Tales of a Lost Sausage!

Alright we’ll get the bad bit over first – a gain of 0.9kg over the last two weeks. I wasn’t really bad but just a bit slack and I’m just not one of those people who can get away with it. Anyway got home late Saturday and got back on track on Sunday and trucking along nicely so far this week. The holiday was great but not without a few dramas. Normally we’d fly direct from Brisbane to Auckland and I’d booked our flights both from home to Brisbane and Brisbane/Auckland back in September. However just before Christmas the airline contacted me to reschedule the Brisbane/Auckland flight to an earlier time. Problem with that was that it didn’t allow us enough time to connect with our flight from home, so they had to book us on a flight via Sydney. Now on that day in at Sydney International, the central baggage conveyor broke down and a replacement part had to be flown in from overseas. So it became a logistical nightmare trying to move all that luggage. Yes you’ve guessed what’s coming – we get to Auckland at 10pm at night and along with about 50 other people on our flight have no luggage. So then it’s stand in a queue, describe your luggage, give your NZ address blah blah blah . We finally got out of there around midnight. Our poor friends had been patiently waiting for us. Trying to find out the next day what progress there had been on locating it was a real trial – on hold for anywhere between 40 minutes to an hour! We had planned to leave to go sailing with our friends on the Thursday lunchtime but delayed that by another day in the hope they’d get our stuff to us. By Friday we were no further forward and our holidays were slipping away so we shot down to the local “The Warehouse’ and bought the absolute basics – nothing too glam there! We were entitled to $100 each after 24 hours to cover emergency purchases. Anyway Bloss’s bag turned up that morning and they taxied it out to us early afternoon. But still no sign of mine. So off we went on the boat. Mine finally did turn up on the Saturday and they delivered it to our friends’ apartment. The airline would have delivered it anywhere we specified but with us being on the boat it was too much hassle to try to find a rendezvous spot. I wear a pretty ugly uniform to work – pants, shirt with reflective stripes and safety boots so holidays are an opportunity for me to wear ‘nice’ clothes albeit very casual ones. So all the feminine readers can probably relate to how it felt with only two pairs of ¾ bike pants, 3 polo shirts, 1 sarong and bathers which were a size 12 (all they had) when my top half requires a size 14 - the cleavage was incredible!! To make matters worse for the first time ever (and we travel a lot) I didn’t take any hand luggage. Because we were going on the boat I don’t use suitcases (they take up too much room) and I had bought a large ‘sausage’ type bag which had heaps of room in it so rather than take another bag with hand luggage I put everything in the sausage thinking – we’re only going to Auckland!!! So no moisturiser, medication, perfume, deodorant, hair product etc. etc. Lesson learnt – you better believe it!! Normally I’d carry all my toiletries, a change of undies and usually a spare top. Anyway I got over it – no sense in being miserable – it’s my holiday I’d be spoiling. Back to the holiday – once again we had absolutely peachy weather in NZ. We sailed to the Coromandel day 1, then next day headed round the other side to the Mercury Islands – a couple of nights there then over to Great Barrier for the next couple of nights then back to Waiheke then home. That was Thursday late afternoon and when we got back to the apartment my precious sausage was there. I think I wore about 3 different outfits in a day and a half just cos I could! We headed home Saturday morning – us to the International and our friends to the Domestic airport as they were flying down to Hawkes Bay for the Mission concert. We were quite excited about coming back home as the new deck was scheduled to be finished. It looks great – the famous lights have yet to be installed although the wiring is in place and our next task will be to oil all the timber. But it was Bloss’s birthday on Monday and our friends joined us for a baptismal beverage on it before heading to the pub for tea. Here are a couple of pictures of the famous deck - it's been a long long time in the planning stages but the end result is well worth the wait. Bloss has named it "The Corral" Hope everyone out there is having a good week - and I intend to have better things to report next week. Thanks folks for the lovely comments about my grandchildren and also for the nice one about my profile photo - I have to confess it is a couple of years old - taken at my son's wedding in November 2002 - so a bit over 3 years ago.