Better late than never, eh?

Forgive me, reading audience of eight, I couldn't be bothered.

Skye came home from Australia very, very poor but with a house for herself and Mike and a bag of cherry ripes for me.

Kruse got a bit older and I gave him socks. He went house sitting for Caro and Dom and I went round to visit and the cat bit me.

Work is ever so busy and it's all gone to hell and no one knows what the feck's going on. Which means it's a good time for me to come home. So five more days. And then a day buying some Rolexes in Hong Kong (anyone want one?) and then Brandon will meet me at Auckland airport wearing a red carnation so I know what to look for next Monday. Three days in Auckland, one in Reporoa hanging with some cows, raging it up in PN for a week, two days in Wellington buying trousers of the like not seen in the UK, then Christchurch for five days to try out the comfort of Fi's spare room and then Sydney for three nights to see brother Nic and the world's tallest man, Tim. And then home in time for work on 6 May, when I discover that all the books I sent to print before I left have mistakes in them. I am a very good production editor.

We had people over for my birthday brunchy lunchy (featuring asparagus rolls, bloody marys, truffles and fairy bread - all class) and there was a greatdeal of nonsense spoken, a history lesson, cake in face, probably a bit too much booze and all in bed by midnight. Thirty is looking as mature as 24 did.

I finally stretched my jeans to an acceptable fit and I was overjoyed but then they started to smell (hadn't washed them for a very long time) so I had to give them up to the washing machine and now I have to start the whole process all over again. I'm eating a caramello koala in an effort to help with the stretching. And then I'm going to make a huge effort to finish off my third birthday cake - is it cheating if I just lick off the icing? Mad Laura made it and it's awfully good.

I got some very good books for turning 30, and marshmellow eggs from Simon, which went straight into the freezer because that's where marshmellow eggs live. You can't get them here so I'm hoping that people are stockpiling them for me. James bought me coffee machine. I loathe coffee. James knows this. Skye is very pleased with her new coffee machine. I think it's going to have an accident. Those things fall off the bench into a hot oven all the time.

And this morning Skye burst into my room and demanded I look out the window. And despite the fact we started daylight saving last weekend and it's been rather warm all week - it was snowing. Was rather pretty but, oddly enough, when I went outside to take some cheesy photos, it was fecking freezing and my toes got cold.

My toenails are disgusting and I don't know what happened to them. One is definitely bruised, but the others? Perhaps it's winter toenail sadness? They just need sunlight? Or heaps of nail polish.

Oh, and some utter bastard in Bulgaria stole $1000 out of my NZ bank account. Fuckers. Once I'd rung the bank and explained stuff (like the fact that I have never been to Bulgaria and I still have my credit card) and wrote an email to explain more stuff, they rang me back to talk some more. Only they forgot about the time difference.

'Penelope? It's Trudi from the National Bank. How are you?'
'What? Sure. Fine.'
'What time is it there?'
'What time is it in New Zealand?'
'One thirty in the afternoon.'
'Then it's 1.30am here.'
'Oh.'
'Yeah.'
'Did I wake you up?'

And so on. So now I have forms to fill out and eventually I should get my money back. Or rather, I should get my overdraft, which is really the bank's money, back.