down the road had a BBQ and invited all the families on Rose Road, which was a
lovely way to spend a glorious summer afternoon. We got a date for Cards
Against Humanity out of that session (we went with neighbours Steve and Liz to their friends', Gabriella
and Nigel - place for that... and it was a
pretty full on night). We also found out about a huge eucalypt that
had come down on Zig & Lib's place, which Jan could get enough wood out of
to make an outdoor seat.
Jan worked pretty steadily on making the seat once we managed to grapple the weight of the block of wood that Jan had cut onto the trailer!
The old couches have been donated to the local scouts, for the Scout Den. We saw them off in the first weekend of the month. The new couches are very stylish, and I am really enjoying them. Jan is much slower to warm up to the change!
Teaching started again for the year with me having two new supervisors, but all the paperwork and processes were pretty much in place for getting my newbies up to speed. So far, so good. First assignment is due in in the first week in March, so I will see how they go with marking!
And of course, we have had some lovely views from 190m:
Catch up with you all in March
Sam (& Jan)
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