23rd Dec = chaos!

Gar! I had typed out the beginning of a post and when I disconnected from the internet the computer restarted and it was gone... I HATE COMPUTERS! As I have said many times before, how I wish I could take this one up to the 11th floor of the James Height library and chuck it off... wheeeeee!!!!
It’s Christmas (summer) and I have a cold. What’s with that? I think it comes from spending lots of time in a cold house, or outside in the rain. *shakes fist angrily at sky*

So anyway, Sally was right. When she leaves, I need to post! When she’s around, I’m occupied enough to not need to post. It’s getting a bit lonely. Ruth is not here. Nathan is away for a month. Sally has been in Timaru (but was back for 3 days this week). My Aunty and family have just left for Australia. Heln has gone to Te Carroty Puke.
As Sally so poetically put it, I am like Mount Cook discovering New Zealand [sic.]. I think Sally is cool =) After our slightly rocky start to flatting together (I thought she was thunder-footted miss lazy, and she thought I was miss uptight and rule-obsessed) I now quite like living with Sal. The thumping and door-slamming in the middle of the night is decreasing, and we are learning to just say something when we have problems. It’s good being comfortable enough with another person to feel that you can speak if there is an issue. The other cool thing about living with Sal now is that she is cool. Sal is strange. Sal is windy. But Sal is fun. So yay for Sal.
Steve is also cool. Strangely, we saw Steve three days this week. I’m not sure what attracted him to Hermil.. No, I jest! It’s obvious why he was there *cough* smitten *cough*. I think its really lovely to watch a relationship develop and, dare I say, blossom. I much prefer that to the oft-rushed world of dating today. Yay for Sally and Steve taking time, and being a cool couple.

Lets tell you about yesterday. I see that Mike has taken a leaf out of my book, and written a long ranty post about his troubles, so I shall follow suit.
Yesterday, the 23rd december.
Sal and I went to the Christchurch City Council to see if the building done on Hermil was up to standard. Interestingly enough, the file was ‘missing’. Yeah! Do I ever feel like Nancy Drew who has just stumbled across sordid details! We left the council, in central Chch, and drove to Steve’s place, in Bishopdale. We picked him up, stopped at Hermil for 10 minutes, then tried to meet Sal’s Timaru friends for lunch. Sal got a bit mixed up with the directions, and we ended up over half an hour late to lunch. It was 1.35, and I decided that if I wanted to be at the Airport at 2pm, then I’d better just skip lunch and head for the airport.
Stupidly, I decided to head down Riccarton Rd, so that I could get drive-through Maccas for lunch. After moving at snail’s pace, I went through KFC and had to go down Blenheim Rd. All day the driving had been chaotic. People were driving like idiots. (including myself) Finally I reached the airport at 2.20, after driving for about 90 minutes, and at no time having travelled more than 9kms over the speed limit. (I count 10 over as speeding). But wait. Every man and his dog was at the airport. I had to wait to get into the carpark, then drive around almost every row to try and find a park. By this time I was panacked, as I had had the impression that my relatives were going to board the plane at 2.30. After yelling at a man (“DON’T YOU KNOW YOUR GIVEWAY RULES?” oops – window down), I fially got parked and ran for the airport.
I puffedly arrived at the international arrival lounge and searched for familiar faces. Wait. Arrival lounge? No! No wonder these people all looked happy. Wrong place. Frantic search for signs. Could find no signs pointing to International Departure Lounge. I have no watch, and all I knew was that last time I’d seen a clock, it read 2.20. It felt like eons later. I strode (? Strided? Stroded? Strude?) through the airport and found the international departures. Crowd scan….. nope. Nobody I knew. I strude back to arrivals. Nope. Back to departures. Back to arrivals. Back to departures, by this stage getting teary and starting to worry that I’d missed them. I felt like screaming “what the heck is wrong with the signage in this place? How can I find anything if the signs don’t make sense?!”
I checked my phone for messages... nothing. I had expected a family member to be waiting outside, ready to scream “where were you? You’re nearly 45 minutes late?!” I felt lost and stressed. Tears clouded my vision and my face began to screw up. (not like that. I mean it got all squinty cos I was trying not to wail) I decided to go down to domestic. On the way I walked through (apparently) international check in… family members! People I knew! I nearly ran over to my mum, promptly burst into tears and wailed “where were you? I thought somebody would come and meet me. I’ve been walking around lost for 20 minutes.” *sob sob sob* My mother put her arms around me (?!) and we walked over to some seats where I wailed that I hadn’t had a drink since 10am, hadn’t had time to eat lunch which was sitting in my car, had been driving for nearly 2hours, couldn’t find anyone, and thought I’d missed seeing my cousins and Aunty before they left.
Apparently the rellies hadn’t checked in at 12.30 like they’d planned, and so had been waiting in line for almost an hour. Yay... I got to see my cousins, my aunty, and my uncle. Suraj held my hand all the way from the check in to the international departures, his little hand gripping to mine. When we hugged goodbye he said, “will you miss us?” I whispered. “of course I will”.


Other thoughts: hmm... if anyone is around over the next few weeks then give me a call at Hermil! I’ve got work the week of the 10th – 16th Jan, but otherwise I’m doing nothing. (secret message contained within that sentence: im getting a bit bored and lonely and would love company. So as long as you txt or call first, then I’ll be glad to see you)
I hope everyone has a lovely Christmas, with lots of Jesus, love, family, joy, and happiness.

Happy Birthday, Jesus.