The Monday with Aidan hooning through her defence

Hi,

Had a good day yesterday, despite Toby being at my work all day.  He was so good - just sat there and played on his iPad, or on my spare laptop.  Turns out he has a limit to the amount of YouTube videos he can watch in a day.  Hahahah.  I bet he thought it was unlimited.  No, it's not.  It's quite capacious.  But not limitless. The receptionist messaged me to say a parcel was in reception for me and would I come down or would my minion come down for me.  He went.  Great delivery service.

Toby hiding at the Backbencher

After work we went to The Backbencher for dinner.  Sally and Andrew joined us and we ate and chatted.  Toby had cabin fever from being inside at my work all day so he ran around Parliament and climbed John Key's trees.  Eventually we left there after a nice meal (even Andrew wasn't too scathing).  Sally and Andrew left for the station and Mike and I collected Toby from Seddon's statue.

We walked back to work as I had left some stuff there and I wanted to ride my bike home.  As we crossed the lights at the corner of The Terrace and Bowen, the taxi waiting for the lights started tooting at us.  By this stage it was about 7.25pm and there weren't a lot of people around.  Turns out it was Aidan and Jackie in the taxi heading to the train station to go home.  Aidan had finished her defence and it had gone well.  And everyone had come in to support her when it was done.  She was awfully excited!  Good on her.

Wellington is a funny wee place.  You bump into people.  Who would have said that we would time our exit from the pub, with an amble across parliament to the intersection on Bowen with Aidan coming back from her house after showing Jackie it?  Fluke.  Nice though.

Back to work and Mike grabbed some stuff for me and Toby and Mike caught a taxi home.  I rode home and really enjoyed it.  No traffic.  Lots of fun.

This morning it is lovely.  Warm here.  And I loved the bike ride in.  Pedalled like mad.  I needed to get a release done before work.  But with the school holiday programme not kicking in until tomorrow (despite advertising 9th to 13th), I am working from home today.  Mike will come collect me soon and swap.

Have a lovely day.

Love,
Angela

The weekend that was great

Hi,

Our weekend started off with a bit of despair. We'd thought Toby was having a sleepover and packed accordingly. We were at the pub after work with some colleagues that were leaving when we both got texts from Yingting saying Toby was at her place.

So we quickly went home and collected Toby. Turns out he had sensibly gone there after being deposited at an empty house. And he was happy playing with the boys.

Back home and an early night. Next morning Mike was off to a river cruising course quite early. Toby and I went into town to start Christmas shopping. The first shop I went into had a broken computer and I couldn't buy the items. Aarrggghh. Fared better at the next place.

Met Aidan in town. She purchased my present from the shop with no computer as she walked past it. Still no computer but they had found a manual zip zap. We had brunch at Thunderbird cafe. Yum.

Dropped Aidan off at her new house and got a look around. They have a lovely new house. Great views. Very comfortable. It feels nice.

Toby and I left Aidan and went to find a tree.  Toby selected the tree in 10 seconds time.  The woman was astonished at our tree selecting speed.  Back home to decorate it.  As I sawed off the last ten centimetres, Toby said "That isn't something mothers do!".  This one does!

Decorating

Left to do some more messages. Then off into town to collect a wardrobe for Aidan and Josh. Right. Aidan said a flat packed wardrobe. I had visions of a nice package for the boot of the car. I found a massive wardrobe, completely the opposite of flat packed.

Mike reminded me we had an Allen key in the car when the existing owner couldn't find one. I got a nice cup of tea from her. Then we dismantled her wardrobe and I carted it to the car.

This was where 3d puzzles came in handy. The pieces were odd shapes and not much smaller than the inside of our car. I eventually figured out a configuration that let me drive with all the doors closed. I went to the train station to collect Mike.

Here we had to swap sides because the passenger seat was actually inside the wardrobe. No way could Mike fit in there. I had to contort myself to fit in under a piece of wardrobe and had my knees jammed into the glove box.

Mike took the wardrobe to the new house while I got to do tramping laundry. Oooo. I'm so lucky.

Making sushi

When Mike got back, the house was mostly tidy and we started dinner. Our first sushi. And it was yummy. Toby ate twelve pieces. It's now a firm favourite meal.

Sushi - homemade!

To bed and Mike and I watched a movie and slept like logs.

I got breakfast in bed. Thanks Mike.  And then headed off to do grocery shopping for family lunch. Mike outsourced the cake collection to Sally (thank you so much) giving us time to get everything ready. Mike made a bacon weave that everyone loved.

Minecraft cake

Cutting the cake

The cake was superb! My work colleague Jo can ice to perfection. Not at all like my gingerbread Santas.

An afternoon reading was lovely. 

Family party

Family party 

Eating

Time for the week to start soon. Today is a big day for Aidan. She defends her PhD thesis this afternoon. She'll romp in and be Doctor Aidan before we know it. 

Have a fantastic week!

Love,

Angela

The Thursday with nothing. Oh, wait. There was something...

Hi,

Such a sticky day in Wellington yesterday - I needed my desk fan on (I have one that runs off my computer USB port).  I heard that Tyler's birthday was very exciting, with a great evening at the Taylor Swift concert.  What a special tenth birthday.

Of course, I was oblivious to what Dec 5th meant in our household and when Karen texted (and emailed) me to remind me what day it was, I was convinced Mike had also forgotten our wedding anniversary.  Shucks.  He didn't, did he?  He had arranged Benjamin to come over to look after Toby and we went out to a fabulous meal at the Boulcott St Bistro.  I like that place.  My steak was perfection.

Cheese board was pretty good too!

Mike loves profiteroles.  Can you tell?

Such a lovely surprise.  It's 14 years!  Wow.  And 21 years we've been going out together.  It's now half Mike's life.  Yes, there are still a few more years before it is half my life.  Hahahah.

Back home and I dropped Benjamin off and caught up with Vivienne for the first time in a wee while.  Had a good chat, saw her Meetup Photography group photos, played with Ramble.  Loads of fun.

Toby's last day of school today.  I hope he has a great day.  He has a sleepover at Isaac's house.  So Mike and I have the evening to ourselves.  Nice.

Oh - and by popular demand, here is photographic proof of my gingerbread Santas.

Iced to perfection!

Pick yourself up off the floor, Karen!  Hahahah.  Yes, I see where one of them got a black armpit by mistake.  And yes, one Santa does have one blue eye and one green eye.  And Mike commented on a demented Santa with angry red eyes!  And their white beards have all gone pink and melted into their chests.  But I'm sure they taste okay.

Nope - Mike didn't marry a domestic goddess.  But I must be doing something right, eh?

Have a wonderful weekend.  We're having Toby's family party on Sunday at our place for lunch (I know this is going to be a surprise for some people when they read this, because we haven't actually told anyone yet).  But there will be an awesome cake.  Not iced by me!  And I need to do some birthday ad Christmas shopping.  Urgently!

Love,
Angela

The Wednesday with Christine for tea

Hi,

Mike had the car in town so I cadged a lift home with him, with grocery shopping on the way (it was getting urgent).  Christine came around for tea and we had a good chat.  I ate far too much yummy cheese after tea though.  Yum!

After she left to collect Tom from his karate, I made gingerbread men for Toby's secret Santa for a boy in his class.  This morning I iced them.  Ummm.  I should have taken a photo for Karen's amusement.  Mike said "If you put a white dob of icing on the top of his head where it is red, it'll look more like Santa".  I said "It had it.  It's just so runny it slid off".  Hahahah.  Hope the kid likes taste over looks.

Now I have fingers stained with food colouring.  Narrowly avoided getting any on my white shirt sleeves.

Have a marvellous day!

Love,
Angela

The Tuesday with nothing much

Hi,

It's Tyler's birthday today!  Happy birthday wee girl.  Wow - she's ten!

It was a lovely day in Wellington yesterday.  So warm (I'm sure it got past 20C) that we went for a quencher break at 3pm.  Just to get some relief from and sapping heat, you understand.  Hahahah.

Rode home and collected Toby and cooked dinner for us.  Mike had a work function on and was supposed to go grocery shopping to provide supplies to the meager offerings for lunchboxes.  But the work function went on, and on, and on.  Into dinner.  So, we didn't get any groceries.

Fortunately, I rummaged around in the pantry and found a carton of UHT milk so Mike and Toby had their Weetbix this morning.  I dislike UHT milk in large quantities (can tolerate it in my tea if I need to while tramping) so I had some toast.

And I did find some stuff for Toby's lunchbox which hopefully means he won't be too disappointed when he opens it today.

The ride in was lovely - so mild.  But it is supposed to rain by evening.  What do they know, anyway?

Have a wonderful day!
Love,
Angela

The Monday with nothing much

Hi,

Well, I did manage to double book my lunch.  Oops.  Met Aidan and had a spontaneous shoe shopping expedition.  Well, spontaneous for me; I suspect she never told me about her intentions just in case I decided to avoid shoe shopping at all costs!  Hahahah.  Aidan is a mystery to me when she shops.  She goes into a shoe shop (okay, this is where it starts getting less likely that I can mimic the Aidan shoe shopping method as I am loathe to enter shoe shops to begin with), the staff somehow immediately see her (how does she do that??), she says something like "I want a shoe, size 38.5, in black, with a 1 inch heel and a strap across the top" and the staff scurry to show her anything remotely like it and she says "yes" or (more usually) "no" as soon as she sees the shoe.

My method usually involves a lot of psyching up to drum up the willpower to enter a shoe shop.  This could be two or three weeks in the making.  Then, once I enter, if staff even notice me and ask if I need anything my response is automatically "Just looking" even if I really, really want to say something like "I want a black shoe, size 38.5, with a 2 cm heel and no strap".  I wander around aimlessly wondering what on earth gene I am missing in my genetic makeup that says I hate shoe shopping.  I thought it came welded to the X chromosome somewhere.

Anyhow, I bought a pair of shoes.  Yes, it was unexpected.  Aidan also bought a pair of shoes.  They looked nothing like each other.  Aidan's shoes made her tower over me and I am sure I'd fall if I tried to wear them.  My shoes were perfect for summer.  Look!

New shoes on the deck after dinner

Aidan went back to work and I popped into the other lunch booking.  No, I didn't eat a second lunch.  But it was nice to see Matt before he leaves for his OE.  Lucky chap.  A whole bunch of us were there.  It was nice.

I rode home after work and collected Toby and started tea.  Vegetarian Monday.  I made spaghetti with tomato sauce.  It was yummy.

Relaxed in the evening and Mike got home and we went to bed.  Slept like a log.  Unlike Mike.  I gave him the new Jack Reacher book Aidan lent me and Mike read it until he finished at 3am!  Oh no!  Don't ask him anything tricky today.

This morning is glorious and a cruise ship is in town.  They will love this place.  Have a fantastic day!

Love,
Angela

The weekend with the Taupo challenge - 160 km

Hi,

I had Friday off to get away early to Taupo. Trouble with my cunning plan was that Mike never got that memo despite a conversation about him coming up later so Toby got to go to school. So I left home at 8 am in the Corolla and Mike left at 4.30 with Toby in the MX-5.

I had a lovely drive up. Music on. Just me in the car. Great fun. I sing so much better when there's just me in the car. Ha ha.

I got to Taihape a few minutes after Sally and Andrew in their wee white car. Had a coffee with them and then bought some bananas and Rooibos from the New World before continuing to Taupo.

I found the house eventually. 16a Tui St. Awesome house. Mike and I got the double bed with the single bed in there. It had an ensuite too. Choice. Richard and Suzie arrived not long after.

Mike and Toby were stuck in the worst traffic ever.  It took three hours to get to Levin. Crazy. Turns out there was a car accident. It meant Mike and Toby didn't get in until 11.30.  Meanwhile Andrew and Sally and I registered for the event and found some lunch at Replete (nice cafe - good iced coffee).  When I finished I remembered I had parked in the 30 minute zone and that was about 90 minutes ago so I took off.  Car was okay.  Phew!

Iced coffee at Replete

Iona came to visit and she kindly said I could ride with her. I was so pleased to be with someone that knew what they were doing. She likely would stop off at licorice cafe on the way (forty kms from the end) and she suggested we start in the 6am group. Sounded perfect.

Number on my bike

Meanwhile Sally cooked up scrumptious macaroni cheese with bacon (and another lot with red onion for Suzie who is vegetarian). We ate tea and I put some aside for breakfast. Carbo loading.

I had a restless sleep because I was so excited. I did doze okay though. I woke easily when Mike and Toby got in. Back to sleep quickly though. But awake well before my alarm at 4.30.  I wanted to eat early so my stomach was settled before the 6am start time. Worked a treat. Ate macaroni cheese and a banana. Drank water. All good.

Had my electrolyte bottle and my water bottle. Two bananas. One OSM (which I didn't eat) and two Lemon Zippys. Two Gus (which I also didn't suck down - they taste so yucky I couldn't face them).

It was before dawn when the race began. Iona and I were in the front row. 160 in our wave. They counted down and we were off.  This was a special wave for slow people that they were trying for the first time. They took us on the relay route so it was different to the route I did with Andrew six weekends back. But I quite liked it. More of an up and up rather than up and down.

Iona was faster than me on the first half. I haven't had a lot of experience with races and figuring out how much energy I can put in to get around at maximum speed. Got a lot to learn. She would let me catch her up.

About twenty minutes into the race I had my first helpful suggestion from a passing cyclist about my noisy bike. But he was the first of many, many comments. Some people got to recognise my bike approaching. Oh, 1270 is coming again, one woman said. I played tag with a few people off and on.

The support stations were amazing. The volunteers were so friendly and filled bottles and offered water or electrolyte and took away rubbish. Even had bananas at one or two places.

Iona and I stopped a few times. Toilet stops. A spot of food here and there. Mike was watching me on Glympse (a GPS app that my phone sends him so he can watch where I am on a map) and he texted me that I hadn't moved for minutes and minutes and to get going! Cheeky thing!

At one point here a wee bunch passed me and I heard one chap tell his mate about asking her if she had a beer in there. And how she'd replied yes and he could have one if the price was right. When Iona got to me next I asked and she said sure enough, he'd asked her that.

After about ninety kms I started to feel pretty good and started trying to go faster. I didn't touch my brakes going down the awesome hill into Tokaanu. Had a ball. Got passed by someone wearing Intergen gear on the downhill near the bottom.

I made it into Turangi forty minutes faster than when I rode with Andrew those weeks back. So happy.  As a huge surprise Mike and Toby were waiting here and shouted encouragement at me (and Iona).  Lucky I felt okay here because the wind started to make its presence felt after Turangi. We started riding into a strong headwind. It is flat on this bit and I was actually quite enjoying it.

Only about 30 km to go!

Iona wanted to stop at the cafe and it was tempting to stay and drink an iced coffee. But I munched my last banana and left her there, waiting for Col. She also had my jacket but the light drizzle from the morning was well and truly gone. So she kept it (and sensibly handed it to Col).

I stopped a kilometre from Hatepe hill and had water, electrolyte and my last lemon zippy. I got up the hill, filled my water bottles at the top at the last support station and started the last twenty kms into Taupo.

By this stage I was keen to finish before eight hours. The wind was strong now though and I had to pedal even on downhill sections. Buffeted around a bit.

Mike and Toby shouted encouragement again about one km out from the finish line. I was so happy when I crossed the line. It felt really good.  I stopped my stopwatch at 7 hours and 49 minutes.  Pretty happy to get under  8 hours for my first time.  I hopped off my bike and rang Mike. We found each other and we walked home.  My barefeet were getting blisters on the hot footpath, so I eventually hopped back on my bike and rode to Tui house.  Caught up with Andrew and his massive day (he went around twice.  Yes, twice!!  320km).  Richard did it in under 5 hours for his first time.  Wow!

160 km

7 hours 49 minutes

My front sprocket gave me a nice greasy mark on the back of my calf.  When Andrew saw it, he suggested I get it as a tattoo (yes, he was joking, Ma, don't panic).  Mike took it a step further and had a design blended in with a silver fern.  Nothing would ever possess me to get a tattoo in a hundred million years.

Tattooed with a sprocket

We popped around to see Iona and Col and chatted to their friends as well.  Then back and Suzie cooked tea and it was beautiful.  Marinated chicken with couscous and salads.  Then I admit to falling asleep around 7.30pm.  And I woke at 7.30am.  Hahahah.  Yes, my body needed a bit of sleep.

On Sunday morning Mike got a migraine.  It meant he didn't want to drive home and we had two cars.  So Andrew kindly volunteered to drive the wee green car home.  Toby and I stayed in Taupo and had breakfast and did some shopping.  Toby loves Taupo.  Wants to live there now.  We left there at about 11am and joined the many cars driving back into Wellington.  Long drive.

Hot chocolate came with a shot of chocolate sauce

Vine eatery iced coffee was okay

Toby waiting for his hot chocolate

Yes, the sun is shining.  Yes, it is a bit cold but I'm staunch

Toby went swimming with Will when we got back.  And I did my ironing for the week.  All good.  Mike is okay after his migraine.  Poor chap.

I absolutely loved the race and I can't wait for next year.  I am already planning my attack now.  It involves a lot more training and some bunch riding so I can draft off a group of riders all the way around instead of working for every kilometre myself.  Especially if it's that windy again.

Can't wait!  Can't wait!  Thanks to everyone for helping.  Mike and Toby for driving through hundreds of cyclists to shout at me halfway along.  Sally for supporting us all with great food and Andrew for supporting me with hours of slow training.  Richard and Suzie for their support at the weekend.  Iona for riding with me and giving me a lot of confidence.  And loads of friends that let me know they were thinking of me.  How kind.

My ride in this morning was good - nice and dry here.  But I did notice I was lacking a bit of energy on some of the wee hills.  Maybe I did do something at the weekend?  Hahahah.

Have a great week!
Love,
Angela