Post Tekapo

I have just had my weekend away at Lake Tekapo. Oh how I LOVE the South Island! It is such a stunning part of the world and it was so calming to be down in the mountains again. I really know now that I am NOT a city person, I am a mountains and lakes person.

I flew down on Friday morning after getting my stitches out from the second and last surgery on my face. I was picked up at the airport by my Girls' Weekend buddies and we headed straight out of town and down to the lake. It is about a 2 1/2 hour drive. We had a brief stop for a bite to eat and quick supermarket stop in Geraldine.

The lake was lovely when we got there. It was quite overcast which made it feel quite brooding.

We had a fairly early night as we were all pretty tired. Saturday dawned as a stunning day.

We ate breakfast and started heading towards Mount Cook. We had a bit of a stop at the Mount John Observatory which overlooks Tekapo. It was beautiful.

MT Cook though was shrouded in rain clouds, but it was still spectacular. We had a coffee at the Sir Edmund Hillary centre and then went back to Tekapo.

On Sunday we awoke to fresh snow on the mountains around the lake.

We pretty much ate and headed straight back to Chch as I was quite keen to see how the city had changed after the February quake. It was interesting....... I suddenly realised that I didn't want to be standing near any tall buildings, the lean on the Hotel Chancellor was astonishing and the Chch I knew had definitely gone. I think the people that continue to live there are an incredible bunch of very strong folks. Most of them that I have talked to still don't want to live anywhere else but they do find the constant shaking terrfying.

Yes!!! They ARE leaning!!!!

Overall, it was a FANTASTIC weekend. I loved every second of it!!!!!!

Other than all those exciting things life has been fairly quiet (which is a good thing!!!!). I have picked up a bit of clipping which has been great.

Brina is up to 44kg so one more and I will be a very happy 'mum'. Spyke is pretty much still on holiday, which is a real bummer. I really want to get him fit and get him out jumping but it so hard at this time of year. The ground is no good for paddock riding, it gets too dark to do much road riding and I don't have transport to get him to an all weather arena with lights. It is pretty disheartening.......but... he is still well and happy and that is what REALLY counts.

Sick as a dog!!!! (But not as expensive ;-)

It is now a month since the quake and a sort of new normality has settled in. All my colleagues in Chch now work from home as the office is in the 'Red Zone' that is still completely out of bounds. The CBD looks like a war zone, the devastation is pretty wide spread. I'm heading down that way early in May, it will be very interesting to see it first hand (although we will be heading to Lake Tekapo for the weekend).

I have been SICK!!!! I had a gastro bug last week and was just revolting!!! I think I may have picked it up at the BMD Garden Party (Pics to follow - Garden Party, not illness). I ended up having four days off work and the weekend to recover. It was HORRIBLE!!! I also had a lesion on my face checked out and it turns out it is a melanoma but it has been caught in time so that comes out later in the week. Quite nervous about that really, it seems quite a lot of face to lose. Oh well, better off without it. Doc reckons I will lose a few wrinkles though :-)

Enough about me. Brina is doing well. I have changed her on to a new dog food and she is doing really well on it. She is bouncy and happy and full of beans. The only trouble is she seems to vomit more when she is on it so I have changed her to half and half with her old food. She weighed in last week at 42kg which is just great!!! A couple more kgs and I will be happy. She still continues to get herself in trouble. I have been giving her some vet tinned food to help get the weight on. After I bought the last lot I popped into the supermarket to grab a couple of items and came out to find that she had chewed through the tin  and had eaten half of it!!!! I had visions of the vet wanting to operate to get bits of tin out of her and me having to put her down 'cos I couldn't afford it. Fortunately I gave her a huge dinner that she promptly threw up which brought up a few bits of tin with it and she doesn't seem to have had any after effects. She also turned 6 yesterday. There have been a number fo times when I thought she wouldn't make it to 6 but that milestone has been accomplished so now I need to work on 7.

Last weekend was the Bernese Mountain Dog Garden Party in Rotorua. It was first weekend away with the dogs since Brina's 'troubles' started and it was really, REALLY nice to get out of Auckland. The girls were really good but got a bit anxious at night so I ended up sleeping in the car with them so that Brina wouldn't do one of her 'anxiety chews' on something highly unsuitable.

It was great to catch up with lots of bernese people and dogs and a good was had by all. Sammie was funny. She 'tolerated' the weekend really. She just doesn't 'do' showing but once the cart came out she was as happy as a wee sand boy. She loves to put her cart. :-) Brina was great in it too.

Spyke is still on holiday, I just keep getting waylaid from riding him so now I am just going to leave it till my face is healed up again. I am hoping we will be able to do some winter show hunter this year. Tai is looking fabulous for a nearly thirty year old and is still full of life.

I have a new flatmate, Sarah, which is really nice and my friend Kerri and her LOVELY little Walter have been staying for a couple of weeks, which was really, really nice.

I think that's everything that has happened in my world recently.We are moving into Autumn now and it is just BLISS to have cooler temperatures. The evenings and mornings are really starting to close in though, which I am a bit LESS keen on......

I will post photos soon. I am having 'technical difficulties' :-/

Devastation in Christchurch

It certainly has been a bit of a week in little old NZ. The week when Christchurch was rocked by another big earthquake. It was 'only' a 6.3 (last one was 7.1) but this one was far, far worse. It was shallower and closer to the city. I was having lunch with my Christchurch friend Kathryn (she was up working in Auckland) when someone came in and said that Chch had just had a big aftershock. We joked a bit about it and brought Geonet up to have a look. As the seismic drums started to show the earthquake we were all a bit stunned by what we saw. It was HUGE!!!! (Funnily enough, when I was chatting to Kath I thought I had felt a tiny quake).

Currently it is 4 days post quake and there is still a search going on in Chch for the living and the dead, although hope is very much fading that anyone will be found alive now. It is such a dreadful, tragic thing. Every time I saw footage of people I scanned the faces, wondering if it was someone I know or work with. The PGG building is a mess, it pancaked down but many people survived in that building. Every survivor that they pulled out said the same thing: They got out, and when they turned to look at the building, none of them could believe what they were seeing or that they survived it. By far the worst building was the CTV building, it just seemed to dissolve into a pile of burning rubble. A Macedonian man managed to reach his wife by cell phone many hours after the quake. She was trapped in the building and had lost three fingers but was OK and was with others. I waited and waited for her to be rescued...but they never found her. The saddest building was the cathedral. A group of people at work were watching events unfold on TV when they showed the spire collapsed. Everyone in the room gasped, it was like the heart had been ripped out Christchurch. When I was down there a few short weeks ago I had thought it sad that the cross had fallen off the cathedral and yet, I now wish with all my heart that that was all that was wrong with it.

Bob Harvey (the mayor) has been incredible. The man simply doesn't seem to sleep. He is compassionate, caring, focused, calm and a tower of strength for Christchurch. He is so positive and yet realistic. He brings hope but doesn't promise false hope. Jon Key has also been a true leader. He speaks so eloquently (not the official speeches that are written FOR him, they are almost unworthy) but I feel like he always 'tells it like it is'. He looks exhausted but I admire him immensly. The USAR crews all deserve medals they have all worked tirelessly alongside the Firemen, Police, Army and Navy. Then there are all the Civil Defence people, Red Cross and just the every day people trying to make a difference. I feel humbled by the international response. The USAR teams that have been sent from other countries are God sent!!!!

All my friends and colleagues in Chch are safe. I confess I cried when I finally heard from the last one, I was so relieved. They have all been lucky and their families and homes are intact.

I have found it a difficult week. Here I am tucked up safe and sound in Auckland and all I want to do is help. Watching the fear and anguish on television has been heart breaking and I have shed a tear more than once.

I don't know how Christchurch can survive this second dreadful blow but over the last few days of watching people pick themselves up and find a way forward and watching Bob Parker I believe that it will and it will be stronger and better.

I have only been to Chch a handful of times in my life but I love the city, it has a vibe, a heart and soul that is beautiful and it will rise again.

Kia Kaha Christchurch.

A Colleague's desk moments after the quake

The dome outside the window of the Chch office

The Cathedral, moments after it collapsed

Home again.

Brina is now home again. The full story is:

I got home on Thursday evening at about 6:30. I had been in Christchurch for my farewell and handover. When I walked in both girls came to meet me as usual but when I got into the living room I found raisin packets on the floor. This sent me into an immediate panic as raisins can be lethal to dogs. A quick check revealed the pantry wide open. Brina was looking like she had eaten a lot so I tried to get her to vomit with some salt water. It didn't work so I got straight onto the vets. They said to bring her in. I threw both dogs in the car and flew down the motorway (at slightly illegal speeds) to the vets. By the time we got there Brina was looking really big so I was pretty sure bloat was now an issue too.

They took both dogs out the back to induce vomiting. Sammie obliged and managed to purge about 400g of raisins. She was then put on a drip and checked in. Brina retched a lot but couldn't vomit. They took x-rays to see if she had a twisted gut and then tried to pump her stomach. This was unsuccessful too, the only way to save her now was surgery.

My friend Kristina had come down to the Emergency Centre, she used to work there so offered to scrub in if a spare pair of hands would help.  They accepted.  So Brina went for her second life saving surgery in 6 months. I was very, very lucky as one of their top surgeons just happened to be there and he performed the operation. The operation went well. Afterwards the vet said that he was 'very impressed' at how much she had managed to eat. They scooped out about 4 litres of stuff: wrappers, sugar, coconut, raisins and lord knows what else. The vet said that she would have certainly died without the surgery.

She has been in hospital for the last 2 days and has been very depressed (we will blame it on the drugs). She is home now and looking very skinny and sad. She still is not eating but we are hoping that now she is home she will soon want to eat again *crossing fingers*.

On a completely different note, PROIR to both girls trying to kill themselves this week I had a fab time in Christchurch. I really like Christchurch and I really like my old team down there. We went out for dinner to Sticky Fingers and had a beautiful meal and lot of laughs. The team gave me a beautiful Pandora bracelet with a pony charm on it.

There were two reasonable earthquakes while was down there and I never felt a thing, I am quite disappointed by the quality of SI quakes. ;-)

After visiting Brina yesterday I went in to New Lynn to get a charm for my bracelet with the gift I got from Provisioning. I was able to get two charms so I got one that was kind of 4 leaf cloverish for Brina and a really cool silver one that will remind me of my time in Prov. I will post a photo when I am able.

Spyke is now back on holiday again for a short time. We were supposed to be show huntering on Saturday morning but Brina came first.

I start my new job tomorrow so have got my friend Tina coming in to look after Brina while I am at work. Hopefully it will just be a case of being here and syringe feeding her a couple of times a day.

Brina's Second Dice With Death

Brina is back in hospital after having life saving surgery....again. She got into the pantry this time and literally stuffed herself. The vet said he has never seen anything like it and that she is very, very lucky to be alive.

That's actually abotu all I can bring myslelf to say right now. I will update soon.

Some pics from this evening.

Slacker!!!!

Goodness I have been a slacker!!!! I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas and New Year.

I have been VERY busy in the last month. I will start right back where I finished off in my last entry. I have a new job. I am off to Gen-i (another part of Telecom) to be a Training and Development Manager (gulp). It is going to be a BIG challenge I think. Fortunately, with it comes a big pay rise which will come in very useful as my flatmate has moved on so I have no help with the rent any more. :-(

Spyke. Well Spyke and I have been kind of busy too. :-) We had our first 'proper' show hunter competition before Christmas. He was all plaited up and looking fabulous and I lost 3kg on a 2 week detox diet so that I could squeeze into my riding jacket. It was a really, really busy competition with heaps of horses there. We didn't really go so well. Actually, that's not true, I didn't go so well. Spyke jumped well (apart from slamming the anchors on at the second fence of the day and dropping me grrrrrr) but I was all OVER the place. The photos are down right embarrassing as me legs are all over the show, I got tipped forward over every jump and we ended up getting 2nd to last on the only round that counted, with 55%. It was pretty terrible and I felt very discouraged - BUT- I did wonder if my beloved Wintec was making life a bit harder so I borrowed Kristina's  CTD flat seat and we had our next attempt at Show Hunter a few days ago.

WHAT a difference!!!!! We got placed!!!! I felt completely different, I was able to balance and stay with him and found my jumping position again!! It was AMAZING!!!! That horse is born to Show Hunter, he is stunning!!!!? (He did manage to drop me TWICE this time though so that is something I am going to have to work on as I am not very keen on falling off.)  So now I have to buy a new saddle. :-/ I am going to need a proper jumping one. Thank goodness for finance. It gets a bit tricky when I am trying to get Brina's op sorted too but Spyke is 12 now and this is the best time to get him out there. I really believe that if I can get the stop sorted and get jumping a little bit bigger we have a shot at qualifying for Horse of the Year (not this year but maybe next).

Brina. She has been doing really, really well. She has loved me being on holiday (as have I :-) She got to be Santa's Reindeer at work just before Christmas. I took the wagon in and she pulled all the secret santa pressies around. She was a big hit and she was sooooooooooo good. I thought I would have to take her straight home after her 'performance' but she was perfectly happy to curl up under my desk and sleep.

On the down side, she has had two womping great seizures. :-( She had one just before Christmas that was just awful. She had about 3 seizures in a row with no break between, it was really, really scary. And early this morning she had another really big seizure. It was one where she didn't recognise me for about 5 minutes after she came around. She also put a hole in her lip. I really, really hate epilepsy!!!!!! She is Ok again this morning though, thank goodness but I find it really hard watching her go through these. The worst thing is that I would not be able to physically get her to the vet if I needed to. Another pitfall of being alone. :-(

BUT on to more positive things. I have just entered my next show hunter so I am looking forward to that. I go back to work on Monday. I have a week in my old job and then I am off to Telecom Place to start my new role. I have had a GREAT holiday We had Kerri and Walter come to stay, which was just lovely!!! And Anne and her family came to visit too. We spent lots of time up in the forest and the kids had a wee ride on Spyke (who was a STAR).

Oh just realised, I completely forgot to mention that the TV and master bedroom are now sporting a new coat of pain!!! Yay!!!! That was a BIG job but I got the TV room finished before Christmas (just) and got the bedroom done before new year. It is sooooo nice to have them done. The TV room looks completely different, I LOVE it!!!!

Anyway here are a few pics from the last month.

The new TV Room

 Our 2nd Show Hunter

 Brina at the office

Evie, Michael and the dogs

Kerri and Walter

 Our terrible SH