Well, that's about enough weather for Auckland, would anyone else like some?

LOCAL NEWS There has been some controversy about a competitor at the Commonwealth Games (oh, yeah, they are on, not sure very many people care) who was born a man but is competing as a woman. I am not sure how I feel about this. It seems highly improbable that a male athlete would be motivated to become a woman primarily to gain a competitive advantage, but conversely, it seems quite unidirectional (like people born women are not likely to ever have the ability to compete as men, perhaps in gymnastics. It would seem that I missed some pretty wild weather in Auckland on Tuesday. The usual sort of power out and such was reported, I didn’t see it as being anything beyond an average storm. You know things are bad when Hannah posts that she has power at the bakery. It appears to have been a lot more serious than the usual ones, our house was without power for nearly two days. Wednesday night Hannah had to shower at Rory’s house because her house didn’t have power either, and Diana did at Sarah’s house. The weather just kept going, even today there is more stormy weather coming. A tanker rolled in Dunedin blocking traffic. I think I forgot to mention a truck that rolled in Pt Chev a few weeks back, I saw it, and weeks later I noticed some decorative shrubbery boxes that were pushed and toppled by it that were still in the wrong place. WORLD NEWS So apparently not winning 30 popularity polls in a row is a reason to stop being prime minister in Australia. Part of me wonders how effective government is if it is merely a popularity contest. Some drug impaired Tasmanian man drove the wrong way up a street in Melbourne in a campervan, apparently the fact that he was Tasmanian explained a lot. Another drug addled man was restrained by an off duty policeman after crashing his car, removing his clothes, and causing disturbance. The clothing removal was “accidental”. A road rage incident in Australia resulted in a punch up then one winner wandered around threatening people with a “live” chainsaw (not my word, but they meant it was turned on). He didn’t use it. All news I heard all week was mostly how Australia was basically winning all the medals at the Commonwealth Games. That and how they told everyone living on the Gold Coast to leave and how all the hospitality people had no customers and how tinder was really busy at the games village. REAL SPORT I have reinstated this section to honour young Tom (and I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that not sure I know his actual surname, but Anna and Jono’s 15yo son). We watched him play soccer on Saturday morning for his regular team, he was playing centre back, wasn’t too happy there prefers centre mid (like they all do). Anyway, he did okay, but the team lost 2-3. Then Jono drove Tom and teammate Reuben (and me) on a scenic tour of Sydney soccer grounds before getting to a second game about 30 seconds before kick off. This was an under-18 game for which the team was more than decimated by a wedding (what under 18 boy cares about a wedding, let alone half a sodding team?). Anyway, short version is they had eleven for the first half including three ring-ins, was 2-2 as half time. Second half they started with nine, got bolstered to ten, then with one going to hospital they ended the game with eight for a good 25 minutes. They nearly had a player red-carded when he went to pick up the ball and the ref walked in between and thought it was a physical attack, but the player did very well to defuse the situation and remain on the pitch. About ten minutes before the end Rueben fed a ball to the now mostly crippled Tom, having played about 150 minutes of football, limping since before half time, and now playing centre forward, Tom got in to the box and put the ball in front of another player who slotted it for a goal to put them 3-2 up and after ten minutes of dour defence they came off the field utterly exhausted but delighted with a most unexpected win (the other team had three subs). The two boys were basically physically hollow husks of cramps, but they were fizzing at the result. MY SAD LIFE Work was mildly mental this week which provided some challenges. Madelaine felt I was working too much and on Monday I probably was, but it was all things that would hold up other things and it was a perfect storm of multiple events all hitting my desk at once. Despite this, I managed to go for a walk with Madelaine and Brett (separately) which meant I got some breaks. Madelaine took me into an Italian supermarket, and my brain imploded. Having tried to speak in French, in a store very much in Italian, listening to Australians, it was very confusing. Also interesting. We went to Madelaine’s daughter’s house for dinner, the boys have grown, they were a little shy at first but were very chatty. I can’t tell who is who easily, one of them was searching how to unlock a character in their Lego Batman 2 game on the tablet and his typing was slow but his vocab was pretty good for seven. Brett got bitten by a suspected spider on Monday night but didn’t realise anything was amiss until Tuesday evening. He saw medical professionals on Wednesday and had various tests, by Wednesday night the suspicion of the spider had diminished and it was released on bail. Brett still isn’t completely certain of the cause of the problem, and (I think) it prevented him going to the gold coast with the family on the weekend. Tuesday night Auckland got an actual storm, it was weird being out of it. Even more so as my understanding of the extent of it slowly unfolded. Diana sent me a couple of emails that just didn’t hit my radar for a while. I did hear the next day that even at Guide Dog Central they had trees down, fences damaged, but the dogs were fine. Their kennels are pretty solid. Tuesday in Melbourne I went in to the city, and bought a bag to replace the one I use on walks, which used to be the swim bag, and has had exceedingly heavy if occasionally intermittent use over more than ten years. On the return from the tram I also did a typical Rob thing and purchased a ridiculous number of socks. My cheapy white socks have become far too unreliable and at home I actually carry a spare pair in case I blow a sock because blisters are a serious business. This week I had two packages being delivered so last week I tried to negotiate delivery without signature, then this week customs wanted more info about the packages, then they wanted invoices, then they wanted duty, then they didn’t. I have never had so many emails about a package (or a pair of packages), it was bizarre. I wasn’t in any particular hurry for them and I think in the end they were out for delivery the day they were originally expected despite everything. Diana said the weird mystery parcel also was reported again, and then I got notification it was delivered, but I really don’t think it was. The fictional parcel that wouldn’t die. The way Wednesday unfolded for me was exceedingly weird, initially I missed it then slowly begun to see how much of a storm had hit Auckland. A friend had no damage except for one heavy wooden outdoor chair being knocked over, then later in the day Diana shared a photo of our outdoor bench seat having kamikazeed off the deck (despite my boots holding it down, I hope my boots are okay). I went for a bit of a wander late morning Melbourne time. Didn't quite see the super courteous drivers that seemed to be abundant earlier in the week and particularly the night before. I nearly got cleaned out by an Indian in a hurry. I do enjoy just walking and exploring and it is nice to do it somewhere beyond the mundane at home. I reckon I walk the main routes in Point Chevalier about 150 times a year, double if I have to go both ways, that gets repetitive. So in short Wednesday was actually pretty good until just after I wrote the paragraph above while slurping a flat white on Sydney St. Then one of those finely balanced emotional/assumption hand grenades hit me in the face, courtesy of a phone call from Guide Dogs about Maddie. She needs surgery on her eyelids, may (as in very probably) not stay being a breeder and could possibly go in to guide dog training. We should know more by the end of this coming week. Meanwhile about five different outcomes exist and Maddie becoming a mother seems the least likely of those. It’s hard to say it wasn’t a shock, but we have always known Maddie wasn’t our dog, and we don’t make the decisions. That being said, the whole thing is hard to get used to when the new status is so thoroughly uncertain. I am not putting anything on facebook until the outcome is more known. I had a last supper with most of Brett’s family on Wednesday night, the boys had been to see an Avengers holiday thing in Federation Square, and we watched Back to the Future part 3 to celebrate Brett’s acquisition of a DeLorean for them. Madelaine included some of the anchovies I bought at the crazy Italian supermarket into one of the three sauces on the pasta, she told me the name of it, wide ribbony stuff, pappardelle, I had to check the spelling. We also tried some weird whitebait in a jar that I had to try at the Italian supermarket. I have had times this week when the dual time zone thing messed with my meagre head. I should be better at this but I am clearly out of practice. Today is the 30th anniversary of the Goodins promising an earnest young priest that they would procreate profusely and raise their horde in the Catholic way. The very same people who’s number one daughter thought Easter was about the birth of Elvis. Also, two isn’t really a horde by any measure. So really it’s about 30 years since they told porkies to jesus. I wonder if the priest is still priesting? He certainly hasn’t made it to Pope yet. I was able to use the lounge at the airport, which was why I chose Virgin but it never worked in the US for domestic flights so I wasn’t too optimistic. It was relatively quiet but a nice venue. I started to get a little fidgety though so I went off for a wander after I had charged my phone. It was weird, the free wifi wouldn’t allow me to send emails but I could enable my automation testing no problem. I walked up and down from gate 1 to 10 and back and forth for a while. The three or so days with Jono and family were a bit of a blur. To go with Gunther being ill and on all sorts of drugs, Elke blew a leg and we had to take her to the vet on Friday night. She started limping about 20 minutes after I arrived on Thursday night, but I deny any responsibility. She slept with me while I stayed at Jonos on the ground floor because going up the stairs was a bad idea. To be fair, Elke was a pretty good roommate except for after she got up for her morning pee and would just lie in the middle of the bed. Isabel remembered me from Christmas and wanted to know where Maddie was. Being with Jono in Sydney was my turn to be the embarrassing guy that pestered strangers about their dogs. Friday morning, Jono thrust me in to the outside world before I was ready, we dropped Issy at school then stopped at a very cool little patisserie called Choco Cannelle run by a very French man. Jono had a chat to him, and it was very interesting, and I think Hannah should talk to him some time. We visited the shop twice more in the following two days, quite an achievement given that he was shut on Sunday. Thankfully, work on Friday was a little calmer than it had been earlier in the week, it usually does go a little quieter on Fridays, usually. I managed two swims at Jono’s and was a little sun burned on Saturday afternoon, not seriously. Jono ditched me at the airport only to pick up his parents from the city on the way home. I am not sure how Elke feels about sharing her bedroom with two people. The flight home from Sydney was absolutely packed with children, being the first weekend of the school holidays in New Zealand and NSW. There’s a lesson in that. The woman in the seat next to me had a sub-one year old baby with her and was an exceedingly good example of a high maintenance demanding customer that is very probably utterly certifiably bonkers and would typically send any rational person screaming for the hills. Despite my misgivings about brats on the plane, it was quite uneventful and really just flew by. I think Tuesday would have been my father’s 80th birthday. Maybe 81, but I think 80. It doesn’t matter terribly, either way, I suppose. I have passed day 50 of continuously practising and learning Francais. This coming week, Diana has volunteered us to board Lulu, a golden retriever and one of the terrible trio that includes Lewis and Lightning. Lulu is the one that met Jacinda a couple of weeks ago. I am totally okay with us having a furry distraction, it will be nice to have a dog around while we wait for news of Maddie. When I walk Lulu I intend to tell people it’s just Maddie, and she’s had a bad dye job and hair extensions. This morning I went for a solo walk, got a little distracted, forgot I was supposed to be on an audio at 9:30 and did it while walking. The park at Western Springs was half closed with workers trying to clear trees, one tree had been sliced off at ground level and the trunk was a larger diameter than the table on our deck. Elsewhere the foliage continues to be in a state of wandering freely and our street looks like some gardening guys went mad then gave up before they hauled it away (which is basically true). There are dead fences, broken railings, and all sorts, and the weather is rough again today. PHILOSOPHY CORNER (possibly inspired by a certain passenger sitting adjacent to me recently) Sometimes you need to be enough of a friend to tell someone that they are just being a total batshit psycho. I hope I have at least a few friends willing to do that with me. I have a sneaky feeling that sometimes they might be doing it but on a level too subtle for me. Right, that’s it. There should be more, but I have to send it. Rob PS Expect Golden Retriever photos next week.

No particularly big news this week, except for a bit of unlikely to be useful advice

LOCAL NEWS The scary toll of Easter wasn’t the road deaths, but that Countdown, one of the larger supermarket chains in New Zealand, sold 400 tonnes of chocolate eggs, 80 tonnes of bunnies, and 13 million hot cross buns. I had 2 so I guess I am under performing. Middlemore Hospital has been in the news for a while with building issues, leaky walls, leaky sewer pipes, leaky electricity, sounds like their buildings (the super clinic also) are crap. We seem to be well in to the new government and the old playing blame games. The Nats are being blamed for Middlemore, and the dodgy repair methods for houses in Christchurch, both of which seem pretty damn fair to be honest. Repaired houses in Christchurch are a very unattractive option for purchasers, worse than leaky homes, and very probably leaky as well. Meanwhile the government is planning an increase in fuel levies for public transport, mainly, and although the impact is likely to be comparatively low for many it has people hating it all. They reckon maybe $250 per year per car, which isn’t massive. My relatively low petrol consumption means I am not particularly bothered by it. I still think they should be taxing the internet. There was a story about concern for Pacific Island families struggling to fit in to new smaller houses. Good grief, if you can’t afford a large house then don’t have a large family. If you have a household with grandparents as well, or cousins, or whatever, then if everybody does their bit the cost should be lower for everyone. Stop your whining. The Warriors have almost provided compelling evidence for the parallel universe theory because they have won their first five games of this season. Bad weather is coming to New Zealand. I won’t see any of it with luck. WORLD NEWS Five elephants escaped from a truck on to a motorway after a crash in Spain. Fiji was evacuating people from a small island for a hurricane, well to avoid a hurricane. China and the US are grumpy with each other over tariffs while the Poms and Russians continue to squabble. The best New Zealand could do was say we couldn’t find any Russian spies, either way that doesn’t look very good. A bus crash in Canada was pretty serious, more than decimating a youth hockey team (given that decimation is by definition one in ten dying, and 14 died on the bus). There was a terrorist even involving a van driving in to a crowd in Muenster in Germany. They have a really cool tank museum there. Good thing the bad guys didn’t use a tank. MY SAD LIFE The Bambi walk on Wednesday was exceedingly weird due to the lack of Labrador involvement. We trekked from our house up to Mount Albert, I snuck food to a black Labrador boy we saw up there, just a biscuit. It was a good two hour walk. We tried to bamboozle Hannah on the return, which mostly failed. The dentist on Wednesday was okay, I guess, I am beginning to feel like a dental cyborg. I really won’t mind not going for a while. However, it has to be said I seem to have no anxiety about going, it’s become tres banal. I borrowed little Pia on Thursday morning for the GDP walk (she boarded with us for ten days a couple of months ago, she is eight months old now). She was quite happy to come with me, I took her on this walk when we had her, so not completely unfamiliar. There were only six dogs on the walk and five at the café, and they were really well behaved. One of the regulars, Ivan, is being withdrawn from the program which is quite a shame, Russ, Ivan’s puppy walker, is a nice guy, retired ex-cop. Thursday night was the final check and fiddle with the lights for the pre-ball on Saturday. I have a couple of parcels due to arrive next week, and I had to jump through hoops to authorise them to not require signatures. Such a mission. Fingers crossed they arrive, been waiting for these since June. Saturday morning I did Mt Eden, walking without the dog is really weird. The supermarket on Friday was so much easier without having to deal with her, but still felt weird. I could use the escalator, which doesn’t happen often. Saturday was a bit of a blur, getting myself ready for trip to Australia because I had to leave for the airport about 6:30am Sunday. We got to the Goodins a little early but I was all ready to go with the photos. I took around 2000 photos in about two hours. I had spare memory cards, a spare battery on charge, needed none of that. I don’t know how many people were there, it wasn’t as many as I said last week, which was something of an exaggeration, but it seemed like a lot. Diana helped out on the hospitality side with Sue and Amy. Thomas was sort of like the ambassador, but was also a bit of a photo whore until Lily finally arrived. Pippy was sensible and stayed out of the way for the most part, Tinky not quite so much. It was Brett’s birthday on Saturday, so I didn’t annoy him until Sunday. Then I really annoyed him. I going to annoy Jono on Thursday. We have heard nothing of Maddie and honestly I don’t expect to until close to when she’s released. We don’t even know is the whole mating thing is going to happen, I think it is likely given her lack of frequency but who knows. We may not hear anything until about 19th April. This coming week is a bit of a scary test for my French skills. Brett’s wife Madelaine speaks French properly, so I was feeling some pressure. I reckon I will have completed what I would call the first pass of the course I am doing within the next two to three weeks. I think talking with a native speaker could help once I get over the terror. The flight to Melbourne was interesting because the plane was piloting wifi so it was free, which is cool. I think they are planning on charging about $10 for it. It’s not real quick, in fact it is really damn slow, but it is enough for a few little things. I got a ton of work done on the flight. At the terminal, they took a male black lab past everyone and despite me not having dog biscuits in my pocket he was interested in me, so I got questioned then directed to an weird holding bay then got the third degree from a guy who I was beginning to think I may come to know as “Mr Jellyfinger”. I got all the questions about did I pack my bag myself and did I know the contents and so forth, I was starting to get a little nervous. I did point out that I had been in contact with an in season female dog, and that could explain the dog’s interest (it helped that I could back that theory up with Maddie’s ID card that said breeder on it). After emptying my laptop bag and suitcase (the suitcase part seemed unnecessary, given that the dog was interested when I hadn’t gone to baggage claim yet) they sent me on my way without having to remove my clothing. I have no clue what the dog was checking for. Sunday afternoon was pretty low key, I went for a walk with Brett which included a store of interest, and later we all went to a Thai place for dinner. Work is mental. Also, a tool I rely on decided to die and I have no idea how to fix it, works fine on my desktop but laptop is knackered and I have to decide if I can wing it without it this week. Do I feel lucky? Madelaine learned that a Prince can make a Princess but the converse is not true (like the progeny of Prince Andrew compared to Princess Anne). ERRORS AND OMISSIONS Apparently I mentioned the ornithologist twice. Saves me mentioning him this week. I failed to mention the real reason for going to see Bambi, apart from the rabbits and the tripods, was to take out a piece of pipe for the bunnies to play in. I left that at home. I also failed to mention how quickly the neighbourhood cats moved in when Maddie disappeared. Diana saw Chops chasing birds on Monday morning on our back lawn. Saw him again on Saturday. Have a good week. I expect Diana’s will be peaceful. Rob PS The advice? Well, that’s basically this: you never know when your pants might smell like an in-season dog (but now you know a way to find out).

I humbly suggest you pay attention this time

Seriously, you should. LOCAL NEWS I learned this week that having a meeting with a cabinet minister is illegal somehow, because Carol Hirschfeld resigned after her meeting with the Broadcasting Minister wasn’t in her diary. A drone got within 5m of a plane coming in to Auckland. The drone rules are stupid, but drone pilots are even more stupider. 65,000 people signed a petition to take away the knighthood of Sir Bob Jones. Goes to show people really don’t have anything better to do. The government continued to make a fuss about 4,000 new houses going in near Unitec, despite them being on the cards for at least a couple of years. Not sure why anyone really cares, except the neighbours. An alpaca was stolen in Auckland, leaving it’s blind brother without a guide alpaca. No, I didn’t make this up. The Facebook fallout continued, including the Privacy Commissioner in New Zealand saying it wasn’t complying with the Privacy Act. I am sure there are many organisations that are not. Data is dangerous. New Zealand Post increased their prices again, speeding up their inevitable demise. On a similar note, Sky TV reckon they may not get the rights to Rugby World Cup 2019. Depending on who does, that could be a real blow to Sky TV. Their CEO announced he was retiring this week, he’s a dinosaur, so that could help them. Some boxer had a fight on Sunday morning and lost. A couple of kids died in a crash on the Desert Road, they were appropriately restrained. The weather has been pretty good, therefore unremarkable. WORLD NEWS A sailor went overboard in the Volvo Ocean Race, in the Southern Ocean. The ball tampering by the Australian Cricket Team has caught the imagination of everyone. One of the best was The Civilian (New Zealand blog) who said that severe disciplinary action had been taken against the non-cheating players for failing to uphold the standards of Australian Cricket. Some professor did the maths for some football player sticker book in the UK for the coming World Cup and reckoned the full collection would cost 773 pounds, and even with 100% effective trading would still cost over 200 quid to complete. I think plenty of people already worked out it would be ridiculously expensive to complete. MY SAD LIFE I had another trip to the dentist this week, the expensive dentist for the tricky stuff, it seemed to go okay. The chair was pink, that was weird. There was a screen on the ceiling, also. It saved me having to count ceiling tiles, and dots on ceiling tiles. There was no Bambi walk this week, he didn’t get back from Melbourne until Wednesday. The really bizarre thing this week was I saw this super sexy Mercedes, I think a AMG GT Coupe, with an old white guy driving it, and (you’ll never believe this) he let me in to the queue in front of him!!! A posh Merc driver that wasn’t a complete dick! Who knew they existed? Tuesday I had an expensive trip to the ornithologist for one of my problem teeth, it went okay, and very expensively, another visit on Wednesday that should mean I am done for about six months, finally. The chair was bright pink and they décor was…interesting. He was very cheerful, and chatty, but the patients can’t really talk back. I had to do a weird drive/walk around Pt Chev looking for halls to rent for Bambi on Tuesday, after a booking SNAFU. Maddie got a small bonus walk at Big King on Wednesday because I was in Epsom dropping something off and it was very close by, we just did a small circuit, but she was very happy. Facebook really does have some issues, it’s decided I need to like more church groups, I really can’t tell why. Everyone is hating Facebook and I see why, half the screen is advertising crap in manky groups to me rather than showing me things that I am clearly interested in. Good Friday was quite special, not because of the birth of Elvis or anything, but because Maddie finally went in to season. This meant a trip out to the Guide Dogs breeding centre, to drop Maddie off. She had been very naughty in the morning, taking off for a KFC bucket at Onehunga lagoon, so I wasn’t very happy with her. Rory came with me to drop Maddie off, Hannah and Allister were grumpy they weren’t invited. In theory, this is the one when my little girl with be deflowered and make me a grandfather. Saturday we checked out the studio for Caitlin’s preball next Saturday, a small function for Caitlin and 170 of her closest friends. I also took Pippy and Tinky for a short walk, which was nice, but weird, because they don’t go on lead. I am not feeling any pressure at all with regards to taking photos. Sunday morning Diana took me for a walk around the viaduct, and we had breakfast in the sunshine looking out across the water. Then we went to visit Bambi in Waitoki to borrow some photography gear for the preball. Diana got to fondle rabbits, Mareea (don’t blame me for that spelling) is breeding them, she has three pairs and there were a few babies. Easter is an appropriate time for that, I suppose (fondling rabbits, not breeding them). Sunday night we had the family over for dinner, which was the first time since Christmas Day, but also the first time ever that it included Hannah J. I opened a bottle of red wine, a 1990 special reserve Cab Sauv. Diana reckoned it would be foul and it really wasn’t, it was quite nice. Between me, Rory, and mother, we finished it off. I figure it’s time some of that wine was consumed. Hannah made some brioche and they were evil. Also she shared some news, and it wasn’t about a bloody dog. This morning I borrowed Conrad (Eva’s brother) and picked up Hannah and Allister and went to Big King for a walk, they hadn’t been there before, it’s very close to their house. Then Diana, Rory and I went to visit Nanny, Rory hasn’t seen her since January. She’s muddling along. As Rory correctly pointed out today, we’ve seen him four days in a row, which means we probably won’t see him again until Diana’s birthday or perhaps Mother’s Day. I have been learning French for 37 days and my fluency appears to be hovering around 62%, not improving, that is a concern. I have finally added Ross to this list, so now Kathryn doesn’t have to talk to him. I have also added Allister as a recipient to this email, I guess he has the right to know what I say, now that he is Hannah’s fiancée. It’s been quite a week. Not going too far from home with the dog proved to be a good idea, and also we seemed to have plenty happening anyway.