Yesterday I did the Auckland University Heritage Walk.  It was the perfect day for it, not too cold – not too hot, beautiful clear blue skies and hardly any people around.  The walk was fascinating and very educational, well worth taking the time to do.

In a small park that stretches all the way from Symonds Street down to Beach Road, we spotted this sign.  From a distance it looked like the sign said No Smoking, but after closer inspection we realised it said No Swimming. The sign doesn’t look all that old, so it must have been recently replaced but the weird thing is… WHY?  Why is the sign there and why can’t you swim, there is no water to swim in anyway.

My guess is that originally this park led you down to the water’s edge on Beach Road, perhaps it didn’t used to be a road at the bottom of the hill but an actual beach.  So why couldn’t you swim there?  Or is the whole thing just a funny joke?

My friend Michelle emailed me today with a link explaining exactly what the sign is for.  Seems I guessed right: Click Me

Today I had lunch with a friend at a great cafe near the library in Highbury.  After lunch I decided to have a look round the library – something I have been meaning to do ever since it reopened about 2 years ago.

A very friendly lady came up and asked me if there was anything she could help me with (I had to do some quick thinking there for something that I might be interested in) so I said I was looking for books on photography, specifically Brian Brake photography.  Turns out they have several but they are all out or in other libraries, so together we reserved them all.  Of course I couldn’t find my card as I hadn’t been to a library for years, so she simply issued me a new one and this one of course is an Auckland library card which gives me access to any of the 55 libraries around Auckland, including the big one in the city.

While she was setting me up with my new card I looked round and right next to where I was sitting was a book of photos by another famous New Zealander that I had seen in the shops for $99 so I grabbed that one and asked if I could put that on my new card, she said sure and took me to the self check out machine.

I had completely forgotten how cool the library is, so if you haven’t been lately I thoroughly recommend it.  The top photo is the new library and the second photo is the view from the library.

Today I went to the Mega Mitre 10 store near Wairau Road to get a washer thingy for my toilet with Dad.  We asked someone where the plumbing section was and were politely shown exactly where to go.  Soon we found the washer we needed, it was a little bit bigger but for where it was supposed to go, it didn’t matter, I figured it would actually create a better seal around the pipe.

Then the most amazing customer service happened.  A man who worked there bowled up to us and said: “Sorry guys that’s not the one you need, it won’t fit – see it’s slightly bigger than yours.  We don’t sell the one you want, but you can get it from Reece’s in Mairangi Bay, they’re open till 4:00 today.”

Wow – I’m still blown away by the complete randomness of this.  If he didn’t observe us selecting the wrong thing, we would’ve gone home none the wiser and wondered why it didn’t work.

Because of this awesome service I said to Dad we really should buy something from here anyway.  Between the two of us we ended up spending about $40, which was ten times more than we would’ve spent on one washer.  We went to Reece’s, they had the right washer and it works beautifully.

So thank you Mitre 10 – AND they have Fly Buys.

This is the most amazing poinsettia I have ever owned. It’s nearly July and it still has several bright red leaves. Usually this type of plant has lost all it’s red leaves and just looks manky by now – of course I am talking about ones I’ve owned, I’m not talking about this plant in general.

Today started out at the movies in St Lukes – X Men, which was great. Then I met up with a friend in Titirangi to view several photographic exhibitions.

The last exhibition we went to was at the Corban’s Estate and that one would be my favourite so far. That’s were I took the photo of the church above. I must go back there one day to photograph it properly, there’s even a heritage walk we can do.

While having coffee in Titirangi my friend pulled these two amazing old cameras out of her bag for me to look at.

It struck me later as I looked back on my day and though about the cool contrasting moments I had. The exhibitions were of modern images in really old buildings. While enjoying coffee – a relatively new thing to do – I was holding an impressively old camera which belonged to a new friend. I started out my day seeing a brand new high tech movie with an “old” friend and ended my day in an old vineyard with a new friend.

This morning on the bus there was a lady sitting in front of me composing an official looking email on her big laptop. I thought this was sad that she has so much work to do and not enough time in her day to get it all done. Surely catching the bus could be a time for reading a book, playing a game, knitting or napping.

BUT THEN… she juggles her laptop precariously while trying to grab something from her bag and not poke the poor guy sitting next to her with her elbow. At last she found it – her iPad. She then got busy looking for something on her iPad and typing about it on her laptop. This required a lot of juggling between the two machines.

I stopped feeling sad at that point – she’s just showing off. The perfect ending to all this was when the guy sitting next to her got off the bus, turned to get a better look at the ridiculous person sitting next to him and gave her such a look of disgust it was beautiful.

Why do flight crew dim the cabin lights before take off?

The next two questions are actually more like complaints than questions…

When you are called to board your aircraft and they specify what rows of people are able to bored first – why do they let people on who are NOT in those rows?

When it is VERY clear how big your carry on baggage should be, why do they let people carry on stuff as big as a suitcase? The lady in the row behind me has just shoved a HUGE bag into the overhead luggage compartment. Her bag is so big there is no room for any other bags. SIX peoples’ carry on luggage is supposed to fit up there!!!

End of the complaints, I’m now sitting back mid flight enjoying a glass of wine, bagel bites and hummus. Aaaahhh fabulous.

This one’s for Michelle. I’ve been in Wellington for two days, which means I got to spend a night here. Usually I just come down for the day for work. But this time it was hand over from my boss who will be taking a year off to look after her baby – due any day now.

So last night after dinner I went for a walk and ended up very near my favourite bar in Wellington. It just wasn’t the same without Michelle, so I didn’t stay for a drink. But at least this time I managed to photograph the outside of the bar.

Hello

Here I am blogging all the way from the Flames Hotel in Whangarei. I’m very pleased to say they have done a bit of renovation since I was last here and the rooms are actually quite nice. The pool looks very inviting – shame it’s far too cold to use it.

This is my second time to stay here, I was up here about two years ago and I really wish I’d stayed somewhere else, don’t get me wrong the hotel is lovely, the food is great and the service is the best I’ve ever experienced anywhere. The problem is – it’s a bit isolated from everything and there’s nothing to do around here.

I’ve looked through the Guest Directory to find things they recommend to do and there is a tiny mention of a 30 minute walk around the base of some hill through the mangroves. Apparently there is even “small snapping creatures” that can be seen amongst the mangroves! Well I’m sorry but that just doesn’t really get me very excited at all – plus by the time I get back here after work it’s almost dark and NO… walking through the mangroves in the dark while trying to avoid stepping on some small snapping creature all on my own terrifies me.

While looking for something in the directory to do I came across a page dedicated to warning you not to cook toast. Not sure who would actually bring a toaster with them to a hotel, but if you do and this upsets the flash new heat protection system they have installed, causing the fire alarm to go off, you will be fined $1,000 to cover the cost of the fire brigade call out fee. Now that’s a very expensive piece of toast!

I had to pick something up from Mt Eden today so while I was there I went for a wee trip down memory lane. The first school I ever went to is in Mt Eden – Maungawhau School.  The school is still there but none of the original buildings are.

I went for a walk through the school hoping to have some little flashbacks of my time there, but mostly I got a big blank feeling something like what I imagine amnesia must feel like.

The swimming pool is still there and that looks the same, the field where we used to have a Xmas parade hasn’t changed much either and then I found the old tennis courts – that did it!  I got a really weird feeling of deja vu there and these very distant memories surfaced of marching in formation in the hot sun. I wonder if the marching was preparing us for the Xmas parade, or was it preparing us to grow up to be soldiers?  Do kids these days still learn to march in formation like that?  If they do I guess they get to wear sun hats while they are doing it.

On the way back to the car I walked past an area that used to be where my first year class was and I remembered ridiculous 2:00 naps on horrible plastic mats which took place after learning to count using coloured blocks of different lengths, I think they were called quisenaires or something like that!   (Edit…I just googled them and found out they still exist and are actually called “Cuisenaire Rods” named after the guy who invented them in 1952.  Click the name to see them in Wikipedia.)

On the way home I drove past a street where a friend lived, which reminded me of playing at his house after school, but it was all dark inside and his Mum was very glamorous, she was dressed up like the dancers on the “Happen In” TV show – mini skirt, long boots & “Bob” haircut. And she was smoking, plus I’m sure she had a big glass of gin or something like that in her other hand.  Thinking about it now… she was probably drunk (ladies in those days did a lot of early afternoon drinking) and not at all happy that her son had dragged some strange kid home from school without permission – she wasn’t very friendly and sent me straight home.  I’m sure that was the day I told him and some girl we were walking home with that I was from Wales!!!  When they asked me what it was like I said it was great coz it was next to the sea and you could see huge whales swimming right by the beach every day. They were so impressed they told everyone at school the next day, thank goodness my parents bought a house on the north shore after that & I didn’t have to keep up that charade for too long – I probably told them we were moving back to Wales LOL.

Wow – that was a very cool trip down memory lane.