A BIG catch up on the last half of 2015

So what has happened this year...?

We put Coco down at the end of August. She had a bone tumour in her elbow that, as the tumour grew, we knew would eventually weaken the bone so much that an impact would break it through the elbow joint ... and the bone did break: and then it was time to say goodbye. She is now, with her squeaky toy in her mouth, running with Fliss and Drew through the pine trees, chasing the rabbits and barking fit to bust (around "Other Bad Cuz", the squeaky)...

That left Bonnie on her own with us, until John got back from the UK. For me, it is the first time in thirty years that there is no dog in the house (for Jan only 15 years). It is very, very quiet.

I am loving my teaching, having taught pretty much a full time load in 2015. I am still seeing career clients, but have not been doing much management consultancy. I am teaching leadership, sports communications, and supervising Year 3 students in their capstone management projects. It is this latter that I so enjoy: guiding students through their research topic, question-formulation and project planning. I think we all love the process - the students as well as myself (though I think the students mostly enjoy it through their rear-vision mirrors!).

I have stepped away from most of my voluntary and community involvements. The Communications Director's role for CDANZ which I have held for the past four years came to an end this year, as I stepped of the Exec at the AGM in November.

The reason for this is that I am planning on diving back into the Post-grad pond, and doing my PhD. Better than that, though, AUT Sports Leadership programme have asked me to undertake a bit of research, and they are paying. I have supervisors. I don't have to do any pre-doc courses, as I my Masters was apparently already at doctoral level (what pulled it down was the lack of findings of 'global significance'). So I am hard at 'think' (not 'work'... yet), trying to nut out what my question should be to fit their topic of "Changing the conversation around sports leadership using case study"... which builds on my Master's work. And planning. And curating materials. And putting together research lists.

So I am as happy as a sandboy.

However, that makes only one of us.

Jan is unsettled at work, as there has been some restructuring at the end of June and, along with a few others, his role has been dropped down a level, with the introduction of a new COO, and the splitting of his old boss's role into two: one now production-oriented, and one engineering-oriented.

Jan's new boss - the new "GM Engineering" has (a) no management skills, and (b) no engineering knowledge, so the appointment of this numpty is pretty bewildering. Mind you, he does know how to glad-hand pretty well, is great at undermining others, could put a gloss on a ...er... brown log-shaped thing, and can run-up a yarn like a true-blue car salesman.

What other skills could you possibly need to manage the engineering requirements of a multi-million dollar facility?

As a result, Jan is really struggling. Not sure what will happen yet. I don't know if a job move is going to be on the cards, either here, nationally or internationally, or if he will stay. It has been good that John is back in NZ as they has been talking a lot about the whats, hows, whys and wherefores. No idea what will come of all the talk. So watch this space.

We are on a tight budget at present, busily paying off our mortgage as fast as we can so as to give ourselves more choices when Jan starts reaching some conclusions. I hope that he doesn't feel that we have to move away, as I am so enjoying my work... but we are a team, and the team stays together.

We will see what turns up.

Our families appear fit and well, so that is all good.

Earlier in the year, we caught up with Janet & Robert up in Auckland. Justine was home for a few weeks in mid-winter, so we caught up with her. Magda and David got engaged this year, then got married in Christchurch at the end of November. We went down to celebrate with them, and had a great time. We stayed with Jenny L, and also caught up with the Boots, Bertie and Dan & Rochelle.

 Please let us know when you are coming to Nelson next. We would love to see you all.

All the best for the New Year break!

Jan & Sam

News from Nelson - May 2013

Hi all,
Wow lots to report since last time. Jan's grandmother died in Germany, and a memorial services has just taken place. More on that later.

We have been very busy: trip news etc will follow in a few days once we have our heads back in the right place. A few photos follow, taken by Amy as she house sitted for us.

Back to you all with an update once we are organised :-)

Sam & Jan

News from Nelson - February 2 2013

Hi all,
Just a quick update again as we are both pretty busy! Surprise, surprise!

Happy birthday to Jan's Oma Friedel who has just turned 99, here with Katrin & Monika: 

I went up to Tauranga for a couple of AUT training days, and caught up with DJ & Dilani, who are both in great form. Hopefully we will catch up with them both again when we take the Rotary exchange students around the far north this April too.

Kathleen & Frits came to stay for a weekend and we shamelessly put them to work. First we cleared some of the rubbish piles from when we had our trees felled about six years ago:

Then, where Jimmy had felled some trees which were threatening our powerlines, Jan & Frits cut them up.

And Coco and Bonnie helped.

And, what a delight for the eyes. Bonnie, sound asleep with eyes slightly open, dreaming and snoring with her tongue out. Bless.

Flissy is getting pretty frail: her back end is getting pretty wobbly due to the Ankylosing Spondylitis. We had them all at the vet the other day for check ups, and basically there is nothing else we can do for her now except control her pain (and she seems relatively pain-free, so that's good). Old dogs :-(

This week Jan has been in Auckland at a work conference/seminar and I have been in Welly for another CDANZ meeting. My next 'meeting' will be via video link from the BNZ Centres all around the country. It will be interesting to see how that works! But if it does work well, it will mean that we can save some $ for our members and have some 'minor' meetings during the year. I don't think the technology is good enough to replace collegiality yet, but it may come.

I teach students in Marlborough via video link, so does work OK: but it is not a replacement for being there.

We have rented our house again, as aside from one offer which fell through, there was nothing happening on the sales front.

Jan is playing in the next NSO concert - a salute to the Steinway - and I am trying to get my NMIT courses sorted so I can get back to my own study. I have some interesting students in my classes though. All those good things that make it enjoyable!

Our neighbour, Kath, is not good again, which is a real shame. But at least Harrison is three now, so will have memories of his Mum.

Our next trip will be the Rotary Youth Exchange one in April/May.  Hope to see some of you then.

Jan & Sam

News from Nelson - October 2012

Hi everyone,

I just did a drive-by on www.xmasclock.com to find there are only 68 shopping days until Christmas. Where did the year go?

Camila comes to us this weekend; we are going to pick her up on Saturday morning. That will be very entertaining, I am sure! She postponed her change of address for a week as she had lots of things to do in town last week, and thought it would be easier to stay where she was. No problem!

Speaking of entertainment, our pool table is continuing to keep us occupied. My skills appear to have plateaued, but Jan is continuing to improve.

I think this weekend we will be continuing with gorse control, a bit more tree planting, and protecting some of the trees we have already planted with drums. Last weekend I went up to Wellington on Sunday, but on Saturday we went into Jan’s work and recycled some old oil drums. Jan cut the tops and bottoms out, so we can put them over our trees and foil the very, very hungry bunnies who are currently our only lawn mowers.

My masters work is continuing well – my reading list is now 460 items long though! However, I am chopping through them. I am holding to an A overall (my methodology needs work though) so all is looking good. Just got to keep chipping away at getting the work done, and not lose focus.

Jan’s Les Mis production went very well, with lots of audience and orchestra people saying they would like to do it again, despite it having been such a huge commitment. So all good. Brigitte and John came down to Nelson while the production was on, so we got them tickets to go and see it. They said that for an amateur production it was surprisingly good. I know exactly what they mean by that, as the same comment was repeated again and again by the audiences. All in all, a great success for Richard Carruthers, the show’s director, driver and creative influence.

Jan was also in Oz last week to visit a Nelson Pine plant, with his mechanical engineer, to look at how a project has gone over there. He has come back with some good ideas, despite being very tired. It was go-go-go for them both for the four days that they were away.

I managed to get my marking sorted during the study break, and have been tackling lots of Career Development things. I had meetings, training and the AGM in Wellington on Sunday & Monday for CDANZ, and came away with my head so full that I felt like I was concussed. I think I have managed to process now! However, we had a stand-out presenter at one of the training sessions, Amanda Fleming of Presenter At Large from Auckland. This woman is a great speaker, with some very interesting stories to tell and insights on personal development. If you get the chance, to go to one of her sessions, go.

Bonnie will be staying with us for a bit longer, I think: John is going to the US for a few months while he gets some business systems sorted out. No problem for Coco to retain her friend, especially as Fliss is growing increasingly frail.

Jan & I are both in Welly from 7-9 December (next CDANZ Exec meeting). I will be free on Saturday evening, so catch ups Sat night with the Hutt crowd would be great. 

Congrats to Christél & Ray for being able to share cute little Lizzie with Christél’s folks! Hard to tell the puppy from the slipper :-)

Congrats to Magda who has a wonderful new job. But sad faces to Sam & Jan who lose her as her new position is in Christchurch :-( 

Happy birthdays over the coming month to Hartmut, Morv, Margie, Uncle Norman, Dawnie, Lara, Justine & Jeremy! 

Right – better feed the dogs  :-D

Jan Kuwilsky & Sam Young

News from Nelson - February 2012

Hi all,
Wow – here we are a sixth of the way through the year already! How did it get to be mid-February so fast?!

Brigitte appears to be recovering well from her hip replacement in Germany, and Jörg is slowly making progress following his head injury. My brother got swarmed by a wasps nest recently when mowing the lawn. He appears to be OK, but that is not the nicest experience either. He was very lucky. 

I had a minor fall – Coco towed me over on the neighbour’s steep gravel driveway, leaving me with lots of bits of gravel to pick out. Thank goodness for Christian’s high pressure winery hose – that cleaned the bits out pronto :-)

As I write I am reading over what we were doing last time I wrote; and I am pretty much at the same space! I am still trying to commission my new PC. Jan has finished building shelves in the cellar – though; and they look great. 

I have pegged back my teaching for this year; only teaching three papers, and they are all now underway. I am still trying to mop up summer school though. Getting there, but it feels like the mountain is very big at the moment.

Each week I have been helping the Nelson Symphony Orchestra secretary set up some new systems. Their previous secretary, who basically carried the whole shebang for several years, recently left. No one knows how to do anything as everything was in his head. At least while we are reinventing everything, we are writing it all down, and putting it into Google docs, so that everyone can access everything.  

We are definitely now driving the Rotary International exchange teenagers around the North Island at Easter for my birthday. Camila, Ana's sister, is here from Brazil, and is coming to stay this Friday night with us. We are going into Able Tasman on Saturday for a day cruise in and a walk – or part walk, part cruise – out, depending on the weather. I hope Camila enjoys the dogs as much as Ana did.
Last weekend we had a great time up in Wellington. Jan had lunch with Doug, and Hui-Ping came around to Tina & Jeremy’s along with Pae-Ling, whom I vaguely remember from Auditing class many years ago. It was great to see everyone. We had a lovely family brunch on Sunday morning too, with Hartmut and Uta, and another friend of theirs. Tina & I tried to take a run – well, Tina did, and I puffed along beside until nearly asphyxiating and having to walk! I was up for a CDANZ Exec meeting, and so had eleven hours of meetings in two days. It was a bit full on – I got a pretty bad migraine on the way home, so will have to cut down what I try to fit in while I am up in Welly.

Kathleen & Frits came to stay at our place for a weekend, which was really fun, and we had Erin, Simon & wee Isla up for a meal while they were on holiday in Nelson. 

Right, that's it for now – this weekend we have the Abel Tasman trip, and a Roses Road BBQ on Sunday. Then I am ensuring that we don’t add any more back in for the next two weeks!

* Justine – the earphones arrived perfectly! Send your CV!

All the best - hope to hear from you all soon!

Jan Kuwilsky & Sam Young

News from Nelson – August 2 2011

Hi everyone,

I hope everyone is fit and well; Jan & I are fine here. I have just realised that neither of us has had a cold all winter – so we are bound to catch a spring one!

Fascinating weather pattern over Kiwiland in the past ten days – a massive cold snap came up from the Antarctic and hit every area of the country with snow, ice, road closures and accidents; except Nelson. We had a week’s worth of perfect weather, and hardly any frosts (light breezes through the nights kept the frost off). Blowed if I know how that worked when you see the photos & hear the stories coming in from the chaos elsewhere in the country.

My recovery slowed up; I stopped taking my iron tablets after I went back for my specialist’s follow-up appointment & got the all clear. Over the next couple of weeks, my energy levels started to drop & I got more tired. So I have gone back on them again & my energy has increased; so I guess I should stay on them for a bit longer!

The semester is going well. I have just over 150 students, and am managing OK thus far. I have a tutorial assistant to help with the marking on the big course, but hopefully will be able to manage the rest. Thank goodness for that month off and all the planning I managed to get done – it set me up for the rest of the semester.

Jan is really busy at work – he has lots of things on, and is feeling like he isn’t getting anywhere, which is hard for him. He is short staffed as he is trying to promote from within and his team are being slow to make the step-up decisions, so he is delayed in hiring the new people he needs. But some decisions were made last week, so I think he is starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel now.

We have managed to watch the Kiwi movie Stickmen twice in two weekends – we have been trying to get two sets of friends from here in the Moutere together for ages (Glenys & Kevin, Ziggy & Lib) to have a Kiwi movie night, and when we succeeded, one set weren’t able to make it, so we ended up with two sessions! Good nights, both of them, though. I could hear Jan reciting bits of the film the second time through.

Fliss turned eleven last weekend. She is so grey around the face now that she looks like she is wearing loads of black eyeliner. Even her eyelashes are white now – they look very fetching :-)

Bonnie & Coco are full of beans. I take them out for walks together every day, and Fliss walks by my side, while Bons & Coco hoon off, plaiting around each other, play fighting, leaping, running, racing, jumping. They both must do eat least three times the distance that Fliss & I do.

The view from the top of Christian's ridge from the top of Mt Arthur showing behind the Moutere Highway foothills to the start of the Southern Alps stretching away to the left below:

We have had internet problems here – for the past couple of weeks I have spent pretty much three days each week in Nelson as we have had no connectivity at home. I would get a minute or two’s connection, then it would drop off again. I didn’t realise just how much of my work is done using the internet as well as the PC; probably 1/3 is PC only, 2/3 is PC & internet. To fix the problem Jan has felled a corridor of the wilding pines in the satellite’s path, and that seems to have boosted our signal strength a bit. Then Jan took out a signal dampener & we seem to be staying on line OK now. Long may it last!

I still have half an assignment to finish – half of it is already complete, but the other half is an interview that has to be recorded, evaluated, reflected on & emailed. I have absolutely no interest in doing it! I felt that morally there was no way I was going to record a client interview; I wouldn’t even ask a client if they would be willing for me to do so. It just feels wrong. So I am stuck with doing a ‘simulated’ interview, and to record an hour’s worth of interview is going to take a lot longer than an hour. It is a big commitment to ask someone to bear with you while you sort out the technology, they will want briefing on why you are doing things, they will probably be nervous, we will need to test to make sure the recording is happening at the right levels, etc. So I am stuck with asking Jan to do it. And because neither of us really want to do it, I have been avoiding it for a month, dragging out finishing the Diploma.

I have started writing two new case studies though; one on leadership about Ray Anderson from Interface Inc, and the other on PR crisis management about Adidas’s perfect storm about the AB’s rugby jersey.

I now have a spec for my new PC – once I have some contract payments coming in, I will put my order in. Jan’s PC (my old one) has started mysteriously and unexpectedly shutting down, so Jan is looking forward to getting my current PC instead. Nothing like hand-me-downs!

The ‘new’ laptop is going well, though the battery doesn’t work at all. I have been looking on the web for a battery, and hopefully will find one for a reasonable price soon.

Jan & I went to see Mrs Carey's Concert at the Gecko Cinema in Motueka yesterday - a special screening for the NSO. What a cute little theatre the Gecko is, and what a fascinating film. Catch both when you have the time!

Right – I think that his all for now, aside from birthdays: Uta K, Oma Lieselotte, Jan, Hui-Ping, Rae T-H, Otto, Bob, Warren & Doug.

Catch you all again soon.

Alles liebe!

Jan Kuwilsky & Sam Young

Dogs - happy at home

Hi all,
A couple of photos of the dogs - they have such a TERRIBLE life of it, really :-)

News from Nelson - March 2011

Hi everyone,

The Christchurch earthquake continues to dominate our news, along with the situation in Libya. Petrol has risen by about 13 cents per litre in the past couple of months, but oil companies have kept the price in Christchurch as it was in an effort to make things easier on Christchurch residents.

Jenny L came up for a few days with her brother & sister-in-law as a rest from the failed Christchurch infrastructure. She came to stay here for a night, and it was great to see her. She was itching to get back down to Christchurch though, and check through her house thoroughly. The Uni is opening again on March 14^th.

It is amazing, but none of our friends appear to have been hurt. The only people we know of who have lost their house are Dave & Jo L (but they & the kids are all OK). Everyone else seems to have come through in good shape.

The central city will take a long time to return to normal; first of all the people of Christchurch need to decide if they wish to rebuild the CBD in the same location, or if it should be relocated to firmer ground. Repairs will apparently cost about $20b.

Photo: 3News (2011) from http://modernsurvivalblog.com/earthquakes/another-quake-rocks-christchurch-new-zealand/


Tessa is now up in Auckland, and is planning on settling there. She is staying with Mike & Kara while she organises everything –she has a preschool position already and is about to move into a house-share in Botany Downs.

Like the rest of the country, here in Nelson we have had a bit of rain, and the temperatures have fallen from some 30 degree days to some cooler temperatures.

In the past few weeks we haven’t really got any work done around the house, as Jan is practicing for the next NSO concert (which is in a fortnight), I am busy teaching a full-time teaching load this semester, and we have been doing lots of other things on our weekends.

We dropped off a trailer-load of firewood to Montrose Drive and picked up a trailer load of green waste from them – man, have we got some great tenants thus far. They seem to be treating our house like their own, and really taking care of it inside and out. It is wonderful.

Last weekend we helped out with the Weet-bix “Tryathlon”, which is a triathlon for primary school children. It was a great event, with nearly 1400 children sea-swimming, cycling and running (and only 4 accidents). I organised a group from Rotary to help out as marshalls on the cycle course, and made banana cake & coffee to bring in for our Rotary helpers team. It was great fun to take part and help the kids complete the event.

We also had Robbie & Janet’s birthday party at their farm in Tapawera - a 'cowboy' party. Luckily both Jan & I have hats, check shirts and boots, which made the whole dress-up aspect really simple. The party was in the woolshed, complete with a really good covers band who played nearly the whole time. It was a really good night, and we caught up with all sorts of people. Fleur & Neil were there and we had a great chat to them, as well as a surprise catch up with Nathan I.

Jan & I also volunteered to help take down a set of water fountain installations from a Nelson street display. There was a competition for these ‘water works’, with the winner getting a prize of $3000, and all the pieces were purchased. The one I liked was a stone sculpture of a man & a dog in a dingy on some rocks, which has been bought by a local pub (the Free House), to go in their beer garden. The fountain is a jet of water that squirts up between the man & dog, as if their boat has been holed. Very cute.

We also went with Sandra & Kevin to the Crusaders vs Waratahs rugby match at Trafalgar Park – moved to Nelson because of the Christchurch earthquake. It was a great opportunity to see a really good game at a very low cost ($32 for both of us on the embankment - plus loads of Stephanos pizzas to keep our strength up!). We would love to be going this Friday coming for the Crusaders vs Brumbies match, but we have friends coming over for a BBQ & movie.

We now have 50 jars of preserved apple puree, apple juice, pear halves and stewed plums in the cellar ready for the winter. I had to borrow some jars off Kathleen to get us through, so now I am trying to buy more Agee jars so that I can pay her back for the loan. Thank goodness for TradeMe and the Buy Sell Swap!

A group of us caught up with Jen C for breakfast the other day – she and some other members of her Friday painting group have an exhibition on at Kaimira Estate for a month, which is pretty exciting. She is thoroughly enjoying Golden Bay, and is now a mad contract Bridge fiend (to the point of having stood for Vice President of the bridge club). The damage from the late December floods is still being repaired.

I have also managed to catch up twice with Kel A – which must be a miracle in the space of a month! Duncan is in PNG, she is splitting her time between Welly & Nelson, but is off to the US in April for a break.

Oli took some fantastic photos at Oma Friedel's 96th birthday in Feb. A couple to share with you below:

This weekend Jan is going to hire a small digger so we can fill in the dirt around our big water tanks (and I can get my clothes line in on top), and move a mound of dirt over a wee bit between the office and the shed so we can plant some screening plants in autumn. We have also ordered our next lot of fruit trees for the gully.

Fliss didn’t have anything stuck in her throat; she had laryngitis! Bonnie then got an eye ulcer, and we spent two weeks back and forth from the vet for both of them. I emailed John & said that it was like a dispensing ward here with all the various meds that had to be administered at each meal time! Fliss is now pretty right, and Bonnie’s eye is slowly coming right.

John got back last week, and is reunited with Bon dog. He heads away in another ten days or so for his last tour for the season, and Bonnie comes back for another stint of ‘home away from home’.

Happy birthdays in the next couple of weeks to Melissa, Brigitte, Sandra W, Mike D, Jen C, Frits, Duncan A & Dilani.

Right, I think that's it. Catch you again soon.

Alles liebe!

Jan Kuwilsky & Sam Young

News from Nelson - January 2011

Well, what a busy few weeks we have had. We are both well; Jan narrowly skirted getting a summer cold, but it didn’t quite eventuate. Jan’s work isn’t too busy, and my study has reached a stall-point as I am waiting for my next lot of materials to be sent to me, and I have completed all the on-line work available. So for the next couple of days, I guess I have to read a few books and go for some walks instead.

We are still battling the gorse in the gully, and we now have a large pile of it against our shed, drying out to burn in autumn once the fire danger is low and we can get a fire permit.

Not only do we have cars in our garage, we also have one wine rack built and full of bottles. Jan did a great job welding last weekend, and we stocked it up. That has freed up a lot of space in the cellar, though we still have one more rack to build, and then some benches and shelves down there before we are really organised. There is still some timber and a few remaining workshop items in the garage that need to go across to the shed.

Our new tandem axle trailer arrived from Briford in Christchurch just before Christmas, which was great. Jan managed to clear some space in the shed for it, so it is stored out of the rain.

We have had lots of visitors – in the past week we have had Kathleen & Frits and John F for an overnight; Megs, Will & Emily along with Noreen & Paul and Max & Karen on New Year’s Day for brunch; Hui-Ping, Ella & Nikus a couple of days ago; Kent C & his wee boy Cameron. Kathleen & I played tennis at the Moutere Rec Centre courts, which was great fun. 

The Chamber of Commerce Christmas function was entertaining at the upgraded Theatre Royal – the restoration team have done a wonderful job of the theatre, including recreating the original wallpaper. The AUT graduation party, NMIT’s graduation and the Business School's farewell get together all went off well. The Roses Road Christmas Party & our family pseudo-Christmas lunch went off well, but we ran out of steam for the Neudorf Road Neighbourhood Party (at Glenys & Kevin's) & put in our apologies instead. We caught up with Glenys & Kevin a couple of nights later & caught up with their news first-hand anyway.

Our Wellington trip went well – read the entry immediately before this one to catch up on that info. Unfortunately we missed seeing Guy & Sonya, but hopefully next time; and also didn’t manage to catch up with Sam & Moose or Gary & Karen on this side of the Cook Strait either.

We have Bon dog here for a couple of months while John F is off on tour. Fliss & Coco are thoroughly enjoying having their partner in crime back.

John, Brigitte and Tanja are coming down to visit us for a few days next week, and I have a few brochures for them to decide what they would like to see while they are here.

We have a barbecue on January 15^th from 3pm if any of you are about Upper Moutere & looking for a party :-)

Right, I think that's it. All the very, very best for January, and we look forward to catching up with you all sometime this year.

Take care

Jan Kuwilsky & Sam Young

Chainsawing

Jan, Coco and Fliss have had a busy morning sorting out firewood. Coco supervised from the tray of the new trailer :-)