It was international lunch day at the office, where everybody brings in something from home. It was quite a spread, spanning the globe. I was able to introduce a bunch of people to the joys of pumpkin pie.

Lee and a coworker with the bad-assest footwear ever.

I still don’t understand the mysterious Martian tree on the right. But the one on the left is a pohutukawa, known as the NZ Christmas tree.

From my past experience they feel most like a CA live oak, crossed with a Japanese bottlebrush. They’re everywhere here, and super pretty.

Turkey is a bit more expensive here… this is the price for about an 8-lb bird.

Our classified-ad succulent garden continues to thrive. This echevaria bloom is an ethereal pink and purple and yellow vision.

The Auckland War Memorial Museum all lit up for Christmas.

And the Sky Tower (sorry about that big bright flash at the bottom… the hazards of low-light pictures).

Summertime, so it’s Christmas. Still weird.

Last night we went to the Christmas in the Park celebration, vociferously sponsored by Coke, thank you Coke. Drink Coke. Coke is it. Really. It.

The festivities took place in the Auckland Domain, right down the street from us, so getting there was easy. It was mostly a concert, but we heard there would be fireworks, and that was the main attraction for us. We sat far enough away that we could kinda see the performers on the jumbo screen, but not at all in real life. Just right to see fireworks and avoid the mêlée.

We missed the first half of the show, which was Christmas music, and I suspect was the best part. The second part was a rotating cast of singers doing mostly covers of hits from the last 40 years or so. These are mostly people who might make it to the Round of 16 on a show like The Voice, but who wouldn’t win. They were good singers and performed with gusto, but not people you’d necessarily pay much to see. At least you wouldn’t pay to see them do this show. Thank you Coke for making this event gratis.

The emcee was bad, unknown to us but probably a morning DJ by the sound of him. He did little beyond introducing each song and saying something like “wow, that was something” after. Makes me appreciate how hard is the job, or at least how rare is the talent, of a Dick Clark or a Ryan Secrest.

The singers were quite a mix… pop and blues and a Polynesian doowop group and more. Perhaps the most surreal moment was a young guy named Tommy Nee (‘NZ’s freshest talent’ according to his web site) covering the Paul Simon song Call Me Al. I wouldn’t claim to understand everything in that song, but for me it’s always been about getting old, living with disappointment, etc., and then soldiering on. With lots and lots of words, very carefully put together. A cerebral song, with irony. With Chevy Chase in the video.

Young Tommy played it as if he were the lone survivor of a One Direction salmonella outbreak. He jumped and skipped and sprinted around the stage, clapping his hands over his head, exhorting the crowd, reaching down to brush fingers with the girls in the front row. He may have said ‘soft in the middle’ and ‘roly-poly little bat-faced girl’ but he surely did not understand.

But then the fireworks came, and it was summer after all and it was almost Christmas and we didn’t have to drive home in traffic and all was once again right with the world.

Every Friday at 4:00, we knock off for drinks, a wonderful tradition.

Unexpectedly, this guy showed up, because he was in the neighborhood knows one of the company founders. Ok, cool.

He turns out to be David Seymour, a Member of Parliament and leader of the ACT party. ACT, if I had to describe them with an unflattering high school metaphor, is the party where all the AV Club geeks went after they finished their econ and poli sci degrees. They poll around 5%, which in NZ must be like 93 votes.

But all that aside, he turned out to be a shockingly charming, intensely informed, and genuinely funny guy.

And so to the Santa hat. Throughout our conversation, he was clutching a shopping bag, and I eventually realized it had a Santa hat in. Why the hat? Turns out he has to judge a bike decoration contest next weekend. He quipped about how New Zealand adores the ritual humiliation of its politicians. I assured him it wasn’t just NZ. And then I asked him for a picture with the hat.

For BBQ.

This carnivore’s delight included some tough beefsteaks, fatty but delicious lamb chops, and a bunch of the inexplicably bad sausages that Kiwis seem to love.

They don’t celebrate Thanksgiving in New Zealand but they do now have Black Friday sales.