A friend is NEVER a co-incidence in your life.

A friend is NEVER a co-incidence in your life. They enter your life at the right time ... be it for a brief moment or a lifetime ... to fulfill a need in you. They bring joy, laughter and tears and their impact on your life always leaves positives behind.

I’m so glad I have so many AWESOME friends in my life.

I’m having a gloomy sort of day. I’d been so looking forward to the Grey Lynn Park Festival this weekend ... and it’s been CANCELLED. Over 400 stall-holders have spent weeks preparing for this event. Bad weather has been forecast for Saturday and this has apparently caused the cancellation. 

Those white cotton-wool clouds spread across my sky this afternoon.

It’s a grrrrr sort of day and the grey gloomy weather is only adding to my mood. 

I’ve BEEN for a long ramble, HAD my caffeine fix AND a brioche - courtesy of Julia .... scoffed a bar of chocolate all on my lonesome .... but it hasn’t lifted my mood.

A baby Chocolat and a baby Shimmer .... they used to LOVE one another!

I was SO excited about participating in this festival.

Time to move on ... so I've been going through all my pics of the hound when she was a puppy .... that's been fun!

At least all the effort I’ve been putting in over the last few months won’t be wasted as it’s only 2 weeks to Fruit Bowl Craft Jam 2012. That’s an INDOOR 2-day market so there’s little chance of it being cancelled unexpectedly ... YAY!

She's LOVED coffee from the very beginning!

I also now get to go to Waiheke tomorrow on a wine tour. It’s a Christmas function that Gav and I were invited to but had to decline because of the Festival. Fortunately they can still accommodate us so I’m off to sample numerous varieties of Fruit of the Vine on the morrow. Better walk the hound early as I probably won’t be in any fit state to walk her on my return. 
Wine does that you know!

I was reading an article earlier about walkable cities ... ie cities where walking about them is safe, useful, comfortable and interesting. This line caught my eye and made me chuckle ... 
“Let’s have a moment of silence for all those who are stuck in traffic on their way to the gym to ride stationery bicycles.” 

She loves being brushed with the vacuum cleaner

I guess walking as much as I do makes the article more pertinent. There’s a lot to be said for re-inventing cities so as to make them more walkable. The article was specifically speaking about American cities which have effectively become no-walking cities ... but it’s probably applicable to most cities worldwide. Downtowns are easy to get to but NOT worth arriving at.  Cities are losing their sparkle. Creating a walkable city is not only socially and physically desirable but would also contribute to an increase in urban vitality. I’m all for it!

A trio of chocolate mousse!

This is what happens when you’re having a ‘grrrr’ kind of day .... you get distracted by all kinds of inane information on-line, some of which actually turns out to be kind of interesting.

Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living.

I had always thought it was fish the herons were catching ... but it's not ... it's CRABS!

Random Fact from The Nutters Club NZ

If you smile, even if you’re in a sad mood, it will immediately improve your mood. The simple action of thinking about smiling and using the muscles is enough to trigger happy chemicals in the brain.

Thank you Nutters Club!

Gav and I walked to the view site at midnight last night. Yes -  it’s an odd time of the day ... or should that be night ... for me to be out on a ramble but the hound didn’t mind. I needed some feel-good endorphins and rambling does that for me. There are other things that do that too, but I wasn’t in the right frame of mind for exercising that option.

Storm clouds gathering overhead on this morning's ramble

I’ve not walked up there at midnight before. It’s a completely different feeling .... eerily spooky!

I think I might do it again!

The hound of course wanted to detour to the beach and was a tad confused when we turned up Cliff Road instead of crossing it. Swilling sea-water of a wet hound and rubbing her dry with a towel at half past midnight ISN’T my idea of fun though.

The sea is inky black and the tide’s full. It looks menacing and for once, I’m glad I’m not walking next to the waves. I can almost SEE the tentacles reaching out to ensnare me. Yes  .... I have way TOO vivid an imagination!

.... and a most appropriate quote, courtesy of Dr. Seuss!

“Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living: It’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of the telescope.”

Don’t you just love it!

It’s fascinating walking past people’s houses after midnight and seeing how many of them are still up and watching TV. Well, they look as if they’re watching TV as the TV’s visible and it’s on but for all I know, they could be sleeping. That’s what happens in my house. Switching on the TV seems to automatically close the eyelids of a certain member of this family ... no names mentioned.

The sun was out this afternoon so we walked down to Kohi Beach ... it was chilly!

The expression ‘You snooze, you loose’ took on new meaning the other day. We’d been watching a movie on TV and eating CHOCOLATE .... the edible kind .... YUM! A certain family member had fallen asleep with the last piece of chocolate perched on their knee! One lemming quietly reaches out, grabs the prize .... and EATS it! I think it was even yummier because it wasn’t meant to be his!

Crop Circles in the rocks!

But back to my midnight ramble and the sights you see. The residents of Cliff Road quite obviously don’t realise their interiors are so well lit up at night-time. The majority don’t close their curtains or blinds and you can see every aspect of whichever room is lit up .... and the antics and state of dress/undress of any and all occupants of those rooms. We won’t dwell on that though.

I’m curious. Why are there so many fishing boats out at midnight? What is the draw? Do the fish REALLY bite better in the middle of the night when the sun’s in bed? How do they know where the fish are biting when there aren’t any birds to guide them? 

So many questions and for once, Google,  that ‘purveyor of all information inane’, HASN’T been able to provide me with a satisfactory answer!

Even DUCKS have murderous tendencies!

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.” 

~ Robbie Louis Stephenson

I discovered today that EVEN ducks have murderous tendencies.... or is it just all that male testosterone pumping through them?

Spring has definitely sprung at the reserve and the ducks are getting amorous. The drakes at times take it to new levels. Miss Duck is swimming along with two males vying for her attention. She quite obviously wasn’t responding so they took matters into their own hands. In their quest to get her attention they ALMOST drowned her! 

Yep .... I didn’t think it was possible to drown a duck but these two drakes gave it a good go

 ... AND nearly succeeded!

Escape!!

It was a mass of feathered bodies as heads went this way and that. Most of the time I could only see TWO heads as the third one was submerged under the water. She escaped with ruffled feathers but virginity still intact. I’ve never seen a duck paddle away QUITE as fast as she did!

Even the hound was pushing the boundaries today and had to be spoken to sternly when she kept wanting to take Shadow’s new ball. She thought his ball was MUCH more exciting than the Chiefs ball - it squeaked and was green and shaped like a small rugby ball. It DIDN’T help that Shadow kept pinching her ball ... she thought that was an open invitation from him to take his!

That’s when her training and discipline come to the fore. Despite the temptation she did listen and dropped Shadow’s ball and picked up her own. It’s a HUGE ask of her though as she LOVES anything that’s different. I had to reinforce the commands ALL the way round the reserve! I reckon Shadow’s ball was talking to her .... just like the chocolate in the pantry talks to me!

I did something cool and funky yesterday .... I  put pink tips in my hair .... JUST a few and JUST on the one side. I wanted to do something different and FUN and I’m delighted with it! It’s BRIGHT pink and the flash of colour is gorgeous! That’s what’s so fun about it .... you see a flash of pink from one side but not on the other ... it makes you wonder if you were seeing things. I LOVE that!!

Sam making sure no other hound pinches Chocolat's ball!

Pink is one of my FAVOURITE colours .... not that you would have guessed!

The family just chuckle ... they think I’m crazy and things like this just confirm it for them. The friends who’ve seen it think it’s cool and the girls at the Co-op loved it. They thought I should have had put more in and maybe NEXT time I will.

Oh yes .... there will be a NEXT time!

"The essence of pleasure is spontaneity." 

~ Germaine Greer

Sam trying to bring BOTH balls back to the side!

Frankie!