Rick, Nicky and Claire in NZ

We have had a pretty good week. Nicky has been busy at work without being utterly stressed. I have had Mac work on four of the five working days, though three of the jobs were only small ones. The weather has been mixed, with some rain and some sun, some warm bits and some chilly bits, but it has settled for the weekend and today has been more like summer than spring, even though summer doesn't officially start for another two months. We started watching The Story of England on Monday, which first caught our interest with being filmed in Kibworth, a village south of Leicester where I had a number of customers. Even though quite a lot of the history isn't new to us, seeing it through the history of once place looks interesting, so we will see how it develops. On Wednesday we had the first national earthquake practice, at 9.26am. We all had to drop, duck and hold, ie: get under a sturdy table to protect yourself from falling things. Even though I was at home alone, and ...

Here we are again dear reader, back to the normal single post this week. It has been more of a normal week too. Things have quietened down for Nicky at work, and I have had just a couple of Mac jobs. Lilly (our lovely little green VW Polo) had is 6-month service and WoF (Warrant of Fitness  ≈  MoT) on Monday. We only needed a new number plate light bulb for the warrant, and they didn't ring me about anything on the service, so I am hoping the bill (which I haven't had yet) which be much smaller than last time. On Tuesday I started the very exciting process of applying for NZ citizenship. The first step was to get some passport photos. This was much more fun that fiddling with a photo booth in Tescos. I went down to the New Lynn Post Shop (the NZ Post website having indicated that they have the equipment), and discovered they use a real camera! They have one of the teller stations set up just for taking passport photos. A curtain dropped down from the ceiling and a ...

It is a bonus week dear reader. In addition to the usual weekly post (see below), you are being treated to this extra succulent morsel as we have now been here five years. So, I thought it was time for a bit of reflection. The move from the UK to NZ has been more difficult than I think I expected, but I am not sure what I expected. I think the area which has been the most difficult is the cultural difference between the two countries. Having visited NZ in 1998 and enjoyed my stay, I didn't expect there to be a problem. Kiwi's speak a reasonably understandable form of English, and drive on the correct side of the road. On the whole the social and cultural mores reflect those of England (not surprising really). The devil, as they say, is in the detail, and it was not until I started living here and we were getting our lives organised that those differences started to become apparent to me. The differences are ones more of nuance, emphasis and perspective, as opposed to anyt...

So what have we been up to in this, our 259th week in NZ? Well for me it has been a case of from feast to famine work wise. I have only done two small Macs jobs, one of which was on the phone yesterday. This has given me plenty of chance to wash clothes, dry them, iron them, and do some shopping and cooking too. Excellent. I have also slipped in a quick visit to the Pah Homestead, the home of the Wallace Art collection. You may remember, dear reader, a few weeks ago I did a modelling session with a group of other naked people for a photographer. His entry into the Wallace competition had been accepted as one of the finalists and was on display at the homestead. This is the first time (that I am ware of) that any piece of art which has me in it has been exhibited. Personally I didn't care for the finished product, but then I find art very subjective. Should any of you want to pop a long to see the exhibition, it is on until November 11th. I have finally started walking my usua...

Spring is making its presence felt, with warmer days, torrential rain every so often, and some very strong winds. Even so, overall the weather has been pretty good with some good periods of sun. Work has been busy for me this week, by recent standards, which has been good. Claire popped over on Friday to deliver their old bread maker and have a quick massage before going off to work. I participated in the church Men's Group 8-ball competition on Friday night. I still prefer snooker to pool, but it was quite a good evening, and I even potted a few balls! I bought some 00 flour while shopping on Thursday and used it to make some pasta on Friday for a veggie cannelloni. 00 flour, as you may already know dear reader, is finer than standard flour, and it did seem to have a beneficial effect on the pasta. In with all this I still managed to a number of loads of washing this week, got it ironed, and emptied the airing cupboard, so from a laundry perspective, all is well with the wor...

I have had a bit of a technology week this week. Well, it was a technology day on Wednesday really, but I have been working up to it. My trusty white keyboard which I have since I don't know when, started to develop the odd slightly sticky key quite some time back. The very nice new wireless keyboard that Nicky bought to use with her iPad was just sitting on the shelf, as now she has got more used to the iPad's on-screen keyboard she doesn't use the wireless one. So, the obvious solution was for me to use the wireless one on my Mac mini. The problem was that my Mac mini doesn't have bluetooth (it added quite a bit to the price when I bought it), and because everything now has bluetooth, USB bluetooth adaptors are as rare as hens teeth. Then on Wednesday, when I met up with Claire to do some fathers day present shopping, we decided we need coffee and free muffins first, she reminded me that we got a USB bluetooth adaptor with her PhotoSmart printer. It might be worth t...