Lady of Leisure no more...

Today finally my prayers were answered!

This week God has reminded me once again that he has a sense of humour. I prayed yesterday that the phone would ring. By this I knew I meant that it would ring and there would be some lovely person at the other end telling me that they would like me to work for them. God being God I thought he'd do a bit of mind reading and realise this was what I meant but obviously not...

For the phone to ring in our house is something special. We don't get too many phone calls and so to be honest when it does ring it's usually quite an exciting occasion. And so yesterday the phone rang, quite a few times in fact. Both the cell phone AND the land line. But at the other end wasn't the person I wanted it to be.

So this morning I got specific, not leaving room for any games.

Well what do you know? Lo and behold today the cell phone rang and there was a lovely nurse at the other end named Jan and she said she was wondering if I would like to come and be a part of their team because they would very much like it if I did!

WOOHOOO! ZIPIDY DOODA!

THANK YOU GOD!

A lady of leisure no longer. The baking marathons will subside. The quiet days will cease. The sleep-ins will be reduced to two days a week rather than seven. The house will get cleaned weekly rather than daily. Dinner may find it's way to the table every once in a while. I will no longer be able to spend hours at the library ready Hello! magazines.

Do I care to put the lady of leisure to rest? Not one bit!

I could not be more excited about this job if I tried. Nurse Mez is BACK!

Ready to share the love, care for the sick, comfort the dying and bring a smile to those who are down. This is my vocation, I think I've realised that over the last four months without work. There is something about being a nurse and caring for others that blesses my life and I'm so ready to be back doing what I enjoy.

Big THANKS to you all for your support and endless encouragement over the last few months. For your prayers, your thoughts, your good luck wishes. We have appreciated them all.

Blessing and love
Nurse Mez (and Mr Mo)

Leprechauns lead the way to the Craic!

Top of the morning to you... For those that read Lonely Planet's guide to the world (their most recent publication which has a double page devoted to each and every one of the world's countries... dreamy stuff) you might notice that Ireland in a word (or phrase) is noted as "What's the Craic?!" An interesting ponderance indeed. (NZ's by the way was "sweet as, bro" - Fair enough i'd say, not too far off the mark).

So what's the Craic? and what on earth is the Craic anyway? Where exactly is the Craic to be found? these were only some of the many questions on our lips as we arrived into Dublin for the weekend and met a barrage of the cheerful, quick-witted and delightfully (and fast) spoken celts. Not to mention a familiar face or two and some new friends at K-teams Ballybrack base.

It needs to be stated that Ryan-Air are pretty damn cool. For a couple of reasons... Firstly, the name. Damn cool I reckon. Then there's the price (bugger-all). And then there were short lines, and prompt timing of flights. We'll be back with them for sure. In fact i'll likely be back with them to Dublin in another month or so, but that's a different story.

So what did we do in Dublin... Task number one was to discover the score of the England Vs Trinidad & Tobago game which started as we took off. Found a big screen in an arrivals lounge conveniently located beside some toilets, and much to the disgust of my non-football appreciating wife, sat down to have a watch, after it was 0-0 with only 15 minutes or so to go... Needless to say a compromise was reached after Peter Crouch got his towering noggin' behind a knock and evaded the keeper to bring the brits up 1-0. we set off to find a further 15 minute wait for our bus across town, which had me racing back only to find i had missed the second (and i'm told) more impressive goal by Steven Gerrard. Such is life. But the story illustrates the assimilation of this kiwi (at least a bit) into british culture.

So clearly Mez found something a little funny about this wee leprechaun...

We arrived to the welcome of Amanda and Dan of Kerygma Teams fame and spent thursday evening catching up with them and meeting a few of their housemates. Stayed at B's place, at Ros Na Ri, between the two 'sugarloafs' (irish have some funny words - the sugar loaf's were two hills) on the outskirts of southern Dublin.

Friday we woke to cold showers (we were later informed amidst much laughter that the cold is actually the hot and the hot, cold, so we needn't have had cold showers after all!!! Only in Ireland!). Anyway Friday we went on a wee bus tour of the city, saw the place where St Patrick baptised a few hundred irish, learnt that Arthur Guiness had 21 children (must have been Catholic - and a trooper mind you). The man also bought the site of the present brewery on a 9000 year lease for 100 pound. Bit of faith in his business me thinks. Also learnt that Dublin zoo is home to one of the most successful lion breeding programmes worldwide, and also the world famous lion of MGM cinemas. (You know the one with the cool roar). Other notable facts... Phoenix park in Dublin is bloody huge - you can fit 2 hyde park London's into it, or 4 central park New York's. Populated by a few deer and game birds, a gigantic white cross where Pope JP II said mass for a million or so irish... oh and a few Leprechauns.

Friday night was a great BBQ at K'teams pad, and met some cool people from the community. Average number of kids per family in the community is 5.2! and they were absolutely delightful - did a couple of short skits for the adults over the course of the evening, one a christian related teaching that was done in a number of musical styles and with dancing from hip-hop and rap to country, quite humorous... then another one taking the mickey out of older community members. Great and safe environment for those kids though, and they're certainly well travelled... hmm things to ponder there. Some great benefits to community living...

Saturday caught up with a great mate from Silverstream (James Kelleher) who regrettably i've not seen much of since school, and ducked into Dublin to a local pub to watch the AB's narrowly beat ireland in an entertaining game despite poor conditions (which shows you can take the kiwis out of NZ, but you can't take NZ out of kiwi's). Great atmosphere, and the irish were great losers too, good humour there. And great food for a late breakfast. Then more chats at another pub outside in the sun with Fi and James, then into town to meet up with miss Molly Malone (see left) and then Amanda and Dan - who looked much like this when we found them. They make a great couple hey?

Saturday afternoon was wandering about Dublin seeing the crazy street performers and muscians, the slightly creepy silver winged wizard and slightly vacant and ditzy looking white angel. Hope they're more impressive in heaven when I get there...

Then there was the Guiness tour, of which probably the most impressive part was (other than learning all the workings of a brewery) learning about the dudes that made the barrell's back in the day - apparrently there were up to 400 men employed at barrell makers at the peak, and they took up to seven years to get an apprenticship at it. Once qualified they had an initiation which involved them making a barrell, climbing into it, getting it filled with beer (i assume their heads poked out the top) and then rolled around the brewery in their barrel (and it's a very big place!) but such initiation rites produce such a cool sense of belonging and cameraderie i think, it's a shame you'd get sued for such behaviour nowadays - i think its to the detriment of us all that such rites are lost. Though i shudder to think what rites there may have been for physio's back in the day...

Great tour though and i'd highly recommend it to anyone planning on going to Dublin for a bit. Bar at the top (cheesy name, wait for it... Gravity) is very cool with a bar in the centre and 360 degree views of the city and surrounding areas (we could even see the far off sugar loaf!) and it's easy to be struck by just what a booming city Dublin is, supposedly ireland is one of the best performing EEC economies and from the amount of construction going on around the city you can see that such comments can't be too far wrong cos the cranes are literally everywhere you look, and in every direction. Any Kiwi construction workers care to brave the irish cold? Great setting though in which to enjoy your 'free' pint of Guiness (note the €14 entry fee) Which Mez (note moustache) took to like a duck to water (note smile). Ok so that is a slight exaggeration. Ok so maybe I got two 'free' pints then. Ok so she hated it. You happy? huh. Gahh you people so can't take a joke!

Guiness was followed by dinner at Temple bar which is most famous in Dublin for stag and hens parties (people come there from all over the the UK!!) Ok food. Crap service. Nuff said. But temple bar is also home to the Mezz bar. And we found a Ryan & Guiness bar too, though unfortunately i think that is only on the DV camera. I think we'll head back to Ireland. Definately a cool place. Such style with their names...

Sunday was Mrs Mez Monastra's 24th birthday. We celebrated her birthday by getting up viciously early (for the third morning in a row) and heading to Mass. Nice service. Then Amanda and Dan made us (especially Mez) breakfast, and we headed, despite the rain, for Glendalough. Great place out in the Wicklow mountains where St Kevin tried to retreat. Evidently he was a bit of a charismatic fella and lots of people followed him out there and communed with him, back in about 1200. There are the ruins of a few houses, a chapel (see right), a great bell tower, a heap of gravestones, and about ten billion 'midges' which is the british equivalent of those almost iconic, bloodsucking NZ mosquito's. Grrr. We then headed to a place called powerscourt, once a private residence, now private gardens and tea rooms, boutique shops etc. We pigged out on cake etc, me on pavalova such as to almost induce vomitus. In my defense it was only one slice... What was that thing you taught me about gluttony on my stag Caleb? A quick drive by the gates to Bono's house and Enya's castle and another BBQ dinner and our Dublin experience was almost over. But not before a superb 3.30am wake up call and a fight through a crowded airport. It was a weird experience for me to arrive, haggard back into Nottingham, turn to my wife and say "at last, we're home..."

Take care out there, mo

I don't mean to rub it in...

But this weather is fantastic!!

Sorry to all you folk back home in Aotearoa loathing the chill of winter as it makes itself known. I'm sure we'll get our fair share of chilling cold, bone rattling, feet freezing weather come the British winter.

For now though we make the most of this tropical climate. We've had a week of pure sunshine. Topping 27 degrees at it's best. We felt, for the first time, somewhat suffocated in our small flat. With hardly a breath of wind the limited air flow turned Flat 4 into a sauna.

It felt like we were in the tropics. I never imagined myself being in England and going to bed with all the windows open and just a sheet to cover our perspiring bodies. This morning again warm, forecast for 27C but today the rain doth fall. Memories of the tropics spring to mind with that sweet smell of the grass and pavement as it dries after the rain before getting rained upon again. And I don't mind it one bit. Actually I'm contemplating doing a little singing in the rain.
Hmm I'm talking about the weather... has my life come to this?! Oh well I'm happy!

Dreamy Saturdays

Some days you just feel like staring at the sky hey? Your whole being seems to peer upward, as if to transport you to the great wide open. You know the ones. When the sky is blue, when the sun is high, when the jets that race across the sky leave you wondering not just where those people are headed, but where your next adventure will take you, when reality seems a distant memory and what if's start taking over. When price is no longer significant enough to consider with thought (hmmm my wife may argue that represents me most of the time!!). When your spirits are soaring, and you can actually imagine the view from up there, bugger it, not even from a plane, gimme a red cape and an 'S' to pin on the chest and i'd be there. When the simple reality is that your only limitation is your own imagination, and you're coaxing it, willing it on, further into wonder, deeper into mystery, wide enough to include all you know and have heard of (even once). Generally for me they're sunny summer's days. Generally they involve exercise of some description (great for getting the happy 'endorphin type' drugs coursing through the veins). More often than not they involve adventure to some new pasture in which we can frolic with glee. And always now, they're shared with my beautiful belle, which is cool on cool really.

So life is good. This weekend God decided to give the Brits something to be happy about (without wanting to be prophetic, perhaps He's preparing them for the simple reality that Wayne Rooney will not be playing in the world cup. It's almost sickening how much the press are talking about this one guy who broke his foot. And if the buggers lose i bet his name will come up again... Have even had reporters this week ringing to try and get a comment from us at work about his injury... honestly they need something better to think about... nuff said)

So a brill weekend we had indeed, hopped on our faithful steeds and headed for Newark, which as the crumbling remains of an old castle indicate... is yet another site of old feuds between royals and parliamentarians. Similar story to the Nottingham Castle really. Fascinating to read about though... Humanity certainly has a colourful and violent past... hmmm and present.

Makes you wonder if in a few hundred years the tourists wont be flocking to iraq to see the results there of the current hostilities. Anyway I digress.

Speaking of digressions, I have another one, and another interesting comment about british culture... well what you see on the streets and in the parks anyway. Brits are very couple-ish. which is nice... but the phrase "get a room" clearly hasn't made it here yet. I've heard it said that shopping was the Brits number one national sport, but if that's true then PDA is certainly a close second. (that's Public Displays of Affection for those street-linguistically-challenged readers). It's almost obscene. Now I wouldn't consider myself a passionless, tight pant-'nice' shirt-brogue shoe wearing spoon (apologies if that is your favourite dress style...) but c'mon, we're not talking the pleasantries of a peck on the cheek, a loving touch, walking hand in hand, even a lingering kiss on the lips here. We're talking 'giving it to her/him' full on street PASHING. As crude a word as that is... it's not a bad descriptor of what you can't help but notice in the middle of town, at bus stops, at every park you go to etc etc etc. It honestly seems there is no escaping it, you turn the opposite direction and you see more!!! Perhaps i could blame modern TV for oversexualising everything, but the same shows play in NZ and you don't get it there... i dunno. But it is an observation you can't help but make.

So what was the point of this blog? Oh... Saturday. We biked 45ish kms to scenic Newark. On the way we got lost and had a great example of the two options that are so often open to people in life... We asked a passing runner (who clearly knew where he was, and who had his young son cycling beside him as he ran)... if he could help us... Sir, can you help us please? (no response), (a little louder) Excuse me sir, can you please give us some direction here? (again, no response), (a third attempt after checking closer to ensure he didn't have headphones on...) excuse me sir, with a violent twist of long flowing mullet he glared in my direction, kept running and said: "look mate can't you see i'm busy!" And that was that. Was just about spitting tacks but no way was I going to give him an earful in front of his son... was just annoyed that anyone would be such a complete prat in front of a child... but i guess thats how they learn... gotta show them how it's done eh? So the next guy we approached almost with trepidation, and got almost the opposite response... "yeah sure there's a turn just up here on the right, i'm headed that way myself" and off we went" Such a simple choice to be nice to someone, takes more effort to avoid (especially when they're persistant with requests for help such as myself). Crazy crazy stuff. I'd be horrified if I came across something similar in NZ.

Oops I digressed again. What was the point? Nice bike trip. Dreamy day. Markets in Newark were kinda cool to walk around, had dinner in a nice wee pub and watched England demolish Jamaica in a world cup warm-up match. Mez got sunburnt (for a change), and is now frantically rubbing moisturiser in to delay the inevitable peel. It's an interesting country England. Am very much looking forward to Mez getting a Job so we can get a car to do a bit more tripping about the country - there is so much beautiful stuff to see. I'm game to see a castle that hasn't been destroyed... We went back to Wollaton Park today for another ride and saw the deer who now have wee foals/Deerlets/Pups/whatever you call their kids. The Geese and the ducks with their Goslings and Ducklings respectively. About a thousand crows... which are almost the equivalent of seagulls over here... kinda hang out at parks and try and get at your food etc. I think I like crows more than seagulls though, they're quieter.

On the whole, life is good, Spring brings rain (bucketloads of it) but there is new growth too, which is ever an enticing thing to watch, be reminded of, be provoked to thought by. And so, spring happens on the inside too, cleaning out old, not so flash ideas, replacing them hopefully with better ones... inner growth i guess. Which is always important.

Our plans are being threshed out again and again as we try and decide on timeframes for our wee travel jaunt and what goals are the must do's, could do's, probably won't do's etc etc Life is interesting... life is beautiful

Hope yours is too.

Words can hardly express...

...but i will find a way!

WOOOOHOOOOO!

Mail arrived today. This is always exciting. Especially if it's got your name on it. And today there was mail for me! And it looked official... interesting i thought. 'I hope this is what i think it is... Please God let this be what i think it is!' I ripped it open and ...

YES!

A letter from City Hospital!

"Dear Maryanne

RE: Application for Post of - Band 5 Staff Nurse - SAU

Further to your application for the above post, I have the pleasure in inviting you for an interview on Thursday 8th June 2006 at 2:15pm."

I'M IN!

Now all that is left to do is to turn up and convince them that i'm the one they want. That they see in me potential and someone worth having as part of the team. I've never wanted a job as much as I want this one! However at the end of the day it is their choice.

It's too early for a celebratory Baileys but I think I'll have one anyway!