Note To Future Self

Hi everyone. Yes, it’s been a while, and it’s been driven almost exclusively by our access (or lack thereof) to the internet (not my general sloth, oh no). It didn’t seem like a luxury at first, but our hotel did have wireless. Since then, we’ve been in the stone ages.

For now, a quick recap, hopefully followed up by more insightful, illustrative (and illustrated) posts once our home broadband is all set up and I’m sitting around the house all day, counting the ceiling tiles.

‘Round these parts (the “civilized world” as one person has so kindly referred to it), the Good Friday/Easter hoilday is a four-day weekend. We spent it participating in NZ’s favorite non-sheep-related pastime, tramping. That is, backpacking. There are some critical differences, but it looks a lot like backpacking. In this case we took our lovely little rental car (perhaps the smallest Toyota Corolla hatchback ever made) up to Arthur’s Pass, the East-West route through the mountains nearest Christchurch. We hiked a little loop known as the “Binser-Casey” loop, for it traverses the Binser and Casey saddles. We spent two nights in the bush, and one at the staging area, for a completely enjoyable (if somewhat exhausting) weekend. So that’s one future post I owe you.

Coming down off the mountain, we moved in with Chris and Kathy, two of Anna’s coworkers, who own a very nice “lifestyle block” (hobby farm?) out on the back side of beyond (between Irwill Crossing and Doyleston, technically). We had a thoroughly wonderful time, I got lots of quality time with their dog, horses, and the neighbor’s sheep and we had a wonderful first hand view at the rural living arrangements which people enjoy around here. Sadly, the isolation made it hard for me to do the things I should be doing (look for a job, shop for a car, write blog posts). I did have time to finish several novels, though.

On Friday night we moved into our new rental house, and we spent the weekend getting use to its idosyncracies. For example, we determined experimentally that the spare fridge in the lundry room is in fact a freezer. Our milk-berg will thaw out one of these days.

So far we’re quite happy, though it does look a bit sparse. We’ve purchased a rather large lot of furniture (fridge, bed, dining room table) from a local moving out of country, which we’re bound to pick up tonight. We expect it to make quite a difference in our lifestyle, though we’ll still be cooking and eating from our little camp cookset. Maybe someday when we’ve really made it we can have more than two forks.

Unfortunately, this coming week, our house is set for new carpet, so we won’t be able to get more settled (aforementioned large lot of furniture is going in the garage). Having a permanent place to sleep and let our luggage explode into little piles all over the place has been quite a relief, even if the little piles have all been swept into the closets to clear the carpeted areas.

So that’s the short story, at least short enough for me to write while I use the library’s computers. Apartment? Check, though not really moved in. Car? Nope. Fun? Yep. Biking? Yep, a little. Fridge? Thankfully, yes.