On another run (9.5km), we ran away from the sun down this strip of road next to the motorway:
After which we had dinner and went to a Fringe Festival show which was fantastic! We sat middle front and center and were forced to become part of the show, at one stage I had tears in my eyes from laughing so hard. The actor was amazing and the show was entertaining the whole way through!
Stacey Marie
A much needed break was had over the weekend, first up I ate myself sick on the sweet grapes at a friends parents house up north, then worked my way through four country pubs and their characters on the way to a campsite where we slept with kiwi running around outside the tent
The Portuguese girl and the Kiwi girl went for dinner last night (after their run up the mountain).
We have decided to use Vera’s legs as lighting when there are powercuts, or as flys when we go fly fishing (all those times we go fly fishing).
Stacey Marie
Vera already wrote about our lovely Sunday afternoon, and here are the pictures. It was such a great day that if it was a date she would have been able to have her wicked way with me later on!
My tootsies on the top of the mountain, while eating takeaway and drinking beer:
Vera’s peids:
Group shot!
Now we are going running up the mountain in about an hour. No curry or beer waiting for us today. Grumpyface.
Stacey Marie
Caught up with two friends I only get to see about twice a year because of our combined crazy lives on Monday night for dinner at this great Thai place I love. Three hours later, gobbling food, wine and words like chickens, we were finished, only because the restaurant closed.
Stacey Marie
Man I am breaking out into the musical today. Must be boredom. Anywho, had dinner in the sun with my friend Kelly at one of my favourite restaurants overlooking the Viaduct on Wednesday night. No complaints here.
Stacey Marie
It’s just gone Labour Weekend here, where we shake off the winter blues and get our first sunburns of the year. I had an awesome time, kicking off on Friday night with drinks, fireworks and laughs with good friends outside on the balcony:
Then Saturday I caught the bus up north to stay with my friends Amy and Paul, who were hosting a hangi (traditional Maori way of cooking food in the ground) for- wait for it-… 90 people! There went the relaxing lie on the beach weekend I had in my head, suddenly I was immigrant labour. However the entire process and weekend was great fun, and really rewarding, and I managed to fit in a swim in the ocean and the chance to get my inaugural sunburn.
Digging of the pit for the food
This is what a quarter of 20kg of potatoes and 10kg of kumera peelings look like
After all that peeling it was time for a dip.
Sunday was hangi day, and it all went off with only one hitch… when high tide happened on the beach, the pit filled with water, at the same time that we wanted to start cooking… waiting for high tide to recede and putting some more sand in the hole seemed to remedy the situation!
Monday morning shone light on the mess 90 people can create, but it was also a beautiful day, so once we had cleaned up, we could relax in this:
Have just got back from a week visiting family and friends in Feilding where I am from. Did lots, here are the shoe per diem photos, although on reflection maybe this should be called sock per diem…
This is in the airport on the way down home. Penguin classics are so pretty, was tempted to buy a few then remembered I have a book back-log I should get through first…
Me and my Ma went for a wee trip to Whanganui, which some people make fun of but I like because it is quaint and has the best second-hand shop in the whole wide world (pretty much the only reason for taking a trip there in the first place, but it is still quaint okay.) And contrary to my above comment, I bought three books.
I chilled out with Jimmy by his fire. He was kind enough to share a little bit with me.
Saw Emma Kate and Honor Violet, more to come from Emma’s camera (ahem).
Played with Rouge the only dog in the whole wide world I like and am thinking of cloning her so I can have some of her lovely sweet nature. She is my friend Renee’s parents dog, and I was there for a big dinner of spaghetti and meatballs. We then used the left over meatballs to teach Rouge how to go in and out of the cat flap.
I then went down to Wellington to stay the night with Renee and her husband Brian and catch up with all my lovely friendlies who live down there. Me and Renee passed Friday afternoon drinking wine on her balcony overlooking the harbour.
And then a group of us went out for a BYO dinner, of which a bottle of red was a casualty… (This was nothing to do with me BTW)…
Stacey Marie
As Vera said, Monday after her first day at work we went for a run (we have entered a 12km run in January, now we just need to train), and then for dinner. A much healthier option than going for a wine and then dinner… anyway after two dinners for some (ahem Vera) we went for coffee and cake and the couch matched my new shoes. Choice!
Stacey Marie
Friday really was a fun day for Vera, she finished one job and starts a new one on Monday. We went out after to celebrate, which involved great amounts of food and drink. mMMM.
PS yes me = new shoes! Bought three pairs on Friday, whoop!
Stacey Marie
Have had two three-hour exams this week, along with working, so I haven’t had much time for much other than studying, travel and work, but now they are over, the sun is shining and it is a beautiful day and I am going home next week and it’s all so good!!! But yeah, where was I oh that’s right, I still found time to go and eat awesome food with Vera on Wednesday at Squid Row. Priorities people.
Stacey Marie
Dinner at an Irish pub out of the cold and in front of the fire with Vera on Sunday night. Bliss.
Stacey Marie
I’ve been on the most amazing trip down in the south island for the last five days, visiting my old university town, and biking the Central Otago Rail Trail, which (as the name suggests) is an old 150km railway trail, converted into a biking, walking and horse riding track. It was sooooo awesome, and I went a bit OTT on the photos cause there was so much to see! Bear with me….
Friday: I caught a plane to Dunedin, which is where I went to uni, and haven’t been back to since graduating. Thought it was fitting that this sign was outside my old theatre classrooms:
Saturday: We woke up to the news that Christchurch (about 4 hours down the road) had been hit smack on by a big earthquake and that heaps of buildings had came down. The place is still shaking now, five days later!
We passed by the Cadbury factory on the way to our train… any good biking trip needs some chocolate
We got to the beautiful train station to catch our train to Pukerangi to meet the others and our bikes:
Taken outside of the train, as it’s going over a really high viaduct:
We had a short bike from our train to the place we were staying for the night:
The place we stayed had an old caboose as the kitchen and dining room, which was kinda cool
Saturday: We started the Rail Trail proper:
But only got 30km out of 60 for the day because of galeforce winds (150km). Three of our group were blown of the trail into ditches, my sunglasses flew off my face never to be seen again, and all of us had to squat on ridges, holding onto our bikes which were flying out in front of us from the wind. It was pretty freaky and scary and hard work, and a lovely local passed by with a trailer, rescued us and took us all to the next pittstop, which was the veranda of a closed cafe, where I was so cold, I had to put my merino top on my legs to stop freezing!! Thank god that was the end of the bad weather!
We were rescued and taken to our hotel for the night, where I made friends with a couple of Alpacas.
Sunday: Started bright and early in the chilly air, with a few shots of Jagermiester to warm the cockles.
Went over a few viaducts on the bike
Monday: We visited NZ’s longest running post office (since 1886) along the trail, and I thought the collection of phones through the ages was pretty cool:
Tuesday: Found this dead bird on a bridge, which I thought was a really pretty colour
We finished the Rail Trail in Clyde, one of the largest dams in New Zealand:
Wednesday: we left lovely Alexandra:
And I waited in the glorious sun at the Dunedin airport for my flight (note the prefix to my name, I usually go by “Captain”, but decided to mix things up this time).
I had an awesome trip and I recommend it to everybody!!
Decided to snap my SPD at lunchtime today, rather than always having my weekday SPD photos taken after dark. Didn’t have my camera with me so had to resort to the cell phone. I’ve been trying to get better at this posting every day thing and didn’t want to lose my mojo so here’s a blurry photo of my sushi anyway!
Wearing flats again, as my legs haven’t fully recovered from the weekend.
paudecanela
But I’m not sure that equals another year wiser 
It was V-dog’s birthday yesterday and I was kind enough to grace her with my presence for the evening. Another friend was also kind enough to bake her a chocolate Oreo cheesecake. Mmmmm mmmm. Food comas all round.
Stacey Marie
After a devilishly delicious dinner of lamb shanks and fresh snapper Vera snapped me in front of this sculpture on Broadway (Newmarket, not US). Damn I need to polish my bag.
Stacey Marie
It may be in the middle of nowhere and some of the people may be slightly odd, but I do enjoy the surroundings of my work place. We have three resident parakeets that inhabit these trees, a tui which mimics your whistle and bunnies which jump around and look cute, and mmmmm I bet they taste good.
Stacey Marie
Sundays are seriously the best day of the week, and last Sunday was exceptionally awesome. My friend Renee and I headed along to a Roller Derby girl’s house, for an interview I am doing for a magazine I edit, and the girl, Fliss, turned out to be awesome and we talked our heads off. Get this, Fliss (roller derby alias = Spar Kill) has a ward room… that’s right a room for her clothes and shoes and bags and sunglasses and hats and ribbons and nail polish and everything else. She seriously has an awesome collection of awesome stuff, and she blogs over at www.frockstar.co.nz to justify having so much stuff. She was kind enough to let us rummage and take photos, and I thought you guys might appreciate this one:
These are just the tip of the iceberg, you should see the full wall of two layers of clothes packed into the room! Make sure you check out her blog 
After this me and Renee headed for a Sunday afternoon debrief involving a bottle of wine and a platter of goodies at a pub on Ponsonby Road, and I couldn’t resist taking another snap of this mosaic, which I know both me and Vera have snapped in the past:
Stacey Marie
Yesterday was a great day, as Vera showed. My highlight was the new soft soft leather overpriced boots I bought to replace the crap Wild Pair ones I have been wearing for the last little while:
And the movie we went to was cool, cause it was in a big old theatre, and after the screening the director and a few of the actors got up and we could ask them questions, I reckon every movie should be like that! (Kinda strategically impossible but never mind). Unfortunately, the actors I would have wanted to ask questions to were busy (bastards), but how cool would it have been to ask Jermaine Clement (Flight of the conchords, Eagle vs shark), Tim Finn (crowded house awesomeness) and the guy that plays Chopper Fucking Reid in the stage show a question? It was cool anyway, and this is a shot looking down at the actors from the gods, although its a bit dark to see….
Stacey Marie
Vera bet me to it, but yes we had delish delish pizza from this out of the way hidden place, which was fill by 5.45 on a Thursday. Always a good omen. Anywho, my foot is in there, the small brown oval in the bottom right of the picture.
What Vera forgot to mention was that after the two large pizzas and carafe of red, we then went for French, her having snails in garlic butter, us both having creme brulee and a long black. Heavenly. Until the food babies arrived and make us feel like shit. We are thinking we might have to start an Auckland food blog to keep up with all the places we go (but really to justify having more than one nationality in one night…) if only this post-natal depression would leave so I felt inspired to begin one
Stacey Marie
Stacey and I decided yesterday that we should move on from our usual weekly dates in the usual places and broaden our horizons. There are so many good places to eat in Auckland, and so much diversity, that it is silly to get stuck with a couple of safe options.
So, with this in mind, we headed along to That’s Amore last night. This italian pizza place, tucked away in the corner of the upper level of a downtown building was such a pleasant surprise, we had trouble keeping a conversation going without interrupting it every three seconds to point out how amazing the pizza was.
We’re still determined to branch out and try as many new places as we can but we will definitely return to this one! Yum!
paudecanela
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