Last updated: 29th December 1998

I was born John Paul Hindin in Christchurch, New Zealand, at 1:24pm on the 20th of May, in 1979. I was a cute baby (Christ knows what happened), all well built and chubby... as a baby should be. My parents (Jane and Philip) kept me, like the dutiful parents they are, and I lived at 8 Halls Road, in Addington. The place was a junkyard - literally. My dad is a hoarder, he collects junk, and we had plenty of it.... cars, bits of cars, steel, god, you name it - it was there. Over the back fence was a car wrecking yard, to the left was my young childhood friend Kent, and to the right was a motorway.
We lived over the road from where my parents used to work (and, funnily enough, actually met)... Andrew and Beavens was some kind of Engineering firm, and my father was a draughtmen methinks... My mother was probably a secretary, with her thick Scottish accent how it worked I just don't know.
I remember, as a youngster, going over to Andrews and Beavens at lunchtime (when I was old enough to walk m'self, that is) and getting in through the cafeteria door... they'd let me pick out cakes and send me home with 'em :)
I started running at nine monthes old (Walk? I never walked), and I don't even want to remember what kind of trouble I got into. I do, however, remember running down my nana's (Thats my Dads mother) hallway at thier old house, opening up a cupboard, and being showered in disposable nappies (Thats UNUSED you sick people)... I was probably about two.

My mother comes from Helensburgh, in Scotland, on the river Clyde. She moved to Australia at 17, and then to New Zealand at around 21... Her parents (John (Joch) and Mary) followed with her two younger brothers (Robbie and Tom), and they set up in Wellington, New Zealand. My grandfather took up a job at the Wellington airport, and my grandmother as a receptionist at Wellington Hospital in the Womens Ward. I remember when I used to get off the plane, when me and my parents would come up from Christchurch for a visit, my grandad would always meet us at the terminal in his over-alls and get up :) He'd naturally show me off to all the pretty short-skirted air hostesses... My grandfather knew everyone, I'd think... He made friends with most everyone. My grandma, of course, had to follow suit, and I remember her taking me into the hospital to show off to HER friends...

My father can easily be called a New Zealander.. His father, Jack comes from Switzerland... he came to New Zealand when his mother died (he was about 16), to live with his estranged (and *very* nasty) father... Naturally, moving countries with your two siblings (Micheal, 14, and Rachel, 9) just after you mother died is bad enough - but that they didn't speak English at all and thier new 'mother' was a plain ole Kiwi was pretty nightmarish, no doubt. They were thrust into a boarding school, and from there they learnt REAL quick
My nana is a farmgirl, her parents had a farm and all I can remember about it was that they had sheep ("The sheep have got the bloat!") and Clydesdales (Zikes! Thems some BIG horsies)...
My father spent most of his time growing up with my Nana's father, my grandpa... Grandpa was an excellent worksman, and taught my father carpentry and metalwork and things like this, which is what shaped my father to become a Mechanical Engineer (Masters thereof:)...
The thing I always thought was cool about my dad was that he could do walking-handstands. He was a very good gymnast when he was young, so it carried on... I made myself learn how to do it... I vow that when I have kids, I'll be able to show them I can do walking handstands just like my dad.

At the age of four my parents decided it was time to move to a nice neighbourhood, and we found an empty property in a row of houses in a suburb called Avonhead... My dad moved the rubbish that inhabited the section (A sign of how lovely our neighbours were), and we up and moved... out whole house. The house was neatly cut in half (They cut my bedroom off! Of all the cheek...), and moved around 10 kilometers on the back of a truck to this new property at 157 Withells Road. While this was happening, I remember living at my nana's place... Her house was HUGE!
During the move, my dad diligently followed the house in his car (My dad is a car God... He's been rebuilding 'em since he was 14, I swear it), a lovely bright orange Morris 1100 (The Mighty Morrie)... being a chocoholic (a trait I have picked up) he stopped to go to a dairy... Which, lo and behold, was a minor mistake due to the fact.. HE LOST THE HOUSE! Yes, its true, my father was reduced to driving around the route towards the new property looking for our house on a truck... This was the largest house moved this distance ever in the city, and my father managed to lose it.

My Nana owns a bach up in a mountain village called Hanmer Springs. Lovely place, hot pools, skiing, so on so forth. Picture, and Picture (Me).
The two main roads (running parallel from each other) are separated by a long strip of a park, with a whole heap of oak trees. When I was two years old, I took an acorn from one of these trees and brought it home back from Hanmer with me, and planted it in my backyard (Halls Road). This tree grew, and by the time we moved to Avonhead, it was a nice sized tree... Dad fondly remembers the hell he went through to dig it up and plant it into the Avonhead backyard! Alas, the new owners built a deck out of the house and removed MY tree. Really a shame I think. Also around this time, my father decided to invest in his own aeroplane. Dad'd had his private pilots liscence since I was born, and it was about time for him to get his own - he had his eye on a RNZAF (Royal New Zealand Air Force) De Havilland 104 Devon, reg. NZ1808. Alas, he fell short of the asking price by about $2k... If they'd held on for a few more monthes, he would have had enough money after we sold our old property.

We kept the property at Halls Road at first, because we still had a HUGE garage on it. My Dad has been mucking with cars since he was very young, and as a consequence has some real beauties ('39 Buick, '34 Buick, '25 Overlander, '75 Vitesse/Herald cross with Holden 6 cyl engine and then some)...
These were all kept in this huge garage. Alas, one night we were rung by our old neighbours. The garage was on fire.
We raced there (I still remember seeing the fire men down the road trying to stop us from getting there (they didn't know it was our place)... My dad was NOT stopping, and so my mum just stuck her head out the window and yelled "Its OUR place!".
When we got there, it was pretty bad. I remember mum picking me up, while Dad was running back and forth inside this burning building to rescue his damned cars (These vehicles mostly still had petrol in the tanks). After the fire, my father found a place about 20 mins out of Christchurch where they were renting off sections of an old factory. To this day ('98), this junk still lives in Rangiora.

Avonhead was nice... It was very surbubanite, with a primary school five minutes walking distance from my house. My next door neighbours became my fast friends, even though they were a ghastly family... Lou and Yvonne, and thier three children Melanie, Lisa and Raymond welcomed us... Mainly by Lou revving up his car every morning at 7am. Yvonne was a lovely woman, and I remember her... Raymond was only a year older than me, and so we became close friends... Lisa was a right whiner, and our friendship was very much off/on... Melanie was lovely, and quite pretty if I recall correctly, and I do remember the many moments when we were dared to kiss each other on the trampoline while the remainder of the kids hid around the house saying they weren't looking (while peeking around the walls, hoping not to be spotted, mind you). We never kissed, funnily enough.

Merrin school was where my long education began. I became 'acquaintances' of everyone, back in those days kids weren't little bastards like they are now, and I wasn't very much ribbed up... It was pleasant enough I suppose.
I remember a few things about it though... For example, I remember learning the letters of the alphabet, and was sent to the deputy principle to practice my N's (I don't remember why)... I wasn't particularly afraid, this didn't exactly seem like punishment to a bewildered Paul. However, while scrawling Ns all over the page, I mucked up (as small children do) and made a U... I scribbled this out, but she was quick to tell me off, and to my recollection, took my hand in hers, and gently slapped the back of it... hardly a whisper, but I was most frightened and bawled.
I remember walking under the jungle-gym at play break, and someone on top of it playing with the hair of my friend, whom I protectively smacked off...
I had, as a child, a nasty eye-to-hand co-ordination problem (it runs in the family along my fathers line), which resulted in my handwriting to be nightmarish and indecipherable... I remember one teacher (Standard 3, if I recall correctly) Mrs Beale.. a nasty brute of a woman.. Built like a brick shithouse and twice as vile... She actually believed that my problem was NOT eye-to-hand co-ordination (no matter how many times my parents explained it to this woman) and actually made me sit only a few feet from the blackboard, insisting it was because I couldn't see the board correctly.
Worse, this was one of those teachers that didn't throw chalk... Oh no, it was the duster. She also used to tell me I was so childish, she should put me in a high-chair and put a bib on me. I was 8 for Christs sake.
I am a physically affectionate person... I playfight a lot and things like that, to show my fondness of someone (male and/or female)... This she thought was 'unnatural' and, I suppose she assumed I was having strong homosexual tendencies at a VERY young age... Which she put forth to my parents, numerous times I don't doubt.
Needless to say, my parents (and parents of other children in the class), were not impressed, and she was sacked. Hurrah! I even have a copy of the letter that my father wrote... Alas I cannot find it at the time of writing, but I'll type it in sometime.
She was replaced with Mrs Mckenzie... a very happy woman, who three weeks after joining us broke her leg in a Children-verse-Teachers game of Netball, and left us as abruptly. She was replaced by another woman, of whose name escapes me, who was absolutely lovely.... I remember her fondly, she was very kind (evidentally brand new to the teaching world:).

The following year I had Mr. Petrie, who the previous year had scared me pretty fundamentally. He was a huge man, at least 6 feet tall and very well built, and to a tiny child such as myself (My mother is 5'0 and my father is 5'6, I was a tiny child:) immense. He once, to show off to my class (This is when I was with Mrs Cant-Remember-Her-Name-But-She-Was-Lovely) picked me clear up off the ground by the neck of my shirt, and held me a good 5 feet off the ground... and upon returning me to mother earth, I grabbed ahold of my teachers waist and cried like hell due to being petrified.
He wasn't too bad, I don't remember many nasty memories. I do remember one, where we (a group of kiddies) were at the computer (A piece of BBC crap, if I remember correctly), and I apparently knocked the 'Break' key, shutting down the programme. This was a newspaper programme, and much time had been spend typing in news reports.. And I lost it all. The teacher came flying up, roaring and hissing like a bull, grabbed the back of my jersey and flung me out of the way to have a look at the precious computer... as I flew into a group of desks, doing myself some emotional damage.

Around a year previous to this, I met my best friend, Terry, whom I see often enough.
He was running around the play ground with his arms outstretched, being a plane (an F14 Tomcat, as I recall)... and invited me to play... So we both buzzed around as Tomcats. Terry played with transformers (I had many myself, and ended up with a very large collection, which my brother, upon his arrival into this world, set about destroying)... and knew tonnes about planes. Today, Terry is a plane God, a walking encylopaedia about damn near every plane ever created.

In 1986, while my mother was pining for another child, we heard that my cousin Teresa had become pregnant, and the father had bolted for the hills... An adoption was soon arranged, and so on March 18th 1987 my little brother Benjamin Timothy Hindin was born. I gave him his second name, too.. He was supposed to be Benjamin Tim Hindin, but the idiot nurse put Timothy on the birth certificate:)
When I was nine, my father became bored with his job, and managed to get one in Wellington, where my mothers parents were. My mother was convinced into it, and we moved to Wellington in 1988.
My parents looked for houses, but my father won over (without my mothers agreement, I don't doubt) and decided to build a house, so he started his new job, I started in a new school, and we lived in a TINY flat for two or three years while our house was being build on 'The Section' as it was named.
I remember the first day of school I came in, and made a new friend... Johnny Graham.. the naughtiest boy in the human history. My first day, all he did was show me card tricks:)
My teacher was Mrs Luxford, a wonderful middle-age woman with a heart of gold... I formed my first childhood crush in that class, on a cute little blonde called Nicole (I still have the class photos, and she really was cute:)
The headmaster was an Indian man by the name of Mr. Parbhu, and I was petrified of him. When I got into Seatoun School, in Standard 4, I'd never even heard of Times Tables... but there they were, learning them away... Up to the 4 times table. However, they had a good way of making you learn them... after the morning messages over the intercom, all the kids who's turn it was, had to go to the principles office (one from each class) and recite their times tables over the intercom to the school!! I remember my first time vividly.. I was going to do the 3 times table, and I had it written out in my book (I can still remember the fuss with my parents of learning them)... Of course, NO ONE told me that the head master didn't let you read from the book... You really had to learn 'em off by heart... So I made a fool of myself, and hated the entire notion from then onwards.
I sure as hell learned my times tables though!

Very soon after I got to Wellington, my Commodore 64 (From Uncle Tom) finally gave up the ghost, from my little brother dancing on it, and I was left machineless. A man at Dads work gave me my first PC, a Sanyo MBC775 Luggable... From there on my vast interest in computer grew...
The Sanyo was, of course, a 'loaner' - but they definately never saw it again.
I remember when I first got it, and Dad had taught me a few DOS commands (the machine ran off MS-DOS v2.1), I was searching through the two disks that came with it for more games... Being new to computers, and ever so keen, I managed to format the system disk thinking it was a game... Oops:) Luckily we had an original

In Christchurch, I had joined Cubs... and upon arriving at Wellington, joined their troop... a hell of a lot less organised, but lots of fun nonetheless.. However, I have to say, I muchly preferred the Christchurch scarf (a royal blue and dark red), to the Wellington one... a yukky dark blue and horrifying puke-tan colour). On the first day at Seatoun, in my class was a fella named Peter McCorkindale... Nice fellow, and we got on well (and did right through the years).. During lunchtime I decided to go swimming, and so met him again, and chatted to him during this... he seemed a little vague, but I wasn't fussed. Back in class, I met him again, and was chatting to him about what I'd talked to him about at swimming... He was most confused... He had no idea what I was talking to him about, and when he told me that he wasn't at swimming I was most worried... Until he happened to mention (oh yes, it must have slipped his mind), that he had a twin brother... Tim!
It was during this year, I met double-digits.. Yes, thats right, I turned 10.
And, at the end of the year, Mrs Luxford left

The following year, I migrated to the dreaded Miss Scott... a nasty woman, if ever there was one, and I got to get real close to Nicole! I remember being her spelling partner, much to my glee... I'll always remember 'Abundance', which she didn't learn.. "Its easy... A, Bun, Dance."
Funny what stays with you, isn't it?
Finally, as I always knew [grin] my brilliance was acknowledged, and me and three other pupils were moved up one class, to Mrs Scotts. (Yep, thats right, Miss Scotts class to Mrs Scotts class).
She was a much better teacher, and although I don't remember the year well, I do remember that I talked too much, and no matter who she made me sit next too, I got chatty with.. Including her.
At the end of that year, off she went, and left.

The following two years I had Mr Marshall, who was a very good teacher... I started getting razzes around this time, as I was relatively geeky (Hell, I was a sad nerd), and from then onwards they stemmed.
This is where I came up with my second crush... Katherine... A British import, smart as a whip and very pretty behind her glasses...
I became a vile flirter, and gave her stick as much as possible. I remember in Form 1 I decided to tell her on the last day of school (To get the least rebuke, I suppose)... I was playing baseball with her, and having good fun, when I went to fetch the ball (it had gone over the school fence) and upon returning found her gone... And my friend had told her that I fancied her... Her reply (I still remember the stinging remark) was "Eww, that geek?". However, I knew she liked me anyway, but I decided to let it drop. :)

I left Seatoun School, after being the top dogs, to Saint Patricks College, an all-boys Catholic school. They accepted only 8% of non-Catholics, and I was very definately non-Catholic. I remember meeting with a Catholic priest (from my grandmothers parish)... "I want to go to Saint Pats... I'll even let you baptise me..." Oops! Maybe it was a glimpse of Religious beliefs to come?

I realised my parents were separating by now, as when we finally moved into my new three storied house in 1990, my parents were in separate bedrooms. In 1994, my father got a job in Christchurch, and moved down there again... My mothers boyfriend, Richard, moved in... and provided many drama's...

In Saint Patricks I quickly made new friends... but became too overbearing for them and towards the end of the year, they ran away from me. The beginning of a painful rejection at school. I also got the piss taken out of me a lot... they were brutish bastards then.
I remember the 3rd form Dean, Brother Matt... Nice priest, with an acid streak. He knew my mum from a while back (She once employed him as a ballot officer during a referendum), and he became attached to me quick. We got on well... He had the nasty habit of suddenly shouting in the middle of a lesson when you were falling asleep and scaring the hell outta you.
In third form, my classes were:
English (Mr Williams), More English (Mr Williams also), French (Madam Morrison), Graphics And Design (Mr Wadsworth), Maths (Mr Deva), Science (Brother Matt), Religious Ed (Brother Matt), Music (Mrs Gould), Social Studies (Mr Noble) and Phys Ed (Mr Packer).

Fourth form passed boringly, except this was the first year of 'streamed' classes (Where the split up the smart ones from the dumb ones in different classes)... I, flatteringly enough, was put into the top class.
The teacher in that class took an instant dislike of me, and I will always maintain the reason I got such bad marks in his English class that year was because of it.
In fourth form I decided that I wanted to be Catholic, and so went through the rigmorale, and was baptised. I regret it.
My classes were:
English (Mr Bishop), Phys Ed (Mr Packer), Science (Miss DeLiefde), Social Studies (Mrs Murray), French (Madam Morrison), Religious Education (Mr O'Halloran).

Fifth form was nasty. In New Zealand, in fifth form at the end of the year you have a major set of exams (each about three hours), called Fifth Form Certificate....
I had chosen to do both Chemistry and Physics, and as it turns out, I'm not allowed to do both of these while also doing General Science... So good old Brother Matt (whose Science class I was supposed to be in) reasoned that I could easily have passed Fifth Form science last year (since all we did in Fourth Form science, WAS Fifth form :) and made a few calls... And so it was done, I got out of fifth form science and got to do Chemistry and Physics. Physics I had with Brother Matt, which I soon decided was not my cup of tea (Too much damn maths)... Chemistry, however, was excellent, and the teacher was a genius...
He was the perfect Chemistry teacher... the one that blew holes in the school yards, and let me prove to him I could make plastic explosives from bleach
That year I discovered the internet and pyrotechnica, and soon learned more about explosives than anyone else I knew... GREAT fun!
Towards the end of the year, we were required in English class to do a seminar... I chose pyrotechnics... And as my 'show and tell', I made up a couple of fuses and set them off... (Which we had to do outside for smoke detector reasons - yes, they were supposedly THAT sensitive)... So I thought, What The Hell, Lets Make it Big... and proved to the school I was a bad MFer... And made a big-arse smoke bomb and filled the entire quad with thick white smoke.
In the first mock Maths exam I got a whole 45%... In the second, 26%. I have always hated maths... And my teacher made it clear the largest jump he'd even seen from mock exam marks were 20%, so I was doomed - but I should work anyway. That year, in School Cert maths I proved him wrong - 81% :) My first, and only A.
Mrs Moore (French and Form teacher) was new, her first year, and not the best of teachers, but a lovely woman nonetheless... We became good friends (Not extracurricular friends, of course).
I was lucky, in doing six base subjects, and so didn't have to do RE nor PE often.. Once a week, in fact:) Praise the Lord!
That year I took:
English (Mrs Bishop), Religious Ed (Mr Ashe), Phys Ed (Mr Packer), Physics (Brother Matt), Chemistry (Mr Murray), Maths (Mr Reid), French (Mrs Moore) and Economics (Mrs ?). The following year was nothing spectacular.
Sixth form was a little boring, except for Biology, which I absolutely love. Miss DeLiefde was back, and she's definately cool.
Economics was cool, there was only 11 people in our class:)
Mr Strang, my Chemistry teacher, was a tall and well balded man with beautiful blue eyes (No, really!)... He also had a nasty habit or as you were falling asleep, or ignoring him while writing, to take a standard Chemistry book (generally 2 to 3 inches thick) and slam it down on your desk, next to your head, with all his might. Needless to say, I lost a lot of weight.
Miss Jacqui Smith was a nasty woman, very immature, who irked me from day one. To this day, I maintain she's the reason I gave up on English classes.
I also met possibly the best friend I've ever had. Gerard was just like me, except from the Bogan (metalhead) angle... He was Irish and damn proud, and I was Scottish and damn proud. We became fast friends, knowing exactly what each other felt and meant, and I dropped my blue track pants for black jeans and T-shirts.
In this year (1996) I started going out with my friends into town, and met my first girlfriend. Ruth was a Goth chick with avengeance, and I'm glad it was her... My first kiss was the first weekend we got together, and she was the only person I knew who had lost her virginity... And she was a month younger than me. I knew I was getting into the big league now :) I cleared out the junk room downstairs, and put a double bed into it, to have a bigger room, and Ruth came over to my house every Friday night, and stayed until Sunday... I became hideously domesticated.
Ruth was younger than me, but a year ahead of me in school. She was far more mature than I (which wasn't hard), and it didn't take long before she matured me severely. I lost my virginity on the 23rd of March, 1996, at around 9:30pm... And I'm forever greatful. We started going out only a month prior, 20th of Febuary... She asked ME out, I was a chickenshit.
I mananged to fail Maths.
At school:
Maths (Mr Drake), Chemistry (Mr Strang), Biology (Miss DeLiefde), Economics (Mr McGrath), Religious Ed. (Mr Woods), English (Miss Smith).

Seventh form is also a nasty year for education, due to Bursary... Seventh form is the end of the line for High School, and as such you have VERY long and extremely hard tests at the end of the year.
My friend in Christchurch, Terry, mentioned to a friend of his about how I was a hacker... This friend, Andrew, was an avid Hacker/Phreaker, and began ringing me. He also put a Wellingtonian redhead, Becky, onto me, and we became friends... I set her up with her boyfriend!
At the end of the previous year, I found my first real Net.Girlfriend, a buxom cutie by the name of Jennifer. We became very close, and she wasted her money talking to me on the phone and swooning over my accent... In December, while I was on holiday, my Ruth found out, and went ballistic, sending a letter to the place I was staying at... I just stopped going online when she was... Cruel, but I didn't know how else to deal with it.
I also broke up with Ruth, in early July... the week before her birthday. I had just fallen out of love with her...
I tried to pick up Jennifer again, because I alway really cared about her, but she decided she was bi-sexual, and started going with a close female friend of mine. I was destroyed. Forevermore I have hated this 'friend'.
I started going out with Gerard more often, and when he came across a prospective girlfriend, a Girl Racer by the name of Mel, whom was very cute, my second head got in the way.
I stayed with her at her graveyard shift at work for the whole 8 hours, slept on the couch at her place to recover, and then went home. Gerard was looking for me, half out of concern and half out of fear I was with his Mel... It was true, and from then our friendship fell. I will always regret the stupidity.
But, it was only to get worse. This gave the arseholes at school an excuse, and soon no one but a few very close friends would talk to me at all. Life became hell.
I also, out of sadness, began to 'see' Mel... who tore my heart out, and danced a fandango on it.
My conversations with Andrew were more often, and I finally decided to go to Christchurch again (I hadn't done so in over a year since when I was with Ruth, I spent my entire holidays with her)... And we met, and I was advanced onto a new life... Crime.
I became highly adept at breaking into Telecom vans, and put my hands on many laptops. I became even better friends with Andrew, and ripped off vans with him every time I was in Christchurch. He set me up with a couple of Phreakers in Wellington, Shannon and Deano. Deano was an utter coward, but worth a laugh.. Shannon was a very cool guy, and we went out nearly every single weekend and did Telecom vans.
The penultimate of these, were when we went into the Telecom vehicle depots. They didn't know what hit them, in Christchurch we spent 3 hours in the depot, and did every van/car there... over 20 of them.
It was exhilerating, and I loved it.
I managed to pass Bursary, even though I had over 80 days off school wagging (School was such a nightmare for me, I didn't even want to know about it)....
I got four C's.
Also this year, my father got another chance at getting a plane - and this time he scored... He acquired from the RNZAF musuem not one, but TWO Devon aircraft (From the same series he went for in '84... ) NZ1827 (As of yet, unrestored) and NZ1828 (Currently Flying). It took quite a few monthes to get NZ1828 flying, and I was there when the engines were first run up... And I was there when the Devon took its first flight (Although, not ON the airplane - just in case it crashed, Dad didn't want the both of us splattered). XRay November Zulu was born (ZK-XNZ).
After coming down to Christchurch, every second weekend my father would fly up on a commerical flight... Now he started flying up in his own plane, and I started racking up the flying hours.

1998 was a new year. I was out of High School and didn't want to go to University... What would I do? Computer Science? I know more about them than most graduates, and I'd have to do maths - and I HATE MATHS! Plus, of course, the minor problem with me failing Sixth Form maths:)
I did nothing. Thats about the size of it. Oh, I did a little programming here and there for Dad, but that was about it.
In March, I moved from my second (and very sweet) net.gf to my third, and final. And I do mean moved, I fell in love with my Kate while still going out with Mel (Mel of Texas, not the Girl Racer)... It was a little messy, but Mel got over it (How, I don't know - I wouldn't have been able to... a better person than I). Kate and I started going out on the 17th of March, during her Spring Break. I fell happily, and upon the introduction of a phone deal where calls to American cost a maximum of $15, no matter how long you talked, our calls were legendary. Our record is 21 hours, straight.
This was also the year when my nightly activities caught up with me. I, the NightCrawler, on April 14th got busted. We were wandering around at 4am, when the cops picked us up... there was a call in of a prowler (Not us), and they soon pinned 3 break ins on us in Christchurch. They raided my house in Wellington, and pinned 5 more on me from up there. Arrested twice, 8 charges of theft ex-vehicle, and Telecom demanding $15k of reparation, life looked bleak. I'm lucky my mother is such a strong and wonderful woman, and that my Kate is such a sweetheart.
My mother had worked at the Department of Justice and in the Wellington Courts for the last four years, and thanks to her, her contacts, and knowledge of the system, and a QC lawyer, I survived.
In New Zealand we have a 'Diversion' police scheme, were you have your conviction wiped from your record - so that only the police ever know... Employers and the like will never find out, so you don't have you job chances slashed.
I got Diversion by a hair (Thanks Mum!), and recieved 80 hours community service with the Salvation Army, $4910 worth of reparation to Telecom, and an apology letter. My father wrote out a cheque that day... The Salvation Army work wasn't bad, it was excellent, and I highly enjoyed it... We spent most of the time in the van with the guy who looked after us (Les), and all we did was shift whitewear, old ladies:), and mow lawns.

In August, 1998, my Kate came to New Zealand with her aunt (and my friend), Carol (aka. Kay). They stayed from August 8th to August 17th, and I loved every second. Kate was absolutely everything I thought she'd be, and Kay was twice as bad as I thought she'd be (in a NICE way, Kay!).
We went to Hanmer for a week to get away from the family, and Dad lent me his car so we travelled - and it was fantastic.
I saw a slice of heaven, and I cried when they left to go home again.

I screwed around for a few monthes, pining after my Kate and being a bastard to everyone... I went to Christchurch to work with my father for a few monthes, to work up the money to get to the US.
My immigration had been well planned.... Kay was going to get me a job in the US, and she had just moved into a house and had a huge room for me and was very happy to let me live with her (Wonderful and patient woman that she is)... All I needed now was the $2k it cost to get there, and the work permit (and job that went with it).

Of course, nothing ever goes as well as planned. The job offer never came (funnily enough), so I decided to just go over for a few monthes, and be with Kate and Kay, find myself a job, go back to NZ to wait for the permit to go through and then go back to the US - how to get back was beyond me at the time.

So, I started working.

On September 30th I had a near death experience. While in Christchurch my father let me use one of his cars (a totally deregistered and illegel Austin 1300 - My father had a dealers plate, so I put that on it whenver I wanted to drive it!)... I had begun to let my little cousin ( Isaac, 14 at the time) drive. We went to a car park by the air museum on the ex-RNZAF base my dad had his planes and office in...
This Saturday I had (unplanned) let him take a little drive, and about fifteen minutes into the fun he mucked up. He was trying to do a chicane deal, but the steering wheel got away from him, and by the time he had it back it was too late.. At first I thought all we were going to hit was the light pole, I wasn't too scared even though I wasn't wearing a seat belt (Isaac was)... however, he tried to correct his mistake, and then realised we were going to hit the solid concrete flower box went for the anchors, but hit the accelerator pedal instead... We rammed into the box at about 60kmh. I flew out of the seat, slammed my right hand and forehead against the windscreen - I can remember watching it fly right out of its frame... After it, we jumped out and bolted... and after even more fuss, my father was alerted, we were okayed, and the car put away in a hangar and the mess cleared up.
Big deal, you say? Maybe you didn't read right - the windscreen flew out of the frame. Thats right, when I got back it was sitting on the bonnet (not even a scratch on it!). Now, if I hit it with enough force to pop it out of the frame, what would have happened if it hadn't have come out? I think I quite possibly might have died.
I think this was a miracle, yes, the real thing.
Click,Click,Click, Click.

Ever since March '98, I had rung my Kate every single weekend. Our normal conversations lastest for around 5 or so hours. Our record, to date, is 21 hours.
About a week after my accident, while talking to Kate, she happened to mention that I was (and I quote) "The talk of the town". I knew it was going to happen someday... Really:)
Apparently word had 'leaked' that I was coming over to the US for Christmas, and as such, Kate coming from a small town (And her parents still living there) word travels fast... To which end, Kate's mother found out about this before Kate actually told her (Oops!).
Of course, apparently we were also already married! And I was coming to move in with Kate. Isn't Chinese Whispers such a fun game?
Neverless, I was flattered.

And, then, miraculously, it was settled and paid. I bought my tickets to go to the US on the 15th of November... I was to leave on the 19th of December.
Needless to say, I was buzzed. In only a few weeks time I was going to get to spend my Christmas - with my Kate!
And - of course - meet her whole family! Zikes!

For two and a half monthes, from the 1st of October to the end of the second week in December, I worked. And I worked hard. I went down to Christchurch with my father, and worked for him. We did the safety inspections on Japanese import vehicles, I just wandered around the vehicle and wrote down all the safety standard marks (light lenses, seat belts, glass, tyres, etc) and made sure the lights all went.
I got $10 a car, which was pretty damn good since on average we did about 10 cars a day... Our best day was 30 cars, and that was working 11am to 9:15pm... Our week record was 103 cars in one week
Maybe numbers to you, but thats a HELL of a lot of cars. I work out I did, in total, in two and a half monthes, 591 cars.
After paying off all sorts of bloody bills, paying my ticket, and frittering about $100 of it away, I was ready.
Me and my father had been living in a tiny little flat (Click, Click, Click) all this time.
I write this exactly one week before I leave to go to the US, finally. I have my tickets. I have money. Here I come America, duck!

Coming to America was quite a culture shock. I can't begin to explain the differences between the countries. However, I can certainly say that wandering around LAX (Los Angeles airport) was a nightmare, and I hope to never have to do it again (Even though, I know I will...).
I met all of Kates family, which was a little unnerving, but they are all a great bunch... except for a few.
Kate's family lives in Hampton, Iowa, which is about an hour out of Ames, which was my main destination since this is where Carol lives.
Kate had had a little trouble from her parents (I won't go into it, this is my life - and not her bad memories), and I was quite nervous about meeting them... Kates mum (or should that be Mom?) was all very nice and welcoming, but Kates dad wasn't so much...
After Christmas, we went back to Ames, and Kates parents arrived at 5 in the morning to 'talk' to her. We also won't go into what they said to Kate, but they stayed in the car, and made me quite nervous - here's hoping I don't have to go through that again either.
I got to meet Kates little cousins - and happen to have a couple of shots of them, Ethan(7) and Ruth(4).
I brought them suckers... That were HUGE. $20 each... See here, here, and here.

I enjoyed America... There were a lot of great people to meet (Nume, Pralle, Sara, Maggs, Dave, Tim, Trude, Amy)... Isn't it strange that I have more friends in a country 10,000 kilometers away? C'est la vie. I write this two months after leaving America, and can barely remember my visit. It came and went all too quick... but thats how life goes, I suppose. I really mucked around instead of being in there and looking for a job like I was supposed to be doing so. Alas.
I tried towards the last two weeks, but eventually I became disheartened and gave up.

I returned to New Zealand very saddened, and there was nothing I could do about it.
Three days after returning, my father rang me (I stayed in Wellington trying to decide what to do with myself) and said that he would like me to come down to Christchurch and help him with work.
His job was changing, and he was intending on starting up a new business - and as I understood the system well, he wanted me in on the job. He said I could work for as short as I liked, for example a couple of weeks.

After a month, I have decided that it isn't so bad. I might even stay for a lot longer, considering the $350NZ I get week, roughly.
We even got Terry in on the act, and he works fulltime with us too.

I think that working fulltime isn't so bad. I find it very stressful, because I'm often very busy. But, its great having the money!
Because I now believe that there's no way America is going to let me stay unless I marry Kate, I'm going to stay here and work.
Kate will (so far) come here in August for about three weeks, before the "fall" semester starts... That'll be nice. I'll probably have to help her pay, but when she's working on occasion during the week in a library and I'm working fulltime - thats fair enough!
Our new company, Wigram Motor Rating, takes cars from vehicle dealers, and strips them down (so you can see seatbelt anchors, sills, wheel arch guards, door seams, so on so forth)... we then have them inspected by a Vehicle Testing New Zealand man, who gives it a pass... and there we have it. A brief as to my business.
We work out of Wigram, the air base where my father stores his aircraft. Soon I hope to have photo's for you.

At the moment, I'm looking at a car... ANOTHER Ford Capri Mark I :)
Real tidy this time. We'll see. Don't have enough money to pay for it, have to bum a loan off Dad... which, since money's tight, won't be too easy. Mind you - it'd only take me just over a month to pay said loan back...

15th of May, 1999
As you can see, these memoirs have kind of changed in tense - I've moved from using past tense to using present tense, since this is kind of a diary. So, I've decided to add dates to when I add stuff in... that way you can get an idea of a time scale.

I did buy that other MkI Capri, without engine however. I brought Bex down from Wellington (What a trip that was) and have swapped the engines around. I'm thinking now (After meeting up with another Capri fan) of turbocharging the beast. I'm probably also going to buy a MkII Capri, since its going for only $500 for a fully LEGAL car!

I was put into the disputes tribunal on the 4th of May, Telecom decided to keep the money that was supposed to go to the Christchurch companies - and said companies wanted it back. To cut a long story short, the three against one "fair" tribunal hearing ended up with them BELIEVING my story, but still ordering me to pay the $744.76 to them. Three weeks paycheque.

Life has come to a point where I'm very bored.
Nothing happens. I don't have any real friends down here, and so I don't have anyone to go and play with. It makes me very sad, and even more now I feel very lonely. I have something wonderful to look forward to, Kate will be here ion August the 3rd for three weeks. Still, it hurts.
Today (a Saturday) I spent the morning bored out of my mind. There was nothing to do. This made me realise that really Christchurch sucks. I see my cousin, and thats it. My newly found friend Simon is ALWAYS busy, and my only other friend is Richard, from work, and I don't really know him well enough to be spending weekends together.
C'est la vie, I hear you cry. Too true. I'm better off than many, many other people. But, still, I can't help feeling depressed.

Enough of that ranting.
I got bored with my old webpage and decided to do a relatively major overview of the place and update it a little. I'm rather proud of myself, God help Kate (Who right now is sitting on the other end of the phone listening to me type)...

What other notable events have occurred? 'Told you it's boring here.

17th of June, 1999
Oh dear Lord is it boring down here!
There has been a lull at work recently, and as a result, there is practically nothing to do! I'm going slowly insane.

My Birthday (20th of May) was a small affair, and I wasn't exactly turning handsprings that day. We went out to dinner, but that was about it. I think the prize present was a book that Kay sent me, 'Cryptonomicon', by Neal Stephenson. I read the 917 pages in a little over a week. Excellent book, definately worth reading - although he tends to waffle on a bit now and then.
A few weeks later, my Nana gave me 'Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl". I'm not too far through it yet, but it is a fascinating book, I can understand why it is considered 'classical literature'.

My Capri efforts have slackened. Kat was pissin' me off, its true, and so I passed the buck to the mechanic (After the amount of trouble I went through, and the shit it gave me on a certain Friday, I wasn't interested in it).
The MkII man changed his price to $650 - and the car become unwarranted and unregistered! As such, I passed - full stop.

I'm rather pleased with my discipline, in the face of so little money. I earn (roughly) $300NZ a week, $150 goes into the 'Kate Account', $100 goes to my father (A rather sharp board & food payment) and the remaining money sieves down into my Cheque account, where it seems to survive somehow.
After the amount of money I've managed to go through in a week, I've altered my spending patterns. I no longer buy lunch (Except in rare occasion) and am more careful on petrol.

47 days to go, until Her Majesty arrives.

7th of July, 1999
26 days to go!

Yes, its been quite a while since I've updated this. I discovered, recently, that Yahoo! and GeoCities have merged. This is bad, in my opinion, because Yahoo! is _very_ commericalised - and it'll make GeoCities even worse! (Yes, I'm sure its possible).
I had to "re-sign in", which only asked what my page was about (As if it could be pinned down to a single subject?).. What a waste of my time.
Why did I do it, you ask? Because GeoCities wouldn't let me upload my webpage until I did!
To add frustration to stupidity - it kept coming up with server errors, and making me do it over again. Idiots!

We're getting a cat!
Well, okay, it is already my cat, but we're bringing her (Sammy) down from Wellington... Mum's asthma is killing her, and the cat is a good contributer. So now we've got to bring her down in the Devon (of all things), and try and acclimatise her to Christchurch. Poor kitty.
I took the Capri in for a Warrant of Fitness on Monday (Today is Wednesday). It failed on: Rusty brake lines (Clean up job) Left hand wheel bearing ("Not shagged but it will be, so fix it") Left hand indicator (A little dim, bad earthing) Castle nut on the wheel bearing needs to have a split pin (Locknut put on instead) Possible rust in the C pillar (After wrestling with the vinyl, turns out its adhesive bubbles!) Not too bad, huh?
I should have them all fixed and done by tomorrow!
However the real story was on the trip to Vehicle Testing to get the car done. On the way there, we had a flat tyre! And on the way back, the clutch cable snapped, THEN it ran out of fuel, THEN the battery (somehow) shorted itself, and zapped the CD player! You can't win!

8th of July, 1999
What? Updating after only one day?
Too true, today was possibly the most difficult, bastardly days of my life. In fact, I swear my Capri is jynxed.

I was taking the Capri out this morning (picking someone up from dropping off a car), and on the way back a great clunking noise came about. I assumed it was the wheel bearing I put on.
I decide to risk it and drive on, and after rounding a bend, the nose drops and the wheel comes off and goes flying down the road. I scraped about 1/4" off the disc, and skidded to a halt w/o killing myself.
What the hell is it with these near death experiences?

On returning to the hangar after fixing this, Terry opened the doors (They open upwards), and crunched against a van - the idiot owner had parked it too close to the door and Terry didn't check right.
As such, we're going half-and-half - but my word, what an argument.

Then the Capri failed AGAIN at VTNZ... too much slop in the wheel (I didn't tighten up the nut on the end of the stub axle enough, easy fix) and the bloody indicator stopped working AGAIN. I give in.

1st of November, 1999
Yea, Yea, I know its been awhile. I've been busy, alright?
Where to begin?
Kate's two weeks was painfully short, but ecstatically enjoyable. Of course, its near on two months from now that I'll see her, and it hurts more and more everyday - insert sappy shit here.

I managed to get a good job. Thanks to Brent, I am now (as of late October) a programmer with Globe.Net Communications Ltd, and to add to it, the job is in Wellington, so I've moved back home and am living with mum and Ben again.
Where am I with Kate? Like I said, its getting more painful, but apart from my illogical irrationalities, we're still very much together. Kate will be here on December 31st, again for two weeks. Upon finding out the time contraints I was very disappointed, so I've convinced her to come to NZ for three months next year. Hurrah!

My poor Capri made the trip from Christchurch up to Picton (Ferry terminal) in 3 hours 25 minutes - and its normally a 4 + 1/2 hour trip. However, when we got to Picton, it decided to burn out the starter motor, and it ended up staying there for a week. Currently its being a pain in the ass, and soon I'll take it down to a mecanics for a top-end overhaul (couple of gaskets and seals), work on the starting, and a serious tune-up.

I'm earning quite a substantial amount of money (Well, quite a bit more than I was), so now I'm fighting the urge to splurge, so to speak. I succumbed on Halloween and bought myself a Katana (Samurai Sword)... Alas we were out, so there were no trick or treaters to chase.