Journal: Earthquake Day 5.
Latest figures now 145 dead.

Bodies are now being recovered from the Canterbury Cathedral and from another building called the CTV building.

The CTV building, 5 stories high  pancaked down to one floor level during the 'quake. The building contained a local TV station, with 15 people present.  An small English school teaching English improvement to 20 Filipino nurses, and a 3rd business thought to be of Japanese origin . A total number of 120 people. Some were out for lunch but most were inside when the 'quake struck.

The building was flattened. Smoke was seen issuing from the building. Firemen put water on the source but to no avail. A Special Rescue team tried to enter but could not penetrate the building. Cell phones could be heard for a while and then nothing. The specialists said smoke inilation would cause death. Special equipment was used to search for life, but none found. Bodies were starting to be removed last night. Each floor of the building had to be removed starting from the top.

Sadly, a Filipino woman in the Philippines received a text from here trapped daughter saying goodbye and then rest of the message petered out.

___________________________

Refer to piece Amputation 2 days ago. Needs expansion / correction.

From 2 different TV channel interviews: The doctor was in fact 3 doctors from the Australian Convention in Christchurch. 2 male and 1 female. After consultation of the 3 doctors the female doctor was selected to do the amputation of both legs and one of the other doctors to apply the anaesthetic. The amount of room in and beneath the beam was very restricted.

The ambulance did have anaesthetics on board but no amputation instruments.  Some tradesmen who had been working nearby were consulted and they produced a hacksaw and a large jackknife. The amputation was successfully carried out, the  patient was then removed from under the beam and then taken to hospital by the medic, and then transferred to Waikato Hospital by helicopter. The patient 2 days later was doing well.

The 2 anaesthetics used were morphine and another drug which I did not catch the name, I think it began with the letter K. This second anaesthetic as explained by the interviewed doctors, was to remove all trace of  memory of what had taken place when he, the patient woke up!! I thought this amazing.

The patient did not want, presently to be identified. The doctor who carried out the amputation did not want to be recognised either.

Today some of the specialist teams are moving out to Port Lyttlton. To remove bodies and maybe find someone alive. Port Lyttlton was the epicentre of the 'quake. To not finish on a sad note, the specialists say it is not unusual to find the living up to 10 days after the 'quake.

Journal: Earthquake Day 4.  
Latest figures 123 Dead  228 missing.

323 Australian police arrived today and sworn in for NZ duties. Reason: to give NZ police a rotational rest and help deter to looters. Many empty homes looted. Worst incident 3 power generators stolen. These were supplying areas where power lines could not  be easily repaired. These looters were caught. about 10 other looters are already caught. All are in jail with no bail allowed. First court sessions March 28, or could be later.

NZ March Census cancelled. No further date given.

1000 Portaloos due to arrive from USA to bolster NZ supply. Sewage lines will be difficult to repair. Some areas estimated months.

3000 Canterbury University student volunteers signed up to help clean up liquefaction over roads and inside many houses. And when the spades and shovels run out, do any other jobs necessary. The liquefaction is mainly sandy mud and sewage.

Everything running 24 hours a day where necessary and available staff. Many people doing long overtime stints in their own time.

John Key, the Prime Minister gave a marvellous speech the first day  to boost the morale of Christchurch and the country, many TV channels using 'sound and picture bites' from the speech. The speech seems to have worked well with many.

The mayor of Christchurch, an ex TV presenter does an excellent job each morning listing what has been done the previous day and the goals ahead. That seems to go down well too with the public.

Christchurch Cathedral: The tower and spire partially collapsed during the earthquake and the stones fell inward filling the remaining standing part of the tower. At the time of the earthquake a party of 20 Japanese tourists were in the tower climbing upward, all were buried. Various tests were made for life, all were  pronounced dead. There is also a strong possibility of other tourists dead at the tower end of the cathedral on the ground floor. Visitors were seen in that vicinity. No sounds of life were detected there either. The standing remains of the tower and surrounding building are in a precarious state and removing the stone work is presently highly dangerous.

Well that is all I can manage today. Again forgive any grammatical errors, time is in short supply

Journal: Earthquake Day 3.
Christchurch is a mess, seen especially from the air. Spent some of yesterday refreshing my memory of "liquefaction". All of Christchurch  and the greater area have many patches of liquefaction, both big and small.
Earthquakes and tremors do not mix well with liquefaction. Experts say liquefaction can be overcome, even with constructing large buildings, but they are loath to guarantee success in an earthquake prone area.

Early this, morning the dreadful figures were deaths 103 and missing 226. Of the missing, this figure is expected to drop somewhat.

Many older residents and those with children are reported to be leaving the city for relatives and friends, and a few, for second homes. The roads are crowded, gasoline is scarce but diesel is freely available. Shell the main distributer are kept busy.

The NZ search and rescue teams are doing a wonderful job along with those teams from Australia and Japan. other teams also from Taiwan, Singapore and the USA. USA team with heavy lifting equipment, I believe. The 2 British teams are arriving today. These are specialist teams, completely self contained, down to food, water and accommodation. They were used in the Haiti earthquake fiasco.

A convention comprising of doctors, surgeons and specialists from Australia were present in Christchurch. They all dug in, helping where needed, along with many other medical people here on holiday in the city.

Amputation.
One most gripping story was from an ambulance medic with an ambulance and on his own arriving at a fallen building to find 2 men trapped by the legs under a beam of the fallen building. A surgeon turned up and managed to severe both legs of one man to release him. the other man died  of blood loss and trauma before he could be saved, this as related by the medic. The medic and ambulance made it to the nearest hospital  with his patient over ruptured roads, blocked roads to the nearest hospital. This incident and more was recorded by the medic after his shift was finished and posted as an email to 1ZM radio station. I heard the email read out. It reminded me of WW2 incidents when I was a small boy, ear glued to the radio or reading the daily paper back in the UK.

Yesterday, the saddest tale I saw of many tales was the statistics shown on TV, at the bottom of the list, a baby of 5 months and another of 9 weeks,  both casualties of the earthquake. What of the parent(s), who knows? I remember I immediately thought of the Ian and Vicky and the twins and then of Tahlia and Jaeden. I felt so sad for the families of those 2 little one.

Finally, the 5 major banks in NZ have each pledged one million dollars to the Christchurch (Red Cross) fund. Australia has pledged $5 million dollars

Fonterra has supplied 1 million litres of drinking water and possibly up to 1 million dollars subject to their owners, the dairy farmers of NZ.

That is all for today, I feel washed out. My grammar and spelling is going to pot. Maybe more tomorrow.

Journal: Not much to say today.
 I again went for a walk this morning, then had breakfast, sat down and watched 2 comedies on SKY-TV., put out the weekly rubbish, did 2 loads of washing and hung them out, cleaned up my overdue Gmail account and then sat down and wrote a few words.

Journal: Second Earthquake
A second earthquake hit the Christchurch area today around 12.30 p.m., lunchtime, magnitude 6.3 and shallow, causing much further devastation to the city, with major injuries and deaths, numbers not known presently. An aftershock followed later said to be 5.6. and also shallow.

Earlier this morning I said not much doing today. An unfortunate phrase. Todays earthquake and aftershock being shallow, was much more serious than last year.

What now to do with Christchurch?  It seem the city was built about 160 years ago on a shallow crust covering the central business district and unknown apparently to to the builders of the past.

The British newspaper The Guardian picked up the story 20 minutes after the 'quake, and before the NZ local papers. Amazing!

Journal: Walk and  thoughts.
Missed yesterdays walk. I didn't wake up until after 6.30a.m. This morning I was awake early and had my early morning walk meeting 2 friends, Grahame and Rosemary coming up behind me. They were walking much faster than me and seemed to be going round the lake twice, I could later see 2 figures in the distance past  G & Rs normal turnoff.

Baked a loaf of bread in the bread maker yesterday for the first time. Usually Pat attends to the bread.

Pat's both  knees are troubling her, usually it is just one. She thinks it may be from swinging around too quickly.

Journal: Jury Service.
The mail this morning brought a call up for Jury Service as from March 28 2011.

Journal: Lake Walk.
I left home to walk round the lake this morning at 6.20am, it was just barely light, but daylight comes quickly here in NZ. I haven't walked round the lake for 2 years now. I managed the walk quite well at a slower pace than I used to do. I had the seats imprinted in my mind in case I had to stop, needing a rest. I used to do the walk in 40 minutes but my slower pace today took me 50 minutes. I felt quite fresh afterwards.

Back home for breakfast, Pat is just waking, I tell her "Fresh Fields" is about to start on UKTV, one of her favourite comedy programs. Soon she is in her favourite chair and chuckling as I make my breakfast. I usually have sliced sliced cheese on a thick slice of homemade bread, toasted in the oven. I found it was nicer toasted  in the oven instead of the toaster. I gave up my regular of many years, baked beans on toast; one morning I made my regular baked beans as usual, sat down to eat and couldn't face them.

Pat tells me that there are some new twins photos on her computer as I was going down to my basement office, but hello, hello no twins just a few regular posts I get from elsewhere and my morning dose of spam. My Gmail is usually much quicker than that.

Journal: Thoughts of This and That.
We got rain for most of the day yesterday, a pleasant change, saved me watering the garden. Lovely blue sky this morning with a few wispy clouds. Humidity has dropped down to 55 which is a pleasant change.

Got a birthday card from Ian and Vicky, yesterday with a newsy note from Vicky which was nice. Also an email from Ian, with a photo of Vicky taking the twins for a spin in the pram (as Ian terms it). Ian must be there, too taking the picture.

Feeling much better once more, but have not walked round the lake for a week. I must, tomorrow morning, without fail!

Trainz has once more been in my mind the past 2 days. Much has been happening on the forums with updating the database items to the latest  ones. There are 165,943 items listed for download presently, not all will be updated, I hope, there are just too much low quality items. My opinion only and some other participants also.

Journal: My Birthday
Yesterday, the 13th of February was my birthday. All my family including Jen and friends remembered it. Phone calls,  emails and face book flooded in. Looking through the messages today, I feel quite humble that I am remembered.

To Vicky's sister Helen, if a raised glass was raised, thank you. If not, the thought was there and for that, I thank you.

Pat and I, along with Anthony(Tony) and Craig went to the Cock and Bull in Hamilton and we had our preferred meals, I, roast beef and Yorkshire Pudding along with my favourite desert, passion fruit cheese- cake with fruit trimmings. With 2 glasses of Chardonnay, that was my limit and I enjoyed both glasses immensely.

What I feel
I'm glad no one refereed to my age. As the numbers creep up, I am starting to feel old. I feel, with my many interests I haven't enough time for all of them, now. What I hope for most is to be able to finish my life story of my many adventures through life. I feel a little envy of the young travelling the world today, I wish I was still one of them. Since my stroke 3 years ago, my sight is now back to normal but my brain frontal lobes are a problem. I realize I am becoming physically unable to travel far now;  the doctors, specialists tell me so.

 Many are people are older than I but I feel my my mind is slowly starting to slow down, I feel tired, my English and grammar is no longer the best. My speech becomes muddled when I try to talk when thinking of more than one subject. I have problems writing my name now, my hand shakes. My spelling deteriorates but computers came to my rescue and so did the spell checker(to a large extent). I use it more and more.

Never the less, I had a happy day yesterday, I usually tend to think of tomorrow as if it is not really there. Today I feel tired and a little sorry for my self, tomorrow I will go for my morning walk round the lake and think of all those who are worse off than I. I will pick up my spirits and be myself again tomorrow and continue to write, stroke the cat in passing, then go and give Pat a little hug, as she sits at her computer, upstairs reading the news, or looking at the pictures of our children and offspring.

Journal: Sunspots.
For quite a few years now I have suffered from sunspots, on my face. Even with treatment they take a long time to heal. mine, each one, up to 2 years. New Zealand is a particularly bad place for sunspots, said to be the worst in the world. Lying over Antarctica is a large break in the ozone layer and a finger from that break creeps up over New Zealand.

 I had more treatment on the past Wednesday, had them burnt off... frozen. For the first time one was found on my hand, I thought it was just a scab from a blister so that one was burnt off, too. The ones on my face are in the last stages now, so I hope this facial treatment will be over, but the one on my hand will no doubt, appear again.

Remember, if sunspots are not treated they can become cancerous!

Journal:
Emails (plural...3)  from Ian this morning. The first one was the new pram for the twins with varying modes of operation, the best, probably the conversion to car seats and the wheels and fittings into the boot.

I've just had a thought, where does Barney fit in, in the greater scheme of things?

The other 2 emails were more photos of the twins. They were excellent, Pat will be studying them for the rest of  the day comparing them to earlier photos. We love their varying expressions and as they are growing older we can distiguish Kate from Eddy quite easily.

Journal: We had a get together lunch today, Sunday at Anthony and Craig's place. Gillian, Paul, Tahlia with Kaedon plus us pair. Gillian and Paul with baby Kaedon stayed overnight on Saturday with us. Tahlia went to stay with friends overnight and had a Saturday night out.

Anthony and Craig are in the process of possibly buying a second house, somewhat larger than their present one.

Very hot today and cloudy 28C. and humidity 75 outside. Anthony has one of these electronic gauges, reads temp. and humidity, both  inside and ouside,  also cloud cover and a few more things. Gillian also has one, and me too, but not got round to installing my unit outside yet.

Journal:  We had an email from Ian today. Pat got her bureau delivered yesterday, our Friday. She seemed pleased with it. I helped the delivery man to carry it in. It was very heavy, solid mahogany and made in India.

The $48.00 bureau is now down in the basement in my office in front of the window. I'll fill it with things. Bits and pieces.

Carrying on with my 'Life Story', just crossed the Pacific from Panama and just arrived in Sydney. Got the piece to read, correct and probably alter.

The last 3 days have been very muggy, hot and overcast with low cloud and some drizzle. Sleeping with no blankets or sheets over. 23C. during the night outside.

Sharon, the gardening lady tided up the garden, many weeds from the rain and heat, two bottles of Vee energy drink usually  keeps her going. I tell her it is not good for her in quantity. I don't see the Vee now, she probably keeps it out of my sight in her gardening bag. Daily temp is usually 28C.

Brighter this morning but cloudy. Just done a load of washing and put it out. Pat has trouble with both knees now, getting down and then upstairs again.

Thursday. Journal:
 Well today we got 8 photos of the twins  during J and E visit (they will be in Spain now)

 Big Daddy with twins, Kate and Eddie. Kate at top.

Journal:
This morning I was thinking of the the new bureau mentioned in yesterdays' post. When we lived in the UK, so long ago now, I built a bureau not long after we married. It was a kit set and the sections were all solid oak.

 I also built a 2 seater green settee and 2 armchairs. These too, were a kit set. When we came to NZ I dismantled them  and brought them in the packing case which came by sea freight.

Journal:
We had a phone call from Ian on our last Friday morning with news of Vicky and the twins. Pat is always glad to talk things over after the call.

By this time I guess John and Edith will have visited you and be on their way again. Pat was hopeful of making contact by Skype during their visit but it was not to be (and me hopefully too).

J & E going to Spain for 2 months and back in early April. They did mention Valencia (been there many years ago) maybe going elsewhere, they didn't say.

Started to walk again in the mornings, from about 10 days ago, but not too far at present. Starting from the Yacht Club to the Green Cathedral car park then back again taking 20 minutes there and back. This morning tried a little further and it seems OK. Will try a bit further in a few days, that will be the half way point round the lake.

The lake path is flooded at the moment in probably 2 places, I haven't had a look, but I know from previous years.

Tuesday today and sunny. Pat got up at 2 am this morning and didn't (wouldn't) go back to bed when I got up, but fell asleep in her chair. I then chased her to bed! Now close to lunchtime and she is still there.

Pat has wanted a bureau... desk type for a while now. bought one on Trade-me for $46.00, but it had borer in the bottom. I treated it but she didn't trust it. Bought a new one on Trade-me for $420.00 made of plantation mahogany. Should be delivered today or tomorrow.

Hello, Ian... hope I can keep this up! If I can manage most days it will be only a few lines. Will be glad if I can keep it up.