An Atmospheric Experience

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Even though it feels like it has been a busy week, I don't have notes of our having done much. I spent quite a bit of the beginning of the week finishing off my last newsletter for the camera club. Claire has been revising and doing two exams, so she hasn't been at Whitcoulls (one of the exams was on Saturday). She has spent most of the week at Ryan's; coming over on Monday so show me his new car, and then for dinner on Thursday, partially because I was cooking roast chicken and Yorkshire puds.


We have been quite occupied with road works for most of the week. All the paths on our street are being replaced, and this has meant there have been periods when we couldn't get the car up the drive, so we have been parking at our landlords house on Donovan Street, which backs onto us. As Murphy's law would have it, this was when we had the worst of the weather this week and were not able to benefit from the shelter which our integral garage provides.


General Election campaigning is now in full swing, and Nicky and I watched the two main party leaders debate on Monday evening.


I went to see one of my fellow students from the massage course on Tuesday to get some treatment on my back which really helped. It isn't quite back to normal yet but it is improving every day and I am sleeping better.


Nicky has been as busy as ever at work, but it has not be quite as eventful as last week. I have had a bit of Mac work, some of which was today for one of the life drawing tutors that I sit for.


Our most exciting day of the week was yesterday (Saturday). Nicky had arranged for us to go on a behind the scenes tour of the Civic Theatre in town. These are rare events - just 5 tours this year, all this weekend. There are a similar number mid-next year, and all of them are already fully booked. I was absolutely stunned which I went to the Civic for the first time during the film festival. It is very highly decorated with intricate plaster work everywhere. We learnt yesterday that it is what is know as an "atmospheric theatre". These were in fashion as cinemas in the 1920's, especially in the USA, but there are only a handful left in the world in anything like a decent state of repair. The aim is for the venue itself to be as entertaining as the show you are going to see, and to create an illusion of being in a "different world". The Civic certainly achieves that. A couple of years back Auckland Council completed a $42 million upgrade of the theatre, recreating the original decor and adding a complete modern theatrical stage to complement the film screen capability. The story of the build and recent restoration was fascinating. Details like the fact that stars in the auditorium ceiling do now depict constellations in the southern sky, and each of the fibre optics creating the star's are labelled on the top side of the ceiling with their astronomical reference data. It can seat around 3000 people depending upon the stalls configuration, and has a range of function rooms which are available for hire. It was a very interesting, informative and entertaining tour, which lasted 3.5 hours.


We had taken a picnic lunch with us which we ate by the beach at Judges Bay, as we were heading next to the Rose Festival in the Parnell Rose Gardens, which are next to Judges Bay. It rained while we were eating our sandwiches, but by the time we had finished our fruit the sun had dried us out. Nicky was disappointed how few roses were in bloom, but she enjoyed the live music and dance.


We got back home and started preparing four ducks for dinner, as we had invited friends John and Jan, Russell and Robyn, Tom and Valder over. Tom and Russell didn't make it, and the others brought more food with them than we were expecting, so we had a good feed, a good evening, and quite a lot of leftovers.


We have had a quieter day today. I got a couple of loads of washing dry before the rain set in this afternoon and I went off to work. Nicky has been pottering around doing various household chores. The weather has been warmer this week and we had taken the top quilt off our bed. We have now changed the duvet for our summer one and put the quilt back on as it is still cool some nights.


That's all for now,

Take care,

Rick

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