Finally February 2015

FINALLY! The month had arrived. As the 1st rolled around I was both excited yet sad. I knew the time with my family would pass all too quickly. The week waiting for them to arrive turned out to be surprisingly busy. I had two full days off work and made the most of my month off from saving by having dinner out twice, going to a play, pampering myself and buying a new camera. I am still undecided about the wisdom in this. On the one hand it’s good to have a better camera for my trip on the other I didn’t really give myself much time to get used to it so my photographs could end up being poor due to my unfamiliarity with the camera. Of course the obvious solution to this would be to take both cameras but then didn’t that defeat the purpose of spending $1300? Anyway that is a problem for future Lyn (who by the time you read this will be past Lyn, now that is confusing).  Whilst I was questioning my sanity for replacing a perfectly good and indeed beloved camera with an unknown I did not question it in regards to the pampering. I treated myself to an overdue haircut which as well as resulting in me hair looking fabulous was a fun experience due to my awesomely talented and friendly hairdresser. I also splashed out on an eyebrow tint and shape. I know this doesn’t sound much but if you know me then you will know how excited I was to have eyebrows again! I certainly got plenty of dances at ceroc post pampering but I suspect that was due to most of the best dancers being in Auckland for cerocmania than the reappearance of my eyebrows.

As exciting as dancing was nothing could beat the next days adventure. As soon as I left work I was on a bus to the airport to meet my brother and his wife who successfully made it too Wellington! Sadly their luggage, not so much. We collected our hire car and I immediately realised I had forgotten how to drive manual. I kid you not. I actually looked down at my feet and thought ABC: accelerate, brake, clutch and then tried very hard to remember how they worked! I am proud to report I only stalled once and soon it all came back to me. I am also pleased to report that my family were very supportive and suffered through my reacquainting myself with a manual car with patience and no back seat driving. As much as I wanted to take them everywhere and introduce them to everyone I knew they would be tired so we settled on getting them booked into their accommodation and getting food from my favourite chippy. For once I decided against my usual fish and decided to finally try one of their burgers and I was more than happy to agree that they deserve their claim to one of the best burgers in Wellington. In an effort to fight the jet lag we took an evening stroll along the water front and I gave my camera its first low light workout. Whilst I was still struggling to get to grips with the settings and how they work best together I was impressed with how well it performed as the sun went down.

The following day I was excited as I had instructed my family to come to my cafe for breakfast, well they kind of had to really. I told anyone who stood still long enough and some who didn’t that they were coming. Finally they arrived and though we were busy I was able to steal 5 minutes here and there to catch up and even managed to make Sister in Law the elder a coffee. Too soon for me but not for them they had sorted out their missing luggage and were on their way up north. Their holiday had properly started but I was stuck in work for three more days. As well as the Friday being a public holiday all weekend Wellington was celebrating the sevens. We were expecting to be busy and on Friday we really were. Fortunately Saturday though busy wasn’t as crazy. I say fortunately as I had a member of staff off with suspected appendicitis. Luckily for us our newest member of staff coped admirably with being thrown in at the deep end. She got nowhere near the amount of support I would have liked to give her but her previous experience meant that she made an excellent start and by the end of the day I was very grateful she had joined our team. I was also feeling a lot more positive about having two new members of staff training whilst I was away. I finally felt that despite the problems that inevitable crop up in hospo that things might just be working out.