The words to the Greymouth / West Coast official anthem:
It rained and rained and rained
The average fall was well maintained
And when the tracks were simple bogs
It started raining cats and dogs
After a drought of half an hour
We had a most refressing shower
and then most curious of all
A gentile rain began to fall
Next day for one was fairly dry
Save for one deluge from the sky
Which wetted the party to the skin
And then at last the Rain set in.
Wednesday, September 25, 2019
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Lately there has been a lot of trash talk going on in the comments section casually dismissing my complaints about the weather down here. Implying that I am some kind of a mama's cry baby weenie boy which anybody who has ever met me knows to be mostly totally untrue. And you know who you are. Yes it's you Bob and I am calling you out on this. Why just a few weeks ago there was such a monster storm here that the driftwood was pushed up to within 50 yards of my house which is two whole blocks from the beach. So as a now hardened "West Coaster" did I hunker down whimpering pitifully in my soon to be swept away shoe box house? No indeed. I waited for high tide then drove 30 miles up the serpentine coast road through the raging deluge to Pancake Rock Park where the land juts way out into the Tasman Sea just to watch huge waves explode on the lime stone cliffs then travel through a network of underground sea caves to series of blow holes causing towers of sea water geysers to erupt 100 yards or more inland. Of course I froze my ass off but a man's got to do what a man's got to do. This is the same thinking - or lack there of - that convinced me it was a good idea to quick run to the all picture widow glassed in 7th floor sky bridge at St Lukes Hospital to try to catch a glimpse of the killer tornado tearing up Cedar Rapids, Iowa 35 years ago. Also last week I googled the wettest place in New Zealand and it's not Milford Sound which everybody says is so rainy but a place called Cobb River about 20 miles south of Greymouth were 2 years ago they had an officially measured 18 meters of rain. 18 METERS....That's more than 50 feet of rain in one year. I rest my case
OK I'll admit that the weather has been a little better the last few weeks so I was able to do a little fly fishing. If I say so myself I got pretty good at it. I had tons of practice perfecting my casting technique without the periodic annoying interruptions of haveing to take fish off the line. Next time I think I'll work on the catching part.
Also last weekend I drove way down south to spend two days on a boat cruising through Doubtfull Sound which the locals say is much better but also less accessable than the more popular Milford Sound. The weather was unusually clear without a cloud in the sky the whole trip. The sound is more accurately a fjord and we wound our way through it's narrow passages for 2 days amoung snow capped peaks out to the Tasman Sea and back. Very cool and very beautiful. I even went in for a 1 and 1/2 second jump in swim (peer pressure sucks) We saw seals and peguins and my favorite - Kea parrots along the way. On the way back to Greymouth while drving past Franz Joseph Glacier the weather was still unheard of clear so I got a helicoper ride up over the glaiciers and around Mt Cook. The sun was almost painfuly bright on the new fallen snow. It was stunningly beautiful. We landed on the glacier for 1/2 hour or so. The snow was too hard to make snow angels but I did start a snow ball fight. Then on the road again back to Grymouth and gathering dark clouds and rain as I entered town.
This will likely be my last official entry from New Zealand. Tomorrow I am leaving Greymouth to drive to Christchurch to ship my priceless dirty clothes and other very important stuff home, transfer all my hard earned money back to the states (the 63 cents US per NZ dollar is killing me) and sell my trusty car, The next day I'll be jeting over the Tasmin Sea to Australia for a few days on a boat out of Carins scaba diving on the The Great Barrier Reef then, God willing and the creeks don't rise, down to Sydney to do some sailing and catch a performance at the Syndney opera house Then on that long miserable 18 hour minus one day flight to the US and, with any luck at all, back to the welcoming bosom of my loving wife who hopefully has yet to realize that her life is so much better with me on the other side of the world
But stay tuned for one more blog from Australia and then after I get home on the 25th or so I'll down load all my cell phone and camera pictures for all your oooing and ahhhing pleasure.
Go Goats!
Dr Jay
OK I'll admit that the weather has been a little better the last few weeks so I was able to do a little fly fishing. If I say so myself I got pretty good at it. I had tons of practice perfecting my casting technique without the periodic annoying interruptions of haveing to take fish off the line. Next time I think I'll work on the catching part.
Also last weekend I drove way down south to spend two days on a boat cruising through Doubtfull Sound which the locals say is much better but also less accessable than the more popular Milford Sound. The weather was unusually clear without a cloud in the sky the whole trip. The sound is more accurately a fjord and we wound our way through it's narrow passages for 2 days amoung snow capped peaks out to the Tasman Sea and back. Very cool and very beautiful. I even went in for a 1 and 1/2 second jump in swim (peer pressure sucks) We saw seals and peguins and my favorite - Kea parrots along the way. On the way back to Greymouth while drving past Franz Joseph Glacier the weather was still unheard of clear so I got a helicoper ride up over the glaiciers and around Mt Cook. The sun was almost painfuly bright on the new fallen snow. It was stunningly beautiful. We landed on the glacier for 1/2 hour or so. The snow was too hard to make snow angels but I did start a snow ball fight. Then on the road again back to Grymouth and gathering dark clouds and rain as I entered town.
This will likely be my last official entry from New Zealand. Tomorrow I am leaving Greymouth to drive to Christchurch to ship my priceless dirty clothes and other very important stuff home, transfer all my hard earned money back to the states (the 63 cents US per NZ dollar is killing me) and sell my trusty car, The next day I'll be jeting over the Tasmin Sea to Australia for a few days on a boat out of Carins scaba diving on the The Great Barrier Reef then, God willing and the creeks don't rise, down to Sydney to do some sailing and catch a performance at the Syndney opera house Then on that long miserable 18 hour minus one day flight to the US and, with any luck at all, back to the welcoming bosom of my loving wife who hopefully has yet to realize that her life is so much better with me on the other side of the world
But stay tuned for one more blog from Australia and then after I get home on the 25th or so I'll down load all my cell phone and camera pictures for all your oooing and ahhhing pleasure.
Go Goats!
Dr Jay
Saturday, September 21, 2019
Monday, July 22, 2019
HELLLOOO ! Is anybody listening? Every couple of weeks I sober up so my hands are steady enough to type my heart out updating my blog but I've not gotten any comments back in months. The accolades better start pouring in pronto or all you readers (if any) I say are literary free loaders casually enabling my moral, psychological and hepatic decay. I know (hope) none of you could live with yourselves if that happened and there'd be all mannor of gnashing of teeth with boat-loads of people jumping off cliffs and stepping in front of speeding trains and dogs and cats sleeping together and general mass pandemonium and we wouldn't want that now would we? So look down. You see all those buttons down there with letters on them. You push them to make words. Good. That's right. Now try a vowel. Very good. Try: "The quick lazy red fox jumped over the huge brown cows." Excellent! Now; " Compared to Dr. Jay's blog, Shakespeare bites.'" By George I think you've got it. Now you know what to do.
That reminds me: After a recent night of immodest farewell revelry for Steve; my last best mate in New Zealand and all round partner in crime, I woke up wondering which is better; Having a night to remember or having a night you can't remember? So now both Steve and Fergal are back in the UK and there is no one left to lead me astray and I like being astray but it's a place that is hard to find alone. My life here is not totally lacking in social contact, I am the token American on a local pub quiz team. The team name is; "Let's Get Quizzical" and we are doing pretty well. Most of the questions are about the obscure minutia of New Zeland geography, pop culture or sports (which All Black player broke his leg in the 1983 1/4 finals match between NZ and South Africa or what did the captain of the 2011 women's Christchurch net ball team get on her 3rd grade spelling test) but about 1 in 10 questions has something to do with the US (name the 13 original colonies, How many Apollo missions landed on the moon (6) State capitals, which NFL team has lost the most superbowls (Buffalo Bills) and to which NBA team was Kevin Durant recently traided (the Nets - "Go Joe-3") ) and stuff that any red blooded American should know. Our team has 5 Kiwis and me but a mix of men and women young and old (me) so we have most of the bases covered and we won the last two fortnightly quizes and @ $180.00 / victory divided by 6 x 2 = $60.00 to me. Not exactly bank but not bad for just knowing a lot of worthless stuff.
The weather down here has been atrocious. It's rained every day for 6 weeks! And between the constant gloom, everybody's British-like Kiwi accent and the coal that lots of peaple still burn down here to heat their houses I feel like a grimy character in a Dicken's novel. The abysmal weather has also put the kibosh on all my out door activities so while yes I now have more time to write I have less to write about.
Down the road a bit come September I will be spending a few days in Austrailia looking around but mostly just to say I've been there and put another pin in the map. Then from Ausie on to the US if the Trumpmeister will let me back in. The very first thing I'm gonna do when I get back is order my Tesla extended range, dual motor, charcoal grey, tasteful chrome wheels, all decked out for full autonomous driving model 3 and then spend some VERY quality time with my women ........hmmmm....... on the other hand I can drive any old time but astray is a hard place to find so maybe the Tesla will not be absolutely the first thing I do when I get back.
God Bless Us Every One
That reminds me: After a recent night of immodest farewell revelry for Steve; my last best mate in New Zealand and all round partner in crime, I woke up wondering which is better; Having a night to remember or having a night you can't remember? So now both Steve and Fergal are back in the UK and there is no one left to lead me astray and I like being astray but it's a place that is hard to find alone. My life here is not totally lacking in social contact, I am the token American on a local pub quiz team. The team name is; "Let's Get Quizzical" and we are doing pretty well. Most of the questions are about the obscure minutia of New Zeland geography, pop culture or sports (which All Black player broke his leg in the 1983 1/4 finals match between NZ and South Africa or what did the captain of the 2011 women's Christchurch net ball team get on her 3rd grade spelling test) but about 1 in 10 questions has something to do with the US (name the 13 original colonies, How many Apollo missions landed on the moon (6) State capitals, which NFL team has lost the most superbowls (Buffalo Bills) and to which NBA team was Kevin Durant recently traided (the Nets - "Go Joe-3") ) and stuff that any red blooded American should know. Our team has 5 Kiwis and me but a mix of men and women young and old (me) so we have most of the bases covered and we won the last two fortnightly quizes and @ $180.00 / victory divided by 6 x 2 = $60.00 to me. Not exactly bank but not bad for just knowing a lot of worthless stuff.
The weather down here has been atrocious. It's rained every day for 6 weeks! And between the constant gloom, everybody's British-like Kiwi accent and the coal that lots of peaple still burn down here to heat their houses I feel like a grimy character in a Dicken's novel. The abysmal weather has also put the kibosh on all my out door activities so while yes I now have more time to write I have less to write about.
Down the road a bit come September I will be spending a few days in Austrailia looking around but mostly just to say I've been there and put another pin in the map. Then from Ausie on to the US if the Trumpmeister will let me back in. The very first thing I'm gonna do when I get back is order my Tesla extended range, dual motor, charcoal grey, tasteful chrome wheels, all decked out for full autonomous driving model 3 and then spend some VERY quality time with my women ........hmmmm....... on the other hand I can drive any old time but astray is a hard place to find so maybe the Tesla will not be absolutely the first thing I do when I get back.
God Bless Us Every One
Saturday, June 29, 2019
So yesterday Helen face times me in a hot toot to sign some on line tax papers, "Down load and print and sign them and i-phone picture them back to me ASAP so we don't go to jail," she says. Well, cheap ass that I am, I never bought a home printer and call me psycho-paranoid but I'll be damned if I'm going to download all my financial info onto an unsecure clinic computer just to use the clinic printer. What to do? What we have here is your basic garden variety dilema: on the one hand risking finacial ruin at the hands of some pasty white, cheetos crumbed, stinky, bearded fat hacker dude living in the his mother's nasty dank basement in Moldova or back to jail again to share a 10 x 20 foot cell with, who would immediately become my new main man, Leroy "Big Willie" Brown (dibs on the top bunk Willie) But hold on..... I'm not your average idiot. In fact, if my last blog is to believed, I am a shoe in for a Nobel Prize for MacGyver stuff. So I bring up the signature page on my lap top and with a felt tip pen sign on the computer screen over the signature box on the e-form. Snap....Snap with my i-phone camera and bada-bing bada-boom send the pics off to Helen. Seriously folks sometimes I even amaze myself. Now for a quick wipe of the screen with a damp cloth to remove the.......hmmmm..... Let me see that pen again ....."Alexa...What does indelible mean?" ....Oh..... Hey, I bet some nail polish remover would work but shoot!~ I forgot, I'm a rough and tumble football watchen beer drinken beef eaten gas passen manly man who would rather root for the Patriots to win the super bowl while jumping up and down doing the chearleader in close clap wearing butter cup yellow skin tight designer jeans than be caught with nail polish and ergo nail polish remover. There must be something around here that would take off.....wait for it...wait for it.....does my epiphany light hurt your eyes? I reach into the pantry and pull out the super special bottle of gin I bought down by Wanaka in a snooty little distillery right next to a 1/2 mile long bra fence (another story for another blog) So glug, glug, glug an ounce or so into a glass and dip dip in the glass with a paper and wipe wipe ....and I smugly sip the rest of the gin as I sit at my spotless computer and book my tickets to Stockholm
Saturday, June 15, 2019
Things have sure been lonely since my main man Fergal left 3 weeks ago. I do have to admit my morning headaches and shakes are better but the voices are starting to come back so what's up with that? And last week my other main man Steve took off for a week of R&R on some South Pacific tropical paradise. Finding a bit of gold now and then helps a little but things got so bad that I frequently found myself wandering the empty evening streets of Greymouth, stopping in front of the sports store and gazing longingly at the volley ball in the window. "Willllsonnn;" I'd whisper making sure he could read my lips and then quetly turn my collar to the cold and damp and doing a classic Bogart, disappear into the night fog moving softly in on little cat feet. Ok, I am saying it straight up: anybody who doesn't think the ending of "Casablanca" is the best movie ending ever is a damn communist or at the very least a leftist symapthizer and to all of you I say a pox on Bernie Sanders.
To make matters worse the wheather around here has been abysmal. It's rained every day for three weeks straight . And windy and cold? Oy vey! But lemons into lemonaide - the other day I was cooking so, as usual, I opened the front door and the big glass slider doors to the back deck hoping to get a little cross breeze to keep the smoke alarm from going off. To get the full picture you have to understand that I live in a shoe box with a one parking space sized (and no not an oversized handicapped spot either )"great" room with combined kitchen, dining and living areas with two tiny bedrooms and a Lou down the hall Well as I said it's been pretty windy around here so instead of a nice gentle smoke clearing breeze I got an everything less than 20 pound... oops...I mean 9.0909090909..... Kg clearing typhoon of biblical proportions. Disaster? Perhaps to the untrained eye but I noticed that most of what blew out the door were things that Helen would have waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat night mares about... I'm talking about your trophy sized, dust bunnies, your odd bits of incriminating evidence of previous indiscretions, last week's shopping list, your museum quality fossilized left overs sitting on the counter from God knows when and the occasional pair of unredeemable undies lying on the floor to name a just few. Well I know a good thing when I see one so now whenever there is a nice brisk northerly wind I do a bit of tidying up........ It's nice when things just seem to work out for the best.
Saving the best for last I was back in the states last month to seee my number one main man Benjamin my absolute favorite grandchild. He is the bomb. During the week I was there I could see that he was getting stronger and more alert every day. While we are all stuned and relieved that Rachel and Bryan are turning out to be such great parents I am concerned that they are not spoiling the little guy enough. I guess I am going to have to step up to the plate myself on that. Also while face timing with me the other day Rachel was whining about how much a nanny will cost when she goes back to work in Sept. So I started thinking. Why not rig up the phone so Ben is always on face time or better yet a bunch of super high def phones like the "Trumen Show?" That way Helen and Margaret can take turns or more likely fight over who gets to gaze lovingly at him remotely hour after hour. And if they see a problem? Easy peasy quick phone Rachel who, just a few steps away in her home office, could in a flash put some random multibillion dollar international bank merger deal on hold and quick like a buny run to change a diaper or someting. And when he goes mobile? What you never heard of go pro? So what if both Helen and Margaret are too busy with something to watch the Ben meister?.....Like that would ever happen. ..... Just out source the job to some tech support dude in some third world country........I ask you; In what universe do I not deserve a Nobel Prize? I mean really! Elon Musk watch and learn!
To make matters worse the wheather around here has been abysmal. It's rained every day for three weeks straight . And windy and cold? Oy vey! But lemons into lemonaide - the other day I was cooking so, as usual, I opened the front door and the big glass slider doors to the back deck hoping to get a little cross breeze to keep the smoke alarm from going off. To get the full picture you have to understand that I live in a shoe box with a one parking space sized (and no not an oversized handicapped spot either )"great" room with combined kitchen, dining and living areas with two tiny bedrooms and a Lou down the hall Well as I said it's been pretty windy around here so instead of a nice gentle smoke clearing breeze I got an everything less than 20 pound... oops...I mean 9.0909090909..... Kg clearing typhoon of biblical proportions. Disaster? Perhaps to the untrained eye but I noticed that most of what blew out the door were things that Helen would have waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat night mares about... I'm talking about your trophy sized, dust bunnies, your odd bits of incriminating evidence of previous indiscretions, last week's shopping list, your museum quality fossilized left overs sitting on the counter from God knows when and the occasional pair of unredeemable undies lying on the floor to name a just few. Well I know a good thing when I see one so now whenever there is a nice brisk northerly wind I do a bit of tidying up........ It's nice when things just seem to work out for the best.
Saving the best for last I was back in the states last month to seee my number one main man Benjamin my absolute favorite grandchild. He is the bomb. During the week I was there I could see that he was getting stronger and more alert every day. While we are all stuned and relieved that Rachel and Bryan are turning out to be such great parents I am concerned that they are not spoiling the little guy enough. I guess I am going to have to step up to the plate myself on that. Also while face timing with me the other day Rachel was whining about how much a nanny will cost when she goes back to work in Sept. So I started thinking. Why not rig up the phone so Ben is always on face time or better yet a bunch of super high def phones like the "Trumen Show?" That way Helen and Margaret can take turns or more likely fight over who gets to gaze lovingly at him remotely hour after hour. And if they see a problem? Easy peasy quick phone Rachel who, just a few steps away in her home office, could in a flash put some random multibillion dollar international bank merger deal on hold and quick like a buny run to change a diaper or someting. And when he goes mobile? What you never heard of go pro? So what if both Helen and Margaret are too busy with something to watch the Ben meister?.....Like that would ever happen. ..... Just out source the job to some tech support dude in some third world country........I ask you; In what universe do I not deserve a Nobel Prize? I mean really! Elon Musk watch and learn!
Saturday, May 11, 2019
More Kiwi Slang U.S. Meaniing Used in a sentence
Stink One : An expression of disappointment
Come Right / Be Right: It will be OK. It's not a problem - "Bro. Oh stink one.
Your leg is totally buggered but no worries. Dr. Jay
will make it come right"
Skint: Broke, No Money - "But dude, I'm totally skint and I can't afford
Dr, Jay's outrageous but totally justified bill."
Skull: To drink an entire beverage in one gulp without a breath - "Bro. Maybe if
you skull this bottle of Tequila your
buggerd leg will come right."
Squizz: To have a look
Twink: White Out - "Bob. I had a squizz at your pictures and you need to have
emergency surgery on that leg. It'll cost $25,000 US"
"But Doc, I'm totally skint. I can't afford it."
"Ok. Hand me that twink and for 50 bucks I'll touch
up your X-rays."
Sprog: Small Child -
Torch: Flashlight - "Honey, It's after midnight and the sprogs are lost in the
swamp again. Where's the torch?"
Tog: Swimsuit - There should be a committee of frat boys to decide who
gets to wear thong togs at the beach.
Wobbly: Temper Tantrum - "When I told Mr. Witherbee that it was time
for another colonoscopy he spit the dummy
and had a major wobbly right here in the office,"
Stink One : An expression of disappointment
Come Right / Be Right: It will be OK. It's not a problem - "Bro. Oh stink one.
Your leg is totally buggered but no worries. Dr. Jay
will make it come right"
Skint: Broke, No Money - "But dude, I'm totally skint and I can't afford
Dr, Jay's outrageous but totally justified bill."
Skull: To drink an entire beverage in one gulp without a breath - "Bro. Maybe if
you skull this bottle of Tequila your
buggerd leg will come right."
Squizz: To have a look
Twink: White Out - "Bob. I had a squizz at your pictures and you need to have
emergency surgery on that leg. It'll cost $25,000 US"
"But Doc, I'm totally skint. I can't afford it."
"Ok. Hand me that twink and for 50 bucks I'll touch
up your X-rays."
Sprog: Small Child -
Torch: Flashlight - "Honey, It's after midnight and the sprogs are lost in the
swamp again. Where's the torch?"
Tog: Swimsuit - There should be a committee of frat boys to decide who
gets to wear thong togs at the beach.
Wobbly: Temper Tantrum - "When I told Mr. Witherbee that it was time
for another colonoscopy he spit the dummy
and had a major wobbly right here in the office,"
Sunday, April 28, 2019
Greetings from New Zealand; the Canada of the south
Well, Fergal and I have been "tearing" up the south island pubs for 5 months now. We always go out trash talken that we are going to paint the town red and close down every pub within a tank of gas but usually around 10:00 we are dragging our-sorry-selves back to our SEPERATE homes for a nice cup of camomile tea and bed.... But for Greymouth 10:00 PM actually IS the absolute zenith of decadence so I guess we are a couple of bad boys after all ..... I would get a bad-ass tatoo but they are just too ouchy. Unfortunately our drunken rampage is comming to an end. Fergal's contract is up next month and he is headed back to the UK. Everybody keeps asking me what am I going to do after he leaves. I think the answer is obvious; detox, rehab and try to get on the "A" list for a liver transplant......and do I really have to do all 12 steps?
But then I think it may be premature to commit myself to a life of pious sobriety. I've been watching the cooking channel now and then to enhance my pathetic cooking skills and noticed that the secret that seperates the abysmal from the great chefs is that the great ones add wine to everything so I tried it: to venison roast, to coq-au-vin, to cheerios.... it really works! Then one day last week in the middle of creating my first true culinary masterpiece (my opus 1) "uh-oh" I had no wine. Not to panic. I also learned from TV that a good chef can think on his / her ( New Zealand is very P.C.) feet and improvise so I grabbed a handy bottle of gin, put on a couple or 10 splashes and popped it all in the oven at 175 degrees CENTIGRADE for 25 minutes and voila....I rule. Iron Chef watch your back.
And talking about Political Correctness, sometimes these Kiwis drive me nuts. You have no doubt all heard about the mass murder at a mosque in Christchurch a few months ago. It was a terrable thing and the whole country did a fantastic job of supporting those affected which was very good. But then came a gush of soul searching, hand wringing and politically correct mea culpa from the lefty leaders as if the people of New Zealand did something wrong or there is rampant racism or islamophobia which enabled this to happen. Believe me the Kiwis have nothing to apologize for. The killer was some random crazy dude from Australia who chose New Zealand specifically because it is so open and welcoming and to demonstrate that no place is safe. It's maddening that so many feel guilty for something that wasn't their fault.
On a happier note Sarah and her beau Andy just left last week after three days of shamelessly POSH Kardashian "camping" and hiking along the Routeburn Treck down south of Queenstown. The weather was unbelievable. We where 3 days on the trail under cloudless skys which down there is highly unusual and with absolutely stunning views of the Southern Alps. I booked the trip through a company called "Ultimate Hikes" and they provided all the transportation and trail guides but most importantly the private lodges along the trail. At the end of each day, out in the middle of nowhere, we had our own 4 star rooms and beds and showers and heat and fancy dinners and breakfasts and box lunches and a bar. No more tent camping for this cowboy. We also spent a day doing adventure stuff in Queenstown and on the way back to Greymouth a helicopter ride to the top of the Franz Joseph glacier and then local stuff around Greymouth and of course no one leaves without a finding little New Zealand gold. But most importantly Andy fixed it so I can connect to my U.S. HBO and Net Flix accounts so if I don't write any more on my blog it's because I am binge watching something on TV.
Laura and her main squeeze Matt where here last month. They said they came for a visit because they love me but I suspect they were really checking up on me for Helen; assessing my chances of surviving on my own until September so Helen can adjust my life insurance policy accordingly. I really believed that the Abel Tasman track that I took (forced) Laura and Matt on would be pretty easy since it was along a string of orange sand beaches. The beaches were really cool but between each was a lot of up and down through the bush and over the rocky headlands jutting out into the sea. We did thirty five miles in 3 days, staying in communal huts - rustic but adequate, sleeping in communal bunk beds and eating dehydrated food and energy bars and hanging with adventurers from all over the world. Definitely tougher then the Routeburn Track with its' small chocolates on freshly fluffed pillows every night. We had one night of pouring down rain but woke before dawn the next morning to clear skies. We had to get up at O-dark thirty to make the low tide crossing across a mile wide estuary to pick up the trail on the other side. There were several low tide crossings along the way but this was the longest and I thought the coolest part of the trip - wading knee deep in water, crossing a giant tidal flat opening eastward to the sun rising over the Pacific Ocean. Very cool! Long story short we all made it and in a unanimous decision by the judges (me) the 2019 award for toughness on the trail goes to Laura and Matt. After that a few days in and around Greymouth panning for gold, checking out the kiwi birds, rubbing elbows with some locals and driving the coast road - still I think the prettiest road I've ever been on. And now that everyone who is coming has come and gone I don't have to clean my house ever again. Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition
I guess you all know by now that Rachel had her baby and so is now more convinced than ever that epidurals are the next best thing to those to-die-for Louis Vuitton strapless hooker-red stilettos she's been pining over for 6 months. Those of us who know Rachel best; me, Laura and Sarah, where taking bets on how long after Helen left Virgina it would be before Child Protective Services showed up but Rachel and Bryan, as it turns out, are great parents and little Benjamin is doing just fine. She gets her nurturing skills from me you know. Anyway, next week I am headed over to the hood in Virginia to hang with my new best homie Ben in his crib in his crib and make sure he chooses, as I did, the road less traveled, which will make all the difference
Lastly I need a ruling on something from some local Chelan residents. (No, not on the morality of my whiskey for gold scam which buy the way is turning out to be quite profitable.) I just got back from my ususal 5 mile run and as aways I was running commando, No not that kind of commando. I just never run with wires on my head relentlessly piping in that Godless abomination they call music these days (Hey you kids get off of my lawn!) I could see maybe Rock and Roll or the stock market report but that blasphemy...No. I like to always maintain total situational awareness and keep all my senses open to, and my mind free to be seduced by, the world's randomness. It also keeps me from being killed by cars comming up behind me. Which is to say my mind is free to wander and I passed a local school with an old basket ball court and two little Kiwi kids chucking up baskets. Well, you know how thoughts lead on to thoughts and I started thinking about "little" Joey Harris and how he totally schooled Steph Curry in the NBA 3 point contest and then I epiphanied maybe we should start calling him "Joe-3" It just came to me. It's a gift I guess. So what's the ruling?
Dr. Jay
Well, Fergal and I have been "tearing" up the south island pubs for 5 months now. We always go out trash talken that we are going to paint the town red and close down every pub within a tank of gas but usually around 10:00 we are dragging our-sorry-selves back to our SEPERATE homes for a nice cup of camomile tea and bed.... But for Greymouth 10:00 PM actually IS the absolute zenith of decadence so I guess we are a couple of bad boys after all ..... I would get a bad-ass tatoo but they are just too ouchy. Unfortunately our drunken rampage is comming to an end. Fergal's contract is up next month and he is headed back to the UK. Everybody keeps asking me what am I going to do after he leaves. I think the answer is obvious; detox, rehab and try to get on the "A" list for a liver transplant......and do I really have to do all 12 steps?
But then I think it may be premature to commit myself to a life of pious sobriety. I've been watching the cooking channel now and then to enhance my pathetic cooking skills and noticed that the secret that seperates the abysmal from the great chefs is that the great ones add wine to everything so I tried it: to venison roast, to coq-au-vin, to cheerios.... it really works! Then one day last week in the middle of creating my first true culinary masterpiece (my opus 1) "uh-oh" I had no wine. Not to panic. I also learned from TV that a good chef can think on his / her ( New Zealand is very P.C.) feet and improvise so I grabbed a handy bottle of gin, put on a couple or 10 splashes and popped it all in the oven at 175 degrees CENTIGRADE for 25 minutes and voila....I rule. Iron Chef watch your back.
And talking about Political Correctness, sometimes these Kiwis drive me nuts. You have no doubt all heard about the mass murder at a mosque in Christchurch a few months ago. It was a terrable thing and the whole country did a fantastic job of supporting those affected which was very good. But then came a gush of soul searching, hand wringing and politically correct mea culpa from the lefty leaders as if the people of New Zealand did something wrong or there is rampant racism or islamophobia which enabled this to happen. Believe me the Kiwis have nothing to apologize for. The killer was some random crazy dude from Australia who chose New Zealand specifically because it is so open and welcoming and to demonstrate that no place is safe. It's maddening that so many feel guilty for something that wasn't their fault.
On a happier note Sarah and her beau Andy just left last week after three days of shamelessly POSH Kardashian "camping" and hiking along the Routeburn Treck down south of Queenstown. The weather was unbelievable. We where 3 days on the trail under cloudless skys which down there is highly unusual and with absolutely stunning views of the Southern Alps. I booked the trip through a company called "Ultimate Hikes" and they provided all the transportation and trail guides but most importantly the private lodges along the trail. At the end of each day, out in the middle of nowhere, we had our own 4 star rooms and beds and showers and heat and fancy dinners and breakfasts and box lunches and a bar. No more tent camping for this cowboy. We also spent a day doing adventure stuff in Queenstown and on the way back to Greymouth a helicopter ride to the top of the Franz Joseph glacier and then local stuff around Greymouth and of course no one leaves without a finding little New Zealand gold. But most importantly Andy fixed it so I can connect to my U.S. HBO and Net Flix accounts so if I don't write any more on my blog it's because I am binge watching something on TV.
Laura and her main squeeze Matt where here last month. They said they came for a visit because they love me but I suspect they were really checking up on me for Helen; assessing my chances of surviving on my own until September so Helen can adjust my life insurance policy accordingly. I really believed that the Abel Tasman track that I took (forced) Laura and Matt on would be pretty easy since it was along a string of orange sand beaches. The beaches were really cool but between each was a lot of up and down through the bush and over the rocky headlands jutting out into the sea. We did thirty five miles in 3 days, staying in communal huts - rustic but adequate, sleeping in communal bunk beds and eating dehydrated food and energy bars and hanging with adventurers from all over the world. Definitely tougher then the Routeburn Track with its' small chocolates on freshly fluffed pillows every night. We had one night of pouring down rain but woke before dawn the next morning to clear skies. We had to get up at O-dark thirty to make the low tide crossing across a mile wide estuary to pick up the trail on the other side. There were several low tide crossings along the way but this was the longest and I thought the coolest part of the trip - wading knee deep in water, crossing a giant tidal flat opening eastward to the sun rising over the Pacific Ocean. Very cool! Long story short we all made it and in a unanimous decision by the judges (me) the 2019 award for toughness on the trail goes to Laura and Matt. After that a few days in and around Greymouth panning for gold, checking out the kiwi birds, rubbing elbows with some locals and driving the coast road - still I think the prettiest road I've ever been on. And now that everyone who is coming has come and gone I don't have to clean my house ever again. Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition
I guess you all know by now that Rachel had her baby and so is now more convinced than ever that epidurals are the next best thing to those to-die-for Louis Vuitton strapless hooker-red stilettos she's been pining over for 6 months. Those of us who know Rachel best; me, Laura and Sarah, where taking bets on how long after Helen left Virgina it would be before Child Protective Services showed up but Rachel and Bryan, as it turns out, are great parents and little Benjamin is doing just fine. She gets her nurturing skills from me you know. Anyway, next week I am headed over to the hood in Virginia to hang with my new best homie Ben in his crib in his crib and make sure he chooses, as I did, the road less traveled, which will make all the difference
Lastly I need a ruling on something from some local Chelan residents. (No, not on the morality of my whiskey for gold scam which buy the way is turning out to be quite profitable.) I just got back from my ususal 5 mile run and as aways I was running commando, No not that kind of commando. I just never run with wires on my head relentlessly piping in that Godless abomination they call music these days (Hey you kids get off of my lawn!) I could see maybe Rock and Roll or the stock market report but that blasphemy...No. I like to always maintain total situational awareness and keep all my senses open to, and my mind free to be seduced by, the world's randomness. It also keeps me from being killed by cars comming up behind me. Which is to say my mind is free to wander and I passed a local school with an old basket ball court and two little Kiwi kids chucking up baskets. Well, you know how thoughts lead on to thoughts and I started thinking about "little" Joey Harris and how he totally schooled Steph Curry in the NBA 3 point contest and then I epiphanied maybe we should start calling him "Joe-3" It just came to me. It's a gift I guess. So what's the ruling?
Dr. Jay
Saturday, April 27, 2019
Sunday, February 24, 2019
After Helen and I finished doing smoochy face on facetime on St Valenitne's day last week she started in griping about the cold and all the snowing going on in Chelan this winter. To me the pictures look like a winter wonderland. "Honey," I said "Let go of those bad vibes and open your (Shoot, that sun burned spot on my back is still soar. How could ALL those beach volley ball girls miss the same spot with the sun block? Stupid English / Swedish translater app.) heart to the wonderous beauty of nature."
She also tells me the people around town have been giving her the stink eye and throwing some hate on her because I haven't been doing my blog. Well. to all you loyal complainers .....know this.....Helen is not the boss of me. She did, however, text me this morning saying no more phone se... "romance" until I get going on my blog so here at my computer I sit on a sunny summer Saturday (say that five times fast) in Greymouth.
Our little clinic depends on an endless phalanx of temporary docs from throughout the English Commonwealth: The U.K., Australia, Canada, South Africa, India, to man the battlements against disease and pestilence but we got our first doc from Ireland last month: Fergal O'Driscoll. Everyone else at the clinic is here with a spouse but Fergal's main squeeze decided to stay home for his 6 months here so we inevitably fell in together and are now two wild and crazy guys around town. In fact I'm pretty sure most people think we are an "item." Now I'm not a homophobe or anything but in this case I AM a homodenier - Fergal and I are just drinking and carousing buddies but sometimes the categorically false and totally wrong and unfounded perception of our "relationship" works to our advantage. In the pubs all the young ladys think we are a cute couple and so let their guard down. Now you understand that Fergal is Irish and has the gift of gab to the max and so, to any random stranger, within 3 minutes Fergal becomes the best friend they never knew they had. It's kind of sad actually. With their shields down and between Fergals' verbal magic and my boyish good looks we hardly ever have to roofie drinks anymore
I ran a 1/2 marathon last weekend in a town about 60 miles up the coast. I was shooting for a time of 100 minutes but came in at 110 minutes. I am pretty sure I could have run 13 miles in 100 min but everything is metric down here so the race was listed as 22 kilometers which is supposed to be the same but just sounds longer. Damn metric system. Anyway, on the way back we; Fergal and I, picked up two kids hitchhiking around NZ one of whom was Liedy; a 20 somthing young lady from France. Well, I'd been preparing for this moment for donky years and after they were safely in the car and with my best ever inspector Clouseau impression I said: "En moi confiance je suis un medecin" which I thought ment: "Trust me I'm a doctor." but judging from Liedy's reaction it's apparently closer to: " Would you like some candy and pictures in my widowless black van little girl?" Fergal immediatly used his powers to make everything righteous and we talked all the way back to Greymouth about Brexit, the yellow vest thing happening in France and argued about weather French or Italian wine is better.
I have been in country now for six months and I was thinking the other day what do I miss most about home...other than the obvious...MY WOMEN....and the kids and my FJ-40 (Toyota Land Cruiser) and the dog and my Chelan buds and my FJ-40 and the turtles and my house and my FJ-40 and my tractor....but other than that I would have to say the magic kitchen and the magic laundry room are what I long for the most. Gourmet meals would magically appear and the dirty dishes would just vanish overnight. My dirty cloths - and I am talking some pretty groatty undies - would just disappear and then reappear clean and nicely folded in my closet and drawers. Yes, I definitly miss that a lot. It just does't work the same down here. It must have something to do with being south of the equater.
FYI two more quirky things about New Zealand; No lie but it is a federal law that every employer here must provide to every emplyee all the wherewithal (tea, milk, sugar) for tea time in the afternoon and this is the only non-third world country with no capital gains tax and since I am a tea drinker and don't like paying taxes this place is looking pretty good. So the question then is; for how much or, more accuratly, how little can I be bought and enticed to stay here forever by the siren's song of low taxes and a free cup of tea every 4 PM on the dot? Well it all comes down to physics....and just regular physics not quantum physics so don't have a cow. As you know Rachel is due to deliver our first grandchild ( a boy... little Charles Jay I'll call him ...no matter what his birth certificate says) sometime around the Ides of March. My expectation is that once born, like a super massive black hole out in space, little C.J.'s grand father event horizen will extend out light years beyond all reckoning and once crossed neither I nor even light itself can slip the unresistible pull of his drooly, poopy gravitational field. Which is to say between little C.J., MY WOMEN and my FJ-40 I will be back in the states sometine in September. I also feel it is my sacred duty as a grand father to teach little C.J. all the bad habits that took me a life time to aquire and perfect.........but then again if they throw in free scones with afternoon tea??hmmm?? Recalculating...Recalculating.
Now for some housekeeping info. I live in shoe box of a house about 100 yards from the Tasman Sea. I can hear the waves thundering on the beach all night which is kind of a relaxing lullaby (See Helen, at least My ears are open to natures wonders) and I generally sleep like a rock. Laura and her hunk of burning love Matt are coming to visit in a few weeks. I plan on testing their mettle on a three day hike on the Abel Tasman Coast track; a pretty flat walk along the north coast of the south island and so, as far as metals are concerned , aluminum will sufice. That of course assumes we avoid the quicksand and the crocodiles. Sarah and her sig. other Andy will be coming in April . To them I will show no mercy and we will be going on a gruelling 3 day mountain adventure along the Routeburn track down in the southern alps of New Zealand. All I am going to say about that is that "Routeburn" is Maori for "Donner." I'll let you know.
So that's it for this installment of my blog
I think I'll give Helen a call.
She also tells me the people around town have been giving her the stink eye and throwing some hate on her because I haven't been doing my blog. Well. to all you loyal complainers .....know this.....Helen is not the boss of me. She did, however, text me this morning saying no more phone se... "romance" until I get going on my blog so here at my computer I sit on a sunny summer Saturday (say that five times fast) in Greymouth.
Our little clinic depends on an endless phalanx of temporary docs from throughout the English Commonwealth: The U.K., Australia, Canada, South Africa, India, to man the battlements against disease and pestilence but we got our first doc from Ireland last month: Fergal O'Driscoll. Everyone else at the clinic is here with a spouse but Fergal's main squeeze decided to stay home for his 6 months here so we inevitably fell in together and are now two wild and crazy guys around town. In fact I'm pretty sure most people think we are an "item." Now I'm not a homophobe or anything but in this case I AM a homodenier - Fergal and I are just drinking and carousing buddies but sometimes the categorically false and totally wrong and unfounded perception of our "relationship" works to our advantage. In the pubs all the young ladys think we are a cute couple and so let their guard down. Now you understand that Fergal is Irish and has the gift of gab to the max and so, to any random stranger, within 3 minutes Fergal becomes the best friend they never knew they had. It's kind of sad actually. With their shields down and between Fergals' verbal magic and my boyish good looks we hardly ever have to roofie drinks anymore
I ran a 1/2 marathon last weekend in a town about 60 miles up the coast. I was shooting for a time of 100 minutes but came in at 110 minutes. I am pretty sure I could have run 13 miles in 100 min but everything is metric down here so the race was listed as 22 kilometers which is supposed to be the same but just sounds longer. Damn metric system. Anyway, on the way back we; Fergal and I, picked up two kids hitchhiking around NZ one of whom was Liedy; a 20 somthing young lady from France. Well, I'd been preparing for this moment for donky years and after they were safely in the car and with my best ever inspector Clouseau impression I said: "En moi confiance je suis un medecin" which I thought ment: "Trust me I'm a doctor." but judging from Liedy's reaction it's apparently closer to: " Would you like some candy and pictures in my widowless black van little girl?" Fergal immediatly used his powers to make everything righteous and we talked all the way back to Greymouth about Brexit, the yellow vest thing happening in France and argued about weather French or Italian wine is better.
I have been in country now for six months and I was thinking the other day what do I miss most about home...other than the obvious...MY WOMEN....and the kids and my FJ-40 (Toyota Land Cruiser) and the dog and my Chelan buds and my FJ-40 and the turtles and my house and my FJ-40 and my tractor....but other than that I would have to say the magic kitchen and the magic laundry room are what I long for the most. Gourmet meals would magically appear and the dirty dishes would just vanish overnight. My dirty cloths - and I am talking some pretty groatty undies - would just disappear and then reappear clean and nicely folded in my closet and drawers. Yes, I definitly miss that a lot. It just does't work the same down here. It must have something to do with being south of the equater.
FYI two more quirky things about New Zealand; No lie but it is a federal law that every employer here must provide to every emplyee all the wherewithal (tea, milk, sugar) for tea time in the afternoon and this is the only non-third world country with no capital gains tax and since I am a tea drinker and don't like paying taxes this place is looking pretty good. So the question then is; for how much or, more accuratly, how little can I be bought and enticed to stay here forever by the siren's song of low taxes and a free cup of tea every 4 PM on the dot? Well it all comes down to physics....and just regular physics not quantum physics so don't have a cow. As you know Rachel is due to deliver our first grandchild ( a boy... little Charles Jay I'll call him ...no matter what his birth certificate says) sometime around the Ides of March. My expectation is that once born, like a super massive black hole out in space, little C.J.'s grand father event horizen will extend out light years beyond all reckoning and once crossed neither I nor even light itself can slip the unresistible pull of his drooly, poopy gravitational field. Which is to say between little C.J., MY WOMEN and my FJ-40 I will be back in the states sometine in September. I also feel it is my sacred duty as a grand father to teach little C.J. all the bad habits that took me a life time to aquire and perfect.........but then again if they throw in free scones with afternoon tea??hmmm?? Recalculating...Recalculating.
Now for some housekeeping info. I live in shoe box of a house about 100 yards from the Tasman Sea. I can hear the waves thundering on the beach all night which is kind of a relaxing lullaby (See Helen, at least My ears are open to natures wonders) and I generally sleep like a rock. Laura and her hunk of burning love Matt are coming to visit in a few weeks. I plan on testing their mettle on a three day hike on the Abel Tasman Coast track; a pretty flat walk along the north coast of the south island and so, as far as metals are concerned , aluminum will sufice. That of course assumes we avoid the quicksand and the crocodiles. Sarah and her sig. other Andy will be coming in April . To them I will show no mercy and we will be going on a gruelling 3 day mountain adventure along the Routeburn track down in the southern alps of New Zealand. All I am going to say about that is that "Routeburn" is Maori for "Donner." I'll let you know.
So that's it for this installment of my blog
I think I'll give Helen a call.
Sunday, January 6, 2019
I know it's been a while since I 've written anything but it's raining today so I have time and I have lots to say. So buckle up and hang on it's going to be a bumpy ride
First, to all you Debbie Downers who gave me a snowball's chance in hell, which is to say took a short position, on my survival down here without Helen....a pox...a pox I say on you and your family. I'm still on my feet - Yes maybe a little malnourished and with multiple vitamin deficiencies, scurvy comes to mind, and coughing a bit from the smoke inhalation from countless catastrophic culinary calamities and yes I am still struggling with my plyntiphobia - but getting counseling and in recovery - 3 days, 14 hours and 33 minutes - I get my first clean clothes coin next week.... but still on my feet. Hey! I'm a victim here too ya know.
So how much does it rain around here on the west coast you ask? It rains so much that ducks carry umbrellas ($50.00 to anyone who comes up with something better) but it does rain enough that a lot of pretty nice houses out in the wop wops (Kiwi for boon docks) get their domestic water from what runs off their roof. No kidding. The rain water is collected in the gutters and drains into big
in- ground cisterns and then pumped straight into the house. When there is a drought ( three days without rain) the local fire department sucks water out of any convenient creek and fills every one's cisterns. Now New Zealand is known for all of it's beautiful birds. In fact the only mammal native to NZ is a small bat. So with all these cool birds flying around one has to wonder what all is up there on the roof. So if offered a beverage when visiting a house outside the city water supply it is my policy to, no matter how dehydrated, decline the "anything with water in it" option but rather opt for, if offered, beer, wine or whisky - single malt is preferred but a fine bourbon will do nicely in a pinch.
Now that we are on the subject of bourbon whisky I need to tell you about my new fall back carer path as a bootlegger / gold miner. A month or so ago I drove out to the wop wops about 30 miles outside of town and 7 miles up a gravel road to a grass field car park and trail head along the Moonlight River to hike up the Moonlight River trail. Parked there were two RV campers and out in front of one sitting in the warm sun drinking what looked like warm beer was this casually groomed Kiwi dude. Most Kiwis are pretty friendly as a baseline and on top of that throw in who knows how many beers and before I knew it I had a new best friend. So Mark lives up there with his friend Martinez who lives in the other van and they both support themselves by panning for gold in the Moonlight River going into town every month or so for supplies. Between them they usually find about $100.00 worth of gold a day but every once in a while they find a nugget worth thousands of dollars. Well he didn't have to say gold nugget twice to get my attention and after talking about gold for a while I didn't have time to get very far up the Moonlight trail. The next weekend I went back up the Moonlight to do the hike and afterwords dropped off a 6 pack of beer as pay back for the gold panning advice. Mark was overjoyed to get more beer and payed me with a small $15.00 gold nugget. It was then that I realized that I had the fever.....The gold fever and Mark said from the look in my eyes I had it bad. I also realized I had stumbled on to a new business opportunity. Meanwhile back at the ranch Rachel and her hubs Bryan were due to arrive in a few days for a 2 week visit (Even at 30 weeks pregnant, 2 weeks with Rachel was go, go, go, and fun, fun, fun and left me physically and financially drained) and so to give them an authentic, back woods, off the grid, New Zealand hillbilly experience I arranged with Mark to return with R and B for some supervised hands on gold panning time. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind that Rachel would get the fever bad with the first tiny glint of color (gold) in her pan. Leaving nothing to chance we arrived back with a nice bottle of Makers Mark bourbon whisky. Mark was ecstatic and helped us, mostly Rachel, find about $50.00 U.S. in gold and, as expected, Rachel was more than willing to kill anyone who tried to take HER gold away. So the coin of the realm up the Moonlight appears to be whisky and gold.
I do need a consensus ruling on this. Am I a bad person for running whisky up the Moonlight for gold or is it just good business? Why does the word "enabler" keep coming to mind? On second thought to heck with what you think....I must have more gold!
So how is business? The patients and the medical problems down here are pretty much the same as in the US. The other doctors, nurses and people in the clinic are great. My house is small and humble but funtional. Helen says I need to work on my humility anyway. I am hopping to jack up my humility score enough to become damn near perfect. The country is beautiful, there a lots of outdoor things to do and the Kiwis are super friendly. I've adjusted to driving on the left side of the road with hardly any life threatening close calls....yet. The pay is enough to support my living and exploring expenses and if I ever did need to, I know where to find a bit of gold to supplement my income. I 've even gotten pretty good at using the Med Tech the computerized medical records system which is much simpler than the ones available in the US. The way the clinic is set up and run however is very inefficient especially regarding the doctors time. The administration keeps saying we need more primary care doctors but I tell them I could see 3 times as many patients if I had my own nurse to boss around and a transcriptionist. Stephanie! Marie! Help!
First, to all you Debbie Downers who gave me a snowball's chance in hell, which is to say took a short position, on my survival down here without Helen....a pox...a pox I say on you and your family. I'm still on my feet - Yes maybe a little malnourished and with multiple vitamin deficiencies, scurvy comes to mind, and coughing a bit from the smoke inhalation from countless catastrophic culinary calamities and yes I am still struggling with my plyntiphobia - but getting counseling and in recovery - 3 days, 14 hours and 33 minutes - I get my first clean clothes coin next week.... but still on my feet. Hey! I'm a victim here too ya know.
So how much does it rain around here on the west coast you ask? It rains so much that ducks carry umbrellas ($50.00 to anyone who comes up with something better) but it does rain enough that a lot of pretty nice houses out in the wop wops (Kiwi for boon docks) get their domestic water from what runs off their roof. No kidding. The rain water is collected in the gutters and drains into big
in- ground cisterns and then pumped straight into the house. When there is a drought ( three days without rain) the local fire department sucks water out of any convenient creek and fills every one's cisterns. Now New Zealand is known for all of it's beautiful birds. In fact the only mammal native to NZ is a small bat. So with all these cool birds flying around one has to wonder what all is up there on the roof. So if offered a beverage when visiting a house outside the city water supply it is my policy to, no matter how dehydrated, decline the "anything with water in it" option but rather opt for, if offered, beer, wine or whisky - single malt is preferred but a fine bourbon will do nicely in a pinch.
Now that we are on the subject of bourbon whisky I need to tell you about my new fall back carer path as a bootlegger / gold miner. A month or so ago I drove out to the wop wops about 30 miles outside of town and 7 miles up a gravel road to a grass field car park and trail head along the Moonlight River to hike up the Moonlight River trail. Parked there were two RV campers and out in front of one sitting in the warm sun drinking what looked like warm beer was this casually groomed Kiwi dude. Most Kiwis are pretty friendly as a baseline and on top of that throw in who knows how many beers and before I knew it I had a new best friend. So Mark lives up there with his friend Martinez who lives in the other van and they both support themselves by panning for gold in the Moonlight River going into town every month or so for supplies. Between them they usually find about $100.00 worth of gold a day but every once in a while they find a nugget worth thousands of dollars. Well he didn't have to say gold nugget twice to get my attention and after talking about gold for a while I didn't have time to get very far up the Moonlight trail. The next weekend I went back up the Moonlight to do the hike and afterwords dropped off a 6 pack of beer as pay back for the gold panning advice. Mark was overjoyed to get more beer and payed me with a small $15.00 gold nugget. It was then that I realized that I had the fever.....The gold fever and Mark said from the look in my eyes I had it bad. I also realized I had stumbled on to a new business opportunity. Meanwhile back at the ranch Rachel and her hubs Bryan were due to arrive in a few days for a 2 week visit (Even at 30 weeks pregnant, 2 weeks with Rachel was go, go, go, and fun, fun, fun and left me physically and financially drained) and so to give them an authentic, back woods, off the grid, New Zealand hillbilly experience I arranged with Mark to return with R and B for some supervised hands on gold panning time. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind that Rachel would get the fever bad with the first tiny glint of color (gold) in her pan. Leaving nothing to chance we arrived back with a nice bottle of Makers Mark bourbon whisky. Mark was ecstatic and helped us, mostly Rachel, find about $50.00 U.S. in gold and, as expected, Rachel was more than willing to kill anyone who tried to take HER gold away. So the coin of the realm up the Moonlight appears to be whisky and gold.
I do need a consensus ruling on this. Am I a bad person for running whisky up the Moonlight for gold or is it just good business? Why does the word "enabler" keep coming to mind? On second thought to heck with what you think....I must have more gold!
So how is business? The patients and the medical problems down here are pretty much the same as in the US. The other doctors, nurses and people in the clinic are great. My house is small and humble but funtional. Helen says I need to work on my humility anyway. I am hopping to jack up my humility score enough to become damn near perfect. The country is beautiful, there a lots of outdoor things to do and the Kiwis are super friendly. I've adjusted to driving on the left side of the road with hardly any life threatening close calls....yet. The pay is enough to support my living and exploring expenses and if I ever did need to, I know where to find a bit of gold to supplement my income. I 've even gotten pretty good at using the Med Tech the computerized medical records system which is much simpler than the ones available in the US. The way the clinic is set up and run however is very inefficient especially regarding the doctors time. The administration keeps saying we need more primary care doctors but I tell them I could see 3 times as many patients if I had my own nurse to boss around and a transcriptionist. Stephanie! Marie! Help!
There are a few things I find challenging however. Call it what you want but the medical care here is definitely rigidly rationed. I have trouble with this for several reasons. There are many patients that don't get the care they need because they don't score high enough on the access score to see a specialist and even if they do, but there is no availability of the service, then things just don't get done. This is particularly true for orthopedics. There is virtually no availability of non emergency orthopedic services so I have many patients enduring years of disabling hip or knee pain waiting for their hip or knee replacements. In general patients here wait for months to years for things that would generally be done in days to weeks in the US. Also it seems that here many times the specialist's primary concern is the system and not what is best for the patient. For example I have had several patients with a history and / or symptoms that would get them a colonoscopy in a week or so in the US get declined by the surgeons here because their access score is not high enough even though their symptoms are worrisome for cancer. I even volunteered to do the scopes myself at no charge but that is against policy. And this is especially vexing since colon cancer is the number one cancer killer in NZ and there is a big national campaign to educate people about early cancer symptoms and detection. While the US system is far from perfect it was my training and was generally my experience that "What's best for the patient" is the guiding principle in treating all patients in the US and the system is flexible enough to allow for the fact that every patient is different. The other thing that I have a problem with is the unavailability of some very useful medicines - particularly for Type 2 diabetes which is very common down here, These meds are expensive but are much much better than what is available. It just bugs me to know that I am unable to offer my patients what I think is the best treatment available.
This all would be understandable if New Zealand was a poor third world country but it's not. It is fairly well off. Helen keeps telling me to keep my mouth shut, don't make waves and just do my job and enjoy my time in NZ. But keeping my mouth shut is not something I excel at so I guess we'll see how it goes.
Cheers
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