Matariki

Matariki, the peri­od of the year when the Plei­ades cluster of stars lifts itself up from below the hori­zon, and which (for some tribes, at least) her­alds in the Maori New Year, is in full swing. The appear­ance of Matariki in the sky is con­sidered vital. If the stars in the cluster are clear and […]

Rose Pruning Day – Botanic Gardens, June 12

Bud­ding rose enthu­si­asts might want to mark June 12 in their diar­ies. It is Rose Prun­ing Day at the Botan­ic Gar­dens. Inter­na­tion­ally acclaimed (prob­ably) rose experts will be on hand giv­ing pub­lic demon­stra­tions, advice, and answer­ing all your thorny ques­tions… If your pas­sion is for Mod­ern Bush & Climbers, you are invited to assemble at […]

Al “Pub Landlord” Murray

Buy, beg or steal a tick­et as we have it on excel­lent notice that this guy (Al Mur­ray) is the best comedi­an seen in many a year. A few of the Wel­ling­tonis­tas are going … you should too. The Opera House: Thursday 30th June & Fri­day 1st July The low-down from the Tick­etek site: All […]

Psst… wanna be a movie star?

48 Hours – Offi­cially NZ’s largest film com­pet­i­tion. Hun­dreds of teams of film-makers kick off tonight all around the coun­try & fin­ish on Sunday night. Dami­an Christie sug­gests “if you’re approached by a bedraggled film crew (the chances are high, there’s a couple of hun­dred teams around the coun­try), be nice to them, do what […]

The Wiggles; and an introduction

Hello. I’m Alan. You may remem­ber me from such blogs as half-pie. No? Oh. James has added me to the roster of con­trib­ut­ors, for which I am very flattered. I’m still fig­ur­ing out what I could pos­sibly relate about this fine city of ours that could be rel­ev­ant and timely. And indeed, I was going […]

The Weekend that Was

The power­boat­ers, women cyc­lists and dragon­boat­ers must have been ruing the choice of Wel­ling­ton as the choice of cham­pi­on­ship ven­ues as a, er, ‘brisk’ north­erly blew in from the Hutt and across the har­bour over the week­end. The wind also caused hav­oc with the Sat­urday night Neil Dia­mond con­cert at the Sta­di­um, where the poor […]

Newtown Festival

The nev­er-end­ing sum­mer stream of Wel­ling­ton sub­urb­an car­ni­vals and fairs con­tin­ues on its merry way with the start of the ten day New­town Fest­iv­al tomor­row (Fri 4 Mar). The big day is Sunday’s Fair Day, when Rid­di­ford Street will be closed to traffic, allow­ing a pleth­ora of stalls, enter­tain­ers and gen­er­al may­hem to hit the […]

Free Acheh Protest

The Indone­sian Ambas­sad­or is giv­ing a talk at the Wel­ling­ton Law School today, giv­ing every­one the chance to voice their dis­ap­prov­al of his gov­ern­ment’s ongo­ing use of viol­ence and tor­ture in Acheh. Blog­green points out that there’ll be a nice big ban­ner to rally behind, but any oth­er imple­ments of protest (noise-makers, plac­ards, that sort […]

Cuba Street Carnival

Hope­fully Wel­ling­ton’s glor­i­ous sum­mer weath­er will hold on for anoth­er few days, and treat the city’s cit­izens to what prom­ises to be a fant­ast­ic Cuba St Car­ni­val, this Sat­urday (Sat 26 Feb). It’s the last Car­ni­val before the south end of Cuba St will be irre­voc­ably altered by the impend­ing bypass, so there’s bound to […]

More Energetic Stuff!

I may as well keep with James’s sport­ing spir­it for the day, and tell you about an event com­ing up this week­end that’s aimed at the fairer sex. The Spe­cial K Triath­lon series is in Wel­ling­ton this Sunday, but, unfor­tu­nately, there are no more spots avail­able for com­pet­it­ors, and no wait­ing list (and I was […]