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today i went to Waiheke Island which used to be an old hippy commune type place about 35 minutes by boat away from Auckland.  work chartered a boat to take us all over there which was jolly good.  although it was very windy so quite choppy

a bus then took us to a vineyard where we had to do various team building activities such as ‘get the team up the vineyard as far as possible in 5 minutes’ and ‘roll the very heavy barrel round an obstacle course’

 

we then did some wine and beer tasting

before doing some archery (did no one think that might be a bad idea ?)

i was a bit rubbish at archery on my first go, but managed to shoot the balloon stuck in the middle on my second go

there was some jucky guess the food game which involved toilet lids and buckets.  no pleasant. 

but our team excelled in the catapult an egg game

 

we saw a man walking a horse down the street

and went for a fantastic meal in a restaurant which served our food much faster than the place the night before

although weirdly the food had froth on it

perhaps that’s one disadvantage of having the dish washer upperer so close to the kitchens on a windy day ?

 

then it was back on the bus to get the ferry back to Auckland

 

here’s the view of Auckland looking back from the restaurant roof

the girls had their swimming lessons after school then we all went to a visit a family who live about 20 minutes away who jane has met via some running connection.  they were great fun and we ended up staying well past 10.30pm which is very late for our girls who have orchestra tomorrow morning

 

here’s an insect which fell on the table next to a piece of onion.

well, what a day.  i met a work chum at 8am and we wandered to a nearby cafe for breakfast.  the waitress offered us a seat which turned out to be seated next to my boss.  small world etc.  (so we sat on the opposite side of the cafe instead!).

after that the rest of the day was spent listening to some rather good (and one spectacularly bad) presentations. 

after lunch Simon, Sasha and I did our long awaited, long prepared presentation on our experiences as the new boys in the department.  i think it went down ok, we certainly got loud laughs in all the right places !

and it was nice for me as abbie, who was the person i used to work with in the UK and who played a big part in lining up the job for me at telecom, presented just before our slot. (abbie is one of the two or three local people who read this blog).

at the end of the day we went to a local restaurant which was then filled with 90 lawyers and other hanger-ons.  unfortunately the food didn’t quite arrive by the time i got my bus home at 9.30pm.  oh well.

and in musical news the girls had their first violin lessons with their new teacher.  all good i think and kezia was even inspired to do extra practice this evening when she got home.

anyway, tomorrow we’re off to a nearby island for team building fun and another meal.  i have to say i’m really looking forward to that.  we have to be at the pier for 8.30am or we’ll miss the boat.  the sign above is on a wall near the warf.

jane and i have been married 14 years today.  hoorah !

i celebrated by going out for a meal with my work colleagues where i was haunted by signs of love such as heart shaped chocolates, heart shaped carrots and even a love based mirror in the gents toilets

 

jane was originally going to be out tonight too which is why i went to the dinner, but in the end stayed at home

jane went out for a run with her friend up/down the road extra early this morning and then i went in to town to meet a friend from church for breakfast at 7.30am. 

he’s an ex-Brit and about 10 years further on in terms of life stage than us and we chatted until 8.30 when he had to go to work (my meeting started at 9.30 just round the corner from the caff).  his wife then turned up and we chatted for further 30 minutes, during which time she mentioned she had a holiday cottage on a nearby island which we were welcome to explore …   so that was time well spent !

meanwhile jane went to a church music thing for kids which she enjoyed.  so that was good too.

did we miss pancake day by the way ? 

 

just after posted the day’s blog yesterday i walked in the bedroom and found this giant cricket thing wandering about

on closer inspection it revealed itself to be a ‘katydid’  which is a new zealand bush cricket.  it’s common in gardens, eats foliage and, according to one website i read, ‘makes a feeble chirp in the evening’.

 

anyway, it caused such a kerfuffle with the olds that esther and kezia came through to investigate with their beetle spotting jars which have proved incredibly useful since moving in to this beastie ridden part of the world.   we did like this chap though.  even more so when we discovered he has ears by his front knees !

and in non-bug news it’s been a medical day.

jane went to the opticians which were very modern and very friendly.  she can reclaim about a third of her year’s contact lens costs from a medical thing i signed up to at work which is good.  she said she had a photo taken of the back of her eye and all is in order.

 

and esther went to the school dentist.  school kids get free checkups and work down, and all kids are seen in the course of a year i think.  there’s a dentist surgery actually at the school which is a good way of making it less scary.  All was well with esther too.

after school they went tennis-ing which was inside today because it’s been raining.

apologies in advance if family blogging is a little random the next day or two as i’ve got work things in the evening.  so don’t panic if there’s radio silence.

see yas

i asked jane if she would do the family blog today because she’d had a busier day than me.  we compared notes and i ended up writing it.

so … i went to work, came home, then went for an hour long stomp round the neighbourhood with Warren, who is the husband of one of Jane’s good friends and lives down our street.  i’ve never had a friend who lives on the same street as me (i’m sure brother edd will correct me if i’m wrong but i think that’s true) so that was very good.   we talked about spreadsheets and databases and geocaching.  you know.  proper man stuff.

work was busy as i’ve been preparing three presentations.  one tomorrow for some exec types, one for thursday which is the triple bill with two of my work colleagues, and one for my boss next week.

the one for thursday has become particularly irksome as the three of us have our own opinion on how it should go, and one chap reordered all the slides over the weekend which was a bit of a pain.  luckily we get on well enough to express our annoyance in non-threatening ways 🙂

i’ll let you know how they all go.

meanwhile the girls went to school and jane went to the supermarket, did some skyping to good friends back in the UK and met up with friends here (Warren’s wife actually) during the day.

and in toastie news i went to a different cafe today. i ordered ham and cheese, but got ham, tomato and cheese.  that really messes up the stickiness of a toastie as well as the thermal properties.  and the woman behind the counter screamed in korean at her poor husband (*) for the 5 minutes it took me to eat through the lava-like slimey crusty sandwich.  i’ll not be going there again.

any toastie news you’d like to share with us ?  if so, you know the address !

 

(*) nationality and relationship are assumed and may not be accurate

i was on church sound this morning.  that meant being at church from 7am to nearly 1pm, but i very much enjoyed of it.  and a few of the music leaders commented on my ‘nice mix’ so i felt like it was a job well done.

here are some things esther made in her sunday club.  they do learn about God and that, but the crafting things aren’t associated with the learning, so please don’t assume we got to a church which is of the ‘jolly Cyclops’ school of theology.

 

whilst i was doing sound at the second service, jane the girls went round to Tracey’s house.  When i’d finished the pack away i joined them and we had lunch and cheese cake.  the message today was about hospitality so it was great to be on the receiving end straight away

this evening we went to the millennium pool to watch esther’s first game of flippa ball.  i bit like netball in water with goals instead of hoops.

 

esther was number 7 and here’s a photo taken by kezia of her in action.  her team lost 00-09 but she still loved it and said on the way home she wished the next game was tomorrow rather than next Sunday

and of course today was valentines day so we did some good card receiving

i think esther must have forgotten as she disappeared for a few minutes then came back with a three cards without envelopes and said “here you are, these are from me”.  She’s keeping the mystery alive !

 

we’re been in New Zealand exactly 4 months today, so we thought we’d have a day out.  the forecast was rain so we went to the hot pools that we’d been to at the end of our first week here

this time i was a bit braver with my camera, not least because other people were taking photos.  here’s kezia whizzing out of a flume called Bob’s Mistake

we were in the pool complex for a good 4 hours.  it only cost $30 for the day to get in (about £15) plus another $5 for the locker

the place itself has the feel of a faded seaside town lido and is a collection of half a dozen different pools ranging from low 30degreesC to 40something i think (the lava pool).  it’s fed with water from the actual ground, and mixed with cold water to get the right temperature

it’s also got some very dodgy looking flumes, and the floor is made up of really sharp stones stuck in to the concrete which really hurt my feet, but the girls were fine as their feet have hardened up nicely.

before we went swimming we had a picnic by the sea and greatly enjoyed watching this mean bird stomping around with his feathers all ruffed up and his head tucked back.  i think he was working on behalf of the council as he drove all the other seagulls away one at a time and was really funny to watch.  we nicknamed his ‘meany red legs’

and here’s another massive beach we we’ve yet to explore.  people are worried that this beach is going to turn in to a Bondi Beach type thing with topless sunbathing beauties and life guards in bikinis.    However, that’s thought to be highly unlikely as i think 90% of the population is retirees.  And they don’t look so good in bikinis (although that’s mostly their beachwear of choice it seems).

we also did a few geocaches around and about.

in other news i’ve been in big pain today due to having about 20 mosquito bites on my hands, legs, feet and neck.  they’ve all been throbbing in unison which has at least meant i’ve been able to keep track of my heart beat.  i looked at whether i could up my dose of antihistamines but i’m already taking twice the amount i should be (ooops).  The breed their mozzies vicious over here.

 

toodle pipkins !  dave

very busy day at work for me today which is good, but meant i only ate chocolate all day until i finally got to buy a sandwich from the local garage at 3pm ! i’m living the dream …

the girls had a good day at school. kezia went to a friend’s pool party after school and then esther and kezia went for their swimming lessons.

This evening we’ve had a couple from church round for a dinner.  i got a few more mozzy bites to add to my collection.  so i think i may need to chop my other arm now too.  I see they’ve even started advertising Immigration Blood so stay-at-home mozzies can still enjoy a decent meal.

the forecast predicts rain all weekend.  oh well.

it was windy yesterday so lots of the giant (about a metre in girth) Chinese new years lanterns fell on to the street.  this one fell in shrubbery by the petrol station near my office (my office is in the background with the big telecom spark on the top).

i’ve been really busy at work which is good.  i’ve been volunteered to repeat a presentation i gave with two colleagues just before Christmas at our away day next week.  some of the company big wigs will be there.  the presentation is basically the three of us talking about random things to lots of random funkypancake pictures.  last time we presented it to an audience of three.  this time it’ll be to 90 lawyers. roll on next Thursday …

And bus fairs are to go up.  it’ll soon cost me $10 for a return trip to work (up from $9.40).  The public car park near my office charges $7 a day for parking.  no wonder everyone drives everywhere.

And in media news there’s a debate going on via the national paper about whether it’s time for New Zealand to change its flag and get rid of that funny mini-flag it has in the top right hand corner which represents long gone days of the empire.  apparently people get the NZ and Australian flag confused.  how about you ?  see if you can draw the NZ flag.  Then the Australia flag.  how did you get on ?  Apparently even some Australian official got confused at some important international event and picked up the NZ flag to wave.

that’s enough flag news.

this is a Christmas tree in the street near my office.  nice how it’s all drying out and turning brownie red.

this evening i went to a worship group meeting at church.  it was really good.  they’re going to experiment a bit more this year which should be fun.  And i got volunteered to do sound on Sunday.  so much for my probation period !

the girls had a good day at school, jane spent most of the day with various different friends including meeting a lady who is over here on a scouting trip to see if she wanted to emigrate.  It’s funny that we were doing that 10 months ago and now we’re the old timers.  jane also went along to an open evening / meet the teacher type thing at the school which was jolly good.

apologies about the picture to word ratio today.  it’s all wrong.

see ya

Hello, my turn to do the blog today, but I have nothing to say, so here is a picture of a mannequin in the mall in the window of the $5 shop. This morning  I went shopping in the mall and then in the supermarket. This afternoon I prepared the dinner and tidied the house. After school we went to a chum’s for afternoon tea and then we went to a beach because Kezia needed some shells for something she is doing at art club tomorrow. We have just had home group here and 2 new people came.

You may have heard Dave being interviewed on good old Radio Berkshire this morning UK time. He was talking about moving abroad. I hope someone who knows us happened to hear it.

Toodle pip