Meddling with Mediocrity

So it's been a while since I wrote a proper entry about my life - hopefully you have enjoyed the variety and change of scenery, I certainly have.

It appears the last entry dealing with my doings was in late February.

Well as you may have gathered from the title of that entry, it was a really hot long Summer, which was nice, as my Summers for the last few years had been pretty average. Mid-March the Hamilton Gardens had an Italian festival, which was nice, especially with the hot weather, made it all the more genuine.

Later that week I had an audition for Footrot Flats - The Musical. I subsequently got a part in it as Boris the Boar, and late in the second act, as the man. Since late April we have had rehearsals 3 nights a week, so I have been kept busy with that.

We had our stocktake at work prior to Easter which was OK, best thing was the food Mum & Dad put on for lunch.

Suzanne, Bevan, & I also went to Stations of the Cross at Hamilton Gardens around that time, which was good.

Easter I ended up just going to Papamoa with the family and chilling out, despite my big ideas about going up the Coromandel, or kayaking down the Waikato river, because I figured I'd left both too late to organise, and with the river I'd require a support crew (and Mum and Dad would be at the beach).

Mid April I did a walk along the rivers at Ngaruawahia, with some people I had previously climbed the Hakarimatas with. That was quite interesting, and not so tiring.

Around that time I went to a couple of seminars through work which was nice, made me feel valued and professional again.

Queen's Birthday weekend I didn't get up to much either, Suzanne and Bevan were moving out of their house, so I helped a little with that.

This weekend was the Annual Agricultural Field days. I enjoyed it, and ended up spending over $300. I had been keen for a while to get a decent pair of steel cap boots for work. Similarly I had toyed with the idea of a camelbak for a while. Later on when I came across the Kukri stall I decided to bite the bullet and get a Waikato jersey, as it would be nice to have something to wear to a rugby game etc, and the Waikato jersey I have now is from when I was 14, and about 71kg, so it is rather skintight at the moment.

So, for the near future - is mainly my play coming up. Once that is over I intend thinking bigger picture, getting serious about getting healthy, sorting out a trip somewhere, and moving out of home, either going flatting, or buying. At the moment I'm in a prison of indecision, and I have a London-sized chip on my shoulder.

My Travel Bucket list

This one has literally been in the pipeline for a while, I just haven't gotten around to finishing it off and making it look pretty etc. A while back I thought I would construct my Travel wish list, so I have a reference for when I am older and forgetful, or for the nearer future when I have started to forget all my great plans.

Britain
It's no secret that I want to go back to England, and especially to check out Cornwall, which I raved on and on about doing when I finished my contract at the Crown Prosecution Service, which then subsequently didn't finish until it was too cold at the end of November 2010. Since then of course I have looked into my family history, and have discovered some of my ancestors came from Cornwall, as well as Dorset, and namely Cerne Abbas - which I would have travelled to in transit there as I knew of the Cerne Abbas Giant, a giant sketch of well, a giant on the side of a hill, (the chalk underneath the soil providing the white outline. 

The Cerne Abbas Giant, Cerne Abbas, Dorset
Courtesy of http://www.dorset.net/

When I manage to find the map of South West England that I longingly looked at, I shall scan it and put it up here, and you'll see why I was so eager, and why I thought it was so possible.

Of course all the other places my ancestors came from, such as Yorkshire, Ayrshire, Dumfries, Lincolnshire, North Wales, and Norfolk.

Kayak the canals
After watching one of the many documentaries on Sky, I am even more keen to explore the canals of Britain, especially when you see things like this - that is an aqueduct people - that isn't a train, that is a canal boat!

Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, Llangollen Canal
Photo Courtesy of http://canalrivertrust.org.uk/

Walk (some of) the Coast of Britain
(Definitely too much watching Coast on TV) Maybe I would limit it to walking from Kings Lynn around to Rhyll perhaps (look on a map, and you will see how far that would still be). However I could kill several birds with the one stone, I'd be checking out Norfolk, Dorset, Cornwall, and Wales. I'd also get to check out the Dover castle, Essex (I had a semi-plan to visit Essex one night as it has a bit of a reputation, and then I also fell in love with The Only Way is Essex. On the aside, for some reason Made in Chelsea doesn't have the same appeal to me, I think it is the class divide thing, MIC appears to be about a bunch of Upper Class wankers who wouldn't give me the time of day, whereas TOWIE is about slightly trashy, yet successful people, much like my ancestors (I had ancestors that lived in either place, and in the case of my Irish ancestors, both places, but none of them got life on a plate, albeit maybe a sponsored ticket to New Zealand).


Europe
- Poland -  Egiertowo (formerly known as Eggershutte) where my German ancestors came from. And as mentioned in another post, Malbork castle, which doesn't look that far away from it.

- Italy
- mainly because I watched James and Thom's Pizza Pilgrimage and want to try all the food, but also I like the sound of the Cinque Terre and all the other places Suzanne and Bevan visited on their tour with Top Deck in 2010. On that note, the other week I watched another Italian food programme on Choice or Sky, and they had a pasta machine. Later that week I had gone to Stevens to buy a mortar and pestle (as I want to make my own pesto, I already have the basil from an earlier purchase) and hello, pasta machines are on special...

-Prague
Namely because it is one of those cities that the TNT continually reviewed, as it was a decent city break from London

-Budapest
Same reason, and also because I remember it from playing Where in The World is Carmen Santiago? on the Commodore 64.

El Camino de Santiago - walk across Spain.
Our vicar has done this, and from what I remember of Spain it is reasonably flat, and beautiful. Adding to this is the fact last year I was in Don Quixote of La Mancha, and I believe this walk would probably take you past some of the towns mentioned in the play/book (and so what if it doesn't?)

Walking across Europe
Looks easy enough. Somewhere I have a pamphlet by Calder and Lawson Tours which outlines a walk around part of Central Eastern Europe, i.e. Prague and Budapest etc.

Kayaking from the Netherlands to Eastern Europe.
As you can see from the below two maps, you can get from the North Sea starting at Amsterdam right across Europe all the way to the Black Sea, via the Rhine, Main, and Danube rivers. Buy a kayak, sweet as.


Check out http://www.communitywalk.com/map/12225 for the full size map of this, which includes all the cities you would pass along the way, and labels which river you would be on at that stage.



Fiji
 I want to do the snorkeling tour I investigated last year. Basically a boat takes you up the Yasawa islands from Nadi, and apparently it is pretty awesome snorkeling.

Cambodia/Vietnam/Laos
- then I have effectively ticked off Asia, and it looks like you could do the three in one hit.

Japan
- although the pangs aren't as strong as they were pre-London, I would like to go back and check out some of the stuff I missed out, which to be fair wasn't a whole heap - mainly just Nara and Ise. I still crave Coco Ichiban from time to time (Japanese curry), and would love to catch up with Eita and Noriyoshi and some of my other students. What is scary is thinking than Ichitomi the three year old at the time is now ten, and the "Angels" who were about 12, are probably at university now.

Brazil/Argentina/Peru/Bolivia
Since I was about 10, when I first read something about Rio de Janeiro and the statue of Christ the Redeemer, I've been keen to check it out. Similarly I wouldn't mind checking out the hot ladies on Copacabana beach.

In more recent years I have heard about Machu Picchu in Peru.

Last but not least I would like to go to San Jose Banda, in Argentina, where my ancestor Donald McDonald was supposedly born.

Antarctica
Mainly then I can say I have been to every Continent in the World (loosely defined - as I have been to "The Americas" i.e. North America, as far down as Mexico, Asia, Europe, Oceania (obviously) and Africa (Egypt))

Keep an eye on this page, as the list will probably keep growing.

App-ly Named...

For something different, I thought I would do an entry reviewing my favourite apps on my iPhone. Pictured below is a selection of some of my apps (basically the icons that came out when I did a screen dump from iTunes).

Not sure if I have mentioned it, but I don't know what I did before I got an iPhone... There are so many things I can do with it, from searching the net to playing games, listening to music, checking my emails etc. I kind of wish I had it back when I lived in London, as it would have proved invaluable on my daily tube journey, almost and hour each way, not only that, would have been useful for using public transport also. Too be honest the thing my phone probably gets the least use with is texting and calls, due to the sad state of my social life. With the 5,000 free texts I get each month I'd have to be dating the entire 16yo female population of New Zealand to use them up.

Anyhow, lets proceed...

Big Bang!

This is your soundboard app - because I'm cheap I have just stuck with the free version and it's limited amount of sounds, however the few sounds it has are very useful, 3 of them are whip sounds (I looked it up after seeing it on the TV programme The Big Bang (hence the name). The other sounds include a drum roll, badaboom bish..., and a cow mooing.

Obviously I have used this in the past. It is good, but it has it's limitations, but mostly because it is always easier and more functional to create a blog on a computer than on a phone. However, it is useful when on the run/adventure (travelling) to be able to write as I am going along, on the tedious bus journeys etc.

Pocket Jake
I remember back in 2009 my mate Scott had this app when we were in Berlin, and it provided some hearty laughs. I went through a stage of thinking of using it in all sorts of inappropriate situations, such as when I used to work at Corrections, which totally would have been the wrong thing to do, and especially not the audience to encourage thinking that domestic violence is funny.

Note Pad

Useful because I can jot all sorts of lists down, and they are kept in the same place. They then can be subsequently copy and pasted into emails etc.

The Night Sky
This is a cool app, you can check out the stars - by facing the phone to the sky it shows you the names of the stars you are looking at, and also where the satellites are at that moment, including the Hubble telescope and the International Space Station. Also adding value is the fact it identifies Mars and Jupiter etc, which you would otherwise just assume were general stars.

Vodafone App
Useful to know how much data, minutes, or texts I have left, as well as how much credit - although I don't use this so much now, as we have wireless at home, and so I don't eat through my bandwidth anymore. The hardest thing is remembering to top-up my phone each month (I am on the GO-19 prepay plan, for $19 I get 5000 texts, 50minutes of calls, and 500MB of data.)

Stuff
Good for New Zealand news. Admittedly I only really use it when someone mentions "Did you see XYZ in the news?"

TNT Magazine UK
If there is one thing I miss about London, it is reading the TNT Magazine every week, and it was free. It is a travel magazine (and substantially meatier than the NZ version) Admittedly I don't look at this app much at the moment as I have plenty of other things to do, and it just reminds me of where I can't be.

The App store
Where all good (and some bad) apps can be bought on an iPhone near you!

iPod (now since I have updated to iOS6 - Music)
An MP3 player - good, but doesn't get a whole lot of use by me.

MyFitnessPal
Awesome for counting calories vs calories burnt with exercise. Even comes with a barcode scanner, so you can scan the barcode which automatically uploads the information.
The downside however, is I got a little disheartened when I saw how many calories things I thought were healthy had, e.g. Muesli. And also the barcode scanner makes you prefer eating processed foods, as it is easier to enter the data that way.

Google Maps
To be honest, since updating to iOS6 I still haven't checked out AppleMaps due to the bad reviews, and the first thing I downloaded was GoogleMaps.

Sky
Despite my love/hate relationship with Sky (i.e. some awesome documentaries vs. repeating the same crap over and over again and having Tom, Dick, & Sanjay ring me trying to sell me it) I absolutely love their app.
We don't have Sky at home (my sister and brother-in-law do, as mentioned previously) but Sky allows you to have a favourites tab  - so I have put in order all the freeview channels, and then my favourite Sky channels (UKTV, The History Channel, BBC Knowledge etc). Not only that, but you can set reminders so it tells you when something will be on shortly. I have got it down pat that I go through my TV guides each week and set reminders for myself. The only downside is Sky will only show you one week in advance, whereas the TV guide comes out a week early.

Lightsaber (sic)

I don't know about you, but I have definitely had in the past, the desire to whip out a light sabre and annihilate someone or something from the gene pool, especially after the times I have played Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast - a totally awesome game, especially when you are in the mood to cut some stormtroopers in half.

Well, now you can. Such Fun!

 

CSR Racing

This is, in the words of someone else - living The Fast and Furious. A simple concept, racing a straight 1/4 mile stretch against other cars. Addictive and free, they live in the hope you'll cave and purchase some gold to speed up the upgrading process. 

 Jetpack Joyride
Quite addictive, despite being very repetitive. A good thing about it however, is the fact it doesn't try and up sell you anything, or have ads that slow it down (and eat your data).

 Kingdom Rush
This is a neat game too, not free, but no ads, and has a bit of a challenge to it, and not repetitive.

Wikipedia

Awesome for looking anything up, without the BS.

I shall leave it there, as I have to go, and Google image search has helped limit the amount of icon pictures I could find.

My Random Bucket list

Over many years of lonely nights and long journeys, I have come up with several bucket list things I would like to do - none of them are particularly dangerous, but they are a little crazy.

To set the scene, I will tell you a story of one that I just ticked off this weekend.
- Shower myself in confetti
Back when I was a student, I had saved up hole-punchings in a plastic container. Eventually it was full, and to prevent it being opened and making a mess I sellotaped it up. Currently I am tidying my room, and I came across it, and decided it needed to be tossed out (I'm attempting to be brutal) but decided I could get the enjoyment out of it and get rid of it at the same time. So I closed the bathroom and toilet doors from the hallway (as they come off in a little alcove) to isolate the mess, and then just let it rip, and vacuumed up later.

Another one on my mind at the moment, with all the rain we have had this weekend is
- Grab a rugby ball and do huge 'Hollywood' tries in the park next door in the mud and rain. 

Related to that one is this, below.
- Dance in the rain

Another which I intend to do shortly, I have even gone so far as to buy the popcorn is:
- Make popcorn, but without the lid on the pot, so it goes everywhere, and try and catch some in my mouth
Actually I asked my sister if Jordan, her dog, whom I am baby-sitting this week, is allowed to eat popcorn, as he could help me clean up. Turns out, it might make him a little constipated.

- Drive a super car
When I was at Big Boys Toys I got a pamphlet on a company that does that at Pukekohe or Hampton Downs, or somewhere local to Auckland. Suzanne and Bevan had done a similar thing in the UK, and I was keen once I got there, but never got around to it, and wasn't ever in a flush state of economy. I could totally afford it at the moment, however have decided I will use it as an incentive/reward to/for losing 10kgs whenever that happens.

Anyhow, that's a few for now, I will add more when I'm inspired/reminded.

Vote for Me! I am not a crook!

The Summer of Singledom, Singlets, and Sunburn

So we had a few more days at the beach, but eventually had to return to work.

The following weekend I went to Auckland for Saturday night. The next morning I texted some old friends, and ended up heading to Omaha beach (north of Auckland, not in northern France) and caught up with Roz, my flatmate from when I lived at the Mainstreet Lodge in Kaitaia, who I hadn't seen since we'd hung out in London in 2009.

On the way back through Auckland I caught up with Mark, who is some of my cousins' cousin. I hadn't seen him for about 13 years, since the wedding of one of our mutual cousins. We had a great time catching up, especially as we had more than cousins in common, Mark has taught ESOL as well, and is on his way to becoming a scriptwriter.

Back at work we implemented computerised packing slips. Admittedly it had a bit more testing required than I anticipated, and for a while was more trouble than it was worth and brought back bad memories of past employments... But now it is functioning well, and almost fully operational.


The Famous Whangamomona hotel.

At the end of January was Auckland Anniversary weekend. Ages ago (such as like 2007, before i went up to Kaitaia) I remembered one of mum and dad's old employees mention the Whangamomona republic day - which is celebrated every two years. Essentially what happened was at some point they changed the province boundaries, and Whangamomona fell into a province it didn't want to be in, so it jokingly declared itself a republic. This was happening on the Saturday, so i had planned to get up early and head down there. As Iwas lying on my bed chilling out on the Friday night I got a bit bored and investigated options of heading halfway there so it would be an easier trip. At around the same time I heard from Bonz, a friend I worked with back in 1999/2000 at Canpac - we catch up at random intervals, after meeting up randomly. For example, in about 2003 we happened to both end up working tutoring excel to trainee nurses. This time we happened to meet up as she came into our shop with a vacuum to be fixed. Last time we'd caught up was just after I got back from Japan.



When you are 87kms SOUTH of Taumarunui, you really are in the middle of nowhere.

Anyhow - I decided I would travel as far as Waitomo that night, and travel the rest in the morning. Ended up Bonz was keen to do that too, and offered that we go in her car (as as we spoke, she was on her way back from Auckland). So we did just that, staying the night at the Kiwi Paka hostel in Waitomo. It was probably just as well that we did, as it was at least another good two hours onto Whangamomona. It was a nice drive (from the passenger seat at least) along the Forgotten World Highway (State Highway 43)- I had intended to, but failed to do this drive several times recently - firstly Easter last year, when I did my ancestor tracing pilgrimage to Taranaki and Wellington, but I was going from Rotorua, and wanted to visit a girl in Piopio. The second time was in November when I visited Dave and Sandra in New Plymouth, but when it came to Sunday, when I intended to do it, it was pouring with rain.

See on the right there a golf cart - they do tours along this now disused train line. When I have the money, it would be really interesting.

Anyhow, the set up there was interesting. There were a few stalls, and a decent amount of food. It was a mega hot day. There was the odd other thing to see, such as whip-cracking, a farm-made water slide (ie doing what we used to do, and using a plastic sheet, water and detergent to slide, but taking it a step further and having a landing pool) and a trough for "guess how many eels are in the trough". It was worth doing the once, maybe a bit too far to do another time.

After the long drive back to Hamilton, I went around to Suzanne and Bevan's for dinner - Bevan had smoked several different types of meats in his pizza oven (as a test run for when he would do it for his parents) and invited Ron and Rach as well (knowing that me and Ron would pretty much eat anything meaty). (For some reason I have just got a huge urge to go to the fridge, can't think why). Anyhow, fantastic feed - one of the best things was something we almost wrote off as being too charcoaled - some ribs.

In the following week, we got the McDonald family Bible back - which had been getting restored in Tauranga. We had hoped initially to have it back in time for Nana's birthday, but were told it wasn't likely. Turned out we did, and it came in cheaper than expected, and delivered as well, complete with archive gloves (think Michael Jackson) and some special sellotape for repairing page tears.



A Four generation photo of my ancestors, although Nana (standing right) should have been taking the photo, and Popa in the photo. Clockwise From bottom, Donald McDonald (sitting), his daughter (Elizabeth) Grace Pearson (nee McDonald), Nana (Marj Pearson), and mum (Anne Thomas, nee Pearson) as a baby. Recently I did a census search, and I believe Donald was born in San Jose Banda, which is apparently in Argentina - looking at his complexion it could be possible that his natural father was Latin American, although my Uncle and cousin have red hair, which we attributed to his Scottish-ness.

The event that weekend then of course was Nana's 80th birthday party. We held it at our house, and had about 50 relations come and have lunch. It was another nice hot day, and we had set up two sun shades. It was great catching up with some of the old relations, as previously I had been "a kid" whereas now I was relating to them as an adult. It was especially great from a family history perspective too, as I pass on and run past some of my theories on our ancestors and get their feedback and knowledge. One such example is the family bible - it was noticeably water damaged - I assumed because it had travelled from Opunake to Kinohaku by boat, and that in it's 116 year life it was bound to have attracted some moisture. Turns out, according to my grandfather's cousin, that it had been through a flood at Kinohaku - at the time it was on top of a piano, which the water rose to the top of, and just up part of the way up the Bible. I also managed to catch up with one of my mother's cousins who I had discussed family history matters with, and she had compiled a whole lot of things since I had talked to her last, so I got a copy of her finished product.

Yeah naturally I like this photo because I look relatively nice in it, but also because it's a nice one of me and Nana.

On the Sunday, I went and did the Hakarimata walk - something that had been on the list for a while, but without company it hadn't got done. I found I wasn't as fit as I remembered, but once we had gotten over the summit of the first bit, it wasn't too bad after that. There is a lookout tower built there as well which is quite awesome. On getting back to the bottom we picked up our cars and went and had a drink (Coca Cola) at the Waipa tavern, which I had always figured was a pretty rough place. Later in the week I made a joke on Facebook that I had come back and found my car without it's glovebox and stereo, but most people missed the second part of the joke where I said that I had previously taken them out in preparation/investigation for installing rear speakers.

In the following week I house sat for Suzanne and Bevan, as they headed up the Coromandel with Suzanne's ex-boss from the UK. The pay-off for me is walking Jordan (exercise) and using their MySky. I am addicted to watching Who Do You Think You Are? and various British documentaries, so I make good use of recording them - so much so that I come away with having recorded more than I watched. My other favourites were The Underground, Dragon's Den Profiles (of the Dragons) and Battle Castles (on various European castles, such as Conwy (which I have visited in Wales), and Malbork - (which I intend to visit - it is only about 100kms from Egiertowo (formerly known as Eggershutte) where my German ancestors came from, in modern day Poland.)) As you can probably imagine, such a diet of programmes really doesn't help me get over missing England and Europe. I'm not sure if I mentioned that I had bought a new TV late last year, which has Freeview built in. Similiarly I love the Channel Choice, as it has programmes such as Coast, and The History of Scotland.

That weekend I took Mum and Dad to the airport as they were heading to the South Island for a holiday, and ending up in Queenstown for a work conference.

After investigating my rear speaker situation, I discovered the wiring was already there in my car. I installed one of the ones I had got from the wreakers, but turns out it doesn't work, so I purchased some Pioneer ones. I had asked my mate Ron for advice, and he ended up finding me some online for a cheap price, I then went to the shop around the corner from work and they matched the price. Late last week Dad and I completed the installation. It's a bit weird now having 4 speakers, after 13 years of just the two front ones, and especially as the new ones have tweeters, so I hear more treble. The next thing on the car list is making a green suede gearstick sock.

Other than that, yesterday I did the intermediate follow-on to the cycle safety thing I did in December. I ended up being the only adult attendee ((they combined it with a family day) probably because they timed it at 4:30, and I left work early) so I got one-on-one tutoring. It was all good, but amazing how tiring the rest of the ride home was.

And there we are, caught up again. I totally intend to update this on a regular basis, and therefore make it a bit more philosophical and interesting, rather than a list of things I've done, but I seem to fail at that. I do however have several plans for future entries, so keep an eye out.

The title, in case you are wondering, is due to the fantastic weather we have had this year (especially compared to last year) and the resulting sunburn and chaffing. After being burnt for a second time, I went and purchased three bottles of sunscreen from work, and put one in my glove box, one in my toilet bag, and one in the drawer. It is been so hot, it I have been living in a singlet in the evenings, and I feel a bit bad that the weekends I have been at Suzanne's I have spent inside watching the TV in order to avoid getting burnt. Unfortunately Hamilton is an inland city, and Raglan is just that little bit too far away to go to for a swim. A couple of times Suzanne and I have taken Jordan (her dog) down to the river to play in the water and meet other dogs, and I have taken the opportunity to have a nice cooling swim (Jordan is also finding it too hot to do anything, if you walk him too early in the evening, he will sit/lie down and have a big rest, usually in such a dramatic fashion that bystanders would think he is totally been overworked) The good thing is with my encouragement Jordan has gained confidence in swimming - but when getting him to swim to me, I have to be careful not to let him try and rest on me, as generally that results in a mis-aimed claw mark down my front. The singledom bit was to make it sound better with a bit of alliteration, and because for once in my single life I am choosing not to look. Truth is I am still confused with the Adessa situation and until I get that sorted in my brain, any rejection will just set me back to the why? feelings.

 So, in the near future what is coming up? Easter - I am hoping to make the most of it, and plan to do the Coromandel, and do some snorkeling, which I have done sweet F A of in the last 5 years, except in Egypt. I have been thinking of other trips I want to do, such as Kaikoura, Melbourne etc, but that is another entry...

Straight to Summer

And so, back to reality once again, things started off slowly. The highlights being winning some free tickets to a movie -Kiwi Flyer - a New Zealand movie, aimed at kids, but entertaining enough for adults, about a trolley race in Nelson. I really enjoyed it, and think it's going to be one of those movies that will be played every Christmas on TV because it ticks all the boxes.

I also did a trip up the Coromandel with dad and one of his suppliers to deliver some toilet paper and other supplies to camp grounds up there, that was quite nice as I hadn't really been that far up, and it showed me a couple of good places to camp.

The Waikato rugby team happened to win the Ranfurly shield in about the second-to-last challenge of the year, so I decided I would go and watch the last game which was at Waikato stadium. It turned out not to be too expensive, and it wasn't packed or monitored, so when it started raining, I moved up into the covered part of the stand. My mate Dave and his dad were there too, so I ended up hanging out and catching up with them.

For the momentous occasion, I fashioned a poncho out of some PVC signs that came on a roll, that I had picked up for free at a garage sale in about 2001. Anyhow, Waikato was victorious on the day, so all in all it was a good year for Waikato rugby.

The rest of October was fairly uneventful, I did some deliveries to Morrinsville, caught up for coffee with some old classmates from tech, and renewed my gun licence. The biggest news was probably becoming an official employee of Waikato Cleaning Supplies. I am mainly doing the accounting side of things, entering invoices into the computer, but also answering email queries, the phone, and serving on the counter as required. One of the things I am going to implement in the quiet patch in January is making our packing slips computerised, essentially cutting out a whole lot of double-handling. Something I have already sorted out was the backing up process - what was happening was at 4:30 everyone had to be out of the system while someone manually backed up the server. I found it a pain because you couldn't really do anything from 4:30 then, and I figured it should be able to be done automatically. So now it's just a case of swapping a portable hard drive each morning.

November began slowly, the highlights early on being going to the CBD pub with Ron & Bevan and having all you can eat chicken wings on "Wingsday Wednesday". Part of that included a challenge if you were up for it of eating 6 really spicy wings in 3 minutes. Usually I'm not a fan of super hot things, but I was keen and wanted to challenge myself so I did it and got the free t-shirt. It's funny how proud of myself I was at winning another eating challenge (you may remember the 25oz steak in 25 minutes at chakalaka in London - which really wasn't that hard) but it's all about celebrating the small victories. Anyhow, that was the preliminary celebration of my birthday, two days later.

On my actual birthday we (mum, dad, Suzanne, Bevan, & I) went out to Keystone, as I am a loyalty card holder of their parent company, so they sent me a $50 voucher to use. For dessert we went to an Italian place, which was OK, but half the stuff on the menu wasn't available.

On the Sunday, Bevan & I went to Auckland to the Big Boys Toys expo. It was OK, a bit better than the last time I went in 2008, which I think was scaled back due to the recession, but it still wasn't as cool as how I remembered it the first time I went, but isn't that always the case.

On the 22nd mum, dad, & I went and saw Nigel Latta talk at Southwell as a fundraiser for ...... I had read two of his books last year, The Politically incorrect guide to Parenting, and ... To teenagers, which I found good books. I found his talk a little bit of a disappointment, I'm not sure what it was, whether it was too rehearsed, or whether he put too many swearwords in there, or the occasional "political" swipe at something.

The following weekend I saw there was a fun run/walk around the lake which was raising money for a charity called Dream chasers. Basically there was a boy who died of Leukaemia, they hadn't been able to match him with a suitable donor for a bone marrow transplant because of his Maori ancestry (IE a match is rarer). Anyway his parents set this charity up to raise awareness - and they were only about my age.

So, anyway, I decided to do the maximum walk - which was 3 laps. There was a couple and their mother I think that also were doing 3 laps too, so I talked to the man and had a great conversation about travel, genealogy, and all sorts. Sadly they reneged on the last lap, but I don't blame them as they were carrying a kid in a backpack as well. Anyhow I went on to finish the third lap, but I think most people had done their one or two and gone home by the time I finished. However on the upside I got a free drink and several cupcakes at the end of it. A friend of mine had organised a social walk around the lake later that day, so I walked halfway round again to where we were going to meet, and chilled out there for about an hour. When he and a few others came we did a lap, then had a milkshake and chatted.

That night my parents and I went to Monique's 30th - I grew up with Monique and her sister Christine, who if you go and look at the entries for February 2011 & 2012 respectfully, they are both mentioned as they were the brides at the weddings I attended.

On the 27th I went to a men's dinner at our church. I wasn't expecting to enjoy it as it was a cricketing guy, however he talked in such away that it was actually quite good, I think it was his humour and the applicability of it, ie it wasn't all about cricket, more his life experience. Similarly I enjoyed catching up with some of the old guys from our old church at Naike, it seems cool to be able to talk to them now with so much more to relate to.

I believe on the Thursday I popped over to Matamata because there was an opening of the I-site over there, which had been re-done as a hobbit hole (Matamata is just down the road from "Hobbiton" the set location of where they filmed the shire scenes in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

At the end of the month I went down to new Plymouth to catch up with Dave and Sandra, and their kids. It was nice getting out of my world for a weekend, but I also started to appreciate that I'm not as ready for kids as I thought I was. I took Luca a book and a small torch that we sell at work - he barely let go of the torch all weekend (nor turned it off) & had the book read to him at least 3 times. On the Saturday we all went to the Egmont visitors centre, had a bit of a walk, and had some lunch there. Sunday it was pouring with rain, and they were having an open home to sell their house, so Sandra and I took the kids out for lunch while Dave played host.

Mid December I went to the Tamahere markets one Saturday - something I've never gotten around to doing. It was interesting, I bought a couple of books and a packet of tomatoes to chew at my convenience.

On the Sunday I did a cycle safety thing, that the council was putting on for free. I figured I probably knew it all already, but would probably pick something useful regardless, which I was right - particularly when turning around to check what other traffic is there I had previously found I wouldn't be able to stay straight, despite not having that issue when I was a kid. Essentially what was I doing wrong was keeping my arms straight and almost locked, where as the idea is to bend your elbows for maximum effect. At the end of it I felt good, it was like I was one with my bike again, like I would have felt as a kid (admittedly the next day I had really sore forearms from being a kid and bouncing the front suspension/attempting wheelies/jumps)

Because where we did that was just around the corner from my aunties I went and visited her and had some lunch. We had a good chat and I tried to fix her skype but didn't have any luck.

Later on I went to a gathering at a pub which was doing $5 pizzas, which was all good.

Other than that, I took Suzanne and Jordan to dog Obedience one night, then dropped Suzanne at Bevan's work do, and Jordan home.

Our work do was on the last Friday before Christmas. We finished slightly early and had a BBQ which was nice.

That night we headed to the beach with Nana. It was nice waking up the next day and already being there. I had organised that on the Sunday we would go and visit her cousin in law in Whakatane, and take the family bible back, we all went down there, but I have ended up holding onto it. The following day I took Nana to meet a distant relative of her's, someone I have been chatting with via email for a while. This lady has researched our common ancestral line well and had a bit of information, most I had gathered from previous emails but she is going to send me more of it soon, and it was in a well presented format, almost booklet profile-like, which is what I want to do in regards to some of my ancestors, so the information can easily be stored, accessed, and past on.

Christmas day was OK. For the four of us it felt almost too much like hard work. I actually enjoyed the remote control car I got in my work present the most. On the concrete in the shed you can make it do awesome skids, almost 180degrees.

On the 27 and 28th we were back at home at work, and then came back that night.

In the following few days I had a few swims and managed to fix the lock in my car.

For New Years I headed up to Auckland. What was really the highlight of the trip though was finding a set of rear speaker panels for my car at a wreckers. I had searched for ages, including several scourings of Hamilton, at least one scouring of Tauranga, and a scouring of Christchurch while I was there.

I returned to Papamoa the next day. Since then I have had a couple more swims, caught up with a few people, and today took the McDonald family bible to be rebound.

Not much planned for the next few days. Much of the same, hopefully will get a bit of exercise in there as well.