Calm before the Storm?

Rumour has it we are to get a cyclone at the weekend. Hard to imagine at the moment. But if we don't get snow, the ski season will close early. There is also an increased danger of Avalanche just now and there have been 3 deaths from them this year. (None at Cardrona).

Finn is still fervently chasing his tolerance pay, for lack of other opportunities.

Meg is working extra this week to help Pip who is covering for Cathy, who is on holiday.

Spook went to work at 6am, came home at 6pm and went back to work again. There is little opportunity for photos other than sticking the camera out the window. I do take mine to work sometimes, thinking there will be an inspired moment, but it's heads down and on with it. Neither Mary or Sarsha are particularly well. Mary is suffering wear and tear from more cleaning than people are meant to do. The sale is looking good and she is loving her Propagation course with plans for the new 20 acres at home. Sarsha has been run down for a week and a half and just has to keep it going until she goes to Fiji in 3 weeks. They figure I have to get my work ethic up to speed before going home as I will need to work much harder there, so there is no sympathy for me.

It's cross country week at school, so the children have been in training and the final is on Thursday. Spook and I are both off, but have to go in disguise as Meg is forbidding us from being there.

I was asking Finn how his day is broken up. He reads after his Whanau (fano = Maori for family = registration, but has children from all age groups so that everyone knows a big variety of people, encouraging support in the school for younger kids). Then they do a bit of work, then they get some brain food and eat it while reading again (the teacher also has a snack and reads her book at the same time), then they do some more work, there are various breaks and lunch, and then more brain food later in the afternoon along with more reading. The children all seem to get through a lot of books. I asked him if his literacy class had helped his reading. He didn't know, but said that it was great to do your work in a class where others understood the struggle and never looked stunned at the stuff you didn't know.

Wimbeldon College is visiting today and there have been various sporting competitions between them. Mary left work early to go and see if her daughters netball team could beat 'The Poms'. Be good if Lochaber High School could come over!!

grateful for:

Sam Turner for introducing Finn to Robert Muchamore books - there are 10 in the series and he has almost finished the 2nd with the 3rd lined up waiting to go. He can't wait to find out who gets expelled next and who snogs who.

The Tui

http://www.nzbirds.com/birds/birdsong.html courtesy of Robbi - this is the song bird which entertains me at work.

there were 3 clicks on the ads yesterday which earned me a massive US$3.85 (this is big bucks, really). what inspired the clicks? I'm hoping the Uk ads are less about urine removal and more about a fine education, starry skies and tolerance. WE are just not picking up on these positives over here!!!

Spring has sprung the grass has ris - I wonder what a Tui is?

1. the children trying to buy back their tolerance pay
2. the house that reminded Spook of ours
3. where Lake Wanaka drains into the Upper Clutha, with Josh's old campsite just to the right of the outlet.

An all work and no play day, with me clocking a magnificent 7hrs of cleaning and Spook coming home for tea and back out to work. He has to go in at 6am tomorrow for tank cleaning.

Otherwise the day had very spring-like qualities again - dry, windless and tweeting birds. Always gives me that optimistic feeling that we get back home with a day like that.

Finn has stumbled upon the origins of the word 'nipple'. He has recognized a similarity in shape between the nipple and the mountain. Mt Everest is the biggest mountain in the world and is in Nepal. With his Dyslexic ear, he figures the words are probably spelt the same. A fine example of how his education is developing.

Spook and I still throwing ideas around with some creative plots for the evacuation!

grateful for:

That black and white bird that looks like a magpie, but I think is a Tui, and has a beautiful voice.

Caffeine Tonic.

Spook went to work and I stayed home with the lovely children. There was no particular push to go snowboarding, which was fine as mine is broken so it was economical not to go. Meg always thinks she wants a nice day at home after work - there is a long life ahead of her yet!! With nothing better to do, they had lot's of time to be uncivil to each other and then had the nerve to ask what had happened to their tolerance pay!! I informed them that their father and I had drunk it in the shape of excellent kiwi coffee, which we had earned in our tolerance of them. It was so bad at one point that I had to go for a walk with Finn and then come home and go for a run with Meg. Finn loved the one to one chance to do some talking and marvelled at how a simple comment on one subject ended with talking about something completely different with lot's of stuff in the middle. Meg ran well and proved that she had become fitter since being here. They go off to school so happily and always seem to have had a good day, that I forget they actually do anything constructive there. The relaxed Kiwi style stikes again.

grateful for:

them giggling happily together at the end of the day - why must they torture me?

Chocolatt.

I called in to Meg's work after my own, to buy one or two wee gifts. She was busy making price labels. While I was there, I took a photo of the lavendar room, where you can drink your chocolate on rainy days. Instead of coming home with a kettle of hot chocolate today, she came home with Chocolatt, the movie, which plays most days on the screen in the shop. Today, it was images of Chagall' paintings that was on the screen. So we had a lovely evening with Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp. Cathy has to work very hard to bring such sensitivities out in the South Islanders, but then so did the heroine in Le Chocolaterie.

Spook went out on his bike over the sticky woods and Finn, John and Sam went down to the lakeside to build a den.

We flew through our work in the cleaning world today. Sarsha only has about 3 weeks left so we will have to put a date on our dance off soon. How I managed to spend 10 months with Mary and, although I knew she danced twice a week, not know that she had done her ballet exams as a young girls and her jazz ones as a young woman, I've no idea. There is very little good stuff I have done, that I don't tell everyone about within the first week of knowing me - if not the first conversation! So now I have committed myself to dancing with a beautiful 25yr old Australian and an extremely well versed Kiwi. With the mung beans and alfalfa sprouts, there will be enough wind to propel me accross the room at high speed and everyone else out the door.

grateful for:

the beauty of Johnny Depp.

a yummy lasagne for tea.

a nice glass of red.

Parsely, Sage, Rosemary and Mung Beans.

I don't tend to re-read my postings, but a quick glance at the google ads, did make me wonder about the content. No wonder no one clicks on the ads. Pet Smells, Odour Control, Urine Remover and Californian Smells were all on offer after yesterdays notes.

Mary was able to reassure me that my mis-spellings were not totally off the mark. She said that the clock on the hillside is not a coincidence, as it nestles amongst the Thyme. It used to be the 2nd biggest clock in the world, after Big Ben.

Spook went up to Cardrona today and had a cool dude day of snowboarding. Very busy and sugary snow, but got loads of runs in. I will post his photo of the half pipe tomorrow, where the Burton Snowboarding Champs were going on.

I filled in a job application after work, as part of the coming home process. Spook was questioning the wisdom of such a move as he played in the sunshine!

Finn went off to Sam's house and refused to come home.

Meg came home from work full of the joys of life. As soon as she got to work, Cathy presented her with a piece of chocolate cake that she had kept in the fridge specially for her.

Dunedin is building a new stadium to replace Carisbrook. They are planning a Tattoo in the style of the Edinburgh one, to increase it's reputation as the Edinburgh of the South, and to help promote the new stadium. The only things that make Dunedin like Edinburgh are the street names - Princes St, George St, Murrayfield St (where Carisbrook the rugby stadium is), Costorphine, Musselborough. And there are a lot of Pipers there.

Spring must be here as the sheep have been sheared and the radio is advertising garden products. Wouldn't it be great if Spring came in the middle of February at home?

grateful for:

the simplicity of chopped purple onions in passata - don't ask me why, but I figure we need to get healthy and try and look like we have blossomed in New Zealand, with it's reputation for athleticism and healthy living. So I threw some alfalfa sprouts and mung beans in too. That may have something to do with why Finn refused to come home.