When I last posted about this little guy, he was in a cage off to have his parts removed. Alas, he was the kit I was going to foster, but it turned out he was too old to be tamed and was returned to the colony.

I still go out once a week to feed the colony kits (this colony is a small one, only 4 cats big) because despite popular belief, domestic cats, even if they are wild or feral CAN’T feed themselves. The best they can do without human intervention is raid rubbish bins, which isn’t good for them and rather annoying for us.

Anyway, like I said, I go out and feed these kits. They’ve all been desexed so the colony is not in any danger of getting bigger, which is good. What is also good is that they are getting better at being around people. They are still all skittish like, but will come when they hear me rattle the food containers. They will eat with me sitting a mere half meter away chattering to them (which is new, they weren’t so keen on that a while back) and the braver kits (like the little black one) will come and sit near (ish) me once they are done.

Not even remotely tame, but a definite improvement :)

Also, while I’m discussing kits. Friendly reminder if you’re looking for a kit, and you’re in Auckland, please check out Forgotten Felines. They have many many kits that were able to be tamed who are looking for homes.

There was this boy that I used to date. We were wrong for each other (I was particularly young, and demanding and pretty hot-headed at the time), which was fine. You learn about these things as time goes on. Our relationship ended, but we still remained friends. We even lived together post-relationship for a bit. Separate rooms, and all that. It was tough for a while, but you know, you work shit out.

We had the kind of post-relationship friendship where we’d sit down after work for a bit, and just chat about our days. It always turned into one of those great honest conversations, where you talk and exchange and discover new thoughts as time goes on with someone who knows you really well. And before we knew it the sun had gone down and we hadn’t even noticed. We talked openly, and it was nice that we could chat like that.

He was such a down to earth guy, who would buy books about places he wanted to go. And the three of us who lived in that flat got on so well! We’d all cook together, and go on walks and take photos together. We’d download tv and watch it all sprawled out in the lounge.

And then he moved to London, and I was horribly sad that he had. I knew it was good for him, and seeing me with another boy (The Boy, actually) wasn’t pleasant for him. But I missed him, I missed our conversations, and I missed not having him around.

He called me from Paris one night a couple weeks after he moved, while he was with a friend. They were on speaker phone, so I could hear them both. And they described what they could see (the people, the Eiffel Tower) and I was amazed. I wished I was there. Glad that he hadn’t forgotten me, glad that he was out there doing things with his life.

He would leave me random messages, and I’d laugh, and send something just as cute back. We were comfortable, as friends. Much more comfortable than when we’d been together. It’s like we let go of all our expectations and were happy just to be in each other’s company and accept each other as we were.

Now days I only talk to him occasionally online. And he’s getting married. At first that wigged me out a little – I was the one before, after all. Now I don’t mind so much, he loves his wife-to-be and I’m happy for him.

What wiggs me out instead is that he’s having his wedding in Hawaii, so the extended family can’t come. He has a wedding planner, and they have a website especially for their wedding.

There is nothing wrong with any of that, but it just makes him seem so different from the guy I knew. I shouldn’t be surprised, really. It’s been two and half years since he moved to London. I’ve changed, he’s changed. We’re doing new things with different people.

But I miss the old us. The sitting on the couch and talking all night. Looking through pictures of Melbourne and London together. I miss the friend I used to have.

I wonder if I went to London whether we could still have that kind of friendship. Or if he came home whether it would be the same.

Probably not. Still, I’m happy that for that short while, we had the friendship that we did. :)

On the weekend, I went to the Pasifika Festival. It’s a pretty intense day that promotes pacific cultures. There were LOADS of people, a billion food stalls, and craft stalls. There were performances (oh MAN I loved the Cook Island drum performance!) and dancers dancing in the rain and people beat boxing and whatever.

To be honest on the day I was pretty miserable. I had Quinn with me, which meant telling every second person that NO they can not touch him, and YES he is a minuture Yorkshire Terrier, and could you kindly get your big fat feet off my dog . . . in the end I brought a perfectly sized kete (a steal at $20!) and carried him around on my shoulder. :)

Then it started raining. Sigh. The poor little guy was shivering enough, so I brought a small dyed lavalava (woo, $8!) to drape over my shoulder to protect him from the rain. Which would have been fine, till I realised that the rain was staining my white hoodie blue. And the kete was adding in purple spots.

Siiiigh. In the end I adopted the ‘fuck it’ attitude and got on with my day. I ended up eating two of those delicious corn things (yay for corn!), and my friend tried Banana Poke (a heavy cornstarchy cake like thing), and had icecream in pineapple shells.

We wandered around and checked everything out (multiple times bumping into John Key, who with his entourage managed to block what small walkways there were!) and by the end of the day I was exhausted, had managed to dye Quinn’s head blue with the wet lavalava, and was full of good food.

It was a good day, even if I had to convince myself it was!

I am a chronic sneezer. I think my nose just has this THING about aircon units, because multiple times a day at work I sneeze. Lucky for me I have a small little sneeze, which is quick and generally pretty quiet. Not one of those giant snoozer sneezes that erupt out of your nose.

One of the cute things about working where I do (I know, I’m still singing the praises of work – I’m not over it yet!) is that when someone sneezes, someone else will say ‘bless you’. And it happens WITHOUT FAIL everytime I sneeze, or anytime someone elses sneezes.

I’ve never, ever been in an environment where people do this – and I think it’s so sweet! A very cute courtesy that has been lost everywhere else.

It’s just lovely, and of course now anytime someone else sneezes I’m happy to say ‘bless you’. :)

It’s nice to know that some of the cute little courtesy’s that you learnt back in primary are still practised!

[edit] Yes I’m talking about sneezes. After the last few heavily sentimental posts I wanted a break and to talk about the asinine.[/edit]

The other day I learnt that an acquaintance of mine has MS. It’s a horrible disease, and the more I read about it the more horrified I am for her quality of life.

The thing is, we weren’t always just acquaintances. When we were at school we were in the same group of very close friends – the same group of friends that I still meet for coffee every few weeks. Unfortunately we all kinda edged her off outside of school – and as sad as I am to say this, I was probably the worst.

We did the same course at uni together, but as time went on I just thought she was plain weird. She would say odd things, or be random and I really didn’t understand her. There weren’t any big events or landmarks that caused the shift in our friendship, I basically just thought she was weird, I didn’t understand and so eventually we drifted apart (quite intentionally on my part, I think). By the time we graduated, we weren’t really friends anymore.

A couple of years passed with very little contact between us, and then mutual friends had weddings. Small talk with her was always a little awkward – I was big with the neon ‘weird’ signs, and would excuse myself from the experience (I’m horrible at small talk anyway). A few times I’d talk to our friends about it, but most of them hadn’t seen her in ages and agreed that their small talk experiences were just as awkward.

And then we found out she has MS. And I’m horrified at my behaviour. And, let me be clear, it is not out of pity. We USED to be good friends, and I’m sure this stems from the care that we had for each other back then. I’m horrified at all that she has been through, and all that she will go through, and even more so at my behaviour towards her.

And I’m torn – I now understand why she is the way she is. I couldn’t have known before now that her slight weirdness was because of something as dire as this.

My problem is this – I feel horrible. I shouldn’t have edged her out because I thought things were slightly weird between us. MS or no, what I did was awful, and I shouldn’t have been the way I was. I feel horrible that it’s only with learning that she had MS that I feel bad about what I have done. I feel horrible that by intentionally edging her out she lost a friend to open up to, a friend to support her through this. I feel horrible that I am now on the outside, and have no idea how to help, or even if she WANTS my help.

I imagine that if she knew I knew, she would be embarrassed. She wouldn’t want my pity, or my help. I was horrible to her, and new knowledge can’t change that.

But in saying that, if she didn’t have an MS, if she was just the way she was because that’s who she is, would it have been wrong of me to edge away? I am one of those people who try to be very clear about the kind of people I wish to surround myself with. If I think you are horrible, I won’t talk to you unless I have to. If you hurt me in a way that is unnecessary and needless, then don’t expect a friendship to follow that. But if you are just weird and I don’t understand you? What then?

I wonder who else I’ve edged out, intentionally pushed away because I didn’t understand the differences between them and me. I wonder who else I’ve hurt, who else I could have helped, and who else I was rude to.

Today a big old personal flaw has been shown to me, and I’m embarrassed about it. And right now I don’t know what to do about it, or even what I CAN do. Sigh.

I don’t often talk about The Boy, we’ve had a rather rough history in the time we’ve been together. For a long time we were up and down, on and off – we had no idea where we were or what we were doing. But for what feels like forever, things have been really amazing between us – he’s everything I could ever want, or need, and I just want to say, publicly, that I really do love and adore him. And as soppy as it is, I’m thankful he’s in my life.

Red Lotus Mama wrote a post that said that we are our own harshest critics. And I agree, after living through a miserable time at the end of last year (a horrible job where my boss often caused tears, being in and out of hospital, having my family split and break) I was at point where my self esteem was at an all time low, and I really couldn’t see any good in myself or the world. While The Boy was undeniably there holding my hand through all of it, what got my through most were the little moments, when I’d just finished bawling my eyes out and we’d be sitting quietly and he’d tell me how beautiful or pretty I was. How we’d get through it, and how life wouldn’t always be as shit as it was. When things really got me down, he’d crack jokes to make me laugh. To remind me that I COULD laugh.

This weekend just past, after I’d said my speech where I caused half the reception to cry (myself and the bride included), and I was shaking with adrenaline and emotion and sitting outside in the cool air with The Boy, he told me how proud he was of me. I love that he was there, surrounded my friends, supporting me the best way he knew how. I love that he danced with me, in front of everyone (as was my duty to join the bride and groom after a bit in their first dance) despite not being comfortable in front of large audiences. I love that he gets on with The Square, and understands how intimate we all are. I love that he is who he is. I love that he half walked, half carried me back to our hotel after such an intense night. I love that he was there.

As most things in my life have changed so drastically in the last little while, I’m all too aware how people can change and relationships, places, and things you thought were stuck in stone can evolve and move on. So, while things are as they are, I love that we are exactly as we are right now. And in the now I love him dearly.

<3

When I was at high school a birthday meant having helium balloons tied to your bag, to being given multiple bouquets of flowers. It meant people leaving surprises in your locker, and messages on the board in your classes. It meant alot of fuss.

I don’t like fuss so much. In high school I would tell my friends that my birthday was in March, and then in March I would tell them it was in October (3/10 and 10/3 and all that). I had two birth certificates that supported this, but mostly it meant I could avoid the FUSS.

Now that I’m much much older, I ENJOY the fuss. I love that people send me texts to let me know they are thinking of me, that my closest give carefully thought out presents and are happy to dance around drunk with me. That they are happy to celebrate that I lived to exist another year!

So, naturally I enjoy this fuss TWICE a year. It seems a bit greedy, I know, but it appears that in this time and age there can never be enough reasons to celebrate happy things. And, I’m a bit sneaky – I never tell people which birthday is ‘the real’ one, for fear of only getting to celebrate one. The Boy cheated by asking my Mother which month I was born in. No one else has been that clever :P

In the March birthday I usually celebrate with Cake and a fancy dinner out. This year I brought an extra large chocolate cake into work to share with everyone, and it was great! Last October (or rather the October before. Last October I celebrated in hospital) I made birthday cookies for the people at work, and had a rocking party which all my friends came to. What I remember of it was brilliant!!

This year, I celebrated all quiet like at home with my Dad, The Boy and Sibling. We’ll all go out to dinner sometime next week, but in the meantime, we had cake. LOTS of cake. Two, large chocolate cakes, in fact.

This is me and my dad, with the smaller cake – super chocolatey rich with marshmallows. For my First Birthday of the year, yesterday was a pretty good day. :)

Over the weekend, my Best Friend, The Out of Town Bride, got married. It was an epic weekend, wildly successful and one of those amazing weekends that you’re both glad and a little disappointed that it’s over.

I left Auckland on the Friday (on a random bus in a crazy storm) to arrive in Rawhiti a mere 5.5 hours later (it usually a 3.5 – 4 hour trip). It was gorgeous up there, blue skies and almost stupidly hot! The bridal party did our own little powhiri (which was short and sweet and necessary, as we’d be walking onto the marae post powhiri the next day).

Then us girls left to head to the Bridal Batch, which was AMAZING! It was all so well designed, and was gorgeous. Surprisingly, it was only the ‘bunkhouse’ – the main batch was HUGE and down the way! We wandered down the mostly private beach and enjoyed a late afternoon swim. It was pretty awesome. The Bay of Islands is truly gorgeous!

That night before the wedding was pretty fun. We headed back to the Marae to set up the last minute details (it was pretty easy to slot back into ‘marae’ mode, and washed dishes, peeled kumura with the mokopuna, made signs and arranged flowers), and on our return to the Bridal Batch we spent the evening drinking champagne, painting nails, tacking dresses and opening presents! The Bride got all us bridesmaids pearl studs, and a bracelet to match! I was blown away by her generosity, for serious. She also got us a pair of gold jandals each, and a pair of red gumboots, depending on how the weather went (none of us planned to be wearing our fancy shoes at the reception, nor in the bridal photos). This thoughtfulness is in part, why I adore The Out of Town Bride!!

The next morning, I snuck in early to the Brides room to see if she was awake (she was, of course) and we had a little squee together. It was her Wedding Day! We spent a little while discussing plans and then the morning came in full swing. We curled each others hair, fixed nails that had broke, did makeup, tried on our boots and did all the cute girly things you do before walking down an aisle.

Once we were all good and ready, we rushed down the road to await the Father of the Bride to appear (he was part of the Powhiri, and would meet us 5 minutes before it was done!) As we had time to kill, we did what all girls who had just gotten all dressed up would do, and we were cam whores. :)

The father of the bride appeared, and we walked down the aisle (followed by a gaggle of children) and we watched The Out of Town Bride get married. It was a touching moment, listening to their vows. It wasn’t without drama though, someone had misplaced the actual marriage license (so we signed a scrap peice of paper for the photographer and signed the real thing later on in the day), and the tent for the children wasn’t set up, so they ended up sitting at our feet. Which would have been fine had they been a bit older. They weren’t, so they were darting around from person to person, and around the bridal couples feet. Sigh.

The group photos after were pretty fun, as was the eating. Oh the eating! I love Marae food. There was fry bread and mussel fritters and fancy cocktails and punch and boil up, and cup cupcakes . . . it was all done in small cute little finger food packages, suitable for a wedding. Having been starved at breakfast I pretty much devoured anything that was put in front of me. At one point I was in the marae kitchen eating the fry bread as it came out of the pan! Oh, the perks of being maid of honour :)

The Bridal Party photos came soon after, and oh we had lots of fun! We were all drinking little bottles of champagne (yum!) and dancing around. We took lots of silly photos of ourselves, to balance up the ‘serious’ photos the professional photographers were taking. It was QUITE fun!

Unfortunately we were in an old farm like property, with long grass. And we were all in jandals – our poor feet got absolutely ATTACKED by the bugs! We were all itching our tootsies at the reception!!

The reception was quite fun too. It was held at Russell, which was a good 40 minute drive away (which was good, because it gave us some downtime). Once there we spent a good while socialising, and wandering around. It was good to see alot of the people that were there. The food was amazing (despite the small cockup, the staff had forgotten that they were to serve the bridal table, and as such we ended up watching other people eat till food came), and by this time I was well into the Champagne, and more than worried at the thought of having to do my speech!

But, the speeches did come. Both the Father of the Bride and the Father of the Groom spoke so eloquently of their children. The Best Man did quite a humorous speech and his speech was well received. Then it was my turn. I apologised for being nervous (and was lucky to have people yell out to tautoko me) and I plowed right ahead. It was good, everyone laughed when they were meant to (in fact my one joke was so well received that I had to pause twice, and mention that yes, it was funny well after the delivery of it. The silly thing was, it was funny because it was TRUE :P).

The worse bit, though came at the end. I’d left all the sentimental emotion for the last line of my speech, and I choked up. I looked at the bride, with her ridiculously big eyes filled with tears and I wanted to bawl my eyes out. I managed to stammer out the rest of my speech, and when I raised my glass for the toast I looked up to see both the Father of the Bride, and the Father of the Groom wiping their eyes, and past them, easily half the guests crying into their hands.

I didn’t feel so stupid crying after that, knowing that everyone else was crying too. The Father of the Groom came up especially to clink my glass for the toast And I got loads of compliments for being brave enough to share that emotion in my speech, and to be THAT sentimental. I didn’t want to cry, but it didn’t seem so bad once I’d seen that everyone else was crying right along with me.

The rest of the night was devoted to dancing, the eating of the cake, the first dance and much socialising (Particularly with The Square)!!

It was such a long day, and I retired gratefully when the Bride and Groom did around two. Early the next morning we met up with the Bridal Party for breakfast (which was delicious! I’m a huuuge fan of scrambled eggs!) where there were more compliments, and congratulations offered to the married couple. We helped pack up what was left, packed all the cars and The Boy and I made it away just before lunch.

This time we DID make 3.5 hour drive in the expected time, though I think I slept through most of it :) We got home, and I had enough time for a lunch and a quick nap before I met the Bride and Groom in Auckland. We opened the rest of the presents (marking down who got what so the Bride could send out thank you notes), and enjoyed cheese and crackers while we looked through the photos that had been taken.

After a Thai dinner, I took the wedding dress (to be dry cleaned and preserved – the Bride would be leaving too early the next morning to do it herself), said good bye (for I wouldn’t be seeing the Bride again till June!) and was on my way. I was SO EXHAUSTED and both glad and a little disappointed the weekend was over.

In saying that, it was a pretty amazing weekend. Incredibly successful, very few issues and the result was a happily married couple. <3