Jessie

Earlier today we found our tortoiseshell cat Jessie, who had become another road toll statistic over Christmas. Sadly, we have been here before with Jasper. Always an independent, on her own terms cat, she would often join me on my late night online sessions by flaking out on top of my monitor. I don't think she ever forgave my for getting a LCD flat screen. After I set it up, she leapt on top, not realising their was no 'top' any more and plummeted down the back of the desk, emerging in one piece but distinctly unamused.

You'll be missed, Jess.

Here and there and elsewhere

I suspended writing on my long-running bignoseduglyguy.com weblog a few months back in favour of concentrating on recording our emigration experiences here.  Whilst I have never been the most consistent of bloggers, I now intend to resume blogging there as well as here and elsewhere.  Now I am settling to my new life and work routine, I am feeling the desire to be looking around the web again and writing on other subjects.  This being the case, I am pretty sure that I will now split my blogging across the two sites. 

No.8 Wire was always intended to be a collection of impressions and recollections centered around our experience as migrants in New Zealand.  This being the case, I hope to keep that focus as the core of my writing here whilst broadening it a little to include things of interest to friends and family around the globe.

bignoseduglyguy will resume where it left off - as a stream of geeky bits and bobs, comments and critiques, fun and philosophy - namely a common or garden blog.

As for writing elsewhere, I was involved in the London launch of the ever-growing Metroblogging franchise and still intend to post there occasionally as a 'foreign correspondent' though, now I have sorted shelter, food and warmth for the family, I might just have time to work on something else with Sean and the crew.  Last but not least, I still hold out a small hope for making time to work on something with my good friends Chuck, Jason and Roger.  Though we are all more than busy with our various lives, careers and families, I still fondly recall the fun we had writing for Chuck's most excellent but now-dormant happypalm.com.

Missing Mog

One of the cats has been missing since Christmas Day morning. Whilst it is perhaps not too surprising as they have been uprooted and relocated twice in the last four months, it has brought a subdued mood to the house. Given that she is a town-raised cat in a rural setting, the possibilities are endless, for all the cats have gone into overdrive exploring their new and extensive territory. As well as the more usual getting stuck in a cupboard or locked in the shed, here we also have possibility of getting lost in the five acre maize field, being kicked by a bull or becoming trapped in the abattoir to factor in. Needless to say, no-one is wanting to even consider the State Highway at the bottom of the garden likelihood.

Christmas in Kumeu: a day in pictures

One adult, two kids and just three hours to assemble

The Chef’s Salad and the salad chefs

No turkey here

The family and the neighbours lunching

Cap from Maryland, USA: US$40
Daughter's RipCurl shades: NZ$20
Shirt from Rarotonga, Cook Islands: NZ$35
Chef's apron from London, UK: £20
Feelings of happiness and contentment: Priceless

 

The cattle are lowing...

Christmas Eve 2004, London, UK

A plastic tree, homemade paper chains and snowflakes, short days with biting winds, some nice neighbours and Chardonnay in the fridge.

Christmas Eve 2005, Kumeu, NZ

A real tree (same fairy on top), homemade paper chains and snowflakes, sunshine in the 20s, bulls for neighbours and Chardonnay on the vine in the distance. 

Given the horrors and privations that some have endured in the last 365 days, we feel extraordinarily privileged to have been able to bring about change in our lives and be where we are today.

Bush telegraph

In the last 36 hours, the combined technical clout of NZ's satellite TV company and national telecoms provider has converted our rural hideaway into a fully connected digital homestead. After nearly four months of expensive cellphone calls and 3G wireless data connections, we now have expensive digital satellite TV and ADSL!

This means is that, when I'm not glued to the European cinema channel eating turkey sandwiches or watching All American supermarket cart racing whilst grilling steak and prawns on the barbie, there's a good chance that I'll start writing here a little more regularly again.

[UPDATE] I have either just fried my AirPlus wifi router or it's power supply, so wifi access for my iBook will have to wait until tomorrow. All I have to do is work out which of the children's presents to return to the store for a refund to pay for a new router.

More to follow...