I wish I was in Wellington

The MUTTONBIRDS

I guess it is given that Muttonbirds songs will be providing the soundtrack.

I’m on the Quantas flight down to Wellington as I write this. Despite many people commenting, “Quantas? They don’t fly around New Zealand,” it seems that yes, they do, and there’s even a sign at the airport saying “Turn Right for the Quantas Terminal”. I figure they used to be Ansett because it’s what I used to know as the Ansett Terminal. Last time I was *there* was when I saw Grandma of as she flew down to Christchurch to see Uncle Kelvin.

Cornerstone had a morning tea thing this morning, and Sue, Dave, and Paula all showed up to see me. Sue is perky as ever; Dave is looking good; and Paula is just the same. No almond croissants from the bakery, but date scones are a good substitute. We sat around and talked shop for an hour or so. Trudy showed up as well!

I reserved maybe 30 minutes to talk to Steve about VFP COM objects and ASP pages – it turns out his current project is very similar to some stuff Lisa and I did recently and I wanted to talk over some of the issues with him, make sure he was making good decisions, etc. (I guess you can’t take the Development Manager out of the Boy.)

Vinessa and Trudy wanted to take me out to lunch before taking me to the airport. I kind of insisted we go to Zarbo’s Delicatessen in Newmarket, which is very much on the way to the airport – except I once again forgot how to get there. There are some one-way streets that make it a little tricky.

Hey, we’re flying over Mt Taranaki and Egmont National Park. I thought at first that it was directly under the plane because I couldn’t see the peak at all, but I just took another look and it’s quite visible, just much further away on the left than I thought.

There’s a good chance that Mum and Dad are going to meet me at the airport, even though I’ve arranged to pick up a rental car. We’ll see if they’re there!

Oops – got to turn off the laptop now, the announcement just came over the intercom.

Later: Mum and Dad did come and meet me at the airport. Dad drove back by himself while I collected the rental car with Mum. It’s a huge Mitsubishi wagon. I’m a bit nervous driving it but it’s got some omph to it so there are compensations.