Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Cabbage Tree (Cornish Palm)

This morning I was out just after 6 a.m. potting and watering and took a photo of one of our cabbage trees in all its glory.


I then had a busy morning in town running all the usual errands followed by a lazy afternoon as I was quite exhausted.   In between my gardening and going to town I caught up with Molly from "Some other Mountain" - good to hear they are not affected by the flooding.

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

New Garage Door Opener

It is installed - it looks better than the old one, works better than the old one and now has a light. All that is left is paying for it!!!!!!!!!!!

The old one


and the new one.  I must do some tidying of the wires but it works - that is the important thing.

Sunday, November 25, 2012

The Kamo Christmas Parade 2012

Yesterday, I went to the Kamo Christmas Parade with two friends,  I hadn't been for a couple of years.  It was smaller this year and a lot less motorcycles (there used to be so many of them and they had toys and went on up to the Hospital with them), the theme was a Northland  Christmas.  I see I didn't get a photo of the motorcycles.











 These roller skaters were great two of them would lie on the road and others would jump over them and other tricks.  Love the get-up.




 This bus is from the home where my husband is.  The residents have spent weeks painting the tree and santa and making the papier mache fish to hang on their fishing rods - the Christmas tree is truly northland - a pohutakawa.







.The parade took 30 minutes to go by and this last photo is of the crowds coming on down to the High School grounds where it finished.

Saturday, November 24, 2012

An early Christmas Present

I have been having problems with my garage door opener.  I thought it was just a low battery on the remote.  On Wednesday afternoon I returned with my grocery shopping and the remote would not work at all.  I went inside and replaced the battery thinking that was the problem - still didn't work.  I then went into the garage and pressed the button to work door still nothing.  I checked the wall socket to make sure a fuse hadn't blown.

Then realising it was something more serious I disconnected the door from the opener and, with difficulty opened the door manually and put the car away.  I phoned a friend and asked if he could recommend someone.  I phoned this company and was told $650 to replace it.  The friend had told me that the units were about $200 and he had problems with his as well.  It turned out that $200 was a bit optimistic.

I then phoned another company I found in the yellow pages.  The other company came first thing on Thursday morning and, apparently, it is an old model and the circuit boards are no longer available but he tried to use one from another model.  He also replaced the bulb - the bulb has never worked since we have been here and, as a too large one had been used, it had burnt and cracked the casing.

Anyway, this gentleman said it would need a new unit - $600.    I told him I could not afford that - he did not want any money for looking at the job and I later phoned him again and checked on what unit he had been pricing the job on.  He told me that on leaving here he had called in at Hammer Hardware and they had one that was ideal for my job on sale for $350.00 (this was  one I had found at $380 ) and he would install it for $140.  

I took up this deal thinking he would be able to install it that day - should have checked.   I now have the car outside as, with my bad shoulder it is too hard lifting the door manually.

It also meant that I could  put the unit on my visa card which would mean not having to pay the whole amount at once.  I went and paid for it on Thursday and they said they would deliver it that afternoon and phone first.  It didn't arrive in the afternoon and yesterday morning I went to an 8.30 physio appointment and when I got home the unit was on the table outside my front door.  I had to borrow a neighbour's husband to move it into the garage for me last night.

So, here is the old unit and, hopefully, on Monday there will be the brand new one installed and it will all look a bit tidier AND WORK.


Monday, November 19, 2012

PARKINSON'S WALK 19th November

Today we walked the trail at Onerahi on the former railway track.  It is a walk we did earlier in the year.  Once again we were lucky with the weather.  It was a 5 kms walk there and back .   This was followed by the usual coffee at a cafe.            I then called in to see my hubby on the way home.  Not a good day but I stayed with him for an hour and a half and fed him the HUGE cream puff he had for afternoon tea and helped him with his cup of tea.  

He was expecting another visit from the Pope (not sure if I mentioned that he had a visit from the Pope's daughter the other day).