Making Friends With The Neighbours

The last couple of months, the weather has been pretty crappy here, making it hard to get outside to run, to walk and to generally be outdoors. To be fair, it has been winter. But last weekend there were some wonderful, sunshine-y breaks in the weather. Sadly these didn't include any waves - through circumstance and timing, I hadn't surfed in weeks, but I feel pretty zen about that these days. There'll always be more waves, and in the meantime I still got to go for a long walk. I rarely check the surf before I go for a walk, so I always wonder if when I get to the top of the hill if I'm going to see anything tempting below me. A few times I've crested the hill and found myself running the kilometre or two home to get my board and rush back to the beach, or kicking myself for not being more organised. Other times I've been floored by the crazy, messy ocean in front of me - whitewash as far as I can see. Last weekend was somewhere in between. It wasn...

I haven't written much on my blog this year. I've wanted to but the stories didn't seem to flow from my brain into words on the screen the way I've always found they have. It's not writer's block because I've been writing lots of other things in other places, so perhaps my word count got used up. Or something. I don't know. But I think about it a lot because I really love writing this blog. Actually, I really love writing. But I have a couple of stories I want to share from today and last weekend, so I'll write them up over the next couple of days. In the mean time, how beautiful is Aotearoa!!

Only because I'm feeling equal parts 'ugh', 'meh' and impressed. On her Instagram post, the surfer, Maud Le Car, says she lost a bet hence the get up. But the clip description on YouTube is a but more political: "Being a sexy pro surfer is one thing and being a skilled and accomplished pro surfer is another... Pro surfer Maud Le Car wants you to know that female pro surfers can look glamor and talented at the same time. She wants to prove that surfing is not just about glamor. Surfing is one of the most physically demanding sports there today." I'm not entirely convinced of what kind of awareness it raises, but you know. I get it. Oh look, I made comment!