DAY THREE - Friday 21 April

Finally got the right number for Tony Dixon, aka the 'balloon man', so spoke to him about possibility of going up on Sunday to the Waikato region for a trip. Entirely weather dependent (obviously!) so would get back to us after he'd made a few enquiries.

So I hung about the house and sunbathed/read (A Fortune Teller Told Me) on the deck all day. Mum got back early afternoon so we just sat in the garden together (busy day at work for her!) and had a beer ... Macs Gold :o)

Friday night went to the Mongolian barbeque in the City with my mum, her friend Paul and Chung and his girlfriend Noy (Chung is my mum's adopted Vietnamese son - complicated, I know!!) . Fab food and if you've never been to one before .... you grab a bowl and help yourself to meat, veggies, beansprouts etc .. then you add your own seasonings and oils ... then give them to a chef who stirfries the whole lot for you in about 2 mins! It was a buffet arrangement at this place (they usually are) so you could have a play around with lots of variations; but that's the fun of it ... how hot can you go??

Then we (mum and her friend Paul - Chung and Noy had buggered off straight after eating, leaving mum with the bill!!) decided to go for a late drink. Ended up in Ponsonby at a bar that was upstairs in small shopping arcade - odd little arrangement, but perhaps normal for NZ??!!

There was a jazz and blues night on and a cool little band were there with this awesome Samoan singer, Peta - very bluesy voice. She decided that I was quite 'exotic' - being foreign and all that ;o) so adopted me for the evening and introduced me to everyone!! Kept calling me Brenda at first (????) - I think she was getting confused with another singer that was on later called Brendan - we don't look alike, he has black hair and a quiff!! Or maybe she'd just had a lot of wine to drink ...

Finally got to bed about half 1 in the morning.