Webb-Ellis Cup

On Tuesday I went to a client in Upper Hutt. As I don't have a car it required that I take two trains so I had some time in the Wellington Train Station. (which is lovely and warrants a post with plenty of pictures of its own.) Walking off the platform into the station I was greeted by two lovely young women who gave me a brochure and told me the Webb-Ellis cup was in the main entrance and I could get my picture taken with it.

I of course looked at them with a blank stare and asked what is a Webb-Ellis cup and why would I want my picture taken with it. They laughed and asked me which state I was from. (My accent meant North America, and a complete ignorance of rugby meant not Canada.) We chatted for a while and I said no-thanks to the invitation for a picture as I wanted a cup of coffee (see earlier post about dead coffee machine) before my next train left the station.

As I walked over to the cafe I had a change of heart. I just imagined my friends saying to me "you didn't get your picture taken with the Webb-Ellis cup! Your not a real kiwi." (See an earlier post about Visas.) So I turned around and went to the main entrance and got in line.

As it was an obnoxiously early hour in the morning there was not much of a line so I quickly went through it. I was asked by a radio hostess for an interview but declined due to the tight schedule.

The arm to the left of the picture was the guard. I looked over at him and asked if I could touch the trophy. He shook his head and laughed at the thought and recommended that I not. So with his permission I rested my arm on the pedestal and smiled for the cameras.

Apologies for the quality of the picture this is from my cell phone which a bystander kindly snapped for me. The link they gave me to their online postings of the pictures didn't work so I can't get the professional quality one. I do wonder if I broke their camera! :)

For those who care to know more here is information on the cup itself

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webb_Ellis_Cup

We did it

On Monday I went down to immigration and applied for my indefinite returning residence visa. I thought it would be a quick drop-off of the paperwork. There were two surprises. The first was the hour wait in line. But as they gave out numbers I just went out and grabbed a bite to eat. The second was that they put the visas in the passports while I waited ... or more correctly stated while I watched.

To the left is a picture of the agent putting the visa in Dennis' passport.

I must admit it bought a tear to my eye to see this. A major part of our desire to go here is to give Dennis another country to play in when he gets older.

With this residency Dennis can live and work come and go in New Zealand for the rest of his life. It is also a first step to acquiring a NZ Passport which would enable him to live and work in Australia and have much easier access to the rest of Asia and Europe. It was a very good day.

French Press

Today a good friend (lives in the neighborhood) dropped off a French Press for my use. We were chatting over the weekend and Chris mentioned that I had broke the espresso machine and had lost our french press in the move.

Our friend, Monique, had an extra one laying around so she came buy and dropped off a two cup french press. Which will be just enough for a morning cup of joe!

Thank you Monique!

Warm ...

The weather outside is frightful! But the fire is really delightful...

When I first arrived in Wellington someone told me that the views come with the wind. We have traded a great view and a large home for the above pictured fireplace, insulation, heat pump, DVS (attic air circulation system,) and a night store (electric heater that heats up bricks at night.)

Our lounge (living room) is a warm 73F the wind is hardly hitting the house (50mph today) and the fireplace is drying out the house.

Sadness

Today I am very very sad. I made more bread, in fact they were beautiful loaves. French Baguettes and Batards. Dennis was great help in making them, he even showed me what I was doing wrong with the scoring of the loaves.

What is sad is that my Sunbeam EM5800 Espresso machine died generating the Steam required to make those perfect loaves of Bread. I must admit that 10 minutes of steam production was a hard ask (notice the kiwiism) for the machine but I expected when it cooled it would be back to its normal self. Instead it now refuses to turn on. Something burned out.

I don't know what I will do tomorrow morning, it will be lonely without my daily capuchino.

Tom

Good Friends

For the past 15 months or so we have had weekly dinners with our neighbors John and Lilli. They live next door up the hill from us.

We take turns cooking for each other and after a delightful dinner we play a game of cards. It started with Hand and Foot and after a couple of months of trying different things we settled on 500 as our game.

Tonight was the last night that we had together with us living in this house on Pitt Street. I will miss John and Lilli quite a bit. They have been great friends to Chris, Dennis and I.

Easter question ...

I'd like to share a a short story and a question which a friend sent to me. The point is not specific to any religion, or for that matter religious at all:

"A few years ago a group of salesmen went to a regional sales convention in Chicago. They had assured their wives that they would be home in plenty of time for Friday night's dinner. In their rush, with tickets and briefcases, one of these salesmen inadvertently kicked over a table which held a display of apples. Apples flew everywhere.

Without stopping or looking back, they all managed to reach the plane in time for their nearly missed boarding. ALL BUT ONE !!! He paused, took a deep breath, and experienced a twinge of compassion for the girl whose apple stand had been overturned.

He told his buddies to go on without him, waved good-bye, told one of them to call his wife when they arrived at their home destination and explain his taking a later flight. Then he returned to the terminal where the apples were all over the terminal floor. He was glad he did.

The 16 year old girl was totally blind! She was softly crying, tears running down her cheeks in frustration, and at the same time helplessly groping for her spilled produce as the crowd swirled about her, no one stopping and no one to care for her plight.

The salesman knelt on the floor with her, gathered up the apples, put them back on the table and helped organize her display. As he did this, he noticed that many of them had become battered and bruised; these he set aside in another basket.

When he had finished, he pulled out his wallet and said to the girl, 'Here, please take this $40 for the damage we did. Are you okay?'

She nodded through her tears. He continued on with, 'I hope we didn't spoil your day too badly.'

As the salesman started to walk away, the bewildered blind girl called out to him, 'Mister.......' He paused and turned to look back into those blind eyes. She continued, 'Are you Jesus?'

He stopped in mid-stride, and he wondered. Then slowly he made his way to catch the later flight with that question burning and bouncing about in his soul: 'Are you Jesus?' "

Now comes the hard (and nondenominational, I might add) question...don't send me your answer...just answer silently to yourself as honestly and sincerely as you can:

Have you had anybody ask you that lately?

Dennis approval of my latest baguettes

Dennis is enjoying my baking. Seems everything I bake is the "best bread he has ever tasted." However he has noted a marked improvement lately.

It took me quite a bit of time to get my baguettes presentable. My family, and a few good friends were kind enough to eat my failures.

I found the recipe, and plenty of advice, for these baguettes at www.breadcetera.com.

Our young crazy dancer ...

Dennis likes playing with the camera, so much so he rand own the batteries recently. Here he is doing a dance for his, and your, viewing pleasure!

Baking

I have been baking quite a bit lately. It all started when Chris was at outward bound. Dennis wanted pizza so I dutifully picked up a few pizza bases (crusts) from the local store. At $3/each base I was shocked and figured I could make them myself ...

I got the recipe from a small book that Chris had picked up locally. The crusts were easy to make and quite good. So embolden by my success I picked another recipe to try. Croissants. (I never was one to aim low.) The croissants took four tries before they were respectable but I did get there.

Then came bagels, baguettes,

and now most recent is a Chicago style deep dish pizza.

Oh the future is truly bright!