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Hey All,

Sorry for the delay between posts. It's been a busy week. We went up to Christchurch this last weekend for a threefold mission.

First, Drea joined up with the Dunedin frisbee club to compete in the New Zealand Coed National Championships. Dave tagged along for the ride. Neither of us remembered to bring our camera's up with us (idiots!) so sorry for the lack of pics. The team had a lot of fun and went 3-1 on the first day that was marked by some pretty heavy winds. We were good with the sunscreen but I'm pretty sure we both ended up with a solid windburn at the end of the day. The second day of play was a little rough and The Dunedin Cortina (the team was named for a late model ford import that I'd never heard of) saw the worse end of a few close games. The team came to Christchurch with 9 able bodied men and left with 5. So you could probably attribute their lackluster finish to attrition.

Second, dave had scheduled (that's shed-juled in NZ speak) meetings in Christchurch Monday morning to meet with his counterparts in the OPUS office there. As part of the deal OPUS put the both of us in a super swanky hotel right off the main park in Christchurch, with an expense account (sweet!!). If we had known how nice it was we would have hurried over there right after the last game. They had free golf clubs for a free golf course, free spa, free food, free gym, free free free free free!! http://www.chateau-park.co.nz/

I got up early and wandered down to the office. Met a whole bunch of people that I'm going to have a hard time remembering the names of but I feel like I was able to make a decent impression on everyone I met. So that was good. I think Drea took a bath while I was out. (Free too!)

After the meetings and on to the third part of our grand plan. OPUS had set us up with a rental car to get back to Dunedin and we had received word from the shipping company earlier in the week that our goods had arrived and were available in Christchurch. So we were able to talk our way into a rental car big enough to transport all the stuff we shipped oversea. That's when things started to fall apart in our grand plan. It turns out the shipping company neglected to send me the cover letter that went with my shipments arrival notice. So I had no idea that I needed to schedule a MAF inspection (that's the ministry of Agriculture and forestry, damn you Ray Fort) and get approval from customs to collect my goods. I had assumed, and the form that said "your goods are available at..." led me to believe, that all this stuff was already taken care of. Well, after several trips back and forth across Christchurch we realized that this wasn't going to happen today. So, extremely frustrated, we drove back to Dunedin.

We returned the rental car the next morning and had a little excitement on the way back. Drea drove the rental car and I was following in ours. We stopped for gas about a kilometer from the rental agency near the airport. Drea jumped in the rental and took off and I jumped in mine to follow. As i get on the road I see Drea in her car half a km away on the wrong side of the road. AAAHHHHHH!!! So I race after her with the horns blasting and the lights flashing as she goes around the corner. She goes another half block before




Gotta run but I'll finish this post later. Couldn't save it as a draft so it forced me to publish. so here you go...