Technology these days is awesome. Here I am waiting for the plane to take off for Wellington and while waiting I can make a video of the plane, upload it to YouTube and then link the video to my blog so you can all see it 🙂

Shortly after take off I will even be able to use my cell phone to make calls plus send and receive text messages. Awesome.

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.