I was off the Christchurch for 2 days before the long weekend to the annual PMINZ conference (that’s the New Zealand Project Management Institute conference) for work.  It provided some food for thought and had some good speakers.  (If you’re interested let me know and we can have a chat).

Anyway, Amanda, Lyla & I all went down to Christchurch to have a holiday.  We caught up with Dick, Erica and their new addition to the family, 5 week old Micah (he’s so small, Lyla was that size only 9 months ago!). All are well and we all managed to get out to Springfield to see their new house under construction (only 4 weeks away the builder tells them). Must admit, a house in the country appeals.

Also caught up with Griff, Tarsh and Aiden for brunch in the Port Hills before heading to Akaroa for a holiday.  Lyla had here first go on a swing and we tried out my Father’s day pressie, a Macpac Possum with a 3 hour bushwalk. We all survived the walk, must remember to watch out for low hanging branches otherwise Lyla’s head might get taken off.

Also managed to catch up with Toby and Rach who were having a party that weekend.  The party looked like fun and think it was going be an all nighter by the looks of things. I’m sure I could of handled the party but not sure how long it would take to recover nowadays (at least 2 days I reckon!)

We stayed with Amanda’s, Aunty Pam, whose little dog “Louie” loved Lyla and decided to share his dog biscuits with her. Lyla decide they looked tasty too.

Lyla has started swimming lessons and seems to be enjoying them, check out the photos

Buenos Dias Amigos

I ran the Auckland Half Marathon on the 1st November. This was my first ever half and did a time of 1:38:22, so ran about 4min39sec km. Check out my results here (search for #7034). I was pleased with my time since it was my first race in 20 years, 5months since I stopped smoking and first time I have ran that distance. 

The last 4k’s was pretty tough for me but really pleased I have finally ran one.  Onwards and upwards now with a time to beat for the next one (whenever that is) and think I will focus on some trail running rather than on the road for fun.

You can check out photos and videos of my style from Marathon-Photos.com.  I am in bib #7034 if you are trying to see me on the videos.

Happy running!

• Few more landscaping photos ones to finish off the collection.
• The Bridge March Protest in May, and
• Whangapoua – Mid Winter Party 2009

Other interesting facts that have taken place over the last 6months:

• I have stopped smoking – haven’t even had a puff for over 4 months now!!
• I am training to run my first half marathon (Auckland, on 1 st Nov but a few injuries along the way preventing a good build up unfortunately)

see you or speak to you soon….

bring on summer…..

• Lyla is now 8 months and her first tooth came through yesterday.  More photos of her in the photo section. Lovin watching her grow and develop a personality.
• DIY to the house and outside slowed but picking up again. Took a week off last week and managed to get the new path in (see the photos).
• A burst water pipe in our Ensuite bathroom while we were away managed to flood our bedroom and half the lounge as well.  We moved the furniture and ourselves into the spare room while they stripped the walls and carpet and started drying and replacing it all (been a month and still haven’t moved back!!).  We upgraded our shower so have a new tiled one. (again see the photos)

So that’s about it, in a nutshell. I finally upgraded to the current version of wordpress for this website (that ’s why I am writing this blog again) so should be back to updating this site a bit more (hopefully).

More photos to follow as the last DIY landscaping photos don’t even show the deck fnished and the grass growing.

Cheers and drop a  line for a chat or come around for a beer /coffee – summer is coming and new deck is looking good (just needs staining). 

C & A

The bike is a 2004 Suzuki Hayabusa in the MPS-1350-BG class which means Modified production, partially streamlined, 1350cc, blown gasoline. Rider is Richard Assen who is very casual about everything he does (crypes he is going to sit on top of a bike and control it going over 400 km/h), the technician is Jason Swan who loves to tinker and make everything go faster and faster until it pops.

During September this year, they will be taking this extremely fast bike to Bonneville, USA and get the following records:

The first event is BUB Speed trials (2^nd to 7^th of September) where they will be challenging the AMA (American Motorcycles Association) record which stands at 217.85 MPH (350.52km/h) for their class. Also, at this first event they will also be challenging the FIM overall world record for a motorcycle which stands at 252MPH (405.5km/h).
The second event is The World of Speed (17^th to 20^th of September), where they will be attempting to break the SCTA (Southern California Timing Association) record of 233MPH (374.9km/h).

All I can say is GOOD LUCK!!!!!

more details to come on how they are geting on……………..

Finally bit the bullet and have purchased the new “bits” and built a new PC (with assistance from Snork!) My old PC was built when I was in the UK in 2001! – i.e AMD 1.25GHz, 512k RAM, 40GB Hard drive etc…. it was about to die and the fans sounded like they were about to take off!

So here is the spec of my new toy (cost about $1200NZD with Vista Premium and Office s/w included in that price) : hmmm more power…..

• CASE – Asus VENTO TA-915 ATX Mid Tower
• DVD DRIVE – Asus DRW-2014L1T LightScribe SATA DVD-RW
• MOTHERBOARD – Asus M2N-VM HDMI Socket 940 AM2 GEFORCE 7050PV DDR2 1066 PCI-E
• RAM – Adata 4GB Dual Kit (2GB*2) DDR2-800 PC6400 240Pin UNB PC2-6400
• PROCESSOR -AMD Phenom 9550 Quad Core 2.2GHz
• HARD DRIVE – Western Digital 7200rpm 640GB 16M SATA Hard Disk
• TV TUNER CARD – Hauppauge WinTV-HVR4000 HD Quad-mode TV receiver

 You’ll notice I have a TV tuner card in the mix – next project is to get it to work so I can get Freeview (DVB-S or DVB-T) and record TV onto my hard drive.  A bit of a mission I believe with New Zealand specs using the latest codecs and standards for HD transmission. 

Will let you know how I go with setting this up…..

 

House DIY is slowly progressing and waiting for some fine weather to measure up the backyard so Amanda can use her landscaping skills she obtained on a course to design it. We hope to get the a new backyard built before summer arrives.

and the BIG news is…..

Amanda is pregnant.  Been trying for a while and finally it happened so we are both really happy!  Amanda is due late January 2009 so will be doing all those pre baby things before our life changes significantly. (I need a boys holiday!!). 

We went for the 12 week scan a couple of weeks ago and all is well. The bean sized person has a head, 2 arms and legs and all they are all in the right places. Hit home when I saw it “live” in the scan and made me really starting thinking about being a Dad (Shit!! – but guess most of you have already been through all this and will start giving me all that advice on how my life will never be the same again!)

Amanda is doing well and so far the pregnancy has been pretty good with only mild symptons, being tired, hungry and weeing a lot more.  I’m fine too except for the occasional reality check when I look into the future, but guess I move to #3 in the pecking order of the family now so I don’t count

Pic below just to confirm this is real

PS:  I will  be updating this site regularly (at least once a week) so come back for more updates, news, views and photos in the coming weeks….

Not sure where the statement “more trains more often” comes from – does this mean that service reliability will improve too?  Currently the southern line which I take everyday has just over a 80% statistic for being on time!  Yes, that means at least once a week both to and from work I can expect the trains I catch to be late (or even worse cancelled!). 

You can check out the delays and increase in costs for the ARTA projects and also the reliability of the Auckland Rail Service in the ARTA monthly business reports.  Will Auckland ever get a reliable and efficient rail service?

For me, a Tui billboard I made up sums it up nicely!!