Arrowtown book buyer Miranda Spary continues her regular column about her recommendations for a good read, and life as she sees it ...
Like everything in our world, it's the idiots using things wrongly that make the problems
Arrowtown book buyer Miranda Spary continues her regular column about her recommendations for a good read, and life as she sees it ...
I always hate leaving the Wakatipu. I know I'll have a lovely time away, but it's so difficult to leave when you live in the most beautiful place in the world with so many strange and wonderful people doing strange and wonderful things.
Roger Tompkins has been saturating damson and black Doris plums in gin and secret spices to create Purple Haze, a most moreish brew that could quite well have left a simple columnist in a pickle. Luckily, at my age, I have learnt a drink that tastes so good is bound to wreak havoc and make you feel very bad the next day. Honestly, maturity can be so tedious.
Despite not launching myself into tasting every single one of the delicious cocktails the team at the Spire Hotel had dreamt up with Purple Haze, it was an excellent chance to give the flares and afros a bit of an outing.
Roger looked a treat in a long, black curly wig, unfortunately acrylic so it kept snagging on his stubble. Gail and Ian Hamilton were unrecognisable in orange swirly chiffon (not Ian!) and other psychedelic garb. Gail has closed her dangerously tantalising shop Covet in Shotover St and is doing colour and wardrobe consultancy now. She very kindly gave me some advice; God knows I could do with it, and it was really fun watching her show me what different colours do when next to different hair and skin.
Gary and Sally Mahan hosted an exhibition at their place on Sunday: Jeff Thomson was in the Wakatipu with his new show called "Tin Guitars".
Even if you haven't heard of Jeff, you will probably recognise his work. He makes all sorts of animals and New Zealand maps and fish, and now guitars, out of corrugated iron. It makes my hands hurt just thinking about cutting and bending sharp, wavy metal so I expected to see Jeff with cuts and scars all over his hands, but he was very well manicured - even sporting the remnants of gold nailpolish which he says were from a party to celebrate his latest friend to join the ranks of pensioner gold-card carriers.
I had taken my mother along to the show. She's wearing the latest fashion in French designer shoulders, after a full shoulder replacement which will have her cartwheeling up the Mall in no time. In the meantime, though, she can't drive or play golf, and nearly two weeks in Auckland caged in hospital and then in an apartment had her very ready for an outing to the "Tin Guitars" show. Trying to trap her and get her back in the car and home to the loving care of my dad (he is probably not going to be taking up nursing as a career) was no easy feat when there was so much to see and so many people to chat to.
If she wants more people to chat to, she should get along to the locals' ball, the fundraiser to get the Memorial Hall tarted up and ready to host more community events. So many people have been so generous with their time and money on this: it proves that the community really want it.
Personally, I think the council should put more money towards these sort of projects, things we need that don't make money, such as halls and swimming pools and libraries, and stay out of the bits that private enterprise can deal with perfectly well.
Even though I've been trying to get packed and ready to leave, I've been hopelessly distracted by a book I'd been told about over a year ago. It's called Uranium by Tom Zoellner and it is the pretty well unbelievable biography of this almost magical element. I still don't really understand the chemistry side (the filing cabinet in my brain marked "What I Know About Science" is an empty, unused thing) but the history is gripping and features some most dangerous, demented characters.
Even though there's a huge amount of gory detail on the bad side of uranium, it's hard to read it and not wonder if the benefits outweigh the problems. Like everything in our world, it's the idiots using things wrongly that make the problems, and uranium in the wrong hands is a colossal problem.
I'm particularly interested in uranium, as my darling left our youngest and naughtiest son in Perth last year with a hundred dollars and an order to grow up.
He got to work with the geologists in the uranium beds, much to my concern.
He assured me the two Geiger counters he wore all the time kept him getting less radiation than even going on a plane. Anyway, it seems a little light radiation therapy was what he needed: he's earning loads of money and seems keen to become a geologist himself now and has quite a different attitude to life.
Fifty Shades of Grey (and the younger siblings in the trilogy) is obviously doing some nice warming things to Wakatipu dwellers in the run-up to winter! Thanks for all the emails - some of them definitely come under the "too much information" category.
It's always such a treat hearing from readers of this column when you enjoy a book I've recommended. Keep the emails coming in; even if you hate my suggestions, I still like to know.
