NDBT

Righty-o! So. My brain is only half working at the moment – my apologies. I think it was fried yesterday. So – the sanctuary (back on Saturday). I had a great afternoon walking around and then I came back in the evening for the night tour. There were about 8 of us, led around by two nice, elderly ladies. The one in charge was a bit in danger of talking so much that we weren’t going to get to see anything, but it was nice to hear a bit more about the history of the sanctuary and the land and the various conservation projects they’re attempting. Plus, she explained that all of the giant wetas (the heaviest insect in the world) had died out for the year, which is why I hadn’t found any earlier in the day. As we were walking around we did see blag shag, pied shag, and native teal, which is the 4th rarest duck in the world. We saw some more bush weta and kaka and tuatara as well. We heard a morepork call, but didn’t see any.

Then, as it got to be very dark out (we just had a sliver past a new moon) we went down by a stream where we were surrounded by fern-covered hillsides, and saw glow-worms!! They were all these tiny little pin-pricks of blue light completely surrounding us. It was the coolest thing. I don’t think I can accurately describe how magical it was. And then!! Just as we were almost back to the start, we heard some scuffling in the bush, and right in a little clearing emerged a Kiwi!!! We had an absolutely perfect view. It snurfled around in the littler for a minute and then ran back up the hillside. It was a little spotted kiwi. I saw a kiwi in the wild! Yay!

Yesterday was an all day marathon to get from Wellington to Auckland. The problem being that our bus didn’t have air-conditioning. Yuck. We drove past one cool part, called the desert road, which was very scrubby and barren (had there not been lots of low-laying clouds, we would’ve been able to see Mount Doom as well, which I’m sure has a real name, and I don’t know it). Anyways, we did drive past the giant volcano that is still pretty active, and lake Taupo, which is dormant, but supposed to become re-active in the next 40 years.

In Auckland; I made things pissy for the driver and refused to stay at one of the giant dorms downtown. I am instead staying at the Brown Kiwi, in Ponsonby. Ponsonby is basically the Castro of Auckland, and I am surrounded by cute cafes, pretty victorian architecture, and bald men driving Z3s. It’s like I’m getting ready to come home. (also – turns out I’m just around the corner from Auldhouse – I should go give Claire a cupcake). Had a yummy tofu shwarma to treat myself last night, and then wandered around for a bit looking for an internet cafe. We’re up on a hill, so we have a nice view of downtown Auckland, which includes the sky tower – the tallest building in the southern hemisphere. It looks like a giant syringe. Really, no one is going to make a tall building cooler than this. They should stop trying.

This morning I slept in, did laundry, went to Cezanne’s cafe, and now I’m taking care of internet stuff. I’ll try to get around to photos today, but we’ll see. There isn’t a lot to do in Auckland – a couple of parks I want to see. So mostly I’ll be hanging around the hostel, reading and watching tv and saving my last few pennies. And turning in my tax form. Oh – and there are a couple of final posts I want to write up on here – so I’ll see if I can get around to those.
This was passed along to me by my mother. It seems to be very pbf kind of humor.

Patrick passed along some information on poverty in Madagascar. It all comes from Wikipedia, though. Still – even if the info isn’t 100% accurate, it is a very poor country, and I’m glad some of my money went to it.

Diablo Cody has a new column at EW. Very cool.

I’m not sure how this weekend will turn out in the box office game, because I just couldn’t bring myself to rank Alvin 2nd, despite most predictions. And the fact that in one weekend it has done better than 2 weeks for the Golden Compass is just oh so sad. National IQ – where have you gone?

Speaking of poor taste (like that segue?) check out suicide food. Particularly the high-noose count categories.

And since I will be finishing up my travel in 4 days (no, it has not sunk in yet), I’ll leave you with this. And this. And this. And this.

And this.

Quick update. Went to the sanctuary today. Splurged and am headed back in about 15 for a night tour. Since I won’t be headed to Waitomo, I figured I should see some glowworms here!

Actually, I already saw some in a cave, but not lit up, obviously (it being daytime). Additionally, I saw Cave weta, tree weta, north island kaka, tui, fantails, robins, scaup, some giant spiderwebs, weka, and THREE tuatara!! Oh, and some California quail with babies. And mallards with ducklings. Not so much native.
The sanctuary itself was really impressive. Great signs (special ones were up detailing various spiders), a live vid cam on a little shag nest, pre-recorded footage of robins hatching, a good tuatara research area, nice trails, some kaka feeders, and special exhibits on nests and birdcalls. Mostly, its just a really lovely area slowly reverting back to wilderness thanks to invasive predator exclusion.

Also, I went to the Golden Compass site. No – I haven’t seen the movie, but the site has a little Q&A that results in determining your very own daemon. Mine is an ermine. Named Photion. Because I am apparently modest, solitary, assertive, competitive, and spontaeous. Well, I think most of that works… except the modest part… The ermine itself is quite cute. I like it.

So – back to the sanctuary. glowworms! more birds! morepork? maybe even… a kiwi? dare I hope?

Also – lots of awards season stuff going on over at the envelope. Particularly golden derby (I don’t think the buzzmeter has been updated to reflect the GG noms. Let’s see Angie inch past Laura Linney, shall we?).  And SAG noms are out on the 20th – fingers crossed everyone!

Ok - I'm just going to post a little bit of mini-spam as an excuse for an entry, because the exciting thing is that while I was sitting here in the hostel typing away (& reading about Mick LaSalle's disappointment ... [Continue reading this entry]

So - I went to the national museum, Te Papa, today. It was ok. They had some Maori cultural stuff, a good exhibit on NZ invasive species, some stuff on earthquakes, and some cool videos about people talking about their ... [Continue reading this entry]

So... yesterday we drove up from Kaikoura to Picton where we caught the ferry across to Wellington. The coastline by Kaikoura was really stunning. The ferry took quite a while, but they had tv and a cafe and I read ... [Continue reading this entry]

Alternate title; or better yet, don't call me, I'll call you! 2 other things I forgot to mention earlier. A) watched black sheep. Oh so fabulous. and B) I BEAT OUR DRIVER at our Stray bus driving game. (it's like bug ... [Continue reading this entry]

http://www.amptp.com/ This whole sitemade me laugh out loud. Best bit?; "'Viva Laughlin' was written by a writer."

Aw hell. The problem with the Broadcast Film critic picks is that for the last 5 years, all five best picture oscar nominees have come from this pool of ten, (this year's; American Gangster, Atonement, The Diving Bell and ... [Continue reading this entry]