What the Heck New Zealand?

We took another stab at "What the Heck America?" last night, but could only sit through 15 minutes of coked-up idiot host rambling on about George Carlin. Here's a sampling (it's :53 long)

VACATION!!

I have all of next week off! Iain doesn't, but he said he'll take a few days so we can do some fun stuff. The bulk of the week will be spent catching up on school, going to the dentist, and cleaning. Thrilling!!! But I am SO excited, as evidenced by these beyond lame action shots taken of me trying to do a dorky leap in the air, and failing miserably.

Email?

Apparently I'm not getting all of my emails. I've had two people reference messages they sent that I never received. This appears to a recent issue, so if you've sent me an email and I haven't responded, please try resending!

Fish and Chips - Kiwi style!

Here's our dinner from last night: fish, chips, fried oysters, mini eggrolls, and a fried hotdog each. Pure disgusting saturated fat heaven.

Working from Home!

My favorite way to "work"! And judging from the number of apple breaks and general meandering through the house that Iain does, it's his favorite way, too! I'm just kidding.

Actually, I did a few things -- tried (unsuccessfully) to launch php on Iain's computer, read a little bit from my Bible-sized php book, and cut and pasted some Javascript into some code. And it worked!!! I was so excited.

But most of all, it was really, really nice to just be at home all day.

Tonight we're taking a break from Dr. BBQ and having fish and chips for dinner. Awesome.

High School Musical

For some reason, Iain took Tama's 'High School Musical' fleece blanket and hung it by his window, creating a terrifying effect. At least three times now, I've been startled by the scary Zac Efron image staring at me from the window.

Hail!!

It hailed today. Thankfully I'd arrived home 30 minutes earlier, so I wasn't caught in it.

Tomorrow I'm "working from home" -- our teachers have to attend some creative conference on Flash and Flex,so we've been told to "go home and practice PHP". I'm just excited to not have to take the bus! Although, I can't get PHP working on my Mac, so I'll need to jump on Iain's PC when he's eating lunch or something... I am hopeless on Windows.

Our teacher has been doing a great job of walking us through PHP but he talks insanely fast when it comes to file management, and I cannot keep up:

"Ok, you'll want to go the C drive then open up post_docs then scroll down to data right click on it to make a copy then open the original in a new folder titled xampp files which you'll put next to another file in the docs folder in the etc file."

I am constantly asking him to slow down.

In other news, over the weekend we had dinner at Toni and Max's house. Gill and Vernie were also there, and to Iain's extreme delight, Stella the cat peed on Vernie's leather coat. The coat was in the corner where we were eating, and Stella just wandered over and squated. I have not seen Iain laugh that hard in months. The whole thing elevated the night from "fun" to "historic". Toni and Max were mortified, but everyone was laughing, even Vernie.

Toni also made some fantastic cocktails using Absolut Pear, champagne, and St. Germaine elderberry liqueur. Yum.

Overheard

From one of my classmates yesterday:

"I thought the weekend was too short! I couldn't wait to get back to class!!"

Winter - with improved audio!

It's winter and that means lots of rain. LOTS. It's great for sleeping, not so hotsy for walking to the bus. I filmed this a few minutes ago. It's pouring right now.

Devonport

We took a drive to the other side of the North Shore -- Devonport. It's gorgeous. It's right on the water and has a real "seaside town" feel to it with lots of shops and cafés. It was rainy but still a little sunny so we saw a rainbow (pictured above). I swear, before I moved here I'd seen maybe 11 rainbows in my entire life. Here, you see them like once a week. I suspect it's probably the same in places like Seattle and Portland? Maybe.

We sat outside and had delish lattes and dessert before going home for a night of movies and Iain's homemade bolognese sauce.

The heat is on!

Even though today was sunny, it was still rainy and a little cold. It is so awesome getting out of bed in the morning and NOT immediately feeling the cold! The cats are also enjoying it.

Tonight we're having dinner at Toni and Max's house. They live in Ponsonby with 2 cats. Iain is making our lunch right now and I'm doing a whole lot of nothing.

Louis Theroux

There's a BBC show we catch over here called Louis Theroux's Wild Weekends. It's documentary style and usually really good. Louis (who reminds me a bit of Dave O, for those who know him) goes around to different places and reports on it. It's always something really random, like the hardcore rap/porn industry, prisoners on death row, strippers, religious radicals, etc.. (http://www.boingboing.net/2008/02/01/louis-therouxs-weird.html).

Unlike most reporters, he does this amazing job of acting completely unassuming and open to whatever a person is telling him, even if it's ridiculous or offensive.

This week he explored the world of female bodybuilders. He interviewed a married couple participating in a body building show. The husband is a total George Constanza type who was beside himself with pride. He has a fetish for muscle women and scored the ultimate prize: he married a female body builder. But the thing is, his "wife" is CLEARLY a man. No one in the interview acknowledges this, especially the husband who kept talking about how feminine his wife is, and how hard she works to get so muscular. At this point, Louis cast a really subtle sideways glance at the camera. And the "wife" would interject with how offended she gets when people mistake her for man. We were yelling at the TV, "But you're a MAN!! That's a MAN!!" It was so funny. I took pictures.

Thanks Jamie!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHN TAYLOR!

This is the last of the Duran Duran birthdays this month. Simon's not until October and I never really counted Andy and Roger....

Who are you?!

I took a quiz on Facebook titled "Which celebrity are you most like?"

According to the quiz, I'm most like Chase Crawford. I don't even know who that IS. Who is he?

Here is the description of "me", verbatim:

Ure the celebrity that teenage girls keep posters of in their bedrooms because they think ure the perfect package.ure really good looking,smart,kind,caring,honest,trustworthy,u have a great personality.URE PERFECT.AND GIRLS WOULD BE ABLE TO RECOGNISE THAT BECAUSE THERE AREN'T THAT MANY GUYS OUT THERE LIKE YOU.

Aces!

Panic, at the Bus Stop

While sitting at the bus stop this morning, slack jawed and listening to my iPod, I suddenly bolted upright: I PUT THE PRINT STYLESHEET LINK ON THE WRONG PAGE!!!!!! This was in reference to our big class project that we just turned in last week. You get one re-do or you fail, and I'd already done my re-do and handed it back in. I realized that I'd forgotten one really stupid, really easy, but really important step in my HTML code. SHIT!

I totally panicked -- I had no cell phone, no way of getting in touch with my teacher to beg for a second chance. In short, I was screwed. And I now had an hour commute ahead of me before getting to school, which gave the teacher that much more time to grade my project and flunk me.

I don't have a cell phone here because, for now at least, I don't have a job and the only people I would call all live in the US, so why spend $60--$75 a month for a phone I'll use maybe twice a month to call Iain and say, "I'm running late." But today I was freaking out over this. It's like being on a plane and realizing you left the iron on. What can you do? Nothing. SHIT!

So I get to school and race up to the 5th floor (ok, via the elevator), dash into the office where 2 of my teachers are hanging out: I'll call them Johnny and Rick. I walk over and politely say, "Um, Rick, I know I handed my project in already but is it at all possible to just double-check one small detail?" Rick gives me a blank stare and says,"No. I already graded it and it's done. Filed. Too late."

I stand there speechless, when Johnny (the department head) intervenes and says, "That means you passed. If it's been filed, you're good." I manage to exhale. Amused, Johnny says, "What'd you think you did wrong?" I explain, and Rick just says, "It was fine." as if I'm this huge annoyance that has interrupted his peaceful morning, instead of a student who helps pay his salary.

I am totally relieved (and baffled) at discovering that my project was fine, but imagine if it wasn't? Thank god Johnny is teaching us now. I officially hate Rick. Iain has jokingly recommended that I start taking the kitty Valium we got in the States that I still have.

Attached is an unrelated picture of our good friend Nam.

Geeks

Main topics of conversations in class yesterday:

1. Firefox 3 launch!!!!! Get online and upgrade today!! They're trying to break the record for the most downloads!!!

2. I woke up at 5am so I could be one of the first to download Firefox

3. How annoying it is that Apple held up the launch of Firefox 3 while the programmers worked out the bugs that would make it compatible on Mac and PC

4. The daily Mac versus PC argument (yes, this occurs DAILY)

5. Only losers use Norton Utilities!

6. Let's go online to see how many people have downloaded Firefox 3 so far!

7. Does anyone still use Safari? (this stirred up another Mac-bashing debate from the PC lovers)

I tried to tune it out but it's really tough.

After class I went home and downloaded Firefox 3. I caught myself making fun of Iain for still using Internet Explorer. He retorted, "Don't you geek out in front of me! Save it for school!"

Come ON

I went online to the Obama store today and saw that one of the tshirts is a take on the old "got milk"campaign. Instead it's "got hope?" Really? I'm sorry, I love Obama but that is beyond lame. That's like spoofing the played out Mastercard 'priceless' campaign. I was FURIOUS. But then I ordered a tshirt (a different one, obviously!)

I sent in my absentee ballot application last month. I called the Philly office to find out if they'd received it. After being sent to like 3 different people, each one less helpful than the last, I got this totally rude guy on the phone who informed me that it was way too early to apply. He said there was "no way" my application would be accepted this soon. "We probably lost it," he added. I said, "Well, can you check?!" He said no, try again in a few months, then he hung up on me. Ah, Philly!!

Auckland public transportation

I ran out the door to catch the bus this morning and forgot to pee. So, 45 minutes and one bus ride later, I arrived in Auckland desperate for a Starbucks. There's one a block away that's usually crowded, allowing me to sneak into their bathroom without feeling obligated to buy anything. Not so today. It was empty, so I reluctantly ordered a cappuccino and then raced to the bathroom.

Coffee in hand I walked to my second bus stop, two blocks away. Remember my post about the busses being so clean? Well, now I know why. The bus driver gave me a firm but polite lecture about beverages being prohibited. I mumbled an apology and went to pay for my ticket. Nope - I was asked to please leave the bus until I was finished with my coffee. I said, "Well, when are you leaving?" and the driver said, "We depart in 5 minutes." So I had to sit outside in the rain with my stupid coffee that I didn't even want in the first place. Then I got on the bus.

Heat -- sort of

It's winter in NZ and while Auckland doesn't get freezing, it does get cold. We were originally going to tough it out this year and "see what happens", which we soon realized was stupid. We know what happens. It turns cold and you have no heat. Still, we didn't get on the heat bandwagon until about a month or so ago, so it's only just been installed. 6 guys, saws, drills, and lots of equipment took over the house on Monday morning to install the furnace and heat ducts. Now we just need the gas company to swing by to turn the whole thing on...

That should happen sometime next week. To celebrate, we're having a dinner party next weekend.

(FYI: the picture of the main vent is on a wall not yet stripped & painted)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM PATEFIELD!

Iain's Mom turns 70 today! Happy birthday, Pat! We'll see you next month!


Iain's Mom turns 70 today! Woo-hoo! Happy birthday, Pat! We'll see you next month!

Yawn.

I'm sorry the blog has been so lame lately. It's been a pretty quiet week:

1. I have a huge project for school (creating a working website for a hotel) so I spent all weekend on the sofa, working (well, and emailing people, reading Slate, and Lostpedia).

2. Iain's been working on house stuff like fixing windows, etc.

3. We weren't feeling well last week -- I had a cold and stayed home for 2 days, and worked (and of course got WAY more done than I would've in class)

4. "Lost" is over for another season, so I'm going through withdrawal.

So, there hasn't been much to report. But my project is due this Friday so I am hoping to relax a bit this weekend. By "relax" I mean "have a very strong Cosmopolitan".

It's fall here but the weather has been really nice lately.

A day in the life of Tama

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NICK RHODES!

Nick Rhodes turns 46 today.
What's even scarier is that Prince is 50!

Herald Island & Greenhithe

Here are pictures of some cool local places we drove to last weekend. Both are rural areas but still considered part of Auckland (I think - but what do I know?)

Friday night

Iain and I don't get out much, so when we do, we like to really whoop it up. Last Friday we met friends in town for dinner, and then went out for many, many drinks. It wasn't the amount of drinks, necessarily, but the TYPE. Who drinks hot toddies? Us. Who takes the bartender's suggestion to try brandy & Benedictine? Us. Here are some really blurry pictures.

Before all of this, we enjoyed a really great dinner at an Italian place (it was very good, despite my ridiculously small portion of spaghetti carbonara). Iain made some at home the next week to make up for it.

30 Rock

I had Iain rewind this scene like 3x.

"Guess who has two thumbs, speaks limited French, and hasn't cried once today? THIS moi!"
- Liz Lemon

Dumbass

I like to subscribe to the free podcasts on iTunes -- stuff like "This American Life" and more recently, "Women of the Web." Ok, this is really embarrassing, but I actually thought that "Women of the Web" would be about women who work in web development or design. Imagine my surprise when an obnoxious DJ guy started counting down the week's hottest / sexiest/ sluttiest women online. Thank god it was free. It was like an audiobook, only instead of a book it's Maxim magazine.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KIM!

Pimp my ride

We drove by this car that was totally pimped out, complete with a confusing vanity plate reading "obease". I wasn't able to get shots of the stickers all over the back windshield. The detail on this car was insane, especially compared to the house it was parked in front of.

Riveting Television

Here are some sample TV shows we get here in New Zealand: 'Lamest Girl Alive' (Danielle, silver platter....) and 'Music Wank'.


I must admit that I was EXTREMELY excited by the True Hollywood Story on Mariska and watched it and loved every minute of it because she's so awesome. Thanks to Kate B for providing lots of Law & Order: SVU for me to watch.