I'm feeling decidedly uninspired today, at the moment, let's face it ... this week.

I think it's that pre-Christmas flatness, the calm before the storm kind of feeling, on the cusp of something good - I've been having a lot of that lately.

Mags has this theory and I think that it's true. In the Northern Hemisphere you need to only survive 6 months between holiday type events - summer break then Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Whereas we poor antipodeans (said anti-pee-deans) have to go a whole year between holidays. Admittedly we get a few weeks off over Christmas as a traditional rule, at least in the south we still do but nothing through the year. 'tis a sad state.

I have just one more week, 5 days 'til I finish for the year. I sure am grateful for a few days off before Christmas.

The best thing about the pre-Christmas period are these...

Pohutukawa trees - our Christmas trees..... love 'em.

See the iconic history of the pohutukawa trees - actually that link isn't very exciting compared to the real deal. Pohutukawa trees are just awesome! That's all you need to know about.

After Pippapotomus and Daya arrive, we will be driving up (yes up the flipping mountains, I know it's south of here but up makes more sense!) to Queenstown on Christmas Day, well actually Arrowtown cause the accommodation is cheaper but we'll spend a couple of days in Queenstown.

This is my favourite view of Queenstown from the Skyline Gondola.

We had a great conference dinner up there last time I was in Queenstown.

They do really good food and heaps of it. Though having an entire salmon with it's face still on and an almost surgical incision in it's side to access the yummy fish flesh was a bit odd on the vegetarian buffet. That freaked even me out and I do like my meat.

Luckily by that time all the international delegates had figured kiwi hospitality out and realised that relaxed is an understatement. The next night the French hosted the dinner, known for their adherence to pomp and formality, the French bailed on the speeches and we all crowded around the tables and watched the Japanese delegation get really super drunk. The next day we all listened to a presentation from the Filipinos about porcine endemic diarrhoea with pictures that will not be shown on my blog.

I've always wondered how the Japanese delegation dealt with that.