The Samba Incentive

I've never been a runner.  I actually hate it, and with good reason!  I mean, have you ever seen a happy runner?  Maybe post-run, but not during.  In late 2009 when the recession really hit New York City and my work was cut to 4 day weeks and 80% pay, I needed to discover cheap exercise alternatives.  Sadly, running is free.  (Well, after you buy sneakers)  So, I started to run haphazardly, mostly at night and only when it was raining - not enough to be called a runner but enough to make a "running" playlist on my iPod.  Since moving to Dunedin, I've toyed with the idea of actually becoming a runner...you know, running more than twice a month and further than up and down the stairs at work when we're busy.  I think I ran about 5 times last year, maybe 6.  It still didn't stick.

courtesy of Google Image search - this is not us!

However back in January Ingrid, who I dance Salsa with, asked if I would like to join her and some friends to do a Brazilian Samba routine that we would perform for her birthday.  I like to dance, I don't mind being the center of attention, naturally I said yes.  

After our first couple rehearsals, we began talking about costumes for the performance and that's when "bras and knickers" came up.  If you've ever seen Brazilian Samba Carnival dancers, you know of what I speak: huge feathered/ bejewled headdresses, brightly colored and glitzy bras and skimpy knickers (we all vetoed the idea of thongs in public - you're welcome, Dad!)  Suddenly, the fear of being all "jiggly" and half naked in front of people I know hit me hard...so I started running.  In earnest.

I used to think of myself as moderately intelligent, but I'm really not.  Who decides to become a runner in the hilliest city outside San Francisco???  Running up hills is the fastest way to kill your commitment to the sport, as well as your quads.  Work is at the top of Maori Hill and though I have started running home from work, it's all downhill.  I've also been running to and from dance rehearsal, but fortunately that's in the flat bit of Dunedin city center, and the beach, my favorite place to run, is also flat.  My goal running on St. Clair beach was to run all the way to the other end of St. Kilda beach and back without stopping.  Tuesday I achieved this goal and I just repeated it again last night!  I'm a very happy quasi-runner and one day I might actually work up to running up hills.  At the moment, running away from the tide into the soft sand is enough of an uphill battle for me.

I've been running off and on for about a month now in preparation for our performance.  Our performance is tonight and after our dress rehearsal on Wednesday, I'm feeling OK about it.  Nerves still hit me in waves when I think of everyone watching me jiggle, but I've invited heaps of friendly faces so hopefully I'll be supported by my friends and they won't judge me!  However, if you're in the Dunedin area tonight, 10:30pm at The Church Cinema on Dundas street!  Bring your camera... this may not happen again!

A brief comment on my age...and a Christmas present!

I'm happy to report that I am constantly misjudged when it comes to my age.  I don't care to ask if this is a comment on how old I look or how old I act, but everyone assumes I'm younger than I am.  This is all very well and good and keeps me in high spirits as I approach 30, except I just recently discovered another white hair.  Not gray.  White.  Alas, I fear that people will soon begin to judge my age as much closer to what it is if I continue to not pluck my non-black hairs...

Email from my family on Christmas Day

However, all these feelings of "old" have since been eclipsed by the arrival of my new tramping backpack!  I've never owned a full on hiking/tramping backpack and until I moved to NZ I never felt the need to.  After Nicky and I hiked the Milford Track, I felt that need. I got in touch with Aarn and tried out one of their packs.  When the family back home asked what I wanted for Christmas I mentioned the backpack not thinking they would actually all band together to get it for me.  My family never ceases to amaze me with their support!  Now I'm the proud owner of an Aarn Featherlite Freedom pack, and I'm in love with it :)

Our friend K, who lives down the way from No. 7, was doing all my family's busy-work running around to stores in Dunedin to order this pack.  This past Friday she texted me announcing her acquisition of a certain Christmas present for me.  I told her when I was working and suddenly, partway through our mid-afternoon coffee rush, I saw her walk through the door with a hot pink package and my celebratory dance ensued. Post coffee production, I ripped open the package, donned the crinkly bow on my head, and tried on the pack for all in the restaurant to see.  Fortunately there weren't too many people in the restaurant to witness my ridiculous display of joy, or the spectacle of me in a skirt and an apron and a tramping pack.  I've since calmed down, regained some dignity, but the crinkly bow stayed in my hair all night and now adorns Hedwig's rear-view mirror.

I have plans to christen my backpack on the Hollyford Track with Nicky, Tom and Jenny at the beginning of March.  It should be amazing and I'm totally stoked to get my new piece of tramping equipment wet, so to speak.  Granted, Hollyford is in Fiordland so my new pack will almost certainly meet with some rain.  Excitement aside, here's some pics of my new baby!!

me - the back - the front - heaps of space inside - and me again

Another Kiwi Christmas

Qtown Christmas Breakfast

Despite being away from my family this year, I had an amazing Christmas!  It was still weird being warm and all… but it was heaps of fun.

I worked on Christmas Eve.  I figured since I didn’t have any family here that required my presence, I would let people with familial obligations have the time off instead.  So, Christmas Eve, Sary, Jac and I worked and were CRAZY busy!  We were all thinking it would be a quiet day, we’d close at 5 and spend most of the day cleaning and making a few coffees for our diehard regulars.  Instead, all our diehard regulars and their mommas came in.  Being unexpectedly swamped on Christmas Eve makes that normally long as day simply fly by. 

Christmas Day Serenade #1

I had plans to drive to Queenstown to spend Christmas with Nicky and the other nomads in the Queenstown house.  After finishing work I did some mad last minute packing…like normal.  I then met Sary and her mum at Di Lusso for a wee drink before the Christmas Eve church service I attended with Shaz.  It was REALLY weird to a) be at a bar on Christmas Eve, b) have the bar not be empty and c) have it be warm enough to wear a summer dress and be comfortable even after the sun had gone down.  After a wee bottle of bubbles, I collected a big box of Sary’s excess kitchen supplies that she no longer wanted/needed.  I decided to play Santa and bring all the extra plates, cups and cutlery out to Queenstown to help out the house as they’re ALWAYS looking for forks.

Christmas Breakfast Spread

After I got my carol singing on at the Christmas Eve service, it was rather late and therefore a short night before my drive to Queenstown.  However, I made it to the nomads' house by 10:30am and whilst skyping with the parental units, I made Nicaraguan tortillas for breakfast.  It was sunny and beautiful so we took everything out to the picnic table and stared at the Remarkables while sipping mimosas and eating tortillas and cookies.   Not a bad Christmas morning!

After breakfast, I got serenaded by Dan while we waited for inspiration for the day's next activity.  Fortunately, the neighbors set up a huge black tarp fully equipped with dishwashing liquid, hose and floatation devices for an extreme slip 'n slide experience...

slip'n'slide sans accessories

we upped the ante with multiple people and multiple accessories

slip 'n slide bruise! (??)

Slip 'n slide, which I haven't done since I was about 8, was epic!  Situated on a wee hill with dishwashing detergent is genius...and super slippery.  We had to add old tires in front of the tree at the bottom of the lawn as we continually slid further than the tarp and ran the risk of giving ourselves concussions with our speed and tree placement.  One of the neighbors already had a broken ankle, we didn't need to add to the injury tally.  However, this guy still managed to hop up to the tarp, slip 'n slide successfully and hop back to the top.  He might be my new hero. 
Clean up was messy.  Nicky and I used the same bathroom and it looked as though we'd brought half the lawn inside with us.  Washing grass off your body is much more annoying than washing sand off.  Grass gets into just as many places and doesn't come off nearly as easily!

our grass stained clothes - the messy bathroom floor - me trying to wash grass outta my biking bottoms

nap time with Nicky

Despite all the energy exerted slipping and sliding, there was only a momentary afternoon lull.  Nicky and I tried to fit in a short nap, but it was altogether too brief.  We were thrown right back into the fray with the rest of the house as we all cooked a potluck Christmas dinner.  Dinner was again outside with a sunset view of the Remarkables and it was FABULOUS.  It was a good thing I'd brought extra plates and cutlery though!  Boon made some spectacular fried rice, Peter and Rob cooked up some pesto stuffed chicken and steaks, there were several salads and a pot of roast potatoes and onions - sooo yum!  And not unhealthy!  Although the quantity consumed would tend to challenge that last statement...

Christmas Dinner by the Remarkables

Dessert was chocolate fondue with heaps of chopped fruits and a cake on the side followed by an acoustic guitar sing-a-long and reunion with Rinie.  Rinie, who used to live in the house, was back in the South Island traveling with his sister and her partner.  They stopped by to say hi and Nicky and I were thrilled to see him again.  We've missed our Dutchman!  Their stay was brief as they were driving out to Milford that night but we made plans for a Boxing Day BBQ by the lake instead.  We ended the evening listening to Dan and Jah sing and play guitar under the stars.  Not my normal Christmas day, but a helluva good alternative!

Lake Wakatipu

Boxing Day started with my chocolate chip scones.  I was up relatively early and was in a baking mood so scones it was.  I skyped with the parentals yet again...mostly because I had missed seeing my nephew dog, Baxter.  He misses me.  At least, I like to think he does...   Anyways, I was most concerned about getting to go cliff jumping.  The water in Lake Wakatipu is quite nippy so having the sun at its zenith is a necessity when you're climbing out of the lake after your jump.

Charlie, Peter, Rob, Boon, Nicky and I all drove down to the lake.  On the way out to Glenorchy at a curve with a guardrail, you park and hike down to the top of several cliffs, popular with rock climbers.  There's one cliff that's a bit higher and we started there.  Having been cautioned numerous times by my family via skype, I didn't jump first.  Peter and Rob, showing no fear at all, ran off the cliff and both came up alive...so I followed.  I knew it was going to be high, but you never know exactly how high you are until you're falling..and then you're conscious that you're still falling...and when you think you're finally going to hit, you realize how freakin' far up you were.  It was AMAZING!

Unfortunately, Boon didn't jump out from the rock far enough and hit his back against one of the large boulders as he fell.  It scared all of us heaps and we were all really concerned about him and what damage he might have done.  It looked to be mostly scrapes and bruises when we got him out of the water, and he hadn't hit his head (thank goodness).  Nothing was broken but he was really shaken and just wanted to lie down for a bit, so we set him up comfortably in the shade and tried not to be too shaken up ourselves. 

Cliff Jumping Bruise :)

We were quickly joined by a few groups of guys, one group from Ireland, another from Australia, one more from a boat that was passing by.  Everyone was eager to jump, but there was plenty of time to talk while everyone psyched themselves up to actually leap.  The perfect weather made it a very popular spot but I still managed to jump from the lower cliff and the higher cliff once more.  Although I got better with my landings, I still managed to slap my arm on the surface of the water every time.  I got some stellar bruises though!  Nicky had the camera and managed to get some good shots of my jumping.  I wanted a side shot of me jumping so you could see how high it was (see little vertical picture #4 above).  Bragging rights proof in hand, we headed back to town in search of pain killers for Boon. 

After procuring pain killers for Boon, we proceeded to indulge in ginormous ice cream cones and then found $10 on the ground which we had to spend.  Apparently that's the rule with found money!  So, we bought some beer and went home where we spent the rest of the afternoon playing an impulsively invented game of beer bottle frisbee.  Using a frisbee-golf frisbee, we tried to knock down the beer bottles we'd set up across the lawn.  1 point for a direct hit, 1/2 point if the frisbee rebounds off the ground and then knocks down a bottle.  Surprisingly? Hours of fun.

Once the sun left the backyard, we grabbed long sleeve shirts and headed down to the lake to meet up with Rinie and company for a BBQ.  Rinie and his sister cooked sausages and burgers and we all sat around talking and making travel plans until the sun was well past the horizon.  It was yet another brilliant day and it helped to be among friends when my family was so far away.  Thank you everyone who made my Christmas great!

Boxing Day BBQ at Lake Wakatipu