Tuesday 23rd February

I’m back in Honiara, arrived 2pm today. Things aren’t looking good for Mum, I know it’s been the last time I’ll see her, I probably should have gone back when I intended and stayed over at this end instead of going early. I’ll go back for the funeral, whenever Mum decides to give in to it.

Tiffany and David met me at Henderson, dropped my baggage at home and went back to Ranandi to see how things are there. We still haven’t got a lease signed yet, but it is looking closer. The pricing I was hoping to have done from Island Enterprises is still floating around somewhere, some of the MID Commonwealth Ave contract has been altered, Imelda has left and got another full time job, we’re down to 10 working crew now, but the good news is that all the palm seeds Hendry and Sharon planted a couple of months back have all sprouted, so we have a few hundred palm seedlings, all Archontophoenix, at the 2 leaf stage now, and should be ready to transplant into growing on bags soon.

The rat in the house has been having a party by the look of the kitchen and floor. I think it may have finally succumbed to the poison, there weren’t any fresh looking droppings, but I had to throw out a bag of flour, and onions and kumara that had been nibbled at while I was away, plus the edges of the cupboard shelves.

I may need to get a cat.

I’ll gradually get back into posting again as things progress this week, at the moment settling back here is a bit of a jolt after Auckland, where the water is available and the power doesn’t cut off at odd times. As usual I’m out of water in the house, I’m hoping it may come on later in the evening, although it is now 8.15 pm, and no sign of anything happening.

The rain is still here, 4.30 it started again, after a brief burst of thunder and a few token lightning flashes. Steady rain today, not the usual bath tub all at once that we get in January.

I’ll have a look around town tomorrow, Tiff said the Post Office gardens are looking good now, David got a load of chippings spread over the copra sacks, and everything is growing well. I’m not expecting things to have changed much in 5 weeks though, the rubbish is still everywhere, we really need some better method of getting everyone to understand and stop dropping rubbish everywhere.