I thought I had it bad...

...when I was out working in the rain the other day.


This picture (courtesy of the BBC South Yorkshire website) is at the road at the bottom of my parents drive. Fortunately they live on a small hill so the house is ok but plenty of others aren't so lucky. Such as our neighbours whose house is just out of shot to the right at ground level.

Freebies...

I went to the annual Green Acres trade show and conference on Thursday. No free trip to far flung exciting destinations but there were free nibbles and lots of prize giveaways.

It was good to chat with a few people from head office and even better to win movie tickets, a mini tool, a new head for my trimmer and a big coil of trimmer line. Well over a 100 bucks worth of prizes which sound a bit boring but it's always good to be a winner...

Boring post but my people demand updates. Not that it matters, everyone is on facebook these days.

The big 3 oh...

As reported on Lunt's blog (with some lovely snaps) I've turned 30. It's the first birthday I haven't really been looking forward to but it turned out to be a good one.

On my actual birthday Jo and I went out for a meal, then I was drafted in to play cricket as we were short. We lost. Disappointing.

On Friday I planned a good old fashioned English all-dayer. Myself, Rob and Dave didn't start as early as we wanted (about 4) but it was a 12 hour session so I guess that qualifies. We started in Shadows, the Auckland Uni bar, drinking rather cheap jugs of Oranjeboom and from there the memory is sketchy at best. A quality night out though.

Then on Saturday morning we dragged ourselves out of bed to go karting. Despite a few late drop outs we still had 8 of us who, to a man, ignored the no contact pleas of the safety video and smashed our way round the indoor/outdoor track for a couple of bruising races. Jiah and Rob took the victories with me coming second both times. Always the bridesmaid...

No pictures unfortunately, but there are plenty of the subsequent night out. The All Blacks' second test against France was on so we went to the Kingslander to watch the slaughter. Watching this game confirmed 2 things... 1. The French national anthem is by far the best around. 2. One of my favourite things about New Zealand is the haka.

Let the pictures tell the story...

Jo and her friends, Gemma and Harriet

Rob and Mia

Will celebrates the All Blacks win

Yes, I am dressed like a girl

Miller entertains the ladies

Birthday shooters

The group

The guy at the front having the time of his life is a total random

French Open semi finals...

Lads, which one were you watching??

Or was it?...