Wally's tales

There is nothing worse in this world, than a house full of elected politicians, all doing what they do best, dreaming of new ways of taxing the populace. Their latest effort, and the one that could prove to be the most expensive for us, and that’s the mooted ‘carbon tax’. Do I understand what’s it’ all about? My answer would have to be, a resounding no. Frankly I haven’t a clue what it’s all about . Half the time I don’t know what they are going on about, and the rest of the time they are talking down to me. They say it’s just because I ask stupid questions. There is too much talk about carbon tax, but as I see it you really need to believe in global warming. For me, you need more than that, it’s an act of faith. It all sounds very authoritarian, but it’s the money side of the equation, is what has me really worried.

For a start, not all the scientists are singing from the same song sheet either. If we assume that there is the need to impose the tax. But who get gets to play with all the money that’s going to be sloshing round once the tax becomes law. This is not peanuts, it’s going to be a sum equal to a King’s ransom. There will be a lot out there, who just can’t wait to get their snouts into the trough

The stupidity of it all, and you don’t have to be too bright to work it all out. For a start, we and Australia are both digging up coal and extracting oil as fast as we can. Which we then on sell to China and India, or for that matter anyone else who, has the money to buy it, Then of course, they burn it. However it must be different coal, because when they burn it, it’s suddenly quite acceptable. But over here we have holy than thou Green folk, all running around trying to stop us from burning any fossil fuel, we have dug up, which of course makes it different.

Yes coal maybe dirty, but it’ still the cheapest energy available, and the Green Movement who don’t want us to burn it here, but by their strange outlook, it’s OK for the folk we sell to, burn it. Suddenly then it’s acceptable. As well, they would like to restrict the little other carbon that we do burn, or use here. When our usage is compared it to the rest of the world, Our contribution is so small, you could say even insignificant, and you wonder all the fuss about . If all this makes sense to the Politicians, well it certainly doesn’t for me. In fact the whole concept is just barmy. As I see it, it’s all about one thing, and only one thing, and that’s money.

It’s even possibly to make a case for coal as an modern energy source. As today we now have the technology of how to burn coal cleanly. The Green movement would be against this also. They have high ideals, but unfortunately they carry in their membership, some fellow travellers whose ideas on how we should live and behave, are extreme. Had these folk been able to inflict their power, and control earlier in our evolution, we would have been lucky even to get out of our caves .

Something unusual happened today. While opening my mail I was surprised when from one envelope, out fell a cheque for $500. Unbelievable. It was from my Insurance Company, responding to a claim for the fee I had paid to an engineer relating to his inspection, and the report that he had put together regarding the condition of my home. We did this on our own bat, after getting impatient while waiting for officialdom to respond. More to the point, our question is, ‘Can I remain in my home safely?’ I didn’t think they would look at paying me out for this service at all. I said my last letter that I wrote to my sister. ‘Now, I truly believe that there is a tooth fairy, and Santa Claus’. I have other claims pending, and thank goodness I’m getting help putting them all together.

We, no I should say Hillary has been hunting to find prices to submit further claims, relative to the more expensive broken items. Easy you say, but not when many of the broken and damaged items have been collected over a lifetime. A lot too, have been given to my wife and self as gifts, some even as wedding presents dating back to more than some sixty years ago. How do you put a value on those items? The Grandfather Clock, most of the jewellers don’t even want to know about it. They say they have containers full, ‘around the back’ to look at.

I had considered moving, possibly to a Retirement Village over recent years, I had looked too at the home where Laura is receiving her Nursing care. But at the time I didn’t wish to sell the family home. But I would if I had to. With my present financial position, I need an income stream to keep Laura in care. This is costing us $3250 per month, I have also discovered that now I do need a little assistance to live alone, I can’t manage to do everything on my own.

We are lucky with Laura in that we pay a monthly rental for her unit. There are traps that have surfaced recently for some of our elderly, especially those who purchased a ‘licence to occupy’, for a lump sum in a retirement village. It would seem that the case of one large home which sadly, was amongst those destroyed. One woman purchased her unit, fourteen years ago. The principals have now indicated that they only wish to pay her out, on the valuation they made fourteen years ago, less of course the 20% or 30% claw back arrangement, These conditions would of course be in her contract. So she can look to receiving a very meagre payout. This sum will not enable her to buy anything at all when she moves on. This information is only what I’m able to glean from the media, and the people who are looking at assisting her, One article released in the press this week said, ‘We are endeavouring to get a peek, to see if the principals of the Home had increased their insurance cover, I will take a bet on that they did, and bringing the property up to today’s valuation’. This will have more than doubled or even more over that period. They would also like to know how much the Earthquake Commission are paying out for each unit. I’m certain it won’t be at the fourteen year old valuation either. So they will have no problem in rebuilding,

But unfortunately it will be a different story for some of the former residents. Most being pensioners will not have enough in investments, to buy into another unit. The homes operators won’t be mentioning this kind of treatment in their glossy advertisements, to seek prospective clients, when they rebuild. This situation will need to be looked at, so that the buyer is protected as well.

If there is one thing you must never do in this this country, and that’s to run foul of the media. Over the years I have watched them on the television screen night after night, and one by one, relentlessly hunt down their victims over the years,. In the chase they are absolutely merciless. Should you show any sign of weakness, or let them get the slightest smell of blood, look out, now you are as good as dead. They never take prisoners either.

This week I watched them drag down and devour Alisdair Thompson, and waited to see if anyone would bother to look for the facts. Why would you want to go out and do that? I have always known too, that our media have never ever let the facts get in the way of a good story. They kept up their merciless attack until the man was dismissed from his job. I would imagine too that he will soon be heading for the employment court, and demanding a very large severance payment. With good grounds too, because of the way that this scenario has been played out. And will the media be around to contribute? I think not. Regardless of what he said, he paid a very steep price, so they could make their news sensational. TV One ‘Close Up’ programme ran a poll, after his dismissal, to find out what their audience thought. Question, ‘Should he have been dismissed or not?’. Thinking that this will drive the final nail into his coffin. Well they were wrong, and the public weren’t it seems following their piper. Sixty percent thought dismissal was too harsh. Whoops! Well, we won’t dwell on that, will we. As far as the public are concerned, the Media this time, may have got it badly wrong.

Thompson is not the first to go down under attack, and he won’t be the last. They had a go at Paul Henry the host on a Morning TV Show, when he ridiculed an Indian Official’s name on air. After they finished with him. Sacked. Another scalp to the Political Correct brigade. He is not alone, there is a long trail of tall poppies that have been cut down.

I seem to remember that they had a feast with an ACT Politician. He in his distant past, when he was young and stupid, applied to be issued with a Pass Port in a dead child’s name. He actually obtained this, but he never used the document. He later confessed to this act of stupidity, and was convicted and discharged, by the Courts. It was with great glee the Media dredged up this bit of his past, chewed over it for days, as the lead story, until the poor fellow just gave up, and resigned from parliament.

If you ever had any ambition of being a politician, and you can see yourself swanning around in a chauffeur driven BMW. You had better examine your past in great detail. Because sure as sure, if you don’t, the opposition and the media are going to do it for you. I’m even sure that they have a department, to do just that, seeking out any flaws or misdemeanour’s, that fellow politicians may have committed in their past. So that it can be leaked to the Media. The object of the exercise is not only to discredit you, but to smear your party. Too often when these misdemeanour’s are found, they are kept under wraps to when they can do the greatest damage. The opposition must spend a lot a time searching for skeletons in their opponents past. This is a sick practice. The kind of people who do this, deserve to be exposed as well, for their perverted behaviour.

Occasionally the boot is on the other foot. There is a case pending in the United Kingdom where a News Paper has been exposed for hacking into cell phones belonging to families, who have experienced a personal trauma. They have been caught at it and exposed, the matter has been raised in the House of Commons. The owner Murdoch, who owns the Group that the News Paper belongs to, acted swiftly, and he has closed the paper down completely. This is a news paper with a circulation of over a million. It would seem that these folk can’t stand up to the heat either.

We are rapidly headed towards our next general election to elect a new government, or perhaps even roll over the existing government. As usual we will get a vote for the member of our choice that’s standing for their electorate. As well, we will get another vote for the party we would like to see Govern, and this is the core of our problem, as it’s also from where the list is born. This time, we have a say in whether we wish to retain the present system, further, what do we wish to do about the terrible list system. On paper it comes through as a fair and equitable system, but in practice it has been open to abuse, and not delivering what we were told it would.

Some people wish to keep the status quo, in spite of the abusive and stupid behaviour of some. and what some of us have just been putting up with. It even occasionally gives the power to elect a government by only a small minority, like what we had when New Zealand First were calling the tune. Next time it could easily be a maverick Maori Party, or perhaps even the Greens.

I have no time for the Greens either. Nothing to do with their environmental plans, but because of their extreme leftest leanings, that are held by some of their members. Political Parties are finding out because of the past behaviour of some, it was a mistake to form a Government with these minorities. From experience when they didn’t get their way, some tended to spit the dummy, and toss out all their toys from their bassinet.

What it did in the past too was allow was some people to take a seat in parliament, who in my opinion would never have made it had they approached the system in the normal way, and tried to get voted in. It also allowed a second chance to some politicians who we considered we had tossed out, and got rid of. Good lord, before you could say ‘Jack Robinson’, they were back in power again. Some were definitely quirky, carrying some very strange baggage. The list is the worst aspect of the system, and I know the average voter is not stupid, I’m sure because of the excesses it has allowed in the past, won’t wish to retain this system, unless some drastic changes are made.

As I see it, MMP gives a minority party sometimes too much power, especially when they hold the position of a ‘kingmakers’. They can demand ministerial positions, and what’s more annoying, they can slide in some of their more dubious agenda, and get it passed into law. This is the price you have to pay for power, and holding onto the Treasury Benches. As far as I’m concerned, I would like to revert back, to the ‘First past the Post’ again.

Some would like to change over to the Australian system of preferential voting. I don’t like their system either, it’s far too complicated.

In the morning News Goff has just announced with a big smirk that if elected, the Labour Party will do away with the GST on food, but he wouldn’t discuss the matter. I hope he has costed this move out, and they have some way of making up this loss of revenue. As well, he will introduce a capital gains tax. So the campaign is hotting up. Many people have bought a second home to supplement their pension, so this move will not be popular with them, not just the wealthy. I heard someone mention tonight that if they spend $50,000 on a kitchen and bathroom they won’t want to be taxed again on their own input when they come to sell the second home.

The Labour Party with the Greens, are dribbling out more of their Capital Gains policy which it seems to me the making of policy on the hoof, it now will include shares and any other personal property. This is going to be a very interesting election.

I have made a break through with my insurance company and it was by an accident. A truck shed some gravel while it was passing me, this damaged my windscreen while I was on my daily trek across town to visit Laura. I’m also due for a warrant. I know unless I can get the screen repaired or replaced, I might just fail it. I called in to the Glass repair shop as I was passing. The receptionist stuck sticky patch where a sizeable rock had struck my car, and told me, to call my insurer. I can understand them being careful, a replacement screen today, can run into hundred of dollars if it requires replacement.

They must have tightened up the system, because the last time I broke a screen, and it would have been at least fifteen years ago, this was when the roading contractors never bothered to sweep the road clear of loose stones after resealing. Back then making contact with the insurance company was all handled by the glass company. Broken windscreens were the most prevalent of accidents we endured then, all because of the Road workers slack attitude.

Today there are so many heavy trucks with trailers on our roads, all busy carting away truckloads from the centre of town, full of Building material which at one time was the fabric of buildings that have been destroyed by earthquakes, load after load.

After calling the insurance coy and getting the authorisation to repair the screen, the young lady inquired, ‘Was there any thing else?’ I replied yes, indeed there was. ‘I would like to return to my home’, and you have insured that as well. I never get an answer from the earthquake people when I call. Up until that point I haven’t been able to talk to anyone about my problems. Before I return to my home it requires some structural repair work to be carried out. ‘From that one call. It’s all go now’. ‘I’m in the white zone group Pod 7’, what ever that means, and she gave me a case number. Further more, they would send a builder around in weeks time to fix up the safety aspect, and would I get get quotes for the other items that require replacement to make the place liveable again. Like the stove top that is ceramic and got broken. All this assistance. Maybe because it was my birthday helped. Hillary and I are going to get our heads together tomorrow. Rod and Hillary have taken over the administration of my affairs, which has been a big help. But apart from having all the services that I commonly use, which unfortunately are all on the other side of the town. So to do anything, I now initially have to drive through to the other side, but apart for this small inconvenience I’m very comfortable.

Many in this City are having a very difficult time, and stoical about getting on with their lives. Just imagine being handed the keys to your new home, three days later, you see an official come around and condemn it, By slapping a ‘Red Sticker’ onto it, ‘Unfit for human habitation’.

Some in the bad hit areas people have suffered a sand and water volcanoes all coming up through the living room floor, and ruining everything in their home. Others are surrounded by a sea of dirty water, sewerage, and silt over the whole of their property, feet deep, and impossible to keep it out of their homes. Liquefaction is the fancy word they have given it, and this is the reason the Government is buying up suburbs, and pushing over the homes that are sitting among it all.

While waiting to have my car serviced and drinking their coffee, I got chatting with another patron. He said, that he came from Kaiapoi, and owned a three year old riverside home, which had now split in two. With every shake the split got bigger. At this stage he has no idea whether he will stay or move. To get to the garage I had to drive through the middle of the City, and I was astounded by the massive damage, parts of the Central City had suffered.

With the demolishing of the Eastern suburbs, we have the incongruous situation now of politicians representing only a muddy pond where their constituents once were . A few now will be scrambling for a new soft seat, eyeing the new areas that have been mooted for future growth and rebuilding.

We have a class of people amongst that certainly are different, they don’t follow normal patterns of behaviour, and are inclined to reject our way of thinking, as weak. Through our eyes they seem to live dangerously, and tempt fate. They also consider themselves bulletproof, and amongst their other negative traits, one thing that is noticeable, they never bother to insure their property. However when they do get caught out, which they do. They are not slow in calling for a handouts. I can remember many years ago, my brother being annoyed when being asked to contribute to a financial list, assisting someone living his area, who hadn’t bothered to insure their home. They had suffered a fire, and needed money for a fresh start.

If you don’t give, you are a miserable sod, and lacking in empathy. But then again, why should you dig into your own slender resources, to keep on helping these lame ducks? When you yourself have had to go without something, to buy your insurance. These people are always with us, and sure as sure, they are always busy making their own bad luck. Everyday we have here, the picture of some unfortunate featured in the Press, they are broke, destitute, and their home has been destroyed by the earthquakes, of course they are uninsured. You have to feel sorry for them. But how do you protect these people from their own folly?

Our current system is that our earthquake insurance, is linked to the Fire Insurance premium. Payment is automatic when you pay your fire premium, and insurance companies therefore, are only the collecting agency. So if you don’t have fire insurance, you don’t have any earthquake cover either. We are very lucky to have this facility where you can insure land. I think too, we are unique in the world with this. However unique or not, in one area I heard in an interview, that there are unfortunately 50 completely uninsured families that have surfaced so far, and have made themselves known to the authorities. Up until recently the premium for this service was a very small sum.

As a country we have another area of concern, we have hundreds, possibly thousands of people driving on our roads uninsured. Should they have an accident, and they are at fault. They can now be sued by the other party or their insurance company. When it comes to the recovery their damage costs. Murphy’s law seems to prevail here too. It is always a Mercedes or a BMW that they collide with, never an old clapped out banger. These folk generally also seem to have a very casual attitude to other driving requirements. No Warrant of Fitness, Drivers licence, or Registration for their car, so immediately, these social misfits are in even more trouble with the law.

I wonder sometimes what’s missing with these people, and perhaps they need to be taught at school a course called ‘common sense’. The sort of things that your Granny thought you should know, before you went out alone into the wide world. Some graduates from colleges today, are ill prepared for what life will throw at them, too many come under the heading of being, complete bunnies.

Helping the unfortunate sometimes has another twist, that’s often played on unsuspecting fellow travellers. Too many times in group travel, someone pops up with the story that he has been robbed, they have taken of all his money, now his holiday is ruined. He has saved for many years to enjoy this break, and the thieves have taken his camera too. Of course he isn’t insured. At this point, up jumps a companion. ‘let’s take up an collection to help this poor soul, this will ease his pain’. In my case I’m too cynical to swallow that nonsense. If it’s travellers cheques lost, the Bank will ‘Stop” payment and replace same.

The Government has just announced that they are now prepared to buy whole suburbs(Up to 5,000 homes) and push them over. They will pay out on the 2007 valuations for the land, and then it’s up to their insurance company to pick up the tab after the Earthquake commission pays out their maximum of $100,000 for each home. This act will create an interesting situation, as some when this formula is applied, they will find by the time they buy new land, they are deeply in debt. It gets worse for some who have a replacement policy, the company will only pay out enough to repair the home. The fact that it’s sitting on condemned land is not their problem.

We live in interesting times.

A few years ago, we didn’t know that such a thing as a Asian warehouse even existed, and that you could actually buy such exotic foods over the counter, such as Soy sauce, Nuoc Nam fish sauce, black beans. Once we got the taste of these Asian condiments, we were hooked, and then to keep up our supply, we resorted to carrying large flagons of soy sauce and whatever, to bring it back with us whenever we travelled off shore. Now we have several Asian supply stores actually in our own City

Someone once said to me, ‘You are barmy‘,‘I wouldn’t eat all that foreign muck’.I had a quiet smile as I watched him slosh on black Worcester sauce onto his pie. Just as well that he hadn’t read the label on the bottle saying, that it contained ground up anchovies, which is also the main ingredient of Asian fish sauce.

The availability of Asian ingredients is something that has proliferated from a small corner in a Supermarket to speciality stores now, selling nothing but Indian, Chinese, Japanese, foods. The choice is endless, and even includes frozen foods. All this seems to have taken place over the past fifteen years or so. There was a problem earlier, as a lot of what was on sale, was a complete mystery to the average New Zealander, not knowing what exactly was in many items on display. So unless you were familiar with the contents of any tin or packet, you didn’t buy. Now all that is changed, everything has an English label. And as well a full description of what it is, and how to use it. As well, I have found the staff in these stores very helpful.

Many years ago when we lived in Port Chalmers, and sometimes in the fungi season we drove out to Heyward’s Point which was often shrouded in fog. These conditions at times produced huge crops of field mushrooms. The kids joined in when we went out gathering. On one visit we soon had bushels of prime fresh mushrooms. These were the days when it wasn’t possible to walk into a greengrocer and buy the cultivated ones we enjoy today. However I had seen overseas, Japanese dried mushrooms, Shitake, and Kikurage being sold in stores. So I decided that if they could dry mushrooms, so could I.

The wife had just taken possession of a new clothes dryer, and it was her pride and joy and it freed her from the drudgery of the endless battle of drying clothes. Here was the perfect instrument to dry my mushrooms. This was an early model, where you hung your clothes onto racks, and a huge fan blew hot air through.

I quickly filled it to the brim with mushrooms, and set it going. It would seem and I now know that mushrooms are 95% water. By the time I discovered this fact back then, I had already flooded out the wash house, and made an awful mess of the dryer with the mushroom spray. I was confronted by an angry wife with armfuls of wet napkins, demanding that I immediately clean the machine, and the washhouse, or I would be busy doing her washing as well. Some days you really should stay in bed.

There is a lot of debate going on, whether or not Christchurch City Business Area should be relocated, or just left where it is. Of course, if you don’t know what all this is about, or even why.’Well it’s where most of the City’s property damage took place’. This is what’s now known, and designated as the ‘Red Zone’, it’s also situated in the shadow of the ‘Grand Chancellor Hotel’,it’s some seventeen stories high, and it’s badly endangered. What’s more, it now has has a very noticeable tilt. This area is strictly ‘Off Limits’ to the public, and will stay that way until it’s pulled down, and the danger removed. Every aftershock moves it, just a little more, but it stubbornly stays put. So now unfortunately they will have to pay to pull the damn thing down. For this task, it will cost really big money. The sum of ten million has been mentioned. I’ll bet too, that they now wish that one of the last series of earthquakes had knocked it over. Because after the last big shock, they poured tons upon tons of cement into the ground floor to stabilise it temporarily. Unfortunately, now they are having to pay as I said Millions, and they also have a time frame of six months to knock it down, and cart away the debris. Of course, not forgetting all the tons of cement, they had earlier put into the ground floor.

Lyttleton Harbour Board decided this was too good an opportunity to miss, so to take advantage of all this free spoil from the City demolition, and carry out some necessary reclamation. They offered to take all of the clean fill. Of course they ran slap bang into yet another official, declaring for this operation, they now required planning permission, which under the old rules would take months or even years to obtain. He was very quickly sorted out and pushed aside. I now see again, dozens of heavy trucks headed out that way again. Possibly they could put him on point duty.

I don’t know if the authorities have noticed or not, or just turning a blind eye to it all, but the local businessmen are busy working out things for themselves. They are all busy relocating and many have decided to work at home. The suburbs are now festooned with hundreds of advertising signs. These are all professionally done, so the sign writers must be enjoying a boom. They are located outside every other residential home. These all belong to former CBD Accountants, Hairdressers, Dentists, locksmiths, and even Jewellers. These are the same guys. who made up the working fabric of our city. In fact you name it, and you will find any and all of these people, all now working from home. In fact they haven’t much choice with their new venues, to carry out their occupations, which is now in a lounge, bathroom, shed, or even a garage.

If you had tried to do this six months ago without a permit, or even without a change of use, and planning permission, it would have been safer to kick over a beehive. Councils over the years have slowly wrapped themselves in more than enough regulations, that up until today, you required an lawyer to hold your hand, and the ‘patience of Job’, to work through. Today people are in no mood to be mucked about any more with petite officialdom. These folk could even find themselves, ‘hog tied’, and hung out to dry, all wrapped up in their own Red Tape should try to stop it.

One strange effect the earthquake has had with me is now when I’m travelling across town, I often take a wrong turning, because landmarks I have used in the past, but probably not realising it, have suddenly been pulled down or just disappeared. This can happen overnight. So its easy to miss a critical turn. Some streets where there were large sections of office blocks or housing have also been damaged and pulled down. This makes some streets you don’t use often seem unfamiliar, and places you are seeking, suddenly become hard to recognise.

We have another problem if you need to travel across town on a regular basis, it matters not if you go around the outskirts, or take your chances and take your normal route, but just be prepared to run into many diversions by repair work being carried out.

I’m still living with Beth and Roger and will be until my home is made liveable again. You may not know that I have had to move out of my home because of earthquake damage. Yet compared to what others have had to put up with, my damage is minimal. Our current generation has lived until this spate of earth quakes, the good life. They have lived in a time of plenty, and never had to front up and fight a War, or cope with being hungry, or a general depression with no work. What a rude wake up call mother nature has dealt them this time here in Christchurch.

With the continuing after shocks amounting to thousands, ( The newspaper reports 7,500 and counting) the damage is on going. What once were small cracks on my home’s brickwork, are now much bigger cracks. We have had several deadlines now, possibly seven or eight to report property damage. Don’t get me wrong, what we have experienced compared to what has happened to some here we have got off lightly. We still have water, power and sewerage. My home requires a little shoring up to make it safe to live in again. My only complaint is it would be nice, if the earthquake and War Damage people, would answer my letters, or even talk to me, or even give me a time frame of when they might call. At my age, I may never live see these people. It would seem that earthquake commission have bitten off more than they can chew. I’m starting to think, ‘Have we got the right people in charge?’

Anyway in my new life which has enabled me to increase my bonding with Beth and her family and enjoy the day to day living with a family again. A couple weeks ago, the grandson returned from school with a note. Kids today are the same as yesterday, they are always conveying to homes teacher’s notes. Some bring good news, and some bad. This note was neither, but only to advise that the School had an outbreak of head lice. Ugh!

As it turned out later, this was bad news. Schools have been a pool of lice infestation since I was a student, and probably a lot longer. As well back then, we didn’t have the aids to clean up after an attack we have now. There were a lot of ‘Granny’s’ remedies still in use back then, doing not an awful lot of good either, as well being a little rough on the patients. Nit combs, and such things as olive oil, kerosene, Lysol, were the main weapons of attack. My mother was at her wits end when our family all became infected. Because as fast as she cleared up our heads, we just as quickly became reinfected. In desperation, we were all packed off to our grandparents. They soon cleaned us up and rid us of the little ‘besties’.

However on our return home, we immediately became reinfected. We soon discovered that it was our baby sitter who was our families, ‘Typhoid Mary’. My parents both worked nights, so we always had a baby sitter. Having found the culprit we had no need to look for any other pool of infestation. My mother quickly took the young lady under her wing. She came from a very poor home that didn’t run to the luxury of an bathroom. Furthermore they didn’t even have running water inside their house. She later thanked my mother for what she taught her about basic personal hygiene.

However I digress, the other morning as grandson was departing for school. Pausing at the door Beth happened to look a little more closely at his head. To her horror she saw that he had a head full of lice. School was not for him that day. It was off to the medical centre and chemists.

I also looked on the Web for Head Lice, and found that there were pages and pages of cures. Some were strange. Like application of Mayonnaise, about 50 of these but it didn’t mention the brand. Listerine mouth wash, and the old standby, a nit comb. However they returned back from the chemists with about three bottles of different lotions, and a electronic nit comb, that zapped any and every louse it came in contact with. We will have to wait a little longer to find out if it’s as good as it’s accompanying burp said it would be.

Naturally Rhys was going to pass his infection around. So we all had to undergo an humiliating immediate close family inspection. Unfortunately Beth failed her inspection. She was going to attend a work dinner that night, and before departing plastered her hair down with a chemist’s recommendation. On arrival someone complimented her on her coiffure’. She didn’t try to lie to conceal the truth, but told the naked truth.

As a young boy growing up in a Sea Port, with a cousin and my brother, we spent most of our free time together. As well, we were all about the same age. It was good too, as together we were quick, and able to exploit all that was on offer. Especially the activities that interested young boys, that we could and did enjoy. For a start, the Dock area was fenced off, but the gates were always open, so we were free to come and go as we wished. All other wharf areas and the fishing steps were wide open as well, so we could wander anywhere we pleased.

If we could time it right, it was good to be present when ever a ship entered one of the docks. Then we waited until the water was lowered to about only six inches deep, then it was time to move down onto the bottom of the dock, and get after the fish that managed to get themselves trapped when the vessel moved in. Now they were there for the taking. Occasionally we actually caught a sea run salmon, but mullet and red cod were the most common catch. Often even the odd octopus turned up, but back then I didn’t know that you could eat such fare. Many meals that ended up on our table came from this source.

Another activity that we kept a close eye on was the pilot Launch. It was also moored in the dock area. The Skipper Mr Marris, and Engineer Mr Thompson were both happy to give kids a ride, providing we could get the timing right. Whenever they were putting out to sea to meet a ship, placing the pilot on board, or retrieving him from a vessel when it was safely at sea. This exchange took place a few miles off the Harbour entrance. Not always could we fit all our arrangements in with their work day. Goodness we had school to attend, so very often it was a no go, especially when two movements were taking place. Sometimes the launch would often tie up at Aramoana to wait on the second vessel, to save steaming back to Port Chalmers.

We knew as much as any Harbour Board employee about shipping movements. We kept in close touch with the pier Master. Whenever we met up with him, and our wandering brought us in contact. We would quickly catch up with all the projected shipping movements. We also wanted to know about the Tug’s movements, at the time it was based at Port Chalmers too. Captain Scoullay was in command of this vessel, he was generous too, and often allowed us on board his tug for short trips. I was fascinated with the power of this steam tug. When on board I often hung over the scuttles peering down into engine room, which took up half of the below deck space, and the boiler the other half. I was fascinated by the heat that came from below, the smell of hot oil, all projected the latent power of the huge engine. Capt. Scoullay had another attraction too. He owned a beautiful sailing dinghy, and a slip around at ‘Back Beach’. The prevalent winds either seemed to blow up, or down the harbour, the Capt. was fond of sailing across to Portobella and back. Both of these trips were on what is called a ‘broad reach,’ which is the most powerful, and fastest sailing angle for any sail boat. I don’t know if we got taken along on many occasions as ballast or kindness, but regardless, we didn’t need any urging to climb aboard, it was an exciting ride.

Late afternoon when the fishing fleet were returning to unload their catch, we could be found handy to take their lines, and tie them up. Should it have been a good day, there were a lot of ‘freebies’ available. Undersized soles that couldn’t be sold, or thrown back, by the time they were retrieved from the ‘cod end’ of their net, they were already dead. A dozen of these threaded onto a wire and lugged home, were a very welcome and tasty addition to the dinner table.

One of our adventures stands out. Uncle Duncan McKenzie was in Port as the Chief Officer of a Union Company vessel. It initially had called at Port Chalmers, but was to be relocated to Dunedin to load cargo. We had permission to travel with her and wonderfully, we were to dine on board while on route. We departed as soon as the tide was in full flood. When we came to the narrow passage between Goat and Quarantine Islands, the current would have been running about 8 knots. Uncle Duncan’s station was on the forecastle, and as we approached the narrow gap, I said to Duncan. ‘Could you tell the Captain, He is travelling too slow to maintain steerage, and he is making his turn too wide’. ‘Continue, and we will run aground’.’How would you know that?’ Reply, ‘I sail over here often with Capt. Scoullay’ ‘Where we are heading, there is a sand bank right in our path’. ‘I should know, as it also gives us problems at low tide’. Well it happened, and while we waited for the vessel to refloat, we dined on fine linen with silver service, and in resplendent style. No one at the table referred to the sand bank that we were stuck on.

I haven’t mentioned our milk run activity, this took place on weekends. We started out on this caper very early in the mornings, around 5am or 6am. I should say too, that the whole household was woken by our alarm clock, which by the way, we had put into a four gallon kerosene tin to make more noise, and to ensure we woke. This and the clatter we made departing, was something the rest of our family hated with a passion and didn’t enjoy. They let it be known, they wanted an uninterrupted ‘sleep in’.

We were unpaid in this exercise, but we had another agenda. We were all teaching ourselves to drive in their vehicle. Another interest was that we also liked to make a visit to Stephenson & Cook’s moulding shop to watch the molten pour of cast iron, whenever they lit up their blast Furnaces. There was an awful lot for small boys to do in our town. We were very lucky indeed.

What a difference today. For a start, everything is fenced off. Little boys of today don’t enjoy the freedom that we had, and they are the poorer for it. I’m not sure who or what they are protecting? or are they are just endeavouring to keep terrorists out? But I’m sure we would have found a way through.