A Vege Post

I love this time of the year - the sun is not yet too hot, we are getting a good drop of rain every now and then, and the garden is growing as I look at it.

Especially the vegetable garden - we have potatoes, tomatoes, two varieties of lettuce, runner beans, butter beans and green dwarf beans, corgettes, broad beans, beetroot, radishes, and spring onions. A good watering every now and then of liquid from the worm farm helps also.

The raspberries are ripening and the Christmas plums are turning colour.

Unfortunately the weeds are growing also! And slugs. I have the lettuces growing in old ice cream containers with the bottom cut out. This is a very effective way of avoiding having to use slug repellant.

Forgot to mention silver beet, basil, mint, green strawberries, sage and thyme.

The Paua

To Māori, paua are recognised taonga, or treasure, esteemed both as kai moana (seafood) and as a valued resource for traditional and contemporary arts and crafts. Paua are frequently used to represent the eyes in Māori carvings and traditionally are associated with the stars, or whetu the eyes of ancestors that gaze down from the night sky.

The paua is iconic in New Zealand: its black muscular foot is considered a delicacy, and the shell is frequently used in jewelry. It is known as abalone in North America.

Highly polished New Zealand pāua shells are extremely popular as souvenirs with their striking blue, green, and purple iridescence. Transporting unprocessed abalone shells out of New Zealand is illegal.
(from Wikipedia)

When the going gets tough then kiwis fly!

Kiwis with one-way tickets are passing through departure lounges in record numbers.



Article from NZ Herald (nzherald.co.nz)

Kiwis fleeing to Australia hit record high
4:00AM Tuesday Nov 25, 2008
By Eloise Gibson

Transtasman migration

* Migration gains hits 7-year low
* Record numbers leaving for Australia

The number of New Zealanders moving to Australia last month set a record, and the flow of people moving here from other countries continued to slow.

Statistics New Zealand figures issued yesterday show 47,800 people left to live in Australia in the year to October.

About 13,200 came to New Zealand from Australia - the same number as last month. About two-thirds of them were New Zealanders returning home.

That created a net outflow of 34,600 permanent and long-term migrants to Australia for the year, breaking September's record of 33,900.

Until last month, September had the highest annual outflow to Australia since records started in 1978.

Immigration from all countries fell last month to its lowest level in seven years.

New Zealand gained 4300 migrants net in the year to October, 3200 fewer than in the previous 12 months.

Tourist numbers for the month were also down, dropping 3 per cent from last October to 173,900 as the economic downturn deterred visitors from China, the United States, Korea and Japan.

Luring people to stay in New Zealand was a policy promise by the National Party.

Before the election, National leader John Key described accelerating losses to Australia as a "vote of no confidence" in the Labour-led Government.

National's agreement with the Act Party included a commitment to set up an advisory group to come up with ways New Zealand can close the income gap with Australia by 2025.

The last time long-term departures peaked as sharply as they did last month was in 1989, when New Zealand lost 33,700 more residents to Australia than it gained.

In the year to December 1979, New Zealand lost 33,400 residents to Australia.

Statistics New Zealand said the population was about a third bigger last year than it was in 1979.

But most of the population growth since then had occurred above the age of 40, while most migration occurred below that age.

Cheeky Blackbird

When I feed our cats we have a visitor who also arrives for some food - a very cheeky Blackbird.


He sits just a few feet away from the cats and is not at all concerned for his safety. He has probably realised that two of our three cats are so old and deaf that they wouldn't be able to even hear him, let alone chase and catch him.

The white spots on the lawn are petals from the flowering cherry tree above.

Sorry about the poor photo - it is taken out the window and shows the reflection.

Togs or Undies?

I was looking through some of our NZ TV ads on You Tube and found this one. No doubt it will make its appearance again for summer.

Its kind of true really!

Most guys here wear boxer type shorts for swimming and wouldn't be seen in speedos, except for the life guards of course.

More Quotes

When asked his opinion of New Zealand:
"I find it hard to say, because when I was there it seemed to be shut." ....... Sir Clement Freud 1978

[He would have been referring to the time when most shops closed all weekend, apart from corner dairies and petrol stations, and also possibly when pubs had to close at 6pm every evening]

"New Zealand was colonised initially by those Australians who had the initiative to escape." ....... Robert Muldoon 1981

[Referring to Australia's background of convict settlement]

"The United States invented the space shuttle, the atomic bomb and Disneyland. We have 35 times more land than New Zealand, 80 times the population, 144 times the gross national product and 220 times as many people in jail.
Many of our big cities have more kilometres of freeway than all of New Zealand, our 10 biggest metropolises each have more people than all of New Zealand, and metropolitan Detroit has more cars on the road than all of New Zealand.
So how come a superpower of 270 million got routed in the America's Cup, the world's most technically oriented yacht race, by a country of 3.5 million that outproduces us only in sheep manure?" ....... Eric Sharp 1995

The Goodnight Kiwi

This was a piece that was played every night at around 11pm when our TV shut down for the night.

This was many years ago of course - we now have TV running all night!

Old TV Ads - this one for Chesdale Cheese

Baking Today

This was my attempt to bake a Christmas cake today. I am quite pleased with my effort. Christmas cakes are not usually my forte - now pavlovas - they are another story!

At my Kitchen window

Slip Slop Slap

An Australian TV ad, but we have had similar ones on our TV in New Zealand

Skin Cancer

This morning I had surgery for a skin cancer removal. Various types of skin cancer are very prevalent in New Zealand. We spend a lot of our time outside, especially during childhood which is when much of the damage to our skin occurs.

Mine is a Basal cell carcinoma - affecting the skin - which is the most common type of cancer in humans. Luckily, it is very rarely a threat to life.

Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) typically affects people of fair complexion who have had a lot of sun exposure or repeated episodes of sunburn. The tendency to develop BCCs may be inherited. BCCs can vary in size from a few millimetres to several centimetres in diameter. They usually grow slowly over months or years.


Mohs surgery: Mohs surgery (or Mohs micrographic surgery) is an outpatient procedure in which the tumor is surgically excised and then immediately examined under a microscope. The base and edges are microscopically examined to verify sufficient margins before the surgical repair of the site. If the margins are insufficient, more is removed from the patient until the margins are sufficient.

Luckily I had to have only one layer removed but am home now with a very sore nose and will have two black eyes by the look of it!

Update:
All is going well, no post op complications of any sort. I just look like a racoon thats all!

A Challenge

My blog friend Gail at Squared Off has awarded me this beautiful Autumn Friends Award.

My task is to list five things I have always wanted to do and pass the challenge on to three other bloggers.

I am a bit of a reluctant participant in memes, mostly because I do not like talking about myself!

1. I would like to fly in a helicopter. Strange but I have never been in one. I have been in just about every other form of transport you could think of but the opportunity has never arisen for a helicopter ride.

They have scenic flights from our local airport so one birthday I might drop a few hints to the family..... Or maybe wait until my 90th birthday (about 30 years away!)and get my photo in the paper with the caption - "family grants aging Grandmother her birthday wish!"

2.Learn to quilt. I look longingly at the beautiful quilts I see at various exhibitions and have a desire to make one myself. I am a good sewer and know that I could learn but I have never been to classes because I think that the hobby could take over my life and I might not be able to allocate the time to it that I would wish. Silly reason maybe. However the classes are there waiting for me and one day very soon I will succumb.......

3.Travel, travel travel. Need I say more. There are many corners of the world that I have yet to explore. There are some places that I visited years ago that I would like to see again - Grand Canyon, the temples of Angkor, Persepolis, Goreme valley (Turkey), and many more. And lots of new places. I would also like to visit friends overseas and especially meet some blogging friends.

4.Spend another winter in BC Canada. A winter there back in 1968 was a magical time (especially for a person who had never even seen snow falling) and I would like to repeat the experience.

5.Live long enough to see my all children marry and have children of their own. And to see Grandchildren grow into adulthood.

Well that about completes the list.

I would like to pass this award and task on to Chrissy who is in hospital at the moment on complete bed rest. All the very best Chrissy.

I will have a think about who else to target!

PS I should have changed this award to a summer picture as of course it is not Autumn here!

A New Government

NZ election means a big jump to right

John Key, leader of the National party, the boy trader of Wall St, was last night tasked with trading New Zealand out of its direst economic crisis for many years.

He is preparing to build a Government of all colours, as he reaches across the political divide to work with not just Act and United Future, but also the Maori Party and the Greens.

New Zealand voted for a change of direction, and a change of generation.

Key faces a weighty responsibility: he will take the premiership as the country enters what could be its worst recession in decades.

Helen Clark, acknowledged by friends and foes alike as one of the country's strongest-ever leaders, last night announced her resignation as leader of the Labour Party.

After nine years as Prime Minister and 15 years as leader of her party, her defeat had seemed inevitable in the final days.

Headlines in todays paper. yesterday we voted, today we have a new Government. Labour,led by Helen Clarke had been in for nine years but the country has voted very clearly for a change in direction. So we now have a National Govt.led by John Key.

I don't tend to get very excited about politics, or Politicians, but there is certainly the need for some new direction.

Quake shakes Bay of Plenty

An earthquake measuring 5.4 on the Richter Scale shook the Bay of Plenty early this morning.

The quake at 12.57am was centred 20km west of Rotorua, at a depth of 200km, GNS Science reported.

The quake was widely felt in the North Island.

And the second headline! Yes another earthquake, no damage though. I didn't feel it.

What they said about us!

"A country of inveterate, backwoods, thick-headed, egotistic philistines" ....... Vladimir Ilyich Lenin 1909

"I believe we were all glad to leave New Zealand. It is not a pleasant place. Amongst the natives there is absent that charming simplicity .... and the greater part of the English are the very refuse of society." ....... Charles Darwin 1860

"If it would not look too much like showing off, I would tell the reader where New Zealand is." ....... Mark Twain 1897

"The first european to find NZ was a Dutch sea-captain who was looking for something else ... It takes its name from a province of Holland to which it does not bear the remotest likeness, and is usually regarded as the antipodes of England, but is not. Taken possession of by an English navigator, whose action was afterwards reversed by his country's rulers, it was only annexed by the English Government which did not want it, to keep it from the French who did."....... William Pember Reeves 1898

When George Bernard Shaw visited New Zealand a reporter asked him his impression of the place and, after a pause, Shaw is said to have replied: "Altogether too many sheep" ....... George Bernard Shaw 1934

"Terrible tragedy of the south seas. Three million people trapped alive." ....... Thomas Jefferson Scott

It's rose time again

Redo of my Weta post

We have an insect in new Zealand that I just love to bits. Truly. It is the weta.

Some people are scared of them, some find them ugly and I guess they are a bit. But they have character and really, if you don't try to cuddle them, they don't hurt you. They can get a little agressive if you try to pick them up.

There are lots of different varieties, Tree weta, ground weta, giant weta and cave weta are a few. The most common one we find around here is the tree weta.

They like dark places and before putting on our gumboots it always pays to shake them first in case a weta has taken up residence.

Some weta facts:

* The weta is only found in New Zealand.
* Weta are large by insect standards but some of the giant weta are ENORMOUS and are amongst the heaviest insects in the world
* The weta is sometimes known as the dinosaur of the insect world
* The weta is more primitive than the tuatara
*The weta has changed very little in the past 100 million years.

Go to:

http://tvnz.co.nz/view/video_popup_flash_skin/1382032

to view a fascinating cave weta video. My brother had an old gold mine on his property and there were lots of cave wetas in there. I have to admit they are a little scary, I don't like the way they can jump on you if you disturb them.

Later
I have just finished cleaning out the garden shed and removing an pile of old firewood. As I predicted it was the home to several wetas. I managed to photograph one very angry specimen. I have put three in a terrarium to observe them for a while.

Interesting Facts - last Installment

17 - Lost in space
In the scene of Star Trek: First Contact, when Picard shows Lilly she is orbiting Earth, Australia and Papa New Guinea are clearly visible but New Zealand is missing.

18 - Bottom line
No capital city in the world is further south than Wellington.

19 - Animal farm
Less than 5 per cent of the population of New Zealand is human - the rest are animals. This is one of the highest ratios of animals to humans in the world.

20 - Pipebands galore
There are more Scottish pipe bands per head of population in New Zealand than in Scotland.

21 - Big readers
New Zealand has more book-shops per head of population than any other country; one for every 7500 people.

22 - Bad behaviour
New Zealand has the third highest rate of deaths in the developed world from maltreatment among under-15-year-olds; third to Mexico and the US.

23 - Freshwater spring
More fresh water flows up from cracks in the limestone at Waikoropupu, near Takaka, than from any other freshwater spring in the world - more than 2100 million litres every 24 hours.

24 - Trout heaven
More rainbow trout in the 2kg to 3kg category are caught annually in New Zealand than in the rest of the world put together.

25 - World-beaters
New Zealand is home to the world's smallest dolphin, the Hectors Dolphin, the rarest sea lion, the Hookers Sea Lion, the largest flightless parrot, the kakapo, the oldest reptile, the tuatara, the heaviest insect, a weta, the biggest earth-worms, the smallest bats, some of the oldest trees, and many of the rarest birds, insects, and plants in the world.

* Facts sourced from Statistics New Zealand, Strange Facts & True About New Zealand, Guinness World records, The Kiwi Site and the ENZ New Zealand Immigration Guide.

Note:
Fact 22 - this is a fact that I am very ashamed of. Our rate of child abuse is horrifying. There is a particularly sad case before the courts at the moment.

More Facts about NZ

8 - Golf swings
Measured by club memberships, golf is the most popular sport in New Zealand, followed by netball.

9 - Curious Kea
The kea, native to New Zealand, likes to eat the strips of rubber around car windows.

10 - Quick work
The shortest interval between separate births in the world is 208 days. New Zealander Jayne Bleackley gave birth to Joseph Robert on September 3, 1999, and Annie Jessica Joyce on March 30, 2000.

11 - Why bother?
Two Massey University students broke a Guinness World Record in December for the world's largest tape ball. The ball, which weighs 53kg and has a circumference of more than 2.5m, was made by winding Scotch tape continually around itself.

12 - Spelling test
The longest place name in the world still in use is Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwenuakitanatahu, a hill in Porangahau in the Hawkes Bay. The Maori name translates to "the place where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, who slid, climbed and swallowed mountains, known as Landeater, played his flute to his loved one."

13 - Middle age
The median age of New Zealanders is growing. In 1901 it was 23. By 1991 it was 31 and in 2001 it was 35. By 2021 it is expected to be 40.

14 - Rising prices
In 1984, $43 in New Zealand would buy approximately the same as $100 today.

15 - Blacked out
The longest blackout in the world was on February 19, 1998, when the four main power cables supplying Auckland city, broke down. The disruption, which lasted 66 days, affected 7500 business and residential customers and cost businesses an estimated $300 million.

16 - The sea, the sea
No part of New Zealand is more than 128km from the sea.

_________________________________________________________________

Fact 9 - the kea is a very cheeky and fearless mountain parrot.

Some Unusual Facts about New Zealand

1 - Cook's cure
Captain James Cook, the man who navigated New Zealand, is said to have discovered a cure for scurvy, a disease that results from Vitamin C deficiency, when he played around with medicines.

2 - More births
New Zealand births exceeded deaths by 29,890 in the September 2005 year.

3 - Older brides
New Zealanders are getting married older. The latest statistics show that the median ages of men and women marrying for the first time is 29.9 and 28.1 years. These brides and grooms married, on average, nine years older than their parents did.

4 - Big on butter
For each person who lives here, New Zealand produces 100kg of butter and 65kg of cheese each year.

5 - Clever Kiwis
A New Zealander invented the tear-back velcro strip, the pop-lid on a self-sealing paint tin, the child-proof pill bottle and the crinkle in hair-pins so that they don't fall out.

6 - Olympic gold
New Zealand has won more Olympic gold medals a head than any other country.

7 - Sheep dip
In the early 1980s, New Zealand was home to more than 70 million sheep, but now has 40 million, or about 10 sheep to one person. This decline hasn't stopped New Zealand from bringing in 50 per cent of all international trade in sheepmeat.