Curiouser and curiouser

Today Craig and I took the ferry out to Rangitoto Island and climbed all the way to the top (!) and all the way back down again.
I took many photos (you're surprised, I know) but they will wait for another day because this afternoon something quite strange happened to me ...

We caught the 12:45pm ferry back to Devonport. I can't be wrong, because there are only 3 ferry crossings a day and if we'd missed that one then we'd have been sat on the island, twiddling our thumbs, for another 3.5 hours.
The ferry ride was uneventful. Except halfway through one of those things popped into my head.
One of those things that gets turned around and around and around like a rock in a tumbler, polishing it up in my mind. One of them is Dolarhyde but today it was ...
R.o.u.s es, Rodents of Unusual Sizes. ROUSes. ROUSes. ROUSes.
I even muttered it outloud as we were disembarking. I was trying to not slip.
The ferry ride took 20 minutes, we were in Devonport at 1pm.

On our way back to Craig's parents' house we stopped at a mall and I bought two pairs of shoes (also, not the point of this story) and the time on the receipt, (I just checked) was 1:51pm.

Have we established the time yet? Craig and I would not have been home before 2pm.
Shortly afterward I started editing and uploading photos from the day. And I checked my email.
I received this:



Bizarre right?
An obscure linguistical obsession pops into my head, apropos of nothing and I come home to a message saying the exact same thing??
My sister and I are obviously psychically linked.

Firstly, an explanation ...

Craig and I arrived safely in New Zealand a few days ago.
Ever since I have been awash on a sea of sugarfree V.
There is a strange cognitive dissonance, everything seems so totally familiar and yet strange. Little things.

On our first day in Hong Kong, we were walking down to catch the ferry and I exclaimed Sparrows!!, I hadn't, until that moment, realised that we don't see sparrows in London.

I have ... oh, hundreds of photos to post. Why?



Because my husband is oh so darling. My fauxmas present was the camera I have been dreaming of for years. The Canon EOS 400d.
Which I have been calling my Ixty, as the US name for the model is the Digital Rebel xti. Hee. But I'm not a big fan of the us-centric nickname. And I will not be anthropomorphising it.
(I have to quit squinting into the viewfinder though.)