So, I sort of have an issue with you flip-flopping baseball fans. I understand the whole "Go Chicago" sentiment, but after hating on the Sox every season, it just seems a little wrong, don't ya think?

Another issue of mine: Every morning I walk 1.5 blocks to my office, down the major street of downtown AKL. I have to cross the street, and since they have the novel system of the diagonal crosswalk here, I do that. I hadn't experienced this untill the week before I came here, in CA. Did y'all know Rodeo Drive has these?

Now, the diagonal crosswalk seems like a good idea in theory - shorter distance from A to B, you don't have to wait for two separate lights to change, etc. etc. But the problem is that, in order for it to be efficient, it needs to be a carefully choreographed affair. Back in my days of dance, we would spend ridiculous amounts of time determining traffic patterns like this. In big group numbers, there's always the one idiot who doesn't understand "right side, downstage; left side, upstage," so the rest of the corps has to walk through it 50 million times. If people who have trained for years in dance don't get this sort of thing, how do expect regular pedestrians to figure it out - without rehearsal?

It goes a little like this: the little green man comes up on the walk sign and the buzzer sounds, and everyone's off. There's always the elderly person or punk ass teenager who steps right in front of you, even though it's obvious you're going to be moving faster than them. And then, it never fails, when you reach the crossing point in the middle, you'll have your route all eyed out, but someone will do a mini-sprint, or stop midstep, and fuck it all up. It wouldn't be so maddening, but it's the very first thing that happens to me every morning, without fail. It's like fucking Groundhog's Day.

Luckily, I'm leaving this town again tomorrow. I've got me a bus ticket to Taupo, for my as-promised travel piece. So far, I've felt like a total asshole arranging on it, cause I don't really understand my assignment, and again, I feel bad being handed free things in exchange for press coverage, when I know perfectly well it's not going to work out like that.

But anywho, I have a truly stellar itinerary in place, which is jampacked with the best activities the town offers, including but not limited to: bungying, skydiving, the huka jet, a Maori hangi, and a winery. Hell yeah, sauvignon blanc here I come... If I survive it all, expect some killer stories.