Wellington Blown Away Sign

Hi there

Even though I've been passing our welcome to Wellington sign that is between the foot of the airport runway and the entrance to the Miramar Cutting practically every day, I've never really registered it lately.  The sign used to be done in a silver colour (except when the vampire movie "What we do in the Shadows" movie was playing in Wellington, and the letters of the word 'Wellington' were blood-spattered).  It's now pastel rainbow colouring.

 

I love it when I pass the sign and see tourists posing in front of it for photos, and I feel such an idiot for not realising it was now coloured.  I wrote a piece on the sign being set into place some years back on this blog.

The sign is called "Wellington Blown Away" because the style of the wording looks like the word is being blown away.  Wellington is known as Windy Wellington.

***

My eyesight is getting better.  Last week, I had the printing of my Kindle on really big print, now I've dropped it down a couple of levels.  And, as of yesterday, I can - with a bit of squinting - do crosswords from my beloved Arrowords magazines.  So, touch wood that my eyesight will get better - oh, wait, I don't have any wood around me to touch.   How embarrassing that I'm like that touch wood advert  (re  getting health jabs) on tv where the actors are all frantically trying to find wood to touch because it will no doubt save them from catching flu or covid. 

After my glaucoma surgery

 Hi there

I'm still having trouble seeing print, still guessing  as to what's on a screen, especially if I can't make the on-screen print into bigger size,  but at least I can see the keyboard on my Kindle Fire tablet and I guess that's something, yeah?

I must admit I was upset when I made a diced pineapple toastie instead of a diced apple one; it came out of the toastie machine as a sodden mess.  I used to love doing Arrowords (crossword magazine) every day but can't see the words anymore. Alphabet letters and numbers are still in double vision.  I stepped into the road this week without seeing an approaching car, it missed me by a whisker. 

It's annoying when I watch tv and the main character brings out a note to read.  The camera focuses on the note, and I can't read it.  If I'm lucky, by the time I leap up from the sofa and all but press my nose to the screen, the note will still be there for me to interpret.

Mustn''t grumble.  Mustn''t grumble - oh, wait, that's exactly what I'm doing...  Sorry.

My glaucoma surgery

 Hi there

last Wednesday I had glaucoma surgery on my right eye.  Well, nope, I don't think it's worked very well.  I  can't even see this screen now as I'm (attempting) to type this blog.  I'm one-fingering it  on my Kindle Fire and hoping I press the right buttons and you get to read this epistle which I'm all but typing blind.  

I'm so unhapy.

stand by....

Pop stars

 Hi there

When I was a young teen, in the 1960's, my friends and I decided to try to get the autograph, or at the very least, see every overseas pop singer to visit New Zealand.  I've already mentioned how I climbed about half a dozen stories up a hotel's fire escape to see Cliff Richard.  Well, I did the  limbo (and fell flat on my back) in front of Chubby Checker.  I asked  singer/actor Adam Faith to marry me (it was that day in February when it's allowed for a woman to propose).

I was front row behind the wire netting as The Beatles got off their plane at the airport, but the five hour wait had been worth it because I got a special wave from George Harrison.  Years later I wrote a story entitled "The Day I Saw The Beatles" for The School Journal.  And got paid for it.

I tried unsuccessfully to rip a button off Bobby Rydell's coat during the riot of his arrival at Wellington Airport and, with a friend, got backstage to Helen Shapiro by presenting her with a charm for her bracelet. 

Gerry, from Gerry and The Pacemakers, gave me his autograph earlier in the day, but when he saw me later at the Town Hall stage door, muttered "Not you again".  Gene Pitney kindly spoke into my new mini tape recorder.

The father/manager/uncle of The Beach Boys asked a crowd of fans hovering around his boys to send him future information about NZ record sales. I was the only one who did so, with clippings and reviews. In exchange he sent me autographed photos.  And records. And a lovely letter.

There were many others....

But then lots of flash-in-the-pan singers began coming in a steady stream to New Zealand, here today and gone tomorrow celebs.  Show-biz entrepreneurs, like Harry M. Miller, were grabbing the opportunity to bring such performers to the country while they were hot.  After a time, however, my friends and I got tired of all the strategising, and conniving, and phoning hotels pretending to be reporters to get a star's arrival time.... 

"We're through with all this," we decided.  It wasn't worth the effort any more to run after the soon-to-be-has-beens, the one-hit wonders.

A music group, one of the many so-called British Invasion groups, was coming over from England.  But my friends and I had made the decision to stop the chase ......

...so we never turned out to see The Rolling Stones.

Our borders are open -

 Hi there

Our borders are now open to international travellers, and covid, omicron, omicron variants, and monkeypox -

welcome Whanau = Welcome our extended family

Photos i wish I'd taken

 Hi there

There are times I wished I'd had my camera on me.  I must have missed out on dozens of  great happenings.

Like those three cruise ships that were leaving Mt Maunganui on a beautiful blue sky day, with paddle-boarders, kayakers, and swimmers in the foreground, and ship passengers hanging over the railings, shouting their goodbyes.

And what about the time I all but crashed into William Shatner in Las Vegas?  By the time I had fumbled my mobile phone camera out of my bag, switched it on, and turned on the photo app, Shatner had beamed himself away, probably to Caesar's Casino behind me.

I was walking along Cobham Drive one day, beside the sea.  There was a family a short distance in front of me.  Mum, Dad, a boy of about six, and a girl eight.  And a black and white border collie sheep dog.

The children were obviously bored, straying separately to opposite  sides of the track, lagging behind, walking backwards, attempting to skip stones into the water.  The parents weren't even watching the kids.  

But the dog was.  He snuck on his belly over to one side of the track to herd in the girl, then dashed to the opposite side for the other sheep-whoops-sorry-I-mean-child to steer him, too, back toward the parents.  The dog hovered around the two kids for the whole of Cobham Drive, manoeuvring them back when they went off-point.

That would have made a hilarious picture.  I guess urban sheep dogs never lose the thrill of the round-up.

But ...  the ultimate photo would have been the day the plumber came to fix my kitchen water pipes.  He opened the cupboard under the sink and attempted to squeeze his heavy bulk into the narrow crawl-space.  His top-half disappeared into the depths of my pots and pans storage area. 

Gulp, I got an embarrassing view of  plumbers crack!  But, no, that wasn't the photo I would've taken.

I hastened outside for a minute or two, just to allow the man some alone time but when I returned there were two rear ends poking out from that cupboard:  one belonging to the jean-clad plumber, the other was furry and with a tail - my nosey Siamese cat, StarGirl.  

There couldn't have been a finger's-width of space between the pair.  Siamese cats just have to take part in everything that's going on.

The plumber later told me that StarGirl was a bossy plumber's mate, crying out orders to him.  Well, what did he expect, she was a Siamese cat, and they're never willing to take a back seat.

But, oh my goodness, didn't I miss an hilarious photo opportunity that day? 

Above:  guess who?