“We are going to build you a purpose built office and while about it a proper back door for the house” my beloved said last year.

We sent our middle son off into the world at the beginning of last year. He had first appeared in this column as a toddler and featured in an early one as he managed to lock himself somehow in his bedroom and it was either break a window or dismantle the door to free him and the latter option was chosen as it should have been cheaper to fix.

We did our little bit four weeks ago to forge the links between city and country. There was a time when every city kid had an uncle and aunt and some cousins somewhere on a farm and those kids got packed off during various holidays to give mum some respite or perhaps because even then both city parents were working and childcare facilities were required.

I’m writing this on the sixtieth anniversary of Sir Ed Hillary and Tenzing Norgay’s successful climb of Mount Everest. Conquest was probably never the right word even if it is the one usually used.

I’ve been ‘under canvas’ over the last three days with a small group of lads doing one of their tramps for their Duke of Edinburgh Award.

Shrek who himself died in June 2011 remains NZ’s most famous sheep not just here but internationally as well and now a ram recognized at last year’s Beef + Lamb New Zealand Sheep Industry Awards has also shuffled off this mortal coil.