A Weekend Away

It's Tuesday.  The weather is absolutely wonderful.  The sun is shining.  There is a slight cooling breeze.  It's perfect.  We were away for the weekend at a golf croquet tournament in Wanganui.  The weather excelled itself which is more than I can say for my play. There were flashes of my old self with some wonderful wins and there were some flashes of utter mediocrity too.  However my partner and I did manage to come runners up in the handicap doubles which was a reasonable result.  I'd never played with Clair before.  In fact I'd never met her before.  We did, however, have something in common.  We both drive Mazda MX5s.  Hers is called Rossee.  Unlike mine, Rossee races in the New Zealand Targa Rally.

 

I hadn't played at Wanganui for a couple of years.  It's a lovely club with a lot of lawns and a wonderful location up on a hill overlooking the (not-so-beautiful-from-this-angle) city. 

The Club's notice board amused me:

PS It's Wednesday now.  I started this on Tuesday but it was that sort of a day!

Too Small a Place To Share

Today I had to travel with the hood up on The Handbag (my Mazda MX5 roadster).  The car is small at the best of times but when the hood is up and I am in the driver's seat there is not much room left for even a handbag (hence its name).  I set off from Gisborne at 0900.  Some 40 ks into the journey travelling down a long straight at 100 kph I suddenly became aware of something large on my left leg by my ankle.  Being a sports car one cannot see one's feet when driving at speed without endangering one's self or others.  I involuntarily moved my leg and a cicada  suddenly flew up and over my leg onto the right hand side door.  (The car is right hand drive).  Now cicada's don't bite nor do they sting.  But with a wing span of about 5cm they are not the best things to have sitting in the car making cicada noises and flying around.  The problem was that as this incident occurred I had to slow down into a sharp bend preceeded by a sign saying that there were sharp bends and steep hills for the next 7 ks.  And I am supposed to share this fairly demanding driving experience with a cicada which by this time has gone up the leg of my shorts.  By definition there is not a lot of leg up which to disappear and I became less than a happy bunny. 

As providence would have it although there were no official passing places I came upon a pull-off which had been used for road maintenance  and managed to leave the carriageway without doing any harm to my suspension or underneath:  sports cars are not generally noted for off-road capability.  After a while I located the cicada which had crawled down the side of the driver's seat and managed to evict it from the car.

All in all not an experience to be recommended.  However in line with my tendency to play The Glad Game I gave thanks that it hadn't been a wasp.

Back at The Cottage

I drove home to The Cottage from Gisborne this morning: 223 ks. It was the first journey of any distance and only the third time since 1 November, that I have travelled with the hood up.

It was relatively (see Eagleton Notes) uneventful with only a stop for fuel for me and for The Handbag in Wairoa.