BREAKING NEWS - HUGH AND CLARE GET ENGAGED 24/5/01,
Click here for the full details
Hugh-Hugh grubs and the like
March 10th was the Wildfoods Festival so Phil, Clare and I trekked over the Alps to partake in some feril festivities.
We left fairly early in the morning (well early for me anyway!), the traffic was steady but not too bad.
I was of course fairly familiar with the road but we saw one pile up on the way in.
We pitched Phil's tent at a local primary school that was (and rightly so) making some money by letting tent sites
out on the field.
We had feared that we might be miserable in the tent if it rained so we had sprayed it thoroughly with waterproofing.
It was of course a scorcher that day ( I had to buy a hat) and really nice weather that night.
The waterproofing was an extremely effective seal, so much so that the test didn't breath and developed severe
condensation from all our breathing.
Ironically by morning the whole of the inside of the tent was dripping condensation like rain.
Still I tried a few things I've not had before; Hu-Hu grubs, Kava, Emu, Octopuss and the usual whitebait and wildpork
etc.
So I can totally recommend the Wildfoods Festival - it's full fun and I will probably be back next year.
A DVD 4 ME
One of our suppliers at work was selling off some ex demo stock which included a DVD player. I'd already
been looking at this particular model which was good value anyway and had all features I wanted (multizone/zone
switchable, even plays MP3's!). If you haven't seen a DVD, the clarity is like putting glasses on.
Anyway I bought it as it was only $399 ex Demo - then it broke, wouldn't work, so it got replaced meaning I got a new
unit for the ex-demo price... Great! I've got it all hooked up in home theater surround sound, so it's
really impressive. When people asked me what I wanted for my birthday I said "this DVD and that DVD" so I
have a really good selection now, what more could a boy want!!
Xpress Xmas
You know how Xmas 2000 was a Monday, well I was over on the coast and didn't get back till late Friday Night.
I still managed to get all my shopping done on Saturday and Sunday even though I had NO idea what to get anyone!
The Host of Christmas Past
I've HAD to change hosting sites about November 2000 due to my other hosters going bust.
I had a good search around for what was the best value at the time and came up with
'Webfarm' who had been around
since 1997 - donkeys years in this business. Now I would be seriously looking at
'Megahost'. All the various deals depend on the space you
require, I have this site, a whole pile of e-mail and some other pages that I use just myself for work but even then
I'm struggling to get anywhere near 50MB! Of course lean is better as far as download times but it's always a
compromise due to the fact that graphics provide much of the interest in a site.
The Wild Food Vestibule
Eeloysius (we butched the name Aloysius -{normally pronounced Al-o-ishus, ours is Eel-o-ishus.
Wierd spelling I had to look it up))
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My Stream down the back has eels. It's sort of a tourist attraction, I started feeding them old
eggs but found grated cheese is the thing that puts them in a feeding frenzy. They fight over it and
it's really cool. There are mainly 3 eels that feed in my section of stream. The one that's been around
for the longest is a greeny eel called Eeloysius.
The trouble with feeding the eels is that ducks hear the commotion and come
down for some food too. That wouldn't normally be a problem but they bring their cute downey
"peep peep peep"ing ducklings too. Eels are higher up the food chain than ducklings, so we try to
chase them away with sticks etc (you feel really mean). As always Helen the cat is hanging around
licking her lips as she peers into the stream.
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The Baxendale Kiwi Safari
We were pleased to have Clare's parents come over for a two week holiday in early December 2000.
Like Clare I took two weeks off work to play tour guide and have a holiday myself.
Smack bang in the middle weekend my work had it's Christmas party in Napier so I
flew up for that, while Clare stayed home and spent some quality time with her
Mum and Dad.
Some of the things we/they did locally are (I've probably forgotten tons by now):
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Short trips we went on
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- TransAlpine-
Scenic train trip across the Alps via Arthurs Pass (while I was away - I drive it enough anyway,
(but it is spectacular)
- Drove 'round Lyttleton Harbour to Sumner
- through Cashmere
- Stop at the old roadhouse Sign of the Takahe (featured in the film Frightners
- Michael J Fox) to look at ChCh from the lookout
- Carry on up to next roadhouse Sign of the Kiwi and walk the 50 metre track to
the lookout over Lyttleton Harbour - can see Diamond Harbour and shipwrecks
near Quail Island - describe how Quail Island was a quarantine island and how it's
the volcano's plug - used my binoculars
- Drove down and called into Corsier bay, lovely sheltered beach.
- Drove around to Lyttleton (featured in the film Frightners
- Michael J Fox) and bought an ice cream (good one's) from a DAIRY!
- Drove around further on the Harbour road (views of the heads)
- Drove down into Sumner
- Bite to eat in one of the nice Cafés in Sumner
- Drove up to park at the top of Taylor's Mistake Road (Great views and often see
paragliders)
- Drove around some of the nice houses on Sumner hill (or what ever it's called)
- Drove back into town
- West side of the city - Arts Centre - Tram (city loop goes through new regent
street and the Cathedral Square, has a commentary- Museum - Botanic Gardens - Hagley
park
- Monavale
- Akaroa - cheerful french settled village - full of character, nice food and coffee.
For a good insite check out the Akaroa web site
On the way in:
- Little river has a great café which burnt down. Fortunately they built a
new one
- The Hilltop tavern is a great spot for photos of inner Akaroa Harbour - you can
see Onawe the plug for this Harbour's volcano and site of a Maori fort or Pa - can
walk onto this at low tide
- Drove past French farm winery and Barry's Bay cheese Factory round past
Duvauchelles (where Oliver's boatshed is)
- On the last bend just before the downhill into Akaroa there is a great viewing
spot for a photo of the village.
In Akaroa
- Tree Crop Farm (I call it the LOVE SHACK! It's up the same road as the
sign posted herb farm only further) - very interesting café/retreat.
When you walk in there first you notice is the beautiful sunny, colourful
cottage garden. The main house has little sayings and anecdotes all over/in
it written in chalk on the deep blue walls. I can spend hours just reading
them - they are mostly humourous. The section is very large with a stream
running through the middle of the valley that it sits in. There are lots of walks
you can do, in fact sometimes MUST do. The proprietor often won't serve you
anything if you've not taken 10 minutes to wander around the gardens - reading the
anecdotes on the signs on the way and generally chilling out. I assume this keeps
bad vibes/stressed people/hurried people out of the communal area. The property
has several shacks you can stay in if your retreating. They have no power at all
Some have pot-belly stoves or open fires etc. You see lots of loving couples there
connecting or reconnecting, I even saw an old bed frame that sat across the trickling
stream - which is when I conjured up the name The Love Shack - it's stuck.
- Museum - Describes the settlement of Akaroa etc.
- Bully Hayes - Great food
- Walked along the Main street (rue Lavaud), the sea front and the pier.
- All the street names are french so I figured the Cinema must be on Rue d'Movie (Joke! Rude Movie?!?)
- Fish and chips went down well - they were astounded by how cheap they
- Checked out the Wildlife in the stream (Eels Ducks, Cats [not in the stream but paying alot of attention])
were.
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| Travels further afield
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- Darfield - this took us to the inland scenic route (just below the southern alps)
- Rakia Gorge
- Geraldine (Bought Barker's preserves at the factory shop there)
- Tekapo and Pukaki - beautiful coloured lakes that never come out on film as brilliant as you see them, the
water is coloured a fantastic teally blue by the mineral flour from the glacial grinding of the rocks on the
mountains that feed them (or something like that)
- Wanaka - Stayed a night here - had a healthy hearty breakfast and walked
around the lake (part way...it's BIG!!)
- Arrowtown
- Queenstown went up the Gondola, went to the bird park, drove around Lake Wakatipu to Glenorchy,
had a great meal at The Chambers Restaurant (a recently converted council chambers)
- Te Anau
- Clare's Parents went on a cruise through Doubtful sound
- Clare and I went on a hike up to 'Key Summit'
It was mainly bush walk through the native forest - lovely bird calls, trees smoothered by moss, etc. It was on
the whole fairly easy going but the weather started to pack in. We were actually almost pleased because we invested
in these liteweight REALLY waterproof parkers (made by Columbia) that morning, (the weather forcast was a bit dodgey!)
When we got out of the bush line we became really exposed to the wind which was racing up the mountain side and was
honestly making us lose our footing quite a bit due to it's strength. I was fairly obvious we were part of a cloud as
whisps of cloud were racing past us about the speed of a reasonably fast car. I was fairly invigorated by the
conditions and so I dramatised the situation by pretending I was Ed Hillary. When we reached the key summit there were
little laminated brouchers to use for the loop track. They explained how the plants were all stunted by the harsh
conditions and we certainly could understand why. It was like walking through some magical japanese garden with
naturally bonzai'ed trees (some of the beeches were 100 yrs old and still only 5 foot high!) and things fading in and
out of view with the dreamy fog/cloud blowing past. Visablity usually hovered around 5-20 meters.
Last time I walked up the track it was fine weather and I painted the painting that is in the 'pictures' section
of "the huge freezer", this time I could see none of the mountainous vistas but it was alright because it was
really moody and your focussed more on the immediate surroundings.
| What we should have seen
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| What we saw instead |
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- Dunedin - Larnoch Castle, Baldwin Street (Steepest street in the world), Albatross/Seal/Tourist Colony
- Moraki boulders
- Southbridge - to visit my sister's family
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Oi-lympics
Watching all these fit people turned me into a couch potato.
Three things stood out:
- The Opening Ceremony - Spectacular! - Loved it
- Cathy Freeman - absolutely had to win after all the hype - is that why the french
contestant got threats? (All a bit sus!!)
- Aggro - Those competitors that had to punch the water, yell at the crowd and
prance around like WWF wrestlers, well ...what's that all about? They need to chill
out with some steroid/training enhancer antidotes. I say all the medals should
go to the humblest competitors, being good winners probably says more about the
country you represent than the how fast or powerful you are, then again I'm just a kiwi
with medal envy.
(Archived from 13/9/00)
The Great Kiwi Concert
Saw Tim Finn, Dave Dobbyn and Bic Runga in concert the other night - doesn't get
much better than that bunch.
Click here for a review which I actually quite
agree with
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The Redheaded Baron - Flying Ace |
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Having finished a demo over at Buller District Council, there was a $10K data
projector available for the weekend, an opportunity too good to miss. I had recently
purchased the Microsoft Combat Flight simulator and a flight stick. The setup went
something like this
- tarpaulin over the windows to block out all light
- Stereo speakers up really loud!
- Paintings off the wall
- Data projector setup to cover the whole wall
- The boys around, Clare doing girly shopping
A great time was had by all. Amid the boys shouting "PULL UP!! PULL UP!!!" to the
pilot of a damaged spitfire, the flight stick came out worse for wear. The casing
split with the desperate maneuvering, but nothing some duct tape hasn't fixed.
www.ihugh.co.nz -and don't you forget it!
- ihugh - Internet Hugh
- ihugh - you jane
- ihugh!- gesundheit (achoo through a big nose) caught a cold in the Huge Freezer
- ihugh - Ice Hugh (Huge Freezer again)
What ever you want it to be that's the name anyway.
I figured it should be easy to remember because it is so similar to that crappy
internet company. I was with them but found them totally unresponsive.
I wanted my homepage on their list of homepages and asked why it wasn't -
I got a response "script looks broken will look at it in the next few days".
Following this up over 7 months with 7 e-mails I got no response.
I sent an e-mail to their support person and got an automated response listing
common problems. At the bottom of the automated e-mail it said if this hasn't helped
please send an e-mail to...and it was the same address that sends the automated
response. I tried, so I could say I did, and got another automated response.
I sent a letter to complaints and some other departments and never received a
reply, I thought I might complain about the complaints dept. so I rang a lad who bore
the brunt of my frustration hey followed it up, I got an e-mail to my ISP mail account
that I don't ever use and told them not to use. It said they don't really "have the
time for fixing it", and they "are under no contractual obligation to fix the problem"
- Not good enough sorry, it is a service they blatantly advertise and they should
remove it altogether if it doesn't function properly, especially if they don't even
intend to fix it.
So now that I have "www.ihugh.co.nz", I am receiving lots of e-mail from people that
are intending their mail to go to "anyusername@ihug.co.nz" but because
they have big fingers when they get to the "g" in ihug they hit the "h" as well (they
are next to each other on the keyboard) so it comes to
"anyusername@ihugh.co.nz". Of course the user doesn't exist on my domain
so it gets sent to me to deal with. So far I've had lawyers letters, health care
big-wigs memo's, smootchie E-cards, sad sad begging from jilted lovers and lots of good
jokes. This is how Politicians get in trouble! Well I've actually been very
responsible about it so far. One thing cracks me up more than anything, is those
disclaimers that say "if you are not the intended recipient do not read this
document" they always put them at the end of the document - you have to read the rest
of it to get there. Then are you allowed to read the disclaimer?
Burnie Frazer
Here's a tale of caution. I spotted this mark on the bedroom wall one day and it
left me wondering what had caused it. It was definately a burn mark in a streak
across the wall. I finally came to the only logical conclusion. Clare has a makeup
mirror that is concave and it usually sits on her bedside dresser. The mirror must
have been at exactly the right focal length to pinpoint enough of the sun's heat on
the wall to burn through the paint. As the sun moved across the sky the shallow arc
it made scribed a complementary one on the wall. I just thank heavens it didn't catch
fire completely. We don't keep it there anymore!
Several months later on a bitterly cold Friday night I fixed my self a hottie
and was so tired I didn't put it in a cover. I also stupidly filled it with boiling
water. I found it far too hot to keep on me so I lay it beside me and went to sleep.
I must have moved my leg up against it again because I woke to find my leg burnt to
blistering next to where the hottie was. It amazes me that I didn't wake up or move
away and it just shows how you could easily sleep during a house fire with all the
smoke putting you into a deeper sleep.
(Archived from 18/8/00)
Clare and I celebrated going out 4 years last Saturday. We went to
"Saggio di vino"
and both had the most divine meals, I started with the bluff oysters in balsalmic vinegar
Then I made a pig of myself with the truffles
Fresh Breast of Duckling with Truffles.
Aromatised with shaved Truffles inserted under the skin, slowly roasted,
served with Sarladaise potato and a Madeira and Truffle jus, accompanied
by mixed salad greens.
Clare had the Crayfish risotto - I tried a bit. It was D-licious, the sauce was a
concentrated crayfish flavour that they make from boiling up the crayfish body once
the meat is extracted. It was complimented with just the right amount of lovely
fresh herbs.
Risotto di Aragosta Risotto Parmigiano, accompanied by 50 grams of fresh
Crayfish meat in a sauce Armoricaine.
Next I had the Crème Brûlée. Clare passed on dessert. However once she'd sampled one
spoonful we decided to share it evenly. We finished with coffee and truffles but
this time "au chocolat". It was one of those meal experiences that you look back
and remember the tastes as you gaze trance like into the distance and start
dribbling. I'm sure lots of people are falsely committed that way!
Anyway I noticed an affiliation logo that they had on the menu and asked the woman
serving us about it. It was the "slow food movement"
that was founded in the 1970's to (in a very dualist sort of way) combat the
barstardisation of food culture by the fast food industry. "Relax... Taste... Enjoy..."
-it started in Europe of course but is worldwide now and I think it's a bloody good
idea. The woman at the restuarant bought out their magazine which is great
(the website only gives you a limited idea).
(Archived from 16/06/00)
When Pigs fly
We ordered our second thing off the web the other day. We wanted a cookbook that wasn't in the
shops here and decided to go for a web purchase. Rather than seeing the profits
go offshore to Amazon.com we decided to go through
www.flyingpig.co.nz
which is from what I understand really Whitcoulls cyberified, and I don't know if this is
New Zealand owned but at least it will have staff in a NZ warehouse somewhere.
While I'm on the subject of flying pigs - many of you people will have had dreams
of flying - but did you know that pigs are one of the few animals we eat that have REM dream
states.
Here's a couple of lists:
| REM Dreaming |
Non REM dreaming
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- Humans (even a fetus past 3 months old)
- Cats (you've probably seen there paws twitching)
- Dogs (Likewise)
- Horses
- Pigs
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- Fish (don't know about whales)
- Sheep
- Cows
- Birds
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Get the picture. I don't know if many of you saw that documentary on TV about the
sow crates with those pigs confined so they couldn't turn around for months on end,
but it's pretty disgusting. Pigs are, despite their looks very intelligent
animals and that sort of treatment is abhorrent. And here endith the sermon! I just wish I didn't like bacon,
ham and pork so much!
(Archived from 29/05/00)
You say "couch Potaahto", I say "couch Potato", Lets call the
whole thing orf
We recently had our lounge suites arrive. We have since decided to allow only magazines
of distinction to feature our house rather than selling to all the Home magazines.
YYYEEESSS !!!
Eat your Hartnell out David
I'm not one to Gossip but... Rumour has it that Olly missed the boat
AND
I'm not one to Gossip but... Rumour has it that Philthy
Logan's has caught a Plane
(Archived from 08/05/00)
Just another Lemon tree...NOT!
The new guy at work says our Lemon tree has a bit of a reputation
around the neighbourhood. He and his wife kept walking past and were
bugged by all the fruit going to waste. They had even discussed it with their
neighbours who felt like-minded about the whole scandalous loss. The fact
that I had several children knocking at the door asking for lemons makes it all
ring true (good on those parents sending the kids out to do the dirty work!)
Book me in for the WildWestFoodFest
I had two trips to the West Coast with work this last week and a half.
On the second one the Otira pass was closed so I had to go Lewis pass there and
back. Knowing this was coming up I hired some talking books from the library and
played them in the car. I got through all of the Hobbit and ¹/
3 of the way through a Terry Pratchet Discworld book.
Pretty good for someone who's only read 4 fiction books in his whole life!
They're a good bunch on the coast -I'm definitely going to the next "Wild food
festival". Forget WWF get really wild with WFF.
Seasonal nesting for winter
I'm not one to Gossip but... Rumour has it that Olly
has been keeping the company of a certain female lately...
AND
I'm not one to Gossip but... Rumour has it that Philthy Logan
has been keeping the company of a certain (although different) female lately!
Dibs' PASTport
Phil West - "Extreme" International Traveller, Jetsetter on "the edge!", Airport-Adrenalin-Junkie.
Rumour has it that Dibs attempted an international departure with an expired
passport!
(Archived from 29/03/00)
upstream without a ...
I had a letter from the bank the other day. It was addressed to Mr Frazerpaddle!
Ferretor 'a funny thing happened on the way
through the checkout the other day'
While making a purchase at the local Supermarket (Century Supervalue), the staff
and customers were aghast at the sight of a ferret being walked on a leash just
outside the door. In making smalltalk with the checkout girls I passed comment
that "I wouldn't be letting that in my trousers!". This was met with an over the top
response of doubling over bursts of laughter in between trying to maintain a straight
face. Now I thought this a little strange but was quite pleased at my ability to
assert my wit. It was only in the car park that I realised my fly was gaping open.
I'm Better! (Archived from 04/03/00)
Well after my bout of "Huemonia" I'm feeling a lot better (bar some late nights -
more on that later).
Having sent out a general call for sympathy e-mails I
found a distinct division between the e-males' and e-females' replies. I think the
the girls win hands down in the nurturing stakes -not difficult considering I had replies
like:
- You are weak. Only the strong shall survive to conquer the Universe.
You seed should not be allowed to contaminate the gene pool.
- Harden up, you wanna go for coma tonight?
- Poor bastard - that's the one that turns your bollocks into sunshine raisins
and causes severe constipation that makes it feel like you are shitting out
concrete blocks lined with heavy duty sandpaper.
- Harden up "Hiew in the liew". Spoke with you mum - she says "Why don't
you have a nice pot of tea and a couple of rusks!"
- Hugh , sympathy will be forth coming once due period of pain & suffering
has been endured
The girls were of cause very caring and concerned. I must thank you all for
the flowers, back rubs, sponge baths, lovely foodstuffs and kind words*
(*Clare figures well in these thank you's).
My new game "Outcast"
I got hooked on a limited demo game from a magazine and then saw it on special for
$60 so decided to get it. I find it to be just the right ratio of adventure game to
shoot'em up, has great production and an appealing sci-fi type theme. This has
meant many LATE nights.
I can thoroughly recommend it although I did need to download the patches to get it to
load properly. If you want to see more:
CLICK HERE for the outcast web site
(You'll need to pick HTML or flash version to get into the guts of it).
ARCHIVED from (21/02/00)
I've got Pneumonia
I've been "not-doing-much" because of it. Poor me!
Click here for my Sick story in Real Media
Party to a Murder
