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Monday, December 17, 2001

Time is hurtling onwards to Christmas at great speed; my Advent calendar is over half-gone (a minute scrap of chockie per day) and there's lots to get done before the holidays.

Some time spent working on the financials in the morning, also helping Teddy sort out their NZ bank account which had not had a term deposit transferred to it. They went off into town to shop, and Joan and I sat down with the UK road atlas to work on a tentative itinerary for our annual UK trip next year. (Relax Keith, we'll get to you some time in June; We'll look in on Matt in May). We're also spending two weeks in Ireland, visiting family and seeing some more of the country. I've got an appointment with the travel agent tomorrow to sort out plane bookings, as we've been warned that space is already tight. It does seem ridiculous, that we are being told that people are not flying on holiday and one might conclude that planes are not particularly full. No -- the wicked airlines just take planes off the routes, and shift the load to those partner airlines that are flying.

Some work this afternoon on the motel website; my portion should be completed by the end of the week. Although I've got Rebeccah and Gemma coming tomorrow for more photography tuition -- that will blot up some time.

Tuesday, December 18, 2001

Believe it or not: another dreary wet day. And this is Rotorua, 7 days from Christmas -- we're usually baking in the sun by now. The newspaper was commenting that Auckland cricket had missed 13 straight weekends of play, and other summer competitions are no better off.

Rebeccah and Gemma duly had their lesson on film and exposure, a solid two hours of it. We broke for lunch, and I brewed up some soup as Joan and the others hadn't returned from town. It turned out that they had witnessed a hit-and-run accident: a car full of teenagers that had been illegally parked just reversed straight back into a car waiting at the Give Way, then drove off erratically down the street. Joan, Kay and Teddy went straight to the police station to report this; fortunately they had been able to get the car's number.

I had to forgo the lessons when Anita brought Drew over for us to look after, as she was off to a funeral. The girls were quite happy to carry on with the baby-sitting. Joan and I had to go off into town for an appointment with the travel agent, to sort out our flights and rental cars in the UK next year. I was able to use some of my vast pile of air points: I bought a return plane ticket to London for myself; Joan's ticket came out of air points as a 'companion fare', and I had plenty left for two business upgrades both ways -- if we get them. At least a business upgrade means you get a quick check-in and you are allowed twice the baggage weight (if you need it). You also go into the business lounge instead of waiting at the boarding gate. But it's a bit of a letdown when you've waited right to the last to see if you've scored the upgrade -- and someone with an elite gold card trumps your ace and gets on, and you're back in cattle class.

We did the exercise of seeing whether it was cheaper to hire a car for 29 days in Britain, go over to Ireland in the car ferry, back to Britain etc -- or the alternative of a couple of one-week separate hires in Britain and a two-week hire in Ireland. That did turn out to be much cheaper, largely due to the $NZ500 or so cost of the car ferry both ways, but also the daily rate was less in Ireland.

Wednesday, December 19, 2001

I've just been looking at the late news, with the highlights of the NZ premiere of Lord of the Rings. It promises to be a triumph for NZ scenery and movie-making expertise, if the comments from overseas stars are echoed elsewhere. A couple of the Hobbit actors want to buy houses in Wellington to bring up their families. We're looking forward to seeing it.

Kay and Teddy drove off for a few days on the coast; they are booked to go to White Island, an active volcano off the coast at Whakatane. We went into town after lunch for Joan to pick up some stuff; I needed small baskets for camera bits, to go on the shelves in my camera cupboard. Of course, it rained off and on all day; just drizzle, then a fine spell for 10 minutes. Our two refurbished chairs arrived back from the upholsterer later in the afternoon.

My friend Russell came over with his computer after tea; he had received it back from his technician and wanted a good check-over. I cleaned out a lot of surplus temp stuff, did a defrag, and tidied up the registry for him. This certainly made a lot of difference, and it now has a much faster boot-up. He'll have to use it over a period before we can say it's fixed.

(Thursday morning addendum from daughter Sue)

Just read your Web site. We didn't go to the premiere last night, but Bryan and family did - just saw all the photos of the stars. They all went dressed up and his daughter got her cloak signed by all the hobbits. There is a great display of Weta props and costumes on here at the moment - absolutely stunning!!! Everything is instantly recognisabel - I didn't need to read the labels. The detail is exquisite - the swords are all covered in fine engraving, the costumes stand up to very close inspection, as do the models. Having seen other movie/TV costumes and props, and can honestly say that I have never seen anything of this quality before.

According to Bryan's daughters (16 and 19 ie not kids), who have read the book dozens of times, the dialogue is virtually verbatim, and the plot only has ommissions, not changes. However, this is quite true because I read the Moria scene 5 minutes after they showed it on TV, and it had differences (eg Pippin drops a stone down a hole in the book, but knocks an entire skeleton down it in the movie). Still, the changes seem to be for the better!

Thanks, Sue <g>

Thursday, December 20, 2001

Writing cheques this morning, and paying bills -- must be the 20th (in NZ most accounts are paid on the 20th of the foillowing month). The sun was out and the sky reasonably clear. Joan went into town with Joanna for beauty appointments, and I didn't see her back until the mid afternoon.

After lunch, the sky clouded over and looked threatening, so I finished what I was doing, put on my gumboots and mowed the lawns -- just in time because there were a few spits of rain. Joan was back by this time, and hurried around the garden, spraying for 'bloack spot' fungus. Russell rang up at 4 pm with a tale of woe: he could connect to his ISP, but not talk to the mail server or the main http server. I had mail to post, so drove over to see if there was a configuration problem. I checked every setting, even removed and re-installed TCP/IP without result. It being 5.45 pm by then, I had to admit defeat and advised him to contact the Clear Net help desk. It started thunder and lightning on the way back home, and then started steady rain -- which is still continuing at 8.10 pm as I write this.

An early bed tonight, as Joan had a restless night last night and that does seem to result in me not sleeping as soundly as usual.

Friday, December 21, 2001

Hope you're not getting bored with me talking about the weather -- but it's still most erratic. We started the day with bright sunshine, most cheery after the recent dull days. Went over to our hairdresser for hair cuts; we drove back into town; I dropped Joan for shopping, visited the bank then went home for lunch.

Russell arrived with gear at 1.45pm. We fiddled with things for a while, but resolved that nothing but a deep scrub and YAWI would work. Soooo... quick format, load Win98SE and configure. I'd slipped in a network card before booting; configured the TCP/IP and up came the Internet no sweat. So it does look as though there was something deep in the bowels of Windows that was preventing proper Internet connection. We continued on, installing drivers, rebooting etc etc; meanwhile, the sky had clouded over and we suddenly were deluged. Not only rain, but hail, and continuous thunder for about half an hour. Russell went off home at 5.30 pm, and we'll continue tomorrow.

It's still raining as I type; Mr Noah, we really didn't mean those cruel things we said about your ark -- can we have a place?

Saturday, December 22, 2001

Nice sunshine again today. Russell came over at 10 am to resume our program load. Everything went without incident for a change; the only little niggle left is a blue screen on the way out of Windows. Fortunately, the Registry had been written out by this stage; it seems to be happening right at the end of the exit before the power goes off. A tap on a key is all that's required to finish the process; I told Russell that this sort of thing happens from time to time; no-one knows why, and odds are that it will correct itself in the course of time and go as mysteriously as it came.

Kay and Teddy arrived in the late morning, having had a launch trip to White Island earlier in the week. They had had to wear a mask to assist breathing on the island because of the sulphur fumes, but enjoyed themselves nonetheless. Russell went back home in the mid-afternoon, lugging his gear, and reported back later that all was well on reassembly. Another 'Lazarus job' completed satisfactorily.

We all went out to a barbecue at 6.30 pm and spent a very pleasant evening chatting and sipping wine. The man of the house was into yachting and there were a lot of yachties there, so Teddy was in his element talking yachting shop.

And please link to Helen, who has some lovely Christmas thoughts.

Sunday, December 23, 2001

Christmas Greetings to all

I'm putting this up early, so regulars can have the benefit ;-]

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all; and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2002, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make New Zealand great (not to imply that New Zealand is necessarily greater than any other country), and without regard to the race, creed, colour, age, physical ability, religious faith, choice of computer platform, or sexual preference of the wishees. Nonetheless, you are entitled to give consideration to these good wishes notwithstanding any of the foregoing terms insofar as they may or may not be applicable.

By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

Don't forget to link to Helen, for her Christmas thoughts.

Miracles! Another reasonably fine day, and the humidity has dropped a little. I have been busy catching up with deferred tasks today, after two days chasing Russell's computer. We watched some of the memorial service to Sir Peter Blake, held in Auckland this morning; followed later in the day by a parade of yachts and boats in Auckland harbour. This numbered many hundreds of craft, and looked most impressive even on the TV.

On the last leg before Christmas; tomorrow is going to be rather busy.