Not something I expected to find on the beach this morning.

Plastic chair missing one leg. Plastic chair missing one leg., angled view.

The chef did a superb job in this build: Mushroom Hash at Cafe Royal in the centre of Palmerston North where I had errands this morning. Very delicious too. Unfortunately, and no fault of the food, another of my teeth fell to bits while eating (pic).

mbnov 18-Nov-19: build

A toqwering stack of food — mushroom hash. This piece of tooth is supposed to be attached to the rest inside my mouth!

Today’s job was to climb a ladder to see what was in our gutter (that feeds our drinking water tank). Then to attach a gutter cleaner nozzle and hose to a long pole and try to wash out the gunk. Much gunk, much cold shower! Now I want torrential rain to finish the job for me.

Filth in the gutter, except where I pulled out a clump of grass. A thick layer of gunk in the gutter. Hose and cleaner nozzle hanging from the gutter. Closer view of hose and nozzle hanging from the gutter.

One of the superb things about going through old Micro.Blog posts with Mars Edit to fix missing alt text is the reminders of posts past. Ahhh, baby quail… Another superb thing is how easy Mars Edit makes working with Micro.Blog posts. // @danielpunkass

mbnov 17-Nov-19: superb

Screenshot of an old Micro.Blog post in Mars edit, with preview pane open.

As I get older I become more selective about pretty much everything. I don’t want to spend time, money, energy on things that aren’t really what I want. And for some purchases I’m more aware than ever that I may have them for the rest of my life.

mbnov 16-Nov-19: selective

In the wee hours we had gusts of wind over 60 Kph, pouring rain loud on the tin roof, thunder, lightning. The dogs were extremely anxious and kept me awake for a couple of hours. In the end I brought them up on the bed where they stayed. Today I’m really sleepy though. 🐶 🥱😴

Small black dog on my bed. Small white and tan dog on my bed.

The Waikawa River flows out to sea at our beach. Not far east two streams converge. At the confluence, crystal clear Waikawa stream from the hills behind North Manakau is joined by murky Waiauti water from the hills behind South Manakau.

mbnov 15-Nov-19: murky

Confluence of a murky stream and a crystal clear stream.

These are astonishing figures for our tiny country. Space sector contributes $1.7 billion to NZ economy 🚀:

Space …Total employment … 12,000 jobs.

total estimated revenue of the space economy was $1.75 billion in 2018-19, representing 0.27% of global space economy revenues.

We orbited the star for a while topping up with warm energy, then I headed out into cold space. A memory of the touch of her hand on mine made me wish it had been possible to stay but I just wasn’t able to. I put the pounamu on its cord around my neck

mbnov Week 2.

There are a handful of Barbary Doves around here. You can tell them by the distinctive ring of black feathers on their neck. They were brought to New Zealand 150 years ago.

mbnov 14-Nov-19: neck

White dove on a flax spear. The dove has a black band of feathers on its neck.

NZ Euthanasia bill passes final vote, goes to referendum

Parliament has passed a bill legalising voluntary euthanasia in a historic vote.

It will now go to a public referendum alongside next year’s general election for a final test.

About time!

After buying a years-overdue water filter replacement for under the kitchen sink, I was able to replace it myself. Luckily I double-checked instructions after putting it in: check direction of flow. Usability trap: flow direction is inverse to text direction. 😫

mbnov 13-Nov-19: able

Water filter in place under the sink - the wrong way up. Close up of filter label showing direction of flow.

Full moon rising 12-Nov-19.

Full moon rising 12-Nov-19.

I also forgot to post this short video of two horses who graze nearby enjoying a little ‘it’s raining’ hijinks.

Somehow yesterday passed without my posting these two photos of our dogs on the grooming table. Luckily they were willing to stay put while I took several photos. 🐶

Sasha and Oshi will be 13 years old on 13 December.

mbnov 12-Nov-19: stay

Small black dog on a red towel on the grooming table. Small white and tan dog on a red towel on the grooming table.

There’s a wingsuit training wind tunnel in Stockholm. Tom Scott tried it out in this 5 minute video: I Almost Learned To Fly In The World’s Only Wingsuit Tunnel. Wingsuit flying looks very hard!

Screenshot of Tom Scott learning to fly in the wind tunnel.

A volunteer job I do is to keep my local community in touch with what’s going on. I write posts for the Waikawa Beach Ratepayers Association’s blog and newsletter, update my own community Micro.Blog, Twitter feed and a local FB page. It’s very satisfying.

mbnov 11-Nov-19: touch

I don’t recall who recommended A Death in the Rainforest: How a Language and a Way of Life Came to an End in Papua New Guinea, but I was hooked by the sample and the book is excellent. 📚

engaging, deeply perceptive, and brilliant interrogation of what it means to study a culture

Death in the Rainforest book cover.

My Siri Watch face reminded me that on 13 November 2005 the decommissioned navy frigate Wellington, F69, was sunk close to where I lived at the time. I took loads of photos, too many to share unless perhaps I make a video, but these 3 were dramatic.

Navy frigate Wellington with what seems like fireworks exploding from the rear. Flames engulf the rear of Navy frigate Wellington.A huge fireball at the rear of Navy frigate Wellington.

The stories I most enjoy are adventures in space. I watched Star Trek as a kid and kept watching even to current times. I never got into Star Wars though. Saw 1 movie and was bored and confused. I did see a recent one though, starring a woman. That was OK.

mbnov 10-Nov-19: space