Graduated

Hi All,
A very brief post, with more to come shortly. Things to do: graduate <tick>

Sam

News from Nelson - October 2 2014

Hi everyone,
Here I am again.

Jan has been on a week long residential course in Christchurch. He caught up with Jenny & Bertie while down there, and has come back with lots of plans for work: so all good... provided he gets time to implement what he wants to, and doesn't get road-blocked too much.

While he was away, I revamped my website and got my marks back for my Master's (A). All good. Had a few storms go through, but most haven't touched us here in the Moutere:

Roses Road looking east, storm going along the Nelson ranges, Oct 2014

A couple of weekends ago, Jan had a concert with the Greenhill Community Orchestra at the Stoke Memorial Hall, which my Mum and I attended on the Sunday (photo of the rehearsal below). Warren swung by on Saturday and we gave him a hand to first load a trailer-load of his farm gear that he had been storing on our wetland, and to then off-load it at his place on Sunday. We even got dinner for our efforts (always stellar if I don't have to cook!).

Greenhill Rehearsal at Stoke Memorial Hall, Oct 2014

Labour weekend we went to three of the Nelson Arts Festival shows: Black Faggot, White Cloud and Davinia Caddy. Of the three sessions, Black Faggot was the most powerful, but White Cloud the most enjoyable. I was thinking, on our way home from seeing White Cloud, that there is probably nowhere else on the planet where you can go to a tiny provincial theatre and have one of your nation's music legends play music and tell conversational stories about their childhood and family. It felt like we were being hosted in Tim Finn's living room. Black Faggot was confrontational, full of pathos, funny and thought-provoking all at once. Both these shows were absolutely stellar.

Davinia Caddy was good, and, as this lecture was held in the Granary Festival Café, we enjoyed a good coffee and a stonking chocolate chip biscuit while listening. We also caught up with Derek Sherwood for a good chat (and briefly with Kate between her performances).

All in all, a great labour weekend. Jan even managed to fell some trees, and I got a chunk of marking done. Jan has been very busy in the garden, and has recycled an old door from Nelson Pine as cloches:

John Fitz returns in a couple of weeks, bringing with him Jan's new bike, a Triumph Tiger:

Jan's new bike: Triumph Tiger 800, 2014 Reg

Barb has been in the US (Maryland) for a few weeks, visiting Joe and his family, and got some great photos at Montego Bay & on Assateauge:

Barb showing us this is definitely Assateague, Oct 2014

Patience (Joe's sister) & Barb, Assateauge, Oct 2014

Awesome light at Montego Bay: Joe reads while carrying Barb's shoes (!)

Next weekend we are helping out at the Big Beach Cleanup, and doing some more gardening chores. The weekend after that, we have a 1920s party to go to (...I have no idea what we will go as!). I will be in Auckland from Sun 16 to Tues 18 Nov at a CDANZ meeting, Symposium and AGM; and the weekend after that is our Anniversary BBQ. Man, where has the year gone?!

We may possibly have a trip to Dunedin to visit some family sites of interest next February, but we are unsure as yet. However, Jan & I are definitely planning a trip to Brazil next April (back in time for Beck's wedding if we can manage it), and we will both be up in Auckland in May for my graduation.

Right, that's all for now: more in a couple of weeks. Keep well!

Sam (& Jan)

Pass A

Well, I got my results on Tuesday (14th of October), and loads of feedback... uh, no. Actually, all I got that was relatively unique to my form, aside from my name and student ID was "Pass A".

So what did I do well, or what did I do not so well? No idea.

This has got to be one of the strangest ways to run an education system.

But hey, at least I passed. It's not "pass, eh", or "passé" (mind you, the results feel a bit passé right now, as my thesis had been submitted on June 26th).

Onwards and upwards!

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

Ahhhhhh....

Here it is, 11.18pm, and I have JUST – about two minutes ago – submitted my thesis for my Master of Management.

It is too long, and doesn't look boring, so I will probably get a rotten mark. But that wasn't the point of doing it: the point of doing it was the learning. And I learned heaps.

So I will now have lots of time to do the ‘nice’ things in life. I could even, if I wanted, clean out the fridge (quite unlikely though). And instead of wedging in work and research at 5am, I could sleep in (that's pretty unlikely too).

But at least there's no study tomorrow.

Cheers!

Sam

News from Nelson - January 2014

Hi everyone,
Well, it has been a long time since I updated you all! We are both well here, and the new year seems to be getting into swing quite fast.

Sad news is that Jan's other grandmother, Oma Friedel, passed away on Saturday (18 January), three weeks short of her 99th birthday. After a short illness she died in hospital. Gerhard and Eberhard were regular visitors, and Brigitte went over as soon as she could get a flight. The funeral is on the 29th. Tina is heading to Germany on 1 February to help Brigitte with anything that needs doing.

Oma Friedel at Christmas 2013

Jan is very glad that he made the time to go and stay in November last year with her. So no 100th birthday in Germany in February 2015... however, they think they might organise a family get-together on 12 February where family members can share their memories of her.

Our next overseas trip will be to Rarotonga for Mike's wedding in April. Then we will be organising a trip to Brazil to see the Martins; we are not sure if this will be later this year or next year yet. June-July, anyway, regardless of the year.

Jan has just ordered the first of the lounge in-ceiling speakers. Yay! At last we will be able to get rid of some the dangly speaker wires. Once this pair has arrived and been installed, then Jan will order the next pair. We have to do a two stage process; order them online in the US and get them sent to a US address (Barb's boyfriend's sister, Patience, in this instance). Then Patience posts them to us. She is a saint who happens to love Whittakers L&P block so gets her thank yous in bars of white and fizzy chocolate :-)

I have discovered the books of Peter Robinson and am just reading the last of them. I have also read about seven Ruth Rendell Inspector Wexfords too. I have a new Kindle touch and am enjoying that immensely (also care of Patience). My old Kindle has gone to my Father, as he can read the screen just fine on that; but a book is too dense. 

We have rediscovered a long-lost cousin: my Uncle Ian's oldest daughter, Kim. I met her with her mum when she was just a wee dot, when I was about five. Kim lives in Dunedin with her family, and we hope that she will come up to Nelson for my father's 80th Birthday party on May 24th this year. I am hoping that we will be able to get all the remaining brothers and sisters together, and as many of the cousins as possible, to have a real family get together. It would be really great. We will see!

Kim & Brenda around 1967/8-ish

Kim & husband Geoff

Had Aunty Jill out for a visit to our place & Aunty Diana up from Christchurch (and how they both hate being called Aunty). It will be a rellie good year :-)

Peter, Joan, Jill & Jan at Roses Road, Jan 2013

 

Peter, Joan, me & Aunty Diana outside at Roses Road

Jan & Aunty Diana at Krauts, December 2013

Andreas's birthday in Germany looked like a very stylish high tea party! Simone sent us photos :-)

Andreas with his grandparents Karin & Ernst at his birthday tea

Jan has been cutting down trees - and cutting them up for firewood. Getting ready for winter when we haven't even hit our summer straps yet. But very prudent. There is a clip below of Jan felling a tree outside my office. Pesky thing was in my view :-)

Chainsawing, of couse :-)

Jan felling a pine tree outside my office

First meeting of the academic year is happening next Monday. Ouch. I am up in Auckland at a Leadership training session at AUT for two days next week, then Otto & Lara come down to stay for a few days with us. Building some of their own family memories :-)

Masters is going on: and will be in draft by 01 April (just in time to go to Raro for Mike & Donna's shindig).

Bonnie has the early stages of congestive heart failure, but is on meds, so will hopefully be OK for many more years to come (as she is only 7). John is planning on a return to Kiwiland later this year, and hopefully won't notice any changes in her. We have tried Skyping with Bonnie, but she cannot work out where the noise comes from...!

Bonnie looking intensely... intense

Bonnie & Coco trying to work out why the crazy woman is trying to get their attention

Caught up with Kevin & Sandra at Mapua recently and finished the evening at McKee Domain with the most fabulous moonrise over the bay

Moon over Tasman Bay, Jan 2014

Right, that will do for now. I know I have missed out heaps of news, but I have hit the end of my writing endurance!

Take care

Sam & Jan

News from Nelson - July 2 2013

Hi all,
A quick update on what we have been doing in the past few weeks.

This weekend we went to see Te Radar's Antarcticana, a monologue with pictures on Antarctic exploration, which was really fun. He speaks very well.

Jan hired a digger this weekend, and now the big pile of dirt that was waiting to cover over the water tanks IS covering the water tanks. This means that the next stage of the house can take place: getting a clothes line! Yay!

Coco is missing Fliss, we think, though Bonnie seems to have not noticed anything amiss. 

We have felt a few of the earthquakes that have been plaguing Seddon (poor beggars - the ground has been shaking under them for a fortnight now). We were at home, and Jan was watching a film, when the 6.8 one struck. It went on for a long time too, and neither Jan nor I knew whether it was going to get worse, so didn't know whether we should rush outside or not. Jan checked in with the Welly family, but everyone seemed to be OK. All good.

Last weekend Sharon & Ian came to stay, and we watch lots of movies, Sharon won the pool tournament, and we had food for Africa. Nibbles that the dogs have now eaten up the leftovers of, and - of course - waffles for breakfast on Sunday morning. 

I cooked a roast chicken and winter roast veges that night, but there was so much left over (because everyone filled up on nibbles), that we couldn't have eaten it before it had passed its use-by date, so I made stock from the chicken carcass and made roast chicken & vege soup. It was the most stellar soup I think I have made this year.

That same weekend we went to visit Gary & Nic at their new place in Marahau, and luckily Nic fed us soup and bread, combined with a lovely long walk along the Marahau waterfront. I think we would have died if we had been faced with too much more food!

We caught up with Jen L in May, at her folks place in 88 Valley, which was great. I got a few shots of a brief walkabout we did, none of which I had posted, so have one here:

We picked up some tiny paintings at the Suter Art Auction a few weeks ago, and, along with some other pictures we have, have put them all up on the wall in the front loo...

It is very nice as they also reflect in the mirror. The big one in the middle was given to us as a thank you for taking the Rotary kids through the far north. It is Jan & I sitting on the beach at Tapotupotu Bay looking out to sea (and sneakily taken by one of the exchange students).

I was also awarded our Rotary club's annual Fred Coe award for a bit of service above self at our change-over, which was a total surprise. Fred is one of our members who unexpected died a few years ago, and his wife donated this perpetual challenge trophy in his memory, and presents it each year to the recipient. The trophy is a streaked rainbow glass creation:

We also farewelled Karin, who headed back home to Sweden - very briefly - because she is going to a drama school course in London early next month, and will be staying with Justine in Willesden Green. Love to see those connections start to be made!

I dropped some baking into the vets to thank Jonathan for driving all the way out to our place to put Fliss down, and they were very grateful (as were we!) for that small gesture. And enjoyed baking that two gluten intolerant vet nurses could eat (added bonus of all my cooking lacking ordinary wheat flour).

I have been having a bit of a baking binge lately - I had to supply the raffle prize at Rotary a couple of weeks ago, and made a batch of shortbread and a banana cake. I was a bit worried that the raffle winner would have thought that home baking was a bit of a cheat, but they seemed quite chuffed, and said the whole office enjoyed it. I enjoy the process of baking, and it is great to have it eaten up by others!

I have just had conditional approval provided on my Masters human participants ethics committee application. I haven't gone through all the little tweaks that they want me to make yet, but will tomorrow. Phew: it is a relief to have that largely done. I have written one of my long cases for my experiments on my students later this semester, and am half-way through the second. My other lecturers are all on board, and I am nearly ready for the major part of the work. Time has gone amazingly fast.

Kathleen & Frits & Amy are coming out next weekend for a mid-winter Christmas celebration, which should be fun. And there will be too much to eat then, I am sure. Thank goodness for freezers, eh.

Jan has his next concert (the Children's Concert) coming up in two weeks, so will be out at rehearsals a bit. He goes in November to the US to the big Trade Show he is attending there. Because I will be teaching my final classes and marking here for the end of the semester and the graduation of my students, I will stay home (though I am also supposed to be attending a CDANZ meeting during that same time, I think we may decide keep things simple).

My next trip overseas will be to Rarotonga in April for my brother's wedding - along with Jan, of course! We booked our tickets and accommodation today, so we are all sorted for that. I will be in Welly another time or two this year, and in Christchurch for four days in the middle of October - 17-20 - for a Careers Symposium and CDANZ AGM - Jan is coming with me, so we hope to catch up with all you Canty guys whom we haven't seen for ages.

Right - that will do for now. Back to you in a bit & hope you are all keeping well

Jan & Sam

News from Nelson - March 2013

Hi all,
Just a quick update again as we are both still flat out... yeah, yeah, I know!

We are getting ready to take all the Rotary Exchange students around the NI: Murray B who does all the planning for the event has organised our flights already, and we get into Wellington at 10.45 on the 20th of April, spend the weekend there, then on to Auckland and all points north. Karin, who came to stay with us before Camila left in January, will hopefully be able to organise the local exchange students whom we haven't yet met, to come out to our place for a weekend so we can get to know them before the trip.

The weather has been staggeringly fine for what seems like months. I awoke this morning to a very light drizzle and mist (in fact, I had to double check that it was actually raining). It will be good as the ground is quite parched and a blasted rabbit keeps finding its way into the vege garden, despite our rabbit-proof fence (ha ha - obviously a misnomer!).

The NSO concert last night was really great - not only were the pieces at the right standard of complexity for the skill of the orchestra, but they finished with Rhapsody in Blue which was an incredibly upbeat way to end the first concert of the year.

Last weekend we had a great time: we went to the Suter Gallery fund raiser on Friday night and bought a Craig Potton print of the Ureweras. Haunting. We were on a very fun table with lots of acid asides about various things which was highly entertaining. Saturday Jan had orchestra practice and sectionals. On the Sunday we trucked off into Nelson very bright & early - arriving at 20 to 6 in the pitch dark: thank goodness for headlight torches - to volunteer for the Weet-bix Kids "Tryathlon". I have organised the cycle steward volunteers for the past three years, and the team assembled was just great. Aside from a few tears and a few grazes, it was pretty much a trouble-free cycle leg with 1779 kids completing the course. We zoomed off from that to the Kahurangi Long Lunch in the Vineyard to celebrate the 2012 vintages which had just gone into the bottle. We caught up with lots of people and had a really great time sitting outside under a lovely soft canopy enjoying lovely food & wine.

We had the 10 year dinner for Whakatu Rotary Club, which Jan came along to. I volunteered to drive, but of course, by the end of the night he was sober anyway, and drove home. It was a good night with several awards given to long serving and charter members. I used the night to recruit - or re-recruit - my cycle stewards. My next project will be the team for the Founders Book Fair which is another community event which raises project funds for Founders Heritage Park.

Jan & I both went to the Nelson Tasman Chamber of Commerce's first lunch of the year, to hear Glidepath's Sir Ken Stevens talk about his business experiences. He was most interesting in answering the questions that were asked: I wished it had only been a Q&A session because the short annecdotes and answers were fascinating.

Frits & Kathleen's daughter Amy has just returned from 4 years in Australia, in order to do some prereq papers before starting her second degree (Engineering this time). We think she will dog sit for us while we are away in the NI, which is fantastic.

We were supposed to be chainsawing today: one of my colleagues from NMIT & his wife - Mark & Nicky - were going to come out & cut wood this morning, but the rain will make it too slippery. Better to be safe! Postponements work just fine.

I have two great classes this semester - both fairly small in number, but both very active and interactive. It is such a pleasure to teach motivated and engaged students! One of my papers is video linked to Marlborough, and I have six students who 'beam in' for each class. I had a new NMIT lecturer sitting in on one of my classes to see how to manage video link etiquette. Like all things, it easier both watched and modelled as well as explained in theory then practiced.

Jan has been asked if he will take on role of the Chair of the NSO Committee, and thinks he probably will for a year and see how he likes it. I think it will be good for the committee and for Jan. Another thing to learn :-)

I am busy recording lectures for a paper that I am not actually teaching this semester, but that four students have asked if they can take early, as they want to attend another institution in the second semester. I am OK with it, but it does mean that work I had postponed until the second half of the year has to be done now.

As a result my own study has been postponed... and I am procrastinating on writing my conference presentation RFP because I am so over-faced by the quality of audience. Ah well.

We have been working in the vege garden: we had good cherry tomatoes, cucumber, sugar snap peas, spinach, lettuce, garlic and courgettes. We have some peppers just coming on now. A few potatoes earlier (we didn't plant any: they just came up from where we had them the winter before last). Sadly our pumpkins got bacterial wilt & died: our larger tomatoes didn't thrive. They have just effectively stalled. So we picked 60 kilos of tomatoes from a local market garden (they grow the vines outside in mounded rows) and bottled them over the last couple of weeks. We have 60 1 litre jars of preserved tomatoes downstairs now, ready for soups, sauce and anything else we fancy this coming winter :-)

Still going to do some apple juice... probably next weekend. 

I will be up in Welly again in May, in Chch in Oct, and might well be in Queenstown in November (Jan will probably come to the last one too). The CDANZ meetings this year are all over the place, driven by conferences where we need to have a presence, largely. Will be a fun year, though I have a lot of projects I am juggling for it: leading a finance system overhaul, audit committee, website committee, communications director and magazine editor. Phew. At least the finance thing will be done soon. And the website not too far - couple of months - afterward, I hope.

Everyone is as well as expected, health-wise, here. Tessa & her girlfriend have split up, which is very sad, but Tessa seems to be coping as well as can be expected from such a meaningful relationship break up.

Brother Mike is getting married on 10th April 2014 in Rarotonga, so that will be our next trip offshore. Then there are Jan's Oma's 100th birthdays the year afterward. Sometime in there we have to squeeze in a Brazil trip too to see the Martins.

Justine, there's a wee buzzy bee print heading your way next week to say thank you for being my postal staging house!  I hope the colour is OK, but it was the VERY last one, so Hobson's choice...

Right - that's it for now. Going to loll about & watch movies and play ladies today, I think. There has been rather too much high-life :-)

Sam & Jan