42 days to go...

I will try not to make the next batch of blogpost titles the countdown to our flight, but for now it's like... 'woah'. 42 days left.

** Not related to anything in this blogpost, but an update: WE FOUND AN ADVENT CALENDAR! Our tradition is being upheld! Mmmm, chocolate!! **

G and I have been majorly busy. It's not that we've procrastinated and have to rush, it's just that everything needs to be done only just before the packers begin. They are here in about 10 days' time. We move out before the end of this coming week!!

Friday evening we spent a rather weird time cleaning the lawnmower. Yes, cleaning, as in: dismantling the entire thing (poor thing!) and wiping down and washing the metal and plastic parts respectively. It was pretty exhausting work washing each individual part, which I did in the bath. What made it worse was that I wasn't really able to sit comfortably and do it: I was NOT going to put my feet into the bath and get covered in grass-greened dirty soapy water, so I had to sit in a rather twisted up position. But, it's done, and now I SERIOUSLY DOUBT that AQIS will have anything to say about it!

Thankfully it required both of us to reassemble the thing, because while we were putting the motor back I noticed a 'coffeebean' in it. On closer inspection, my auto-horrified reaction was justified: it was an ootheca... a cockroach egg-case. THANK GOD it was long dead (not hatched praise the LORD!), it must have been roasted to hell and gone repeatedly LOL. I felt so vindicatedly joyful!

Apart from the lawnmower, we also cleaned the Weber. Not such a big task since I already cleaned it quite well a couple of days after we'd used it. We still need to clean the bicycles, our shoes, the remaining food containers which have yet to be emptied, plus once we've moved out/finished our food here, we need to clean the fridge. And also need to unplug the washmachine and let it dry out completely and secure the drum, etc etc etc.

So much to do. I mentioned in the previous post that we were going to help move the furniture around at Mom's place. Well, that didn't work. Aunt + co went to visit (to borrow money, woot - long story: this 'borrowing' has been a habit of theirs since at LEAST 2002 or so), so I decided we weren't going to go 'hang out' with them while they spend Mom's money, and we were instead going to rearrange the furniture this weekend. I sms'd Mom this morning to find out what the plans were, whether Sis was home from work etc so that we could drive through and make moves. She suggested that she and Sis do it, saving us a long drive through (30km one way). So I sms'd my sis, who replied extremely doubtfully but that she would try make this work.

Basically, it hasn't happened. Age-old problem with Mom over-reacting whenever there's change, procrastination/complication and so on and so forth, which ends up with Mom over-reacting generally to everything, which ends up with her objecting to Sis's attitude and the last change that has occurred, and then Sis ends up having a complete huffy-fit because she is the only one who actually makes a change there and it's all for naught. Yay.

Now I don't know what to do with the flipping fishtank. Yes, 'flipping'. I love these fish, they are so special to me, but I don't even want to get involved with Mom's problems. I don't want to have this negative thing hanging around the memory of the fish for all eternity.

I wonder if there's a way of having the fish put to sleep, humanely, like take them to the vet etc. Then I could just give the tank away. I know that people who you give the fish 'to good home' to - it's just too much of a responsibility. When you get a tank like this, you want it so you can put your OWN choice of fish into it. Or whoever would get them might put totally unsuitable tankmates into it... etc etc etc.

I don't wish that I never got them... they have been so special to me and I've enjoyed them so much. They're more than 'just fish' to me. But now I don't know what to do.

I'm very tired. Anyone saying emigration is an easy way out needs to catch a wake up. There's a saying (at least, with SA migrants), "emigration is not for sissies" and boy is it so true. Each stage is more taxing than the one before it. It's like a computer game - level 1 is hard for the first time, then once you've progressed to level 10, level 1 seems obscenely easy in comparison to level 10. I think we're on a pretty high level now LOL. Next level is doing all the admin once our stuff has shipped off. The NEXT level is once we've arrived - starting things up again and waiting til our stuff arrives. I think the last level (at least in this emigration game!) is once our stuff arrives, settling everything back into place and then rerooting ourselves.

I think for now, the right-now stage is heading to bed - it's SLEEP TIME!! :D