We are now officially into the autumn season, which brings some rain and cooler temperatures. In fact, we have been utilizing our “log-burner” most nights the last couple weeks, and even had a fluke, one-time, night frost a couple weeks ago. Despite the fairly mild temperatures, it takes a log or two every night to make up for the lousy (or lack of) insulation, inefficient windows and doors and total lack of central heating. The owner of our little house tells us that the walls are insulated with R-3 batts. What they refer to as insulation in the floor is actually a single layer of foil attached to the underside of the sub-floor. That’s it. These were government standards 10 years ago. I do hope they’ve stepped it up a notch since
then. I have a confession. Father, I knowingly and willfully ate farmed salmon. I can only hope my Alaskan friends can see it in their hearts to forgive me (and Chris, too). I suppose if I were truly honest with myself, I’d go and rip the “Fiends don’t let friends eat farmed fish,” bumper sticker off my guitar case, but I think I’ll leave it as a reminder of what a bad person I am. We actually did this thing at the invitation of some neighbors, at an end-of-season feed at the salmon farm (See photo); one consolation being that it’s a landlocked facility where there seems to be little
danger of escapees contaminating the wild stock as there is in the ocean-based farms. I hereby verify that the taste and texture bears not a whole lot of resemblance to the real thing, though in their defense, they do look like fish.
Speaking of foods…I’ve been doing more than my fair share to support the NZ fruit industry, but as we get closer to winter, the goods are harder to come by, at least at the roadside stands. Peaches, apricots, berries, plums, tomatoes and nashees are gone; oranges, grapefruit and grapes are on their way out; pears, apples and feijoas and are peaked, and kiwifruit are coming on. I’ve been trying to do my ten servings a day, but it’s getting harder. Looks like I’ll be on a kiwifruit-heavy diet for a while. (FYI, they don’t call the fruit “kiwi’s…those are the people.) Of course, there are always the Ecuadorian bananas, Hawaiian pineapples and other imports at our not-so-super-market, but I haven’t caved to that. Just got some grim news from a local, organic farmer; next year is forecast to be a lousy year for avocados…30% of this year’s crop. Not much else to do but try to eat all of next year’s allotment this year.
While eating lunch on the deck the other day, and when I wasn’t loo
king, a bee dove into my juice glass for a dip. When I took a sip, it was hard not to notice a chunky thing squirming in my mouth. Unfortunately, I was slower spitting him out than he was inserting his stinger into my tongue. I debated heading for the ER, just in case my tongue should swell up and choke me to death, but didn’t. It did go away, but not before swelling into a grape-sized lump, mid-tongue. It was over in a couple hours…enough time for me to take in the lesson of not drinking before looking.
And then there’s the flood. Monday before last, it started raining around noon. It was not your ordinary rain, this was RAIN…13 inches in 9 hours. It was so loud in the house it pretty much brought conversation to a halt. All the while, I’m just thinking on the bright side, that our water tank will at least get topped off. About 9PM, we hear a crash so I looked out the back door to see what it might have been and before I confirmed that it was our firewood pile having fallen over, I see chunks of firewood, various pieces of lumber and a gas can floating through the carport and across the lawn. I don’t get any photos because it all happened after dark, certainly the most 
disconcerting time for such a thing to happen.
At that point, there was about 3 inches of water flowing through the carport, so I decided to move the car to higher ground. I donned the swim trunks and sandals and moved the car up a nearby hill. During this process of driving and wading through the neighborhood I could see that the creek that normally flows innocuously along our property boundary was way over it’s bank, 18” over the road at the end of our driveway, and our land was now part of the creek bed, with water flowing under and around the house…about 2 feet on one side…enough to completely immerse the lawnmower, which is stored under the house. (The accompanying photo of the creek is its normal level. This particular night, it was about 18" deep where I was standing when I took this photo.) Lots of firewood floated away, most of which I managed to salvage from the yard and the woods across the road the next morning. Just as quickly as the water rose, it fell. In about 20 minutes, it went from 2 feet of water at the deepest point in the yard, to just soggy grass.
Other than having to disassemble the lawnmower motor to dry it out, and water getting into the gas and oil cans there was no real damage; just another adventure at Patons Rock. The next morning, of course, all the neighbors were out surveying the damage and talking about how this has never happened and lying about how deep the water was at their house. Anyway, I managed to make three new “friends,” which more accurately tra
nslates to “I know their names.”
I’ve finally worked up the courage to ride the highways on my bike and in the past couple weeks have done my two lifetime bests for distance. To save embarrassment, I won’t say how long (or short) they actually were, but it’s nice to be able to talk about distances in kilometers rather than miles...it adds nearly 40%.
And on the subject of metric conversions, we are paying $1.94 per liter for petrol, which doesn’t sound too bad until you do the math. Since there’s 3.785 liters in a
And speaking of conservation, the Golden Bay Dump, which they call the Refuse/Recycling Center, or something similar, is a thing to behold. No, really! Entering the grounds is like entering an adventure ride in Disney World . You drive up this gentle hill on a curving road. On both sides of the road are stone outcroppings that look truly fake, with exotic vegetation and beautiful flowers growing out of the crevices (see the 2 photos). Since most flowers have died off for the season, you’ll have to imagine them. The facility itself is incredibly organized into tidy piles of like materials with places for every kind of recyclable material. Since most people around here compost all their organics, there is very, very little actual garbage (rubbish, here) that makes it to the dump that can't be recycled. Th
e cool thing is that the dump has its own “Shop,” (store). The staff scavenges anything that may be of any use to anyone, clean it up a little, and sell it in the shop to offset the price of operating the place. No prices are marked; you just ask the shopkeeper, Hitha (spelled Heather) or just make her an offer. None are refused. If you want her to keep an eye out for anything in particular, she’ll write it down and give you a call when one comes in. (Hitha and her husband have two old Studebakers. See my last post.) Exciting, eh?
Our last two evenings have been a study in contrasts. Sunday evening was the annual Harvest Feast, put on by the organization, HANDS (How About a Non Dollar System), which is a conceptually, neat system of buying and selling goods and services using vouchers as opposed to Kiwi dollars. The members-attendees were heavily dreadlocked, dashiki’d, barefoot, vegetarian, spiritual-seeking, yurt-dwelling, artistic, immigrant greenies; all very nice, thoughtful, friendly saviors of the earth and advocates of a sustainable economy and planet. It was great…good vegetarian, low-salt, fat-free, home-grown food, herbal tea, music and conversation. I'm still telling myself, “I thought we left Homer?”
Then Monday was Eucher night at the East Takaka hall, a slightly musty smelling, 100 year-old renovated, one room schoolhouse (see photo), to which we were invited by our septuagenarian n
eighbors, whom we’ve gotten to know quite well, lately (plus their 2 grown children and 3 teenaged grandchildren who are visiting for the school holiday). Oh, Eucher is a card game. The attendees there were heavily short haired, conservatively dressed, long-time residents, well-shod, well-adjusted, happy, smiling, meat-eating, paint-by-the numbers, retired Kiwi farmers. I’d guess the average age, even taking into account five teenagers, was still my age or worse. After 2 hours of highly competitive card-playing, we stayed seated for tea and tiny, crustless sandwiches (with meat, of course) and desserts of various kinds (heavy with real sugar and butter, of course), yum. I was the only one of the 40 people who had coffee (instant, of course) instead of tea. Your choices of tea; with milk or without? Winners for the evening took home bags of feijoas and walnuts and free admission to next week’s Eucher night.
I’m still looking for the venue where these groups come together.
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