Cafe names

 Hi there

I'm never surprised when I visit a waterside holiday area  and discover a cafe called either The Boathouse or The Boatshed.  When the owners are naming their eateries don't they ever give thought to what a common, unoriginal, no-thought-involved name they've picked?

There are Boathouse and Boatshed cafes everywhere.  Heck, in Nelson, The Boatshed and The Boathouse are only a two minute walk apart from each other, and even on the same side of the same road.   Confusion much for customers?

The same goes for cafes with the name 'Relish'.  If i come across another 'Relish', be it in Aotearoa-New Zealand or overseas, I swear you'll be seeing me standing in front of the place and stamping my foot.  

I guess the owners of such cafes get a 'Eureka' moment that suddenly hits them and they shriek "I've got it!! - The Boathouse!  And so original. No cafe owner - occupying an old boathouse, like us- will ever have thought of the name!" .

Aeroplane Toilets (or 'lavatories' as many planes still call them)

 Hi there

Years and years ago the toilet door got jammed on my international flight.  It took a while for my hammering on the door and my shouting to draw attention to the predicament.  

The air hostess (yes, that's what she was called and there was no such person as an 'air host') tried tugging the door from the other side.  I could hear hasty whispers and she was joined by a couple of others.  The toilet door was pulled, tugged, violated.

Finally, I guessed that a conger line must have been formed to do the deed, everyone digging their heels in and working as a team -  I fell out with a stumble into the plane's aisle.

Lots of passengers clapped.  And someone shouted, "Encore"....

Beaches

 Hi there

I've shown enough photos of Hataitai Beach over the years so, by now, you will know that I don't like swimming where there are big breaker waves and fierce water.  This is why I like Hataitai Beach.  I can easily swim back and forth across the bay, like lengths at a pool.  When I'm in fierce water, it's impossible to swim so all I can do is dive-bomb into each approaching wave, then hope to the heavens that I have time to stand up and re-group before the next huge wave appears behind me with the full intent of mowing me down.

Much as I like dive-bombing into waves and get that wonderfully euphoric feeling as I'm swimming under water, there is still always the small niggle that I could drown.  A few years ago at Ohope Beach, a wave threw me aside with such strength that my leg twisted under me and my boogie board broke right in two.

above:  Main Beach, Mt Maunganui.  Better to go to Pilot Bay, a couple of minutes away.

above:  Not for me (having said that I did wave-dive here!)

I truly dislike coat-hangers

 Hi there

Coat-hangers are essential.  I suppose we could use hooks in a wardrobe but they're not as versatile as coat-hangers.  With hooks, there'd only be room for about a dozen dresses.   Or a dozen jackets (6 jackets if they're of the puffer variety). 

With coat-hangers, one can cram in ... a lot!

I certainly try to cram in a lot.  And this is why I dislike coat-hangers.  I have so many clothes on clothes-hangers that my clothes are all jammed into my wardrobe like sardines.  Clothes often slip off the hangers as I'm rummaging through, trying to decide what to wear.  Handbags and shoulderbags that have their straps dangling down from the shelf above, get tangled up in coat-hangers.  When I pull out something on a coat-hanger, down comes a slew of handbags and shoulderbags as well as, perhaps, a couple of coat-hangered dresses that have also got tangled up in the pull-out.

I've tried many times to tuck the straps of shoulderbags and handbags away from the edge of the shelf but no, the sly little bags still manage to dangle their straps down.  Maybe it's the wardrobe monster that resides there, a left-over from childhood dreams?  He-he, I have my revenge on that wicked child,  Lorraine....

I do have many, many hangers. I guess you could call them my heritage.  The hangers belonged to my mother, some of them even from my grandmother.  They're all wood, and make me remember actress Joan Crawford who got into a maniacal tizzy when she caught her daughter, Christina, using wire hangers.  Years later, and because of the book and movie "Mommy Dearest" about Crawford, a friend confided to me that this was how she learnt what type of hangers she should buy. 

I've found out a lot recently about Swedish Death Cleaning where a person should declutter before they die.  Maybe reducing my clothes is what I should do?  I mean, I really should get rid of my bop skirt from the fifties, the one that has Elvis Presley's name lovingly embroidered by 13 year old me all over the material?   And what about my elephant pants from the hippie era?  Or my flapper dresses from the art deco weekends over in Napier?  If I just had a few things in my wardrobe - not many bags, not many dresses not many tops, not many jackets, definitely not many bags - my life could be so much more enhanced? 

Will I? - should I? - get rid of clothes that I havent worn in years but clothes that stlll give me beautiful nostalgic memories when I paw through my wardrobe....?

Um... Er....   

No!     Case closed. 

 Or should I say 'Wardrobe Closed'?  Slam!!