The Kiwi Dream

Camping at Lake Aviemore

If the American dream is earning fat wads of cash, the kiwi dream is camping by the lake with lots of petrol powered acessories.

We have been staying down at Lake Aviemore, watching the people with their jetboats fishing, waterski-ing and zooming across the water.

We were there with our new Kathmandu tent and camping furniture, but to be honest no-one was impressed. Our neighbours, for instance, had in-tent satellite TV.

We went on a couple of walks. One was a deathtrap, beside a near-vertical drop into the depths of the reservoir (no fencing, obviously). The other was to see the impressive Clay Cliffs at Omarama, advertised as an easy 100m walk. Inevitably, this was in reality a 2km uphill slog on a slipperly gravel surface in 100 degree heat. There was a great view at the top though and we definitely earned it.

The Clay Cliffs at Omarama

Is it me or is pop music crap these days?

This is the end of 2009, my year of middle-aged outrage. And I would like to finish the year with this thought.

Is it me or is pop music crap these days? Half of it is pointless vapid drivel from an identikit Simon Cowell pop-drone. The other is people shouting about g-strings and booty over the top of random electronic beeping. You certainly can't sing along to that!

Mind you, I can remember the days of Rick Astley and Sinitta. So perhaps nothings changed.

Making washing powder.

Boxing day and we've been making our own washing powder. You have to mix laundry soap with washing soda and grind it into a powder. There is washing soda everywhere and I have almost blown up the food mixer. We might not save all that much money but it will be interesting to see if it works.

Mind you, I generally assume that if the clothes have been through the washing machine they must be clean, regardless of whether they actually are, so I probably won't notice.

It's a Kathmandu Christmas

We love Kiwi camping shop Kathmandu. It is full of clever things for when you go camping, like hammocks, or fold up kitchen utensils. Whatever you have at home, there’s something in Kathmandu that does the same job for when you are camping and folds up to one tenth the original size or less. And it’s all so cleverly designed. When Jo and I go to Kathmandu, we run around from shelf to shelf squealing in delight. I think in this way it is like Ikea – as far as I can remember.

And excitingly, Christmas presents this year were mostly from Kathmandu. Jo got a fold up wardrobe. I got a fold up Kitchen. Jo got a blow up chair. We were squealing in delight once more. It was great. I can’t wait to get out there camping in the next few days with my fold up furniture. We will be the envy of the camp site.

Happy Christmas!

Rolling Over

Toby is 4 months old today and to celebrate he rolled over on his own, the first proper landmark in baby development.

There was no-one to see it though as we were out the room.

It's a beautiful day but the nor wester is howling through (as always) so it's too windy to go out.

Sicko

Toby is the sickiest little baby ever! He has just been sick down me, not an unusual occurance. He has been sick about five times since I got home 3 hours ago. He is sick on Jo about 5 times a day on average. It is quite annoying. But he seems quite happy.

Judge John Deed

Tonight I am watching high-brow UK drama series Judge John Deed. It is a bit old fashioned looking. The acting is a bit wooden and the sets look like they might fall over at any time. They only use one camera angle per scene where I am used to at least seven. I also think it needs to be filmed in orange sepia and I think Judge John needs to take his glasses on and off all the time. And they should play techno music in the background all the time. And blow some stuff up.

Then it would be a bit more with it. They might get a spin-off series, say Judge John Deed: Wales. Or something.

Domestic Chocolate Wars

Jo and I have a routine. We get Lily into bed by 8, then we have a copy of coffee and a cake, or some chocolate. Obviously, we can't eat these things in front of her because she wants them and they send her loopy.

It's worked well until recently, but she has started getting up after bedtime to investigate. "Daddy what's that" she says, "daddy I would like some chocolate / ice cream / biscuits"

Now we have to listen for her door and if we hear it then we scramble to hide the chocolate behind the sofa. Then we try and act normal.

National Chocolate Wars

There are two main manufacturers of chocolate in NZ, Cadburys and Whitakers which for years have carved up the chocolate market between them. There is a huge choice of chocolate in the supermarket and a there are huge number of fat people clogging up the street.

They have always sold their chocolate in giant 250g bars. They used to compete by discounting against each other and the chocolate buyer could just buy whatever was on special offer. Then something changed.

What happened was this. Cadburys shrank the size of their bars to 220g. Then they took some of the cocoa out of their bars and replaced it with vegetable fat. Worst of all, they started manufacturing it in Australia.

It's been a disaster for them and they have had to run a series of adverts on the telly featuring their CEO grovelling to the public and begging for forgiveness for diluting their Dairy Milk with Stork SB from Wollengong. And rightly so.

The proper chocolate is going to be back soon and in the meantime they are virtually giving away the old stock. Hooray! We bought 4 bars yesterday and I might go out and buy 4 more today.

However, I have noted that they are not intending to increase the size of the bar again.

Toby at 15 weeks

Here is a picture of Toby. He is 15 weeks old today.