bone arse freezing

I do have to say it's been soo sooo cold the last two days.

We had a wee weather bomb filled with snow

about 6am yesterday.

I woke to a txt from the Lovely Kim to say

don't come to work cause the roads are covered with snow.

Fine by me.

I knew it was going to be bad

cause the farmers whose farms are on my way home from the Methven

were loading up bales of hay by gates for easy access

when the land was deep in snow.

I guess the bales would been identifiable by

 being the really big mounds of snow.

They had a couple of feet of snow in the Methven by 7am,

we had only just started.

Punky Pete had already left by then

but was home by 10am when they closed the Polytech

and sent the students home.

I don't know why I take photos in the dark when it snows.

We didn't get much snow in Leeston.

Only 5 cms but it was endless.

Snowed and sleeted all day.

Then rained and melted and froze.

I spent the day sitting a metre from the roasty, toasty fire.

Wow the fireplace looks wonky there!

I woke this morning in my bedroom with no curtains

to see my breath and to hear it was -5.8 degrees.

That's cold.

That's bone arse cold.

We hit a high of 0C today.

I stayed inside with my thermal long johns on,

my merino undershirt, a merino jersey,

jeans, wool work socks and my favourite

possum merino beanie from TBfree New Zealand.

Oh and I threw a Young Farmer's hoodie on so kept my hood up.

Cosy as a fridge.

At least I'm not these heifers I saw today.

I have to remind myself their hides are very thick

and the girls can handle being out in the snow.

For Leeston the snow has pretty much melted away.

That means black ice and slippy roads.

Oh good! 

I need to drive to Christchurch tomorrow to play musical cars.

Snow, snow go away and bugger off to Antarctica from where you came! 

Leeston Fete

It was the Leeston Fete today.

The second annual Leeston Fete that is.

We had the mandatory vehicle display
on the main street closed for the day.
The weather was perfect t-shirt temperatures
not that cynical Cantabrians will allow themselves to
enjoy such foolery as short sleeves.

First place I searched out was the Black Forest Waffle Hut.
Last year the inaugural Leeston Fete had seriously bad weather but
plenty of people still came out.
I lined up then for waffles with cream and cinnamon
and I lined up today too.
I live for waffles from fairs, fetes, galas and markets.
Freshly ironed waffles, yum!

I should know this pirate's name but now at the end of the day I can't!

(I have a post coming up about getting older).

There was plenty of awesome kids entertainment on.

Between the pirate and the bouncy castle

there was these huge transparent plastic balls

that the kids climbed inside and tumbled themselves around a pool of water.

Looked fun.

I wanted a go but I suspect a grown up inside a transparent ball

may have taken the fun out of the experience for the kids.

I think they have replaced dodgem cars.

And because winter is long around here,

and people love their animals

we have Cab 4 Ewe.

Don't worry, it will be able to be driven

and the sheep will recline in the back as they tootle down the road.

(this is a gross exageration, that wire wouldn't hold the sheep in)

I like the wooden gate best.

Very true to kiwi number 8 wire tradition.

Our tiny town is pulling together since the earthquakes started.

We get out and buy the sausages sizzles with bread and onion

raising money for the kindy.

And then another sausage from the Fire Brigade.

Waffles, kebabs, hot dogs on sticks, hot chips, coconut ice, fudge

it's just an orgy of poor food choices,

but all off set by all the walking and standing around chatting.

Right neighbourly it is, the old Leeston Fete.

I bought manuka/clover honey from Sheehans

Leeston is the centre of New Zealand's bee belt.

I finally found daffodil bulbs for less than a dollar each

so had a wee glut buy of those

(all planted this afternoon).

And that was about me really.

Oh and two fresh, crisp waffles.

That will be it until Feildays.

I came home

early today feeling a bit sicky again.

But happy day!

The burned out house next door has being pulled down.

Down to the ground.



Though that photo looks weird,

the sky and the house are too similar a colour I think.

Mags reckon the rats and mice holding hands as

they were fleeing the house towards ours.

She has active imagination.

I suggested she call the Pied Piper of Hamlin.

This was Oscar the dwarfs house that he and his brothers lived in

as they grew older,

They build it, it was their home, now it's rubble.

They died a while ago but many people my age remember

how Oscar used to sit at his gate,

which is my gate now,

and jump out and shout at the passing kids.

Sneaky dwarfs must scare the pants off kids.

Oscar was not popular.

The last residents moved on after the fire in December.
Some are still in town and they stopped by to see what had happened.

I feel sorry for them, they lost all their possessions and had no insurance.

But man am I happy they have moved on.

Noisy little beggars.



Excellerated house fire

My word, Leeston is very exciting lately.

Late last night as we were just about to go to bed.

Punk came out to say to call the fire brigade.

The naughty neighbour's house had caught fire

and it's very suspicious.

The kids, I say that cause they are young,

were having a very small,

very quiet 18th birthday party for one of the boys who lived there.

They all got out safely.

It's good thing shoes are optional in NZ cause none of them have any now.
The house is totally munted.

This is from our front door which is at the back.

(House relocated, turned around to take advantage of the sun)

This was just after I called 111.

I was unfailingly polite to the operator

cause I was a little bit surprised to find myself calling them.

About a minute after this photo was taken

the front of the house went whoosh and

flames were metres into the sky.

This is also happening metres from my house.

Mem called out to the birthday boy

who then joined us on the deck

(there's a poem here).

He was naturally upset but even more so

because one of the girls who was visiting

tried three times to get into the tinder dry, well and truly on fire house.....

to get her phone.

The local cop finally handcuffed her and shut her in his car.

I tell ya it's all on in Leeston.

The Leeston Volunteer Fire Brigade was very prompt.

Apparently they were a bit concerned when they pulled up

cause the fire was so hot from the street.

 

You can hardly see but

here are the guys going into the house.

Let's talk about the house.

The house is incredibly old.

Murray, one of the firemen was brought home

from the hospital as a baby.

He must be 60 if he is a day.

It has been an iconic house because it was the home

of three brothers who were midgets.

They used to sit where my gate is now

and jump out at school kids as they walked home from school.

We called it the pig house because a mate of Oti's reckons

it looks like a pig's face.

The naughty kids moved next door

probably because no sane, self respecting person would live in it.

Between the midget sized kitchen,

the earthquake uneven floors,

the lack of insulation

and the just plain ugliness

the only reason to live there was

that the rent would have been next to nothing.

So hours later we went to bed.

Our house a little worse for sooty wear.

This morning the house is surrounded by fire investigators

and CIB police people.

We've been interviewed and will be interviewed again

for a small amount of info we have.

Looks like it was silly kids playing with fire

or maybe it was something else.

Regardless of what happened,

you can't help but feel sorry for the naughty kids.

Besides, now we get a peaceful summer without noisy neighbours.

a new reason

to hate Nor'westers,

it drives you crazy with it's dry

forceful wind.

Now it brings a fresh kind of hell

and that's the noisy neighbour kind.

We have had large children living next door

of the 18 - 20 year age group.

First we thought they were full of new freedom type youthful exuberance.

Now we know better.

The house next door should be demolished..

water, water every and not a drop to drink....

900 buildings being demolished not 45 minutes from here

and the one next door with it's pre-earthquake

uneven floors, mould, over grown garden, thing after thing is still there.

It must be unhealthy to live in

and has super cheap rent,

which is where the large children next door come in.

Turns out they are not just large children

but junior criminals.

We've heard rumours of many things they have done.

We've seen the regular visits from the cops.

We've seen who visits the house.

We've heard the screaming fights,

the drunken fights,

the dog fights

and we have heard today for the last 10 hours

the radio,

loud and clear as a bell.

Which may be worse than just hearing

the dull thud of the beat of another non-discript 'song'.

On Friday night the large children

were out on the street

fighting each other with sticks,

actually fighting.

Not haha! play fight.

Then some guy comes along in his car and

tries to run one of them over and

very near succeeds.

He may have been a really ticked off father.

Girls are drawn to that house like flies.

Every weekend, the good girls of Leeston

stroll past the house craning their necks to catch one of the bad boys eye

and be invited in.

Stupid little girlies.

As the car screamed towards the ring leader

one of the other little beggars phoned the police!

And their nasty, ill trained, sheep worrying dog ran away

unfortunately the spoon was on the phoned with the cops

so couldn't run away too.

Oh well not too long before we can call noise control.

My luck I'll be in a fitful sleep by then

and wake up at 3am wide awake

and the neighbour's radio will still be playing

with the noise being pushed our way by the Nor'wester.

I don't live in the country to have noisy neighbours!

So much more I could say about the noisy little sods

but that would be gossip

and there's already enough of that flying around here.

P.S. National won the election, which is, y'know good.  Nicky (National) is tied with the Labour candidate, exactly the same number of votes with 3000 odd special votes to be counted.  Rahui, the sweetest, hard working MP for Te Tai Tonga Maori seat lost to some nob with a famous last name - very unhappy face.  ACT got back in.... if you can call John Banks ACT, but no other seats so it the John Banks ACTs like a liberal for the next few months, then he'll go back to his conservative roots.  Ah the politics of a couple of small islands in the Southern Pacific ocean.

in my neighbourhood

the people you meet when you are walking down my street,

in my neighbourhood

are basically fine people.

I mean you can't tell who is an axe murderer

and who isn't.

I do actually know a couple of  murderers

and you do too most likely.

Different ones to the ones I know though.

My point is we don't really know

what goes on behind closed doors

or inside cars

or what happened to someone

this morning, yesterday

or last year.

This evening I attended

a neighbourhood watch meeting.

This was called by neighbours because

in the middle of our streets,

next to my house

is the most scuzzy little cottage

in the universe.

And in the scuzzy little cottage

lives a couple of 18 year old boys.

They do things that 18 year old boys do.

Like play music all hours of the night,

have bonfires in their backyard all night,

have random people who scream

 insults at each other in the middle of the night,

they climb on their roof and

 have fisticuffs on the street outside neighbour's houses

in the middle of night.

My favourite is

they go skateboarding on the very non-smooth road

in the middle of the night.

They are generally terrible, thoughtless, threatening neighbours.

So the pommie chick down the back called a meeting.

Most of the neighbours came,

except, obviously the boys in question.

And we sat in Pam and Tony's lounge

basically complaining about the noise and the disruption

these boys cause.

The pommie chick told us that she knew they were on bail

and that they had weapons.

I think she may have known this cause her husband is a screw*.

Cops have been called

and Aaron,

the cop was invited to this evenings meeting

but must have got busy with a crime

probably sheep rustling**.

What I found most interesting about the meeting

was that most people just wanted to sit around complain.

They didn't want an action plan

or to know what to do.

They wanted some else to sort the problem.

So I am, Mel is and the Claw is too.

We each have an assignment

and will report back to the next meeting

in a few weeks.

Meanwhile, poor Mags

has an abscess on her jaw

and looks like she has a goitre.

Will try to get a photo.....

* Corrections officer by profession as many people who live in my town are.

** Don't laugh, it's a serious issue around here.  Sheep are worth quite a bit of money at the moment.

surrounded by socks

I emptied out my sock drawer

because I'm on this get rid of things kick at the moment.

I have done four drawers so far

but my sock drawer is just too hard.

It started last week

(I know, it's taken me since Thursday to do four drawers!)

when I came home in a vengeful cleaning mood.

You know the kind where you are actually in a foul mood

and you know you are going to take it on someone or something

so the bathroom cupboard bears the brunt of your frustrations.

Least it did for me.

So that's four drawers and one larger cupboard since Thursday.

I also tackled, albeit half heartedly

the laundry.

Do you clean your laundry room often?

By often I mean once a year.

I think often in my house means once every five years.

At my house in Hamilton

I cleaned the laundry at least annually

because it opened out on to our huge, sunny deck

so when ever an urge to clean hit me,

and it did periodically while I was on the deck in the sun

probably feeling guiltily about lazing around in the summer sun,

I'd clean the laundry.

Once I even painted the floor in a black and white check.

A tile look but with paint.

I think I had been reading a Martha Stewart magazine.

But the laundry received my attention because

it was close to a place where I received my cleaning inspiration.

So proximity = cleanliness in my life.

I think I'm going to stop blogging and

shove all my socks back in the drawer.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Also an excellent theory of cleaning.



SNOW DAY!

oh and Pippapotamus and CLoD arrived from the tropics to this...

Well not quite, these photos are from this morning.

Pippapotamus and CLoD arrived at midnight Saturday,

it's Monday morning now.

And it's cold

but so beautiful.

It's so pristine

and I can't wait to go and stomp all over it...

before you think I'm being selfish and destructive...

This is what it's like outside now

Last night we, Pippapotamus, CLoD, Punky Pete and Me* 

had a snowball fight in the dark 

while the snow piled up around us.

Then stood watching the snow float down around us

through the security light beams.

Turns out snow in your eye is really annoying.

Snow in your ear isn't too flash either.

My ute is going nowhere today.

I wouldn't want to disturb the snow.

The cats are loving the snow.

They like pouncing on what they think is a solid lump

and smooshing it.

They come in, washing their feet first,

and rub up against your leg

and we all get to be wet and cold.

* I wanted a capital letter too.

Christchurch District Finals 2011

You may not know this but the National Bank Young Farmer Contest kicked off in November.

I know you wondering how you missed your local District Final

and you probably have.

Never fear,

I report here on the Christchurch District Final

held yesterday at Ellesmere A&P Showgrounds

that's els-mere to the locals.

Firstly let me make it clear that although I work for Young Farmers

I have little to nothing to do with The Contest. 

Not my area of responsibility but is my area of fun,

all care and no responsibility for me.

So let me walk you through a District Final.

Organised by a committee of older and experienced ex-Contestants,

this year lead by Hayden Dorman

(with serious organisational support from his new-wife Jessie,

such are country ways,

the greatest asset a farmer can have is to be married to another farmer

(cause wives are farmers too!))

There are practical modules, in this case 11 of them lasting 30 minutes each.

All organised and manned by volunteers, 

who are also the judges.

After the modules there is a quick answer quiz and a speech competition.

The person who has the highest points goes through to the Regional Final
or in this case,

the top four go through

cause Christchurch District has many, many members

so gets a proportionate number through to the Regional Finals.

Got that? 

It's simple, straight forward and been this way for 42 years.

So the modules that I could be bothered* taking photos of were....

building casing for something

I didn't stop to ask cause I was hurrying on to...

 slightly distract and embarrass Cole while he worked out building dimensions.

It's all good, he is laughing.

 Then I wandered along to see Sarah completing her Environmental module,

she is smiling too.

Oh and working hard to answer these vital environmental questions. 

It's tough this farming gig these days.

Doesn't she have lovely cheek bones?

Then a touch of masterchef as the contestants made pikelets and then ironed a shirt.

This module was rather kind as usually they do not provide the recipe

and add in a few rouge ingredients.

I must admit I had to leave when the shirt ironing started

I wanted to help too much.

 Lisa got into identifying sheep breeds from their wool,

harder than you might think

or easier

because I got two right

(thanks to a spot of wool classing in Central Otago)

I got the other two totally wrong mostly cause I haven't studied my sheep breeds poster lately

and couldn't remember any breed names other than the most common, hence only two.

The couple running the module here have been involved with Young Farmers since 1957!

 Lisa then grappled with three little Suffolk hoggets

She was doing a bit of stock judging

which is also not super hard

until you have to explain why you've ranked the animals the way you have.

Lisa was the only one who checked their little feets.

I'm not sure what this signifies but it may be used against her in a court of law.

 Back to Sarah again as she set about winning the speech competition.

Sadly or happily this section is easy for her and she usually wins it.

 Overall Cole won, Woody was second, Sarah was third and Goose forth.

All go through to the Regionals and you bet it's game on for all of them.

If you want to know what the other modules are, go to comments

cause I'm sure Sarah will have written them up for me.

Hi Sarah... can you please write up in comments what all the modules were?  Ta muchly

*It was hot and there was hay.  I'm allergic to hay so was starting to get a bit sinusy especially since I had a bit of chat with Greenie while leaning on his hay and watching Sarah load a trailer with hay and backing - actually backing says it all really.  Yukky.

crazy wind

There are crazy making winds here in Canterbury - Nor'Westers are the main culprits but any kind of northerly wind can drive you nuts but when you are having a string of 30 degree days and the sun is divinely relentless you will be grateful for any wind from the south. Watching the temperature plumet 10 degrees in 5 minutes and the winds clash overhead is amazing but, and theres always a but....

but when the dry dust blows in the windows and cakes itself under bathroom mats and in kitchen corners (I don't want to know about the carpeted areas!) the Southerly winds can stay where they come from.

On the South-East side of the house are utility rooms and they have high up windows that I keep open through the summer to dry out the 'wet' rooms. It can be a little cold in May (my housekeeping works on an annual timetable) when in the bath and the Southerly comes howling through the window - makes me feel as if I reenacting a settler reality show.

Excuse me Constable I'd like to report...

these two for excessive waste of water as according to the by-laws of Brisbane city...

clean gutters though!

No! Brisbane is over there!

Phew we is in Leeston where there is lots of water!

Sunday... and the weather is blah

While I'm on the verge of huge things happening in my life (or not happening as they may) I really trying hard to get perspective on everything else that's going on. Usually I take things in my stride and everything's good but lately waiting for a seismic change in my life is take its toll. The toll is manifesting itself as a can't be bothered to do anything and then getting ticked that I have to. I'm just grumpy has hell about it.

To combat this bad attitude I go walking. I have a choice of a 6 km circuit or a 9 km circuit. The 9 circuit takes in another town, nope village, nope still to grandiose... oh a grouping of houses might be the best term. I feel virtuous when I walk to another grouping of houses and back.

Recently when summer popped in for a visit and then left for warmer climes, I went for a walk.

This is what I see on my walks...

This is heading out of town...

This is looking back at town, well back at my street there is a real true town at the end of my street and a subdivision off to the left...

Then there is the road I jog along cause it has lots of grass verges and no cars plus if you walk on the gravel its a great butt workout...

And on this road live some sheep...

They hide when they hear people, ok me coming but soon they will be too big to hide in the long grass and the farmer will come and take them away for all the city people's Christmas dinners and even better their cold lambie sammies on Boxing Day. Yum, yum pig's bum - oh that's if you get to have Christmas ham sammies that's right.

There are people where I live too but this was about 7am so there was just me, the milk tankers and two late model European luxury cars on the road.

So this week I am preparing for our Christmas work dinner at Restaurant Schwass and then a special treat of a Christmas work lunch at Raspberry Cafe (no link to this one, very strange, must mention that to them. Quite odd not having a website!!) and I shall relay stories of my gluttony to you this week. Hanging out for treasure cafe at Raspberry Cafe! Oh and will also provide a review of my last 12 weeks knocking myself out at the gym with photographic results - maybe just the after photos, oooh no they might need some referrence - before and after photos then. Big week this week!