Thanks to...
...my pets, who tolerated 30 days quarantine, to comfort me here at the edge of the earth.
...my sister and brother in law, who have taken care of me, put up with me, and educated me about living in Auckland.
...my husband, for taking care of the pets and house after I left So Cal for Auckland, and for doing all the busywork to get our lives in order over here.
...my friends who send the regular or occasional email, to give feedback and share information about their lives. I really appreciate this, and I encourage everyone to leave a comment on the blog or send me an email.
...the new friends I have made here, who, so far, are Americans. I am trying to make Kiwi friends, but they tend to be aloof. There are people from all over the world here, and I'm glad for the diversity.
...New Zealand Immigration service, who approved our application for residence (with another payment of $600) so quickly! Yay! The main advantage of this is that I can take advantage of the socialized medicine, and see a specialist at a subsidized cost instead of $325 just for a consultation.
We celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday, the 25th, at Barb's house with 3 other Americans in Auckland, who also happened to be California escapees. We had wild turkey, homemade stuffing, an award winning NZ Pinot Gris, and incredibly rich and yummy chocolate cake. We had a field trip down to visit the cows, turkeys, and chickens. The wild turkeys were re-homed here from a local friend's property- he wanted to get rid of them. We captured a tom and 2 hens and they have made a home here. They are quite interesting and amusing- it was funny to see the cows chasing the turkeys.
Today Darin, Barb and I went to a dog show and met a Borzoi breeder who is interested in lure coursing. She is keen to buy the equipement when visiting the US in April, and I promised to send her the information about where to buy it. As far as Barb and I can tell, the lure coursing here in NZ is just for sighthounds. I did lure coursing with my Rottweiler, and he loved it, at Luratics in San Diego. What a great group. We watched the rottweilers show, and all of them have short muzzles. They also do not disqualify dogs for missing teeth, as the US standard does. I had a nice meeting with Vickie and Ken Brodmuir, whose dogs are very nice. I saw my first Kelpie. There was only one there, though. The other breeds I hadn't come across until moving here include the huntaway and pig dogs. I find it appalling that pet stores sell puppies and kittens in their shops, frequently what they call "designer" dogs, crosses of purebreeds (Bichon x Lhasa Apso, Jack Russel x Papillon, etc.) for upwards of $500, what you might expect to pay for a purebreed dog. Apparently, the kennel clubs here don't care as much about the future of their breeds as the rest of the world.
