Rick, Nicky and Claire in NZ

Saturday was a significant day: Election Day, the first actual day of spring in terms of the equinoxes, and the beginning of daylight saving. The week has really been dominated by the General Election. The polls has the two main parties, Labour and National (the incumbents) very close, so the final result was a bit of a disappointment for those wanting change. National got the greatest proportion of the vote, but not large enough to form a government outright. Labour and two minor parties (Green and NZ First) got enough together to just form a government, but now much negotiating will take place as NZ First may also get together with National. However, not all the votes have been counted. The result of the 340,000 special votes won’t be known until October 7th, and this could affect the proportions of the party votes enough to change the basis of any negotiation. Even though Saturday was Election Day, we have had Advanced Polling Booths as they are known here open for two weeks pr...

Thursday of this week was our tenth anniversary of arriving in New Zealand. In order to celebrate, Nicky and I went out for dinner and Claire went out for lunch with a friend in Dunedin. In some respects we don’t seem to have been here for very long, but it feels like a long time since we left England. Much has happened. Claire has got a degree, and job, the Ryan and moved to Dunedin. Nicky has worked in more libraries than she did in her 30 years in England (I think), and I have had a job, qualified as a massage therapist, and set up in business as a freelance Mac support technician again. We are in our second rented home, onto our second car, and Claire and I have had to renew our driving licences. I have got my citizenship, a New Zealand passport, and two pairs of spectacles. Nicky has got hearing aids and Claire has acquired a cat. We have voted in three general elections (fourth one next week) and been to some beaches. We have walked up volcanoes, Claire has seen the effects ...

Even though Monday was one of Nicky’s new weekend days, it was very busy for both of us. I had a number of work commitments and Nicky spent all day cooking making Alpha desserts (a small one for us) and a lovely beef casserole for us. The rest of the week has been a pretty normal working week for both of us. Much of mine has been spent on a couple of machines at home because of them needing a full rebuild. Nicky’s work routine has also changed a little with her now doing a late duty every Thursday as opposed to every other Thursday. I took Dawn our landlady to Greenlane Clinic for a short visit on Tuesday, passed my eye test on Friday, and had a good evening out at Deep and Meaningful. The weather has been changeable and often wet and stormy, and the weekend has been much cooler with winds coming off the Antarctic.  Following on from my technology upgrade last week, Nicky’s new iPad arrived this week. Her old one has provided sterling service but its wireless netwo...

I have had the week without my Mac mini, but do not worry Dear Reader as I have backup technology to keep me going. It has spent most of its week travelling down to Dunedin and then back again so that Ryan could install a solid state drive for me. With that and some additional RAM the performance has significantly improved. This has also been good test of my disaster recovery plans which I have modified a little in light of the experience. Work was quiet for me at the beginning of the week then busy at the end. Nicky and I had a late breakfast on Monday, a walk in Archibald Park (they haven’t started installing the boardwalk yet) and started a small (450 piece) jigsaw. Nicky had a church meeting in the evening. Nicky has had another good week at work and did a swapped late duty on Thursday. I had Tuesday evening out at a “Raising the Bar” event, which is a week of talks given in pubs and bars by staff from the University of Auckland. I had chosen “Getting into space: how hard ...