Dress Update

A friend sent me a text during the week informing me that she had forgotten to let me know she had left a dress she thought I might like in our garden.

I was touched by the kind thought.
She has always said she liked that colour on me, so I should have guessed it was her.

So mystery solved. Thank you Wendy

Identification Needed

On Sunday it was reported that a ladies body had been found in a local park in Hamilton.
She was discovered by 2 teenage boys as they walked through the the park.
It was decided that the lady had unfortunately been unable to negotiate a bend on a steep path whilst riding her bike and had hit a tree and fallen into the knee high water, were sadly she drowned.

I did not know the lady, but what struck me as the sadest part was that it took her family 4 days to realise she was missing.
Because she was out cycling, although she wasn't wearing a cycle helmet, she had no identification on her at all.
It turns out that she was a 40 yr old lady who lived alone. She had seen her family the night before and because of that they didn't notice her not being around until about Wednesday.

Now I can see this happening very easily, my mum lives on her own, (an hour away) now ok my brother lives 500m down the street from her, but I can happily go 4-5 days without talking to her on the phone. If my brother didn't live so close then I wouldn't know if anything was wrong until I tried to contact her and couldn't. So it is not unusual.

But what I am trying to stress here is the importance of ID when out running or cycling on your own.
This lady had keys with her and nothing else.
It would have been so great if she had a card on her that said her name and emergency contact details.

So if you have a friend or loved one who loves going for long runs or bike rides on their own, then encourage them to make a card that is about credit card size, that they can slip in a back pocket of shorts etc that gives their name and emergency contact.
That way, if anything ever happened to them whilst out, someone would be notified immediately and not have the whole town wondering who this poor person is and who do they belong too.

Beef Anyone?

In our freezer currently, we have 1/4 of a beast.
Yep that is what I said, 1/4 of a beast. 1/4 of a cow is frozen in our freezer, in pieces obviously, in fact even in different pices.
Several roasts, stewing steak packs, eye fillet steaks, porterhouse steak, rump steak and sausages.
More mince than you can imagine recipes for and even weiner schnitzel.

A friend has always had homekill meat, and seeing as we live in the middle of cow country, then where else would you acquire fresh homekill beef?

The mince is so red in colour, hardly any fat in it. It has not been processed 6 times, like you wonder if the supermarket stuff has? It is fresh smelling and gorgeous.
I guess we could class it as prime mince beef which currently sells for about $14.99 / Kg.
I currently have the equivalant of about $120 worth of mince in my freezer.
If you then add to that the sausages (at least $6.99/Kg ) the 10 roast (at least $22.99/Kg) I have and all the steak I have that can run at at least $19.99 upwards then there is a lot of fresh beef available to us.
And we paid all of $305 for the lot!
Apparently it works out at about $5.99 / Kg for everything in our freezer. I was quite impressed when I worked it all out and said yes to the 1/4.
Steve loves the taste of fresh beef and was very happy to accept. But yes, you do need the freezer space for it all and I thought we had more than we do, but it all fitted so no worries, but we may be having beef on the menu a lot in the next few months!

I have been good though, before I placed it all in the freezer, I made a list of what we have so I can cross off as we use things and then I know what is left. This will also make sure I use things within a reasonable amount of time and not find something lurking at the bottom of the freezer in 2 years time!

Pink Dress Update

The pink dress is still with me.

I have tried it on, just in case someone thought it was for me, but alas, it is a tad way too small. Wish I was a size 8 on the top! It is a Laura Ashley silky material (thus the creases) dress, would suit being a very nice party dress or even a bridesmaid dress.

No one has knocked on the door to ask if we have found a dress because it got left in our garden by mistake.
I still think it might belong to someone in the street, and they are waiting for a friend etc to drop it off. Maybe they will wait a little longer and then contact the person involved and ask them about the dress. Hopefully that person will then be able to remember where they dropped it off!

If it hasn't been collected or claimed in about 4 weeks time, then I will give it a nice send off to the local op shop round the corner, because it is in wonderful condition and they may as well benefit from it.

Pink Dress

Last night I took the washing off the line in a hurry as a light shower was passing and I had just managed to dry all the clothes.
As we have the gazebo still up in the garden from the BBQ last weekend, I quickly wheeled the laundry trolley under there and promptly forgot about it until this morning.
I actually only noticed it as I was racing out the door to work, but seeing as it was going to be another glorious day and it was under the gazebo, I decided to leave it where it was till I got home.

This is where the mystery comes in......

When we got home, there was a salmon pink dress laid across the laundry trolley.

No note, no explaination, no nothing, just the dress.
It is a size 8, so way too big too small for me.
Definetely my style, little sleeves and scooped in at the waist, although it won't fit!

But no explaination as to where it came from.
I have searched the garden as it has been a little windy today, so thought maybe the note (if one was left) had got blustered away into the hedge, but no.

So I have this dress that I don't know where it came from or what I am meant to do with it?
Is it for me? It is 2nd hand but in very good condition.

So I will take it into the house today and wait to see if anyone texts me to ask how I liked it, or something like that?

Courgettes

I use courgettes in a lot of cooking, I like them.
So when at the garden centre last year I noticed a courgette plant and decided that we could try growing some.
No one told me how easy it would be and how fast they grow!

From this....

To this.....

To this.....

to this.....

To OMG this.....

The very large one grew so fast I forgot to go and check them and it almost turned into a marrow!

Growing Your Own

Last year we successfully grew a few tomatoes. Not enough to really do anything major with towards our grocery shopping, but enough for Steve to create some Italian Tomato Sauce with that I used in 3 lots of Spag Bog.

This year we have once again grown tomatoes over the summer, along with spinach, lettuce, carrots and courgettes.
The boys have enjoyed watching things grow at super fast speed and also had fun being able to collect lettuce from the garden in the morning for daddy's salad that he takes to work each day.

lettuce and spinach

Courgettes

tomatoes (covered in tomato dust)

finally going red, although they really are taking a long time!

Maybe next year we will venture and try something else, like corn

Complaining

I don't like to complain to companies about service received, but I have now come to the conclusion that if you don't then you can no longer complain about how poor the service is.
If you are not prepared to say anything then what can you expect?

So I complained today about my visit to the Doctors yesterday.

It was long and slow and when in the consultation I had the pleasure of knowing the Doctor was not enjoying his job and that he had written an email to his boss explaining all this!
I only went in with back ache....came out knowing how much the Dr was not happy and not enthused about his job.
Not what I wanted on a day I was feeling not 100%, not information I even needed to know, although that does now explain his lack of enthusiasm and effort towards the patients.

So I called the surgery today and voiced my complaint, it was duely heard and noted and I am happy now. As I said to the lady, there is nothing that can be done to change the consultation from yesterday, medically I am now fine and do not need to see another Doctor today to feel happy about my condition, but felt that he really wasn't interested in what we had to say yesterday and felt they needed to know this.

Now I feel better, it is not bugging me so much now.

Game Time

Yes it has finally arrived, the much waited for Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Canada.

I love the Winter Olympics

I just love everything about it, the thrill of the down hill skiing, ice skating, luging, curling just everything.
I would, if possible, take 2 weeks of work, resign from the human race and veg for the whole time watching it. Even if this meant I had to live nights and sleep during the day to capture the coverage with the time differences!
Which given we are always in the midst of our summertime when ever the Winter Games are on, is pretty much, all the time!

So, having just enjoyed the intense Women's Moguls, and it was thrilling, USA Gold and Bronze, Cananda Silver, and I so wanted the young 18 yr old Canadian to get a medal, unfortunately she came 5th, I have some very busy evenings ahead of me catching up on the days events that I will be missing whilst at work

For Christmas, Steve brought me a new game for the Wii, 'Mario and Sonic at the Winter Olympics'.
The boys have loved playing this game and have grasped some idea of downhill skiing, iceskating etc so I am loving being able to show them real people doing real games, although they do keep asking when Mario and Sonic will be competing!

But now my computer is back up and running, I will sadly have no time to get on it because I will be glued to the tv every evening.
So I am back, but just got way laid on the way for the Olympics.

Enjoy the games!

Valentines Day

Happy Valentines Day to all my friends and family, near and far, old and new.
Think about you all often and wish I could catch up with you all more often.

This is also my Anniversary
Not for my wedding but for the time I moved to New Zealand.
As of 11am today I have been here 12 years.
WOW, where does the time go...?
Look at all I have achieved in this time....

Also today is my Sister in Laws Birthday,

So Happy Birthday to Karen, hope you have a good one.

Up and Running

We are back on line.
Yea for modern technology, well yea for me for working out the problem whilst the tech support guy was here!

New modem and we are running nicely.
Now if we could only get the tv to work and we will have no electrical problems to sort out.

Computer

I am still here, but unfortunately we have internet issues!
We are currently running at about 450 kbps (kilobites per second) and it should be somewhere between 1000 - 3000 kbps!

I can get online but am never sure what it will allow me to do or how long it will last.
They assure me the fault is being looked in to but I am not so sure, it is taking too long!

So I am checking your blogs when I can and I am updating here when it has enough power to let me post something.
Hopefully things will gp back to normal soon, cause I have lots of pictures of things we have been doing to share with you all.

Have a great weekend