Busy Week

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 Monday started mildly with a bit of cloud and quickly developed into a lovely sunny day. I had arranged to meet Steve at Angel Louise in Raetihi, as he was in the area walking with friends over the weekend. We had decided to do the Taranaki Falls walk in the Tongariro National Park. Including stopping for me to take photos and having a bite of lunch, the looped walk took us 2¼ hours. It was really good. Great views, good variety of terrain, and just the right distance on the day, for both of us. 




I was home in time to spend an hour on the phone with a customer. While I was away Nicky continued working in the garden.


We had another pleasant start to the day on Tuesday, though it was cooler. It’s cheap tickets day on a Tuesday at our local cinema, so we headed into to town to see The Duke, with Helen Mirren and Jim Broadbent, and throughly enjoyed it. The film is based on the true story of the “theft” of the portrait of the Duke of Wellington in 1961. It was ransomed in order to highlight the difficulty faced by pensioners and war veterans in paying the TV licence fee. It was a well told story. Nicky had Life Group in the afternoon. We had been given lots of eggs, so we had omelettes for tea.


It was a mild and wet start that greeted us on Wednesday morning, but it dried up during the morning and it has stayed dry for the rest of the week. This has enabled Nicky to finish the bed in the south-west corner of the back garden and get started on digging the holes for the poles to support espalier trees. I dug the remaining two post holes for the retaining wall, fitted the posts and then attached the planking. Completing these tasks has given us both pleasure, but just to reinforce our progress I showed Nicky some photos of the state of the front and back gardens a year ago:






We had an unexpected phone call early on Thursday afternoon, from two Blockhouse Bay parishioners who were in town and wanting to catch up. We didn’t have time in the afternoon as Nicky had a Hospital Ophthalmology appointment. However we arranged for Ros and Lynn to come round on Friday morning after checking out of their motel. I hadn’t met them before, but they are a very nice couple. We had a good chat while consuming tea, coffee and freshly made scones. We look forward to seeing them again in the future.


Yesterday was busy with Nicky doing 4 loads of washing and me finishing the “construction” phase of the retaining wall. I made a fish pie before breakfast, because we had invited Frances round for dinner. We were expecting a warm day (which it was) so thought a cold main course would be good. Nicky made a pumpkin salad to accompany the remaining coleslaw from Friday, and it worked out very well. As Frances arrived I put an apple and plum jam (made by Frances) crumble together, as an excuse to have some custard. Like us, Frances enjoys a bit of yellow sauce.


Neither of us slept well last night. Nicky woke this morning feeling under the weather, with a scratchy throat, aching and headache. So missing church, she went off for a Covid test. Her result was negative, but she was given a couple of RAT kits with 5 tests in each, to use if symptoms persist, or I become unwell too. I had a gentle morning and Nicky has had a gentle day, though it did include ironing. In the afternoon I trimmed the garden and berm with our line trimmer. I started filling in the retaining wall trench prior to adding scoria and setting up the drainage.


Wednesday was an anniversary day for me - 25 years since officially going self-employed. Only three more to go!


Take care, Rick and Nicky.

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