Happy Movember!

Hello Friends and Family -
Happy Movember! Perhaps you dont' know this holiday, but it is a
month in which people grow (or paste) jolly mustaches, "mo's", on
their face for charity! It's apparently for men's health awareness,
but I bet half the people doing it didn't know that - ironically
enough. Anyway, Dave got all shy and decided not to do it. I,
however, am wearing a gray 'scoundrel' mustache today. It looks very

wild wild west. Drea and coworkers with their "mustaches"

There's a Movember parade that ends in the cafeteria
at 12:30 here at the hospital. I am not sure whether I will make it
that long. One of the therapists had a bunch of mustaches available
this morning that I couldn't turn down. You can buy them at the store
and they're called "mustache party." They have all types available:
bandit, scoundrel, smarty, rogue, casanova and partyboy. So anyway,
we chose a great month to join the kiwi nation!
Anyway, we got a new chicken, which I'm sure you are all aware if
you've read the blog. Coco likes to peck at new chicken's face when
she's eating, so Coco is slowly falling out of favor with me. Yes,
she's a chicken, but can't they just get along?? New chicken is still
as of yet unnamed. But is terrified of anything large moving outside
of the cage, and likes to chase little birds around the coop while
flapping her wings. She accidentally flew up and got her head caught
in the cage netting a few days ago.Silly chicken! I want to get a
wacky looking chicken with two chicks to add to our collection from
the ebay equivalent of new zealand, but dave is not in favor of wacky
looking chickens. Coco does look like those chicken tea kettle
warmers when she is sitting, though. Very picture perfect.
The garden looks great - except when the ducks get in there and dig
things up. Any ideas on how to keep ducks out of our garden? Send
them along to us!

Here is one of those pesky ducks on the roof of our sunroom.

Speaking of living plants, it seems very popular here to sell lettuce
and herbs and spinach with roots and a little dirt attached. I've
seen a little of that in the states, but it's very common here. The
produce seems to be pretty expensive (unless you're buying a 15 lb
head of cabbage). I accidentally bought a $3 potato yesterday.
Whoops.
Lots and lots of people are barefoot around town here. I saw someone
walk out of a mall yesterday barefoot, and it's very common on the
street. I'm thinking that's why spitting on the street is frowned
upon. But it's not like it's hot or even warm when this occurs. I
don't' know how they do it. I can't even handle not wearing socks in
my shoes.

As for more kiwi slang, we are still trying to complete the list of
translations for 'cheers'. Right now we have: you're welcome, see you
later, best wishes, toast, thanks. But there are many more. My boss
keeps saying 'jolly' instead of darn or damn, and 'wee' often . ("I
can't get this jolly drive to work.") Dave and I have been having fun
saying 'jolly' in place of worse words, because we always just end up
laughing instead of being upset. Is that the point?
In the hospital here, we have paper bags in the trash cans that say
"RUBBISH, burn when full'. Which I'm thinking is not very
environmentally friendly. There's also a lot of coal burning for
heat, and nobody seems to want to add insulation to their houses, but
instead get jolly wee 'heat pumps' which act like a reverse
refrigerator.
They have switched the jolly sides of faucets! From what i've seen
in the states, cold is on the right, hot on the left. Down here, hot
is on the right hand side of the faucets. I know that's not a very
interesting fact, but you know. The differences... And doesn't it
sound more exciting if I say 'jolly' and use a jolly exclamation
point!?
Fortnight is a commonly used term here. It means every two weeks. We
had to ask what that meant in the bank the other week. Speaking of
the bank, we were getting some paperwork done the first week, and
there was nice background music. We look around to find that it's
coming from a wee radio that's hung with a bungee cord from the
ceiling in the corner. Nice.
I've heard there's 70% homeownership here, and I keep getting asked
whether I own. There are some adorable houses with awesome views that
are CHEAP CHEAP CHEAP, so I'm trying not to look.
There is a very regimented tea time here. 10:15 +/- 5 min, the office
walks out to the break room where there is free tea and coffee. It
took Dave a few days to catch on to why he was the only one in the
office for 15 min in the 10 o'clock hour. People call planners, or
mini calendars 'diaries' here. And everyone has them. It's weird to
hear men referring to their diaries all the time. Not that there's
anything wrong with that...
Sorry if any of this is repeat. I haven't checked completely what
Dave wrote recently in the blog.

Hope everyone is doing well, and we're so so so jolly happy to hear
that Dave's dad is doing so well! Hurray for Fred!!

Love to all,
Wee Andrea and Jolly Dave