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What I can see from my window
11 Dec 2011 09:22 pmOne of the cool things about work is having a desk right by a window, something I haven't had in most offices. This is what I can see.
( Two photos and two volcanoes )
They had another Newmarket viaduct segment signing today (see here for the first one featuring Ceiling Cat) so we went in and signed the insides of two. As it's also Sebastian's estimated first birthday, one of them got signed as "Sebastian's Birthday Seggie".
( Photos of cats, viaduct, Big Blue Thing, and a Scotsman )
Snow in Auckland!
15 Aug 2011 08:59 pmPeople, it snowed today! There hasn't been snow in Auckland since 1939. There had been hail earlier in the day but suddenly people in the place I was working started shouting there was snow falling and we rushed out onto the roof deck. Some people said it was more hail, but it was real, drifting snow, glittering on our hair and clothes though it melted as soon as it hit the ground. There was visible ground snow in the Bombay hills though!
OK, I lived in Germany for almost three years so I know about real snow and really cold temperatures, but this is news for this city. Of course the more southern snowed-in cities are pointing and laughing like they did when we had an earthquake recently, but the point in both cases is that we hardly ever get either.
I am so glad we have a heat-pump even though it's only managed to bring the house up to about 16-17C.
I should also report that my striped scarf and purple Wolf Bay mitts and possum-wool hat were very much appreciated on the walking part of my commute, especially in the morning gale.
Local weather and elections
19 Sep 2010 11:53 amIt's a blustery and occasionally wet Sunday as a storm the size of Australia passes over, which means that it's not worth going out to Ardmore for the Battle of Britain air show, dammit. They have the Warbirds (vintage war planes) there and it would have been wonderful in decent weather. We wouldn't be able to see them with the rain and low clouds. :-(
Anyway. We have local elections on across the country and there's a Jedi standing in the Waitemata and Gulf ward. "He is encouraging voters to strike back against dull, traditional candidates and support his policies. These include light sabre-based progress, the formation of a Rebel Alliance against the political clone army and light-speed local infrastructure." :-D Pity it's not my ward or I'd vote for him, but the Orakei guy saying he will fight "council stupidity" among other things will probably get my vote.
A poll on Auckland's mayoral campaign has Bob Parker way out in front, and he's not even standing. He's the mayor of Christchurch who has been so impressive after the earthquake. Auckland would be his if he wanted it, which I doubt. :-)
This viaduct has had my feet on it
30 Aug 2010 11:21 pmRemember the Newmarket Viaduct that has our names in it (and Vila's for that matter)? They've completed the new southbound lanes so they opened them up yesterday (Sunday) for the public to walk over. Greg's been looking forward to it for weeks, and I was keen too, depending on the weather. I said if it was raining I'd stay home. It wasn't when we left, but if course it poured down while we were walking up the on-ramp and along to the Big Blue Thing (the self-launching crane also affectionately called Big Blue). I thought it was a complete wash-out since all I could see was the inside of my large green umbrella and the wet concrete under my feet. I hate winter. I really hate winter. But then the sun came out and yay, I could see! And even take photos!
When we went back down (it was a walk of about 1.5kms) we went over to 277, stopping on the way to let a sudden downpour pass, and ate at my favourite place in the food hall there, the Thai-Vietnamese-Malay fusion place. We had kung-po chicken, tamarind fish, and beef rendang, and very yummy it was too.
( Photos )
Windows around the world
20 Dec 2008 01:09 pmTake a picture of what is outside of your window right now and post it.
( Two from upstairs )
And while I'm at it, here's my summer tree, inside two windows. :-) I found some very cheap summer-related decorations on-line that are unbreakable, so I put up a tree that celebrates summer, sand, and sea. The kittens have batted the lower ones round a bit, but they can't hurt them, or be hurt by them.
( Summer tree )
Windows around the world
20 Dec 2008 01:09 pmTake a picture of what is outside of your window right now and post it.
( Two from upstairs )
And while I'm at it, here's my summer tree, inside two windows. :-) I found some very cheap summer-related decorations on-line that are unbreakable, so I put up a tree that celebrates summer, sand, and sea. The kittens have batted the lower ones round a bit, but they can't hurt them, or be hurt by them.
( Summer tree )
Since I posted about the burning bus, here's the other fire last week, the day I picked up Ashley. This one took out a huge hardware store a couple of suburbs away from me. A shopper smelled smoke and told the staff to get out; everyone escaped including the staff member in the toilets at the time, which was lucky as all the gas tanks they had for sale then started exploding--yes, there really were fireballs. They think it was arson. I'm posting because I happened to find a great set of images here.
The first is my favourite, but I especially admire numbers 6, 7, and 10, which shows a fireman against roiling smoke--and a pohuhukawa tree in full bloom.
Since I posted about the burning bus, here's the other fire last week, the day I picked up Ashley. This one took out a huge hardware store a couple of suburbs away from me. A shopper smelled smoke and told the staff to get out; everyone escaped including the staff member in the toilets at the time, which was lucky as all the gas tanks they had for sale then started exploding--yes, there really were fireballs. They think it was arson. I'm posting because I happened to find a great set of images here.
The first is my favourite, but I especially admire numbers 6, 7, and 10, which shows a fireman against roiling smoke--and a pohuhukawa tree in full bloom.
The burning bus
16 Dec 2008 11:38 pmAfter the fireball in that last Pretender episode, I thought I should provide a link to the burning bus. This happened a few days ago in the next suburb, only a few blocks away from our house, and I missed it.
Fireballs seem unlikely (and a trope really made fun of in the Simpsons), and I'm not sure this was one--though the article says it was--but dude, you can hardly see the bus for flames, and the heat was intense.
And the name of the spokesman for the fire service I almost read as Jarod. :-P I'd say "too much Pretender" but I've nowhere near reached that point.
The burning bus
16 Dec 2008 11:38 pmAfter the fireball in that last Pretender episode, I thought I should provide a link to the burning bus. This happened a few days ago in the next suburb, only a few blocks away from our house, and I missed it.
Fireballs seem unlikely (and a trope really made fun of in the Simpsons), and I'm not sure this was one--though the article says it was--but dude, you can hardly see the bus for flames, and the heat was intense.
And the name of the spokesman for the fire service I almost read as Jarod. :-P I'd say "too much Pretender" but I've nowhere near reached that point.
Thanks to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
trixieleitz who located a British shop near me, I have now eaten a Jaffa cake. And it was very nice too: intense and extra-orangey. YUM!
But first we went to the annual fair at a local church. We got:
- a foot-spa (at last, a rhyme for chutzpah!) for only $5, not yet tested
- almost all the Marcus Didius Falco novels by Lindsey Davis
- two old Giles cartoon books
- The Book of the Goons, so old it has pink and yellow 60s psychedelic lettering on the cover; it will go with my Goon Show scripts
- an SF anthology published in 1970
- two lamps consisting of giant blue light-bulbs, pictures below
Then because
trixieleitz had told me about The English Corner Shop (which isn't on one), we went there and bought Jaffa cakes, chocolate digestives, rich tea biscuits, crisps (pickled onion and worcester sauce flavours), Caramacs, and various sweets that appeal to Greg but not me.There seemed to be a festival in Onehunga, so we stopped on the way back to see what was going on. It was Onehunga Heritage Weekend (who knew?) and I took some photos, then we went to the Hard To Find second-hand bookshop there. This is an old house full of stairs and little rooms, all packed with books. I really need to make up a list of authors I want before I go back, especially to the SF room.
( Photos: band, big horses, bookshop, bizarre blue lamp )
And now I'm off to bed.
A while back, people were doing a meme where you google "You know you're from [wherever] when" and post the results. There was only one for Auckland It was:
...you leave the house on a beautiful sunny day and think, "Oh shit, I forgot my umbrella!"
Which is very true. I did think up another one though:
...no matter where you're driving from or where to, at least one street will be dug up.
But this week there were a few in The Aucklander which had an article on how hated we are by the rest of the country. In fact we proudly call ourselves by their insult: JAFA: just another f-ing Aucklander.
( You know you're a JAFA when )
( Some rather unkind Auckland jokes from the rest of the country )
Picspam of cats and mall art
24 Jun 2008 07:29 pmWe braved the weather to go to Sylvia Park to have lunch at the Casablanca Moroccan restaurant (yum!) and to see Prince Caspian. It's really strange weather today: cold, wet, blustery, and sunny, all mixed up. It was miserable when we left home but bright and sunny when we got there, and it has just hailed. I have a fan heater on in here as well as the heatpump in the TV room; it's 6C out there. :-P
I shall put my comments about the film in a separate post because of spoilers, and devote this one to picspam.
First of all, two cats in boxes. Greg's hard drive failed while he was away so he got a new one delivered. Claudia and Vic were more interested in the box it came in.
( Cats in a box )
And at Sylvia Park mall, I finally got round to taking pictures of the wall climbers and also Boba Fett de Milo.
( Climbers and a Lego Boba Fett )
Animals in traffic
18 Jan 2007 11:35 pmtrixieleitz posted about the kitten on the motorway yesterday. Today, it was a penguin on the Harbour Bridge!I tell you, it's all go in Auckland, the city where I once saw sheep which had escaped from Cornwall Park blocking traffic on a main road.
What I did yesterday
17 Sep 2006 01:13 pmI went into town yesterday because the Civic Theatre, the magnificent 1920s theatre used in King Kong, was open for the Auckland Heritage Festival, and I love it. I used to go there when it was a cinema, which it still is during film festivals. It's an amazing place: the auditorium is like a sultan's palace open to a starry sky, and I've always adored what I thought were lionesses with glowing eyes crouched either side of the stage. I found out yesterday that they are in fact Syrian panthers. The rest of the cinema is an extraordinary mixture of Hindu, Buddhist, and African themes. I took two more pictures to add to my Civic Theatre gallery.
[Edit:] Thanks to glitterboy1 for finding this: very cool virtual tours of the Civic Auditorium and Wintergarden.
It was not a good day however. As part of the festival, I did some painting which was stolen while it was drying. No one else's was taken. Just mine. Someone is passing it off as theirs now.
I was so upset that the Aotea Square craft market failed to cheer me up. I just got some lunch (Indian) and some hand-made chocolates and some coffee and went home -- but not before taking a picture of the new espresso coffee van there that Stark's Bar run, complete with what I can't see as anything but a Stykera logo. :-)
( Buddhas, elephants, and Stark's )
And now for something completely different: the works of art that are Japanese manhole covers (found on User Friendly).
Local elections
9 Oct 2004 08:50 pmWe just had local elections here (for mayor and various officals) by postal vote as usual. John Banks (the right-wing bastard who wanted to spend all our money on yet another packed-solid motorway instead of addressing the causes of gridlock) lost by 20,000 votes to Dick Hubbard who's definitely the best of the bunch and a late entry. The guy runs a cereal company (which makes a variety of excellent and inventive cereals) and puts interesting newsletters with his views on life and business into the packets. He's an eccentric who flew all his workforce to Samoa for a holiday, so I'm looking forward to what he'll do.
And yes, there's a definite move to the left right across the Auckland electorate. My little votes did their bit.
