If I could find my Frontpage software I could load it onto my new laptop and update the website from there.  Instead I must continue blogging from the old laptop with the dodgy screen. I have turned the house upside down several times, looking in every single box, every cupboard and even places that the software box cannot possibly be, including the pantry, china cabinet, and even the glove box of my truck.  Still no luck.

The only thing to do now is get up into the ceiling space and see if I have a box up there.  Andrew might climb up there for me, as it is a bit of a mission to clamber up the aluminium ladder through the access hole in the bathroom ceiling and make one's way around the side of the hot water tank.

I have just seen the proof copy for a book I recently illustrated. It should go to print in the next month. It's a book of verses by a New Plymouth man, Brian Aroa. It's called Vernon's Vulgar Verses. I won't spoil the fun of his launch, which will happen shortly, but here are a couple of the pictures from it. It's a rather 'different' sort of poetry book.

Another couple of days of great weather. I have now cleaned out the passion fruit tubs and have cleared all of the dried vine off the back trellis.  We didn't get much fruit to eat off those vines, because they were clinging to the corrugated iron fence, and when the summer sun beat against the other side it was like a hot plate, cooking the passion fruit on the vine before they ripened.  In their place I have planted raspberry canes. I can tie them to the trellis, but they won't climb up the iron fence like the passion fruit did, so I should get a better result with these plants. I LOVE raspberries. 

Today I cleaned out a bunch of pots and prepared them for some of the vegies that will soon germinate on the potting bench. Perhaps sooner than I thought: the rocket came up in 2 days and the mustard lettuce followed the next day.  I love the way the seedlings push the soil up like a little pie crust as they pop their heads up. I also picked all of the lettuce from our terracotta lettuce tray and put in new compost ready for the next lot of young plants.

HOORAY! The rose garden is now complete. I planted the Fairy rose this evening, so that it will be able to settle into the garden in the cooler temperatures over night. The bark is laid down and the irrigation system is up and running (I tried it out tonight). 

And finally for today: here's the view from our kitchen window a couple of weeks back, as snapped by Andrew. Mount Taranaki (or Egmont to others) looks like Mount Fuji with the cherry blossoms in the foreground.

The rain is bucketing down here, and the ranch slider door continues to leak.  We accepted a quote from an aluminium joinery company for a replacement unit before we headed overseas, but have still not heard when we can get the work done.  I suppose we will now have to wait for warmer, drier weather.  Hopefully the fire in the hearth will dry the place out as fast as it gets damp from the leaks.  We can hardly think about new carpet while the door and windows are leaking like sieves!

Our travels have taken us to some wonderful places.  I have included a few small photos below.  Out of the many hundreds of photos I took (thank goodness for digital cameras) it wasn't easy to choose a small selection for my blog.  Certainly Luxembourg was my favourite city that we visited.  Andrew and I made rash (and probably unattainable) promises to one another that we will go and live there when we retire so he can use it as a base to follow the Formula 1 around the world.  A nice thought indeed!  But I also loved Britain.  No matter how may times I go there, I always something more to love about it.  Perhaps it is the people with whom we stay each time that make it so special but, whatever it is, I always feel that I could spend a lot more time exploring there.