Steps

These steps connect two sections of Hankey St in Mt Cook, Wellington, where i lived in 2004-5. The street was part of a neighbourhood planned on paper, and it didn't fit the geography of Mt Cook. On reflection it seems that uncooperative geography was but one of the problems faced by Wakefield's surveyors as they set about establishing the city. More on wikipedia here.

New Jakob track

New at least 3 months ago, anyway! It occurred to me that really, really I need some more Jakob in my life so I went a-hunting and managed to find this page which appears to be as near as they have to a website just now. Here's a beautifully shot live video of a new track, 'Magna Carta', which I'm already loving:

Baking Dogs

My friend Rain posted this video on Facebook, and I just have to share it cos it's brilliant. I do not remember Sesame Street being this entertaining, in fact I never really liked it much. I always got really confused by the way the big yellow dog disappeared behind the tree. Or the kids disappeared. Something disappeared.



I've been listening to 6 music and getting excited about Glastonbury...even though I'm not going. It starts in 2.5 hours! Loved the countdown of top ten performances, particularly that I was at the number one: Blur in 2009. Their finale of 'The Universal' really was something else. I remember standing there with Audrey, Treez and Ian, and it was just lovely and transcendental and all those things you get after four days of camping and hangovers and mud and sun.

Now, back to work. I'm finishing early today, to watch the football of course! Go All Whites!

Weeknote #5

At home
The French had visitors most of last week, which necessitated a lot of indulgent nights for them, not so much for me. And now Mathieu is away all this week, so it's just me and the lovely Martial, who's just brought me a mug of peppermint tea. Perfect.

During the week I discovered that some nasty spammer had left a lengthy and nonsensical message on a recent blog post. It didn't worry me too much and at the least it was mildly amusing, in its total lack of sense. But then I realised the spam was repeated on no less than 45 posts! I've been cleaning it up in shifts, as blogger doesn't seem to provide an easy way to batch edit comments. Still, there's been an unexpected positive to this boring chore, as I wind up reading posts from years gone by and remembering events long forgotten. Mostly it's made me nostalgic for the days when I had the time to write, things to write about and the confidence to put it out there.

This morning as I watered my coriander seeds, I thought to myself, today is a good day for growing - and sure enough, this evening I found three tiny shoots beginning to peek through the soil! This makes me very happy. Remember when I lived in Wellington and the back yard was full of succulents grown from cuttings my brother gave me?

At work
My American colleague is in the States for a few weeks, so I took the opportunity to work from home for most of last week, and will probably do so again this week. As long as I manage to leave the house once or twice a day, it's very chilled out and pleasant. Various work projects are in the workhorse stage just now, with lots of effort required but not much to show for it - in a few days' time I think there will be progress to speak of.

On my mind is the fact that my current contract terminates in three and a half weeks. I hope that something decisive happens after that - something decisive resulting in a permanent job, even! That said, the uncertainty is no hardship. My only concern is that in order to carry out my plans for early next year, I am going to need to be able to start saving in the not-too-distant future. Make a stash, etc. And start repaying the many favours generous friends have shown me in recent months.

Out n about
Lovely dinner catch up at my local the Dove with Tom on Monday. Jailbreak to hang with my brother-in-law in Walthamstow on Weds evening. Caught up with Tim for the laptop handoff before heading sarf on Thurs for dinner with Mikey and co in Clapham North, followed by Dangerous Heresy at The Rest Is Noise in Brixton. Felt odd to be on the tube after travelling exclusively by bike for the last few weeks. Speaking of, I dealt with my bike-shop-man-induced paranoia about leaving the thing anywhere by getting insurance. It's only a fiver a month. Friday saw me chilling at home and then on Saturday after watching a tedious Australia vs Ghana match, Tom and I ventured down the market to the Dove. He was in mid-flow with the most preposterous tale when I realised we were sharing a table with the one and only Ian Hart...cue much excitement, gurning and crowing that it had been eleven and three quarter months since our last adventure!

I was a bit slow off the mark on Sunday but managed to get to Proud Gallery in Camden in time for kick off in the New Zealand vs Italy match. Some friends had hired a stable for us to watch the game, and it was a tense but most enjoyable 90+ minutes. Very impressed with the team, particularly the fabulous Paston.

Future happenings
Crazy to think that this time last year I was gearing up for Glastonbury - it seems to have come around a lot quicker this year. Not for me though - I'll be watching it on tv, or trying to ignore it - and anyway, Blondie is happening this weekend. I'm also excited about having made plans to attend Jane's birthday weekend in the Lakes District! Can't wait, although it's not until late next month and comes hot on the heels of some minor surgery. On my tongue. Guess how much I can't wait for that.

All Whites 1 - Slovakia 1

In the interests of posterity, I must blog this (parental advisory, explicit lyrics):



What a great finish to a fairly uninteresting game.

This requires new tag: 'world cup' and 'sport'. Will I ever use them again?!

In Transit II

Once again I'm in transit in Hong Kong, and I'm in much better shape than last visit. I think it's around half 4 in the morning NZ time, and around eleven thirty local time, and physically I feel fine. Mentally, I have no idea how I feel... I do know that I had a brilliant time in New Zealand, loads of great experiences with great people and just one or two that I don't need to repeat ever again.

Because I'm a fledgling data geek, here's a look at where I spent my 90 days in Aotearoa:



Within those locations, I stayed at 26 different places. Thanks to the kindness of a then-stranger, turned-out-to-be-a-relative, I drove over 7000 km and was driven another 1000 or so. I went to three weddings and three music festivals. I drank 40 litres of sauvignon blanc and 175 Mac's Great Whites. The last sentence isn't true. I took a roller coaster ride with the farmer poet and developed a dog-crush on Taffy the coolest labrador ever (affectionately known as my perfect man in canine form).



And now I'm London-bound, to start a new job and find a new flat, and looking forward to jaunts to Iceland, Japan, and Spain in the next few months. Bring it on.

St Jerome's Laneway Festival - Auckland

This morning I woke up on a motel floor. As I lay contemplating the ceiling, a gentle breeze stirring the curtains on the french doors to my left, I reflected on my fabulous day at Laneways.



It was a brilliant day, and the rain held off for the most part. I met up with the friendly neighbour late morning, and we cabbed downtown to Britomart Square. After a bit of wandering around the site and getting acquainted with the layout, I met up with Lisa and we enjoyed a set from the Naked and Famous, along with a growing and appreciative crowd. Around 3pm I was very very happy to see the Phoenix Foundation play, on the bittersweet occasion of bass player and my good friend Warner's last gig. He's been with the band seven years, pretty much all the time I've known him, and I wish him well in his future projects, which include the highly entertaining Double Ya D.

After that it was time for a much, much anticpated set from the xx. Oh, how I love the xx. Their set was just lovely. I caught some of Daniel Johnston next, a very special performance - you can see a short video here. I didn't pay enough attention to the Dirty Three, and I wish I'd given more time to Chris Knox and the Nothing. I spent the next 45 minutes or so waiting in the food queue, hoping I could use some of my plastic drink coupons, and snarling at queue jumpers. The hot chips were a necessary evil; I missed Echo & the Bunnymen, but I think I'd always missed them so I didn't mind too much.

Because it was the first year of the festival in Auckland, there were inevitably some problems, not least of which was the long wait for food and beer (although happily this didn't affect me). There were also some scheduling reshuffles later in the day, not to mention a disappointing overlap of Cut Off Your Hands beginning their set before Daniel Johnston was finished. I don't believe this was an intentional slight, and I hope that Daniel wasn't too offended.

The reshuffles meant that the 3Ds played later in the evening, and their set was a blinder. The crowd just loved it, what a treat to see such hits as Outer Space, Hey Seuss and Animal performed live!



Florence closed the show, however I was sifting about at the Northern Steamship by this time, catching up with friends and setting the scene for the next few hours. My drinking buddies in London will not be surprised that I have developed quite a taste for Mac's Great White. And that was it - the night ended, as so many do, with a dirty kebab on Queen St.

Observations that struck me but now seem unstriking

The first day or so of being in New Zealand, some things really leaped out at me. Even now I'm starting to assimilate so they almost seem normal again - before that happens I'm collecting them here.

• There is a lady at the airport doing poi stuff. I probably should know the right way to say 'doing poi'. Makes it sound like an illegal substance.
  
• The airport shuttle man doesn't want to know the postcode. This is convenient since I don't know it either.
• The bus driver is not behind a wall. There is a STRING to pull when you want to stop.
• The 12-hour clock is much more used than the 24-hour version, further confusing my time-zone-pressured self.
  
• The streets are wide, and empty.
• Using NZ currency is so novel! Plastic notes and baby 50c pieces!
  
• I see an ex-boyfriend on Great North Rd and have to duck down in my car seat.
• I practically passed out after running a shorter distance than I'm accustomed to in London, which I put down to the extreme levels of humidity (100%?!) and the hills.

It's been an excellent day. I got to drive a car for the first time in two and half years! It was a blissful and a tiny bit scary. And I visited my old office in Grey Lynn, caught up with the boss (still the boss, after all this time) and the friendly neighbour, as well as the rest of the team, and was very happy indeed to see everyone again.

This track makes me happy too:

Two Months + Three Months

In a week's time, I'll be boarding a flight bound for Hong Kong, where I'll meet the aeroplane which will take me home. I've been away for two and a half years. Not a huge absence, but the hugest to date, and I've got a mixed bag of emotions. Mostly they're of the positive, apprehensive sort, and where they're not, they are concerns based around how much money I will actually need to pass a summer in New Zealand. I've lost my understanding of the value of the dollar, except where it relates to the value of the pound - which is a sore point of late!

Some people who visit the Backyard will be aware that I was fortunate to be offered redundancy from my job of two years working for MCPS. This came at an excellent time and has been a very positive experience, mostly because I wasn't feeling in the least inspired by my role and because it's given me the opportunity to do whatever I want for the last two months.

Now I regularly face the question: "So what have you been doing for two months, O lady of leisure?" I usually have to think for a minute, musing that for the most part, I've been so busy that I'm not sure how I used to have time to go to work! And what have I actually been doing?

I spent time with my cousin Allyson who visited from Melbourne, I've had visits of varying durations to Bratislava (hi Mikhal!), Vienna and Budapest, and closer to home, to Birmingham (hi Dubber!), Devon (which I persist in calling Dorset), and Manchester (hi Paulie!). I've had countless lunches and run 160km. I've been to see The Black Seeds, Art Brut supporting Pixies, the Mountain Goats, Easy Star All-Stars, Jaga Jazzist supporting Efterklang, Grizzly Bear, the Drones, Röyksopp, Liam Finn, the Flaming Lips, Her Make Believe Band, a Manc metal band called Bisonhammer, Monsters of Folk, the Decemberists and finally, Dangerous Heresy. I've spent an inordinate length of time perfecting my CV and I've secured an internship with Topspin Media for my return to London in March.

I've been too busy to keep my flickr up to date, although I have been putting the odd set of gig photos up at songkick. Speaking of which - one project of mine while I'm in New Zealand is to find my old diaries and post a load of New Zealand gigs to this excellent database of live music. I reckon I can easily top 200 in my gigography. Check it out, get involved! Maybe we've been to some gigs together?

The next three months will see me in New Zealand, catching up with friends and family, attending several weddings, soaking up the scenery and the summer, not to mention a few gigs. I'm already giddy with excitement at the propsect of seeing Faith No More for the fourth (and fifth ;) time in a fourth country! Not to mention Big Day Out, Campus A Low Hum, Laneways, any number of great-sounding Mystery Girl events, and perhaps even the Fourth Annual Wellingtonista Awards (affectionately known as #T4WA).

Let's catch up.

Sir Edmund Hillary

Rest in peace. What a great man.

Tyranny of Distance

One thing about being a lawyer, even one with L-plates firmly attached, is that there's LOADS of reading to keep up with keep stacked in an orderly pile somewhere. Mine is currently doing a good impersonation of Tower of Pisa.

It’s mostly newsletters, detailing current legislative debate, recent case commentary, occasional snippets of Hansard (sometimes quite amusing, I have to say), thrilling missives on the new Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act, the implications for property transactions of the new Building Act, stuff about tax and trusts and estates and commerce. Ugh.

The pile doesn’t exactly go down, but now and then I finish one, initial it and put it into a second, much more modest ‘to-be-filed-somewhere’ pile. My desk is covered in piles. I am a Piler of Things. Now there’s an analogy…

This is going somewhere. I came across this piece a few weeks ago, and funnily enough it stacks nicely with my own half-formed theories on the societal and cultural influence of New Zealand’s geographical location with respect to the Rest of the World.

Tyranny of Distance

Some things do not change. Professor Michael Taggard prefaces a recent article (2004) 15 Public Law Review 1 with a quotation from Mark Twain's book, Following the Equator: a journey around the world (1897) which read: "All people think that New Zealand is close to Australia or Asia, or somewhere, and that you cross to it on a bridge. But that is not so. It is not close to anything, but lies by itself, out in the water. It is nearest to Australia, but still not too near. The gap between is very wide. It will be a surprise to the reader, as it was to me, to learn that the distance from Australia to New Zealand is really twelve or thirteen hundred miles, and that there is no bridge." In August, the English writer Jenny Diski (London Review of Books, 5/8/2004) observed: "... everything is far away from New Zealand if that is where you are. But that's easy to say if you are merely in transit and you have a return ticket to the far away you came from. All New Zealanders tell you about their European trip, a year or five spent where far away isn't. Or they say that they are planning such a trip - soon or one day. The feeling of separation grabs you, and you rapidly begin to think like a New Zealander. I've never felt the distance of distance so strongly. Not in the Antarctic, not at the tip of Tierra del Fuego, not even in the nowhere of Raton, New Mexico. Only in the grip of a depression have I felt the 'world', whatever I and my New Zealand hosts meant by that, to be so remote."

From The Capital Letter 27 TCL 35, 10

Six months is my longest stretch away from these shores in all my 24 years; I look forward to spending many more months exploring the corners of the world. All I know is that when I moved back to Dunedin after six months in a cultural blender, I felt like I was coming back to mono sound when I had grown accustomed to 5.1 surround. I vividly recall the metamorphosis as I flew home. One minute I was living the dream, and the next (actually a painful 24 hours later) it was over. I recall the drive from Wellington airport – I kept my eyes closed for as long as I could, trying to keep the awful truth at bay. Moving back to Dunedin may well have been one of the hardest things ever, even harder than the idea of my third year jurisprudence exam (which in reality wasn’t so bad). Of course I “got over it”, there’s little choice to do otherwise. I put my memories and experiences away, kept on walking through and beyond the reverse culture shock.

Something I ponder now and then is how our geographical isolation shapes our identity. The potential effects of isolation, insulation, and influences intrigue me. As I said, it's a half-formed theory. Like Mainland cheese...