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quite a busy day at work for me today which was good, then home and out to MOB (Men Only Business) at church.  that’s the men’s group.  now it’s now. 

the picture is of a kiwi vagrant camping out under an umbrella.

i think jane and the girls have had a much more exciting day so i’ll get jane to write a bit more below

Well today the girls had mufti day at school. It was also crazy hat day. Kezia had a custom made hat. I meanwhile went running with the super fit ladies, but there was a new friend of theirs who I met for the first time today and she was a bit slower than me, so that was great. We had a little dip in the sea half way round as it may be the last time this year.

I had lunch with some other friends in Devonport, where we had been for an explore last week-end. After swimming, the girls and I went to see Joseph with my friend Fleur and her daughter Evie. It was a school production and very good. And I found my way home in the dark without even using the satnav.

See ya

so that’s it for our rotorua away trip.  quite an amazing place and one we’re sure to go back to.  and if/when you come to visit you must go too !

and as a finale, here are all the comedy mirror pictures from the rotorua museum reflection exhibition

not much to report today, so here’s a picture of some jandals on the beach.

esther has to meet and greet some japanese visitors at school tomorrow.  i saw an old lady shouting at pies in a cafe and jane bought some spray to kill bugs at my request.

oh, and we’re still trying to let out our UK house from end of May, so all prayers gratefully received

as this has been such a boring update (except the picture above which was from our holiday), i’ll post the comedy mirror pictures from a science exhibition we went to in Rotorua.  stand by

quite an amazing journey in to work this morning flitting through patches of fog or mist or something.

it was sitting all wispy around Albany where we live and looked quite weird at the bus station.  then it all cleared up until we went over the bridge. which made for a rather strange view from outside my office.  rather like the clouds had dropped out the sky and landed in the harbour.

i applied for my NZ driving licence today.  jane did hers a couple of weeks ago and now has her plastic version, so there was no excuse.  the whole thing took about 10 minutes.  it involved my passport, a utility bill, my UK driving licence plastic card, looking down a plastic tube as part of a live eye test (you could wear glasses) and a quick photo (i was told i could smile if i wanted.  i didn’t).  and that was that !

meanwhile jane went in to church for her first helping out thing which turned out to be nice timing as today was someone’s last day so she got free cake.   actually i got free cake today too as someone was celebrating their 35th year at Telecom.

girls had a nice time at school and this evening esther’s spent an hour or so helping kezia on her school project which she’s doing in powerpoint.

and we’re now all rushing around getting ready for our home group who are coming in 15 minutes.  we perhaps suggests i should be helping somewhere…  oops.   see ya

well, it felt a lot more autumnal today.  not just because a bit of a breeze earlier today brought quite a few leaves down.

but also because it chucked it down with rain

 

i went for a walk at lunchtime before the rain started. i’d just crossed over a busy road in a residential area and a little old lady hobbled over to me.   she gestured me over and i was expecting her to ask me to help her cross the road or something.  instead she said ‘would you like to buy a hat. they are 2 dollars’ (ie about 1 pound).

i thought, why not ?  so here’s the hat i bought for 2 dollars off a strange lady in quiet residential street by a busy intersection.

 

just after i bought it, it chucked it down with rain.  that’s weird isn’t it.  And it’s comedy hat day for the girls on Friday so that’s good timing.

 

and here’s another thing – it’s a sign outside a record shop which has lyrics of the day.  yesterday it was Falco’s Amadeus.

meanwhile jane went to a shopping centre with friends and the girls had a tennis lesson in the rain.

the last day of our holiday started off with the kids throwing themselves in the motel pool for an hour.

i was supervising by sitting on a sun lounger reading the sunday papers

then we loaded up the car and headed off to a beach which was on the way home.  as we arrived it started raining so we did a geocache instead

there were some very cool shells on the beach

amazingly you didn’t even need to hold them up to your ear to hear the sea

because the sea was just next to where they were

we then stopped somewhere else for lunch and finally arrived at Ngatea Water Gardens early afternoon.

it’s difficult to describe what this place is.  it’s definitely a nice garden with a big pond and a good wander.  but what makes it so fantastic is all the great signage and visual jokes all over the place

one thing this garden has which many others don’t is a can museum.  that’s right.  i can museum.  as in ‘beer can’.  over 10,000 of them. all in a room behind glass.  each of them different.   i loved it of course and there are a few more pictures in the slideshow below

 

i deliberately haven’t shown you all the pictures of all the jokes in the gardens as it’d spoil it for when you come to visit.  it is great !

once we’d seen everything we loaded back in to the car for the final hour and a half drive back to home, having had a really rather excellent holiday !

Took the car for its WOF today. That’s warrant of fitness. And a service. I did some speed grocery shopping, helped in Kezia’s class and met a friend for coffee. After school we went to collect the car, then to the post office and then to the library, where Esther picked up a leaflet for a competition. Came home and worked hard over some of the answers. Dave and I have watched a film and now I must finish my short term loan library book to avoid even heftier fines.

Good night

church today was followed by a quick dash in to the village for the ANZAC day service.  Esther is a school leader so needed to be there to help lay the flowers. 

it was in the local community hall which made for some great signage.  And it was really busy so we had to stand all the way through.  still, it was a lot warmer than the Rememberance day services in the UK !

after the service there were big sponge cakes and sandwiches with the crusts cut off.

we didn’t eat any, but instead we went back to some friends’ house for pizza and chatting.  both of which were jolly good.

 

after that we drove down to Devonport and had a walk along the beach

it’s still really warm – the car said 26degC, although it started to cool off later.  it was still warm enough to justify an ice-cream though !

that thing above is not an ice-cream.  it’s a tree weta which was splatted on a footpath we walked down. 

and just as we nearly got back to the car this giant cruise ship (seen in yesterday’s bus photo) came round the corner.

this evening i went out to the first of four seminars on the life of Paul.  this picture was taken before everyone turned up.  i sat on a sofa which was nice.  and the seminar was excellent !

by the way, i’ve still got one more day of easter holiday photos to show you – hopefully i’ll get them up this week.

highlight for me today was seeing Rhys Darby in a sort of live radio show which was very excellent.  i ended up sitting on the front row with the various guests of the show.  along the way i also got to hold what might have actually have been a yeti poo (still awaiting confirmation from the DNA labs in New Zealand apparently).

the show was a live version of the radio show about Cryptozoology ie the study of mysterious animals like the yeti and the loch ness monster etc.  which is a nice link to this which the girls found and caught in our spare room this morning.  i took a few pictures of it and then the girls threw it outside.

i thought i’d see if i could find out what sort it was to impress you with and it turns out it’s one of New Zealand’s only dangerous spider – the White-tailed spider (the other is more dangerous, and this one causes bites more like ) .  It’s an Australian import originally.

you can read more about these beasties here.  i think we’re going to get some bug-bomb tomorrow which takes a chemical approach to beast control. 

anyway, the day started with jane leaving the house very early for a walk with Biffy.  by the time she got home the girls had got up and skyped my mum, and then we all went off to the girl’s violin orchestra thing.  They thought this might be the last one as the teacher is quite rubbish and they aren’t enjoying it, but they thought they’d give it one more go.  it turned out it was worth going as their old teacher has left and they might actually get someone quite good.  we’ll have to see …

meanwhile jane and i went to a cafe for our saturday morning date.  the chap behind the counter said the cake jane had was a poison berry so we went for that.  (it was actually a boysenberry).

 

then after their lesson we dropped their violins at home and went to Takapuna.  After a wander round the posh shops we bought some food which we ate down by the beach.    If you are a pensioner you can get a free cup of tea with your pie.  hoorah.

after Takapuna the girls went swimming and i headed in to town to see the show.

this evening there’s been jigsawing and rummikubbing

things really are the wrong way up down here.  for example warning signs written on the street are written to be read as you approach them driving down the street.

so there are signs saying ‘down slow’.   sometimes they can be read either way like this one and it all gets very confusing.

anyway, it was friday so that’s a casual clothes day, which means trainers, blue jeans and a black t-shirt.  them’s the (unwritten) rules. and seeing as i wear trainers, friday is the day i try to commute without the car by walking the 30 minutes to the bus station.  which is what i did today.

meanwhile esther and her friend sunny had a nice job being the receptionists at school whilst the paid receptionists had morning tea in the staff room.  it was left to esther and her chum to answer the phone !  They were also briefed to take any ill children to the sick bay, although they weren’t allowed to put any plasters on or give kids medicines.  Esther said that was just as well as she didn’t want to anyway.   All went well.  3 phone calls, no sick kids.

jane had a church ladies group round this morning and then had lunch with a jolly chum (the one who is best friends with the person i used to sit next when i worked for Sky) and generally had a nice time.

very full day tomorrow including me going to see one of my comedy heroes in action …