Visiting the city of Palmerston North!

it
Hi All
The very welcome rain has at last fallen over the Nelson region.....just in time to dampen all of the kids walking to Brightwater School this morning with Hamish Carter and Debbie Tanner!! Didn't dampen our spirits though......one of our wee lads piped us all the way..... the walk was followed by a Sanitarium breakfast...raspberry ricies, Apricot and Yoghurt kornies, Berry Bix and the old standby.....hearty weetbix ( not popular) and endless boxes of Up and Go. A fun breakfast, maybe lacking in a bit of nutrition!! The reason for all this fuss and celebration....our school were the NZ Winners ...for the second year in a row of the Walk to School Campaign!! Yeah, go Brightwater!

Anyways, Jeff, I am will be in the city of Palmerston North this Tuesday and Wednesday, 1 and 2 May...a brief visit. Will be a Whakarongo school both days. Our meeting agenda suggests that we have the evenings free, sometimes these meetings lead to informal networking so at this stage am thinking I will be able to catch up with you and Kate - if your schedule allows - for a coffee, meal of something! I have your cell number so will give you a call during the afternoon....my phone is 021 1521166...am good at losing my phone so don't panic if i don't reply immediately!!

First games of rugby and netball tomorrow for Tracey and Tim....... here's hoping the rain eases by morning, but then if it didn't we could all haveone of those sleeping in mornings!! Hmmmmm!

Mum and Dad are over late tomorrow to play bowls all day Sunday in Motueka and then they are off home on Monday.

Monday sees us celebrating Tracey's birthday....17! The party is next Friday night......... if they all have an early netball game on the Saturday maybe we won't get to have a really late night!!!

Was travelling home from town tonight to be stopped by polie officers at a slip around the rocks......but as he approaced my car and no one elses in the queue I became a bit comncerned....however the pleasantly spoken gentleman just asked me to put my lights on....a bit embarassing!!

Enjoy the weekend everyone......

Janice

ANZAC DAY

Hi All,

Thought i'd blog quickly whilst I wait for the bad American medical dramas to start...

Yesterday was fun, managed to get up at 5 and get a good pozzy in front of the War Memorial in the Auckland Domain. 15,000 others turned up - the biggest crowd ever, which aint too bad for Aucklanders...

When the shops opened at 1am, we headed to the pet store and managed to purchase 18 new fish for the tank. It's looking really good (thank goodness) and causes no end of excitement around the flat.

Can't believe its already Thursday, I'm thinking a 4 day week could be the way of the future.

Hope everyone's week is fab

Dave

Happy Birthday

Jo Willie..................

A very happy birthday to you from all of us in Denmark.
Hope you have a great day with the family. All the best for the future.
Big regards from Brian who is already planning the design of you simmerframe.........
Take care and have a drink from us.

Cheers

Fishy quiz business

Howdy,


Well the quiz night was a huge success, seems lawyers are far superior than bean-counters when it comes to meaningless trivia... of the 8 teams from KPMG and the 8 teams from Kensington Swan, we took out the top 7 spots, with our team of secretaries finishing second last... Our team (made up primarily of law clerks) managed to end 2nd equal, needless to say we were gutted when the two awards were awarded to the best team of each company.



In other news, I bought a sixty litre tropical fish tank on sunday, somewhat of a whimsical purchase, but fun none-the-less! I've set it up, plugged in the heater and filter, put the gravel in, and the water purifiers, so it'll be ready for fish tomorrow... Mary couldn't wait for the water to settle, so we bought a trio of neon tetras (photo above) to get things started. Will send a proper photo once the turtles, frogs, fish, unicorns, gryffons, and centaurs have settled in.
Enjoy your week everyone!
Dave

Hi All
Nice to hear from you Ashley...... welcome to the new blog!

Today sees the end of the two week holiday break.....whilst it has been a great break this is the time when one thinks about all those things that could have been done over the last two weeks and weren't!! Hmmmm, I think it will be a busy week!!

We start the new term with five new kids, a new caretaker and a new teacher......should be fun!!

Amy has been home for the last two weeks,,,,,shhe has spent her days studying for midsessionals and working at Subway. Jayne flew in last Thursday and leaves on ANZAC day frio Chc ha nd Amy leaves the day after...the house will become quiet and empty again! It has been great having them both home to celebrate Willie's birthday.

Tim has spent the holidays doing quite a few rugby practices, fisihing wth his friends and catching up on eating and sleeping....... we have just bought hime some new basketball boots....size 11's!

Tracey has been working at Subway though theh holidays as well. She has also had a very social time so all in all we have not seen as lot of her!

We had a great day out in the bay yesterday, taking a water taxi from Marahau to Awaroa Lodge for lunch and home again. For any of you who have not explored this wonderful part of the country you should do so sometime! After lunch Willie, Tim, Jayne and Amy walked to Tonga Bay...about an hour away and Tracey and I explored the beach at Awaroa. There was to be a wedding on the beach later in the day and it was all set up...rather romantic!!We had a great water taxi driver who took us to some really rocky parts where we got up close and friendly with some seals....some people even touching them...they were just seal pups and swam through the water very much like dolphins...it was just great. The day was perfect, sunny, warm, calm and we were all in good spirits! We came back home to hurriedly do the last minute preparations for BBQ dinner with several friends........ it was a perfect end to our day out and about.
By the way, for those of you who don't know this celebration was all for Willie's 60th on ANZAC Day.
Amy and tracey have Subjammers night tomorrow....all partof a national contest through Subway to see who can make the best sub in under a minutes.....regional and area winners pay off and the champion sandwich artiste gets a trip to overseas....bet you never knew that sandwich making could be such fun!
Hope the new week goes well fo reveryone.....a mid week break willno doubt be enjoyed!
Love to all
JAnice

Timaru's Turn

Hi Everyone, and all that. We will go with RED, Crusaders and all that.

This blog system is great once you have access, etc.

We have had an interesting couple of weeks, Queenstown for Easter, Dunedin for Davids Admission, and a catchup day or two around here this weekend. In between I have had day trips to Auckland and Christchurch. The weather has been excellent until this weekend when we have had a bit of misty drizzle--ok for the garden.

Dunedin beckons again in 3 weeks for Davids graduation -- 12th of May -- more ceremony, drinks and meals out. Will also have a celebratory drink for Jeffs graduation in Palmy North on the 14th of May. Then 5 more weeks after that and we are off to Dubai, Turkey, Greece and Denmark. Home on the 14th of July ready for Term 3. An early Birthday Dinner with Brian and Hella is programmed for July.

Willie, I hear, has a BIG Birthday on the 25th of April. Congratulations on your 60th.

Cheers to you all, Regards Ashley and Barbara.

We are In.............................

Yep even the mad danes are on the ball.

Hello every one and about time we are back together. Blogging is like a drug (not that i know anything of that) but you do get hooked.

Life at the Harper DK house hold is quite normal. Richard is at a produktionschool in Rødekro due to the fact that there is a shortage og apprentienship places for his line of work (technical enginering) but the school pays him for being there which is good.
Christina is due for exams in the next two months. Then of to boarding school. its a sportsboarding school with 15-20 hours of sport a week. She can choose to do extra sports if she wants.
She passed her moped license two weeks ago but must wait until she is 16 to ride a moped. Don-t think Richards moped will be safe for much longer.
Thomas is getting readdy for the big A&P show. And will be in charge of feeding times at the local neighbours stables in autumn. That will keep him out of mishief.
have you all seen the homepage www.ahk.aee.dk ?
That is Thomas' hockey home page. They are all still practising as there are no clubs down here yet and travelling to CPH is too much.
Brian has finally settled on a menu for his big 50 on the 1st of august.
His is at the moment getting very intimate with a "cangahammer". He is braking up some old concrete floor to get some new down and he and Richard will have a place to put there bikes.
If anyone needs to get rid of some frustrations they are welcome to help he still have 500 square meters of stable to do.

So will put the kettle on and see you all here for some good hard labour.

see ya
Hella

Further Jeff Details.

Yo

Sorry, I forgot to mention that the new job was based in Auckland. In Princes St. I will have to investigate whether Dave is in a taller building. I know my new office is on the 3rd floor which isn't very impressive but still...

The full name of my new band is "harperama and the soul burritos" - I am playing the tambourine but we need at least 9 more people to join to give it the full sound it will need. We plan to write our own music appealing to those mixed up souls of the modern world. Our first track is called "rednecks can't read the second amendment.." It's political, it's a thinktank, it's a twist on the lefty thing but with beats.

delicious! RSS. Are you streaming your blog to your ipod? are you like hip? nice. Web 2.0 is like... so.... like....cool, man.

I've got 5 bucks on the accountants. Them number crunchers get bored quicker and thus prolly spend more time memorising non-work-related-facts (NWRF's).

Jayne. A lack of news is another way of saying a "lack of imagination" - surely you can put an amusing spin on your flatting life? perhaps regale us with stories of chem labs and chch flatting malady?

I wonder if the evil internet hackers will find this blog? i hope it is secure!

Digg it.

Jeff

Admission to the Bar

Not so gummy as the last one!

Thursday

I'm afraid I have no idea what you mean by the net coming to you, and not having to search for stuff!?! seems that until the computer knows telepathy that this is a little too much to ask? Sounds interesting though, maybe you could send me through an article? or just imagine it and i'm sure the computer will do it for you!

So pleased you've finally decided on a job Jeff! I know how torn you've been over it, sounds like a good decision to me!

My workmates took me and Mary out for dinner last night on the company credit card. It was fab - we went to a raucous Italian place with red chekered table clothes, accordian players and Italian waiters. Was brilliant. Then we headed out for a cocktail, still making up my mind as to whether or not that was a good idea...

I've got a drinks function tonight (put on by a client) which should be fun, then tomorrow is the annual KPMG vs Kensington Swan Quiz night here in the Viaduct, which I can imagine will be a fairly contested battle between accountants and lawyers.

Ciao
Dave

WOW, such a fast response from the younger generation!!

Yeah, you are all so cool to take up the new blog......what a rapid response also.........

harperama....cool name Jeff, perhaps there will be other cuzzies going harperama1, 2 and 3 etc!!

I have had a great afternoon learning all about how to make the internet come to me rather than me going out and always seeking stuff....so, do you know about RSS feeds, bloglines, Technorati and deli.cio.us ? I need more practice but can tell you heaps should you ever want to know!!

Anyways, i've picked the colour purple for my blogging so I will not have to sign off!

New job sounds interesting ??? Jeff...I can tell it is still with Fonterra....but....will you still be based in Palmerston North??

Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow Jayne, happy travelling!

Will be in touch again soon

LOL
Janice

the first post

Crikey,

We're back! Family happenings 3 - the trequel. Usually more violent than the others!

Um, yeah, so, um, yeah. I guess I have lots of news. Basically, I have been without a concrete thing to do from 8-5 for the last few months. I have been coming into work hoping something would turn up etc and doing odd jobs as they pop up. During this time I sent my resume to every person I knew hoping something would show up.

The basic question i have been trying to answer is what sort of person do I want to be. If you recognise the fact that your profession ends up shaping you (40 hours week times 30 years!! it would have to!) then this is a crucial question. I chose to simplify it into an even simpler question of do I want to be a patent attorney or a non-lawyer. In the end (and in the short term anyway) I have chosen the non-lawyer path...

After all this kerfuffle, 4 job offers and a healthy dose of anguish, I have finally secured a new job. My title is "Logistics Officer." This is a random move for me but hopefully should be excellent. The job basically involves working on projects that will help Fonterra streamline its shipping operations. Sounds dry but it isn't - trust me! So the question now is "How do we ship 2 million tonnes of product cheaper/faster/in better condition?"

Wedding is March 15th at the Garrison Church, Sydney. Its a big old church and everyone will be invited (including cuzzies!!!). Easter is the week after so hopefully this will allow everyone to take a wee break and enjoy the sites...

Am off to Holland with a bit of luck too. I hope to leave after Dave's grad around the 15th of May...

Thats enough from me.

Jeff.

PS I have acquired the email address: harperama@gmail.com. Am sure many of you would also like this beauty but too bad. Please email me at work tho for the time being as it is my only source of internet and gmail is blocked from here...

The blog.. again

Hi All,
Was surprised to get an email about the blog going again. Thanks mum... Loved the instructions too, aren't you just showing off!!
Congratualtions Davey for being admitted to the bar. Hard out.
Not much is happening here, I am in Christchurch at the moment, although I go home tomorrow in time for dad's birthday. Have been trying to catch up on work, but just being on holiday and not doing much is quite a good option right now.
Might blog later when I have something interesting to say.
Bye
~ Jayne

Look who's back!

Hello All,

3rd time lucky on the blog! Let's hope this sees out the year, they are such a good contact avenue for us all!
As I'm sure everyone is aware, I was admitted to the bar in Dunedin on Friday, which basically just means I can now practice as a barrister and solicitor (well, once the firm pays for my practicing certificate...). It was a great day in Dunedin, snow on the hills, piercing cold winds and heavy showers. The ceremony itself was nice - a little pomp and circumstance as we all donned our wigs and gowns and read oaths - but rather quick and no room for boredom.
Mum's parents came down from Waimate for it which was great, though grandma was definitely the first of many to fall asleep on the couch in the pub...

Hope everyone is fit and well,
Keep on bloggin'!

Dave

Welcome back

WOW, at last, here we go again....good luck and happy blogging!

Janice