My Favourite Bus Shelter

Hi there

There is a lot of legal artwork going on around public areas in Wellington.  On walls.  Wellington City Council electricity boxes.  Fences. Bus shelters...

Above is my favourite Wellington bus shelter.  I so love bright colours.  This shelter is on the Miramar No 2 bus route, at the corner of Elizabeth and Brougham Streets.  I so wish I could paint, or draw, or even doodle.  I don't have one art bone in my body but, of course, I have been practising drawing cubes in case I get asked to produce one by those doctors who might one day be assessing me for Shady Pines (see earlier blog). 

Swimming, Hataitai Beach

Hi there

My friend J, and I were swimming. There was a lovely high tide, the sea was glass-like and flat, the sun was out, and it was warm.  We'd completed our widths across the bay, and were now having a happy frolic in the ocean.  A cavort, if you will. The fun reward at the end of a hard slog!

I thought I felt some raindrops.  Not that it mattered because we were enjoying ourselves so much.  But as my four readers may remember my friend J becomes a copycat Irish Rover at the first sign of a splish or a splash.

She burst into song -

"... through the driving rain, those unicorns were hiding.
They were playing' silly games
Kickin' and a-splashin'
While the rain was a-pouring-"

.. and both J and I burst out at the top of our lungs, "OH THOSE SILLY UNICORNS!!!"

Guess who were the two most embarrassed swimmers as we got out of the water.  Did I truly hear clapping and a shout of "Encore!"?  We have to remember that with summer now just around the corner, we might no longer have an isolated beach ...

Putting on weight

Hi there

I was talking with a friend.  We were discussing putting on weight.

"How come, " pondered my friend, "that I stand on the scales, clothed, clutching a packet of chocolate biscuits to my bosom and I will be a certain weight, right?  Then I scoff down that whole packet of biscuits, stand on the scales again - same clothes, same scales - and I'm suddenly as heavy as an elephant?"

I pointed out the obvious.  "Because you've just eaten a whole packet of biscuits?"

"But the biscuits should weigh exactly the same inside me as they do outside of me.  If the biscuit packet weighed 200 grams, I should have put on 200 grams. Not a whole 1 kg!"

Ah, the great mysteries of the universe ....  but more to the point, did my friend actually conduct such an experiment?  We senior citizens really should get out more?

Whitebait Fritters

Hi there

I was in New Plymouth, leaning over a bridge, and looking down into the river. There was a guy standing in the river, holding a scoop net.  An American lady asked me what he was doing

"He's collecting whitebait," I said.

"Oh, I know about whitebait," she said.  "Tiny transparent tadpole-like fish."

"You fillet their eyes out," I said.

...and she believed me!  For all of about one minute until I burst into laughter.

Filleting fish eyes from whitebait is one of the oldest kiwi jokes.  One eats every part of the whitebait.  Whitebait is a delicacy.  And very expensive.  In my Mum's day, whitebait weren't expensive at all.  They were, well, cheap as chips.  There is a strict season, very short, when you can harvest them.

Anyway, I went to the Sunday food and vegetable market this last Sunday (the market is alongside Te Papa Tongarewa, the Museum of New Zealand) and, wow, there were whitebait fritters there.   $12.  I can take whitebait or leave them, but my Mum loved whitebait.  So in recognition of her love of whitebait fritters, I always try to eat a fritter at the start of each season.

Above: the fritters being fried at the Sunday market.

I like "The Chase"

Hi there

I like watching a good quiz show on television, especially the British show, "The Chase". 

I sit in front of the tv waiting for the question.  The question is "Name the Yeti who lives on the second highest peak of Mt Everest?" -

And the three choices come up:  A.  Fred.   B.  Sam.   C.  Joe.

I'm jumping up and down, out of  my seat screaming, "Fred!  Fred!  It's A.  Fred!"

The contestant chooses "B.  Sam".

"You idiot!  Idiot!"  I'm in hysterics over the thickness of this contestant.   "Stupid-Stupid person!  It's A. Fred.  Fred-Fred-Fred!!!"

Bradley, the host, tells us that the answer is ... "C.  Joe."

Myself and the contestant, we both hang our heads in shame ...

And I see there is now an extra 'Chaser' added to the British team:

Appointments with the medical professions

Hi there

Oh dear, it has just hit home to me that older people are rarely ever not at the dentist, the eye people, or the ear place. We spend a fortune on them.  Tsk, tsk.

I have just been told that if the new eye drops I have been given (last ditch attempt to fix the problem) do not work before my next appointment on 11 November then I will have to immediately give up driving. For the rest of my life!

Grrrrhh.  My booked summer South Island road trip is in complete jeopardy.   All my future-years' summer road trips are in jeopardy.  Just driving to the nearby suburb of Kilbirnie is in jeopardy.

If  I'm told I won't be able to drive, well, that's it then;  I'll put on a brave face.

However, I'm admitting to you, my four beloved readers, that I'm a wee bit frightened.

Shady Pines, here I come?

Hi there

Recently, I wrote about how if we older people aren't too  careful with our actions we could be carted off to Shady Pines (reference "Golden Girls).  I rambled on about putting bowling balls in the fridge, and how it might only take one spur-of-the-moment absent-minded mistake like this and the guys in the white coats might truly register us for Shady Pines.

Yesterday, I mislaid my wallet again.  A brand-new five-day old wallet that wasn't, as yet, a familiar artefact to me.

I searched for it all around the house .....

With trepidation, I searched in the fridge, knowing that if I found my wallet in there I truly would be in line for Shady Pines.  Phewww, thank goodness, my wallet wasn't there. I  searched in even more outlandish places.  Goodness, I'd only handled the wallet forty-five minutes before, so why was I searching in the top of my wardrobe.  Alzheimer's became an even closer worry with every place I looked.  Had I had an amnesiac period?

My little cottage is about the size of most people's lounges.  I went round and around hunting in those rooms over and over, getting more and more agitated by the minute.

I thought about the last time I had opened my wallet.  What had I done after that?

Got it!  I had scooped up a big bundle of stuff from the kitchen counter and, arms laden, had carried it all outside to the recycling bin!

My wallet was there!   In the bin, amongst the egg trays, envelopes, council electioneering pamphlets and, sadly, empty Pepsi Max bottles (I swear I am trying to wean myself off Pepsi, promise).

I am so glad that no representative from Shady Pines was nearby to catch my latest "senior moment"...

Reading - which way is best?

Hi there

A few years ago, I used to go to the library two or three times a week.  I couldn't stand to pass the library without going into the building and getting books out.  When I've ever moved house, I've had four locality requirements.  I would have to be near a supermarket, a bus stop, a Post Shop, and a library.

Then I bought a Kindle Reader.  Now I probably visit the library only once or twice a month because I am soooooo hooked on my Kindle. It's addictive.  And expensive.

"But I love the tactile feeling of a book!"  A friend throws her hands up in horror.  She is stunned that I could abandon print and paper so easily.  "I love feeling the crisp pages," she says.

Yes, I am definitely looked on as some sort of traitor against a cause.

And today I was chatting to a stranger, sort of in passing, and I mentioned my Kindle addiction.

He said, in all seriousness, "Who reads anymore?"  Apparently, television, streaming, On Demand, Netflix were all more important to this guy.

So, I'm old-fashioned nowadays for reading my Kindle?  Oh dear, how sad ..

(This piece of writing brought to you by one-fingered typing on my Kindle Fire)