A day in the life of...!!

Don't ask me why pink, it just happened - don't get hung up on it.

Right, last saturday (that's the day of our lives I'm writing about but contains lots of thoughts we have on lots of days) we did some usualish things...

We'd thought of getting to the beach after work on the Friday (evening before) but weather wasn't great - rains a lot here apparently although we've seen mostly sun). So saturday we decided to head to the beach (see photos), although first decided it was high time we got Joey her sewing machine...a top Saturday purchase (for those not one of many inner circles, it's the "Saturday - I need to spend loads of money that I don't have on a random piece of kit" syndrome). But this was different (mostly) as we used some of our wedding money - thank you all so much - and went to our local shops and found a brilliant sewing shop with a hugely helpful kiwi lady who sold us the first one we looked at. Phewph. First task of the day completed, although I should just explain why this was so important...

...it's because we've stacked our house full of useless furniture. Ha! Only temporarily useless furniture. Next step is to cram our house and garage full of incredibly useful tools that we can attack the useless furniture with. Prime example being the useless and very ugly long set of draws that we got from TradeMe, our Ebay equivalent, for a tenner. It's lost its legs, has had a quality paint job and is sitting under the window waiting for some beautiful stenciling from Joey and a long comfy cushion to sit on...hence the sewing machine :) OK, you can just see the big white box in the boot of the car. You'll also notice the foam for the cushion and, importantly, a new foam mattress waiting to be chopped into a more car shaped piece that will then act as our bed on our weekend adventures!

On the roads in Auckland is a bitter sweet experience. Happy days, the roads are wide and except during rush-hour, the traffic is easy. Unfortunately, NZ drivers have a completely different mentality to all other drivers I've met - perhaps it would be more fair to say, they have no mentality. They just drive, doesn't matter what lane they're in or who is going where and when, they just drive about minding their own business...great until someone gets stuck trying to turn across a continuous flow of traffic. Do cars slow down to let the unfortunate "crosser" continue their journey?...errr...nope...and if you try, you send the drivers behind you into some sort of anxiety or confusion crisis and completely baffled at the scene unfolding before them, they sit on their horns until something has changed - crazy.

And interesting observations driving through Auckland...sounds dumb, but no old buildings. They're all made of wood and to be honest it feels like you're driving round a giant caravan park. That's ok though.

So out of Auckland and onto the winding road to the beach, singing along to a great bit of Fat and Frantic - awesome. Until we hit the beach...great view...sorry the photo's don't do it justice.

Hmm...but bizarrely, one of the most popular surf beaches in New Zealand...has only one small shop (apparently - we couldn't find it!), nowhere to hire boards at the beach and no cafe that we could find either. Well, a km back up into the hills, Mike is hiring kit, so if you've got your car, that's ok.

And then we're in the surf...great surf for those who that means something for. Although probably a bit too great for Joey and I at the moment...Joey's Jesus on the Cross surfing style wasn't fully flowing this time.

Then back to Auckland for a take-away and silly games with some English teacher friends that Joey has met - Johnny and Kath. They're great although drive a very dodgy van that keeps breaking down and work far too hard. Funny, but take-aways are huge over here...haven't pin-pointed why, but our set of shops has one take-away for every other shop/pub/restaurant. They're good though and pretty reasonably priced, so in some ways, why not?

And other things we could've done on a typical day include crazy handstands and quartets on the piano - thanks the Burstows. Right, out of time, got to run to the harbour to get a new gear from crazy Bruce at the bike-shop. I bent thefront gear on our tandem in half when we were charging up the hill on our way to work. Then it's down to the beach for a swim and then who's knows what after that... :)

Hope you're all having wonderful days too.