GE - Dealing with conflict

Had a great GE (generating excellence) module on Friday last week. We had 2 Aikido practioners in to cover how to deal with conflict situations and talked about the way Aikido covers it and how it can be applied to the work place. Really interesting and a pair of nice guys too.
Made me realise a couple of things:

• I really enjoy the GE group as a whole, but may not get on with all the people individually as well.
  
• I have so much to learn about myself.
  
• I should look deeper at eastern philosophy as it seems to make a lot of sense to me.
  

Curtains are up

Well the curtains on the house are up, mostly anyway. They stuffed up one of the 'sheer' curtains and need to redo it, but we now have curtains and not blue surgical drapes stuck to the windows of the bedroom with insulation tape.
That now completes phase one of the house renovations. Next we need to get the builders back in to redo the upstairs bathroom. And then .........

Catchup with the Grunings

I managed to catchup with Armin & Rita Gruning a few weeks ago when I was in Sydney on my second Architecture review trip. It was good to see them them again, been about 4 years. They stay way on the outskirts of Sydney (Campbelltown) so I stayed over and travelled back on the train in the morning. They trains are pretty good, and cheap in Sydney, the english ones are SO expensive.
Their kids are looking good and growing up and they seem to have a happy very domesticated life, Armin is very handy/helpful around the house. Rita still into horses and teaching art and Armin selling seals and other technical components.
They still maintain they will come over and visit NZ, same as before, believe it when I see it.