imhilien

It's been a nice spring day but the weather promises to turn nasty again tomorrow. *sigh*

My BPAL perfume 'Sister Mary Loquacious' which featured white musk, lemon peel, vanilla incense and bergamot arrived recently. I'm wearing it today and its quite nice on my skin. :)

I went to the yearly Knit and Spin weekend retreat a few weeks ago and had a nice time catching up with friends. I did a crochet class on Saturday, although trying to replicate what I did should be fun. XD

My local mall ten minutes away has been half rebuilt after a few years absence which is good. I've checked out the place and it shows promise. No supermarket quite yet which is something I really missed. We need a bookshop back too. *gets twitchy*   There's going to be a Lego store too. :)

Was pleased to hear that Archive of Our Own won a Hugo award for fanfic. So if you've got work published there, the Hugo is for you too. :D

I'm a bit sad at the moment as my favourite local mall, '277'* in Newmarket (a shopping district) is to be pulled down soon. It closed the other day. I had found out the news at the beginning of January and it totally floored me - there was nothing wrong with it. I had never heard any rumours of structual faults. It was built in the '80's - maybe that was the fault? One flaw we have in New Zealand is that we're quick to pull down heritage buildings, which in this country means anything nearly a century old, or not even that. Yes, I'm sure the UK / Europe f-list is laughing at this point, rightly so. The exterior was mirrored glass - maybe that was seen as an earthquake risk? But then again, we hardly have earthquakes in Auckland.

I used to go there all the time - it had a bank, bookstore, food court, supermarket** , a tea shop, shoe and clothing shops. It occupied two floors and the top 70% of the building were offices. It will be a real gaping hole in Newmarket, and that thought makes me upset all over again. A replacement mall is to be built, but that will probably take three years(!).  There was a mall in the CBD that was pulled down about 18 months ago (which I liked to visit too) and is only half built at this stage. Could the timing be any worse?

277 had a lovely glass dome too and I cringe at the thought of the wrecking ball coming for it. I mean, who would want that saved for something else, right? Ugh.

*it's street number

**There are people living in apartments in Newmarket who now have to go further afield to get to a supermarket. Not everyone has a car, people.

Update: I read an article today that said 277 will be gutted, not torn down. Whew! I can live with that.