On Tuesday, I went to an “outlet mall” called Fox Outlet Centre, a sort of small mall of discount retailers. When the centre opened several years ago, it had a reasonable number of shops selling clothing, kitchenware, athletic equipment, camping stuff, CDs, and so on. But the centre’s shops didn’t do well in the global financial crisis, and it’s been all downhill since then.
The largest retailers have all left, as have all the smaller outlet stores for major retailers. The mall is mainly small, independent discount retailers and the physical location for the largely online retailer, Pharmacy Direct (I ordered my contact lenses from them back in the day).
The largest retailer at the moment is The Clearance Shed, in a short-term location. That was my destination. The store sells a variety of (mostly) homewares at very low prices. Most of the stuff is very high quality, and I was there to buy towels. I ended up buying a lot of other stuff, too.
The next day, in addition to being able to meet Nigel for lunch (a rare midweek treat), I went to Bunning’s Warehouse were I picked up Simple Green Outdoor Cleaner concentrate (photo above). I’d posed a question to my Facebook friends in New Zealand about what they used to clean the green gunge that builds up on wooden decks in winter. A friend recommended I try the Simple Green stuff.
The weather Wednesday was sometimes rainy, so I decided to wait until Thursday to clean the deck, because that day was supposed to be sunny. So, I spent some time that afternoon finishing editing the video I posted that day.
Thursday was as bright and sunny day as was predicted, so I got set up to scrub the worst parts of the deck, and I set up cameras to video it for a YouTube video. I’ll talk a bit more about the cleaning effort in a post later on, because it’s still a work in progress (and there may or may not be a video). I want to see a bit more of how the story evolves before I say anything more.
Friday was mainly my weekly chores, but I was frankly pretty worn out from scrubbing the deck, which was more physically demanding than I’d expected. I was probably naïve not to realise that.
Saturday, we headed down to Hamilton for my mother-in-law’s birthday parties: She had an afternoon tea for some friends and extended family, some of whom are older. That evening, we had a party with the immediate family at the home of one of my sisters-in-law. Both were really great—good time, good food, and great company, especially because there were a lot of family members we don’t see very often, including some who now live in Australia.
Today, we got together with some of the family who live in (or were still in) Hamilton, before we headed home, arriving back around 4:30.
The furbabies were extremely happy to see us. Our very good friend Pete stayed at our house on Saturday night to “furbabysit” the kids. They apparently all enjoyed that!
So, it was a great weekend after a very busy week. There were a few issues with the trip, but that’s a topic for another post, when I can give it proper attention. While I have a very busy week coming up, I still have several things lined up to talk about, including the final “Ask Arthur” posts. How many of those are actually published will show how busy I am.
Because, like I said, when I don’t have time to blog, it’s a good indicator of how busy I am.
As is my custom, I've been deliberately vague about family members, and about specific details about what we did: I simply don't discuss family members without their permission, because that just isn't fair to them.
4 comments:
We love Simple Green because it cleans so well and has a nice, fresh scent. And it's safe for the environment. I think ours is an all purpose cleaner and not made specifically for outdoor use. We use it inside and outside. Good luck with cleaning your deck.
This is why I write ahead... just sayin'.
Yes, and I actually do sometimes. For example, I actually wrote Part 6 of Arthur Answers several days earlier, but I decided it needed a re-write to tone it down.
Ya know, I wrote a reply but apparently didn't post it. Sigh. Anyway, I use a NZ-made plant-based cleaning products (and I've thought about posting about that…). At the risk of giving away how the story might turn out, I think some of the deck is looking better. We'll see.
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