
Instead of blowing out candles, one centenarian had guests blowing pipes.
The Mackenzie Highland Pipe Band made a surprise appearance at Betty Blakemore’s 100th birthday, bringing the Pleasant Point party to life with four tunes.
Mrs Blakemore said she had often heard them playing and she had told anyone who cared to listen, ‘‘I wish they’d come to my house’’.
For such a monumental occasion, the band had decided to make her dreams come true.
She said the party was ‘‘chocka-block’’.
‘‘It was tough going trying to talk to people, there was so much noise.’’
Born in New Zealand in 1924, Mrs Blakemore credited her long life to eating well.
She said she had never eaten McDonalds, and had dined on fish and chips only a few times.
‘‘I’d buy the fish and cook it, though.’’
She ate ‘‘minimal’’ chips, rice, and pasta, preferring to stick to lots of fresh vegetables and meat.
When she was a young woman she had preferred her grains in her baking, like the puddings which she had made daily.]

Her daughter Elaine Lindsay said her mother baked twice a week, and with no microwave to rely on, she could recall her mother whipping ‘‘plenty’’ of enamel bowls in and out of the oven melting butter for the many recipes she had on the go. Mrs Lindsay could remember the mousetraps, scones and tea cakes.
Mrs Blakemore met her husband Lawrie at a dance in Hinds. ‘‘We loved dancing.’’
The couple were together for four years before they got married. While her father had warned all of his daughters against marrying farmers, not one of them took his advice.
Moving out to a farm, she spent 10 years driving her children about in a one-tonne truck. She said she did not have a driver’s licence, because she did not think she needed it.
When she did finally head to Pleasant Point to get one, she was pregnant and driving a one-tonne truck.
‘‘I only went as far as the next corner.’’
‘‘I said I need a heavy licence, too, and he said oh, that was no problem.’’
While she had her heavy driver’s licence until she was 87, she could recall only one time when she had driven a very large truck on the road.
Living on a farm had made her well experienced in throwing large meals together. She said after harvesting, men would wait around while their vehicles cooled. Those old machines would get so hot there was the fear they could start a fire. While they waited they were treated to a meal. She could remember throwing together a meal for 23 of them.
‘‘You just had to get on and do it.’’
She said a big roast in the oven did the trick. ‘‘They were such happy days.’’
She felt the farming situation for women folk had changed so much.
‘‘Meals don’t go out to the field any more.’’
Back then a meal would be provided to everyone who appeared, even the petrol man who’d popped in to fill the tank.
While she had relished her life, she was accepting of change.