gjm

"Are you an experienced Project Manager- Network and Infrastructure with a background in finance sector..." What does 'finance sector' have to do with it?

Yup - new strategy, but want 10 years experience of something no-one will ever use again. It's a familiar story. People skills are imperative when managing anyone, or any extensive piece of work, but companies don't seem to have woken up to that yet. There's so little actual cloud in NZ that it beggars belief. There's some small-scale implementations, but nothing with true resilience or BC. And the other thing so many people lose sight of is data sovereignty - NZ law requires much of NZ data to be kept in NZ, and not under the control of someone in the US, India, some funny little island somewhere...

Conveyancing in the UK is rarely done by solicitors. It is done by firms of solicitors, but it's legal clerks, aides and similar who do the work. (And they still charge solicitor-level fees for it.) This means no-one actually thinks - they just parrot the rules in the book. I genuinely don't see the problem. It's a 50/50 wall. Half each. which means we can't even knock it down without the neighbour's agreement!

And... Here's what they didn't show you... What_Porsche_HID_from_that_onboard_919_Lap.mp4

I know. Unfortunately we're 12000 miles and 12 hours shifted from them. The lawyer maintains they are acting in the interests of their client. Their client may be happy to believe that, of course.

I'd like to think so, but with the neighbour being uncontactable at present, it wouldn't get far. the situation is very similar to that experienced by some buyers in rural NZ - boundaries exist, but are somewhat fluid. The issue in this case has arisen because the wall was built *on* the boundary, and not on one side or the other. the solicitor is being an overly judicious arse and demanding formal representation and agreement, and doing so in the name of making more money protecting their client.

'Make work' is exactly what this is. We've seen it before, with the sale of my grandfathers house. Payment to the solicitor may be withheld but more worrying for us is the buyers desire to move quickly. We could lose our buyer.

f**king solicitors (in the Uk, but this may be an accurate generalisation). Selling mother-in-law's house following her passing away earlier this year. Have a keen buyer. House ckeared - a traumatic experience. Buyer has finance and is keen to move. Solicitor notices there is a 3' high wall directly on the boundary, separating the two driveways. It's been there 26 years and is regarded as, and described as, a party wall meaning shared responsibility between the neighbours. Buyers solicitor refuses to complete until they receive written documentation from the neighbour... Who is away until mid-August. Buyer is livid. We're livid. Solicitor is running up a bill with phone calls and letters.

I've found the devil is in the details and that the tiniest straying from a role description has sidelined me. In fact, meeting every requirement is insufficient - I need to exceed, by some margin the experience stated, in time-served, qualification and breadth, before I make first interview. I have to consider that I am doing something wrong, but the feedback I get (when I actually get any feedback, which is very rare) doesn't support that. I seem to be consistently second, in areas I know back-to-front and inside-out. By deciding I don't want to work in Auckland, or live more than 4 hours from Hamilton (where Bex is at Uni) certainly does limit the field, and I accept that.

Rear rims are 2-piece Mille Miglia (Mille 1000) Revenge IIs, 18x8.5. No idea of offset, but they fit. I'll check the fronts but looking at tyre fitment, I suspect they are the same size. Shocks are BMW (Sachs) all round, and springs are from Eibach.

For anyone who is interested, here's the 'official' LVVTA tyre size guide document. LVVTA_Info_01-2009_V2_Tyre_Size_to_Wheel_Size_Compatibility_Guide.pdf

It's fun for a while... Good luck!

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

It was perfect timing. Well, sort of... The whole point of selling the 318Ti (and others) was to reduce the number of cars we have, not get some money together to buy another one! I do like the E46 Ci. Great shape, nice car. And this one is pretty close to what I was looking for - a very late M43-engine production (this one is within the last 2 months of production), in an unusual colour and with good spec. I'd have been happy without the bodykit, the 18" rims and the sunroof, but I am looking for something of a unicorn!

Could be very keen - just need to check the rears will fit on the rims on our E46. Happy to collect!

The Z4 is a great car, almost regardless of the engine up front. I say almost: if buying one with the 2.0 N46 engine (in particular), ensure it has been meticulously maintained.

That actually sounds quite tempting at the moment...

It'd be less than I worked in the UK...

I was talking yesterday with someone and got to thinking how good a M43 would be in front of an autobox in an E30... I do have some odd ideas, sometimes.

I had this when I first arrived in NZ. 'Experience in NZ' killed jobs for me, especially given Telecom (now Spark) had just released so many people into the jobsearch market. The functions are the same... There may be some cultural differences, especially around Maaori culture, but it's no a complete change. I'm not culturally profiling, but I have found a lot of Asians do change their names, sometimes fundamentally, when moving to an English-speaking country. It's not a new thing - so many are known as Paul Kwong, for instance. We had a homestay student whose name was 'Samantha'... Except it wasn't - that was her Western given name. At home with her family she was still Wing. I suspect it is for same the reasons 'Frank' did the same. It meant he appeared more familiar to those he approached , in his case,for work. But yeah... that surname. Wow.

Just saw a job advertised in Hawkes Bay. Not for me, but one of the requirements had me scratching my head... "At least two years New Zealand experience of working with Photoshop, 3D Studio Max and Archicad." Presumably NZ has it's own versions of Photoshop and so on...? This is exactly the issue I faced after landing in NZ - everyone wanted NZ-based experience. Nowhere else came close.

I would have liked to see more of the Zakspeed Capri, but some nice footage of many cars. Including, of course, the BMW... Gruppe_5_at_Goodwood.mp4

? Here's home to two of them:

A quick (it's cold!) and not-very-good pic to show what I'm working with. The driver side wiper arm is bent - looks like someone had the bonnet up, pulled the arm back from the windscreen (perhaps to change the blade) and the bonnet closed on it.

E46 318i. I'll check all the bulbs abd holders for corrosion, and values/types. Update: following a visit to Kyu's for coffee and chat on Sunday morning, the consensus seems to be a wiring issue with the supply or earth to the rear offside indicator bulb. We swapped the bulbs - same problem - but using the hazard lights shows no issue, other than the rear offside being not as bright (regardless of bulb) as the nearside.