Waterlogged!

Well, what a wet and cold few weeks! Winter arrived just after my last blog with six days of more-or-less continual rain! Plus it was quite chilly too. But hey, it's great news for the skiiers down here as the local skifields now have a great base covering.

It was great to be working at Business Mentors in the Canterbury Development Corporation's offices - nice and warm compared to a cold home-office! And being part of a team of people was very pleasant again - someone to speak to over tea-break! There also seemed to be even more 'training course/board meeting lunch leftovers' than at R-R - so I didn't go hungry whilst I was there!

The role with Business Mentors has now finished as Jill has returned from her Northern Hemisphere trip. She found it a bit of a shock landing back here in the midst of a cold snap having just spent a few days in Dubai on route back home! I've got to say that the thought of getting somewhere warmer for a few days had been playing on my mind over the last week or so and I'm still mulling over a trip to Oz over the winter school holidays. (The sun is out today and it's suddenly gone quite warm again - bizarre).

I also closed out my lecturing at the University last week. It seemed to go OK, though my last session was not the best attended. I think I suffered from a big clash with a project hand-in deadline!

Maria and I went to The Loons (theatre) in Lyttelton a couple of weeks ago to see The Butler. It was a good evening out - interesting show - described in the notes as 'Cirque du Soleil meets Pinter'. Lots of action, witty and quite risquee in places - it's coming to a theatre in Islington, London next month if you're in the area!

I also ventured out into Christchurch last weekend for a few beers with the Asia Pacific Football Academy crowd at the Twisted Hop in Lichfield Lanes. It was a bank holiday weekend - Queens Birthday! - and on Friday at 5.30 the place was already buzzing! Apparently it's the closest you will get to an English pint of beer in Christchurch - and it was very good - in fact they all were! Despite being advised differently, this was the start of my carbo-loading for the Christchurch Half Marathon on the Sunday. It seemed to work, as I managed to get around in just under 1 hour 28 minutes - marginally slower than my previous PB set at the Great North Run back in 2002! Maria dipped in just under the hour mark for her 10k. It was a great event - over 6ooo competitors across the full, half and 10K events - the weather was a bit of a spoiler - wet and cold - but we enjoyed our efforts.

It was also Sarah's 14th birthday that day. She had invited a crowd of her friends over for a sleepover the night before. They seemed to have a good time - got on with things themselves - watched a few DVDs and ate sweets and crisps all evening!
It's quite strange witnessing a winter birthday for her - usually it's been an outdoor affair back in the UK - bouncy castles and camping out in the back garden.

I'm off to Dunedin in a week or so to do some work with Simply Lean which has been scheduled for some time. I'm looking forward to that. There was also an outside chance of being required on a contract out in Sydney at the start of July - though that seems to have gone quiet. I've also been discussing the opportunity of doing some Quality/Business Improvement work with Fulton Hogan in and around Canmterbury. Again, this looks as though it would be interesting stuff to be doing - they're a growing company with a presence in OZ as well as here in NZ. Hopefully that one could turn into something quite substantial.

And with just over 24 hours before the start of the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, I'm starting to map out my TV time for the next 4 weeks around all of these work commitments! We still haven't installed SKY, so I'm limited to whatever is on TVNZ 1 or 7 - unless I want to be in a local pub between 2am and 8am each night! England vs USA is live on Sunday morning - so I guess my world cup will start then!