Hmmm...

Okay, it is back to the most non descriptive subject post line. I haven't posted in a while because nothing jumped out at me to post about.

In my news: I'm only about 9 days away from another move. This will be the hardest move of my life, because for the first time I have big stuff to move! There is the bed, the couch, the love seat, the kitchen table, the dryer, the big stand thing, etc. As usual prior to my moves, I've been purging. I went through my entire closet and was what I considered to be fairly relentless. I must have trimmed out about 4 or 5 bags that went to the red bin. I'm thinning out books as well- although I must say I've been rather restrained buying them, instead trying to make better use of the library. Those will get dropped off at the windmill which will be then used in the great annual Founders Book fair, where you can buy books really cheap. I take advantage, so best to donate as well. I've also been trying to eat the pantry- but haven't made too much headway on that front. I'll be moving away from this cute but ant full and non insulated house to a house that at least has underfloor and ceiling insulation only put in last year. Its a short term let of 6 months or hopefully a year and is much closer to town with a fab kitchen. I can't wait to be moved!

Other than that, my weekday activities of horseback riding and pilates take up a couple of nights a week. I've been pondering entering a 10km race in May- more to get me running again than anything else. Since a slight foot injury a while back, I haven't been out but am feeling okay again. We'll see if I get motivated after the move.

The days are getting shorter. It feels like winter is around the corner. I'm not looking forward to it, even though it doesn't mean -40. :) It does mean cold chilly kiwi houses and darkness, and thats a challenge enough.

My kittens are growing rapidly. Jasper is starting to look like a cat- getting his winter coat, so he's starting to lose the very extreme kitten cuteness. Allie already looks like a cat- she's a big girl. I've had her 4 months already, and him about 2 1/2.

Well, off to work I go. I had room for my blog this morning compliments of my darling kittens who decided I should get up at 6am, a full half hour early, so you can thank them for this post!

On the move...

Okay, so pretty much ever since I moved into my current flat, I've been looking for a new flat. Strangely my couple of minute walk through didn't help me predict how terribly prone to temperature fluctuations my current house would be. If the temperature is in the mid 20s outside, its quite common for me to get home after work and it to be 27 inside. Then it cools right off overnight. This is what happens with lots of windows and no insulation.

I went to see a house closer to town a week or two back. After going through the process, I'm going to be moving April 1st. Its only a short term accomodation- but should get me through the winter, and at least it has new underfloor and ceiling insulation. Plus a bigger yard...

My kittens are driving me slightly crazy when I take them outside. They go darting around the back of the house into the front, and towards the road. I tear after them to try and keep them safe. The new house has a fenced yard. Yay- hopefully they can go for play fests with a little less stress on me... They never seem to run the same direction when they're both outside.

I've eaten a tomato based veg stock made from tomatoes from my garden, and a pasta sauce as well in recent days. I can't keep up with the tomatoes from my 3 plants. Thankfully the big pumpkin plant is starting to tone down a bit- it seems to have stopped creeping- which is good. It covers a huge part of the yard, still. I'll need to get the garden all tidied up before I move. I'm not really looking forward to the moving process- I have far too much big stuff these days!

Tsunamis and Pride

First off, I just got back from watching a taped version of the Mens hockey finals at a Canadian friends. We sat together, 4 Canadians and a wider group of kiwis cheering on our boys. And they won. We cheered, and we felt proud- from the other side of the globe. Early in the games they were de-crying the Canadians lack of performance. If our medal count started slow, it certainly didn't finish that way - especially with our strong gold performance. The only Olympic event I was lucky enough to see was this hockey game. It was the last event, and as I heard the anthem played I felt proud... Just as I did when I saw "with glowing hearts" on the ice at GM place. Well done, athletes. Well done.

In other patriotic news, I must say I felt strangely proud to be Canadian yesterday. I got up after a well deserved sleep in yesterday morning (the kittens didn't get me up early for once! Celebration!) I logged into my email and the government of Canada was the first to inform me of the tsunami warning to NZ. I then checked on stuff.co.nz and found out sure enough waves were due to NZ, however after researching what had happened elsewhere in NZ it sounded like we had nothing to fear as long as we stayed out of the water and off the beach. Since I've done a bit of reading about the waves- it sounds like a really interesting phenomena. According to todays Nelson Mail, the tsunami caused tidal surges of close to 1.5M in Napier and more than a metre in Canterbury. One of the quotes: "I was blown away by how low the tide was and 15 minutes later it was all back again. The river dropped 1.5 metres in 10 minutes. It was really scary." There wasn't much impact in Nelson.