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[themargaret66-blog]

Counselling

Since writing about my problems in my last blog - I have decided to go and have some counselling - over Desiree’s ‘’could not care attitude about me or Adrienne” and Adrienne’s refusal to acknowledge my genealogy research! I know that Adrienne hates my family - because we have never had a relationship with any of my relatives over the 40 years that Adrienne has existed on this earth! However, we did use to get visits from Loie (my mother’s sister) and Eric her husband from time to time (usually once or twice a year) - even they were extremely judgmental as far I was concerned! Fair enough - but it seemed quite ironic for Loie to be so judgemental towards me, the reason being that Loie worked in a factory sorting out different grades of paper and she did this very boring job for a great many years - from approximatley 1972 to about 1994! Eric worked in the same place which was called the Kinlieth Paper Mill in Tokoroa - however he worked in the office. Out of their jobs they managed to buy a house and went for lots of holidays around New Zealand. They played life - in a very safe manner - never making or doing anything rash or extraordinary! The centre of Loie’s life was her daughter Brenda - who was lazy and never aspired to do anything extraordinary with her life! Brenda married into a rich sheep farming family and then had three children in quick succession! She then moved out of this marriage after a few years (I think her husband was having affairs left right and centre). Brenda worked at the her local library out in the boon docks (a isolated sheep farming area) - she then tried to get a library qualification (in her case this took several years) - which she failed at miserably! However, she did not have to worry about her future prospects because of her very healthy devorce settlement from her husband (with this she bought a very flash house in Rotorua so her mother Loie told me) and then when Loie died in 2007 - she then got Loie’s house - for which, I am sure she was the sole beneficiary! The last I heard about Brenda - my aunt Val then told me a few years back, that she had bought a block of land up North! Brenda had told me (in the two weeks before Loie’s death when she was looking out for her mother in the Waikato Hospital and I was visiting) - that she, her son Aaron and his girlfriend (who was a psychologist from the USA) and the psychologist’s mother were going to open up some sort of Health Spa up North - they were going to offer services such as emotional and physical therapy! Loie died in 2007 - so they have had 10 years to set this business up - but as yet, I cannot find them on the internet. I asked my aunt Val about Brenda and her family business - but she said she doesn’t know anything! She said I would have to ask Jeanette (my sister) - however, since I have only seen Jeanette twice in the last 33 years - since giving birth to Desiree and both times were at funerals - Loie and my aunt Charlie’s funerals - there is not a chance of that!  And as for Jeanette since we are on this subject - she stole a bible (the Vickers family bible - a very large book that I remember in 1959) from my father’s house in Kerepehi! We had relatives who came to visit us in Kerepehi from Canada in 1959 - they were my grandfather Vickers (William Edward Vickers) brother Hedley Vickers and his wife Nellie and Barbara Castley (Hedley and William’s sister) and her husband - Allen. They had bought the bible with them from Canada. I remember reading this book (at nine years of age) and being absolutely entranced and in awe of this book - as the book was extremely old!  I also remember the various writings from the various ancestors in this book - the dates and the facts! Since 1995 (the year I went to  university - I decided to try it out - but did not go any further with it) was the first time that I asked for a photocopy of the pages at the front of the bible - which has the names of the Vickers ancestors in Yorkshire going back for many years (what I can remember - for many generations) for genealogy purposes! I have asked and asked and I am still waiting! I have just accepted it now - I will never see this Bible again and I have told my daughters that the Bible would probably end up at a Op Shop! Adrienne has said that this would be extremely sad - to see a family heirloom disappear from the family because of my sister’s spite, stupidity, extreme selfishness and arrogance!

When I lived in Twizel in the South Island from 1976 to 81 - Jeanette lived in Christchurch with her boyfriend Grant during those same years. Every year for five years, I would go and stay with Jeanette in Christchurch for a couple of weeks each year. Those visits were never reciprocated. Jeanette and Grant came once and stayed one night in Twizel. They never ever showed any interest in the hydro project - whereas when my father and Mavis came to stay and Loie and Eric came to stay - (both at different times) - they were all very interested and Jim gave them all a guided tour of the Waitaki Power Scheme! Jim worked mainy on the Ohau C Power Scheme (for the five years that we lived there),  which is located in the MacKenzie Basin, South Canterbury, New Zealand. Apparently, Ohau C supplies power to 144,000 average New Zealand homes. They never came back again during those five years!  During this visit Jim took them fishing out at one of the hydro lakes - but neither of them seemed very interested! I remember Jeanette reading the newspaper during the whole fishing excursion! Grant was never a happy chap - with his demeanour he was always grumpy, surly and dour! I remember Jim and I and Adrienne (she was six months at the time) were visiting them in Tokoroa in 1977 (they shared the house with several other people) and on one occasion we were all watching the television and at the same time I was baking some trout! (I learn’t how to bake trout in Twizel from our time spent at the Omarama camping ground (we were waiting for a house in Twizel) for two months in 1976. All of these anglers and fishing folk would stay at the camping grounds and catch a lot of trout and then quite often - they would give us some trout - which was greatly appreciated! So I became an expert at baking trout). Anyway while we were all watching TV - I suddenly became aware that Grant was talking to me - he did not address me at all! He wanted to know what was happening to the trout - he must have got the trout from somewhere! Here he was babbling away to me, without addressing me! So I said to him - sorry but are you talking to me? I felt like saying to him - you know I do have a name believe it or not? He was very strange in a lot of respects! Anyway - when we came back to Whakatane in the north island in 1981 - Jeanette and Grant separated. Loie told me (Grant’s sister lived in Tokoroa during the 1970s) that Grant had got married and now has two children. These two children would be adults now. I shouldn’t say that Grant was dour and surly all the time. Remembering back now - Grant was always nice to Adrienne. He would often talk to her and would often refer to her as The Bairn - which means child in the Scottish language. Grant was originally from the north of England. However, my family (sisters and aunts) never showed any interest in my family - so I can understand why Adrienne has no interest in my genealogy - more’s the pity! 

Now onto the subject of aunt Val. She recently contacted me about the wrong placement of Isabella’s (her father’s sister) two daughters on my family tree which is located on Geni.com. I sent an email back and thanked her - as I said I wanted a authentic tree - not like some I have seen! There is a family tree on the MyHeritage site (someone has my photo on their tree and I have asked this guy to remove the photo - as I am not related to any of the people on this tree but it is still there - 12 months later! This is very annoying!) There is another family tree on FamilySearch (the Mormon site) where someone has Frances Strickland (my great grandmother from Crosthwaite, Cumbria, UK) married to James Strickland - her father in-law. She was married to Thomas Strickland - James youngest son! Frances and Thomas are named on all the birth certificates of their 10 children - so don’t know why this person would get confused! Then Val said to me - she had not seen me in a long time - really, I only saw her a few months ago! I drove over to her house in Desiree’s car in about September of 2017. Val has only ever visited me once in her whole life - that was at the rotting and decrepit house that I lived in for eight years on Helvietia Road in 2009 - when Adrienne and Clinton had arrived back in New Zealand from England. When I think back to the house I had lived in at 20 Highland Drive in Hamilton (where I had some beautiful gardens with fabulous rose bushes, native trees, pungas (native tree ferns) and I had wallpapered and painted the interrior of this house) - why did she not visit me then? I had lived in that house for 15 years and she never came once to visit - neither did Jeanette for that matter! I told Adrienne - the last visit with Val was so disappointing - there were many reasons - one reason was when she made disparaging comments about my camera! It was way too flash (for little old me) to own such a camera! My photography hobby has helped save me from going insane! Practically every weekend during the summertime - I am travelling on the train (all buses and trains are free for me - since I am over 65 years old) to somewhere to some place or to some festival in order to take photos! I am nearly 68 years old - how dare you talk to me in such a manner! I never said this to her - (I am way too polite for that) - however, my aunt Val has at times has a very abrasive and intrusive manner! She is also very nosy - she needs to remember that at her own volition my family and I (me and my two daughters) have never ever been invited to any Christmas or any other family gathering at her house! So what I do with my time - is my business and it has nothing to do with Val! I told Adrienne that I will not be visiting her again - that visit was such a disappointment on so many levels! I told Val that Adrienne use to go and visit her counselling friends and colleagues (Adrienne worked with them for several months at Relationship Services in Thames - then the National Government withdrew their funding and so the place was then closed down) - Bill and Glenn who live in Thames - (where Val lives) - even after this organisation had closed down - many times! Val was quite angry and highly upset and was extremely put out by this knowledge - that Adrienne never went to visit her in Thames! I felt like saying to aunt Val - you were the one who never showed any interest in my family - when my daughters were growing up! You never ever came to visit - you never showed any generosity of spirit or largesse to our circumstances! I was a single parent to my daughters for most of their lives - all that you could do during those formative years of my daughters lives, was sit on your haunches and (belly ache) criticize me! We never ever registered on your radar during the last 40 years or more! Then you have these expectations of my family - what a joke! Unfortunately for you Val - my daughters have not the slightest interest in you or your family and will not be visiting you - ever! The only reason that I have been visiting you in Thames (on a yearly basis for approximately the last five years) was for genealogy purposes and for the sharing of photos. In that sense - the visits have been worthwhile - but not when you have to put up with Val’s arrogant and haughty manner and overbearing attitude! On one occasion I left a box of books on her patio (I think that was in about 2013) as I use to do with aunt Loie. Loie always loved my books - however Val was a different kettle of fish altogether. After this incident, she rang me up and told me that she never ever reads any books whatsoever and then expected me to drive to Thames to pick up the box of books from her house! Thames is an hour’s drive from me in Pukekohe! I was completely flaberghasted and flummoxed at her small minded and petty attitude! I told her, no I would not be driving to Thames anytime soon and I then suggested she donate the books to the Salvation Army or to any op shop in Thames! She then inferred to me that this little job - was way too much trouble for her to undertake! All it takes Val - “ you place the box of books into the boot of your car - you drive to the op shop ( a five minute drive) and then you go and ask the girl in the shop to take the box of books”!  For God’s sake -  how hard is that - not hard at all! This would probably take 10 minutes at the most of your precious time! I worked at the Hospice Op Shop in Manurewa for several years - people did this all  the time! We were always getting boxes of clothes, books, utensils, ornaments out of people’s car boots all the time! I was just shocked and astounded that Val has never ever donated anything during her lifetime to the op shops! Just too mean and too gready! At one point she wanted my phone number. She rang me up once - just before Christmas and wanted to know - where I was going for Christmas! I go to the City Mission every year and you know that - so why do you ask! She rang a couple of times after that - but I would not pick up! I learn’t my lesson - I will never ever give out my phone number to her again! I am not going to have her pry into my business and then start making scathing comments to me - in how I choose to live my life! She and her husband (when he was alive) were a horrible,  vindictive and nasty couple! In my presence, on one of my visits in 1985 (Desiree was about 12 months old)  - her husband made sexual innuendos and comments to me - because I was a single woman with two children! I never went back to visit Val for many years! However, every Christmas I would write a long letter to Val - usually just talking about the girls and what they were up to - like their interests and their progress at their various schools. On my last visit to Val - she asked why my typing was so fast (because I never studied it at High School) - I told her I went to Night School in Waihi when I worked at the Rail Road Services and I studied typing in Twizel for a couple of years! She then said she was a two fingered typist!  So I then figured - that is why she probably does not send emails any more - it is just too much hard work for her - if you are a two fingered typist!  Anyway must go - I am exhausted. I have to go and water the outside pot plants. All afternoon I have have had the fan going and directed at me. For many years I would never use a fan - because of the cost! However, this is the first year that I have used a fan on a regular basis. I only use it when I am typing and using my laptop - I feel as though I am suffocating if I don’t! I have really enjoyed this summer and I am dreading this winter! Last winter - I was sick all winter long with bronchitis, whooping cough and the flu - even though I was innoculated agrainst the flu! Must go once and for all!

[themargaret66-blog]

Where do I start ...........

I have not written on this platform for a long time and so much has happened over the last few weeks! Siua and Desiree and their daughters travelled to Dunedin for Christmas and as a result of this - Desiree gave me her car which I had for 10 days. I did a lot of driving - went to Clark’s Beach, Port Waikato and Auckland several times for various reasons i.e. - K Mart in Manukau. We don’t have K Mart in Pukekohe and the one in Manukau is very difficult to get to - if you don’t have a car. I originally went there to get some cheap Christmas decorations and particularly lights to string along amongst my trees - which I did - but I bought quite a bit of other stuff such as a mortar and pestle for grinding herbs $15, shelves for the kitchen $25, mat for the garage $20, apparatus to keep and store shoes on $20, shoes $20, sandels $30, large pot for $12 (which is practically useless - food sticks to the bottom of it) and so on. Last year I bought a food mixer for $60 and a microwave for $85. I also bought a book-shelf $40 for the spare room and a set of bright coloured shelves for $40 from the Salvation Army Op Shop - this includes transport to my house which costs $10. I had $1000 saved in the bank - however, after my spending splurge over Christmas - my balance is reduced to $200. Over the summer I also spent quite of bit of money on the garden such as fertilizers, bags of potting mix and three bags of bark and one rose bush for $30. I decided that I had to write about where my money is being spent - as I am supposed to be saving for a car and at the same time I am trying to sort out where my money is being spent! At the present time, I am trying to show some good and healthy bank balances in order to secure a loan of $5000 from the Salvation Army for the purpose of buying a car! This year, I have a bumper crop of tomatoes and as a result, my freezer compartment of the fridge is full of bags of tomatoes. I have also completed a lot of bottling and have made chutneys, tomato pasta sauce, tomato and garlic sauce, tomato jam, bottled tomatoes and so on. So far I have given Liz Masters two bowls of tomatoes and Adrienne three bowls of tomatoes and I still have heaps of tomatoes in the garden - waiting to ripen! So will be doing some more bottling in the next few weeks! it should be worth it - when winter comes along! I have been posting my images onto Facebook of my gardens (flower and vegetable) and my bottling, have been getting some great messages from people all over the world - particularly in the States and England. What amazes me is when people say - what a lot of work you have done in your garden for flower and vegetables. I have been doing this for years and years and have very rarely ever received any compliments at all from family or anyone else for that matter! However, when living in Hamilton - I would occasionally get compliments from various acquaintances I met in the streets! It just shows you the power of Facebook and digital cameras - it has changed our perception of everything that happens in life and all for the better!  My neighbour whose name is Claire (she is five years older than me) told me that she hated Facebook! On one recent occasion, I traveled with her in her car to the Auckland Botanic Gardens in Manurewa. Never again will I ever go with her to anything again - ever. She was downright embarrassing, rude and nasty! All she could do was talk about herself and her many jobs! At the ‘’gardens’’ she had to stop and talk to all and sundry and kept asking for directions! We each had a map and as far as I was concerned no one in their right mind had to ask for directions - the place was also well signposted! Also, the way she looked me over at the ‘’gardens’’ to see if I was suitable attired and wearing the correct footwear! Who cares - people walk around in jandels as it only takes one and half hours to complete the circuit around the ‘’gardens’’! On this occasion God was looking after me (although I did not know it at the time) - just 10 minutes into our walk, it began pouring down with rain and we all got drenched. We were sheltering with other people in some sort of tree shelter, after waiting for the weather to clear (about 15 minutes) these people said that they were going home in order to get out of their wet clothes. So Claire decided we had to go home as well - thank God. However, instead of driving on the motorway - we were driving down all the backroads of South Auckland and as a consequence of this, we got lost! However, I did enjoy that bit of the trip - going to places which I had not seen in a long time. Back in 2009 to 2013, I use to drive down these roads in order to complete surveys for Colmar Brunton - so I thought that this part of the trip was interesting. We finally got home at 5.45pm! if Claire had driven on the motorways both ways - this would have saved a lot of time and stress! Looking back now - I realize she is suffering from dementia! Obviously, this trip was just beyond her capabilities in terms of driving there and back again - to and from Manurewa from Pukekohe. Also, I now realize - as far as cognitive abilities go - I am way ahead of her in this department - for example if those people had not said - we are going home to get changed out of our wet clothes - we would have kept walking around the ‘’gardens’’ in drenched clothing for the next one and half hours! I now know what she thinks of me - “someone who is not good enough for her - meaning I am way down on her socially acceptable scale”! This suits me just fine - from now on I will try and avoid her at all costs! There is no way I will place myself in that situation again - she is welcome to her snobby friends and family! Also, I must mention Desiree’s strange behaviour this summer (since I am talking about my fantastic gardens) - I invited her to look at my gardens - she said she wouldn’t because of her hay-fever! To look at my gardens - would have taken about 20 minutes all up! I mentioned her strange behaviour to Adrienne and Adrienne told me that when Desiree and the girsl were visiting her recently - Desiree wouldn’t let the girls play on Adrienne’s trampoline - because she said that Lia has hayfever! Yes, we all know that Lia has hayfever - but that does not stop her from playing outside in any other circumstances! After Desiree, Siua and the girls got back from Dunedin - Lia wanted to look at my Christmas decorations in the garden - however, Desiree was not interested at all and told Lia to get into the car! Adrienne and I are completely blindsided and shocked at Desiree’s arrogant and haughty attitude! I have barely seen Desiree, Siua and the girls this summer! This coming winter I won’t be making myself available for any babysitting again - if the girls get sick - which I have done in the past! Apparently every Sunday they all (Desiree, Siua and the girls) visit Siua’s parents - while Adrienne and I are avoided at all costs. However, there is always consequences to any behaviour! If she wants to avoid her mother and sister - one day she may live to regret her reproachable and unacceptable behaviour! Also she visits her cousin Marie and Equator on regular occasions. She attends their big family outings which Adrienne and I happen to see on Facebook - photos! As I said to Adrienne - Marie is a liar, a bullshit artist, narcisstic, egotistical and is downright slimy! I would not trust her as far as I could throw her! All of Jim’s (Desiree’s father) family know this and as a consequence - they all treat her with contempt and disdain!  Whereas Desiree cannot see through her bullshit and lying! Apparently, according to Adrienne, she was recently (Adrienne was told by some very reliable friends) was forced to leave her job at the Middlemore Hospital - working for the Auckland Hospital Board! Marie is now telling everyone that she is the CEO for some sort of business - yeah that is the operative work in this instance! So Adrienne and I decided to check this business out online - yeah she is the CEO alright  - with one employee under her who wasn’t appropriately dressed in Adrienne’s opinion! On one occasion Desiree told me that Richie McCaw (who was the captain of the All Blacks for several years) was a dirty player. I don’t watch the rugby - however I do read - everything - newspapers and I watch the news every day! Everyone has always said that Richie’s behaviour is always exemplary and he is a fastastic example for everyone else to aspire to! I have no idea why and where Desiree gets her strange ideas from - in my opinion (she never reads - I don’t think she has read a book in her life) - so she invents these strange and untrue stories about famous people such as Richie McCaw! I think Richie retired after the World Cup in 2011 and since then, it seems to me, practically every week - you will see Richie in the news for some reason! He must be one of the most famous rugby players to come out of New Zealand. Must go and have some lunch as I am starving!

[themargaret66-blog]

Lost and Found

It was Saturday 18 November 2017 - my youngest daughter’s birthday - she had just turned 33 years old. On this particular day I had sauntered in to the public library, which had been my second home for the past 12 months - researching for my ancestors through Ancestry.com and Find my Past. At that point according to the geni.com (where my family tree can be located) statistics - I had entered 1370 names onto my tree. I had completed a huge amount of intense genealogy research and I was still unable to find the one person (or persons) I had been pursuing with aggressiveness and resolve and who was the catalyst for this particular passion!

Back in 1981 my father had mentioned to me - he knew absolutely nothing about his mother’s family who were from England, with some bitterness and recrimination! Grandmother had arrived in New Zealand from England in 1915 in rather mysterious circumstances and then got married (soon after the death of her first husband in the UK) to my grandfather at The Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Church on Queen Street, Auckland.

On this particular day - I was looking glumly at the computer as I had exhausted all avenues in my research on my grandmother’s family - or so I had thought!  So on a whim I then decided to enter my grandmother’s first husband and his family onto my family tree.  As I was perusing through the 1911 English census - I saw a Kathleen Mary, living with her paternal relatives! Finally, I felt relieved and estatic as the riddle and mystery was now finally solved!  I had discovered a half-sister to my dad!  Unfortunately, my father had died in 1983 and Kathleen Mary died in England in 1982. However, this is not the end of this particular story - the search is on now on for any relative or descendant of my great aunt!

[themargaret66-blog]

Christmas will be soon upon us - tomorrow is the 1st December 2017.

Two days ago I had travelled into Manurewa by bus and two trains in order to get my teeth repaired at the dentists. I have three broken teeth on one side of my mouth - through eating chupa chups lolly pops! Desiree rang me at 1.30pm in order to tell me that she had bought me a $20 ticket in order to watch Kortelia at her Dance School Concert that afternoon at 4.00pm. So I postponed my visit to the dentist and caught the two trains and one bus back into Pukekohe. Before I caught the bus I walked to The Warehouse in order to get a hose for the garden.  I then caught the bus to the Countdown Supermarket and then walked past the public toilets - when Siua came out of one of them (my son-in-law) - we then walked to the Harrington Hall for the concert together.  Lia looked very cute in her yellow duck outfit, black tap shoes and pantyhose. She will be five years of age next month on the 21 December. She got a bit confused in her item - however, it was only a dress rehearsal. I am sure she do better in her next performances - I think there will be three more - not sure!  Lia performed in the first half and then Lia, Fitimoka, Siua and Desiree went home at the interval as Desiree had some lesson-planning to complete as a VIP person (from the Education Department) was going to Paerata the next day, in order to watch my daughter teach at the local primary school. Desiree said that this had never happened before since she has been teaching. She has been teaching for approximately 10 years now! The second half of the concert was much more interesting and the dance performances were fantastic. Some the students were amazing and brilliant. Personally, I loved the older ladies dance group - they got an arousing applause at the end of their item. Then there was a young girl with blonde hair (who looked about 15 to 18 years age bracket) who completed a tap dance. She wore very drab clothing with very tight shorts. I couldn’t get over how muscled her legs looked.  Her dancing was superb and exquisite. There was also another item which I enjoyed very much - there was a big guy who was Pakeha with ginger hair - he wore a t-shirt, leggings with shorts. He looked about 15 years old. His dancing was superb as well. He completed a jazz dance and I thought that he was very flexible. Its good to see more guys dancing now - there seem to be more these days going to dance lessons which is really good to see! The only problem that I had with the venue - the air-conditioning was up too high and I shivered all the way through the concert. I wore a t-shirt, with 3/4 pants and a then summer jacket. It is really annoying - because the temperature outside was a very summery 25 degrees - while inside the Harrington Hall - it was like sitting in a fridge. It was very uncomfortable from my perspective. The next day I went back to the dentist (as I had rescheduled my appointment) in Manurewa at Hillpark Shopping Centre - which is a half hour walk from the South Mall. With my first appointment, I had decided to walk to the dentist - yesterday I got a taxi (it was very hot and I felt quite tired) and we got lost. I berated the Indian taxi driver for not knowing where the Hillpark Shopping Centre was - in the end, I only paid $10 - probably should have paid him at least $20. The dentist looked like she was Indian as well - she only fixed one broken tooth which took an hour. She did an amazing job! I just had a stump - where I had lost at least half of the tooth or more, while I was eating muesli about a week ago. She made a completely new tooth - I told her it looked excellent.  I paid her the $825 all up - because I had got the money from Work and Income and it had to be paid by Friday.  My next appointment is the same time next week. The next tooth is close to a nerve so the dentist told me  - so I am not looking forward to having that one repaired. I have to pay back Work and Income - $10 a week - which I don’t mind! About three years ago I saw a dentist on the North Shore. This Chinese outfit was a complete rip-off outfit because each time I paid a visit, I had to pay $60 and then I got two fillings done for $600 - which took one hour and the fillings must have been close together - as she only worked on one tooth.  THE BIGGEST RIP OFF EVER! ! ! ! ! So all up for one hour’s work - this cost me $720 - a complete rip-off - ever!  I went to her to get my teeth whitened - but she told me to get the front fillings replaced. She gave me a quote for $1800 and I got a quote from a dentist at the Manukau Mall for $1200 - so I went to the dentist at the Manukau Mall and got the fillings replaced and then paid Work and Income back at $10 a week. I did not go back to the young Chinese lady at Takapuna - my conscience would not allow me to! She would probably rip me off again! I learned my lesson in my first two visits - won’t be going back. My teeth are very discoloured - but I have decided I have to save my money to get to England next year or the year after! I told my friend Liz I would rather save to go to England - than get a car! Just the running of the car and the upkeep costs are very expensive! After the dentist, I caught a train to Puhinui and then another to Manukau in order to get some Xmas lights from Bunnings. I then walked over to Bunnings in Manukau from the train station. To get across the road to Bunnings is nerve-racking - it is like a motorway - the traffic is very fast and very dense. Bunnings are excellent value for your money - way better than Mitre 10 - so it is worth it in the end, to make the effort! We only have a small Bunnings shop in Pukekohe - so I rarely go there. While there I bought some packets of flower seed, a pot with a swan plant in it for Matheus (Adrienne’s four-year-old son) and some snowflake lights. Matheus is extremely spoilt as Henry’s family buy him all kinds of toys, bikes, motor-cars, trampoline and so on. Decided to buy him something completely different - which may interest him. I did buy one for Lia as they (Desiree, Siua, Lia and now Moka) always go to Kawhia for two weeks after Xmas Day. They go and stay with Emma Hetet ( Desiree’s friend - they have been friends since they were in Kindergarten together in Pukete, Hamilton).  They have been going every year for the last five years at least. I bought a large packet of chips (I was extremely hungry) before catching the three trains and one bus back to my house. I had to catch the Manukau Train, then the Papakura train, then the Pukekohe train. At Pukekohe, it began to rain. Everyone who wants to catch the bus after getting off the train, have to walk at a very fast pace over the bridge (to catch the bus on time - so you don’t get left behind if you happen to dally around) - on each side there are about 30 steps to climb and then descend. I found it exhausting - I was hungry and tired. There was a guy (who looked about 50 years old) - he went storming pass me - I am sure he was trying to race me! Typical male - he looked like the cat who swallowed the cream - by the time I had reached the bus station a couple of minutes after and behind him! The dork then stood in the rain - while I went and stood in the bus shelter. About five minutes later - we both then caught the same bus. He sat up the front - with his legs hanging over the arm-rest - what a sexist dork! I am female, going on 68 years old and I am only five feet and three inches.  He needs to find an opponent who is male and of a similar age and height if he wants to portray that he is superior physically! 

Also just a small note about Adrienne once again. Her passive aggressive behaviour towards Desiree has reached new heights. She told Desiree last year - ‘’Thanks for inviting me to Lia’s dance concert last year” - which she said she knew nothing about! So this year, Desiree told her about the dance concert to which Adrienne replied by text message - “I won’t be going as Matheus will not keep still throughout the concert”!  I then said to Desiree - that Adrienne should come on her own. Desiree then said to me - “I could not care less about her - I am sick and tired of her childish behaviour”! I went to last year’s dance concert or dance recital as well.  When the children get older - I am sure they will be pleased that I made the effort!  In 2015 I paid a visit to Henry at the Wiri prison - then he died approximately four months later. Henry never lacked for visitors - he was very popular - Adrienne planned my visit a month before the visit. Jim also came at the same time. During the visit, Henry asked Jim permission to marry Adrienne. As usual, Jim behaved very strangely (as he does these days because of his dementia - he got upset, began muttering and then began talking rubbish) - he then said - “I don’t know if I can allow you to marry - you have to ask Margaret”! I then laughed and said - “You don’t need my permission - you are both old enough to make up your own minds for goodness sake”! The way Jim carried on - it was though Adrienne and Henry were teenagers - at the time Henry was 38 years old and Adrienne was 39 years old! Anyway, I am pleased I made the effort to go and see Henry - whereas Desiree never did - in fact, she hated Henry! She hated the fact that Henry was a convicted felon. Desiree felt embarrassed by this fact and for the approximate three years that they were together - Desiree would constantly complain about Henry to me.  I did not say anything - I just listened to see if she had a valid reason for hating Henry apart from being embarrassed, feeling ashame and self-conscious for having a sister whose fiance was a convicted felon. I never felt the way that Desiree did about Henry. I just felt that Adrienne has a choice in the partner that she chooses to live with and at the end of the day, I just respected her choice. I thought that Henry was a better choice than her previous partner whose name was Clinton.  Clinton had some strange and distasteful habits - like picking his nose and flicking his snot around, where ever he happens to be sitting like in the back set of the car (when I was driving down the Southern Motorway on one occasion) and in my lounge at Pukekohe. On another occasion, Clinton and Adrienne came to stay at my house (they both lived in Hamilton at the time) and Adrienne asked me if I had any spare new underwear - as she had forgotten to bring her own. I said yes and I went found her a packet of four (unopened) packet of underwear. I gave her the packet and then went to the toilet. In the toilet I heard Clinton say to Adrienne - “Just keep the underwear - don’t give it back”!  When I came out of the toilet - I then said - “It goes without saying - I don’t want the underwear back - for goodness sake. I am not that desperate”! Adrienne then laughed - “Of course I am not giving them back - I will pay you for them”! I just said - “That is not necessary!” Also when Clinton was cooking - he use to lick the spoons and then continue to use them in the cooking-mixture!” I can imagine if Gordon Ramsay (a famous English cook) caught him doing that - there would have been an explosion and much berating! Now Desiree tells me that Clinton and his girlfriend (a pakeha lady who he once worked with at Work and Income in Hamilton) have bought a house. Also, she said that Clinton completed some prestigious computer course and now he has some prestigious job in computer science. He and the girlfriend had a baby girl in recent times! Desiree then said to me - Adrienne should have stayed with Clinton!

Anyway must go and hang the snowflake lights onto my fence. I want to do it now as it is much cooler. It was extremely hot during the day - I just can’t do it then - as the heat makes me feel ill! Sometimes when I am working in the garden and it is extremely hot - I often feel nauseous! Also sometimes when I get out of bed these days - I have these spells of giddiness - not a good sign! I haven’t told anyone about it yet! If it gets any worst - I may go and see the doctor about it! Anyway, Au Revoir for now!

[themargaret66-blog]

Yesterday was Desiree’s (my daughter) 33rd birthday and yesterday was the day that I discovered that my dad and his sister in New Zealand once had a half-sister who lived in Birmingham in England!

I was completely shocked when I made this discovery - a discovery (I now regret) I could have made much sooner! When my grandmother died in 1963 my father was completely shocked to discover that his mother had been married once before. This information was discovered amongst her personal items.  I lived in Twizel, in the  South Island of New Zealand from 1976 to 1981 and when I arrived back in the North Island and then decided to live in Hamilton in 1981 - I was living in a flat on Ulster Street in Hamilton for approximately three months.  During this time I will always remember my father saying with some regret - that he did not know a thing about his mother’s family who were from Birmingham in England. At the time I wasn’t that interested - but I always remembered him saying this fact. However, after my dad’s death in 1983 I decided to try and keep in touch with his one and only sister (what I knew at that time to be his only sister) who lived in Nelson in the South Island of New Zealand. I had hoped she would tell me some family history - but whenever I asked Jeanne about anything pertaining to family history - she said she did not know anything as she never ever asked her mother anything! So, unfortunately, she could not tell me anything about her mother’s family?! I completed a Genealogy course in Hamilton in approximately the year 2000 and this is when I was first introduced to the genealogy records at the Church of Latter Day Saints at Temple View in Hamilton. I went there off and on for the next couple of months and this is when I first discovered Henry and Maria Share (my 2x great grandparents) - but I could not find my great-grandparents at this stage! However, I went looking for the death record for William Munn (the first husband to my paternal grandmother) and I could not find it. A volunteer then decided to help me and she discovered that Mary Elizabeth Bertha Share’s  (my grandmother) first husband had actually died in March 1915 and not 1913 - which was written on her marriage certificate to her second husband - W E. Vickers!  This was my first shock (and there would be many more) that my family (who could portray themselves as being very respected members of the community) could actually lie on very important and legal documents such as a marriage certificate! I have found many more untruths in their records on my father’s side of the family - but not my mother’s side of the family! For example a couple of years ago I decided to obtain my parent's marriage certificate from Internal Affairs in Manukau City in Auckland. When I got it - I was completely dumbfounded! I then asked the people at the front counter - if they had given me the right certificate? They, of course, said - yes it was the right certificate! There were so many inaccuracies in this document - that I am very sure that my mother never ever saw it! The first inaccuracy - my mother’s father was a Retired Farmer! He wasn’t - his last job was working in a Quarry! As far as I am aware he has never worked on a farm in his whole life! The second inaccuracy - my father’s mother’s name was named as Dorothy Vickers. Her name was (as above) Mary Elizabeth Bertha Vickers. There were others which I don’t remember at the present time. The only reason why my father would say Dorothy I can only hazard a guess at - was because his father (my grandfather) had a brother who lived in Cariboo, Lake Shuswap, British Columbia in Canada who once had a wife called Dorothy! Also, his grandfather had a sister called Margaret (so this is where I got my name) and my grandfather also had a sister called Eleanor who had a daughter called Barbara and this is where my sister got her name from!  Eleanor (I remember my father telling me) once taught in Nelson, South Island, NZ in the 1930s.

Anyway getting back to the discovery of another sister to my father yesterday - which I thought I could have been made sooner was because for the last approximate three years I have concentrated solely on the Share family. For some inexplicable and unfathomable reason (you need to have an open mind) I thought if she had children to her first marriage - they would be looked after by my grandmother’s own kith and kin (her own blood family) in England. I discovered on the 1911 census UK - that my grandmother wasn’t with her first husband on the census night. I had this suspicion that they had separated which is why my grandmother had kept her first marriage as a secret from her children (my father and Jeanne) and for quite some time I went looking for my grandmother and I have not been able to find her from the time of her first marriage in 1907 to the time she came to NZ in 1915.  Anyway for the last three years while I have been slaving away and working feverishly on my research of the Share Family and adding their names to a rather extensive family tree - I ignored her first husband’s family - thinking why would I bother adding their names to my tree - apart from William Munn?! Then yesterday I was feeling really depressed as I had planned to go to the Highland Games in Ellerslie in Auckland - I got to the train station to discover that there were no trains running on this past weekend. Instead, I would have to catch a bus to Manukau, then catch a train to Penrose, then catch a bus to Greenlane - it would take too long I decided - so I walked to The Warehouse instead. After the Warehouse, I then went to the Markets and bought some vegetables and then went to the library at 12.00 noon. I only go to the library to do my genealogy research as I can look at some sites for free through the Auckland libraries such as Ancestry.com and Find My Past. Once again I commenced on the Share family and two weeks ago I decided to get some help at the Pukekohe library in regards to the Share Family - Valerie Gillanders (a member of the Pukekohe Genealogy Society) was on hand to help. She discovered that William Share who was born in 1903 (son of Thomas Share and Thomas is a brother to Mary Elizabeth Bertha) was enrolled in a school by his grandfather George Harry Share and at 14 years was withdrawn from school by his grandfather (my great-grandfather) in September because of a broken leg and was sent to hospital to recuperate! We then thought that he got married to May Round and had six children. But to me - he was only 17 years old when he would have got married and this seemed way too young to my way of thinking! Val discovered that he had died in 1981. On the same day, I then decided to send to England for his death certificate - just to find out who his wife actually was! I am wondering if we will be so lucky to find out?! Valerie also discovered that Alice Emily Share (the daughter of Thomas Share) got married to James Callagher and they had a daughter by the name of Margaret Wainwright on the 1938 UK census - there were other children in the household but their files are closed - which means that they are still alive. So I now have to figure out how to find these other children? Later that night on Google I found the grave that contains the following family (much to my astonishment) - James Callagher, Alice Emily Callagher - 1907 to 1989, Brian Peter Wainwright - 1936 to 2007 and Margaret Wainwright - 1938 to 2009. So I thought I was making great strides in my discovery of the Share family from Birmingham. So yesterday the 18 November 2017 - I just thought to myself I cannot find anythiing else at this stage about the Share family (there are lots more facts to find - if you know where to go that is) - so I then decided to place the family of William Munn onto my family tree on a whim! Yesterday turned from a very frustrating time to a very momentous time as you will see - I then began with Abigail Munn (who was William Munn’s sister). I decided to find her family on the 1911 census UK and I discovered that she was married to Arthur Creswell and they had two daughters by the names of Marjorie and Marion and then I discovered a name (which jumped off the pages to me) Kathleen Mary Munn who was three years old and it was stated that she was a niece and she was born in 1908! I calculated her age from my grandmother’s first marriage in 1907 - by this time I was beginning to shake! I then thought I would then place Kathleen’s name onto the search panel for Ancestry.com and there it was - the daughter of William Munn and Mary Elizabeth Bertha Share. There was also a “Hill Family Tree” on Ancestry.com - so I had a look and there was William Munn, Mary Elizabeth Bertha Munn and next to Kathleen Mary Munn was the name of Edward Vickes - the right spelling of course is William Edward Vickers! By this time I was shaking and in tears because I have been looking for the last three years for any off-spring from William and my grandmother that they may have had! However, unfortunately it seems that Kathleen did not have any children - she died in 1982.  I just thought what ashame that my grandmother took her secret of her first daughter’s life and existence to her grave. My father and Jeanne his sister did not know of her existence! (I met up with Desiree later and we went to Mitre 10 for a coffee and cake. Desiree found it appalling that my grandmother would abandon her daughter in England at the age of eight years old and never talk about her again during her life in New Zealand. Kathleen’s father William died in March in 1915 and my grandmother emigrated to NZ and got married to W. E. Vickers at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints of the Mormon Church on Queen Street, Auckland in September of 1915. So in effect Kathleen at the age of eight years old - lost both her blood parents). At the library I then went and had a look at the 1938 UK census and I discovered that Kathleen was born on the 14 June 1907 (not 1908 as stated on the 1911 census) and she was working as a Wages Clerk (good with figures just like my dad) and she was still living with Abigail and Arthur Creswell at the age of 31 years. I just thought she obviously had a good life to be still living with her aunt and uncle. I also discovered that my grandmother was six months pregnant when she got married to William - so what went wrong - we will probably never find out! William and my grandmother’s young daughter was being looked after by her aunt and uncle while William lived with his parents and my grandmother was living elsewhere and where was she - who knows? After Desiree and Siua dropped me off at my house - I sent a note via Facebook to Adrienne and my aunt Val about my momentous discovery. Have not heard anything from Adrienne (Desiree says she is really parculiar and she is sick of her passive-aggressive behaviour) and I got a “sad face” from aunt Val. Apparently according to Desiree - Adrienne has been spreading stories about Desiree’s lack of visits to her house amongst Siua’s family and Desiree & Siua’s friends which Desiree finds extremely galling and extremely upsetting! We don’t visit her because of her aggressive and confronting behaviour!  Its like walking on egg-shells around Adrienne as you don’t want to say something in case it sets her off and she explodes! A couple of weeks ago Adrienne told me on Facebook - she was moving to Wellington! I sent a message back and said - “Rug up warm as Wellington is known to be freezing in the wintertime”! Then I thought to myself - “why would you move to Wellington as your brother Aaron and his family have moved to the Gold Coast in Australia from Wellington and Jonah Lomu has died”? Then I got another message to say that she wasn’t going to move to Wellington after all - because she loves her new Counselling job! I told Desiree - “why tell me she was going to Wellington - then she wasn’t because of her new job”!  So then Desiree asked me yesterday - “have I got any more strange comments from Adrienne - lately”? I said - “no - thank goodness - as I am tired of trying to figure out how to ‘respond’ to her strange comments that have been  directed at me”!  In regards to Kathleen Mary Munn - Desiree suggested I look for any family that she may have had. Just before I go and make some dinner to eat - I also discovered that Alice Beatrice Share (a sister to Mary Elizabeth Bertha Share/Munn/Vickers) in the 1938 census UK was living in London and was unemployed and was looking for a job as a housekeeper. She died in Stourbridge, Worcestershire, UK in 1966. She was 78 years old. My father and Jeanne also did not know of her existence. It makes you wonder why there was no communication between my father and Jeanne (because of their mother who apparently had excommunicated herself from all of her family in the UK) with their many relatives who lived in Birmingham, UK!  And as for me - I am now busy scrabbling around trying in vain to find any relatives and ancestors from my grandmother’s generation to the present day, to try and make some connections for the sake of FAMILY! For the past 12 months - most of my time has been given over to the pursuit of my research into my genealogy! Next year - I aim to get a job so that I can get to England in 18 months time.  Desiree and Siua are saving up to go to England next year in order to visit Paddy (Siua’s brother) and Soana. They have been living in England for the last approximate 10 years and at the present time - they live in London. Before London - they lived in Manchester for many years - where Coronation is filmed. Au Revior! 

[themargaret66-blog]

Christmas this year - 14 November 2017

As usual, Christmas will be a non-event this year again - where I will go and have Christmas once again with strangers at the City Mission on Wynyard Quarter in Auckland City. Adrienne as per usual will spend Christmas with her friends and their families.  Desiree will spend Christmas with Siua’s parents in Otahuhu. Last year, Adrienne gushed about her visit to a family who is associated with the Rebel Gang in Auckland at Xmas time. She kept talking to me about the grandmother who is my age apparently - about her likes and dislikes. I don’t know this woman from a bar of soap - why Adrienne thought that I should be interested is a mystery to me! I was definitely not interested! And as for Desiree who has been best mates with her cousin Marie and her family for many years - I think she has finally seen Marie for what she really is! Marie is egotistical, self-centered and has a narcissistic personality disorder. On one occasion back in the 1990s - Marie cornered me at her house and then for the next hour I had to listen to her exaggerated sense of her own self-importance, her exaggerated achievements, and talents, her belief she is superior and can only associate with equally special people. She monopolizes conversations and belittles (such as myself) or looks down on people who she perceives as inferior. She takes advantage of her own family ( most won’t have anything to do with her) - on many occasions she has tried to get Jim (my ex) to go and paint her rental houses for nothing!  And of course, Jim can smell a rat and refuses to accommodate Marie - but whenever Marie sees Jim - she keeps inviting Jim to stay at her house. Something he will never do. Of course, Jim cannot do it now because of ill-health. About a month ago, her daughter Clarisse got married on the Cook Islands and she had eight bridesmaids. I was shocked that Desiree wasn’t asked to be one of the bridesmaids at her wedding, as Clarisse was a bridesmaid at Desiree’s wedding. Just quietly I think Desiree was quite miffed and annoyed that she wasn’t asked. I could see her look of resignation and acquiescence - what will be - will be! Desiree and Siua went on lots of trips and excursions on the Cook Islands and had little to do with Marie, Clarisse, and their entourage. I was surprised that Heather did not attend (Marie’s sister) - however, Heather’s two daughters and their partners attended the wedding. Apparently, Jules and her partner who was from Mexico - the partner completely annoyed everyone concerned with his incessant talking about himself!  Marie’s sons (who are Desiree’s age) threaten to drop him - they were so fed up with him! I also saw that Siua found this guy just a complete nuisance and a try-hard - a wannabe - but was a nobody! 

After Christmas, I thought I would find a house to look after (in the South Island preferably) through Kiwi House-sitters and may get people to look after this house.  I have to wait until after Christmas because of my garden. At the present time, I am raising the following plants in seed boxes - flox gloves, zinnias, capsicums, cornflowers, and hollyhocks. I started my seed boxes late this year because I just could not find any suitable packets of flower seeds. I went to Countdown, The Warehouse, The Clearance Shed several times and Mitre 10 on a couple of occasions - but Mitre 10 is difficult for me to get to as I have to catch two buses. Mitre 10 has the best selections of packets of flower seed. I only planted the packets of seed a few days ago - I am one month behind schedule. So will have to wait until the middle of January in order to be able to plant from the seed boxes. Last week I cleaned out all of the cupboards in the kitchen and threw out various plastic containers that I don’t use any more. At the moment I am cleaning out the spare room - where I have boxes of photos, boxes of mementos, one box of bills and accounts, two sewing boxes, folders of recipes and so forth. If you don’t keep throwing stuff out - the house will start to look like a hoarder’s house which I definitely don’t want. About a month ago - I decided to throw out the spare bed-base and mattress - it was brand new, but never got used. Desiree and I took it down to the Salvation Army shop late one night. There was a clothing bin situated behind the shop and there were a couple of Maori teenagers fossicking through it. We left the bed there with a box of books. When I visited the shop a few days later - I could not see one book that I had left behind in that particular box, behind the shop! Those teenagers must have taken the books home with them! I always look for autobiographies and biographies and always look at least once a week at the Salvation Army shop. On one of my last visits to the Salvation Army shop in Pukekohe - the Supervisor (who only looks about 25 years old) asked me about my pull-along- shopping trolley! She asked if I had bought the shopping trolley from my house to the Salvation Army Shop.(God knows what she was trying to insinuate - I haven't figured it out yet!) I said yes - but I always catch a bus into town. I also said I always take my pull-along-shopping-trolly because I have a ten-minute walk to the bus stop. If I don’t take the trolley - and try and carry everything - its hard work and very difficult! She then told me that they were going to ask people to leave their trolleys at the door - because of the amount of thieving that goes on. I then said - why would anyone steal from the Salvation Army shop when it is the cheapest place in town! She said there are a lot of people with trolleys who thieve. During the conservation, she told me that they have cameras in the shop and she said that she never forgets the faces of people who thieve. While all the time during this talk, I had the feeling of being scrutinized for suspicious behaviour. I then told this “silly girl” - I definitely would not be a good thief - as it would show all over my face - I would probably go red in the face and start sweating! I then said - I can’t see the point because everything is so cheap at the Salvation Army shop. Afterwards - I thought to myself, you have never caught me thieving - because I have never thieved from the Salvation Army! Amen. Up until I got my SLR digital camera three years ago - I would often steal film from The Warehouse. But that is all that I stole. Now I have about 40 rolls of film stashed away in my wardrobe - as I don’t have the money to get the film developed. I would go in the evenings to The Warehouse when it was really quiet and there was no one around. It was easy to do - just throw the film into my handbag and walk out to my car. I have decided to take my watch back to The Warehouse - I found the docket for the watch which I bought in May this year. Some people are just stupid (like this young girl who is the Supervisor at the Sallies) as they don’t think before opening their mouths, because on one occasion recently Claire my next door neighbour asked me why I had such a large handbag - when she herself - had only a small one!!! (My aunt Val had also asked me the same question at Desiree’s wedding - never mind the fact that large handbags are in fashion and are seen as being in vogue in the last few years)! Just such stupid and thoughtless remarks from women who should know better. I told Claire that I have a large bag for my gloves and scarf during the winter-time. I would leave the house at 2.00pm (you are allowed to only spend a maximum of three hours on the public computers) and by the time I want to catch the bus home again at 6.00pm - it is freezing standing around at the bus stop. I also take a spare pair of knickers and pads (for my irritable bowel syndrome) and a magazine and a book to read. It gets really tedious waiting around for buses especially in the bitter cold of winter-time. The worst occasion for me was when I had to wait for 30 minutes at the Puhinui Train Platform in Papatoetoe. I was desperate to go to the toilet and pass a bowel motion. I thought I could wait as it only takes 10 minutes on the train from Puhinui to Manukau. However, half-way to Manukau the train stalled on the tracks for several minutes. I just could not believe it - I was in absolute agony. I doubled over and said a prayer to God. I made it to Manukau without having an accident and practically ran to the toilet at the Manukau Train Station. These days I just don’t take any chances - if I am going to Manukau I will always take medication (called Loperamide) beforehand - so I don’t have to contend with another embarrassing situation as the time above - which was excruciating, harrowing and extremely embarrassing! Anyway must go and finish cleaning the spare room out. I have been on the computer practically all day - however I have decided to write my life story and write about my frustrations - so I don’t throw myself off a tall building out of frustration. I have to go into town tomorrow to buy a lotto ticket for the  $32,000, 000 draw. Winning it would mean freedom for me to travel overseas and complete my genealogy research. That would be absolute heaven!

[themargaret66-blog]

Birthdays - 14 November 2017

It is Desiree’s birthday this Saturday and I for one won’t be giving her anything. I am sick to death of giving her something and I barely get a thank you. So I have decided - why bother!  

Last Saturday I sent Desiree four text messages about the visit to the Waikumete Cemetery for their open day. I was extremely frustrated as my watch kept stopping and was also losing time - so I was late to some of the talks which were held in the Chapel of Faith in the Oaks at this cemetery. I did not get any response to my text messages. I also sent a long message via Facebook to Adrienne last week about my genealogy discoveries with a researcher at the library last week in Pukekohe. Got no response to my message. (Valerie my researcher thought that William Share ( the first cousin of my father - but my father knew nothing about this man’s existence) was married to May Round and they had six children.  However, after these children were born - we could not find any more records pertaining to this man’s children. Both Valerie and I decided that this man was very mysterious - indeed!) To get to Waikumete - I decided to catch the 8.00am bus, then caught the 8.30am train to Papakura. Then we (the other passengers and I) had to wait for 3/4 of an hour at Papakura for the next train (usually the connecting train leaves within five minutes of getting to Papakura from Pukekohe). I got to New Lynn at 11.00am - but because my watch kept stopping I missed the first bus going past the Waikumete Cemetery. I had to then wait until 11.45am for the next bus - so I then got to Waikumete at 12.00 noon. If I had a car - it would have taken me about 1 1/2 hours to get to Waikumete as it was, it took me four hours to get to this place - an absolutely ridiculous situation. Then to top it all off - I kept getting to the talks 10 minutes after the commencement times. The most interesting talk was called the ‘’the last of the hangings in New Zealand’’. We visited the graves of Frederick Foster and the ex-girlfriend. Foster was convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend at a milk bar on Queen Street, Auckland in 1955. Edward Te Whiu was convicted of murdering an elderly woman during a home invasion of her house. He was looking for money. He was hung in 1955. Before this hanging took place at Mt Eden prison - his mother wailed outside the prison for several days which everyone found unnerving and spooky! Albert Black (only 20 years old) got into a fight with Alan Jacques at a cafe on Queen Street in 1955. Alan was stabbed (and died at the scene) and Albert Black was then later hung at Mt Eden prison. I found this particular story very sad and haunting. Apparently, during those days - there were illegal beer houses, bodgies, widgies and teddy boys. According to author Scott Bainbridge (this sir name is on my family tree from Cumbria) - Black’s execution was used by the National Government of the day to set an example to other teenagers that this sort of behaviour would not be tolerated. It was a very conservative time - politicians were conservative, the police were respected, the Minister of Justice was very autocratic and later became Prime Minister - John Marshall. (I remember John Marshall when he was defeated in the 1972 election to Norman Kirk for Labour. The night before the election I watched both John Marshall and Norman Kirk give speeches to the nation on television at my sister Barbara’s house. Both Barbara and Tom were in bed - God knows why as it was quite early. Norman Kirk appeared to me to be serious, articulate, empathetic and commanding in his speech. Where as Jack Marshall appeared to me to lack desiveness, was irresolute, hesitant and at the same time appeared cocky and confidant that he would get re-elected! Labour won that election - it was a landslide victory! This was my first taste of politics! My father said that I could have voted - but I had just come back from Australia where I had been for 12 months and I had no idea who to vote for.  All of my family were staunch National voters, my father voted for Social Credit and after the 1972 election - I always voted Labour and my daughters and their families always vote Labour.  I always remember the 1969 election when my uncle Fred turned up at our house at Waihi Beach in order to take my mother to the polling booth - all they could talk about was voting for National. They said that the Labour government was just a much of Communists and they didn’t want the Communists running New Zealand). Getting back to life in the early 1950s (the National government of the time were worried about the teenage culture where the disaffected youth were following the likes of movie and singing stars such as Marlon Brando, James Dean, Elvis Presley and Mickey Spillane) - hangings sent out a stern warning to the young and rebellious that any subversive behaviour was not tolerated. This is a brief history of what happened to Albert Black. Black moved to New Zealand from Belfast, seeking a better life in the colonies after the end of World War 2 in 1953. He had numerous unskilled jobs around the country before ending up as a caretaker of a Wellesley Street Boarding House. In July 1955 at a party there, he got into a fight with a 19 year old Londoner Jacques. However he was known as Johnny McBride from a book called The Long Wait wrtten by the American crime novelist Mickey Spillane.The party was one of many held at the Boarding House, which were attended by notable underworld figures including soon-to-be strip club boss Rainton Hastie. (It was around this time that my father bought two Boarding Houses in Auckland. One in Grafton on Calton Gore road called Glen Eagles and the other in Grey Lynn called Graydene. As children we spent holidays at these two Boarding Houses from time to time. We were taken to the swimming pools in Newmarket, the salt water pools at Parnell, the Zoo - where we had a ride on a elephant and attended a chimpanzee party. Of course they do not have these rides and parties any more as it as seen as exploitation of the animals. Sometimes we would walk across the Grafton Bridge and go shopping on Karangahape Road. I can always remember my mother’s constant complaining and moaning about my behaviour to my father. I was just a child and always had to keep my head down and not cause any noise or disruptions - otherwise I got a hiding from my dad and when he wasn’t around - my mother would belt me with a bamboo stick on frequent occasions. My mother’s hatred of me was always a ‘’constant in the background of my childhood’’ when I was growing up. To this day I am amazed that I am still alive as I had nothing going for me during my life. I did badly at school (I was always in the bottom group at school) during my primary school days, I was very ugly as I had very dark freckles and a red nose during the summertime - so had few friends. My forte was sports, athletics and art  - I loved drawing. Primary school was boring and tedious. During breaks - the girls would walk around the school in groups and talk about the boys. It was extremely tedious and boring. I wanted to play sport - but there was little sport going on and that was for sure! Also, I can always remember being rather grubby and disheveled. In my family we rarely bathed!) Getting back to the murder of Jacques. Jacques had been ‘’bludging” free accommodation from Black - while the owner of the Boarding House was overseas. It reached boiling point when Black caught Jacques kissing a 16 year old girl he was seeing - “a good New Zealand girl”. The two got into a fight and Jacques (who was much larger than Black), gave the Irishman a nasty and painful black eye. The next day everyone went and congregated at the Ye Old Barn Cafe at 366 Queen Street where everyone would socialize on frequent occasions. Everyone was getting along with everyone and there were no tensions in the group until Jacques arrived. He and Black then exchanged heated words. As Jacques leaned over the jukebox to select Earth Angel by the Penguins - Black lunged at him. The crime became known as the “the jukebox killing”. The injury inflicted by Black wasn’t enough to kill Jacques - it was the fall backwards that lodged the five-inch blade into his neck. He should have been charged with the lesser charge of manslaughter. Apparently Jacques was known as a bully to everyone and sundry and Black carried the knife for his own self-protection - as he was only a small guy! Black was found guilty and a subsequent appeal was dismissed. He was hanged on 5 December 1955.

[themargaret66-blog]

Visit from Liz - 6 November 2017

Liz came to visit me last Thursday and as a result I did not get to the AAAP meeting. I stayed at home to clean the bathroom and to do some housework. I will send another text message to the AAAP and tell them I would be interested in going to another meeting at some time in the future. Liz now tells me that she wants to be called Elizabeth and I felt like saying - whatever! I hardly ever see her so the name change is not an issue for me! A few years ago (like 2010) I would visit her every Saturday night and watch television or SKY at her home-unit. This went on for a couple of years and then I began going to Adrienne’s house - because Henry her partner had gone to jail! For a couple of years, I practically lived at Adrienne’s house - partly to look after Matheus while Adrienne attended court for Henry and his gang of 15 men. After the court case had gone on for two months - Henry and his gang got sentenced 15 years jail-time for the production and supply of methamphetamine! Then two years ago (practically to the day and it was after Jonah’s memorial service at Wesley College on 18 November 2015 - Desiree’s birthday - my daughter) that Adrienne and I had a big blow-up! I came home with Desiree and Siua at 4.00pm and Adrienne kept saying that she was going to bring some takeaways - as she had texted me twice while I was at home - waiting. However, I was still waiting for takeaways at 9.00pm - when she finally turned up - minus the takeaways! I was absolutely starving. I was then expected to jump into her car - drive to Manurewa to collect Matheus (she talks to Henry’s family for at least 30 minutes on these occasions - sometimes longer while I wait in the car) and the drive from Pukekohe to Otahuhu takes 45 minutes! Then she had to drop off her girlfriend in Pakuranga. So by the time, I would have got dinner that night - would have probably been mid-night and I was already starving at 9.00pm! So I then informed her I wasn’t going anywhere with her that night - I had promised to look after Matheus the next day. Adrienne and her girlfriend then marched off to her car and drove off! I set about cooking some dinner for myself! I was just getting sick and tired of being treated like Adrienne’s personal maid! Her behaviour towards me was getting really disrespectful, antagonistic, demanding, unfair, aggressive and the worst aspect of this behaviour towards me - she kept telling me that I had dementia! If I had dementia - I wouldn’t be able to look after myself and I don’t have any problem in that department!  A couple of weeks later Desiree told me that Adrienne was really angry and furious - as if her opinion of the above incident was way more important than my opinion of this incident! I just said - I couldn’t care less - she needs to look at her deplorable behaviour towards me! I have set my boundaries in place! As a consequence of this - I have only looked after Matheus once in the last two years! 

Anyway getting back to Liz’s visit to me. She looked really old and haggard (from a lifetime of chain-smoking). I noticed that Winston Peters (the leader of the NZ First Party) has become very wrinkly in the last few years - apparently, he is a lifetime smoker as well! She kept asking me if I had Wi-Fi - I kept saying yes! We watched Henry’s funeral on youtube on my computer. Liz was shocked to see lots of bikie gangs at the funeral service such as the Rebels, King Cobra, Blood Bank and so forth. After the service - you could hear the roar of the motor-bikes and smell the smoke and petrol - it was very impressive for Henry to get such a big send off! She asked about the music that was played in the background - I said I wouldn’t have a clue what the music is - who is singing blah, blah, blah! She then said she had to have a smoke outside and I said don’t worry about it - smoke inside my house! One cigarette in my house is not going to give me cancer or discolour my ceiling and walls! She then told me that she is not allowed to take her grandchildren anywhere in her car - because her car smells of smoke! So she then tried to give up and got down to two cigarettes a day! You never know - she may be able to give it up! My aunt Loie was a chain smoker for most of her life.  Then she got pneumonia and ended up in the hospital and the Specialist told her - she had to give up smoking and she did - which absolutely amazed me! However, aunt Loie died two years later of lung cancer! She died in in 2007 at 70 years of age. Liz has now got three grandchildren - Michael, Claudia and Violet.  Her two daughters and one son have one child each. She kept asking about Desiree and the number of children that she has and I had to keep repeating that she has two daughters and works full-time. Her daughters have one child each and they work part-time as teachers. Desiree teaches at Paerata. Shelley teaches at Glenbrook in a job share position and she and her husband have bought a house in Waiuku. Laura teaches part-time at Managatawhiri. I don’t know where her son lives - he married a girl from a very wealthy family in Patamahoe - they had a huge onion growing business! I can’t find their name on the internet. Liz then told me that she now drinks red wine - because I use to buy red wine all the time and drink it at her house.  Why I use to go to Liz’s house was because I had the car at that time and she didn’t have one. Now she has a car and I don’t! But she did tell me that she struggles to pay the mortgage, car payments and is only allowed to work 10 hours a week as a Caregiver (because she is on a benefit) - going to people’s homes and doing housework! Before that she was doing 20 hours a week and then all the Caregivers in New Zealand got a big increase in their wages. She then asked me “wasn’t I aware of the pay increase” and I said yes I was - but did not know how it affected people like her! I FELT LIKE SAYING TO HER - UNLIKE YOU LIZ I WATCH THE NEWS TWICE A DAY and have done so for many many years! I remember her telling me on one occasion that she rarely watched the news as it was boring! She also said that she never ever watched television during the daytime - trying to sound sanctimonious and self-righteous! I do if I am at home - I watch the News at 12 noon, then Dr Phil.  I have learned so much from watching Dr Phil - like basically what is acceptable behaviour for any occasions, setting boundaries, child abuse, drug and alcohol abuse and so forth.  I know now that without a doubt that my mothers belting of us kids (my two sisters and I) with a bamboo stick, (tree branch when she could not find the bamboo stick) was tantamount to child abuse! In those days - nothing was ever done about it! I remember going to school with welts on my legs and arms from the many thrashings. She got away with it because it was the 1950s, our neighbours lived a long away away and my father was very rarely ever in the home. Before my parents separated, my father would spend weeks and weeks away from the house - my mother did not know where he was - he was a law unto himself! No one told him what to do! I ended up living with Jim who was a replica of my father! In the five years that we lived in Twizel - Jim would come home every night from work at 5.30pm. Have dinner, get in the bath and then he was out the door again at 6.00pm! He usually got home at 10.00 or 11.00pm. On Saturday nights - he would usually come home at 4.00 to 5.00am - Sunday mornings. He did this every night for the five years that we lived in Twizel except for Sundays - pubs were closed on Sundays! On Sundays, Jim would watch sport all afternoon on television - every Sunday! He did absolutely nothing in the house or outside the house during those five years! Siua (Desiree’s husband) cooks dinner every night and washes the dishes. I told Desiree that she needs to help Siua every night with dinner and she said - she collects their daughters from pre-school in Pukekohe and cleans the bathroom every weekend! What can I say - it is none of my business! 

Anway getting back to Liz - her dog wandered around my house and insisted on checking out my garage. Liz wanted the dog to go into my backyard and I said no - because I have just planted a large vegetable garden consisting of about 30 tomato plants. I am also growing silverbeet, purple cauliflower, broccoli, basil, and chilies. Her dog also chewed a couple of my stuffed soft animals. Finally, her dog settled on the top of my couch - not the seat - the top of the couch! I wasn’t concerned about the couch as it is old (15 years old) and I have many stuffed animals! However, at the end of the day, I was pleased to see Liz as I hadn’t seen her since I had Isabella (my dog) put down about two years ago. I was very keen to hear about her job and her family! I was shocked when she said she was asked to leave the Pukekohe Hospital where she worked for two and half years! She said she was pleased to leave - as she started having panic attacks a couple of months before leaving! She said she loves her new Employer - a Maori name - which I cannot remember! She also had her car written off in an accident - when someone drove into the back of her car! She bought the car off Adrienne three years ago.  I told Adrienne on Faceback. I think Adrienne was very shocked as she said it the car (a Nissan March) was very sound - mechanically according to Henry! Henry use to know everything about cars and had bought several during his short lifetime - cars for various members in his family! He bought a car for Adrienne, his ex-girlfriend Tina and their three daughters, his stepfather and one for one of his brothers.  Matheus is the same (his son) - as he loves cars and loves pulling things apart and then putting them back together again. I told this to my aunt Val and she said this was a Strickland trait. Her daughter’s (Alison) son Stephen Campbell also loved cars and worked at a panel-beaters before his death. He was killed a couple a months before Desiree and Siua’s wedding in 2010.  I think he was about 24 years old and he was Alison’s only child! An extremely sad situation! My aunt Cis’s (mother’s sister) husband died the day after Desiree and Siua’s wedding. Cis then died in 2014 - it was near to Christmastime. I wasn’t impressed when I met Helen again (40 years later and Cis’s daughter) at her funeral, she was very arrogant - she mentioned the suit that I made at her mother’s house in 1968 which took a week to make - a jacket and skirt. I made it for a wedding. I told Helen I have kept this suit and it will only be thrown out - after my funeral! That should have given Helen something to think about! However, I always regretted not keeping in touch with this family! I never kept in touch because of Jim's behaviour and antics - I was basically ashamed of the situation I found myself in!  Anyway, must go and watch Married at First Sight! I hope that Vickie will get her comeuppance - she is a bitch! Her husband is a moron - maybe that is why she is a bitch!

[themargaret66-blog]

I have another cold - the 3rd this year!

It seems I have another cold and it is raining again.  It has just about rained every day for the last seven months. The sun was supposed to be out today - there is no sun - but it is raining again as usual!  Apparently, this has been the wettest winter that we have had in many years and as a consequence, the vegetables are rotting in the ground - especially the potatoes. This, of course, drives the price up. For the last two days, I have had a stabbing pain in the right side of my head and the right nostril of my nose is running like a river. Last night I kept stuffing pieces of tissue into the nose to stop the constant running. I went on the net to see what the problem could be - it may be a migraine.  However, I am sick of being constantly sick for this past winter! Every night I have the electric blanket on the middle setting and I leave it on all night long - which you should never do! However, I am constantly cold and I can’t sleep if I am cold.  Have decided to buy a new electric blanket every couple of years - to play it safe - so that I don’t end up burning down the house. 

Jim, Adrienne and Matheus finally turned up at about 4.30pm and stayed until 7.30pm.  We had a long talk about the election, the guy who booted my letterbox one week ago at 12.30am on Sunday.  This guy totally wrecked my letterbox. Housing NZ has promised to look at the problem in the 10 days from the time this vandalism happened - however, I am not holding my breath.  We also talked about the bus driver who will not lower the bus for me and for the past few months I have been sending emails to his boss about this problem.  One of the last times when I saw this bus driver - he told me to my face that he is not going to lower the bus - as it takes too much time! I then walked and sat down in the bus in a state of a shock! Then about three weeks after this incident - I got an email from the Ritchies & Murphy management saying that they have closed my file on the matter as the problem has now been resolved. I was furious and responded by saying no this problem has not been resolved as this particular  bus driver refuses to lower the bus! Since sending the last email - I have not seen this particular bus driver.  I have now encountered several new female bus drivers.  I haven’t caught the bus as much in the last two weeks because I have been spending a lot of time completing Photoshop work on my photos.  When I had Desiree’s car for one week - I took many photos such as the open Pit Mine in Waihi, Henry’s grave at the Manukau Memorial Gardens Cemetery, Waikumete Cemetery and so forth.  Then one week ago I took photos on the Ponsonby Church Heritage Walk and the Grafton Heritage Walk. On both occasions I was carrying alot of gear - some people were carrying nothing!  I had a back pack which had my camera, book to read on the train, rain coat, umbrella, also in a plastic bag I have a spare pair of knickers, pad for incontinence (in case of an accident), scarf and socks. In another bag (over the shoulder) I had a packed lunch (which I make the night before) and a drink of Vita Fresh. I always take a packed lunch and a drink when travelling anywhere in Auckland - so I am not wasting money on buying food.  However, I always set aside enough money for one cup of coffee. Sometimes when I go shopping at the Manukau Mall - I will buy sushi for lunch - however that is the only exception to my rule for not buying lunch when I go to some event in Auckland. 

Getting back to Adrienne and Jim’s visit - I noticed that Jim was not interested in my Polyfest photos, the images of Desiree’s girls, Pasifika photos and so forth.  Apart from the election (which Jim did not have much to say about), the booting of my mailbox, the extremely rude bus - Jim was not interested in anything else. I stand corrected - he said I had a great garden. Jim’s principal interest is going to the casino in Hamiton.  I have no idea what Mary is interested in - I don’t think she has any interests. She has never had a garden, never cooks or bakes or does anything else. She spent most of her life (until she retired last year) washing dishes in a old people’s home for many years.  Every Saturday - Jim and Mary would go shopping and pay their bills by cash - because neither could operate a cheque book! Meanwhile every Saturday - I would take Desiree and Adrienne to the courts at Minogue Park in Hamilton to play netball. Val my aunt from Thames told me at my  last visit to her - she and Dennis her husband would go shopping in Thames every Friday (when they lived on their various farms) and then go and see Anne - Dennis’s sister! When I thought about this statement later that Val had made - I thought, during all of those years you would visit my mother on one occasion and vice-versa, once a year, but visit Anne (your husband’s) sister each week for many years! So then when my mother died - Val was at the funeral service - crying and sobbing! This is from someone who never came to visit my mother and family!  But then I thought why did my mother not get her license - then she could have driven to Val’s house in order to visit. Val only lived about 30 minutes away. Val also said to me - you must have gone shopping on a regular basis and I said no we never went shopping.  However, we often went to the movies on a regular basis with my father at the Embassy Theatre in Thames.  There was also the Regent theatre in Thames - but we hardly ever went to that theatre. I remember on one occasion, I went and bought two handkerchiefs from a local shop in Kerepehi and booked up this cost to my mother. I was 13 years old at the time. I was then made to walk with my mother to the shops and then my mother explained to the shop assistant that I was paying for the handkerchiefs with my money! She told the shop assistant (Audrey Billington) that she was furious and that this sort of thing was never going to happen again! Who would do that to their own child?!  When my own children were teenagers - we often went shopping and I paid for everything! I usually bought them clothes, knickers and bras and so forth. If there was something I did not agree with - this would have been dealt with IN MY HOUSE! I would never involve people outside the house - which my mother did! AS USUAL SHE ONLY THOUGHT ABOUT HERSELF OR JEANNETTE MY SISTER - but that is another story!  Except to say that I remember that Jeanette had many fancy expensive bras - which my mother had bought for her! I had to buy my own bras (the cheapest that I could find) with money that my father gave me for birthdays and Christmas. I use to make my own clothes and knit all of my cardigans and jumpers. Jeanette never ever did any sewing or knitting. I don’t remember Jeanette ever making a thing for herself - EVER in her whole life!  My mother use to make her clothes!

For many years Jack Lord would visit our house EVERY SATURDAY - so that my mother could give him money to bet on the horses at the TAB in Ngatea!  She always had money for the horses - BUT NOT ANY MONEY FOR TWO HANDERCHIEFTS! Throughout my school years I had to use toilet paper for this purpose!  Many years later when I came back from Australia at the age of 22 years old and going on 23 years - I had taken up smoking while living in Australia.  When in Kerepehi - I use to smoke in the bedroom (where I was sleeping) at Kerepehi.  Mavis (my father’s second wife) found my ash-tray filled with cigarette butts and ash in one of the dressing table draws - I was then sent to live with Barbara and Tom. Mavis was appalled to discover that I was smoking in HER HOUSE!  SHE TOLD ME THAT THE HOUSE AT KEREPEHI WAS HER HOUSE on several occasions! I use to think to myself - your welcome to this house as I have no wish to live in Kerepehi! It is too far out in the boon-docks for me to even consider living in Kerepehi again! Then as soon as my father had died and his money had been distributed - she got 50% of his estate and me and my two sisters got the other 50% of the estate - she tried to sell her house from Kerepehi to me through our lawyers!  I refused - I did not even have to think about it! I was completely shocked that Mavis would have the gall to do this.  My sisters and I had grown up in this house - from birth and for myself to the age of 16 years! For me I would never buy anything from Mavis - out of principle! I stayed at Barbara and Tom’s house for about two weeks - then went to live and work at the Maternity Hospital in Te Awamutu. 

I had to laugh - even though it was a great visit from Adriennne, Jim and Matheus - she kept getting Desiree to phone me - (so I wouldn’t find out her new phone number)! GET OVER YOURSELF ADRIENNE! Adrienne seemed to think that it was okay (in fact it was something that she thought should be encouraged) for Silua and her mother to talk on the phone every night for many years - I just thought that this was way too excessive!  However, Adrienne has decided that she doesn’t want me to have her phone number - as she doesn’t want to receive twice weekly text messages from me! Absolutely pathetic! Adrienne hates me so much - it is very sad! I noticed that Matheus was very standoffish - which is understandable as he hasn’t seen me for 10 months. Also he had not seen me in the 12 months leading up to last Christmas! So in effect he has seen me once in the last approximate two years!

I am going to a AAAP training on Thursday in Onehunga - meaning Auckland Action Against Poverty.  If I can get there on time and if it is something I could get interested in - then I will do it.  I want to do volunteer work in order to get some referrees - so that I can go back to doing paid work.  At the present time - I don’t have any referrees to call upon! 

Anyway must leave this blog and go and do some Photoshop work!

[themargaret66-blog]

Here we go again . . . . . . . . !

Adrienne contacted me via Facebook about visiting me with her father and Matheus today.  They were supposed to arrive after lunch and it is now 3.30pm.  I don’t think I am going to get a visit today. Adrienne’s passive aggressive behaviour gets worse every year! I have got to the stage where I don’t know how to counteract her spiteful and nasty behaviour! I don’t go in for ‘’show-downs’’ if I can help it!  I hate fighting (especially when there is screaming and yelling involved) - these days I try to avoid it at all costs.  You end up saying things that you later regret!  Yesterday and last night I had a terrible headache and did not get to sleep until 2.00am because of the headache! I slept in and got up at 11.00am - then tore around in order to tidy up the house.  Thank goodness I had cleaned the bathroom a couple of days ago and also mopped the floor recently! Sometimes - the bathroom doesn’t get cleaned for a couple of weeks and the floor doesn’t get mopped for about a month. These days I rarely bother with the dusting.  When I lived in Hamilton - I was constantly dusting - like every week.

Well, my family and I got what we wanted - a Labour-led government!  It was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!  Because our government has been MMP since 1993 - we have had to wait from 23 September to the 17 October to hear what Winston Peters had decided which party he wanted to form a coalition with! When he said Labour - I began shouting and then I began crying - it was such an unbelievable result!  I will never forget the election night when Bill English the leader of the National Party carried on in a party mode - like the cat who had swallowed the cream! He looked smug, arrogant, supercilious - like someone who could not be touched! I just kept thinking why are you celebrating you moron - you did not reach the 61 seats required to form a government? Then Bill bleated on about forming a government with NZ First - Winston Peters party and it was just going to be a mere formality and it would only take a few days! Wow, I thought at the time - what arrogance and stupidity!  Later Winston went on record by saying he had no ‘’moral obligation to go with National - just because they had got more votes than any other party - National fail to understand MMP”.  I am not super- intelligent but even I can understand how MMP works!  After the election, I then read on Facebook really stupid comments like how Winston was going with National for all sorts of wacky reasons. There were even stupid comments in that the Greens were thinking of going with National - as Paula Bennett suggested. She is the Deputy Leader of the National party.   I just kept saying on Facebook if the Greens went with National - it would be political suicide and I would never vote for them again.  I have voted for Labour and the Greens in every MMP election. I then kept reminding everyone on Facebook - that Winston is just as likely to go with Labour and the Greens!  So when Winston announced on the 17 October 2017 - he was going with Labour - it was just so exciting.  I went on Facebook and the whole National party and supporters looked “shelled shocked” - the look on their faces was just priceless - then people kept saying on Facebook that Bill English was such a nice bloke, he worked hard, he was gracious in defeat and blah blah blah and so on! I then said it was time for Bill English to be put out to pasture and to go and look after the six farms that he owns! National has been in power for nine years - WE NEEDED A CHANGE OF GOVERNMENT. We needed fresh new ideas and fresh new faces in government.  The National party is now spreading rumours by saying that the Labour party are going to change New Zealand into a banana republic and they are making all sorts of dire and stupid predictions to the negative on Facebook.  I then kept on saying the following - “And the Scaremongering begins - National need to get over it - LABOUR IS NOW IN POWER”!  Which everyone seemed to like - got lots of comments and likes! Adrienne and Jim are on their way to my house - so I now have to finish this! It is now 4.30pm - they were supposed to be here at 1.00pm. What can I say?

[themargaret66-blog]

Trying to save money!

A few days ago Desiree alerted me some great cheap flights on “grabaseat” to Niue Island.  I told her I was saving my money for England - which will take me another two years! This year I am not spending a lot of money on Christmas Lights for outdoors (as I did last year) - when the family doesn't appreciate the effort!  Also, this year I am not going to worry about getting Christmas presents to the family on time for Christmas - they can wait until the family decides to come and collect them from my house.  I am sick of the fighting (with Adrienne) and the indifference (with Desiree and Siua). Desiree and Siua visit Siua’s family at Christmas - but as with most Tongans, they don’t really bother with presents. I guess I will end up at the City Mission again at the Viaduct Basin in Auckland City and will have Christmas dinner with strangers.  Since there are no taxis on Christmas Day in Pukekohe - I will be biking to the train station and I then will have to secure my bike in some location where hopefully the thieves won’t find it. About five years ago my once upon a friend Liz mowed her lawns on Christmas Day. Her family turned up for an hour on Christmas Day and all that she received were two picture frames - one with a picture in it and the other without!  I would never mow the lawns on Christmas Day - even if I was spending it on my own. In 2010 I spent Christmas on my own (it was a week before Desiree and Siua got married).  A couple of days before Christmas - Adrienne was screaming at me to “clean my house’’ - which I took exception to as my house was already ‘’clean’’! I screamed back at her and told Adrienne to go and jump in the lake!  On the day of the wedding, I drove in my car to Desiree and Siua’s house (where they were flatting with Irene and her boyfriend and Silua) and was shocked to see the kitchen and bathroom were in an absolutely filthy state! In the previous week, Silua had gone home to Hamilton and Irene and her boyfriend had gone to Australia.  Jim had come up from Hamilton and was staying in the house and Aaron and Yowlyn (my daughter’s half-brother and his wife) had come over from Australia and were staying at the house. A few months later when I made comments about the state of the filthy kitchen and bathroom - Adrienne then told me in her self-righteous and sanctimonious way - we never had time to clean the bathroom and kitchen! So why was she screaming at me to clean my house - when none of the wedding guests were coming to my house apart from Jim - my ex! She needs to do something about her temper!  Desiree stayed with Adrienne for a couple of months while she was pregnant with Kortelia and Siua was teaching in Hong Kong.  Desiree told me a few months after this “stay” - she would never stay with Adrienne ever again.  She said that Adrienne was forever moaning! The two police raids on Adrienne’s house would not have helped either.  Adrienne had just got pregnant and Desiree was about six months pregnant at the time of the police raids.  Henry (Adrienne’s partner) had just spent a couple of weeks in Thailand on business (organizing uniforms for sports teams - apparently) - on the day he arrived back in New Zealand he was having lunch with some mates at McDonalds when the police turned up and told Henry and his mates to get on the floor.  According to Adrienne - Henry being so big (6ft 10 ins) - he could not fit his body onto the floor - which caused a lot of commotion and consternation with the arresting police officers!  Henry and all of his mates were handcuffed and then taken off to the Mt Eden prison.  After the first raid - Desiree had only had a couple of hours of sleep before going to work - she was teaching at Kedgley Intermediate School at the time.  Adrienne (who is clean-freak in her own house) told me that the police had turned up at 5.00am - herded Adrienne and Desiree into the lounge and they were told to stay there for the next two hours.  Meanwhile, the police went around and emptied all of their cupboards and draws and threw everything onto the floor and as a consequence, many items got damaged.  They took Desiree and Adrienne’s laptops, cameras and phones.  Two days before Adrienne had just sent in her last assignment for her Masters in Counselling course to the University of Waikato from her laptop. She needed to do this in order to graduate from this course - which she did! Desiree needed her laptop for her teaching job - so she had to tell the Principal of her predicament and the police raid on Adrienne’s house.  The Principal was very sympathetic - she got her laptop back two weeks later.  Adrienne had to wait for a few months - before getting her laptop back and also all the cameras and phones for both Adrienne and Desiree.  Adrienne told me it took a couple of weeks to sort everything out and put the gear away after the police raid. Both girls had to go out and buy new phones! Adrienne had made a special visit to me after the first police raid - (they had another raid about two months after the first raid) - I thought she was going to tell me about the police raid because Desiree had told me on the phone about the police raid!  She came out to tell me that she had just found out she was pregnant! I was thrilled to bits (because Adrienne was 35 years old and it was her first baby) - I drank copious amounts of red wine and got drunk - I was so happy for Adrienne - even with Henry in jail! I then spent the next three years staying with Adrienne for lengthy periods at a time ( while Henry languished in jail) completing a lot of babysitting - especially during the time of Henry’s court case - which went on for two months.  He was sentenced to 16 years in jail - because it was thought (by the police and prosecutors) that Henry was the mastermind and leader of a gang that produced and sold methamphetamines. For 12 months after Henry’s arrest - Henry paid for the rent on their house and all other expenses through Henry’s mother.  I was shocked at the appalling waste of money and told Adrienne she should have gone on the DPB - Domestic Purposes Benefit.  At times she has NO COMMON SENSE! She told me a few weeks ago - she is finding it difficult to survive on the DPB and part-time Counselling job! Yeah - I thought to myself - this is the first time in your whole life where you have had no financial support or aid from anyone! She lived at my house rent free (also did not pay for the power or groceries for 12 months) for our first year in Pukekohe (while she worked in the office of the courts in Pukekohe), in the second year she lived rent-free in Jonah Lomu’s flat in his upmarket flat in central Wellington.  However, I know that people have been mowing her lawns in Otahuhu for the last few months! Carol stayed with Adrienne for a few months after Henry’s death!  He died on the 12 April 2016 of a heart attack at the prison in Wiri, South Auckland. Henry’s death was a shocking and a miscarriage of justice due to the fact that a defrilliator was not used to resuscitate Henry.  After Henry had been resuscitated by his prison mates - the guards then put Henry back into his cell ALONE AND WHERE HE LATER DIED!  He should have been sent to the Middlemore Hospital - THERE WAS ‘’NO DUTY OF CARE’’ applied by the prison staff! Adrienne tried to get justice for Henry (she was going to be interviewed on Television One by Andrea Vance (who is from Northern Ireland) - however Henry’s family persuaded Adrienne not to take this course of action because of Henry’s previous convictions!  Adrienne told me recently she had not done any Christmas shopping! I shop throughout the year for both daughters and grandchildren.  I buy items at sales and then hide them away.  I have done this since moving to Hamilton in 1981! I had a boyfriend for a few months back in approximately 1990 and his name was Colin (he was originally from the UK). He told me that his father got paid two days before Christmas Day - the family then went Christmas shopping and it was always frantic and stressful! I have never done that - GONE SHOPPING TWO DAYS BEFORE CHRISTMAS!  I think there was something wrong with his mother (mentally and emotionally) - she never worked in the workforce again once she got married to Colin’s father! There was only to children in the family and apparently she use to iron the family’s bed-sheets! If Colin was upset about something - HE WOULD SULK FOR DAYS ON END! In 1990 I had an operation on a prolapsed bladder at the Te Kuiti Hospital - (since Desiree’s birth in 1984 - my bladder was bulging through the vagina and was extremely uncomfortable)! Colin decided to drive me to the Te Kuiti hospital - a distance of 78 kilometres from Hamilton.  Colin had stayed the previous night at my house and he seemed like he was in a good mood! The next day - all the way to Te Kuiti - he wouldn’t talk! I just thought he must have been tired or just wasn’t in the mood for talking! On reaching Te Kuiti - we went to a look out (on a hill) overlooking Te Kuiti! While I was admiring the view - Colin then exploded and told me he had not slept a wink all night the night before,  because of the way my children had behaved on the previous night! He then told me that my children were brats and needed to be taught some manners! My daughters have always had excellent school reports and their manners have always being above reproach! In fact Ken Morris (who was the Principal of Aberdeen Primary School in Dinsdale) always complimented me on Adrienne’s manners and for this reason I always had a great rapport with the teaching staff at this school for several years! I then decided I’d had enough of Colin’s STUPIDITY, PARANOIA, ABSURD and LUDICROUS behaviour. I then grabbed my suitcase and handbag from his car and then headed off (walking at a fast pace) down the hill and in the general direction of the Te Kuiti hospital. Once I got to the bottom of the hill and onto the road - I was going to put my thumb out in order to get a lift to the hospital - so I would be on time for my check-in at the hospital - which I think was at 1.00pm - after lunch! I was halfway down the hill - when Colin came alongside me in his car and was pleading for me to get back in his car.  We continued in this manner until we got to the bottom of the hill - me walking with my luggage and he driving in his car! By this time he was beginning to panic and became very apologetic for his ridiculous behaviour!  I finally got back into the car and he drove me to the hospital just in time to be checked in!  I had not had any lunch or any breakfast for that matter - in those days I did not eat breakfast! I had to ask the hospital staff for something to eat - (they were not happy because I had been told to eat lunch before arriving at the hospital in the afternoon) - they gave me a cup of tea and biscuits! When I look back - I am  appalled at Colin’s indifference, callousness, stupid and narcissistic behaviour! I was scheduled  to have a major operation the next day and meanwhile I had to put with this grown man’s silly, childish sulking and abberant behaviour! I gave Colin the beneift of the doubt and we continued with our relationship for another six months. However, the situation did not improve as he continued throughout those six months - with long periods of sulking (passive aggressive behaviour which he learnt from his mother) that went on for several days! In his family of origin - problems were not talked over - instead you displayed passive aggressive behaviour - until you got what you wanted!  He didn’t like the way I dealt with problems - he said I was too confrontational - I believed in being upfront and talking a problem through - not bottling up problems then exploding! I have noticed that in the past few years - Adrienne now displays passive aggressive behaviour!  I have chosen not to be drawn into her supercillious behaviour and as a result we have barely had any contact with each other for the last two years! I have not seen Adrienne or her son Matheus for the last 10 months - in effect since Christmas Day in 2016 - a distance of 38 Kms and a 30 minute drive from Otahuhu (where she lives) to Pukekohe! In some ways I was relieved in not having to babysit Matheus (because he keeps pooing his pants) for the last 10 months! He is due to start school next year - on 23 April 2018. I asked Desiree if she has looked after Matheus in the last 12 months and she said yes (on two occasions) and she doesn’t know if he is still pooing his pants. He had to revert back to wearing disposal nappies to his pre-school - as the staff were not prepared to clean up a four year old boy with faeces in his pants! Desiree thinks that Matheus is “backward mentally” because of Henry’s dealing in drugs during the time he was conceived! I don’t believe that Matheus is “mentally deficient - but he may have special needs”! I have told Adrienne and Desiree individually and on separate occasions - that Matheus needs to see a Child Psychologist for his delayed behaviour in not going to the toilet in order to have a bowel motion. He would prefer to go and hide in a corner and then squart and poo his pants! Anyway must go and have some lunch as it is 12.30pm.  This evening we will hear if Winston Peters NZ First party will form a coalition with National or Labour.  I am hoping he will form a coalition with Labour and the Green party! I am praying and hoping for the best! Today is such a sunny and beautiful day (19 October 2017) - I think I will go and do some shopping! It is not much fun to go shopping in the rain and without a car! I have been assured by Ritchies & Murphy Bus Services Management that a bus driver I have been complaining about for several months - (he won’t lower the bus as he told me to my face that it takes too long) has finally been dealt with and I shouldn’t have any more problems!  The Management told me by email that this bus driver’s attitude has been dealt with!  I am hoping that this bus driver has changed his ways - I was sick of his bullying and unscrupulous behaviour!

AU REVOIR

[themargaret66-blog]

Heritage Walk in Ponsonby - part 2.

While we were at the Baptist Church we were treated to some organ music - an elderly gentleman then played us some music such as Handel - which was fabulous.  A volunteer from our group pumped the bellows. After reading about the history of the Baptist Church in Ponsonby I I have decided to visit the Auckland Baptist Tabernacle on Queen Street at 10.30am on Sundays - then I will spend the afternoon at the library researching  my genealogy - then I will attend Friend of Friends Fellowship @ 4.30pm.  Decided on the Queen Street Baptist Church as opposed to the one in Ponsonby as it is much easier for me to attend.  After the Baptist, we then walked to the Presbyterian church.  The day turned out to be extremely hot and I kept drinking my Vita Fresh from my bottle. At the end of the walk, I went and bought a bottle of zero coke - because I was so thirsty! (Just a small note about my strange and unethical relatives. When I visited Val and Susan - Susan said that her son and his girlfriend got married in the Presbyterian church last year - which I thought was unethical because of the fact that this family hates any kind of religion - so why get married in a church.  There is no need for hypocrisy in these days and times as what use to happen in previous generations  - as many people now get married on the beach or in parks and so forth! When I told aunt Val that Desiree, Siua and their daughters visit a Methodist Church most Sundays and Adrienne attends the Rev. Emily Worman’s (formerly Lange -David Lange's daughter) Metropolitan Church.  I saw Val pull a strange face - you could see the hatred for any kind of religion registering on her face. I should have told her that religion is far better than being addicted to alcohol, drugs, the casino (like my ex Jim) and so forth.  If your family hate religion so much - why get your marriage sanctioned in a church like she did, Susan got married in a Presbyterian church and Susan’s son Shane Brewer also got married in a Presbyterian Church!) Anyway getting back to the Presbyterian  Church in Ponsonby.  The original church was opened in 1879 and was designed in a Gothic Revival Style. Later in 1907a major extension was added in an Edwardian style. Despite the two styles the church looks completely unified. This church is registered as a Historic Category 2 with Heritage New Zealand. heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga may enter any historic place or historic area on the New Zealand Heritage List if it is satisfied that the place or area has aesthetic, archaeological, architectural, cultural, historical, scientific, social, spiritual, technological, or traditional significance or value. Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga may assign the status of Category 1 or 2 to any historic place, having regard to the nature of the places to which these categories may be assigned.  These categories may be assigned because for the following - 

1/ the extenet which the place reflects important or representative aspects of New Zealand history:

2/ the association of the place with events, persons, or ideas of importance in New Zealand history:

3/ the potential of the place to provide knowledge of New Zealand history:

4/ the importance of place to tangata whenua:

5/ the community association wtih, or public esteem for, the place:

6/ the potential of the place for public education:

7/ the symbolic or commemorative value of the place:

8/ the importance of identifying historic places known to date from an early period of New Zealand settlement:

9/ the importance of identifying rare types of historic places:

10/ the extent to which the place forms part of a wider historical and cultural area:

Seeking God

One of the well recognised characteristics of our age is the widespread interest in spirituality. Words like ‘spiritual’, ‘soul’ and ‘values’ have come back into ordinary conversation. Books like Chicken Soup for the Soul and The Road Less Travelled are best sellers, while many popullar movies are full of spiritual themes (Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, Keeping the Faith, Sixth Sense, Lion King and New Zealand’s Whalerider to mention a few). A few decades this was non-existent.  

What is spirituality?

All people are spiritual being - it is a part of being human. Everyone is made up of a number of dimensions and we function by means of the interaction of these dimensions.  In a fully functioning person all the dimensions are working together so it is important that each is nurtured. These dimensions include the physcial, intellectual, emotional and social as well as being spiritual.

Spirituality then is what ‘turns us on’, what gives us life, our deep down desire. It is about the whole person and the whole of life. In a broad sense of a Jedi Knight, the purpose of a fellowship’s quest in the Lord of the Rings, or the drive and energy that motivates a Mother Theresa.

Christain spirituality

We recognise that Christians do not have a monopoly on spirituality and that, since all people are created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26), all humans have a spiritual dimension which will be expressed in a variety of ways. The word spirituality is also used to refer to the model which gives structure and expression to our spiritual dimension.  There are many  different models, such as Maori, Buddhist, Muslim or Christain Spirituality. Christain spirituality is modelled on the life and teachings of Jesus. Faith involves trust, which occurs when you entrust yourself to the understanding you have come to know and accept. It means accepting that as true and finally trusting your life, both for now and the future, to follow the model of relationship with God provided through Jesus.

Will bring this blog to a close and will continue with the Grafton walk blog tomorrow. I am exhausted from talking about my Heritage Walk with Ponsonby Churches - which I have to say was extremely interesting, thought provoking  and life transforming.  This walk was far more interesting than the Heritage Grafton Walk I completed on the 15 October 2017 - which has surprised me somewhat as I thought that it would be the reverse.

[themargaret66-blog]

Heritage Walks in Ponsonby and Grafton - 14 and 15 October 2017

Today is the 16 October 2017. I shall continue on with my description of my Heritage Walk in Ponsonby.  As I said previously, the Anglican church has many wonderful features and was built in the 1950s. I went on the internet to find out about the unique windows and just describes the stained glass windows at the side of the building - but not the windows at the front of the building - the figures of the apostles during Christ’s time - had a different treatment.  Another feature that this church has is the carillon bells - which is operated by one person, one of very few in New Zealand. Apparently, the carillon bells have woken many a late sleeper as it has played out hymns before services over the years. What a lovely place to own a house in and then to be woken up by the carillon bells on Sundays. The later history of the church requires a separate chapter as there were extraordinary changes in Ponsonby’s history, as it went from an artisan suburb to a poor community, which became the home of many Pacific Islanders. It has become a community of students, for gay people and then was transformed again in recent years to a very fashionable inner city address. After the Anglican church - we then walked up the road to the Baptist Church.  This church was founded in 1880 as an off-shoot of the Wellesley Baptist Church at the top of Queen Street. When A. H. Collins arrived from Manchester in 1892 he was the first of several ministers to lead the church in radical directions. he was a strong trade union supporter who condemned the capitalist system of exploiting poor workers. During World War1 - W. S, Rollings published provocative articles as a minster, including a booklet that denounced the atrocities of war. Church members were active in reform movements, opposing boxing, gambling and “the drink’’.  They supported votes for women and followed Mary Aldis in opposition to the humiliating compulsory inspection of prostitutes for venereal diseases. In the 1960s new Pacific island immigrants who had been encouraged to work on the wharfs and in factories nearby came to live in Ponsonby’s large decaying villas. Ponsonby Baptist became home to a cluster of Niue Island families and the Wongs who ran very successful fruiterers’ business at Three Lamps. Then came the arrival of Mike Riddell who saw the revival streak. this was when the speculators and middle-class families moved into renovating Ponsonby’s old villas and many Pacific Islanders were ousted from their rental properties.  The church then founded the Community of Refuge Trust to race speculators to buy up cheap housing so it could rent them to people who were hard up and were recently released from mental hospitals. The ethnic diversity of the 1960s and 70s was replaced by a mixture of young families and people who were experiencing sporadic bouts of mental illness. Through the last 40 years, Ponsonby Baptist has developed a strong identity as a place that challenges the status quo and is inclusive in its attitude to newcomers.  The growth of the Community Refuge Trust (CORT) has harnessed the energies of members who are looking for practical ways to work out their faith.

[themargaret66-blog]

Last weekend - Heritage walks in Auckland

Last weekend was absolutely exhausting and exhilarating at the same time. On Saturday - I caught two buses and one train into Britomart, then onto Ponsonby in order to do the Churches Heritage Walk - from 1.30pm to 3.30pm. The guided tour was fabulous and very informative. There were only about 10 people on this particular tour and most were elderly apart from four young Japanese girls. We first viewed the Methodist Church which is apparently used by two Samoan congregations - who don’t get on with each other according to our Tour Guide. The church had many chandeliers - which made it look very grand - but at the same time you could see that the church needed to have some repairs - it looked a bit shabby!  There was a Samoan choir singing in the hall at the time of our visit, the hall was attached to the church.  The singing sounded very emotive and moving - which added to the atmosphere of our visit. The next visit was to the Anglican church - which was located about 50 yards further up the road from the Methodist church.  The Anglican church was built in the 1950s - was built to replace the church that was built in the 1870s. This church has many wonderful features (I would not have noticed this unless it was pointed out to me) - for example, the front of the church was made to look like a Maori Meeting House. A number of sophisticated moves have been made in the planning of the building. The walls were built with folded ceiling planes and walls.  

[themargaret66-blog]

My holiday for the last five days -courtesy of Desiree’s car!

During the time that I had Desiree’s car, one day I drove out to St Heliers Beach in order to see the stingrays stranded on the beach - according to a news report from the night before.  However, I did not see any stingrays, unfortunately.  I saw the park where I had worked one night for Colmar Brunton collecting email addresses from people viewing a Christmas Concert there - four years ago.  People were then sent a questionnaire about what they thought of the concert which was supported by the Auckland City Council. It was a fabulous evening and lots of people were walking their dogs on the beach and I could not help but notice that everyone was white. Not a single brown person of Polynesian ethnicity could be seen within cooee!  I go to the Manukau Mall on frequent occasions - like at least once a fortnight and most of the people there are Polynesian, Indian and a few other nationalities like Chinese and so forth! You see very few white people shopping there - it is my favourite shopping location. I then decided I would drive out to Waikumete - West Auckland.  However, I gave up once I drove into the city as the traffic was horrendous because by this time it was 6.00pm and there were huge traffic jams and snarl-ups - so, in the end, I drove home. 

The next day I decided to drive to Waikumete in order to get some atmospheric photos of some of the oldest graves in New Zealand - looking towards Auckland City.  I called into the Manukau Memorial Gardens Cemetery first to see Henry (Adrienne’s partner who died last year) and then I continued onto Waikumete.  Of course, I struck the 5.00pm rush hour traffic and it took me a very long to get out there and I then I ended up on the West Coast Road and I should have been on the Great North Road - this added an extra hour to my time.  I finally got there and headed for the Chapel of Faith in the Oaks - where there are some of the oldest graves in New Zealand are located - for example from 1886 (my three grandparents were born in England in 1884). (William Edward Vickers was born in Rotherham, Yorkshire, England, died in 1949 and is buried in the Totara Cemetery in Thames, NZ.  Ernest Strickland was born in Crosthwaite, Cumbria, UK, died in 1952 and is buried at the Waihi Cemetery, NZ.  Mary Elizabeth Bertha (formerly Share) Vickers died in 1963 and is buried in a cemetery in Nelson, NZ.).  I had taken my gumboots and it was just as well as it was very muddy and slushy underfoot and where I was walking was on the brow of a hill. I got my tripod out and the legs just sunk through the ground - it was so muddy. So, In the end, I stood on top of some of the graves (the ones that had big slabs of concrete over their graves) and I also stood under the Pohutukawa trees as I was taking the photos - it began to rain lightly! So I then took out my umbrella in order to shelter my camera! The scene in front of me looked very moody and atmospheric and I took a great many photos - however on returning home when viewing my photos - they failed to convey the mood that I had wanted! So it is back to the drawing board to try and work out what I should have done to get this effect in my images! There were quite a few people out and about walking their dogs, guys running and I saw a young guy eating his dinner on the church steps which was pretty unnerving - but he did not come near me - thank goodness! There is a house near the church where I saw some people standing around outside - as I drove past.  So I figured if I got attacked - there would be help nearby! While I was taking photographs - a huge Alsatian dog came and sniffed me over and its owner just kept walking - about 100 yards away from me.  The dog did not worry me one bit as it looked well cared for and it didn’t seem aggressive at all.  It just seemed curious - so decided to have a good sniff in order to see if I was a threat at all.  I just ignored the dog. Before leaving the cemetery - I had a quick look at some of the graves.  A great many people had died at a very young age along with their children - who were all buried in the same plot. It took me a long time to drive home from Waikumete - as it was night-time and I was unfamiliar with the roads! Will just write a few facts about Waikumete Cemetery here. “Waikumete is New Zealand’s largest cemetery, the second largest in the Southern Hemisphere and the resting place for over 70,000 people.  The cemetery is owned and managed by the Auckland City Council. The cemetery was opened in 1986 as a replacement for the overcrowded Symonds Street Cemetery. It was laid out by denomination and contains many historic graves, soldiers’ cemetery, Maori urupa, a mass grave of over 1000 flu victims from 1918 and a memorial to the 1979 Mt Erebus Air Disaster.  It also contains a notable group of mausoleums and the historic Faith-in-the-Oaks Chapel (1886), Sexton’s house (1886) and crematorium. The site consists of gently sloping land with pockets of flatter areas in the southern corner of the site adjacent to Glen View Road.  This land was bisected by two main gully systems with small streams at their base. The Cemetery site is located in what has become a predominantly urban area, surrounded on all sides by residential properties. The Cemetery provides a significant area of open space within in this urban fabric and the scale of the site and its trees have a strong impact on the amenity of the area.”

Before I bring this blog to a close - Adrienne contacted me via Facebook and I think she was a bit shocked at the number of books that I gave her a few days ago.  I gave her a large plastic container of children's books for Matheus.  She told me she would go through them all and with the ones that she didn’t want - she would donate to the Women’s Refuge!  Hmmm, I thought  - there goes all of my hard work in sellotaping all of the pages that were ripped in 95% of the books.  She said that she took the large container of books from the hedge (where I left them) into the house before it rained! The books were in a plastic container with a lid - so I doubt that they would have got wet anyway! She should treat them as library books - once Matheus has read them - then give them away or keep as required! I also gave her books about women who lost their loved ones (and vice-versa) such as the 9/11 tragedy on the twin towers in New York City.  I actually read this book and what struck me is the American culture where in one case - they either went to restaurants or had takeaways. I thought that this was shocking - what is wrong with cooking your own food! It is much healthier than eating out and eating takeaways!  No wonder the Americans have huge problems with obesity.  In another case - a husband would not eat fruit or vegetables - well he wasn’t going to live to a great age when eating such a restricted diet.  He was killed in one of the twin towers in the 9/11 tragedy. There was a couple of books about prisoners in the USA which I thought might interest her - because of Henry’s imprisonment!

Desiree, Siua and the children came over today - they arrived back from the Cook Islands this morning.  They all had a great time and were amazed at the number of luxury houses that can be seen in Rarotonga - which you don’t see on Niue Island! There are no luxury homes on Niue Island. Apparently, Clarisse had eight bridesmaids!  They did not see very much of Clarisse and her bridal party as they were staying in a different location to Desiree, Siua and their children.  They met Zoe and her Italian husband (they described him as a hard case) - their daughter was a flower girl along with Kortelia.  They also met Jules and her Mexican boyfriend - who they described as extremely annoying - as he would not shut up! Clarisse’s brothers wanted to punch him on some occasions - as he was constantly talking and was very annoying.  He works as a teacher for children who have ‘’special needs or who are intellectually impaired in some way”. I saw an image of Desiree, Zoe, and Jules at Clarisse's wedding on Facebook.  Zoe is now really huge - she looks like a size 20 and even Jules is quite a bit bigger than Desiree.  Desiree looked tiny next to the both of them. When their grandmother died in approximately 1994 when Desiree was 10 years of age - Desiree, Zoe, Jules, and Clarisse were all very slim - approximately 23 years later - what a huge difference, particularly with Zoe - her weight has exploded! Desiree and Siua had a lot to do with a lady (Mrs Townsend) who once taught at Wesley College in approximately in 2001. She has lived on the Cook Islands for 16 years and is working as a secretary for the Education Board - where she gets to hire teachers for various schools on the Cook Islands.  In this job, she gets to travel extensively around the Pacific to other Pacific Islands. She recently got engaged to a local of European descent who lives in Rarotonga. 

Anyway its time I say au revoir (goodbye) - I am starving and it is now nearly 8.00pm.  I have been writing this blog since 4.00pm!  I thought I should write about my wonderful holiday of the last five days - when I had Desiree’s car at my disposal.  Desiree asked if I went anywhere of interest - I told her about the visit to see Henry's grave and nothing else.  She doesn’t need to know about my visit to see my aunt Val in Thames and also my visit to Waihi and Waihi Beach. I had such a good time - it would be wonderful to get a car again - but then I need to get a job to keep the car on the road! At the present time - I have been spending all of my time researching my genealogy, spending huge amounts of time in fixing and enhancing my images in Photoshop then posting them onto Flickr.  In the last month - I have been looking at other people’s images on Facebook and there a great many images taken of homeless people from all around the world!  I read an article about six months ago where a woman was denouncing people for taking photos of the homeless - she was emphatic about NOT TAKING PHOTOS OF THE HOMELESS.  She said it was disrespectful, encroached on peoples rights and so forth. Just as well I did not take any notice of her - I took several photos of homeless people on Queen Street in Auckland City during the 24 hour photography competition in June.  I asked each one before I took photos and none seemed to mind! When I showed aunt Val these photos (I showed her a great many other photos (not just the homeless) that were on my laptop)! Val was extremely shocked and she then asked Susan about the homeless on Queen Street as Susan had once worked at the Auckland Central Library in recent times. Susan was rather sheepish about the subject - she agreed I was right - but was disinclined to talk about the subject of the homeless!  You could see that Susan was not interested in talking about the subject of the homeless at all - which I thought would be a typical response from her!  She lives a life of wealth and ease - has no compassion for people who are less fortunate than herself! TYPICAL!

 Au revoir once again and once for all!  

[themargaret66-blog]

A Balancing Act - part 3

Well, I have to say that the balancing act has failed miserably in this past week.  I am not going to look at my bank balance - as it would only make me feel more depressed than what I am feeling already over my money situation.  However, since Desiree, Siua and the girls went to the Cook Islands - I have had the time of my life.  Since having the Pole’s car - I have driven to many places that I have wanted to go to for many years - (well since I haven’t had a car) - which is coming up three years. For example, I have driven to Waihi and Waihi Beach and achieved my objective of taking photos of Ernest Strickland's grave-stone in order to place on my family tree on geni.com.  Last Friday, I drove to the ASB Show-grounds and as a result of this - I did not have to walk the couple of miles to the train-station at Greenlane which I did last year in the pouring rain! My pull along-trolley-bag was filled to the brim and when I got on the train I was soaking wet. People were giving me pitiful looks and some people were looking at me in aghast!  (I did not get a taxi - because of the traffic jams and snarl-ups from the ASB showgrounds to the train-station in Greenlane.  Also if I ordered a taxi - I would have to wait in the pouring rain outside the ASB Showgrounds for at least 30 minutes -there was no shelter.  So I figured I would save myself the money on a taxi and the frustration of waiting for a taxi in the pouring rain)! Two nights ago I visited the Heights Park Cemetery which is off Helvetia Road and on the way to Paerata primarily to visit Ross Humphries grave.  He was one of my clients when I worked for Health Vision in 2008.  I have many fond and unique memories of completing housework for Ross every weekend (Saturday and Sunday) for the whole of 2008. He died on 29 March 2012. I was shocked to see an image of him on the grave - looking a lot bigger than when I knew him.  I had a quick look at the other graves and was shocked to see so many graves of young people! A lot of Maori people are buried there and most were very young at the time of their deaths - some were younger than Desiree.  And the same young people had many children! I also came across the Schlaepfer family where the father Brian Schlaepfer (64 years) had killed his wife (55 years), three sons (39, 33 and 31 years) and one grandson (who was 11 years) in 1992.  Two young girls escaped the carnage - one girl (nine years) barricaded herself in the bedroom for three hours while talking on the phone to a policeman. The other girl was staying with friends.  What an appalling waste of life and of course it is always the man who commits these terrible acts of carnage. Yesterday I drove to the Manukau Memorial Gardens Cemetery in order to photograph Henry’s grave for my family tree on geni.com.  His grave was very easy to find as it is close to the entrance of this cemetery and it is on the way to the Auckland airport. I was appalled to see how close all the graves are to each other - there is no room to walk without walking on other people’s graves!  There were some people a few yards away - (sitting on chairs near their loved one’s grave) and there was a great deal of loud laughing going on! I took a great many photos and once again I went for a saunter around some other graves in that location and once again I was shocked to see so many graves of young people and these same people had left many children behind! Apparently, Jonah Lomu (a New Zealand Rugby Star of colossus status)  is buried nearby as Adrienne was going to show me his grave last Christmas Day - but there were too many people around! Before leaving this cemetery I went and had another look at Henry’s grave and discovered at the top of the head-stone there were the names of his children to many women! For the life of me, I could not find Tina’s three girls names there - they all have Samoan names - perhaps I just did not recognise their names! These girls often stay with Adrienne and Matheus. They are half-sisters to Matheus who is my grandson.  Apparently, Tina is part-Niuean (she was born in Alofi on Niue Island and is related to Jim’s family) and part-Samoan.  Every weekend she leaves the girls with their grandparents in Manurewa (and has done so many years) - while Tina goes out drinking and partying every weekend! I could never do that and I never had that luxury to do that anyway.  If someone looked after my girls every alternate weekend, that would have been great and given me a most needed break! Even if their father (who was not interested and could not be trusted as he was often drunk on the weekends and brawling with Mary - his lady friend of 33 years) had been more responsible - but it wasn’t to be!  The way Jim conducted his life was appalling as he only thought about himself - he had a very cavalier attitude!  What upset me so much - was that Jim showed no interest in his daughters' extra-curricular activities - such as jazz ballet, tap dancing, gymnastics, and netball.  However, throughout my daughters' lives, he would visit my house on regular occasions as it was near his job.  He would often visit at least once a week and did so for many years. For many years he only paid $10,00 a week in maintenance to Work and Income - I have no idea how he got away with it because for many years he was earning at least $30,000 and more per year - which was good money in the 1980s and 1990s! On a couple of occasions, I even paid for Jim to go to Desiree’s dance recitals and I had very little money! When I stopped paying - Jim stopped attending except on one occasion, after I had moved to Pukekohe.  Desiree had a dance recital at the Founder’s Theatre in Hamilton - she paid for Jim to attend the dance recital - however, she never told me the date of her recital and so I did not attend.  I then had to listen to Jim going on about how he had a wonderful time at this dance recital - thankyou Desiree! I was the one who took Desiree to dance lessons for many years and as per usual he did nothing and paid for nothing! This situation reminded me of Kiri Te Kanawa. Kiri’s parents moved to Auckland from Gisborne - so that Kiri (as a child) could have singing lessons with Dame Sister Mary Leo - a Catholic Nun.  When Kiri’s father died - she said she was too busy to attend his funeral! I was appalled and disgusted! Every time I see Kiri’s photo now - I am just filled with revulsion and disgust! In the following years since her father died - she now tells everyone how she misses her father - yeah I can see the crocodile tears as well - you don’t fool me, Kiri! When Desiree moved to Auckland after finishing university in 2007 - I would maybe get one visit a year from her and this situation went on for many years! When I did go and visit her - I got yelled at and abused! During those years she was belligerent, hostile and aggressive towards me! Her deplorable behaviour went on until she moved to Wesley College in 2016!  We only really got back into regular contact with each other - after she gave birth to Fitimoka.  I babysat for Fitimoka in 2016 for about three months - while Desiree completed a dance paper at the University of Auckland and she also did some relief teaching at Wesley College during that time - as well.  However, I believe in karma - one day Desiree will get her comeuppance for her appalling and indifferent behaviour towards me - during the many years when she lived in Auckland! It seems also I am always second choice when it comes to babysitting - she always asks Siua’s sisters first.  These girls have had no experience in looking after children - so why they would be the first choice for babysitting - has always baffled me.  However, she won’t allow Adrienne to look after her children as Adrienne was unpleasant, horrible and downright mean towards Desiree when Desiree was a child!  At the time - I was at a lost at Adrienne’s attitude towards Desiree and most of the time I just tried to protect Desiree from Adrienne’s many shouting matches with her. I am now getting the full force of Adrienne’s aberrant and abhorrent behaviour directed at me! The shouting and the fireworks - I am too old to put up with such appalling behaviour - so I choose not to - by staying away! I have barely seen Adrienne in the last two years - since Jonah Lomu’s Memorial Service at Wesley ColIege in November 2015. (I remember on one occasion - Adrienne dressed Desiree up as a strumpet (when Desiree was five years old) - she placed lots of make-up on her and thought Desiree looked very funny! I told Adrienne to stop doing that - I did not like her nasty and the suggestive undertones in her action towards Desiree)!  Apparently, Adrienne has offered to look after Desiree’s girls on many occasions - but on many occasions, Desiree finds an excuse for her not to look after her children! Desiree thinks that Adrienne will bully her kids like the way she was bullied by Adrienne as a child!  Anyway must end this now - will finish this blog at a later date as I want to watch the 12.00 noon news.   

[themargaret66-blog]

A Balancing Act - part 2

The day after arriving back from Waihi Beach I went to the Noel Leming Sale at the ASB Showgrounds in Greenlane.  It was fantastic and the bargains were amazing.  This huge complex was jampacked full of people - most were of Indian or Asian heritage.  People kept knicking my heels with their shopping trolleys - it was so crowded.  I bought an amazing back-pack for my camera for $60,00 - which I used today for the first time - the date being the 8 October 2017. The backpack - since using it, I have discovered - has very deep pockets so you can fit a lot of gear in it! GREAT BUY! Bought kitchen scales for $20,00 (usual cost $40,00), a digital phone for $20,00 (usual cost $30,00), a pack of eight AA batteries for $5,00 (cost usually $20,00), a memory stick for $17,00 - don’t know how much I saved on it - just wanted something different from my usual memory sticks - I have about 40 of them! I also have a portable hard drive which I bought at the beginning of this year - cost me $350,00.  My old one got bugged by a virus and would not work - so I went to a computer place in town - they transferred all of my photos onto a new portable hard drive - just about killed me to pay it off! It took me about two months to pay it off in stalments! Then at about the same time I thought I was paying for MyHeritage (a genealogy site) for $30,00 a week (which is how it was advertised) and much to my astonishment - I got billed $250,00 for 12 months.  I was not happy.  So this year I have devoted most of my time to my genealogy research at the library in Pukekohe in order to get my money’s worth.  Then about a month ago I entered five photographs into the Franklin Arts Show - this cost me an arm and a leg - $15 to print each photograph, $40 to place backing and matts to each photograph and $75 for the entry fee!  This cost me $350 all up! Phew - that is why I can’t save any money! When I left the ASB Show-grounds - my heart sank because it was 5.30pm and Friday and the traffic was horrendous.  It took me an hour to drive from the show-grounds to the traffic island - leading onto the Southern Motorway.  I was exhausted and so I drove around the island and then to McDonalds in order to get a cup of coffee to perk myself up.  While there I also had a chocolate muffin.  Afterwards I drove to the Manukau Mall and my first stop there - is always Millers.  I bought a jacket for $21,00 - which was orginally $35,00!  The Pacific Island sales lady chatted to me about other bargains she thought that I may be interested in.  I had to go to the toilet and told her I woud be back in 30 minutes.  While I was in the toilets I had a look in the mirror and much to my horror - there were chocolate chips stuck to my teeth!  Then it took me some time to erase the chips from my front top teeth!  Talk about a huge embarrassment! I did go back to Millers - had another look around but did not buy anything. I hung around the Manukau Mall for two hours as I was trying to avoid the traffic jams - which I did!