Finished reading Ruakaka (A Brief History), compiled by Judy Richards, 1984, $25 from the Post Office shop. Hard to believe it was written 40 years ago!
The book takes us from a presumed first settlement around 1,000 years ago to the early 1980s. 📚
While there is no certainty about the actual date of arrival of the earliest migrants to New Zealand from Eastern Polynesia … Radio-carbon dating techniques suggest that human occupation could have begun as early as 800 or 900 A.D.
There were numerous interesting snippets. Now I just wish there were a book to cover the 1980s to present day.
As the book went along I had my doubts about how things were occurring, but Kate Wells wove it all together quite cleverly in the end. A Midsummer Murder (The Malvern Mysteries Book 7). 📚
When a fatal accident shatters the peace, the weekend of relaxation descends into anything but tranquility. And Jude learns that Inigo’s connections to many of those at the retreat go back decades, and their shared secrets have been deeply buried.
This Frittata recipe from The Doctor's Kitchen is delicious.
Starting your day with a high-protein, high-fibre breakfast can really help with your energy and focus.
4 eggs, 75g cottage cheese, 25g frozen spinach, 25g frozen peas, 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed, 2 teaspoons dried oregano or parsley or tarragon, salt and pepper.
Preheat oven to 180C fan; Put mixed ingredients in lined baking dishes (1 x 16 cm x 12 cm); Bake for 30+ minutes
Sometimes the truth just slips out — we are but a line item on a spreadsheet:
… public service commissioner Sir Brian Roche on RNZ … Speaking about the recently announced 8,700 job cuts coming for the public service … : “It’s regrettable that this is going to occur, but change does require it being made – and there will be an impact on human capital.”
[Spinoff writer] There it was, as clear as day, a new way for me, a wage earner, to identify: I am human capital.
Via: Thanks to Nicola Willis and Brian Roche, I now get that I’m just human capital | The Spinoff.
Today I walked as far as the beach — 20 minutes and almost 2 Km each way.
There were two cargo ships on the horizon.
Things in my life are running very smoothly just now, for which I'm very thankful. Doesn't explain why I woke from a full-on stress dream this morning where I was supposed to be doing a thing by a deadline but one interruption after another kept hampering me.
Ugh. Weird.
After a couple of books that weren't quite what I hoped I turned to a known series; The Mystery of the Seaside Treasure (The Antique Shop Mysteries Book 7) by Judith Cutler was as good as I'd hoped. 📚
Lina isn’t thrilled when her beloved mentor Griff suggests a weekend getaway to Torquay. Instead of sun, sand and ice creams, an uninspiring antique fair and a fancy-dress ballroom dance are on the agenda.
The fair is as boring as she expects — until a miniature Japanese sculpture catches her eye.
Lina's life is changing though — I do so hope there are more to come in the series.
UGH. Bill seeking to legally define the terms 'man' and 'woman' passes first reading | RNZ News:
The Legislation (Definitions of Woman and Man) Amendment Bill would define "woman" in law as "an adult human biological female", and "man" as "an adult human biological male".
Marcroft said what it meant to be a woman was "under attack," and the bill would deliver clarity and consistency.
As a "biological female" I reject this attempt by the government to define who I am. It's only a tiny step from here to "women must…" and "women may not…". And, it's not science-based either.
The human cost of governing by spreadsheet | The Spinoff:
What is actually being done away with is not inefficiency. What is being done away with is us.
National ministers Nicola Willis and Paul Goldsmith announced this week that the government intends to reduce the core public service … through mergers, digitisation, AI tools and spending caps. The stated rationale is returning staffing to pre-2017 levels. This implies the country has simply been running excessive paperwork for the past nine years and that the solution is obvious. The implied logic of these cuts is that 9,000 people were essentially surplus. Warm bodies occupying desks, processing nothing, contributing nothing, simply drawing salaries while the real work happened around them. It is an extraordinary claim. And no evidence has seriously been offered, let alone proved.
This was a useful video: 7 health benefits of fibremaxxing and how to build a high-fibre diet with Dr Karan Rajan. I'm pleased to discover that the blueberries I sometimes eat with Greek yoghurt, and the chickpeas I include in salads are both good sources of fibre.
An elite investigation team swoops in to a small Australian outback town to solve the case in Lest Angels Weep (Detective Liz Moorland. Major Crimes. Book 5) by Phillipa Nefri Clark. 📚
The discovery of an angel-shaped pendant on a grave leads to a rumoured fourth death - from even longer ago. How the pieces connect is proving to be the most complex puzzle Operation Nobody has encountered.
I can't pin down why this book didn't really suit me, but I should remember not to read more in this series.
Current view from my chair in the lounge.
Not sure why the digger is creating a ditch just behind us. On the maps there's a watercourse there, but it doesn't seem to actually exist, unlike the watercourse about 10 metres further from our house that they dug out weeks ago.
It was a big high tide when I biked down to the estuary this morning.
D. L. Keur is an author I really enjoy. Come Calling (The Sam & Mr. Nosy K-9 Cozy Mysteries Book 1) is in a new series, with ties in to her other series and was a darned good read. 📚
I love how Sam bonds with horse and dog — they are just as much lead characters.
Keen to read the next one now.
With a new horse, a found dog, lost people push Sam Cassidy back out on the high trails in North Idaho .
Samantha “Sam” Cassidy, a widow and sixty-eight years feisty, is a member of the local mounted search and rescue (SAR).
It's only a 10 minute stroll to the prettiest and most accessible part of the nearby Dune Lake.
Along with some ducks, a pair of Kakiānu | Black Swans on the lake were enjoying the pleasant sunny day. 🐦
It was bugging me why I didn't quite engage with the book I just read.
As I wrote my usual two sentence review though I realised that as a reader I didn't get to feel how high the stakes were. The book should have talked much more about the lead character's memories of and history with the place. 📚
While the plot had a couple of dicey moments, the characters in Dropped Like a Bad Habit (Nun the Wiser Mysteries Book 2) by Melissa Westemeier were interesting. 📚
I just didn't entirely engage with the book — it was a little formulaic. Also, we needed to learn much more about the main character's deep connection to the place so we could really get to feel the threat.
When Sister Bernadette hears from the local pharmacist about plans to redevelop and gentrify their small community on Chestnut Street, she rallies her neighbors at The Abbey: Senior Living to help stop it.
Heh, Rachel McAlpine's Old lady poem: Not like getting pregnant, Bye bye well-wishing ageism and wishing old age away:
… when I say I’m getting old,
nobody says to me, “How lovely!
Congratulations!
Is this your first old age?
When is it due?”
I suffer from gastric reflux, so this was interesting — How To Treat Heart Burn, Acid Reflux & Stomach Pain :
… avoid lying down with a full stomach, which can increase the production of gastric acid and cause that reflux of the stomach contents.
Typically, it can take up to four hours for 90% of a solid meal to move forward out of the stomach. … So you're still going to have that acid, whirling around your stomach, after a couple of hours. And if you try and go to sleep, then it's no wonder you're going to get this reflux as well.
I drove down to Waipū Bird Sanctuary today where I saw shags, gulls, oystercatchers, white-faced herons, white-fronted terns, dotterels, a stray kingfisher and an occasional godwit.
On the horizon I spotted a couple of ships, possibly carrying logs.
