Funday Friday in Our Old Home Town

Friday 26 June

Louis had been invited out to King’s College to visit their new recording studio and add his professional advice to the mix. Over the last decade he has worked with Gary Burton, one of the science teachers there who is a bit “School of Rock” and would engage many of the less advantaged, scholarship students and others in forming a band called “The Burtones” which regularly toured in Thailand! The students would record an album each year at Ellamy Studios which Louis always enjoyed. King's College is a real anachronism, set in the heart of South Auckland all red brick buildings, park like grounds and a stunning chapel. It is one of the more expensive Kiwi boarding schools but offers a number of scholarships to less advantaged students or those who have good rugby skills 😉

Meanwhile Albi & I had snuggles and then walked round the block before I abandoned her (apparently) to hop on a bus to Broadway to see Jacob at Blaze Hair. Being back on an Auckland bus felt oh so familiar, as I used to commute to work at UoA on the bus back in the day.

Jacob is an awesome hairdresser - I found him through a FB post for haircut models when he was an apprentice at Killer Hair 3-4 years ago and have been coming to him ever since. After 2 years of free or at cost treatments, I am more than happy to pay for his excellent services now ❤️. He's recently moved to Blaze in Newmarket so I popped in there, for a haircut to try and remove almost all of the blonde bits and finally be my natural hair colour for the first time in about 15 years! So happy with the final effect 🩶

Louis swung by and picked me up from there after test driving another GWM Cannon up on the North Shore, and we whizzed out to IKEA (which I for one, was thoroughly over excited about!). It's been open for over 6 months now so the novelty value is wearing off a little, but it was still pretty busy.

Spent a happy hour or so wandering the famous IKEA labyrinth, swooning over pieces we fancied for a future home (the checked wingback chair and footstool - super comfortable, cost $400/450 and the checks made me feel homesick for my early post-student days in London in the early 90s!) and reminiscing over items we owned & loved back in the UK (Billy bookcase of course); had the obligatory Swedish meatballs for lunch, bought 4 smallish things to take back to Banjo and departed on a wave of nostalgia 🇸🇪 Happiness is a trip to IKEA!

Time for a siesta then off to Green Bay with grandma Helen for a delicious dinner of salmon & risotto with Russ and two of his lovely noff-spring (blended family & kids’ partners!) - June and Carlo. Minnie the dog found us all rather dull so she put herself to bed, entirely wrapping herself in her favourite Batman fleece blanket. Wonderful way to round off the day 🥰.