At the time of writing this, there’s four days to go until Christmas Day. It’s been a year of some change for me, where I’ve been learning to adjust to semi-retirement. Or, as the Spanish call being retired - and which I much prefer the look and sound of - jubilada. I’ve had both some …

Continue reading Nearly Christmas again!

I headed off to Westport again recently, to spend a few days with my sister who lives there. Westport is on the West Coast of the South Island, a little further north than where I live on the east coast. The differences between the two places are somewhat more than a little, though, with the …

Continue reading I headed off to the West Coast again for a few days.

You know how we knock ourselves around when we’re young, and think we’ve got away with it? It’s an illusion. It may look as though we bounce back from bangs, bruises, and breaks, with no harm done (or not much, for the most part), but the knocked around bits bide their time. Then, as we …

Continue reading Bad backs, vacuum cleaners, and Elliot to the rescue.

About 20 months ago my cat, Patrick, popped out of the cat door for the last time. He was 14 years old, and had been diagnosed with the not uncommon cat ailment of hyperthyroidism. It was being treated, but must have worsened faster than the treatment could keep up, and he died in the neighbour’s …

Continue reading I lost a cat, then briefly acquired a kitten. I’m no longer an ‘old cat lady’ – for now.

At long last I got around to doing something I’d been meaning to do for ages – I visited the New Brighton History Museum. That’s New Brighton in Christchurch NZ, not New Brighton and Christchurch in the UK, in the event anyone needs that clarified. If either of those places in the UK have a …

Continue reading The New Brighton History Museum

It was my birthday yesterday – 1st October. I’ve now been in this world for 67 years, and boy have I learned some stuff. I survived the years of being ‘young and dumb and just wanting fun’, plus the years after that of work and paying a mortgage, and now I’ve reached this third era …

Continue reading If I have to have another birthday, I might as well have another book on fungi. Believe it not, that makes sense to me.

Fourteen years ago on the 4th September 2010, Canterbury, NZ, was struck with was what to be the first of several earthquakes over the next year and a bit. The most destructive of these was on 22nd February 2011, but that was still a few months away. At the time of the September earthquake, I …

Continue reading A story of the September 2010 earthquake in Canterbury, NZ, on its anniversary.

In a move to write again after several months' hiatus, what better way to get back into it than with a title that's possibly mystifying to some. If you understood it, though, perhaps you’re a creative right-brain thinker, even if that is scientifically unproven. However, going with that, because it’s more entertaining than sticking with …

Continue reading I’m stealing an idea from this local business to ‘driftwood’ my stone non-garden area.

“Come on, Aunty Katrina”, my nine-year-old twin grand-nieces called back to me as we were running for the ferry. “The ferry’s coming!” they urgently informed me, with a touch of panic on their faces. I really was trying to be as fleet of foot as possible, but to their nine-year-old young, fit, and athletic bodies, …

Continue reading Going downhill at Diamond Harbour is much easier than going uphill, but …..

It was an interesting sight to see my neighbour slowly walking towards me holding a lead in one hand with a creaky old dog on the end of it, and a battered old beer carton in the other hand. I’ve lived in this neighbourhood for almost eight years, and have a friendly acquaintanceship with a …

Continue reading Old dogs and beer