aah spring, how i love your sunny still mornings!
i've somehow (yay!) got into the habit of awaking early, it's really nice to be up and about hours before i actually need to be. i was explaining to steve yesterday, it feels like bonus time.. anything i get done before i was even needing to be awake is total bonus, which makes me very very happy.
and there is *plenty* to do ~ the garden check alone takes a good 20mins. only one pea up so far, sigh, i wonder if the birds got them? the earth doesn't seem to be very roughed up though. perhaps i'll germinate some in water and then they'll be ready in a couple of days if the others don't show.
i'm very pleased with my new raised garden bed. made of chimney bricks, it is a wonderful marriage of recycling and aesthetics! i plan on filling it with zucchinis and pumpkins, big leafy things which like space to sprawl.
very much loving my woolston wonderland at the moment. tracey (she's back, folks) persuaded me to host a garage sale this coming saturday, which means i should really be digging out lots of stuff to get rid of, not to mention making space in the rather crowded garage (not even my stuff, damn it!).
in family news, helen and marco are nearly in melbourne. this makes me sad. not because they're close, but because they're not close enough. and i am also a little envious that helen and aeneas and damien will all be living together. i do love my christchurch life, but melbourne does still pull. especially now.
but, best i don't focus on that right now.
happy days!
xx

just up the road....

too close for comfort

# Sat, Sep 25 2010 8:01 pm
# Magnitude: 4.0
# Depth: 9 km

---

38 Ensors Rd
Opawa, Christchurch 8023, New Zealand

Show on Google Maps

GOOD MORNiNG, SUNSHiNE

awoken by a rather big aftershock (yes, still!) i am happily gazing out over my garden on a perfect spring morning. granted, it's not very warm ~ but my coffee is, and for once i feel like i've had enough sleep. it's crazy how much sleep i've been getting lately, and now little of it seems to be effective. i guess it's still the after effects of the earthquake stress, as most people i talk to seem to be in the same boat. the same suddenly rocking at random moments boat in fact.
life is slowly feeling more normal, i am no longer freaked out about being on my own ~ hooray! that said, i'm not yet game to put my pretty things back on their high shelves.
i did manage to do a HUGE batch of grapefruit and cranberry marmalade yesterday. turns out that tripling the recipe was perhaps a little too keen. it's a real bugger when you realise half way through that you're going to need to transfer half of the scaldingly hot gloop into another pot. aah, but the satisfaction of having 24 jars of marmalade lined up on the bench makes it worth while.
in garden news, i finally managed to get things in the ground last sunday. four feijoa bushes, a blackcurrant, a lemon, and three cranberries. feels good. it was particularly awesome to have steve's input, and by input i mean digging. yay steve! this weekend i plan on going to a couple of markets and drinking fancy wine and eating fancy cheese with claire, looking forward to that!
hope all is well in your worlds, blogfolks.
xxx

WHO SAYS IT'S NOT AS BAD AS THEY SAY??

i'm writing this at the kitchen table. and do you know what that means, blogfolks?
yes that's right, i'm finally wifi-ed. thanks to my mac techie jeff for setting it up, i was entirely bamboozled.
in other news, the tremors are still enough to scare me. there's this moment when every nerve is on high alert, until you feel the tremor subside. not much fun at all. though luckily i am calming down, that constant anxiety is hard to live with.
i'm really hoping that big aftershock they keep talking about doesn't eventuate. interesting that many people around the country are suggesting that this quake is being sensationalised, and isn't really as bad as it's made out to be. try living here, fuckwits! there is, as i write, a crane pulling down a section of my workplace. and we were lucky the damage wasn't more extensive.
don't get me started on the liquifaction in bexley, those poor sods have houses that are subsiding into the mud, and the land is probably unable to be built on again. more and more cracks are appearing in our houses, our chimneys are in piles on the ground (it's still bloody cold here too!) and i have friends with kids who are totally traumatised by every tremor.
so, darlings, it is as bad as it's made out to be. but that said, we are fine, we are alive and we'll be swapping horror stories for years to come.

i wish i knew some relevant biblical quote to start this post.
something about the earth heaving and all will be smiteth, you know what i mean.

so yes, there was an earthquake.
a big fuckin' earthquake, the sort of earthquake you see on tv.
it was 7.1 on the richter scale, and the centre was only 30km away and a measly 10km deep. now *that's* an earthquake.
i woke up to a shuddering house, leapt out of bed and threw myself under the doorway where i had a fabulous view of the rather heavy bookcase in the hallway swaying back and forth and spewing it's contents onto the floor in front of me. the noise was phenomenal, end of the world type stuff. i didn't know if anyone else was home, and for a few moments there thought that it might be curtains closed, the quake seemed to go on for such a long time and everything was crashing down around me.
luckily when it was safe to stand up i could see the van outside, which meant that matt was home at least. turns out he was outside wondering if he'd have to smash a window to get me out of the bedroom! so we huddled in the garden feeling the aftershocks, and watching the lights on the hill go out suburb by suburb. we made a couple of very quick forays into the house for warmer clothes and boots and cellphones. it was really frightening being inside the house, not knowing whether another big one was going to hit. the first thing i did when i got back outside was fire a text off to jeff, i figured it was a good idea to get one out of the country just in case! crazy what our minds do in a crisis.
i was worried then that we'd just caught the tail end of something bigger based in wellington (that's the quake we've all been waiting for), but luckily we still had power and a few minutes later there was a report on the radio that it was based near christchurch -  which, believe it or not, was a relief!
i couldn't get hold of mum and dad on any of their phones, but wasn't too worried as the networks were overloaded and they don't tend to keep their cellphones on them anyway. eventually i got through, they'd lost power and a brick chimney. so when it seemed safe enough (how does one even try to gauge that?!) we drove over with a kettle of water for cups of tea in the dark. what fun and larks!
day broke an hour or so later, and then we were off to check on our shops. surprisingly the damage was minimal. plenty of smashed bottles and jars on the floor at piko, but no real damage to the building other than a few more cracks in the plaster (thank god we got it earthquake strengthened to the tune of a few hundred thousand dollars a few years back, we'd be sifting through a pile of rubble otherwise) so after a clean up for a couple of hours, we figured it was time to go have a look at the central city. we'd heard that a lot of it was cordoned off, so it was a walking mission. unbelievable! there are buildings missing whole sides, groups of shops crumpled on the ground, broken windows everywhere and a few squashed cars... my sister's included. we'd picked her up earlier, her house is unlivable and her car is a total write off due to a load of bricks falling on it.
there was this weird post-apocalyptic feel in the air, though sort of exciting and cheery at the same time, probably due to the ridiculously beautiful day that was unfolding [oh fuck, that was quite a big aftershock]. we were so lucky to have a sunny day, it would have been horrendous if people were also getting cold and wet and hyperthermic. there is definitely a lot to be thankful for, for one that it was during the quietest part of the night and most people were safe(ish) at home.
after the town mission i made my way up the hill to check on jeff's parents as he hadn't heard from them. all good there, they were in fine form and offered me cups of coffee and a tour of the garden - i've promised i'll go back one day soon for that! then it was down the hill for a debriefing with my family, over a bowl of hot soup. not bad at all.
after a few hours of talking and tidying i finally made it home to see the state of my little house. structurally intact, and plenty of material for mosaicing. i'm a little sad to have lost so many of my favourite pieces of handmade crockery, but it's such a small price to pay really.
sleep was a long time coming, we left the radio and a lamp on, and i do admit i put a change of clothes in a bag beside the door. but here i am this morning, safe and well other than a banging headache and a bruised toe. didn't get too much sleep last night, and the aftershocks are still scary, but at least the worst is over!
take care, blogfriends.
x e

fuck ME that was an earthquake.

NEWtown

new discoveries:
(late to the game, as usual)

*scott pilgrim
*dan savage
*writersblok (move aside, moleskine! actually don't move aside, just become a little more affordable)

wickedness!
i am loving this shot of city life, it makes me wonder why i don't live here. maybe i will one of these years. having the company of my man friday for a few days of lurking is super cool, yay for that! loving it.

MAKE LiKE HOUDiNi ...and

ESCAPE!

Sydney today, Broken Hill tomorrow.

most annoying thing about packing: finding chargers! phone, camera, ipod...

x

THiNGS i'M EXCiTED ABOUT

sydney and broken hill in a month.. escape! dry desert air!

m. ward and belle and sebastian

g's new venture

helen trying to figure out residency for marco (take that, italy)

slow-cooker soups and houseguests who make them!

xx

ADMiSSiONS

so a couple of weeks ago i made my first foray into the world of online bookshopping. i've been thus far avoiding it, in the knowledge that it is a slippery slippery slope!! far too much temptation. however, sometimes books just aren't available anywhere in new zealand, and the cost of getting a shop to special order them is just too much!
i am still a fan of buying local and supporting small business.. of course.. but i decided to cut myself some slack and just buy the three books i really wanted!
i've been holding off telling you about them, but now i can (fb knows why). the first one....
from eroica with love, vol.1 ~ yes, really! this is a very bizarre series of manga, the central character being this blond gay chap by the name of eroica. all the girls swoon over him. i admit i have only read the first couple of pages.. it's cringeworthy!
the next book was "rotisserie chook or the founding fathers" by jessica hagy, from her awesome website indexed. it's 30 postcards, all of them awesomely cool graphs of various types.
finally, the buy that really made my day.... "ZOMBIE HAIKU"!!! two of my favourite things united at last. it is wicked. probably in both senses of that word. i opened this package on the bus one day, within about 5 pages i was laughing so hard that i had to put the book away, and hide my face in my hands because people were starting to look alarmed. i never had much of a thing about zombies until quite recently. of course "shawn of the dead" was an awesome movie, but that still didn't turn me. i'm not quite sure what did actually, though i'm sure fishboy had a lot to do with it. his influence is strong, many a time i've been pulled to the dark(er) side by that one. anyhoo... definitely happy to have received this brilliant book in the post!
sometimes at work i pretend that i'm a zombie, i've discovered that just pretending inside my head is enough to bring a smile to my face... so customers think i'm nice when actually i am imagining ripping them limb from limb and devouring their mushy organic brains. oooh, have i said too much?
in other news, i'm listening to the national for the first time, loving it so far, thanks ray and claire for another good recommendation.

xx

THE iMPORTANCE OF BEiNG iNTERESTiNG

i had a good chat with my friend ariel a couple of days ago, about how good 'we' are at avoiding doing the things which are actually important.
we deem silly things like laundry and and tidying to be important, somehow making time to do those things... and yet, at the end of the day we haven't really spent any time on the things that we tell ourselves are the most important!
like, when someone asks what's important to me in my life i will come up with things like making art, crafting, gardening, blogging, walking in nature...
and when do i actually do these things??? i tell myself i don't have time, there is too much daily grind to get through! what the hell? it's so easy to push those 'nice' things aside as being less important than keeping the house tidy. 'we' must be mad, surely.
so i am once again reminding myself that those other things are not to be ignored... i come to this conclusion periodically... and i intend to do something about it!
i have started playing around over at listography, i think it's time to write some real to-do lists.

dear blog friends,

i love you. please give yourselves a hug from me.

yours sporadically,

eroica

x

PUBLIC HOLIDAY MONDAY

genius playlists make my monday a happy place.
i am halfway finished jeff's very late birthday present.
i have a pile of clothes for the salvation army.
coffee number 3 is being planned.
leonard cohen tickets are purchased (yes!!).
it's still raining.
i am loving indexed.

x

hello blog-loves.
update time.

firstly, and very importantly, my hands are on the mend. give it a few more days and they'll be good as new. this is an immense relief! it got to the point where i just stopped coping, which of course was over easter when medical facilities were shutburgers.

today i am sick with other ails, aah it's so much fun being me! lack of sleep has triggered shivers and aches and nausea and dizziness, i don't think catching up on sleep will salvage me anymore.

yesterday i spend 8 hours at the polytech learning about the sale of liquor act, in a bid to apply for my duty manager certificate. it was painful. not so much because it was dull (it had it's moments) but more because i find it so damn upsetting that we have this utterly abhorrent drinking culture in our country. it really bugs me. according to one economist's study, in 2004 kiwi taxpayers spend a whopping $11 billion on alcohol related issues. this is not ok! what is wrong with 'us' that we feel the need to get shitfaced to the extent that we cause more damage than you can even really imagine? i mean, $11 billion!!! i have to stop writing about it, i'm getting knotted up again.

in other news, helen and marco are mere days from leaving. currently they're holidaying in golden bay, so i am housemateless. i hate that they are leaving! i miss helen already, and she's only been gone a day. for sisters who used to swap bites for kicks, we now get on very well and i happily consider her my friend as well as little sis. it'll be hard being without her again. thank the gods for such wondrous technologies as skype.

my friend matt may move in, which would be an easy way to solve my housemate issues. for although i like the idea of a few weeks on my own, more than that will just get difficult in the money department. and i have a raft of money-sucking thing to attend to, such as renewing my passport and planning a trip to sydney for late winter. man, i hope that can happen! definitely been too long since i was there. i can't think of a better way to spend a few days than wandering newtown with the esteemable jeffmeister (love you). my friend nik lives there now as well, which means another very good reason to visit old sydney town.

i had the lovely j&m to stay last week, lucky me! they made super first houseguests, and justin and i had plenty of opportunities to talk art and craft and bounce ideas off each other. we also managed to fit in a lengthy breakfast and cribbage session at the addington coffee co-op, a la last winter. definitely a sweet weekend.

now, back to my sage-oliveleaf-ginger-lemon-honey tea and perhaps a page or two of shantaram (i'm over halfway through now).

love to you blogfolk
xxx

my hands are wrecked.
there is nothing, NOTHING, ok about this. it is the most demoralising depressing thing. i can't do the simplest things, and it is driving me fucking crazy.
FUUUUUUUCK.
rant over.

ONLY LOVE CAN BREAK YOUR HEART

so said neil young


i am not heartbroken, but i am heartsore.
i made a decision today which feels like the right one, even if it's a bit shit. and sad. but you know, i'm all about the simplicity and happiness and i think i'm on the right road. i feel like making this decision is a step in the right direction, a step towards being the best person i can be. god that sounds awful, but that is cynical me talking, and didn't i say something about casting cynical eroica aside for a while?
this is all good learning. many a challenge, as if i could expect otherwise. life is a bitch! but a beautiful sweet bitch.
someone tell me to shut up?

x e

A NEW WEEK

last week was shit, for various reasons that i don't intend to divulge.
this week shall be a much better one! i am determined to make it so. it's off to a good start... a sunny morning, i don't have to be at work till lunch time, and i have tentative dinner plans with the darling gregstar this evening.
right, blogfolk, i'm off to read shanataram for a bit.
xx love

The Wiggles ~ You Make Me Feel Like Dancing

i don't care what you say, there is nothing wrong with this video!
in fact, on a shitty day, it's about the only thing to bring a smile
hehe.

blogpeeps, it's going very well.
<3

.. and then when we parted company, he kissed me. just a peck, but it was on the lips. so, for someone so shy, i think i can take that as a sign he really is interested in more than the sweet friendship we already have going.

i have no appetite and mild insomnia.
this can mean only one thing, blogpeeps.
yes, i am crushing.

*freaking out freaking out freaking out*

it's been a while.
x

summer delights

late night adventures leave me over tired but smiling.
it was the most eerie night in new brighton. thick thick mist, and so very still. i've never before walked down the pier without getting windswept! standing at the end, staring out at a wall of solid air was very disconcerting. such a fitting end to a beautiful day.



and haiku for greg:

summer happiness!
the sun is setting pinkly
in woolston tonight

x

sunny saturday, no work for me
lyttelton for coffee and market
then home for lunch with sis
and my new nephew
shit, he's cute.

"Love one another and you will be happy. It's as simple and as difficult as that."

so said michael leunig.

much relief in saying things aloud,
this note brought on by a conversation in which something that had never been spoken of, well.. was. and i didn't realise it'd be such a relief to have it said, it was never a big deal, but the smile that broke across my face unbidden must mean that at some level it had been bugging me!
i also told a friend that i love him, and that felt good too. even if he thinks i'm a weirdo. actually he knows that. i'm all about the honesty, blogpeeps.
honestly, i love that you're reading this.
*smooch*

bugger this, i'm off to hinewai.
:-)

finding joy in gardening, in catching up with old friends (three cheers for skype! even if the omani version is a bit shit), in planning waitangi day outings.
and tomorrow i get to meet my new nephew!

well i think i did a fairly good job of being diplomatic in my awkward meeting today. no tears, which is a good start. and hopefully changes will be made, and everyone will be smiling again.
i'm very happy to be finished work for the week! and happier still that there is lots of good stuff going on tomorrow. it's waitangi day, and i plan on checking out a latin american festival in the square, and perhaps a bit of good music at the art gallery too. fingers crossed this sweet weather holds!

it's all about the joy, baby!
seeking it out.
today's joy was a cupcake with karen (belated birthday cupcake), collecting seeds from my garden (sage, rocket, radish), eating one bright red cherry tomato, and listening to jens lekman turned up loud on the way home.
(in other news, i had a slightly unpleasant work meeting tonight, and now i have to have a rather awkward conversation with a workmate.)

no more haloscan.. all old comments lost!
the sentimental hoarder in me is smarting.
but pretty red and green lifts my spirits a little.

i have decided to seek out joy. i'll let you know how that works out for me! so far so good, i am feeling positive about this feeling positive thing.

SUNDAY SUN DAY

i have just been informed that it's HOT in invercargill. what the hell!
why am i in shitty cold christchurch when i could be living it up in a tshirt in a town far closer to antarctica? that is just so damn wrong. the fact that i am irrationally angry about it really does speak volumes about what a lack of vitamin D does for one's mood. summer is not meant to be a time of angry shivering, yet this is what i have been reduced to. i know it is fruitless to be angry at the weather, and yet i (and many other chch'ers) just can't seem to help it this summer. i feel like i've been thoroughly ripped off! three weeks into my new house, and i am already planning on moving to australia, and not only for the money. climate is a big part of it too.
ok, rant over. today is actually beautiful. the wind is cold, but the sunshine makes up for it. i've had a lovely day, starting with coffee down the road and then a leisurely bike ride over to the local market for a couple of bargains. then back home to ready the house for more visitors. the sunday craft sessions continue! i spent it going through a box of old paintings, very entertaining. i painted a lot of shit, some of it is probably even recorded on here. though i did find a very cool fish drawing in pastel, which will make a good gift for the hazelnut.
now i am very much enjoying some time alone at home, listening to new music recommended by darling mr. fish (la roux, mumford & sons, lykke li) and planning a craft project i have in the works.
tonight i'm off to see polka dot dot dot and jens lekman at the wunderbar. must make the most of these opportunities, although my natural leaning is towards hermitude. i'm sure the gig will be brilliant though, so the money time drive people will be worth it. haha, such enthusiasm!
ok love you bye
xx

house blog over this way...

click my pretty green link to be taken to the woolston wonderland that is my new blog. it doesn't mean i'll cast this one aside though... i have issues with letting go...
hey, you read my blog, you probably already know that about me.

:-) i hope you are happy, blogfriends.

love from me.

87

i have a house now. it is very pretty, with clean walls and wooden floors. and a big big garden.