Snow daze & battling bastards

Snow Daze

The snow has almost completely gone now but in our amateur-weather-predicting defense, it was a rather warm weather system that dumped it on us. The complete lack of wind meant the snow clouds remained parked overhead, dropping snow straight down in a sweet, floaty kind of way.

So, as you do, I went wandering with my camera on Thursday to capture some of the neighbourhood winter wonderland...

 Looking down Strickland St towards the Port Hills

 Snow dandruff on the statue at the Beckenham shops

Deja-choo

There's been a lot going on over the last couple of weeks including the odd winter sniffle. Luckily most of the snottiness has passed me by, inflicting most of its damage on the male members of the household.

Which is just as well, as I've been far too busy to get sick - organising protest meetings about public broadcasting, making my thoughts heard on the UC Arts proposal (votes/results here), working my last shifts at the Quake Box and doing some fill-in production work a few days a week... you can see why my thesis proposal is still very much a work-in-progress.

The house has been moving on at pace.

 The foundations were laid on Monday May 21st, then the framing arrived on the Friday.

On Monday 28th, the walls started going up... this is where it starts to get really exciting, where the shapes we've made in our heads/on paper start to come to life.  The more housey it gets, the harder it is to wait out the remaining time until it's completed.

The news game

Tim the weatherman checks his appearance in the mirror, carefully skews his tie slightly off-centre and tussles his hair once more. Wearing his trademark cheeky grin like a badge of honour, he waits for the right moment before turning to face the camera.

The floor manager makes his standard hand movement (index finger raised in a classic ‘up-yours’ gesture) and Tim turns around with a well-rehearsed air of surprise.

“Hullo Noo Zild, gosh it’s nice to see you. Been a bit of a cold old day up & down the country, but we’ll find out more about that a little later on in the bulletin. I’m off for a cup of Bell Tea and a Gingernut and I’ll see you in about 20 minutes. But right now it’s six o’clock.”

As the credits start to roll, Tim looks over to the news anchors with two fingers up in the air.

“And that, boys and girls, is how you do it. Two points for me & we haven’t even started yet.” With a smirk, he turned on his heel and sauntered off to the green room.

Scenes from a mall

For the last month I've been spending 2-3 days a week working at the Quake Box in City Mall. This little stint has now come to an end - the Quake Box gets moved to a new location this weekend.

It's been... interesting. So here, in no particular order, are some random incidents and photos from the central city in recent times.

Congratulations! It's a...

... hole.
Yep, we're now the proud owners of a hole in the ground.

Given that in the whole of last week we only added a fence, it's nice to see some progress. Already we're a day behind schedule - this digging was supposed to happen last Friday - but at least it's a glorious, muddy start.

Ready, Set, Build

It seems like just the other day I was lamenting the lack of rebuilding going on... oh wait, it was! That may be true for the city centre, but around the edges and out in the suburbs, repairs & new constructions are getting underway.

Just across the road from my PO Box used to be a bookstore, art gallery & dairy. This is what it looked like on March 17, 2011...

Here's the same site today...

Memories on Madras

During a break in the recent Music & Crisis conference someone approached me and asked how the rebuild was going.
'Rebuild?' I laughed. 'We're not up to rebuilding yet, we're still in the demolition phase.'

And every week, it seems, another notable building gets added to the demolition list, some to predictable outcry and plaintive petitions wanting signatures. Other petitions have already been sent off in protest. 

However, on Monday we reached a milestone - the reopening of Madras Street, from Tuam St onwards. Traffic was reportedly busy all day long, and has been ever since too. But I wanted to walk not drive, so I could take some pictures and contemplate the empty spaces at my leisure.

The journey started at C4 for a compulsory coffee, after which I headed towards the freshly-opened roadway.

It's the latest craze in inner-city abandoned sites - the open-air basement bath-house.