This piece of driftwood caught my eye this morning.
Today was rather satisfying. Now April has arrived I seem to be finally settling into a useful pattern of activity. I did a bit of weeding and mulching, planted out an Avocado stone, put pegs in to brace a border board, and various other activities.
Waikawa Beach photos from a drone
A professional operator with his own DJI Inspire v1 drone visited today and took a few photos of our property and the area nearby. I was very lucky that he did this as a favour, so I wasn’t hit with a huge fee. The following 15 second video shows the drone taking off from our yard.
Blair flew the drone at various heights, including the maximum allowed 120 metres.
I was so excited to finally see our area from above (Google Maps is good, but this is better).
We live in a land of lakes around here, with ancient wetlands all up and down this coast. There are two small, privately owned and unnamed lakes at the end of our road, just a few hundred metres away. To our east, behind some trees, is Lake Huritini. To our South is Lake Waiorongomai, and closer to the coast is another privately owned lake.
One photo shows the river mouth where it meets the sea.
I can’t express how excited and happy I am to get these photos.
Then the sun came up.
I love these misty autumn mornings. Such beautiful colours in the greenery. Can't decide which of the exposures I like better.
Aphra rarely allows me to catch her or pick her up, but tonight she let her guard down. 🐈
A gorgeous dog walk at the beach this morning.
Kawau, Pied Shags: ready, set, go go go.
Now the dog yard is secure, though unfinished, I need to start beautifying it. Step 1: replant and mulch one of the small trees that had to be moved. This could be a long job.
Oshi in his new $8 dog cave (on the dog bed, on the rug, on the carpet, on the floor…).
Come on, Apple, give us Kiwis a choice
New Zealand has at least two official languages: English and Māori. The English we speak and write isn't *exactly* the same as Australian or British, Canadian or US Englishes. Māori has some resemblances, I believe to Hawai'ian, but it isn't the same.
Our placenames are mostly English or Māori, or even both. I live at a place called Waikawa Beach. The Beach part is English. Waikawa translated from Māori to English is 'bitter water'.
These days I’m helping a Māori organisation with their newsletter, or Pānui, and I’m learning Te Reo for myself.
And, I’m going crazy.
Autocorrect, which I usually find fairly helpful, transforms words like ‘pai’ to ‘paint’. All the time. Every single Māori word gets corrected
. On my Mac, my iPhone and my iPad. Talk about hōhā!
It makes it almost impossible to take notes.
I don't want to turn off autocorrect. I don't want to have to teach my devices hundreds or thousands of Māori words and names.
I've been using Macs for nearly 20 years now. How hard is it for Apple to make a New Zealand option under Keyboards and spellcheck etc?
And I’m no linguist, but I feel that a New Zealand option like that should handle both Māori and English language words.
Come on, Apple. Make a job for someone and give nearly 5 million Kiwis a better option.
The dogs are very happy in their new playground. 🐶
Something is wrong. I heard it rain in the night. The ground is wet. But the rain gauge shows no rain.
Noooo. Yesterday I missed my Activity ring by 8 points simply because I forgot to check before I went to bed. Darn it.
The dog yard is sufficiently complete to put it to the test. Refinements will come (gates, handrail on the ramp, properly blocking up known gaps). It worked. 😀 🐶
Fish heads on the beach.
The dog yard has a way to go yet, but it’s definitely getting there. The deck on the house needs some rails and a step. There will be gates.
Progress on the dog yard.
Buddies: Sasha and Ares. Hard to believe Sasha (and her brother Oshi) used to chase Ares every single time she could when we lived in Wellington. 🐶 🐈
The dog yard now has most of its posts. Still to come: rails and 2 gates. 🐶
The secure dog yard is underway. 🐶
