DeeKnow’s Grotto

Seeing as Kym and I are only a handfull of hours away from a life-changing exercise, ie Kym having our first child, it seemed like a good idea to post something from our relatively calm and peaceful environment, and later contrast that with a tired and weary first time parents view a few days later.

Of course, Kym may have other ideas about just how much time I will have available to spend at the laptop writing blog posts, but I’m picking she’ll be tired enough at the odd time when I’ll be able to sneak down to the lounge. My flight-simming days though are seriously numbered. In fact I’d say their number is approximately one-half of a day (I’ve got a desperate last minute flight underway right now from Tokyo Narita to Auckland which should touch down with a couple of hours to spare

Kym is being induced at 7pm tonite, which is a bummer in one respect coz we were both hoping things would pan out naturally, but in another way its actually kinda good that there is a plan now, we have an idea of what the procedure will be, its almost like Kym has a little more control. Of course that’s not quite the way she looks at it. Like most mothers she worries about the extra added complications of what is basically an intervention into something that should be happening on its own accord.

Anyway back to the previously child-less and blissfully ignorant view of what’s in store for the two of us, if you are a parent you’ll be laughing now just like every other couple we know has done as we near the big day.. “You just dont know what your in for” … followed by an evil cackle pretty much sums up the common reaction, and no doubt that’s true. My strategy has pretty much been to ignore the feedback and more or less pretend its not happening. Whats the point in worrying about things that are unavoidable until they actually hit you, especially if you’ve done pretty much all you can do to prepare. Ok so “prepare” is probably a stretch, we did go to ante-natal classes though (or anti-natal as I called it)

So here we are. Bags packed, snacks and comfort foods ready, a good stiff brandy learing at me from the shelf in the kitchen, us waiting patiently and keeping nerves at bay as 7pm approaches. I promise I wont be posting any gorey pics here later, but I will try and post something as a post-birth-father-traumatic-stress syndrome sufferer.

Wish me luck !!!

Me mum just FWD’d me this hard case pic (no doubt doctored in Photoshop) of someone about to end their ablutions a bit earlier than they thought (there’s a Lion creeping up in the top-right corner)

Jesus, that’d do it all right. I was in almost the exact same position when we were traveling through Africa. I was on a jeep going across a big game park (the Mara I think), I had been suffering from the African two-step so got the truck to stop in some trees, ducked out, pulled me strides down and got on with the job. Next thing there’s this screeching and wailing ruckus coming roaring thru the grass towards me, stopped me efforts short and leaped on the truck just as a troop of interested Baboons came bounding out of the undergrowth. No doubt they had fun picking thru what I’d left behind.

The world is ending, run for the hills. Gwynne Dyer said so, it must be true.

Ok, so he didn’t actually say it was ending but he covered some pretty gloomy topics and delivered some alarming stats at his talk at Waikato University tonight that might lead you to believe that it was. When I got home Kym asked me for a summary of the talk at the end of which she said “So was it all Doom and Gloom?“, but I guess that is the role of a journalist like Gwynne and the topics he covers. He’s in the business of informing people about broad reaching global influences and encouraging people to think about how they might themselves do something to make a change.

Dyer gave us a round-up of issues he thought weren’t a big problem, some others he thought were a problem, and a few more that were problems he was really worried about. If you’re a regular reader of his newspaper columns (which are widely syndicated, including by our local Waikato Times) you’ll know that he is a reporter who focuses on problems, so when he says he’s particularly worried about any of them then you can be sure they are issues to be taken seriously.

Some of the issues that made it into the less serious camp included American withdrawl from Iraq and Afghanistan (they will bounce back in their own natural way and time), Oil supply issues (the vendors will always need to sell their oil, to buy food and comodities), the conflict between Georgia/the West and Russia (storm in a teacup).

The issue that he really reinforced as more serious centred around Global warming, its likely affect on traditional food growing regions of the planet, potential conflict between nations over food supply, and the very real potential for catastrophic global thermal runaway that will be beyond our control if temperatures rise by more than the two or three degrees that is expected to result in this.

So was it really all Doom and Gloom? Dyer did discuss some Geo-Engineering options that are being considered to help defer the onset and initial impact of global warming but these are stop gaps which dont offer a solution to the problem of escalating warming. The scientific consensus is apparently that we are unlikely to be able to react in time to stop the process, and that global industrialisation in nations whose “turn it is” now clearly isnt helping.

So where do we go from here? I dont know that there really was any clear message from the speaker regarding this, other than looking at technology for energy generation options with less impact, doing what we can to reduce our input into warming, considering Geo-Engineering options and such like. I get the sense that there’s a big helping of good luck and timing required, but one relatively comforting outcome from the talk came right at the end when Dyer said…

“I’m not quite ready to cut my throat… yet”

Kym and I are on our winter break down at Ruapehu, have been here since the weekend, and now is the first time I’ve managed to escape the evil clutches of her-indoors to make a break for the nearest Internet terminal. I’ll have to make something up for my return, yes “I just went for a stroll darling” might just cut it.

It has to be said that we are pretty stoked to have ended up at Turoa for a couple of days skiing on what is their biggest EVER recorded snow-base, currently 4.5m…. or to put a little more emphasis on the statistic…

FOUR POINT FIVE BLOODY METERS OF SNOW!!!

Christ it was good fun these last couple of days, a clear blue sky day mostly on Tuesday, a bit cloudy since then but how the hell can you complain about visibility when you’ve got this friggin awesome snow base underneath the skis. For most north-island skiers its a bloody struggle to get through fresh powder, especially when the entire bloody field is covered in the stuff. Funny tho, it never seems to be a chore to have to get back on your feet and dust off a covering of dry powder. Never ceases to bring a smile to your face, and its a crack-up seeing someone else wipe-out in it and do a disappearing act.

Actually had the day off today, thats what comes with approaching your 5th decade I guess. No more getting up there at 9am every day and skiiing till you drop at 4pm. Christ its great fun, I just love the winter trip rolling around each year. Such a buzz, almost everyone on the mountain is fizzing with excitement, you hear people whooping it up, not coz they’re trying to annoy or impress you, its coz they’re so stoked to be in this amazing alpine environment.

As you can probably pickup, I’m basically having a great break.

Like most bike riders I’m pretty much always keeping an eye on the trade mags and websites monitoring new bike releases and prices. Its not that bikers are loaded with dosh and can change bikes on a whim every few months, in fact I’d say every 2-4 years is pretty common, and its not like there’s anything wrong as such with the bike you have, its just something about being a bike junkie. You’re always hungry for a new twist on the old addiction.

This is mostly how I ended up looking seriously at a bike over these last few weeks.

Kym is used to me day-dreaming and flicking endlessly through mags but this time she could see I was a little more serious than usual. We went through the accounting-dance to negotiate just how much moolah I was authorised to spend and I promptly hit the streets.

After testing 8 bikes over the last few weeks and finally settling on two I fancied I visited the two stores in question at lunchtime yesterday to get the best trade deal and ended up riding out of Hamilton Motorcycles on a near-new Triumph Daytona 675. (here’s a wee video of the bike if your interested)

Got insurance sorted out this morning and went out for a lunchtime strop out of town, round a few back-roads near Hamilton Airport and back in through Peacocks rd. It was raining of course, we’ve hardly seen a dry day in the last couple of months, but the bike handled beautifully in the wet. The torque is gorgeous, it loves to rev, brakes are great, engine braking surprisingly good, the engine note is fantastic, I could (and will) listen to all day.

Its fair to say… I’m stoked !!!

EDIT: - took the long way home from work tonight, still raining, also dark, but had some more fun and picked up on some more details. I know its very shallow and cosmetic but am totally loving the tone of the Triple, especially in the low-to-mid-range area, the sound is to die for, has a slightly edgyier-than-twin but less coarse than 4-cyl sort of tone to it. A real nice grumble, not quite as distinctive at the top-end but pleasing none the less.

Handling wise am loving the way it tips in to corners. Not too urgently so it catches you out, just very easy to initiate the roll and very stable and linear as it tips in. The clutch is REAL nice too, requires very little input but still obvious as far as required input goes. Gearbox is a wee bit clunky though, could be the new-ness of the machine I spose. Oh yeah, and on the new-ness front, it still smells new when it warms up. About as close to a new bike as I’ll probably get so I intend to savour it