Beyond COVID-19 NZ

Well, I did my online passport application yesterday - and today I get an email saying it's been completed and on its way to me!How speedy. And how ironic ... I can't actually travel overseas anywhere, but at least I'll have my passport in double quick time! So even though I can't go anywhere, I will be thrilled to have my new passport, that means I can travel as soon as travel can happen. Attended a funeral today for a 92yo man. A life well lived. Had been intending to go to Omaha but ended up not. A bit too much to do here. Brett and I went into the city for dinner at The Depot. It was very busy. We've eaten there quite a number of times through the years, and it's always good. Tonight was no exception. Ended up sharing a table with a lawyer from Hamilton that Brett knows through golfing circles - his wife had a conference in Auckland and it was a nice connection. Home by 9pm. SHARE-NOTE OF THE DAY More WOW photos ... This time from 2012 when, again, I had two

Sam's back in London after his short trip to Gran Canaria - and now he and Anna are in self-isolation along with the other couple they travelled with. Hmm, bad timing. They went away for a long weekend (had a great time by all accounts), and the rule came into effect while they were away - all travellers returning from Spain must self-isolate for 14 days. Bummer. Today I got to grips with MailChimp, did some emails, admin, updates and a bit of writing. And applied for my new Passport! Optimistic, I know, but I simply can't be Passport-less! I ought to have cleaned the floors but couldn't quite bring myself to do it! Tomorrow ... SHARE-NOTE OF THE DAY: WOW World of Wearable Arts show ... Cancelled this year, but I thought I'd reflect back on and share pics of some of the garments I've had in the show over the past decade (8 in total). I'll share a few today, and a few more over coming days. These two garments were in the 2011 show. Hayfever Gone Haywire 2011 (Ill

Day 51 of level 1 ... It's kind of a meaningless reference these days. No one refers to levels any more in NZ! We're just living life - a little differently. Eyes are turning to the NZ election, coming up on 19th September. Already, the political fisticuffs are out, and shambles is being well and truly spread across the floors of parliament for the unwary to slip on, slither over and end up in. Surely the slopes of parliament can't get any steeper or slipperier? But they will. Meanwhile, it's winter in NZ - and talking of slippery slopes ... people here have been enjoying the skifields which were very busy during the school holidays. There's plenty of snow in the south, but ideally more is required in the central North Island at Mt Ruapehu to get it up to full speed. Being a rocky volcano, the mountain needs good coverage to get fully operational. It's best for spring skiing, with bluebird days and corn snow, so patience is a virtue. Michael went down to ski Mt

Meetings, work, quiz. Oh dear, quiz was very hard tonight. We came third equal but not quite sure how. Not sure anyone did terribly well. There was a round about the 1970s - that's our "era of great memories" and we even fluffed up a few of those questions. Our memories weren't on form tonight! Oh well, it was a good night and we got to scoff lots of goodies thanks to the voucher we won last week. I think we learnt more than we knew tonight, although our score was better than we thought it was going to be. Not much to report so I'll share a couple of lovely photo of white lilies. These were taken at the Wintergarden hothouse in the Domain, almost ten years ago! Their shape had me mesmerised. When I was looking through old photos to find something nice to post today, I came across these - and it's actually very poignant because I found out today that the father of some friends of mine (brother and sister) died suddenly but peacefully at the weekend. I'd onl

Well ... best laid plans ... Sam and Anna thought they'd have a nice few days away in Gran Canaria (Spain), seeing they could finally travel out of UK and had previously had to cancel several trips due to Covid. Uh-oh - Spain's crazy Covid situation meant a new isolation rule came into effect over the weekend, while they're over there! This requires all travellers returning to the UK from Spain to self-isolate for 14 days. Gran Canaria may be an island off the coast of Africa, and not rife with Covid but, being part of Spain, they're grouped in. They've had a great time on the island - and say they felt much safer there than in London. But isolate they must.Bugger, bad timing. Go figure ... it's all nuts. Sam and Anna on Gran Canaria Meanwhile, London-based friends Jill and Peter who are spending a month in their second home in Mallorca (Spain) ... well, they'll be caught out too. The real problem here is that Jill's mum is not well and so, once they ret

Firstly apologies for yesterday's post which ended up to be a bit nonsensical. Not sure what happened to the images either. Blame it on the Batch 10 Honey Bourbon that we consumed as a nightcap! Lyle is the honey bourbon king, and we probably consumed more than we should have! This Batch 10 brew is locally produced and I'd bought a bottle at the Matakana market yesterday as a wee treat. Our sampling session last night proved it is indeed a very good drop! Just a bit too good! Anyway, I've now fixed the glitches with the post, added images and made some sense of the words!  This morning we sat outside on the deck - it was very pleasant, although every now and then a pesky cold wind would cause us to shiver.  I whipped up a big cooked breakfast  - well, brunch - and we ate that outside. Middle of winter, eating brunch outside - nice!  The baked beans soaked up the honey bourbon residue nicely! All of a sudden, the sun disappeared and the temperature dropped by about 5 degrees

Today, 25th July, is Mum's birthday. She would have turned 80 today. Instead of having a special birthday celebration, we just have memories. It's 13 years since she died.  Today - home stuff in the morning, trip to Matakana market, Vicki & Lyle came up to Omaha for the night.  We had some friends over. Toasted mothers in heaven. A lovely evening, mostly sitting outside, believe it or not. Our outdoor heater works brilliantly. Brett had gone back to Auckland to play golf for the afternoon, came back up to Omaha later in the evening.  This is a photo of an artwork I did not long after Mum died; it's called Mother and Daughters.  Mother & Daughters SHARE-NOTE OF THE DAY: Mothers and daughters ... I only have sons, but as a daughter, I came to understand so much more about that mother/daughter bond when I became a mother myself. A beautiful dusk tonight, with a bright crescent moon ...  View from the deck

Just a short post today. Brett played golf at Tara Iti Golf Course - he came home raving about it. I did some writing and other work.  It was another "10 seasons in one hour" sort of day - either howling a gale or as calm as anything; blue sky or black rainclouds.  Went for a walk to the beach early afternoon during a blue sky phase; it was warm and lovely down there, no wind. Went for a wander, then headed home - and just in the nick of time, as a huge black cloud came over and dropped rain just as I got there. I made a batch of caramalised red onions. And then made a French onion style soup with some of them, and a fresh stock I made last night after lamb shanks.  Dinner sorted. Yum! SHARE-NOTE OF THE DAY: Watched The Mallorca Files tonight for the firs time; a new cop show set on the island of Mallorca. The main characters - British female, German male - are total opposites who go about solving mysteries in lovely locations around the island! Elen Rhys is brilliant as the

Busy morning working through stuff, mostly on the computer. I've been doing so much on the computer lately that my shoulders are feeling aggrieved!  I even gave the house a quick vacuum today (so boring but utterly necessary!) I went to the garage to pack up my car (to head to Omaha) - honestly, the garage was a shambles. It is quite full of boxes of my various WOW garments through the years, but somehow or other they had all toppled over and were all over the place. It wasn't like that yesterday! I'm not sure how this came to pass - whether this was on account of some wayward cat that got trapped in the garage, or Michael who came to get his ski gear last night!  Whatever, it simply couldn't stay in such a shambles, so I set to work to sort it out. By the time I'd moved boxes, picked up sports gear all over the show, chucked rubbish stuff, rearranged "keep" things in better order, I was sweating and exhausted. Even though the day was actually freezing.  D

What a wild windy day it was today! And freezing, especially with the wind chill factor. Spent the morning in my office working away on one thing and another. There is a never-ending "to do" list that is purely work-related in some capacity - a project, a job, a role that I'm involved with. Just when I think I'm getting on top of things, another ten "to-dos" come along! At times it feels overwhelming - but a steady ship and unflustered captain should reach its destination. Then of course there are the housework and messages to-dos ... Mid-afternoon I headed up to Remuera to pick up some shoes I'd had repaired. They looked as good as new, excellent. It's kind of weird and ironic that the carpark above the shoe repair shop has some of the most expansive views of Auckland city and its volcanoes! Auckland city over yonder, from Remuera I also whipped into the photo shop to get a Passport photo taken as my passport expires on 13th August this year. Whilst

What a stunning morning at Omaha! I had a haircut booked for 10am in Matakana and my initial intention had been to pack up, get my hair cut and continue back to Auckland straight after. But this day was too good to leave. So I did a bit of a cleanup, but not a packup, as I decided I'd return to Omaha after said haircut and go for a beach walk before heading back to the city. Had my hair cut by the lovely Amy at Matakana Hair Co (very pleased with it!) and headed back to Omaha. En route, I made an impromptu decision to take a drive out to the Tawharanui Peninsula to take a look at some of the little beaches and bays. It's been ages since I did that. First, I grabbed a coffee from Brambles Cafe at Matakana Country Park - it was heaving, good to see. This park is great, with all sorts of activities for kids, including a mini-train and a fantastic playground. Note the "worm" in the foreground!! On the drive out to the peninsula, I stopped and took some photos of the scene