Yuck.

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. It hasn't been a good few days. It's done nothing but rain and I have a horrendous cold which caused me to miss 1.5 days o'school. Bad idea. Because my school is only 10 months, the teachers fly through everything, and it's really difficult when you miss a class. Honestly, I thought my days of sitting in a classroom on the verge of tears were over, but no.

Today was also filled with fun "Are you kidding me?" bad day incidents: my teacher actually typed "Saxon is sick and should go home" in PHP code on the overhead projector. Admittedly, I was "that guy" in class -- coughing, sniffling, fumbling for tissues. I ended up leaving early, when my Bea Arthur voice gave out and I broke down into non-stop coughing.

Then, while waiting at the bus stop, it arrived and stopped 20 feet up from the official stop to let people out - I thought, "Weird, but so what! I'll be first!" So I approached it, only to have the bus driver close the doors on me and drive 20 feet to the actual bus stop, forcing me to walk back to my original position, and wind up in the back of the line. Then, right in front of our house, I walked through wet cement. Come ON. It'll serve as a reminder of this day, right alongside the Van Halen logo and I.P + S.F.D = TLA / BFF.

Thanks to Iain for comforting me and reminding me of my days working for Mr. Pitt -- nothing is ever that bad.

Tomorrow is Friday and will hopefully mark the return of more interesting, positive posts. Unlikely!

No, really, I have a bunch of pictures from our weekend in Dunedin to post and all...

Happy Anniversary, Pete & Zeke!

Our friends in Christchurch (the ones with the vineyard, chickens and kitties) celebrate their anniversary today!

speaking of death

What kind of person STEALS the gravestone off Ian Curtis' grave in Macclesfield? Maybe the same punk who thought it would be cool to steal Kurt Cobain's ashes.

death becomes her

No posts this week -- I've contracted the worst head cold EVER and am staying home from school while Iain brings me tea and soup in exchange for self-pitying moans and handfuls of used Kleenex.

This is the thanks I get for popping vitamins, frantically washing my hands and using hand sanitizer wherever necessary. It doesn't do any good. I might as well lick the bus seats and wash my hands in the airplane toilet - I'm going get sick anyway!

More posts when I'm feeling better.

Thank god for cold & flu tablets and back-to-back downloaded episodes of Gossip Girl! Ed Westwick is hot.

Happy Birthday Sue!

Happy Birthday Liz!

Visiting the Fam'

This morning we're taking a day off from school and work and flying to the South Island to Iain's hometown, Dunedin. This month was Iain's 40th, his Mom's 70th, and his parents' 50th anniversary.

We'll both be offline for a few days as we chill out with family, although Iain made the suggestion, "Hey, maybe I'll watch the rugby game with my Dad and you can finish your PHP tutorials!" Yeah, right.

WWJD?

I love iTunes. I download television shows, audiobooks, podcasts, and music all the time. Audiobooks and podcasts are especially awesome for long bus rides and exercise. So I was really psyched to see a new audiobook called 'The Shack" advertised for an introductory rate of $5.95. I read the plot synopsis -- it's about a girl who gets abducted by a serial killer. PERFECT. The summary goes on to say that the girl's father receives a mysterious letter one day -- supposedly from God, and "walks back into his darkest nightmare". SOLD!

I download it.

I listen to the first hour.

It's a God book. It's a total Christian book. God, Jesus, the holy trinity, creation, praying... the whole bit. It's all about forgiveness, I suppose. Whatever. I feel totally cheated. But what's the most upsetting is that I'm still listening to it. Not because I'm totally digging the fictitious dialogue between the dad and God (which has been going on for over 2 hours now...), but because it's better than just sitting on the bus with nothing to listen to. Amen.

This isn't the first time I've been duped. Last year I grabbed a book from the library that was actually a God book disguised as a thriller. Like "The Shack", once I started I felt compelled to finish, even though I spent most of the book sighing heavily and rolling my eyes.

Weber Circus

Some circus called Weber Circus is coming to town and they're advertising it through the use of terrifying house-sized blow-up clowns and peculiar posters featuring an offensive picture of a buck-toothed Asian guy, excuse me, an Acrobat of the Orient. It's not Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's racist, but considering Auckland is like 50% Asian, this probably isn't going to do much for ticket sales.



What's interesting is that when we were in Sicily in 2005, they had posters for the same circus but they were these gorgeous, elaborately done illustrations of huge, roaring tigers leaping through flaming hoops and voluptuous women in beautiful spangled circus/stripper outfits. They were incredible. Way better than this crap.

Happy Birthday Justin!

Happy Birthday Hannah!

I love this picture - it's from Thanksgiving at Shelby's like 3 years ago.

Tuesday Geeks

Overheard convo:

"Wouldn't it be cool to design an e-commerce site that charges you higher prices if you're not using Firefox 3? Like, like, if you're using IE6..."

"No one uses IE6 anymore!"

"Some people do - I think my friend's Mom does. So like you're buying something and you're on Safari or IE6..."

"Safari is Mac! Macs suck!"

"Only Safari sucks. Not Mac."

"What if you used LINUX!!" (all geeks erupt in hysterics)

"Yeah, so you charge people MORE and then you'd program a prompt to come up at the end that says, um, that says, 'You paid ten dollars ninety for this because you don't have Firefox 3!'"

Exasperated teacher breaks in, explains how punishing customers generally doesn't work, then asks the following: "What do you want spend your time doing? Earning money or getting people to switch browsers?" Geek pauses, starts laughing, and says, "BOTH!"

Discipline!

Iain left for his fishing trip yesterday morning. He'd been gone only 20 minutes when I heard the unmistakable sound of paws on a counter (or bench, as they say over here). Sure enough, Tama's up on the counter and didn't even seem fazed when he saw me. I guess it's clear who disciplines the kids in this house.

Iain's Birthday Weekend part 2

On Sunday we drove to the swanky suburb of Parnell for a late lunch/dinner at what has been called the best Italian restaurant in Auckland. We soon learned that "the best Italian restaurant in Auckland" is like saying "the best sushi in Oklahoma City" -- it's not much of a claim.

We should have known the place would suck just by looking at their horribly designed website:

http://www.nonsolopizza.co.nz/

It's worth checking out, just for the cheesy 80s art deco theme that has NOTHING to do with the restaurant, the difficult to read fonts, and the annoying flyouts when all you're looking for are their hours or the dinner menu.

Also, the actual menu, like the menu online, is totally annoying and overdone. It's a BOOK. It's got at least 20 pages in hardcover book form with tabs -- TABS. Gimme a break. Just put it all on one big piece of paper already. It was so irritating: "So Iain, I'm looking at the entreés right now -- um, I think it's Tab 4, two pages in. The wine list is tab 7, three pages in after cocktails."

The environment was nice. They had a big fire going which was such a treat because most places this time of year barely have heat, so we've been dressing in 2-3 layers in anticipation of freezing to death. Our server was really nice and 100% Italian. Encouraging.

We ordered a bottle of wine and the beef carpaccio. Puke. It was like someone took some leftover cold roast beef and threw it on the plate. It came with fried artichoke hearts that were incredible -- they should've been their own appetizer.


Then we had arrancini (rice balls) and cauliflower & artichoke fritters, and a wild mushroom dish. The mushrooms were just portobellas doused in balsamic vinegar - they were gross. The fritters were good but how tough is it to screw up something mashed and fried? The rice balls were also good (same theory) but should've come with some marinara sauce or something to dip them in.


Less than thrilled with the food so far, we contemplated leaving. But it was pouring outside, we had our wine, so we took our chances and continued ordering. Iain's tagliatelle with duck ragu could've been dog food or chicken or tofurkey. It was watery and tasted like nothing. I'm sure once it cooks longer and reduces down a bit, it would've had potential, but what we were served was below mediocre. I had the beetroot and ricotta ravioli (I tried to make this at home a few months ago without luck) that were delicious BUT were ruined by an oily beet and onion mess that was underneath the pasta. It was like a salsa almost, but of beets, onions, olive oil and WAY too much balsamic.

Our dessert - a rhubarb pannacotta - was fantastic. Figures. It's probably a different chef.

We paid the bill, complimented the server on her great job, and told the manager or hostess lady how disappointed we were with the food. It was obvious that her question, "How was everything?" was rhetorical. She didn't want or care about an honest answer. I don't understand why restaurants don't equip their staff with skills to handle the occasional disgruntled guest. Rather than actually listen to us, or - hey! - take something off of the rather large tab we'd accrued - she gave us a bored look and muttered lame and derogatory explanations like "Well, it's always been a popular dish with other customers" or "Well, the chef makes food with very subtle flavors so maybe you didn't pick up on it..."


We won't be going back. But it was fun otherwise -- it was really nice to hang out together for the day.

¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡¡ HAPPY 40TH BIRTHDAY, IAIN !!!!!!!!!

Here are some awesome pictures of Iain from the 80s & 90s. (No matter how much I beg, he refuses to grow his hair long again... ) Happy birthday Iain!!