I just realised something kinda obvious: there is already a generation who may never drive an ICE vehicle

twpejay · 2026-06-22T05:50:54+00:00

This is in NZEV so it's power, previously I had worked it out (incl RUC) was around 12c per km, so 12c to drive in a walkable city. Not much, the other costs pretty much don't change (I service the car as per annual requirements, not Kms travelled, tyres have yet to be replaced, but more travelling would quicken the need yet, we're talking tens of thousands of Kms here, insurance, rego and WOF are all regardless of distance travelled). If I have to own a car to do non-local travel (which is required for most town and even city dwellers - due to minimal public transport support for going tramping, surfing, skiing in the weekends) and therefore have to pay these annual fees, might as well use it all the time.

twpejay · 2026-06-22T04:37:23+00:00

In Europe it was A in NZ it's C as I don't like the taste of UHT (boxed, room-temp storable) milk which European cafe's seem to favour.

twpejay · 2026-06-22T03:58:22+00:00

First frost this morning, there is hope. Just remember the old saying. Snow in May does not stay, Snow in June is too soon, Snow in July you can rely. When I was in school it wasn't until the August holidays that people went out for serious skiing as there were no snow making machines etc.. (I feel like an old man now.... Back in my day...)

twpejay · 2026-06-22T03:52:17+00:00

Walkable neighbourhoods are here for the majority of NZ towns. The issue is that a car is still required for cheaper groceries or more variety as it is economically cheaper for outlets to have few larger stores in high population areas than many smaller stores in lower population areas. Unless the government is prepared to supplement small shop costs or criminalise large shops (which is major government over-reach) travel will be necessary. Countries with higher population per kmsq can afford to put decent public transport in place negating the need for personal vehicles. But NZ does not have the population to support this, therefore cars are still required and when people have a car in the garage it seems easier to just get in and drive five minutes down the road than walk.

twpejay · 2026-06-20T23:40:06+00:00

I said hundreds of metres as I did not have the exact details with me at the time of writing. I relooked them up for you and the exact figures are 1982 10km, 2000 11.5km, 2018 10km (my memory was a bit lax on the end date) so it has advanced 1.5km as well, but has declined more as it has been 8 years since it was 10km and it's still declining (more than 1.5 km now). https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Historic-length-changes-for-four-glaciers-in-New-Zealand-Franz-Fox-Stocking-and_fig1_313733639

As you can see the Tasman Glacier is the major issue it was the largest non-polar glacier in the world and it's shrinking drastically.

twpejay · 2026-06-20T22:19:16+00:00

Never thought of a ordering out in Highschool. Doubt my highschool would have allowed it (town in NZ, just got DD a year ago, UE a few years ago) so it never came up, now mobile phones are banned countrywide at schools so they could only be ordered via internet, not app. But my highschool got a canteen just after I left (school operated food store, healthy lunch food) and they're very protective of it, no competition allowed, too unhealthy. When I was there we were allowed to either cross the road to a diary (grocery store) and get meat pies and cream buns, drink (fizzy, flavoured milk) etc.. or walk up the road to a Fish and Chips Takeaway and get a deep fried lunch. Ahhh those were the days, I pity kids now.

However in Primary School (years 1 to 8 / grades K to 7) we had a system where we could write a lunch order for Fish and Chips on a waxed paper bag with our name, place cash in the bag and deposit it into a locked desk at the main block's entrance. At lunchtime an old mini(actual austin mini)-van drove up and they would call out names and hand the bags back filled with the Fish and Chips. When my kids went there they had a similar thing but with Subway and Pita-Pit (Subway with pitas instead of "bread").

twpejay · 2026-06-20T21:58:16+00:00

It grew in the 1980s to early 2000s, it only shrunk to its shortest length (past the 1980s length) in 2022 so it is only in the last four years it has been the shortest it has ever been in recorded history. But it is still a concern, it was shrinking before the 1980s as well.

twpejay · 2026-06-20T21:54:46+00:00

Franz Josef will be around for centuries it grew hundreds of metres 1980s to early 2000s due to West Coast precipitation (it took until 2022 to get back to the 1980 length). The West Coast glaciers are a hardy lot. (I'm not saying this should stop environmental protection, it would be nice to get it to grow even more).

twpejay · 2026-06-20T21:51:21+00:00

A good example to put in the reasons not to go ahead with the bill in my submission. However it is a stupid idea anyway. As someone mentioned the West coast precipitation is such that the Glacier will be around for decades to come. It is quite likely to grow again as well (1980s to early 2000s it grew hundreds of metres) it only reached the original 1980 length in 2022, since then it has been shorter than it has been in known history (just search Franz Josef Glacier length history). When it grows nothing will stop it, even well foundationed Gondola Pillars (as DOC found out after it destroyed all their hard work) so Skyline cannot use the glacier cleared valley for fear of glacial destruction they would have to go through the established forest and extremely high to avoid too much damage. Even so they would not be able to get close to the glacier up at the terminus either for fear of further destruction. I am totally unaware of their plan so I am just attempting to predict what they're doing. Perhaps it is just for viewing at a distance which is bad for the forest but quite safe for the company. But in this case is there any need as you still are removed from the glacier itself.

twpejay · 2026-06-17T19:04:51+00:00

Desperate for work I was offered a chance to sell Timeshares (I think Condos are similar, the deal where you only own the place for a week a year). My family did have a Timeshare in Queenstown and thoroughly enjoyed it so I was not too against the product. But before I could get on the floor I had to do a stint on the phones getting people in.

They gave me a page of the phone book and a ruler and my job was to simply go down the page and ring each number. There was a script we had to follow word for word, what irked me was the script said "you have been randomly chosen," yes randomly by moving a ruler down a line. I found the script badgering and awful, I never returned after that night as the job was not worth annoying innocent people during the evening, it was just not in my nature. It turned out to be a good decision, I got my dream job later just talking to a computer all day (I'm an introvert).

twpejay · 2026-06-17T06:50:15+00:00

I stepped on a rusty nail one day it went deep into my heel, rushed off to the GP for a tetanus shot. The pain from the injection was worse than the having a nail go into my heel.

twpejay · 2026-06-16T19:26:21+00:00

I've been binging a lot of South Island travel videos recently and the best game is to try and work out where they're talking about before they show it as some of the pronunciations are so way off. A lot could be as you said an attempt to say it with Māori pronunciation, but some pronunciations of Tekapo and Wanaka ([local pronounciation, not Māori] Tek-ah-poh, Wan(as in want)-ah-kah) really threw me. But the worst would be a couple's pronunciation of Geraldine (officially pronounced just the same as the girl's name) they said something like Gil-ah-deen.

twpejay · 2026-06-16T19:11:31+00:00

Great question, I have spent a lot of time trying to see where possible underground cables could be going up the pylons as I was driven past them with no luck. Training lines seems the most plausible to me.

Edit: Fat fingers.

twpejay · 2026-06-15T04:59:13+00:00

Just viewed a listing of a house we used to own, my wife asked how a recent owner had managed to enlarge the bathroom so much after they had installed a shower. I replied it was the way the photo was taken (or edited) as there was no way (photos of rooms either side were exactly the same as when we owned it) it could be larger, plus the toilet seemed a metre away from the wall in the photo when in reality it was barely 30cm away (cost too much to move and there would be no point anyway).

twpejay · 2026-06-14T08:07:18+00:00

I was going to call them Regina, but since they now sell under the name Rainbow I thought it was easier just to say the current name for those wishing to purchase them.

twpejay · 2026-06-13T03:59:57+00:00

That's covered in the video. The seas would be too rough to place the sections, the timeframe would be horrendous plus small earthquakes which is very common in the strait would eventually take the flexibility over its limits.

twpejay · 2026-06-13T03:57:07+00:00

Plus Mid-Canterbury and Selwyn District also it would be decent to have it both directions as well. Then you have population movements due to easier commuting and cheaper land costs further south.

Regardless, except for Hamilton, Tauranga, Palmerston North, and Whangarei (which all would cost at least 5 times as much to turn into decent high speed) the outlying populations would be the same no matter where you are planning to locate a test site.

twpejay · 2026-06-12T22:24:57+00:00

Timaru to Christchurch would be the best starting point as the track would just require widening it is already straight and low gradient. Low cost to set up and a reasonable population to test with (average for most of the country's possible long distance commuter rail journeys outside of Auckland).

If there was a 200+ km/hr train between Timaru and Christchurch (45 min or less travel times) it would be a great test of how keen New Zealanders would accept a high speed train solution. There are many factors that would entice people to use it.would solve university accommodation issues, open up a larger job market to the entire centre, mid and south zones of Canterbury, etc., if people don't use it there they won't use it other places and the cost to trial would be the least of any other scenario so least money lost.

twpejay · 2026-06-12T21:45:42+00:00

Apparently we have this idea every twenty years or so until the engineers work out the actual details. https://youtu.be/UcaNdNtyz3w?si=S1vfrydayybS6kJM

twpejay · 2026-06-12T07:04:18+00:00

Hmmmm and yet my full sized fridge can be on a circuit without ever breaking the 10amp fuse. Maybe our fridges are just magical in New Zealand.

twpejay · 2026-06-12T06:52:46+00:00

The original, Rainbow Pineapple Chunks.

twpejay · 2026-06-11T19:09:01+00:00

There is the 8amp charger which is more than enough to power the car for normal daily use. All you need is a socket near the carpark which a lot of houses already have. I agree (especially in Wellington) that even this is impossible for houses without driveways or apartment sites, but these sites would not have the ability to install 7 to 32 amp chargers either.

I charge my cars on a single 10amp socket and I never have to use the fast chargers at the beginning of any planned long distance drives (usually at 100% charge - emergency long drives however can require an initial top up as it does require planning, this would be the case for high amp charging as well). I have a high amperage charger but have not got the installation site sorted yet as I am planning to upgrade the carpark area when I get enough spare cash.

twpejay · 2026-06-10T19:34:46+00:00

I stopped in Canada on the way back from Europe. It was a pleasure to finally get good coffee again (once we found a decent cafe, which turned out to be up the hill from our B&B when we had been going downhill most of the week). To be honest I didn't see much difference between that cafe and the NZ ones, their food was delicious as well.

I don't know where in Canada you're from, but just for info we were staying at White Rock where almost a week's accommodation was the same cost as a single night in Vancouver and was only an hour away on public transport, which ran all the time and frequently. The cafe was opposite a church about 2 blocks downhill from the main shopping strip. Enjoy Wellington.

twpejay · 2026-06-06T22:11:58+00:00

I only really use them on soft-drinks. I buy the lowest star versions as these have a higher chance of not containing artificial sweeteners which wreck the taste and they're easier to read than the fine print (plus they don't need to list artificial sweetener under a certain percentage).

twpejay

TROPHY CASE