Festival Part 3

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Nicky has been at home all week, with an upper respiratory tract infection and laryngitis. She started feeling under the weather at the end of the previous working week and over the weekend, but by Monday morning was really not well so went up to the doctor. He signed her off until Thursday/Friday, gave her antibiotics and told her to stop taking - like that was going to happen (apparently she hasn’t said as much as she would have done if it were not for this instruction!). She was back at the doctors again on Thursday after a very poor night on Wednesday. He signed her off again until next Wednesday. The infection has given her a very bad cough, and bouts of coughing leading to vomiting. In addition, the antibiotics have caused havoc with her intestines and she is rushing to the toilet every few minutes. The net result has been very little sleep, which hasn’t helped her recovery. She has been better this weekend but is still far from well enough to return to work.

It has been the final weekend of the Heritage Festival. We only had two things planned, the fist of which was one of our “major” events (because it involved food) and Nicky missed out on them both. I had booked for brunch and a tour of the Pah Homestead. As it was all paid for and I didn’t want to waste the second ticket, I offered it to some of the folks at my MeetUp group on Thursday evening, and Kelly accepted. The brunch of eggs Benedict on bagels was as good as I expected, though could have been hotter, and there was loads of coffee. The tour guide was George, who works for the Council and is very involved in all their building restorations. He was our guide when we went round the Civic some years ago, and is excellent. The Pah has changed a bit since I was last there, and there are big plans afoot in the grounds. We got to see areas when the public are not normally allowed, and also went up the turret which is just brilliant. Kelly and I had a coffee afterwards before going our separate ways, which for me was to Jellicoe Park in Onehunga for a presentation at The Blockhouse on Auckland Place names. This was very interesting, though the speaker had quite a lot to get through so spoke quite quickly. It was a shame that Nicky didn’t make it to our closing events, but it has again been a very enjoyable festival. It one of those things that we feel make Auckland such a great place to live.

The weather has been improving this week, with more sunshine and slightly warmer temperatures, though the wind has still been cool. I did a major session of cooking on Monday afternoon, making a large lasagne and a smoked fish pie. On Tuesday evening I went to see Shani’s play -  a reworking of the SuperMan story with songs, dance, and Christmas Cracker style jokes. On Wednesday evening we watched The Dark Horse on DVD, based on the true story of a talented but mentally challenged man from Gisborne. Work has been feast and famine this week - Wednesday very busy and then today busy upgrading two machines ready to take back fist thing tomorrow. I also have a book to finish which has to be back tomorrow, and some sleep to get in before breakfast, so I will say good night!


Take care, Rick

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