Just a Whistling Fool

Head north out of Auckland for 3 hrs till you reach Whangerai, take the Ngunguru road to the Tutukaka coast and carry on through the town of Matapouri. Past the village shop hang a left onto Clements Street and follow it until the road turns into an unsealed track. Carry on over the bridge, past the horse paddock and bio tunnels, right to the end of the line.

There you will probably hear the whistling coming from under one of the homes, built into the side of the hill. The whistling may be interspursed with sounds of sawing, hammering or drilling. The hammering particularly may come across as slightly 'chirpy' somehow.

The source of this contented, busy, racket is hard at work, but unusually he is happy to be so. Strangely he was also happy to get up early this morning, and to then cycle 2km and go swimming in the sea, before he'd had his breakfast. Before he'd had his coffee even. He did not complain in the slightest, in fact he began whistling about this point and has continued ever since. He whistled through the garden picking bananas and passion fruit for his breakfast. He whistled as he munched on his musili - this is not a good idea - whistled as he sharpened his pencil stub and stuck it behind his ear, and, springily it seemed, walked to the site of his days labours.

If pressed he would put it down to the environment. He'd always, previously, come down on the side of 'nurture', though in this instance he believes its the nurturing effect of the 'nature' thats tweaked the tone knob on the amplifier of his disposition. It also occurs to him that The Good Life may not have been so named purely because of the presence of Felicity Kendal. He thinks, not for the first time, how nice it must be to build your own home, grow your own food, knit your own yogurt.