I usually loll in bed with a cup of tea, listening to RadioLive’s Kitchen & Garden Show. People phone in asking which type of the potato is the best to plant in Spring, or to give out their recipe for Coconut Macaroon Slice.
I love it.
Instead, I hear that an earthquake hit Christchurch at 4.35am; 7.1 on the Richter Scale. People are phoning in, telling their stories. Some of them on the verge of tears, still obviously upset, reliving the moment in their recalling of it.
Buildings destroyed. Roads buckling. Sewage lines overflowing. No power, no water.
My heart goes out to them. Amazingly, nobody lost their lives.
I got up, and the Other Harf and I did the typical Saturday routine.
We cleaned the house.
Then I did some weeding.
He cut wood.
Miss 9.11 played with her cousins.
The chickens did some free ranging. Rodney did a bit of sunbathing. Freckles played Queen of the Castle in her little corrugated-iron hut. The dogs finally got the walk they’ve been dreaming about all day.
And I was very, very appreciative of how normal it all was…
No, it’s not the line up for the 2.45 at Addington; they’re the names of the five different types of tomato seeds the lovely Laura sent me all the way from up north.
I’ve never grown heritage tomatoes before, nor have I grown tomatoes from seed.
Here we have my sister’s dog Ruby (a whole one year old, this August) pestering the living crap out of Pippa (seven this December) who would rather loll on her bed than play with very silly puppies.
It was half an hour before Ruby called it a day, or should I say when Lil’Sis called it a day and hauled Ruby back down to the Beige Barn.
Ruby’s predecessor, Holly, was subjected to one very silly puppy herself, way back in the day.
Ah yes, Auckland. It’s only been four years since we lived there, but oh! How I have become so very accustomed to the quiet. To me a crowd now means tens of people, not hundreds (the teeming hordes in the food court at Westfield Albany sent me into a mild panic Saturday lunchtime).
Noise is the bulls bellowing up the back, skylarks hovering way on high, magpies staking their territory, moreporks finding a mate and tui chortling in the kowhai, as opposed to some complete moron hooning his Nissan Skyline past our bedroom window at 100kms an hour just after 2 o’clock on a Sunday morning.
Our life is rolling acres of green instead of the ranks upon ranks of suburbia. Neighbours that are hundreds of metres away, not just a stone’s throw. Slow, considered living, instead of rush rush rush.
Not to say that Auckland isn’t a great place to live. In fact, it ranks 4th equal in the world, according to Mercer’s Quality of Living Survey, who seem to know a thing or two about the old quality of living.
And I’ve lived in two other much, much, much bigger cities (Sydney and London) and they are fabulous, wonderful, exciting places, at the right time in your life.
It isn’t Auckland as such.
It’s just ‘cos it’s a city, and I’ve become so very accustomed to living in the country.
It’s the Other Harf’s 48th birthday today, and he really, really wanted a hydraulic wood splitter for a present. Yes, a hydraulic wood splitter would be fabulous (we have two fireplaces to feed, and lots of huge stumps which don’t fit into fireplaces) but I did some ringing round, and turns out they’re the price of a recent model hatchback car, so that idea was a no-go.
So it was vouchers from his favourite rural supplies store RD1 instead. I am sure he will enjoy kitting himself out with overalls or thermal socks or a Swanndri or some such woolly, outdoorsy farming item of clothing to make him look the part.
Miss 9.11 did well with her gift; she made him a little key-ring tab at school out of dyed bone with his initial carved in it. Turns out they make all kinds of things in “Technology” these days. Bless her cottons.
We’re not going out to dinner as we’re off down to Auckland Saturday morning to visit our friends L & S, leaving Miss 9.11 in the tender care of her grandparents. Plans involve shopping (for the girls) and a few rounds of pool and darts at the RSA (for the boys – it’s the only place the pair of them actually feel like boys as everybody else is 70-plus) followed by dinner out on Saturday night somewhere grown-up and reasonably fancy.
However, I am making the OH a special birthday dinner tonight. Smoked salmon for starters then a very blokey part-time farmer type of main course of aged eye-fillet steak, homemade chips and blue cheese sauce, accompanied by a not-so-blokey bottle of Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc, rounded off by the OH’s favourite Movenpick chocolate icecream.
Eating – Whittakers Ghana Peppermint chocolate, where have you been all my life? I can’t believe we only purchased our first bar this Saturday! Rich, smooth and dark on the outside with the perfect amount of “snap” when you bite into it, releasing the cool, sweet, oozing peppermint within, ye-um! The three of us have decided that we all like it very much indeed so I predict there may be arguments over who gets the last piece. Perhaps safer to buy another block…
Listening – Crossfire, Brandon Flowers. I love The Killers, and this one from their infamous lead singer is definitely growing on me….
Watching – Halcyon River Diaries. I spotted Charlie Hamilton James’ beautiful photos from the book of the series in one of the many photography magazines that I hoard collect, so when I heard that the series was going to be screened on the Living Channel on Sunday evenings I booked my slot on the sofa and it soon became officially known as “Mummy’s programme.” Charlie, his conservationist wife Philippa and their three cute-as-a-button sons follow the wildlife on the Halcyon riverside for a year, observing and capturing the lives of kingfishers, otters, dragonflies and water voles up close – with a lot of patience and some very, very fancy cameras. Completely enchanting…
Reading – At Home – A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson. Ever wondered why forks have four prongs? Or why we prefer salt and pepper above all other spices? Or why reading books at home only really became popular in the early 19th century? This is a book all about the history of domesticity and it’s great. I have all of Bill Bryson’s books and apart from his witty, subtle, droll sense of humour I love his tendency to go off at a complete tangent, sweeping the reader totally off the subject and returning them with a single paragraph right at the end of the chapter. I bought this one about six weeks ago, read half of it and put it down. I’ll pick it up and most probably read the rest of the book all in one sitting. Entertaining, amusing and informative all at once.
Liking – that it’s getting lighter in the evenings, that the sunshine has actually got a touch of warmth in it, daffodils, snowdrops, The Collective Dairy’s Apple Crumble yoghurt,Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey (another sofa slot), and NZ Gardener magazine (just subscribed for the first time, have come to the conclusion I need all the help I can get…)
to this here blog, brought to you by ex- citymouse Fi, (40 ), residing in a big old house on 14 acres in rural Northland, New Zealand accompanied by the Other Harf (ageless) and our daughter (currently Miss 9.11) plus a menagarie of orphaned animals and overextended relatives. Have mercy.
Watching – 
