As seen from the windows

Everyone loves pictures.


A pigeon gathers its thoughts, if the word can be applied to pigeons, after mistaking our bedroom window for a low cloud.


The silvereye is possibly New Zealand's most beautiful native bird. But sadly, also quite shy.


The tui: uglier, but more iconic.


I don't want to point fingers, but this might have something to do with why we don't see more silvereyes around.


And finally: our upwardly Møbler dresser.

De grass is riz

Spring is - well, trying to.

The basic winter weather pattern of rain, wind and chill has given way to a more compromising rhythm, in which the rain sometimes takes whole days off. As I type this, the sun is actually looking quite friendly. Hardy European souls like me can now wander about Auckland, during the day, without even a jacket on.

The downside is, I really have to drag out the lawnmower as soon as I'm able. In this idiotic climate, the grass never really stops growing. As a result, the lawn - and even more, the communal area I take care of - are looking more than a little shaggy.

One of the neighbours was dropping heavy hints to me the other day about rats nesting in long grass. Personally, I think the local cat population should be well on top of that - we see them prowling about quite routinely. But I do want to mow it anyway, before it gets even more out of hand.

Once upon a time, my ancestors mowed the grass with a scythe - a tool that positively relished length. For the past 20 years, I've searched for such an instrument in every DIY store and garden centre I've been in. You just can't get 'em. And so I have to struggle with a powered lawnmower, which costs ten times as much, requires recharging, and can't cope with grass that's more than ankle-deep. That's progress for you.

Grass

We finally bought a lawnmower on Saturday.

I can't be having with petrol-powered mowers. For one thing, it means keeping petrol on the premises. And electric mowers, as a rule, mean trailing some huge extension cord around the lawn with you.

A push mower, then? Been there, done that. Never again.

The answer we found was an irritatingly-named battery-powered jobby.

"Almost as light as a feather" says the blurb on that page. At 36kg, that's some feather. I can only assume the idiot who wrote that got some bigger idiot to deliver it to her house. I didn't have that luxury: I had to lift the damn' thing into and out of the car myself.

"Battery fully charged", the salesman assured me. I was actually looking forward to mowing the lawn on Sunday. A fitting culmination to our endless house search, I thought. When Sunday morning dawned bright and clear, I was down in the garage, assembling the new mower and reading the instructions.

In retrospect, maybe reading the instructions was a mistake. They don't mince their words. "Charge the battery for at least 16 hours before first use, or you will definitely cause the mower to explode and level all non-brick structures within a 20 metre radius." I may be paraphrasing slightly, but I definitely got the impression that pitching straight in would void the warranty. Sighing, I put the battery on charge and the lawnmowing on hold for one more day.

Last night, then, I arrived home at 5:30 and broke out the mower, in the failing evening light, for its first run.

Our house borders on a small patch of common ground that's shared between the five houses in our block. Since ours is the only one of the five with a lawn - and therefore the one with a mower - the job of mowing this common patch also defaults to me. I started with that patch first. It's bumpier than it looks, and liberally endowed with weeds, but I think I made a reasonable job of it. Then emptied out the catcher before moving on to our own lawn.

By the time I got to that, it was almost dark. I worked quickly around the edges while I could still see where they were, then - trying to avoid the gathering clouds of insects, and navigating by feel of the bumpy ground - set to work mowing up and down in the traditional stripey pattern I learned from my parents.

I didn't have the heart to look at it this morning. Sufficient unto next Sunday, I figure, is the evil thereof.