The weekend with so much stuff going on

Angela is off down south so you've got me again for the week. Actually, she jumped on this and wrote the whole thing in the third person so I will continue to take the credit.

Angela was getting ready for bed on Friday night and heard a lot of lapping. She turned around to find Moxley hanging out of the toilet bowl, having a wee drink. Unlike when she was a kitten and Toby and I found her in this bathroom soaking wet, she can now perch halfway into the bowl and keep herself from falling in.

Moxley lapping up toilet water

Packed on Saturday

Saturday saw Angela finalise the gear on her bike for her trip. A quick ride around with the panniers packed with her stuff saw it pretty secure. So a quick trip to the local bike shop in Ngaio for some spare tubes (27.5 x 2.4) and she was set.

Nice day in Wellington

Mike finished the HWC timer at last! The solution that worked was two mounting boxes, one on top of the other to make enough space for the timer and all the wiring. 

He'd nearly finished when Adnan pinged us and said he had tickets for Wellington Phoenix women versus Perth Glory in a corporate box and did we want to come? Yes, we did. Okay, Angela did. But Mike also decided it would be a good distraction. So the timer remained finished but with the wires hanging out of the box and off we went.

Tidied up the next day. Looks ... anticlimactic.

We drove into town and parked on Thorndon Quay and walked down the concourse. As we waited for Adnan just before 5pm, a wee aerobatic jet buzzed Wellington a few times. And then we noticed a JetStar flight that was on approach to the airport power up its engines and do a go around. Obviously the wee jet had got in the way and the flight had to do a big long loop back to the north after overshooting the runway.

Naughty jet pilot!

Watching a wee jet buzz Wellington

The wee jet made the Jetstar flight do a go-around!

Waiting for the football game

And we're in! Ta Adnan

Loved the football! As we stepped into the stadium, Perth got a goal. And seriously, the Phoenix women were all over the Perth Glory for the remainder of the game. But just couldn't secure a goal to equalise. No idea how that happened!

But I loved it! Thank you Adnan (and his brother!).

Souvenir

Evidence

Back for some takeaways and off to bed. Up early for a drive to the Bluebridge for the 7.15am check-in. Mike got me sorted despite the huge queue of cars. 

At the Bluebridge terminal

Waiting for the ferry to board

I got onto the ferry with 2 other cyclists (all women around my age) and found there was nothing to secure our bikes to in there. The bike rack was an unsecured piece of metal that could take 3 bikes with no gear and skinny tyres. But we all had fat tyres. And two of us had a lot of gear.

The staff were great - agreeing that the bike facilities were terrible. And one took my bike over to a ladder and I used my bungees to lash my bike to it. They chocked the tyres. My bike wasn't going anywhere. The other women used their bike locks to secure their bikes to various metal fittings. But mine was through my panniers to try and make it harder to grab those. But always travel on the ferry with some bungees!

Lashing my bike

And coming back to see it still there!

We were first off the ferry - and the other foot passengers were directed to waiting buses for the ride back to the terminal. But they just said to us cyclists to put our helmets on and ride away. So we did. I only had my sneakers and a big backpack. So I used the throttle to ride the bike to the terminal like a wee motorbike. Hahahah.

On the ute

Best configuration sorted

Iona and Col picked me up from the terminal and we headed into Picton - which was chaos. Full of tourists. So we kept going and went to Catalyst in Blenheim for a nice lunch and excellent iced latte.

Meanwhile Mike got stuck into chores. The timer got finished and the missing hinge on the basement door got fitted. And while Angela was away and couldn't see, he scampered around the deck balustrades and up the high ladders and cleaned out the gutters. The gutter above our bedroom window will still overflow, since it's not installed right, but it shouldn't overflow quite so often now all the grass and mulch is gone.

Sunday vibe

Sunday dinner at Sally and Andrew's, along with Helen and Anthony. It was nice to catch up with Helen and Anthony and see what both are up to.

Right - time to get stuck into my Monday. Have a great day. Angela is heading working from the remote Blenheim office today, then tomorrow she's driving from Blenheim to Christchurch to collect the van. I'll post photos if I get them.