Big day for my brother

What should be the final chapter of my brother's saga will play out tomorrow. Let's hope common sense prevails and his ex-fiancée, an extremely poisonous and vindictive woman, doesn't cause any more damage to him than she already has. I'll be in touch with him during the day. Our body corporate AGM takes place at 6:30 tomorrow; the earthquake risk issue was already the elephant in the room before the recent shakes so it could be a marathon meeting. Hopefully the guts of it will be over by the time my brother's flight gets in around nine. I've taken Friday off work. I'm not sure what we'll do yet. The film festival is on - I really want to see 56 Up but I'm not sure that's my brother's cup of tea. We'll probably go on a long walk, weather permitting. He turns 32 on Saturday but he's never been a big one for celebrating birthdays. The most important thing is that I see my brother at all. He flies to the UK next Thursday and has vowed not to renew his NZ passport nor ever set foot in the country again, and although I'm sure his attitude will change, it's likely to be a long time before I next see him.

Last Saturday I did the Southern Walkway with four others including the leader whose extreme enthusiasm nearly drove me around the bend. She was about to change jobs; I don't envy her new colleagues. I didn't get much of a feel-good sensation from the walk (I didn't want to be with people) although the exercise surely did me some good. Danielle was there - she clearly doesn't like dogs (unlike many Aspies who are very fond of them). We finished up at Island Bay and could see the destruction caused by last month's storm.

Am I supposed to be excited by the arrival of the royal baby? Because I'm not. I'm much more excited about my friend Mandy's baby. A university friend sent me an email with news of people from the past. When faced with such news it's hard not to make comparisons: while other people have hopes and dreams and goals and plans and kids and stuff, I'm just going through the motions.

I've compared notes with my workmates and I'm alarmed by just how many aftershocks I've felt. If I had kids and plans and stuff I might not have felt so many, but I do seem to be in the dodgy zone. I've felt almost as many quakes as the smart-arse in Auckland who submits felt reports on Geonet, claiming to have noticed every single one.