Wellingtron and lab boredom

I have had a very unmotivated couple of weeks in the lab, fortunately punctuated by a wicked weekend up in Wellington visiting Charlie (Sean's bro). We were only up there from Friday to Sunday, but we packed loads in, whilst still saving time for chillage. Went to a brilliant party on the Friday after getting in at 11pm cos our flight was delayed, but it was well worth livening up for. Met some supremely friendly and fun people including two girls from Essex, of all places! It was a funky party complete with crazy folk band and was very reminiscent of the party's we used to have in the old WG in Basel. God I miss Basel and that WG, with its wonderful musicians, alternative therapists and youth social workers! I felt like such a capitalist working for an actual company! At least I was an intern and wasn't getting paid much!

Anyway, I diverge. So yeah, the party really reminded me why I wish I lived in Wellington and not Christchurch, with it's cool vibe and style. Got to go shopping which was lots of fun, and Sean even cruised round with me for most of it. I was very impressed, but he said he was exhausted by the end after all that walking! See boys; shopping's hard work, not fun! Managed to buy and bring back to Christchurch coffee eclairs from a little French cafe which my pregnant French friend Emelie has had cravings for since she went up there a few months ago! Anyone visiting Wellington should go to Simply Paris on Cuba Street - brilliant desserts and apparently very good coffee too. We also went out to a bird sanctuary which is basically in Wellington which was cool.

Below is a photo of the awesome view Charlie has from his bedroom window.
Wellington is crammed into a bay so a lot of the houses are built up on the hills around which makes it a really pretty and cool city. The houses are all timber-built and have to be built on some pretty ridiulous angles, with one part of the house dug into the bedrock and the other end often up on stilts a couple of metres tall! All very precarious given that Wellington is particularly prone to earthquakes (it's right on the faultline at a twisted point where on one side the east plate is trying to go above the west and the other side the west side is trying to go above the east - no idea how that's supposed to work but nevermind!) and they get landslides occasionally.

Apart from that, just been stuck, being slow and slack, in the lab. I'm losing momentum at the moment, cos of spending two weeks at a time laboriously trying to make the starting materials I need, only to get like 2 mg of the compound I need! Not sure how long I'll be stuck in the lab before I can finish off my writing, but at this rate, it'll be a while!

Been enjoying the rugby, despite the ridiculous times of the matches. We did an all-nighter on Saturday to watch SA/Tonga and England /Samoa. Whilst it may be treachorous to my nation, I'm kinda hoping the All Blacks will win the world cup this time, cos it's such a rugby mad country and it'd be cool to be here if they did. Plus they've got so many hotties on their team, it's a pleasure to watch em! I love that new haka they're doing sometimes as well; so exciting!

So anyway, not been up to much else recently. Hope ya'll are well.