The old bear finds some magic numbers to play with ~ Oldbear News

I have always loved numbers. Not that I can retain any of them. Nor am I particularly brilliant when it comes to adding or dividing. I married a certain female bear for that skill - she is way ahead of me when it comes to numbers. She can recall birthdays and equations / special dates and numerical oddities with consummate ease - which is why she is the Accountant in the family and I happily leave her to balance the books. Don't get me wrong - I can and could balance my cheque book if I had to. Nor could I keep up with my boys once

they got into algebra and numbers at school - they talked a foreign language at that point. Nevertheless I do love numbers, and in particular statistical numbers.

There are certain numbers that just appeal - for example a 86-60-86 sequence would be great and very pleasing to look at!!

I belong to a group called ARHS - Association of Rugby Historians and Statistician and we operate a website and Facebook page. I keep records of other certain things - like our monthly power usage and certain medal winners by state or athlete in certain sports.

For a while I kept track of every earthquake we felt in Christchurch but since the Feb shake of 3 years back gave that up. the latest current thing is keeping track of the daily high temperatures for Christchurch / Dunedin/ Whitianga and Waiuru. (we are comparing notes between where we live - and Pam's sister lives (Dunedin) where we would like retiring too (Whitianga) and where the boys thought they could learn how to be a soldier (Waiuru) ). I drive my boys nuts with the insane need to get the numbers correct - and in right order.
Of course part of the fun is to draw nice graphs and such things . . . .

So guess what - last week it dawned on me that today - yes T O D A Y - the 27 Feb 2014 is the exact 30 year anniversary since I touched down in New Zealand - and touchdown it was - no air-bridge in those days - you just walked down the stairs and in-between 2 yellow lines across the tarmac to the terminal!!

30 years!! :)

Time to reflect. For within these 30 years a few things that have happened, that are little anniversaries in itself.

I have been involved as a scout-leader exactly half of my time since I been in New Zealand - some 15 years and still counting.

I have had the same employer now for 10 years - one third of my time here

I have been married for 96% of that time - ok ok - I can never got to 100% on that - still it is pretty good going (and next year we will celebrate 30 years of marriage)

I have had the privilege of walking alongside my son for 25 years = thats 85% of my time here

I have been a full time dad raising my boys for 12 years of my time here - = thats urm - adds one - looks at calculator and comes up with 40% of my time here.

the Millennium celebration - are sitting exactly half way between arriving and now - and who can forget all those fireworks and the y2k bug???

I had my first jamboree in 2002 - and had 3 more since then

I gained 33% (some whopping 22kg) of my original weight - yes I was a skinny rag - due to all the cycling I used to do. Since I stopped that and stayed at home my middle has gone more sideways then I care to admit. Actually that is not a statistic I am proud to admit. Lets scrap that from the internal memory bank :)

I have lived her 30% longer then I have in my entire life in Salzburg.

on average we have been back to Europe for a visit every 7.5 years

This year will be my 10th mid winter camping trip with some scouts - to our lovely west-coast

As a Family (counting the wife as a secretary and the boys starting keas) we are involved with scouting in various roles for the last 20 years

We have had 14 times where someone crossed the Equator (either we made a trip or received visitor's from Europe). It works out on average every 2.05 years . Wohoooo who is next????