"What have you been up to?"

Hi All,

Here we are Christmas, and a New Year is fast approaching. Over the last couple of days I have been thinking over the past year and what we have done / achieved.

I have been making contact with a few old friends lately and invariably the question comes up, “What have you been up to?” and the equally predictable response spills out of my mouth, “Not much.” Days, weeks, months and years come and go, and it becomes very easy for the events of the past to merge into the mundane, non-committal and non-descript ‘not much.’ So I sat down and listed the main events of the last year, and hopefully remind myself that ‘not much’ is ‘quite a bit’.

I will start a little more that a year ago, 25 November 2007 to be exact. That was the day that I became a Grandad. Reuben (my son) and Erin (his long-term fiancée) became the proud young parents of Victor. He was a beautiful wee boy, but to be perfectly honest, I am not sure if I was more proud or concerned. I was all too aware of what it is like to be a young parent and the trials and tribulations that I know that they will have to face. But despite all of those feelings I am pleased for the two of them and, it’s taken a while, but I have grown used to the idea as well. Of course it helps that he is such a gorgeous kid. He had his birthday last month. 1 year old … wow! Already! And at the risk of repetitiveness, he really is gorgeous. It really is quite exciting when you see them, crawling, walking, and starting to interact and express their personalities. They had a little delayed birthday party on the 30th November, very low key, but good to see the family. The reason for the delay is another story.

As usual Reuben lives life at 100mph. I have never seen anyone with more energy and such a positive action no matter what life throws at him. I used to wonder why someone who is a self proclaimed geek is so popular with everyone around him. I have come to appreciate that it his positive attitude and his genuine interest in everyone and everything around him. Behaviour breeds behaviour, he brings out the best in all of us, and for that I am very proud of him. He is also a very busy young man. He is still studying for his Bcom at Auckland Uni, doing the maximum papers each semester of course. He graduates in May, and will be spending this year doing Post Grad. He also works three different jobs, all part time, and is a busy dad doing the usual domestic duties. His latest endeavour is he has joined the Territorial Army. He did his first round of basic in October/November, and loved it. I wondered at first why he would want to do that as well, but I also understand that it is so different to everything else that he does that in one sense it is ‘time out’.

Hamish? Well Hamish is Hamish. He just lets life pass him by. I was very please that in the later part of this year he has got into full time employment, installing windows (both Commercial and Domestic). He seems to be loving it and enjoying his workmates so for that I am doubly pleased. He seems to do life hard sometimes, which worries me. But then as parent even when they are fully independent you still worry don’t you. J

New Year started well this year, we spent New Year in Taranaki (Inglewood) and New Years day was the day we climbed to the summit of Mt Egmont (Mt Taranaki). It was a long climb, but the view and the feeling of being on top of the world, was worth it. It really is a magical place.

It was anniversary weekend that we bought ourselves body boards. I hear you asking “why?” But I don’t think I have had so much fun since I was a kid. If you don’t have them I would suggest you go and buy one and rediscover your inner child. It’s well worth the trip. I nice reminder not to take life too seriously.

In a similar vein, Justine and I started dancing lessons in February. Learning, or at least being taught, a mixture of Latin and Ballroom dances. It re-confirms the fact that I have two left feet, but it is a lot of fun. Where is the fun in life if you can’t laugh at yourself? Anyway, after a year of struggling though the ‘quick-quicks’ and the ‘slow-slows’ we decided that we should front up and do a medal test. We thought that we had being doing this long enough and could skip a stage … well … we had no idea that this was so serious!!!! Justine did OK, but I did VERY badly. But we both passed, more out of sympathy than dexterity displayed I feel. But we got our certificate, little pin and at least we have something to show for our time.

Someone at work had the bright idea that we should all do the ‘Round the Bays’ this year. Well as it transpired it was another case of all talk and no action. Justine, Aisha and I were the only ones that fronted up and participated. Hmmm. Oh well, it was a good day out in the sunshine with thousands of other sweating bodies shuffling along in close proximity. Now that’s my idea of a Sunday morning well spent in the spirit of team building.

Justine and I bought ourselves Road bikes in April. The idea being that we have spent so much time walking around that we would like to go a little further and discover new sights and sounds. For a while I was riding to work everyday (which did help the fuel bill). But I became a bit wary of riding on wet and dark nights, the night that I got bowled off. Not too much damage to me, but it has made me a little more cautious.

We also bought ourselves DSLR Cameras in April. Sad I know, but we got matching Nikon D80s. I’ve had a lot of use out of mine, Justine not so much. I’ve even managed to get a couple of photography assignments for work out of it, which provides a bit of a break in the mundane.

- Chistchurch in April. Our first anniversary of being together.
- Awhitu for a weekend in April
- Sydney for four days in May (Queens Birthday) Justine stayed on for a conference
- Rotorua in August
- Taupo Labour Weekend

In September I did a first aid course through work. We needed someone with a first aid certificate and so I put up my hand. It is something that I have always wanted to do.

In October we started tennis lessons. Justine played as kid, but I didn’t have that privilege, I was completely green. Once again, it’s been a lot of fun. And I think I may be marginally better than I was.

We signed up for a Photography class in November. Well what a waste of time that was. I didn’t learn a single thing. The tutor despite proclaiming his professional status had definitely substandard samples to show us. I think I have learnt more just by doing and reading.

Yes I am still a member of Toastmasters. I received my AC-S (Advanced Communicator Silver) earlier in the year and am now only two speeches away from my Gold, which I will get in the New Year. Justine received her Silver recently and then left Toastmasters to give herself more time for other things.

We planned a trip to Italy this year (six weeks in September), but it fell through. Well more accurately, my employer wouldn’t give me the time off. Huge disappointment as it was something that we have both wanted for a very long time, and we lost the deposit on the tickets we had reserved as well. So we decided (about February this year) that I would leave work and do a bigger trip next year. So our planning has started.

We went to the Travel Expo in November and bought tickets. We leave on the 06 May 2009 bound for Rome. 24 hour stopover in Singapore. We plan to spend 6 weeks in Rome and then … Hmmm … still working on that J So far we have Tickets / Insurance / Car for six months / Packs / Sleeping bags / Some clothes. Very, very exciting, particularly since we don’t know when we will be coming back. Justine has 14 months leave of absence from her work. I am organising a ‘Right of abode’ for the UK which means that that I can live and work there indefinitely. So who knows what the future may hold. Those cameras will come in handy J

Well that’s about all that I can think of that has happened over the last year. So “what have we been up to?” “Not much, but we’re going for a bit of a trip next year.”

Merry Christmas to you all and Happy New Year.