Books down here are quite expensive. Our local version of Walmart, The Warehouse, had a rack of books marked "priced to clear" that were marked at $15 and higher. That's not what I consider "priced to clear." So, when I discovered that Borders had opened an outlet store downtown with books from $5 to $8 I was super excited. I had to walk by it ( Read more... )

I caught a cold the other day. Not that big a deal except finding medications down here isn't as easy as it is in the US. First of all, everything is different. There's no Nyquil or Sudafed or any of the other medicines I know. They have equivalents down here but I actually have to work to find out what they are. So, I go the medicine aisle in the ( Read more... )

The other day I was on the bus riding to work when I saw the cutest VW bus. I wasn't able to take a very good picture on my phone so I'm posting this just so you can get an idea of the size of the thing:


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I had intended to post in here on a regular basis but since it's been three months between posts, that plan's not really working out ( Read more... )

Last Friday after I posted my last entry, Shannon and I hopped a bus over to another neighborhood called New Market. The Rialto theater is hosting a documentary film festival and we had tickets for one of the movies called Kiri Wai Inner Skin. It's about a westerner exploring the significance of the Maori tattoo called a Moko. The Maori (pronounced ( Read more... )

I had intended to post a lot more frequently about getting acclimated to life here in Auckland but I had no idea how much I'd be working. In the last eleven days, I've worked about 75 hours. My store is perpetually shorthanded so we sometimes have to work 15 hour days. And let me tell you that is just brutal! 6am to 9pm is harsh.
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When we finally got through immigration, customs, and biosecurity in the Auckland airport, we found Brendon waiting for us on the other side. Brendon and Dillie were Shannon's flatmates when she was going to grad school here in 2008. Once we found out for sure that we were coming back, they began looking for a house large enough for the four of us ( Read more... )

I meant to make blog posts during the whole moving process but it just didn't work out. So instead I'll post the condensed version.
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Today would have been my father's 62nd birthday. If he had not chosen to shoot himself back in September that is. Yesterday marks three months since he did that. I have spent the last three months trying to figure out how I feel about it. It's not been easy for me because my feelings for him were never easy. He was an easy man to like but a hard ( Read more... )

With a trip to the FedEx facility in Austin today, Shannon and I replaced all the electronics that were stolen from our car last month. Shannon purchased a new camera, a fancy-dancy thing I have no idea how to operate, a couple of weeks ago just in time for our anniversary trip to The Gathering Storm signing and RenFest ( Read more... )