Rooftop Badminton

They were not our first guests to our new flat but they did have the dubious honor of playing the first ever game of rooftop badminton!  Luc, Finn and Rhys met up with us this Sunday afternoon so we took the boys up to the roof of our flat for a rousing game of badminton. 

We did not keep score, except for the loss of one shuttlecock.  Luc was jumping on the ledge and we thought we would lose him but Dad kept his feet firmly planted.

 

City Safari

Mallory's work-mate, Ashlee, convinced us all to sign up for the Wellington City Safari. We had three hours to find as many control points around the city, and gain points based on the difficulty of finding them. Jeanne, Mallory, and Ashlee mapping out our game plan.


So many people came out for the Safari - despite the pouring rain all morning!

We were all PISSED (and I'm not talking drunk here)! Our strategy of going for the high value check points turned south when we spent almost the entire three hours searching for the illusive "hut in the bush." Needless to say, we never found it, and we ended our Safari seriously doubting it's existence.

Oh, and Jeanne and Jamie fell in love on the bus...

Shifting Flats

After several weeks of looking for a new place to live Mallory and I finally found a new place to call home.  Thank goodness, we were about to kill each other in the process!

After much searching around town and on several misadventures we found a new flat across town.  We knew it the minute we walked into it.  We can walk to our old place which is good but it is a long walk.  So even though we are  in familiar territory everything seems different.  The best part of it - among many things is that we both can walk to work with our commute times even got a little shorter.

 

Because of the tenants in our new place our moving day was Monday 9 May.  We hired out movers: two guys and a very large truck.  They were scheduled at our old flat at 8.00 AM.  The came 10 minutes early and when all was said and done they had us in our new flat by 9.30 AM.  It was pretty awesome.  We had all day to unpack and get settled.  Which we are still doing for the most part, two weeks later.

These are photos of us cleaning and packing up things in our old place.  We will miss it in some ways......

 

These are our things in our new flat before we started unpacking.  It was pretty amazing how much stuff we had after being here for only a year!   Not as much stuff as we had in Pittsburgh but still a bit baffling.  Why to we humans needs so much stuff?  It is like it is attracted to us!

Once we have our new place settled I promise I will post new photos.  Above is Mallory taking care of a flat shifting related incident.  And oh yeah, our new place actually has a bedroom and a living room!

NZI Sevens

So, where to begin....

Mallory and I recently responded to a help wanted ad for Red Badge a company that provided event services for the local stadium; WestPac Stadium.  They were looking for help for the upcoming NZI Sevens tournament.  It is staged  over two days and nights, the NZI Rugby Sevens involves 16 international teams competing for points that go towards the International Rugby Board (IRB) Sevens series. Eight tournaments make up the IRB Rugby Sevens series.


The tournament is played under the laws of the game of rugby with some Sevens variations which are framed by the IRB. The 16 teams are split into 4 pools. Play on the first day of the tournament consists of pool matches on a round robin basis. Points are awarded for wins, losses and draws and go towards each team's final points tabulation. Following completion of all the pool matches in day one, the first and second placed teams in each pool progress to the Cup Championship. The third and fourth placed teams of each pool progress to the Bowl Championship.


So all good?  But it is less about the sport and more about a two day party where people like to dress up in costumes and drink as much as humanly possible.  Look at the proof:

 

 For more photos go here

I'm not going to lie, while the rest of the city enjoyed to two day party, Mallory and I spent most of our time on our feet asking these good people to keep the stairs clear - it was like herding cats.  And where there is lots of beer there are lots of arrests. "Isolated acts of stupidity and severely intoxicated young women kept Wellington police busy during the NZI Sevens. Police arrested 43 people in the central city last night. The majority of these were for disorder and assault.At the stadium yesterday, 28 people were arrested for a variety of offences including disorder, offensive behaviour and pitch invasion. A further 40 people were evicted. On Friday, 16 were arrested at the stadium and 76 evicted, with a further 18 people arrested in the central city overnight."

This is what our walk home looked like.  This is about two blocks from our flat.....

Next year were are definitely dressing up and going ourselves - costumes and all!

It was interesting to say the least. But we need the money so this Wednesday we are off to help out with the Nitro Circus