The vet rang today at 1pm to let me know that Oscar was fine, back on his perch and chirping. I went out to get him an hour and a half later, he was out the back but even there I could hear him clucking loudly. He's got some antibiotics and some anti-inflamatories, plus new stuff to eat instead of seed. I didn't realise just how bad seed is for caged birds but the vet had to chat to me about it.
Good to have him back!

I went to a second job interview this morning, it looks like it's all go for the upcoming work. There's paperwork to sort out but we (Prophecy) have a verbal agreement with the company in question for the work. It's going to be exciting!

Not much else to tell you really!

Tim

Poor Oscar! I filled up his water bowl this morning and when I went out to the shed later I noticed he was splashing around in it quite happily, like he usually does. But then I noticed a large (well, pea sized, large for a lovebird) lump on his tail. I also realised that he'd been pulling out quite a few feathers (we'd noticed a couple the last week or two but didn't think much of it)
I took him up to the local vet but she happily admitted she didn't know anything about birds and said I should take him to bird specialist if I was worried.
Which of course I was!

So lunch time I drove Oscar to the second vet, the bird specialist man. He was really good too, he said Oscar was the sixth bird he'd seen that day. He put some Oscar poop under the...

Of course, this is something that if you know me, you already knew. I went and bought a little FM transmitter that plugs into the computer. Now I can just tune any radio in the house into TripleJ. Since listening I've already discovered about 3 "new" bands I'd not heard of that I like, probably the best being "The Cat Empire"
Cool to see that they are going to make a New Zealand version of Dragon's Den, I wonder who the investors will be? I'd love to go on apart from a) I have no smart ideas and b) I don't have a business. Maybe one day.
Not a real lot else to tell you, looks like there might be some pretty serious work coming my way soon. I had an interview on Thursday and I have another one (interview number 2) on Tuesday. Hopefully it comes off and...

Big stress yesterday when I realised that our phone line didn't work and my ADSL (high speed internet) wasn't really working either. Thankfully today when I got back from a nice lunch at the Fish Market with Sarah I saw the Telecom line man digging holes. I'm back online at full speed again, I was getting the shakes for a little bit there.

We waved goodbye to Francis this morning, she's off on her 7 day holiday in Fiji, lucky girl. We took her down to Devonport last night to show her around, it was freezing cold but we still had a quick look at the war memorial there and then got a nice bite to eat at the local Fish n Chip shop.

Hedgehog is doing well, she (fairly sure she's a she) now weighs 155 grams, up from about 120 when I found her last Friday. Hurry up...

Why didn't I think to ask for a day off today? Sarah was smart enough to do that, seems I don't have the necessary brain to do that.
The hedgehog is doing well, already he's put on 20g and isn't timid anymore which is good for me, less prickles.
We have Sarah's cousin Francis staying with at the moment, she's gone over to Waihekie Island today. Poor girl, it seemed like such nice weather when she left and now it's terrible. Ruth and Leia are coming back sometime this week too, we've turned into a nice little boarding house. I'm not complaing though (just in case I sound like I am) they're all really nice people.

Happy Anzac day for tomorrow, hope your finger gets better soon Denny!

We have a new pet! Well not really, but he'll probably be with us for a week or two. It all started this afternoon when I went out to get the mail. As I was walking back from the mailbox I heard the weirdest squeaking/snuffing noise. Looking down I saw the smallest cutest hedgehog you've ever seen. I thought straight away that something must be wrong with him, hedgehogs are a nocturnal animal, this guy was out at 3pm in the blazing sunlight.

I bundled him up, took him inside and examined him. I noticed he had a little bit of blood around his neck so I put him a bucket and rang the SPCA. They said if I took him to a vet that they'd take care of him, free of charge. So I quickly drove him up to the vet (it's a 2 minute drive) but they weren't...

At 3:10pm there was a knock at the door and standing there was a man giving me a 12 pack of beer! Fantastic! He also had about 20 other bags full of things to give me. Yes, the online shopping had arrived. I thought that some of the fruit and veg might be a little suspect but it's all very good, not bruised or too old. The only complaint we had really was one of the cuts of meat we got was a little fatty but that's the price you pay when you don't pick it out yourself.

All up it cost the same as a regular supermarket shop would have, plus $12 delivery fee. I agree with Sarah though, we easily save that by not buying all the extra crap that we'd pick up.
Overall very impressive, I think we'll do our shopping like this from now on, as...

We are experimenting tonight with online shopping. That's right, instead of buggering off to the supermarket to fight with all the other people, we're doing it all online. It seems pretty nifty, you can tick all the things you want every time and each time you login to shop, it'll automatically put those in your (virtual) basket.
I remember my old workmate Phill telling me it was quite nifty and that was probably 5 years ago now! Guess we'll find out how good/accurate it really is when the man rocks up tomorrow with our stuff.

Got pulled over by Mr Police man last night. He looked exactly like Alexei Sayle. I'd driven past an unmarked police car that had pulled someone over and thought to myself "Haha sucked in!" when the car pulled out right behind me and kept his lights on. Bugger. He just asked me a bunch of...

Made it back to Auckland last night safe and sound, though the drive too us forever. We decided to take a back road to miss the huge pile of traffic on the main road, but it seems a lot of other people had our idea and there must have been some sort of accident because we had to crawl along, bumper to bumper for about 40 minutes. We finally made it home about 7:30 to a very happy to see us Oscar.

Really nothing exciting to tell you! It's a horrid rainy day today, I'm working on the stuff I've got to work on. That's about all really!

Tim