Another year. Another bin full of memories. Nigel Benson looks back on 2009.
It's a hot and balmy Wednesday night as more than 15,000 revellers fill the Octagon to welcome in 2009.
The Otago Daily Times reports the following day that "a spectacular fireworks display had the large crowd gasping".
Few could have foreseen the excitement and drama that would unfold over the next 12 months.
The eyes of the world are temporarily dazzled by the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States on January 20, before we all really settle down to business.
A local highlight of the year is the look on Dunedin Mayor Peter Chin's face as he unveils "Syd Adie Corner" at the bottom of Brockville Rd in November in honour of his old adversary's retirement from the Dunedin Ratepayers and Householders Association.
A close second would be the look on new Dunedin Stadium head David Davies' face when he hears we're paying him $250,000 year to work there.
But more of that later.
In February, an ASB bank survey finds Dunedin is the best city in which to live in New Zealand.
However, bagpiper Simon McLean would argue the toss after he is banned by DCC noise control officers from playing his pipes in the Octagon.
Robbie shudders.
"O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us to see oursels as others see us."
Perhaps inspired by the ASB bank survey, David Bain returns to Dunedin in February for the first time since the 1995 Every St Mystery.
He wears a plain jersey in the hope of being incognito, but the ODT tracks him down.
We learn that the St Kilda shark nets have had gaping holes in them all through summer. Great.
Popular Otago District Health Board chairman Richard Thomson is sacked by new Health Minister Tony Ryall over Michael Swann's $16.9m Dunedin Hospital fraud, in a move that prompts a string of angry letters to the ODT editor.
It will be a rough year for Swann, too, who is sentenced to nine and a-half years imprisonment in March and then sees his favourite ship, Cromwell Townsend, which has become something of a tourist attraction at the Birch St Wharf, renamed the Lau Trader and sailed off to Fiji.
February closes with a police warning of a growing gang problem between Black Power and Mongrel Mob in Dunedin.
Although Dunedin people don't really notice.
They do notice though, and scowl presbyterianly, when a University of Otago toga party turns ugly on George St.
The Dunedin Heritage Festival's inaugural Bluestone Awards go to historians James Ng and George Griffiths and architect Ted McCoy on Otago Anniversary Day.
"No other city in New Zealand has the richness of heritage that Dunedin does and it is time we celebrated the people who have contributed so much to that heritage," Mayor Chin says, secretly just delighted that Syd Adie didn't get one.
Dunedin's Retrial of the Century starts in the High Court at Christchurch where former choirboy David Bain denies shooting his parents, Robin and Margaret, brother, Stephen, and sisters, Arawa and Laniet, in 1995.
It's the end of an era in Mosgiel, as Fisher & Paykel shoots through.
No-one denies it is a shame.
Queenstown residents are up in arms to read on the front page of the ODT of plans for a solution to the resort's parking problems - an $80m floating carpark on Lake Wakatipu.
Then they realise it's April 1.
Dunedin Fringe Festival performer George Parker is spoken to by police for carrying a chicken down George St.
He is naked, apart from an apron. And a wig. It is still April 1.
Warrington's beloved flying saucer house takes off for Auckland - just after April 1.
The laughter then stops as an OECD report warns New Zealand is in for "a long and deep recession".
Three days later DCC councillors vote 10-4 to proceed with the $198 million Dunedin Stadium.
A protest group called Stop The Stadium rises in indignation and stands up to City Hall like a feisty little sparrowhawk.
"Carisbrook is an icon. We don't want to pay more rates," the feisty little sparrowhawk cries.
But, the people who like the new stadium idea hire legal eagles who turn the feisty little sparrowhawk into a feather duster.
Stop The Stadium changes its name to Sort The System.
First item on the agenda is to get a "Stop The Stadium Corner", like Syd's.
Cadbury decides to deal with the recession by reducing the size of its flagship Dairy Milk chocolate bars and replacing some of the cocoa butter with palm oil.
It's Chocolate-gate as customers go nuts.
Three months later, Cadbury says it was just kidding and it's as you were for chocolate-lovers.
Except the blocks are still smaller and made in Australia.
DCC councillor Teresa Stevenson is censured for leaking information about the new stadium to the ODT and ordered to apologise.
An apology sent on May 15 is deemed "not acceptable" by Mayor Chin and returned to the chastened councillor.
The same day and the first sod is turned at the Awatea St stadium.
Mayor Chin leaps into a mechanical excavator for a media stunt and promptly sends Hall Bros Transport operations manager Nick McEwan flying.
The Department of Labour issues a stern warning to the mayor the following day.
"The particulars of this incident will be discussed with the parties involved to ensure that they are all reminded of the department's expectations," a killjoy spokesman sniffs.
"In the event the department speaks to me, I will certainly have to hear what they say and respond accordingly," Mayor Chin sniffs back.
Fortunately, they do not require an apology.
Meanwhile, an inspired Cr Stevenson emails a new apology to Mayor Chin.
David Bain is acquitted in the High Court of Christchurch of charges of murdering his family at Every St in 1995.
When the verdict is read, ex-All Black Joe Karam looks for someone to swap jerseys with.
He's standing beside Bain, but pretends not to notice him.
June 10 and Mayor Chin has still not received an acceptable apology from Cr Stevenson.
He is less than happy when reminded about this by the ODT.
A 71-year-old Mosgiel man breaks into the roof of the ANZ bank on Gordon Rd and attempts to cut open an ATM machine.
He is caught by police.
A crane crashes to the ground outside Dunedin Hospital, its 63m boom missing by centimetres a bus of 50 school children and morning motorists.
Meanwhile, bus-drivers wear masks while driving the unforgiving streets of Dunedin as protection against swine flu.
Eighteen months after her murder, Sophie Elliot's parents, Gil and Lesley, take her ashes to the High Court in Christchurch on June 22 for the trial of accused Clayton Weatherston.
The former University of Otago research assistant is sentenced to a minimum term of 18 years without parole on September 15.
Gil Elliot tells Weatherston he is "the epitome of evil" at the sentencing.
Dunedin supermarket shelf-filler Jeffrey Hurring (19) is sentenced to 12 months jail for killing an 18-month-old jack russell terrier called "Diesel".
It is the longest sentence ever handed down in New Zealand for animal cruelty.
It's June 25 and a red-letter day as Mayor Chin finally accepts Cr Stevenson's apology - her fifth draft.
Fellow councillors break out in a spontaneous rendition of For they are jolly good fellows.
But controversy returns a week later when new high-tech parking meters are stealthily installed on city streets.
Within days central city retailers are up in arms.
Three swine flu cases are confirmed in Dunedin.
Bus drivers who have been wearing masks are fair chuffed.
In crustacean news, University of Otago glass-blower Anne Ryan makes a glasshouse for a hermit crab at Portobello Aquarium.
The Central Otago District Council bans Oamaru stone under its new planning rules.
Oamaru responds by banning blossom (or should have).
The DCC decides to poison black-backed gulls at Green Island tip with alpha-chloralose, which causes lethal hypothermia.
However, the much nicer red-billed and black-billed seagulls will be taken back to the site office and "resuscitated" with the aid of a heater.
The council abandons the operation after a front-page ODT story causes a public outcry.
Research by 12-year-old Columba College pupil Kim Shultz shows five ice creams out of 17 purchased at Dunedin dairies are contaminated with E. coli bacteria.
She describes the results as "scary".
The body of Play School legend Little Ted turns up in late August, headless.
Inquiries reveal the decapitation was a result of staff hi-jinks after the final show in 1989.
Alas, poor Little Ted.
His head is still outstanding.
The Department of Corrections denies it is hiding the number of assaults at the Milton Hilton, but can't explain why its figure of seven assaults wildly differs to the Corrections Association union's official figure of 128 assaults since the prison opened in 2007.
In response to an ODT Official Information Act request, the Corrections Department says it takes the issue of violence in prisons "very seriously".
It's September and spring and David Bain's legal team asks for the .22 rifle back, which was used to kill his family.
Castle St is in chaos as the Undie 500 comes to town.
A crowd of 500 well-oiled youngsters hurl bottles and debris at police, who flee and return with riot-geared reinforcements two hours later.
"We are happy to have been able to stabilise the crowd without exerting our authority too much," Inspector Alistair Dickie tells the ODT.
More than 80 arrests follow. The police say none will get diversion. Some get diversion.
In one of the biggest employee relations disasters of the year, Port Otago announces that 35 jobs are to go and issues notices to staff advising of their redundancies.
Then, 48 hours later, it decides no-one is going to lose their job after all.
Dr Philip Nitschke (Dr Death) cancels his talk in the Port Chalmers Town Hall.
The Otago Museum also has something of an annus horribilis as people are outraged to discover the butterflies in the Tropical Forest Butterfly House are dying within a few weeks - even though the average butterfly lifespan is two weeks.
A group of former employees also complains of an institution of bullying by museum management.
Delivery driver Grant Fridd is charged with careless use of a vehicle and obstructing police after he blocks George St in protest at the new parking regime.
Grateful local business owners later cover his court fines and costs.
The new meters are considered so ugly that someone covers their faces with hessian bags on September 28.
The next day the DCC backs down from the strategy and says it was really just kidding.
There are more red faces at council when it realises that both its high-end concert venues, the Dunedin Town Hall and the Regent Theatre, will be closed at the same time for refurbishment for a good part of next year.
But it's smiles all round as the new $2.2m Orokonui Sanctuary birdcage-without-a-roof opens.
Central Otago environmentalists and nimbys alike rejoice as the Environment Court drop-kicks Meridian Energy's $2.2b Project Hayes windfarm into touch over the Lammermoor Range.
The DCC announces plans to turn the former chief post office in the Exchange into a $28m library. Maybe.
Dunedin is the first city in the world to celebrate Armistice Day on November 11, when a cannon accidentally goes off 12 minutes early.
A University of Otago climate change model shows the new Dunedin Stadium will probably be under water in 90 years.
Sort The System changes its name to Save The Seawater.
Otherwise, it's just another year in Otago - icebergs, whales, droughts, fires, student riots, dumb stuff on Baldwin St, neat festivals and live performances, Michael Hill, Shania Twain, Shrek, drink-driving deaths, parking tickets, overpriced groceries, underpriced alcohol, wind, rain, snow and some sunshine.
