All of the things. ALL OF THEM.

And now, Christmas is two sleeps away. And I am in bed sick. Good times.

Because it would take far too long to properly recap on the last month, here is a collection of photos with some context.

Lots has been going on at work - first of all, Ed designed this amazing Christmas poster.

Pip moved out. It was sad. But she made us an incredible goodbye dinner featuring pulled pork, spicy coleslaw, and lemon meringue pie.

My letter to the editor was published in the North & South, which confirms my future as an angry letter writing old lady.

I went to Auckland and ate like a Queen, saw the musical Little Shop of Horrors which was a really fun time, and saw 'Who Shot Rock & Roll' at the Auckland Art Gallery.

I went to Toast Martinborough for the third year in a row, this time with Ed, Nick and Little Claire. This is a chicken and quince pie by Ruth Pretty at Ata Rangi. Sadly there was no creme brulee this year which was honestly one of the reasons I wanted to go to Toast. I think I'll have a break from it next year, it was a good day but I need a rest from it.

We stayed at my family's house in Masterton after Toast and went for a walk to Rathkeale to walk off all the food we'd eaten.

We put on a Christmas sing-along show and I went to Auckland. Again.

To help market the show the cast and a couple of others (actually just Kate the Stage Manager and I), went and sang at the Christmas markets in Frank Kitts Park. It was really cute and some old people loved it.

We had a party under the dome in the Grand Hall upstairs at 1 Kent Tce to say Bon Voyage to BATS while we temporarily relocate to the corner of Cuba and Dixon Streets for 2013. My last week at work was spent in a makeshift office upstairs with a 12 metre drill below.

I got to go to carols at Longwood again this year, it was lovely as per usual.

Then I had a roast dinner two nights in a row, at the second one we had amazing bread pudding with chocolate, pears, and sugar syrup.

On Friday night there was some South Island road trip planning and a visit to the Telecom Christmas Tree. Then yesterday a visit to Alex for her birthday where there were some beautiful flowers and a beautiful baby. He is so cute.

Now, I'm really looking forward to feeling better (please let it be soon). I was meant to be in the Wairarapa already but I felt too sick to drive over. So I'm hanging out in bed watching first the clouds and then the fog roll in and magically disappear the harbour. It hasn't really felt like Christmas much yet, I haven't decorated a tree, didn't get time to make Christmas cards, I haven't done all my Christmas shopping, and I've only listened to A Very Cherry Christmas a couple of times. But my first 10 weeks of work have been crazy and we made a Christmas show, so that probably has something to do with it.

On the 28th I'm going down South for a little drive around (although, not so little really, one day involves five hours of driving...) as I've never been south of Christchurch. I'm excited. Let's hope Boy Alex (my Mum insists I stop calling him that, 'It makes him sound like Boy George' - but I've got too many Alexs around, I need to differentiate them somehow) and I don't get too sick of each other. I plan to take lot's of photos, so stay tuned.

Up the Garden Path (but not really)

The path to my house is covered with pink flowers, which is very picturesque but also very slippery when it has been raining.

We had Baby Knitters Club last Wednesday. I'm making slow progress on the Pebble Vest. I feel like the finished product is going to be tiny given it's all knit as one piece, so I'd better hurry up.

Last week I went to Bill Bailey, The Keepers and Flowers From My Mother's Garden. I'm going to try to go to all the BATS shows from now on given my new job, so I might have to stop listing them or it will get boring. I also went to La Boca Loca in Mirarmar and it was yum. I'd wanted to go for a while because people had said it was good and I was not disappointed. I especially appreciated the Frida shrine in the toilet. Although, I wonder how she'd feel about her shrine being in the toilet.

I feel like I haven't been to the movies in ages, but that's not actually true. The other week I went to The Sapphires. It was bit too cheesy for my liking. The dialogue felt pretty stale. But the music was fun.

A mundane novella

Last Sunday I took part in Corner Diary at BATS, which was basically a group of us reading things we had written when we were younger and were, to varying degrees, ashamed of. I read from the diary I wrote when I was eight years old, and the diary I wrote when I was ten. I had the best time and I wasn't embarrassed by the younger me at all - I'm glad I was so precocious and self-absorbed and strange, it has given me the best comedy material possible. Anyway, a lot of my diary entries from when I was ten begin with 'Sorry I haven't written for so long' or 'I can't believe it's been three days/three weeks/three months since I last wrote'. Nothing changes.

That photo above was taken on my way to work one morning just over a week ago. We'd had a lot of rain and one of the walls that the footpath on Glenmore Street runs alongside had even more moss on it than usual; I didn't touch it but it looked much thicker and bouncier (I'm sure moss doesn't bounce, but whatever). And it had little succulent flowers growing out of it. I thought they were pretty cool.

In the last few weeks I have been doing the usual - eating, working, going to movies and shows, writing a Christmas show with Alex and Ed, and various other things. Have I written about the orchestra? I don't think so.

I went to the orchestra one Friday night in August. I asked for two tickets for my birthday because I hadn't been since I was much younger and I had pretty much forgotten what it was like. It was the NZSO and the concert was called Cathedral of Sound, with 'one of the most exciting and ground breaking conductors of our time' Simone Young conducting Mozart's Symphony No. 36 Linz and Bruckner's Symphony No. 5. This really means nothing to me, all I know is I really enjoyed it and I couldn't believe over two hours had passed when we walked out. Simone Young was very animated in her conducting, she pretty much conducted with her whole body so it was really interesting to watch. Which was lucky because we were right near the front so could only see the front part of the string section. The person I went with wore a bow tie. Which was pretty great.

Here are some pictures of food I have eaten in the past few weeks:

The main of the Wellington On A Plate set menu at Le Metropolitain, followed by dessert off the menu. Creme brulee for me and warm chocolate pudding with sour cherries for Kelly.

Tacos from QBT on the waterfront at lunchtime on Friday. A bit of a wait, but so worth it.

Scones with jam and cream (not pictured, obviously) at Martha's Pantry. Two days in a row. As well as the daffodils in that photo, there are blossoms and blooms and bulbs everywhere in the Botanic Garden at the moment. It looks and smells pretty amazing every morning when I walk through it.

Churros and chocolate sauce for dessert at El Matador last night. I drank the last of the sauce out of the cup when I'd finished the churros. So good. Kelly got pancakes filled with caramel, which looked quite crepe-ish and tasted yum.

As for movies and theatre, I went to West End Girls at Circa, which was as expected (the ending was particularly cringe-inducing). I went to Tiny Spectacle / Shitty Lyricism at BATS which was painfully hip. I went to Jerichow at the Film Society (anyone could go along for a donation), a somewhat bleak and sometimes ridiculous, but enjoyable enough German film. I went to One Day Moko at BATS which was beautiful and made me a bit emotional. I saw it in its first incarnation as a Toi Whakaari solo and since then Tim has developed it into an hour long show. He is very very clever and such a strong performer. It makes you think a bit differently about homelessness and people you see regularly on the street, but most importantly it just makes you think about those things and has some very funny moments. Rave over. I went to Moonrise Kingdom last night which was cute and funny and I loved the music (by composer Benjamin Britten).

That's enough.

Oh but I listened to the most beautiful and sad 'This American Life' podcast this week. 'Our Friend David', following the death of regular contributor David Rakoff, whose voice I love. David's life is explored through bits from stories he'd told on the show and it was just so funny and lovely. I love that show.

Everything. Again.

It's been a week since my birthday eve. Where does the time go? Age.

Those are some biscuits I made to take to work on my birthday. There's a weird semi-tradition at my current workplace in which people bring baking on their birthday. Which doesn't really make sense, but it meant I got to eat Nigella's extreme chocolate chip biscuits with the five minute quiz, so I wasn't complaining.

I had a really great birthday that included being taken out three times for cups of tea, gifts of novelty socks, necklaces (including a necklace with a tiny working harmonica and a necklace that looks like bunting), and home made fruit leather, pizza with lots of cool people, wine, and me getting angrily adamant about how long someone has to have their full license for before they can teach a learner driver. Turns out I was wrong. It is only two years. Fine.

Alex gave me these tulips which have been the gift that just keeps on giving. They started out all closed and lovely and over the past week, encouraged by the gentle humming of the fridge no doubt, they have opened up and become even lovelier.

On Saturday the weather was yuck but that was more than okay because a collection of people came to my house and played boardgames. Then I proof-read a whole lot of short essays for a non-fiction book my old manager is publishing. I learned a lot about early New Zealand tourism ephemera (namely posters).

Then on Sunday we had classic movie Sunday and I got to choose because it was my birthday and I chose Annie because I didn't think I'd ever seen it before and if I had I couldn't remember any of it and it's very important that I see a seminal redheaded child movie.

Oh Annie, you hilarious but too long musical movie. Daddy Warbucks is both creepy and the best billionaire adoptive father ever. Miss Hannigan is probably me in 20 years time, bathing in gin. There are some strange characters like Punjab, and I was pretty surprised by the sometimes quite intense sexual innuendo in a children's movie.

Monday night saw my flatmate Emma and I tucked up in her bed watching the season finale of Girls. I don't know if I've mentioned Girls on here before, but the season finale was amazing and I now love Girls unequivocally. I really wasn't sure for a while, I liked the first episode, I wasn't that thrilled by some other episodes, I was disappointed we didn't see more of my favourite character (Shoshana), I have read a lot of the criticisms (and the hype) of the show and I agree with some of them, but overall I think it's pretty impressive and I am looking forward to season two.

Tuesday night I saw All My Sons at Circa and was pleasantly surprised. I had low expectations, but the cast was impressive and the script was very good (when considered in terms of the tradition that it comes from). I got a fright at the end which was probably very naive of me, and it made me think about the wider effects of war - beyond soldiers dying and the effect that has on their families.

Last night I went to Flight of the Conchords at the Michael Fowler Centre. The songs were great, they played lots of classics and a few new ones. There were some excellent surprised (especially during 'Bowie's In Space'), and Arj Barker's opening comedy set was pretty funny. I did feel, though, like Bret wasn't that enthused about being there. He seemed to want to just get it over and done with. Someone at work went last night as well and she said, 'Oh I didn't think that, I thought that was just him, or his schtick.' But I saw them a few years ago in Masterton and I definitely think they were more generous with their between-song banter and general attitude. I'm glad I went though, it was so good hearing some old favourites, especially  'A Hilarious Misunderstanding' which isn't on either of the albums but is very good.

And now I'm going to Christchurch for the weekend. I want to take my knitting but I only have carry-on and I'm scared they'll take it off me and it'll be gone forever. It's a hard knock life, for me.

Paper and cheese

The other morning, when my room was still in disarray, I went and sat in my flatmate Emma's room to eat my cinnamon and grated apple porridge (I didn't make it, but it's really yum, so one day I will have to try to recreate the glory of it). The door of her wardrobe was open and the wallpaper on the inside was so great I had to take a photo of it.

My room is pretty much all set up now, which is nice. This house is so homely that I want to burrow in and hibernate all winter knitting and listening to podcasts, and reading, and watching Girls and the latest season of Mad Men. Unfortunately, I still have to leave the house to go to work. And really, I don't think I'd last long at pure hibernation, because then I'd miss things like the talk I went to by Oliver Jeffers on Tuesday night, run by the New Zealand Book Council.

Oliver Jeffers is an Irishman living in New York who writes and illustrates picture books. I got him to sign my copy of The Heart and the Bottle. He asked if I worked in publishing or wanted to be a children's book maker (because it seemed like that was the background of a lot of other people there) and I said, 'No, I work for the Government. I tell stories, but they're pretty boring.' And he replied, 'Oh. Well...good luck with that.'

He's right. I need to get out of the Government. But what will I doooooo? I'm working on it.

On Thursday night I went to Yeti Is Dead/I Am Tom which was very funny in a silly way, and last night I went to Command Performance which was impressive musical improvisation. Both were at BATS as part of the NZ International Comedy Festival.

I forgot to include this photo in one of my earlier posts. This was my Aro Cafe lunch on Sunday in between my first and second car load to the new house. It was extremely delicious fried haloumi and bread with a side salad. I decided I'd better make the most of Aro Cafe on my last day living around the corner from it.

Food. Theatre. Comedy.

These are few of my favourite things. Take it away Julie Andrews!

On Wednesday night I had dinner at Olive Cafe which was extremely yum - gnocchi with mushrooms and a blue cheese sauce - and then the warm chocolate pudding. Oh that pudding. The centre was all gooey and amazing.

Apart from that I have been to all of the things - Lucrece, Live at Six, A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and a Prayer, The Five-Year Engagement, My Life Has Been A Series Of Poorly Made Decisions, Good Times With Cool Dudes, Bombs Away! A Musical, and Constantinople.

I also joined Twitter (@ActuallyCherie).

All these things have proved excellent procrastination tactics when I should have been packing to move on Sunday. Oh well.

My favourites of the above list have been:

A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and A Prayer. This collection of monologues was a fundraiser for Wellington Rape Crisis in recognition of V-Day 'a global activist movement that generates broader attention for the fight to stop violence against women and girls'. The monologues were read by a collection of awesome people and politicians and were sad, funny, interesting, scary, thought provoking, and one made me quite squeamish. It was storytelling at its most pure and I really loved it.

Constantinople. So strange, I can't even really describe it except to say there are two men in togas and the history of Constantinople is the framework for some weird and ingenious comedy.

In other news, I am excited about having a desk in my new room because I am planning on setting my sewing machine up on the desk and leaving it out for easy access. Will this mean I use it more? I hope so.

On the road again

Photo by Anita Pitu Photography

Our show opened on Thursday night. People have been laughing and I am really proud of it. It's called Nucking Futs and is on at BATS Theatre until Saturday 21 April. It's pretty much been my life the last two weeks so I don't really have anything else to say. Except I have been making progress on this scarf, a little bit at a time.

I started it last year but had to frog it because I wasn't happy with the border (it's moss stitch with a border of plain). I love this yarn though, it's from Tash and the little flecks of light blue pop up rather nicely.

Arrived today

Late last year, the Patron Saint of Wellington, Sir Peter Jackson, and his equally excellent and talented wife, Fran Walsh, purchased the building that BATS Theatre is housed in. 

BATS currently only uses one of the three floors of the building, and the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes used to own the building and take up the other two floors (the middle floor has this amazing hall with a stained glass dome in the ceiling). 

When the Buffs sold the building and moved out earlier this year, they weren't exactly fastidious in their removal of their things, which has meant going up into their old rooms for rehearsals has been excellent for poking around and being nosey. One thing we found on a bookshelf left full of books, was this postcard. 

Seeing as it was sent from Bristol in 1978 and had such an amazing message, we decided to send it to our friends Hannah and Ralph who are currently living in Bristol. Being an extreme goody good, I was a bit worried about removing the postcard from where it had lived for over 30 years, but I'm glad we did. If I was a postcard, I'd want an equally unexpected turn in my life.

Everything and nothing really

New permanent sculpture in Glover Park that I saw while walking through on the weekend. It makes me think of hot air balloons, exotic palaces, and tree forts.

In between rehearsing and working, I have seen lots of good things lately. I started writing about them all but then I lost the enthusiasm for it. So in brief:

Two weeks ago I saw The Artist, which I really enjoyed. Last Wednesday night I saw A Play About Love which I also enjoyed.

On Friday night I saw Raoul which had some moments of absolute magic that I am still amazed thinking about, but also lacked cohesiveness and seemed to suffer from having too much money. For example, there were some amazing puppets, but they kind of just came on, had people gasp and clap at them, and then they left again very quickly - they weren't used to their full potential or developed as characters. The parts I enjoyed best were often the most simple - a trick with a big round mirror which made it look like someone had fallen into the mirror and disappeared, some physical comedy in which the guy couldn't get comfortable while sitting reading a book. Overall, Raoul didn't live up to its hype for me.

On Sunday night I saw my last New Zealand International Arts Festival show: Hohepa. A modern New Zealand opera. I really did not like it. Maybe modern opera just isn't for me, but it felt like a bad musical. There were clearly some amazing (especially male) singers, but it felt like we didn't get to hear the full range of their voices because they did a lot of talk singing (there's a flash Italian word for it but I can't remember it). And there's something that just annoys me about people singing such inane things as, 'And Jane was very seasick' and 'We are going to the shops soon.' I kid you not. Those were actual lines.

On Saturday night I saw Hugo, which I LOVED. I went with my little brother who was in town, and it's lucky he was, otherwise I probably wouldn't have thought to go at all. It was in 3D which normally doesn't do much for me but this was so so good. I loved the setting (Paris in the 1930s) and the mystery and all the clockwork mechanics. The idea of an automaton blew my mind. On the way home I was saying to Hunter, 'But they couldn't really have made automated dolls before computers that could draw such detailed pictures - you'd have to have so many tiny cogs and wheels and things inside them, how would they all fit?' But when we came home and I looked it up, it turned out it was true. They really exist. Given I'm scared of dolls, I think seeing one working in real life would creep me out way too much, but as a concept, they are fascinating.

This was Lyall Bay from the deck of Maranui on Saturday morning. It seems a long time ago given that rain, wind, fog, and cold temperatures have now hit town with a vengeance.

Weekend

On Saturday, my Nana turned 78. We had lunch at the golf driving range cafe to celebrate, as you do in the Wairarapa. But first, I discovered the rather civilised Thorndon Farmers' Market on my way to catch the train.

Hunter took this photo of me holding Isla. It's so good! 

I had to get the early train home on Sunday morning as we had a rehearsal that afternoon for our next show. The show is called Nucking Futs and it's on at BATS from the 12th to the 21st of April. We're doing some podcasts in the lead-up to opening night - they're basically Alex and I rambling about different parts of the internet and coming up with brief flashes of comedy lightning. Even though everyone who reads this blog is likely to know about the podcasts already anyway, the link is here.