Wednesday waiting

It's already Wednesday, which is strange cos it feels like a Tuesday.  Thankfully it's a Wednesday, means we're closer to the weekend!

Nothing has (so far) come of my email to the bosses.  I've managed to ignore her the whole of Friday, Monday, Tuesday and today, as much as is possible.  She did, however, inform me yesterday (past 4pm) that the following morning (today) she will be going to the traffic dept to fetch her license.  Thanks, bitch for giving me ample warning... but anyway, I did my time, she came in earlier than 10:30 (her approximate time of arrival), but I don't believe her story of going to the traffic dept.  Dunno, she's a bitch and she cries wolf "being sick" and going to see the doctor when she has an interview, for eg.  Anyway, yesterday she whined at everyone that she had a stomach bug, and she came to work this morning carrying a large brownpaper pharmacy packet... so I dunno, hey.  I smell something that smells like bullshit.

Yesterday evening, after having a ROUGH day (both me and G had crap days), we got home to... the brat next door blowing a happy-new-year style tweeter.  What... the... fuck... is... WRONG WITH THOSE PEOPLE?!??!?!  What in all hell makes them think that it's FINE to do stuff like that?  He was standing out in their garden, tweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeting the fucking thing at his mother who was inside the house.  And then he'd run indoors to tweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet at her, and then run outside again.  What... the fuck.  Seriously, in a COMPLEX/COMMUNAL type residential set up, oh and I suspect that they have a vuvuzela too, because we heard THAT a couple of times TOO.  The problem is, we can't yell out the window every single time they make a noise, because they make noise ALL THE TIME!!  And no, it's not us being 'triggered' by noises, they just ARE noisy assholes who don't give a fuck.

I sincerely wish the other brats in the complex would see some sense.  Since they (and their moo mother who should tell them not to) don't 'see' the logic of NOT PLAYING in the driveway, the only solution I see is for one of her MANY (wtf, is she a wannabe Duggar or something?!) brats to be involved in an 'accident'*.  I wish someone would accidentally, gently knock her kid over with one of their 'PRECIOUS' cars, so that the obvious would be made, well, obvious!  You DON'T PLAY WHERE CARS DRIVE!  But the big flaw in that 'lesson' is that the driver of the car would be blamed and everything would be THEIR fault, of COURSE it wouldn't be the brat or their mother at fault!

Anyway, G and I are both feeling the 'lack' of point of having this 'wonderful' home with garden+windows+carport and everything, if we can't even enjoy it, despite paying the rent for it.  Out of curiosity, I looked online to see if there were any places out there, but they're all terrible and majorly expensive, so I guess all we can do is stick it out until we move and we can get a small FREESTANDING home on its OWN PLOT/ERF.

I'm comforted by the fact that it's not just me who feels this way, but it sucks to have to stick around for an uncertain length of time because we just don't know when we'll get the visa.  A person sometimes just wishes for a bit of peace and quiet at home after a SHITTY DAY AT THE OFFICE but it seems an impossible piece of heaven that no one is entitled to.

*  I don't wish horrible accidents on anyone, but sometimes there's just this extreme need for a bit of commonsense reinforcement.  Call it karma?  Or maybe 'carma' HARDYHAR!!!!

Reading and contemplation

I'm currently reading up on Australia. Queensland, Brisbane, Sydney, New South Wales, etc.

I have found out 2 things:

Jørn Utzon died in the same month that we went to see the Sydney Opera House. We got to see the Sydney Opera House, which he never got to see despite having designed and built (most of) it. Somehow, it's touching... makes me feel weird. I know LOADS of people go to the Opera House every day, but *our* visit happened to be that particular month. Hectic though, he was 90!

The second thing I found out is this: the area in Redfern that we walked around (lost) trying to find our hotel, is a block or 2 away from The Block.

Wikipedia has the following to say about The Block:

The Block is a colloquial but universally applied name given to a block of housing in Redfern Sydney. The block was purchased over a period of 30 years by the Aboriginal Housing Company (AHC) for use as a project in Aboriginal-managed housing.

The Block is probably the most famous feature of the suburb of Redfern, although in point of fact it is located on the western border of that suburb, on the edge of Darlington. The focus of life in the Block has always been Eveleigh Street, which is its eastern border, with railway lines on the other side of that street.

This area and surrounds has a high street crime rate and is "no go area" for Sydney Taxi Drivers. This is exacerbating the racism experienced by the diverse members of the community, who are being refused taxi service.

The area around The Block is now reportedly the subject of plans for massive redevelopment by private developers at the instigation of the New South Wales state government - see Redfern-Eveleigh-Darlington.

Seriously, a dangerous area, which the hotel front-desk guy warned us about, saying 'never, never go there'. We walked through there, as touristy as could be (save for a Hawaiian shirt or 2), dragging luggage and suitcase, lost, at about 7pm. We are still alive. Nothing happened! I'm not saying it isn't a dangerous area, just that it's evidently NOT AS BAD AS CAPE TOWN CITY ANYWHERE!!!

I'm so looking forward to living in Aus!!! Where to choose to live?! Probably Brisbane, with lots of holidays to the other cities :D Can't wait!

I'm sorry, BITCH, but I've had enough

I have seriously HAD IT with the receptionist.

A bit of background: I'm first in line to stand in for the receptionist whenever she needs to go away from her desk. It is just one of my duties. Officially, it is so that she can go to the toilet or make a cup of tea or attend to some work that requires her being away from her desk, but unofficially (based on 'good working relationship') it allows for her to go make tea, toast sandwiches, quickly run out to draw money, etc. It is one of those give and take things.

Except, she's been abusing me.

A few weeks ago, at 1pm (lunchtime), I was warming some lunch (pizza leftovers) in the microwave, and passed her desk bringing a cup of hot chocolate to my desk. She asked me if she could quickly go to the toilet, so I asked her why the accountant (whose switchboard lunch-duty day it was) wasn't there yet. She said that she'd volunteered to sit through lunch for her, as the accountant had a headache. I told her she could quickly go, while my food was in the microwave, so that I didn't have to wait (and let it go cold) once it was ready (because she would be back by then).

She took 10minutes, while I was waiting, to go to the toilet. Except, she didn't JUST go to the toilet, SHE MADE HER LUNCH THEN TOO. I went towards the kitchen and met her coming out with her food, and said to her "I thought you were just going to the loo..?? I've been listening the whole time" so she replied "I was listening from the kitchen". Nice, you could have TOLD ME so that I could have eaten before my FOOD WENT COLD! Thank you for volunteering to stand in for someone then USING MY LUNCHBREAK instead!!!!

Anyway, today, at 1pm, I'm getting up to go warm my lunch (pizza leftovers again), as, although Thursdays are my switchboard lunch-duty days, today is my once-in-6-weeks Thursday off. She says "can I just go to the loo and make tea", so, because my food isn't yet warming/going cold, I agree. I head to the kitchen, after 5mins, to make some tea in the meantime, to find her TOASTING SANDWICHES AND MAKING A WHOLE GOURMET MEAL. I say "you're making food now??" so she says "yes, I said I was going to make tea" so I said "tea, you said tea, not lunch", so she replies "tea is food, is the same thing" so I said "no, tea is tea, tea tea"... I was so angry I just left my mug there and stormed back to my desk so that I wouldn't lose it and give her a slap.

She took FIFTEEN MINUTES of MY lunchbreak.

I waited, til I'd cooled off (after having my food and tea), and wrote a civil email to her:

(her name)

Please can we reach an agreement regarding lunch times.

I am happy to stand in for you to make food/go to the toilet on the days where you have to sit at the switchboard during lunch, as I understand about being hungry and having to sit at the phone without actually getting a lunchbreak the whole day.

But please don’t do it during my lunch break - plan ahead and ask me BEFORE 13:00. It is my lunch time that you are using up and I don’t get the time back afterwards because my hours resume at 13:45 (that is when lunch time is officially over and I have to be available immediately for Mr Colussi or whoever else may need me urgently). When I sit at the switchboard on normal Thursdays, I usually don’t get the time back afterwards to have my OWN lunch for this same reason, so I basically miss out on a lunchbreak most Thursdays.

As the receptionist, I didn’t have anyone like a (my name) who is there to sit for you whenever you wish, I had to run to and from the kitchen to make my food outside of lunch-time, so as to go during a quiet time when I could hear the phone from the kitchen. I am happy to listen for you so that you don’t have to starve or run around, but I’m not happy about doing this if you abuse my goodwill by using up my lunch time.

I don’t want to stir up hard feelings or have an argument, but I have to bring it up so that we can resolve it.

I would not call that a rude or aggressive email.

I, however, get this as a reply. Please bear with me, it is pasted verbatim (yes, she really IS THIS FUCKING ILLITERATE):

You know that mostly before one I get so busy and normally you get here at 1:05 or 13:10 have I complain about that NO!!!!!!!!!! starting from now you will be here from 13h00 and I will do the same to you, I didn’t think I was abusing your goodwill which so you were also abusing mine by coming late to releave me, starting from now you will be here at 13h00 sharp and I’ll be back at 13:45 sharp as well, no lhard feeling is that you just know how are welling to help and not I always know you don’t like to help when it comes to switch board.

. As the receptionist, I didn’t have anyone like a (my name) who is there to sit for you whenever you wish, I had to run to and from the kitchen to make my food outside of lunch-time, so as to go during a quiet time when I could hear the phone from the kitchen. I am happy to listen for you so that you don’t have to starve or run around, but I’m not happy about doing this if you abuse my goodwill by using up my lunch time.

This highlighted one I wont urgeu about because it was like this before I came.

The italics is her quoting my email.

Oh, my, god. I cannot believe her GALL!! And then to go on and accuse me of being LATE to relieve her?!?!?!?!??!?!?! I am never late unless my BOSS has delayed me. I go and make my tea BEFORE lunch so that I am READY AT 13:00, but she often makes me wait while she tidies up her desk, which can take 5mins and wastes time. Not to mention her often coming BACK late!! The UTTER CHEEK to reply with such a lie, I'm just ... baffled. Enraged!

I have emailed the bosses, as this is UNACCEPTABLE. I tried to resolve this amicably, but she turns around and LIES and gets all aggressive about it.

I'm so fed up. If I get crap from EITHER the bosses, or her, I'm going to resign. I'm sorry, but this is unacceptable.

BRT

BRT stands for Bus Rapid Transit.  It is a system that is being put in place to provide public transport, supplementing the train, bus, taxi and private transport systems, so that there will be sufficient transport systems in place ready for the Soccer World Cup, next year.

Or it is supposed to be.  Except, the taxi mob have got it into their heads that this BRT is going to threaten their jobs*.  So, instead of 'adapt or die', they've decided to SHOOT AT THE BUSES.  Killing commuters... shooting at the buses.  How DARE the public use OTHER MODES OF TRANSPORT?!?!??!?!?!?

Oh... my... god... what the fuck is wrong with these people?  Seriously, where else in the WHOLE WORLD do you find people so VIOLENTLY anti-progress??

*  if people had a CHOICE, they would never USE those bloody taxis in the first place!  They essentially have a monopoly due to sheer lack of CHOICE on the part of the commuters, who are mostly very poor people who can't afford anything else.  So these terrorists feel that their monopoly will be affected, thereby losing them money, etc etc, nevermind the little FACT that TOURISTS WOULD NEVER USE their flipping 'services' ANYWAY, so they wouldn't have be MAKING any money off them in the first place!!

Sunshine Island

I grabbed some time in the garden on Saturday, just long enough to cut a twig of Yesterday/Today/Tomorrow and Jasmine.  I stuck them into a glass with water, and they've been filling the whole lounge with their beautiful, therapeutic scent.  It really makes it feel summery.

I stitched a lot this weekend.  Golden Ice is looking good, I've 'edited' his forelock on the chart so I'm going to leave out the topmost part of his forelock (it makes him look like a punkrocker or something)... so he's gonna be STUNNING.  I'm so nearly done with the whole right-half of the chart, once I'm done with it I'm going to cut that half off the chart so I have less paper hanging around.  Then my aim will be to do the top left quadrant of the design so that I can cut that part off too.  The thing is, only the bottom left quadrant has a lot of stitching (nearly every block is a stitch).  Anyway, GI Joe is coming along nicely.

I hope that winter's on its way out now.  The light and brightness that comes with Spring really makes everything more happy and positive.  I understand so well the idea of 'springcleaning'... and there's a feeling of impending clearout!

Both G and I feel superamped now to start making moves, but we have to wait... gotta wait for ACS and also gotta wait til his co. change happens.  It's all too exciting.  I'm going to head-down for the next while though:  I have plenty of stitching to do, plus springcleaning (my emailboxes, my laptop, etc plus we have to finally ACTUALLY get rid of junk that's been hanging around for an age)... plus other things.  I just wish I had more time during the day... the usual 'gripe'.

I can't think of anything else to write now... I have some filing.  I have 110 days left here (72 this year).  I've now been here 5.5 years (at the end of today), and I have 6 months left.

Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye (apparently by Gracie Field, don't think I've heard it before)

Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Cheerio, here I go, on my way
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Not a tear, but a cheer, make it gay
Give me a smile I can keep all the while
In my heart while I'm away
Till we meet once again, you and I
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Cheerio, here I go on my way
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Not a tear, but a cheer, make it gay
Give me a smile I can keep all the while
In my heart while I'm away
Till we meet once again, you and I
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye...
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Cheerio, here I go, on my way
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Not a tear, but a cheer, make it gay
Give me a smile I can keep all the while
In my heart while I'm away
Till we meet once again, you and I
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Cheerio, here I go, on my way
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye
Not a tear, but a cheer, make it gay
Give me a smile I can keep all the while
In my heart while I'm away
Till we meet once again you and I
Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye...
Goodbye everybody, I'll do my best for ye

111 / 73

My tally is 73 left for this year.  The bosses released the dates the office will be closed at the end of the year, so I've put in my leave.  The 16th Dec is a public holiday and the office closes on the 18th, so I've put in my 4 days leave so I finish work for this year on 11th Dec.  The office lunch is on 15th, so I miss it!  Yay!  It's always so awkward...  I haven't missed many of them, but they're ALWAYS so awkward, and it doesn't feel worth the 'free food' to sit and feel so badly awkward through a long lunch.

No ACS news.  If they work according to their previous 'schedule', we should get it middle of September.  We'll wait and see.  I just hope that it'll be positive so we can go ahead an apply already.  It's been such a delay cos, if the previous assessment was correct, we could have applied in July.  But if you take it further back, if we'd sorted the ACS stuff out BEFORE the IELTS test, we could have already had the results and have applied in um... April or so?  But regardless... it doesn't serve any purpose retrospecting like that.  I just hope they HURRY UP eek.

Work has been so unbearably boring.  'Nuff said.

There's been a competition on the radio for the past week, to win tickets to go on holiday to India, to follow the 20/20 cricket, sightsee a little bit, etc.  It requires listening out for keywords throughout the day to earn points, as you need a certain number of points to get an entry into the draw.  I've been listening to the radio on my phone, using the earphones so no one else can hear (we can't listen to music/radio at work so I'm sneaking it hehe).  It's been SUCH A PLEASURE listening to the radio during the day (it's been pretty much all day each day this week), because it's been like a happy, lively connection to the outside world which is a nice change from feeling like a captive zombie in a morgue.  The only problem is the UTTERLY SHIT signal reception in here... it's unbelievable.  Anyway, I'm holding thumbs because a holiday to India would be AWESOME, and watching cricket and going sightseeing with the DJ would be cool too.

No other NEWS NEWS at all.  Oh, except G's work change is looking more and more definite.  So we will have a direction again! 

Nearly weekend.  I'm so bored.  Can I go home now?

I just give up!

I just fuckingwell give up.

 

A friend, who works about 10mins' walk away from me, emailed me earlier this week to ask whether I could meet up with him and his sister during lunch on Thursday (today).  At first I couldn't, until I swapped switchboard day for this week, so I was free on Thursday.  I emailed telling him and so we were on for lunch today.  I didn't pack lunch, because it was all arranged.

 

Except, now, at 12:50, hbbm gets a phonecall, regarding something he's been working on since 16:55 yesterday.  It has to go out today, during lunch.

 

YES, my fucking lunch.

 

MY FUCKING LUNCH.

 

He asked whether I was going out during lunch... but it's a fucking rhetorical question because it would just create such a fucking fuss if I were actually to GO out when I'm needed here that I JUST GIVE UP!!!!!!!!!!!

 

So I sit WAITING AROUND til 13:30, before I even GET ANYTHING to work on.

 

So all this basically is, is WAITING, WASTING MY LUNCH BREAK.

 

Thanks so much.

Nickelback - If Today Was Your Last Day

My best friend gave me the best advice
He said each day's a gift and not a given right
Leave no stone unturned, leave your fears behind
And try to take the path less traveled by
That first step you take is the longest stride

If today was your last day
And tomorrow was too late
Could you say goodbye to yesterday?
Would you live each moment like your last?
Leave old pictures in the past
Donate every dime you have?
If today was your last day

Against the grain should be a way of life
What's worth the prize is always worth the fight
Every second counts 'cause there's no second try
So live like you'll never live it twice
Don't take the free ride in your own life

If today was your last day
And tomorrow was too late
Could you say goodbye to yesterday?
Would you live each moment like your last?
Leave old pictures in the past
Donate every dime you have?
Would you call old friends you never see?
Reminisce old memories
Would you forgive your enemies?
Would you find that one you're dreamin' of?
Swear up and down to God above
That you finally fall in love
If today was your last day

If today was your last day
Would you make your mark by mending a broken heart?
You know it's never too late to shoot for the stars
Regardless of who you are
So do whatever it takes
'Cause you can't rewind a moment in this life
Let nothin' stand in your way
Cause the hands of time are never on your side

If today was your last day
And tomorrow was too late
Could you say goodbye to yesterday?

Would you live each moment like your last?
Leave old pictures in the past
Donate every dime you have?
Would you call old friends you never see?
Reminisce old memories
Would you forgive your enemies?
Would you find that one you're dreamin' of?
Swear up and down to God above
That you finally fall in love
If today was your last day

Friendslist cull

Such a liberating feeling!

After much dithering, I went through my FB friendslist, 'labelling' each friend as 'keep' and 'deletable'.  I was going to dither still more, but I accidentally defriended someone (luckily one of the deletables) so I thought 'what the hell!' and deleted ALL of them.  Seriously, do I really need to concern myself with the day-to-day lives of people who barely spoke to me in high school?  In 10 years, no contact was made up until friend-request on FB.  Are they *really* friends?  Do I really want to share my day-to-day life with them?  Would they even notice my absence from their friends list?  *shrugs* I guess it's hardly important.  I think another cull will happen again in the future.  It just gets to a point where if someone doesn't say a WORD to you in years, then you can hardly call them 'friends'...

What spurred me into action (to 'classify' the people on my friends list) was the fact that an ex-colleague had the lack of manners to lift photos from my FB album(s?) and email them to people who are still my colleagues, WITHOUT ASKING first.  Not even a MENTION that they had done it.  I don't know, now, what all photos HAVE been emailed (ie, from other of my albums), but the ones I KNOW of are wedding photos, and yay, hbbm gets to see my wedding pics.

Thanks, moron, I really wanted to have my wedding photos emailed to all and sundry.  I was actually going to bring some photos with me to work, to show, because then at least I can take them HOME with me afterwards.  I hadn't brought them to work yet, yes, procrastination etc, but also there's the small fact that the wedding pics DVD is faulty/damaged and we OURSELVES can't view the pics.  We've been waiting for ages for a replacement... but yah... regardless.  Thank you, moron.  I really appreciate your 'friendship'.

I need to get out of here

I'm... so... bored...

 

And, to make things so much more joyful, the receptionist just farted.

 

Yes, she farted.  Twice... saying 'oops sorry'.

 

Jees, thanks lady.

 

Lovely.

 

I need to get out of here.

 

I just need to get out of here...

 

O.o

The Cardigans - Starter

This is a start
that I know I'll believe in
so I'm leavin' everything behind
Keeping the parts
that I know I'll be needing
and I breed to be a better kind
And I'm leavin' everyone behind

This is the age
when my past should be gone
but it's just stronger than the aims I have
Turning the pages
I used to hang on to
I was young and I have changed my mind
And I'm leaving everything behind

New beginning again
a bit closer
new beginning again
a little bit closer
New beginning again
a bit closer to the end

This is the time
it's a delicate line
to the beginning of what's yet to come
Lifetimes of changes
a strange generation
explanations never come in time
So I'm leavin' everything behind

Gripes

YAY a Ranty McRant blogpost!!

First of all, I don't care how much SMALLER it would be living in a freestanding house (because of not being able to afford a suitably-sized one), but once we're in Aus, I am not staying in a flat/townhouse/duplex/conjoined place.  If we have to park the car in the street because all our stuff can't fit in the house and has to be stuffed into the garage, so be it.  I'm just tired (seriously had enough) of having someone sharing a wall and making unadulterated noise like slamming doors, banging things on kitchen counters, bashing things against the walls, letting things bang on the floors, having a yell session for about 20mins solid, having tantrums which last 30mins+, stamping around in high-heels on tiled floors (yes that sound DOES carry, you cowbitchneighbour) and last but not least, their kid having nightmares and screaming the fucking building down.  Yes I'm referring to OUR neighbours (who else?).  But seriously.  Screaming, not just crying, hell, not even waking up screaming and then crying out of shock, no... screaming/crying/wailing/screaming/wailing/crying all looped, for everyone's benefit.

I'm just... so... over it.  So over having to 'share' lifespace with INCONSIDERATE ASSHOLES.  I understand that just because a house is freestanding, doesn't mean it has a magic sound-proof, interference-proof barrier, but at least it won't be JOINED so we won't have to hear every time one of the neighbours flushes their toilet.  And we can finally be freed from brats playing around our car.

Ok that's Rant no. 1.  2nd one isn't so much a rant as a grumble/snark.

Hbbm came in this morning, complaining about being stuck in traffic for 45mins.  Sorry, dude, 45mins, stuck in a Merc 550 SLK?  WTF?  No sympathy, sorry.  Try catching the train, from 30kms away, leaving home at +-7:00, sitting stuck in a 'broken down' train (delayed for an unknowable time, for some unknowable reason which is made-up by the train company anyway), that's if you even get your right train and aren't forced to take a late train (which can be delayed by sometimes over an hour), getting to work late AND STILL GETTING GRIEF FROM THE BOSS/ES!  Some people live even further away, so my experiences aren't even THAT BAD.. but regardless of where you are, or how early you have to get up, you get the same stupid 'grief':  why don't you catch an earlier train?  why did you miss your train? you should get up earlier!  Seriously, I won't even go into DETAILS as to why we sometimes missed our trains, but trains don't run PERFECTLY TO SCHEDULE even in the most 1st world country, you dumbasses.

Work is so exceptionally dull that I even have time to blog (when I feel like it anyway).  My 'routine' for every morning is:  check my private mail, check the ACS status, open my diary and put a pencil line through the previous day's date on the year-calendar page, go to the previous day's page (page-a-day diary), take the to-do-list post-it note off that page and restick it onto the current day.  After that, I 'meditate' about what still has to happen.  Like, when we can expect the ACS result, etc.  Once that's done, I get to look forward to a whole day of dull.

I have 118 working days left til the end of Feb 2010, 80 working days left til office closes end of this year.  24 working weeks til end of Feb 2010, 16 working weeks left for this year.  5.5 working months til end of Feb 2010, 3.5 working months til end of this year.

I have 7.5hours left til 5pm today.  Joy.

Thoughts for today

It's Monday YIPPEE!! :-/

In our lovely little country, we're having a trainstrike.  Yay.  Once one group strikes, then everyone strikes.  I reckon EVERYONE should just have a sit and sulk day where nobody works the whole day, and then everyone can get it out of their damn systems!

This weekend was a nice relaxing, lazy one.  The dude didn't come to finish our security gate, so we just sat doing nothing really cos we were kinda waiting for him.  Sunday was pretty much the same (lazing), but we visited G's parents.  I got about 200 more photos to scan, YAY!!  There are some fun ones in the batch, like 2 of G with a ponytail :-D

*gasp* I BROAK THE LAAWWW gollygosh, by surfing the net at work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Oh big deal... dumb asses.  No one came to yell at me so whatever.  I went onto the Aus quarantine website, to find out if there's been any changes to whether we can take Dude with us.  So far, no change.  The quarantine/import procedure for a pet bird from NZ is quite extensive but not majorly troublesome, so I sent them a query on their website to ask whether they are able to look at each case (from a country OTHER than NZ) on an individual basis and formulate procedure.  It's worth a shot.  Maybe I'll get a glimmer of hope, they might well reply saying that they're working on formulating procedures for our country, or something, in future, so by the time we move maybe we can take Dude.  I really hope that we are able to take him... I don't care if it costs a fortune, he's my sweet Bumble and I can't bear the thought of leaving him behind.

I'm so sleepy now.  It's so boring, but I feel amped cos there are only 120 working days left for me... it really doesn't feel like lots.  In fact, it's really only about 6 months.  And I feel like some *movements* now.  G, hopefully, will get some concrete info regarding his job changes soon, so we can re-focus our plan/time-scale, etc.  I'm hoping we get the ACS result by the end of the month so that next month we can apply already... but we just have to wait and see with it.  It really is dull now, this waiting BEFORE we can apply.  It's not really possible to think along these lines (or at least, I shouldn't) but I have to acknowledge the fact that if the ACS result had been correct, we would already have applied for the visa!!  Bleh!  Hurry up pleeeeeeeeeeeeease...

Growth

This month, so far, has been quite... interesting.

G's results are back, and thankfully it's nothing serious.  He's on cortisone for a month, then, depending on the effect of the cortisone, will either go for a drip (with the possibility of a follow-up drip at a later stage) which takes 5 days to do, in hospital, OR a year's course of tablets.  Or both!

We should have the ACS result by the end of the month, maybe in early September.

Work is still dull.  There are 121 working days left for me, 83 left this year.

G's work is possibly changing quite significantly, but for now that's still in the proposal stage and nothing's certain.  For ease of progress, we're hoping that the change DOES happen: it'll give us a solid base on which to prepare for our move, and a definite starting point.  If it doesn't happen, things will continue to be 'prospective' only, until the end of his contract.

My sweet Dude, cute Bumble.  I clipped his nails last night, and he wasn't very fazed.  One of his toes (inner back, hard to reach) he wasn't too happy about, so I tried to hold him in the blanket but didn't manage to clip it and had to let him out.  He seemed to be more relieved to be out of the blanket than afraid or terrorised.  Maybe he realised that if he didn't allow me to clip his nails OUT of the blanket then he's asking to be blanketed, because he didn't fuss after the blanket and I was able to clip that troublesome nail.

Afterwards, G and I played Rummikub on the bed, with Dude in accompaniment.  The Rummikub tiles make a fascinating click-clack sound which matches his ball's sound so he was quite happy.  Overall he was a happy bird, he got so much neckscratching I think he was on cloud 9.  He's such a sweetie pie!!  It really sucks leaving the house in the morning, knowing he's bored and alone during the day, when I *could* (wishful thinking) be home with him :-D

 I have just got 150 A3 drawings to fold.  Wow.

G's parents have dug out another +-180 photos for me to scan :-D  I must still round up all the photos Mom has all over the place though.

Golden Ice is growing.  I can't wait to stitch more!

No other news, for now.

Inspired cooking

G's been 'out of action' since Thursday. He had an MRI, nerve conduction study, xrays, blood tests and a lumbar puncture, and has been suffering from a post-lumbar puncture headache since Thursday evening. The doctor is going to see us next week, after poring over G's test results, and hopefully he'll have an answer as to what exactly is causing G's relentless lower-leg pain. We're hoping that the xray and MRI reports saying 'normal' is a good sign that nothing serious is wrong, but regardless, we're staying 'neutral' and neither optimistic nor pessimistic about it.

Because of G being out of action, we haven't gone to the shops, and have since run out of bread. Technically, I could drive to the shops myself, but I don't believe I would be able to manoeuvre out of the parking bay and parking lot without incident, nevermind actually get into the parking at the shop. No biggie: it has inspired me to come up with interesting meal plans.

Yesterday afternoon, for lunch, I made tortillas. Diced sliced ham, sliced mushrooms, grated Gouda and some creamy honey mustard. Stuck that in the oven to grill lightly, and voila! Quite yummy, a nice use of 'leftovers': the ham and mushrooms were a few days in the fridge, by that stage.

Yesterday's supper entailed smoked chicken cut up chunkily, mayonnaise and baked potatoes. G looked up a nice 'recipe' to bake potatoes: you use a bit of oil mixed with a bit of salt, to coat each potato. It was VERY delicious. The mayonnaise gave the meal a nice tang, and the smoked chicken and potato went very well together.

Tonight's supper: smoked chicken (also cut up chunkily), 'cape cottage' (plain chunky) cottage cheese and some sunflower seeds, mixed together in a pancake. Very delicious. The pancake mix we made came from the Hulett's website, so it wasn't a savoury-pancake recipe, and we made 6 pancakes in total. We each had 2 filled pancakes for supper and 1 pancake with golden syrup for dessert.

YUM!!!

I don't recall blogging about it, but I've finished scanning.

Yes, I HAVE FINISHED! Until I get given more photos, that is. My tally: 6282. That is Six Thousand, Two Hundred and Eighty Two photographs! That's quite a lot. I'm very pleased I managed without having a nervous breakdown :P I am now rewarding myself... well I wouldn't even call it "rewarding". I'm now resuming normal life, and have started stitching.

Worked on Golden Ice most of yesterday, and most of today too. I'm not really happy with his mane/forelock (as I may have mentioned LONGGGGGGGG ago (whenever last I blogged about him)), so I may edit the picture even more and rechart that part. I don't like how he has hair like an 80s rocker. I know leaving off his 'just behind ears' mane will take away quite a bit of the 80s-rocker-look, but I'm now considering leaving off more mane so that he looks a bit more real... but....................... I shall see how it goes. I haven't reached a point yet where this is important. He's still beautiful, regardless.

I have thoroughly enjoyed being on leave, doing things during my own time and not having a thought about work. It's already Sunday (I was on leave Thursday and Friday) but tomorrow is a public holiday. I really can't wait until we can spend time like this, relaxing, more regularly. There is a possibility that a change in G's work scenario is going to happen, which might shift the balance between work+relaxation time for him. I hope so, I think he hopes so too... it'll be nice to have a more 'normal' work week with no homework nor the feeling that the whole company's destiny rests on his shoulders.

That's all blog-news for now, back to a bit of stitching before it's sleep time! A picture of Golden Ice will be posted soon.

Stuff

Scanning update:  I've reached 5 994... I think (I can't remember the exact figure).  I know my status said I'd reached 6 000, but I miscalculated (out of sheer enthusiasm :-/ ), and I've got about 6 photos left to scan to reach 6 000. About 300 photos left of this batch.  G's mom is going to give me a few more on Thursday.  Photos haven't been forthcoming from Mom, but that is to be expected... and also from G's dad - in light of current circumstances, completely understandable.  I may, upon scanning G's mom's photos, take a long break and actually stitch.  We'll see.

ACS update:  no change in the status,  we're expecting the letter to arrive in early September.  Can't wait, it's time now.

Nothing else much is going on... I've taken Thursday and Friday off, cos Monday is a holiday.  Thursday G and I have a long day ahead of us.  I may or may not blog about it - depends how I/we feel.

Everything depends.

I had a good chat to Te about it, her experience with these things really is hugely comforting.  Thursday is just going to be long, I think.  I'm going to prepare myself with eats (and money to buy lunch, etc), my phone (fully charged so I can play games/sms/chat), a book or 2 (or 3), etc.  Oh and my iPod.  And phone earphones, for when the iPod goes flat.

I really hope ACS hurries up, so we can APPLY already.  I just hope that it all goes smoothly... I hope Thursday goes smoothly.    I hope everything goes smoothly.

Life is a lemon

I don't care much for 'life'.

Why is it that life seems so full of potential, when you're a kid... it's just... SO OPEN TO EXPERIENCES and EXCITING!  So much to learn, so much to do!  Just WAIT til you're out of school and LIFE STARTS!  I'll do this, this, this, that, this OH I can't WAIT!!

What is it that starts, exactly?  Daily grind?  Slaps in the face, boredom, trudge-work like chores, tiredness, problems, other people causing shit, all that starts?

Yay.  It's shit.

I'm tired, so very tired of this 'life'.  Yes counting down whatever bla bla bla fucking bla, but LIFE ITSELF is just... dull.  Shit.

Work life, dull as shit, same damn day every single day.  Pointless.

Home life, always problems.  Why do we have to live next door to &*^%#%%^!^?  I really don't know.  Is this what life is?  Living your days with NEIGHBOUR PROBLEMS??

Why?

 

WHY??????

 

I'm so pissed off... but actually am... I dunno, it's... the last straw... I feel brokenspirited right now.  I just ... can't.

 

Something so "small" as GRASS GROWING INTO THEIR GUTTER.  We get emailed by the owner of our place.  That's all fair and well... except ...

 

GRASS IS INTERFERING WITH THE ENJOYMENT OF THEIR BACK-YARD.  OUR grass.  In THEIR gutter.  It's INTERFERING.  Their OUTDOORS life.

 

Wait a second... OUTDOORS life?  They HAVE an outdoors life?  Yes, they do, they CERTAINLY do, one that INTERFERES with our INDOORS life!  Yes, *!#!$%$&*%&#*, your 'blessed' and enjoyable outdoors life, which you are ENTITLED to, interferes with our INDOORS life (GOOD LORD!!!  Yes, we are actually entitled to one!), because YOU STINK US OUT, IN OUR HOUSE, LIKE CANCER!!  We don't HAVE an outdoors life, you bitches, BECAUSE OF YOU!!!!!!

 

I wish there was something I could do, but there isn't - do YOU want to try speak to SMOKERS??  Try convince them that they are actually STINKING??   Jeesus why do you think there is a LAW about smoking in public places... because THEY THEMSELVES don't give a fuck else there wouldn't be a NEED for such a law!!  (oh and anyway "it's their own garden, they're entitled to smoke there!" and THAT is why I want to glue-seal up the fucking windows).

 

I wish that I wasn't atheist, so that I could believe in the 'balance' of life and that somehow, justice would be served... that their life would be just a tiny bit LESS enjoyable because of what they do... but no.

 

I wish that with a lot of things: people who litter, people who don't change the loo roll/refill the kettle+sugar at work, people who abuse animals, people who try/succeed in denying women the right to control their own bodies (anti-choice people), people who are inconsiderate (drivers, shoppers, etc) ANYONE who just ... I dunno. I... just wish that there was some.... payback.  Some sort of feeling that my being (for eg) one of the few people at work who refills the sugar... it's actually worth it.  It's worth the effort.

 

Pffffff!

Dear X

Hi X

 

I wish we could be like normal people... sharing a relationship like normal people.

 

I wish we could hang out, and chat about things, spend time with each other, sharing experiences and growing together.

 

I wish our relationship wasn't one-sided despite a desperate need for it to be two-way.

 

I wish it wasn't all about offloading... just pouring out of endless, unsolveable problems, which I have tried making suggestions about...

 

An endless cycle of how she treats you, because you LET her treat you like that.  You always have.  She's always been like that, it's not my doing, it has nothing to do with me.  It has never had anything to do with me... my whole life, I've sat to the side and been excluded from it... I've wished she would stop, that you'd stop her, but you never did.  You still don't.  And now you can't.

 

It shouldn't have anything to do with you and me, our relationship, but somehow it always does.  It's always poured all over me:  the misery and complaints, partnered with a clawing need for comfort which I can't give.  It's the kind of comfort that one can only get from oneself... and yet you can't... and I wonder, now, whether you ever could.

 

I am only able to show you that I care by spending time with you and doing things with you... but I can't.  I can't share with you parts of my life - yes, I actually do have a life.  A real, grown-up life, with its own problems and trials, but also with its own joys and fun.  But you aren't really part of it.  I could try invite you in, except... it's like we're in two rooms separated by a long passage, and my door is open, but yours isn't.

 

Sometimes, I really could do with your care, just a small part of you, just sometimes.  Sometimes, significant things happen, which we should, I guess, share.  Something's coming up, soon, and I really could do with your support.  Scratch that, I really could do with just being able to talk to you about it.  But I can't.  I guess I should get used to that.  I don't see what else I can do.

Progress

I cleaned the fishtank today, it was a week overdue, but now it looks stunning again.

I'm scanning now, after doing the fishtank, which I did only after lazing away most of the afternoon, soaking up the sunrays. Beautiful day, today.

Yesterday was another stunning day - we met up with G's parents for breakfast, then came home. I'd been wanting to take a drive around our neighbourhood for a while now, ever since getting the old (1960s to 1970s) letters to dad, because they have the addresses that Grandma and Grandpa used to live at. They weren't far from where we are. First one we went to wasn't in a very bad area at all... up on a hillside, but the houses are mostly redone/upgraded and I didn't see any with the name that they used to call their house. I don't have a house number either, so no luck there. We went on down into the area below this, which is quite 'scaly' i.e. quite grubby, not very pleasant and not somewhere I'd care to be stuck in with a broken car. Luckily we weren't, but again couldn't find anything. The closest 'fit' we could find was Walmer Square, but the place we were looking for was Walmer Mansions. Maybe the same place, or somewhere that's been since demolished.

The last place we went to... is still there. The house number is there, it doesn't look like a VERY modern house, so probably wasn't refurbished recently, and might well be the house they stayed in during the early 1960s. I took photos from the car. I don't know how fond of that place they were, they seemed far more fond of the 1st house we tried to find.

All in all, it was a day tinged with history. I just wish Dad was around to tell him about it. Or to take him with us... to ask him about the places. To ask him about a lot of things.

I've really enjoyed scanning the photos from my Aunt, there are so many photos of my mom as a kid, and Gran and Grampa at most ages. One thing I want to do, before we move to Aus, is go to gran and grampa's grave, pay my respects. I have never been to their grave, when Grampa died I was 'too young' and when Gran died, her burial was so rushed (by "uncle" - I won't go into detail right now) that I don't think any of the rest of us got to attend the funeral! I would like to take a photo, for a reference and reminder, because I won't have been there many times to remember it, and also it would be a sort of final photo of them.

Not much other news, for now. Waiting for ACS to do their thing. Work... bleh. I have 95 working days this year.

I will blog again, when I think of news!!

96 and counting

Ok this is still dull.  I wake up each morning feeling completely and utterly groundhogday-ish... yet ANOTHER work day of the same stuff, repeated.  This morning I really didn't want to get out of bed as it was raining like mad!

What's crazy is that it's nearly August.  I guess wishing away the time does actually work, because it's past the middlepoint of the year.  2009 has, so far, been the speediest year ever.

ACS sent G a notification mail with his appeal's reference number, so we can track its progress.  At the moment it's "to be allocated" (yay we've restarted the whole process!!), but hopefully it'll take quicker as it's an appeal.

It's so weird to me how people on forums are so emo.  I don't know if emo is the right word but OH MAN people get so touchy.  No, I didn't piss anyone off, I was a bystander.  One of the forums I frequent to pick up information on the SA-Aus move had a meltdown of sorts.  3 of the 'senior' members (one was the forum creator) had a bit of a tizz, and the only really active topic (190+ pages) on the forum was closed.  So it basically means that forum is closed as none of the other topics were alive.  But it's so silly - someone 'upstages' someone else, or someone edits their own post, and people get butthurt.

Anyway, the other forum I frequent is alive and well and everyone's more chilled there!!  And, I'm getting the impression that DIAC are really racing through the visa applications, because they're apparently taking +- 5 months to assign case officers.  Just reading the forum members' timeline and an 'international' spreadsheet of information from lots of applicants gives me such a boost.  5 months to get a case officer!  Usually doesn't take long to get the actual visa after you get a case officer, so if we are lucky and can apply in September, we may well have a case officer by March and who knows, maybe a visa before July?  That would seriously rule!!

Ok enough VISA FRICKIN' stuff now.

And enough PHOTOS STUFF now.

I have to remark that ever since the neighbour's brat has learnt how to speak, the TANTRUMS AND SCREAMING have lessened.  Now I guess he can actually EXPRESS what he wants and doesn't have to bash things and wail.  He's still a brat though and they're still bloody annoying (and stinky), but at least we don't have to listen to the Saga of Igor Bashing The Walls every day.  Yay!!!!!

Thank heavens for a motorplan.  The car repairs 'cost' R8000.  To replace a door lock (which I guess contains the central locking system) and the front brakes.  Jeeeeeeeeeeeeepers!!

Tues night we watched Bolt which was VERY funny!!!  A really entertaining, funny movie - Rhino is a legend!  We've hired Evan Almighty and HP4 to watch tonight and Friday evening.

It seems more and more certain that we will live in Brisbane.  Just judging from what others say, everything points to Brisbane.  Sydney is wonderful, but apparently extremely expensive.  Melbourne apparently has cruddy weather, Cairns is HOT AND HUMID, Perth is just too far from everything for me to really like, Adelaide is cooler, whereas Brisbane is cheap, not TOO humid, doesn't have cruddy weather and not far from everything (a 1.5hr plane trip to Sydney, which is great cos we can go on holiday anytime! :D)  Oh and we know people who are in Brisbane (as well as another friend who is going to be moving to Brisbane soon - he's already got his visa but is in no actual hurry to move yet).  Oh and I know it's not a big issue, but Queensland doesn't have daylight savings. 

I really can't wait until we're settled there though, because there's so much I want to do which I can't do while we're in this 'transitional' state.  G was explaining music (theory) to me last night, and I got a serious urge to bang out sounds on a piano.  I don't know if a keyboard would suffice (a piano engages more senses, I've always thought) but we'll see - maybe we can get a piano over there, seeing as G can play and I'd love to mess about and at least find out whether I have an affinity to it or not (I've never had the opportunity to try).

I have 6 working months (most of December will be holidays if I'm able to put in leave, as the office closes for 2 weeks), 27 working weeks, 134 working days left!!!!!!!

Photo status

Last count, I had 5193 photos scanned.  That's quite a pile of photos.  It hardly feels like I've really scanned that many.

I still have 8 photo albums to scan, which probably have 400 or so photos between them.  After that, another 100 in a flip-through set of small albums, and a packet of photos from G... I'd say maybe another 300 or so.  I'm waiting to hear from my cousins if they have any photos for me to scan... and G's parents and Mom might still have some odds and ends that I can scan.  So all in all, I'll probably reach 6000+.  Not bad!

It's about time that this comes to a close.  I'm starting to desperately crave cross-stitch, and PSP games too.  I haven't really been 'relaxing' at home (because I start quite soon after we get home), and I haven't stitched in MONTHS.  It must be doing some damage!  Golden Ice is crying out to be finished - I really want to finish the scanning and then pay total attention to him.  Still not sure where he'll be 'stabled', I'll probably put Golden Ice in Heremia's place, Heremia in Warpony's place and Warpony up on the empty hook in the bedroom.  I'd love to put a nail in the wall by the bathroom door but I kinda feel that we shouldn't add nails all over the place since we'll more than likely only be staying for another year and they already have plenty of other nails up on the walls.

What's 'disturbing' is the fact that I'm getting this 'craving' for a new cross stitch: the new, untouched threads, unmarked chart, blank fabric, everything crisp and new.  But!  Golden Ice is 'new' enough for now as I've not touched it for so long.

I've discovered a brilliant blog:  STFU, Parents.  I don't know the URL offhand, but it's google-able.  It's a very amusing site, where people post stuff that they've had inflicted on them on Facebook, or Twitter, etc.  Like constant potty-training updates or tweets during labour right up to 5mins before the baby is born... seriously!  Oh and PICTURES from 'successful' potty training... yes, people POST THAT ON FACEBOOK!!!  I'm seriously considering taking a screenshot from an ex-schoolmate's album, in which she has posted a 'black&white, for the squeemies' picture of her... well, I can't really tell (do I want to know?) but I think it's a caesarian.  Wonderful pic to pop up on my newsfeed and, seeing how FB recycles stuff (ie, you see news from 3 weeks ago), repeatedly pop up for weeks after.

Our ACS appeal letter arrived on Friday.  We got the refund from Postnet on Saturday - no hassles.  Now we're just waiting to hear from ACS.  Not sure if they're going to update the application status on their website, maybe we won't know they've even looked at it until we finally get the 2nd letter.

It is now nearly lunchtime, and I have 99 working days left for this year. 137 days left in total.  For now I'm just thrilled that I have only 99 working days left THIS WHOLE YEAR!!!  I guess it's a kinda 'pre-goal', because once I've reached the last working day of this year, I will only have 38 working days left in total!!

Saturday night we had avo sushi.  We were at the supermarket and had got everything we needed, except for salmon.  We were planning on popping to the more expensive grocery store upstairs, when our train of thought was completely disrupted by the realisation that the person who was ahead of us in the queue had left her credit card in the card slot.  I ran out to find the lady (luckily she seemed quite in a daze and wasn't far but she also couldn't recall what till she'd just been at), and we completely forgot to get the salmon.  But it was delicious with just avo.  Last night we had sushi WITH salmon, YUMMMMM!!!!!  And we watched Harry Potter 2.  Harry Potter 3 is lined up for tonight, then we're going to hire the 4th and 5th ones...

I do believe that that is all news for now... such a newsupdate this blogging thing is! :P

Postnet update

The plot thickens.

 

I kept checking DHL's website throughout the morning and afternoon.  Nothing.  At about 16:30, I phoned DHL and the lady there told me that the letter had only just been collected, at 15:55.  (Note: collected, not dropped off)

 

I immediately phoned Postnet, asked to speak to the manager, and told him that we had a slight problem.

 

Apparently the cow there told ME that the manager himself would drop off the letter at DHL that very morning, but told her MANAGER that the letter wasn't urgent and could wait til the DHL guy came to fetch stuff that afternoon!

 

WTF?!  First of all, make a STUFF UP, then promise to make amends, AND THEN not even BOTHER to follow through with a promise?  Sorry, no.

 

So on Saturday we are going to go fetch our refund!  R470, thank you very much, and no repeat business from US ever again!

 

Thankfully DHL is performing impeccably and our letter is already in Sydney, most likely being delivered tomorrow morning (their time).  YEEEHAAA

Photos!

On Sunday we popped in at G's parents' place and dropped off their photos. I finished everything they'd given me, including two VERY sticky, old albums whose photos had become glued. There aren't any more pics from them for now, which is a great relief, because that means I'm able to focus completely on the OTHER photos I got:

We went to see Mom & sis too, and Aunt+Uncle+cousin were there too. Aunt gave me her set of photo albums, plus a tin of photos from Gran.

They are INCREDIBLE! Old photos, from when Mom and her were growing up, plus a whole stack of OLDER pics, of Gran and Grampa approximately my age, and some even younger. Incredible. And more photos of Mom as a youngster. We really don't have many in our albums, so this is a great gift.

These pics have a far more profound effect on me than I thought they would because there's actually quite little I know about Gran or Grampa... REALLY know about them, not knew from grandchild's perspective but as an adult now. Seeing the pics of Grampa as a 20 year old... he looks so different from how I'd imagined he'd look. Gran too, even more different. It's incredible. This scanning has become such a journey for me, more than I'd foreseen.

It's like meeting people for the first time after hearing so much about them, except what I experienced as a child is the 'hear-say' and the photos the meeting. It has been a great revelation seeing G's parents, and his grandparents, in old photos, but this is closer to home, obviously.

I am currently scanning sis's box of photos, but I can't wait to settle in and savour the other photos. My family's photos.

Postnet

Saturday morning we dragged our sleepy asses out of bed, in order to drop off our skills assessment appeal letter at Postnet, to be collected (by DHL) on Monday to be couriered to Aus.

 

Last night, I checked DHL's track and trace, and there was no record of our parcel.  Warning bell.

 

This morning, I try again - still nothing.  I phone DHL, nope, no record of our parcel.

 

Phone Postnet.  It apparently would have been collected at 3:30 pm on Monday, and would probably only show on DHL's system FROM midnight only.  Thanks, but it should show already, right?

 

I phoned DHL - apparently the only reason they WOULDN'T have the parcel is if a) it wasn't ready at the time of collection or b) Postnet was closed when they got there.  This wouldn't be the case as Postnet has a regular agreed collection-time with DHL and wouldn't be closed at the time the DHL guy would come.

 

I phoned Postnet, the guy said he'd trace our parcel and phone me back.  1 hour goes past, I try again.  Speak to the lady we dealt with on Saturday.

 

She offers to trace the parcel for me and call me back, I say 'the guy there said he would too but an hour has passed, can I hold rather?... can you just tell me whether it was collected - can you check in your books to see what time it was collected?'

 

Not such a difficult thing to do, right?  This, somehow, was: she took 10mins to look in the book, come back to the phone and tell me that she's 'asked everyone in the whole office and it was found in the drawer, so it wasn't fetched yesterday'.

 

Yes, that is right.  DHL came yesterday to fetch the courier parcels, and our one?  Got LEFT BEHIND IN POSTNET'S BLOODY DRAWER!

 

"The manager is going to drop it off at DHL's office now this morning, it should show up on DHL's tracking tonight".

 

Guess we won't BOTHER going to Postnet again...!  R470 to 'forget' our parcel!  WTF!!!

Update!

Right now I'm scanning photos - as I have been pretty much constantly whenever I'm home without other things that I must do.

I've scanned over 4500 photos now. I still have 2 photo albums to work through (the pictures have become almost glued to the pages so I won't be able to take them out), I'm waiting on a picture box from my sis, a tin of pics from my aunt, plus any other odds and ends my mom and G's parents can find. Oh and I have a photo album of my own, and G's got a small packet of photos too. So, I'm getting there. I can't wait til it's all finished, I REALLY REALLY want to start stitching again!

And now for an update on the ACS assessment. I phoned ACS at 1:30am our time, and spoke to a very helpful lady there. Long story short, we are appealing the assessment, with a SUPER-DETAILED work reference letter backing up G's request for acknowledgment of his C#/C++/C specialisation. The whole process should take between 5 and 7 weeks (taking the week for delivery to ACS into account, but excluding postage back to us)... and hopefully we'll be A for AWAY and able to apply for the visa.

That was fun...er... not

I checked the post office track and trace site this morning, and the letter was ready for collection. During lunch I walked down and fetched it, and opened it and read it (via msn) to G. It's ... essentially useless.

The code required by the Aus govt to know that G has a critical skills list skill ... isn't right. They have the code to say he has skills but not the little set of letters in brackets that follow the code to specify which he has.

So now we start again. Make an appeal, I guess, which requires us to fork out another (70% of the application fee) pile of cash.

Yay. 12+ weeks down the drain.

Whatever.

It's NEARLY HERE!!

I just phoned our post office helpline.  Held for flippin' ages listening to a LOOPED Sarah Brightman - Deliver Me.  FFS PLEASE not a LOOP!!!  On my 3rd try I was lucky and someone answered.

 

THE LETTER IS GOING TO BE DELIVERED THIS WEEK!!!!  It's not just already in the country, it's already in the CITY!  It's so nearly here AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!

 

So we should know ASAP (before Friday, hopefully!) what the result is, AND WE CAN APPLY ASAP TOO!!!!!!!

 

OMG AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!

 

Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Stet

"Stet" is such a smug word.

This is why I hate the word "stet":

ACS update

G and I (totally coincidentally) just simultaneously checked ACS, to find the status has changed from "with assessor" to "case finalised"!!!

 

YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY  We should get the letter very soon now!!  Yay!!!!!!

Boy do I love my job

Arrghhh...

 

I tried to make changes, applied for jobs, but seeing as there (are now 151 and were at the time under 200) working days left, I thought I might stick it out here (and I didn't have any success with the applications I made).

 

It is going to be HARD.  If I manage.

 

What's got up my nose this time is the receptionist was just off sick yesterday.  Her cousin died or something and so she was 'sick' yesterday and didn't come to work.  And now she's taking FOUR days off to attend a funeral in Eastern Cape.  Ok, a day or two I can understand, for a CLOSE relative, but 4 days?  Ok maybe I'm being insensitive and stuff, but with my JOB of being BACKUP fucking receptionist, I'm pissed.  I don't think I took that many days combined when my own FATHER and then grandmother died, and I doubt I'd even get to take a day off to attend the funeral if one of my THREE (yes, only three, not 20) cousins died.

 

I hate this job.  I hate how it makes me hate people, hate things, it just makes me so hateful and... well... hardyhar, I hate it.  I know that you can apparently 'choose' how you feel about stuff, but this stupid bloody pathetic STAND IN, no *actual* job, job ... I dunno... it just pisses me off.  I don't have WORK of my OWN, so I get to have other people's stuff palmed off onto me.  If you get other people's shitty tasks palmed off onto you, you don't HAVE anything to be PROUD OF... nothing to sit back after doing and be satisfied knowing you have a JOB that you, just you, do.  It's just 'this is actually someone else's job but they're too busy/can't be bothered/don't feel like doing it because it's a shitty task, so I have to do it'.  My only 'job' is FILING YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.

 

I guess this is an incoherent, overly ranty boring dull blogpost, as usual...

 

YAYYYYY  stupid pathetic excuse for a 'job'.

 

I've probably blogged before about visa news - the visa price has gone up and ACS is sending the letter soon and hopefully the visa won't take ages, etc etc and we're hoping to apply before end of July blablabla.

 

I know once we arrive in Aus, we'll have to start our whole life again... and things will be difficult and we'll have to 'vasbyt' for a while.  Probably will have to work straight away to afford stuff...

 

BUT OMG I'm so not going to be a STAND IN BLOODY RECEPTIONIST again.

 

For now, I need to keep working until we have definite progress with the visa, as we need the $.  I just hope, seriously hope, that there will be some sort of... I don't think the word is 'vindication' but some sort of payback for sitting through this.  Karmic credit... I dunno.  Just something that I can ENJOY after tolerating and enduring this.  Like post-marathon satisfied exhaustion.

News!!!!

There has been a change on the ACS status:  it is now 'with assessor' and we've been given a registered post tracking number!!  Apparently it means the letter has been posted off already - but we're going to wait until it arrives (to be sure we have the actual letter AND that it has a positive result) before we REALLY go mad with excitement.

 

THIS MEANS WE'LL BE APPLYING FOR THE VISA SOON!!!!!  HOPEFULLY BEFORE THE END OF JULY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

OMG so yay exciting WOW!!

 

So all we have to do is apply, submit all the relevant documents (we're going to do an e-application), pay the relevant visa fee, and wait.  We'll be told when to do the medicals and send through a police clearance certificate.  Ok, this all, of course, depends on the ACS RESULT... but I'm really really really optimistic now!

 

We might get the visa before MY BIRTHDAY!!  Or maybe even before I finish working here!!  So we might even be in Aus before the end of next year!!  We'll see.

 

The 'gamble' for us is when to apply for the police clearance certificates.  I think we should apply for them very soon after we actually apply for the visa, because it'll take about a month (at least) for them to do.  At the moment the Aus govt is priority-processing the visa class we're going to be applying for, so they might do ours very quickly, and would need the clearance certificates soon.  Once they are received by Aus govt, they're valid for 1 year (not the 6 months as stated on the certificate), and the entry-by-no-later-than date is (I think) the earlier of the 2 expiry dates between the medicals and the police clearance certificate. 

 

What's important though is getting the visa ASAP, because if push comes to shove, we can take a holiday (whenever NEEDed, but we can take it as a 1st anniversary holiday!!) and go to Aus to get the visas stamped in our passports.   It's not that important that we *move* straight away, but it isn't ideal not to as it's bit of a 'waste' to go there just for the visa.  BUT, we can maybe go to Aus to get the visa stamped in our passports, then return via Singapore with a week or more's stopover there for a holiday!  OR SOMETHING!  Not urgent to think about right now, more urgent is preparing to apply!

 

YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

And a 1 and a 2 and a 1, 2, 3 EEEEEEEEEEEEEK

EEEEEEEEEEEEk!

 

I am so insanely bored at work today.  I have had work to do on and off, but for the most part I've been bored.  I've just been going through the pre-move checklist, which starts all the way back at 'decide which visa is best for you and your situation'.  Check!

 

All we still need in order to make the visa application is the ACS assessment!!  Apart from that we just have to fill in a character assessment document, and actually submit the visa application.

 

ACS is on track with the assessment, I hope.  Yesterday was 12 weeks since we submitted everything electronically, we still have to wait til the end of July til the 12 weeks since paper-submission is up.  I really hope that they don't take 6 months with this, else I might reach my wits' end!  It's really so exciting and actually submitting the VISA APPLICATION will be one MASSIVE step for us.  A concrete, definite step.  I know that we will wait a long time for the visa application to be processed, and will have to do other stuff in the meantime (like get medicals, etc), but that's at least... it'll be DONE, we'll have SUBMITTED it.  AND I fully understand that only once we actually GET the visa will the whole process actually START... the closing up shop and moving part. 

 

I'm probably reblogging the same thought over and over again (like a broken record), but it really is a massive, exciting thing for us.

 

This weekend we're getting new tyres for the car.  And we're going to put up 'for sale' ads for it too.  The sooner we can downgrade the better as we can settle a whole lot of things at once, which puts us in a better position to save in preparation for the move.  It will just be sad not to have the car as it really is a lovely, luxurious car.  I suppose the car we get will always be considered our 'interim' car and we won't feel very affectionate towards it.  The audi is *our* car... the next one will be the temporary car!

 

I am still very disappointed by the junk-blitz's non-happening, and the general implication it has.  I am trying to separate my emotional response to my realisations separate from my own behaviours and habits.  I don't want to knee-jerk adjust my own behaviour in an irrational bid to be 'non-cluttery' as it would catapult me straight over to the complete opposite end of the scale and cause *me* problems.  Mom's problem is not mine - what I have to deal with is my feelings about her problem.  I don't have to deal with and sort out her problem.  I can only try help her realise that she has a problem and support her (if, not when) she decides to deal with it.

 

156 working days left.  I'm so bored and restless that I am starting to wish that I could be allowed to work half-day instead.  That way they have me employed and working here and I still get to do stuff at home.  But that's a wishful thinking scenario if there ever was one!

 

Today's weather has been rather miserable, raining like mad and then the sun peeps out for a second and a half before clouding over and repeating the cycle.

 

This evening I am going to carry on scanning photos.  I took a break from photos to scan a few letters, but it takes longer than I thought it would so I've decided they can wait until the photos are done.  G's dad uncovered a whole drawer full of photo folders, so I may well have a whole consignment more to do.  I know I've taken on a colossal task, but I reckon I can beat it.  I've scanned over 2000 photos.  I'd say it's an accomplishment.  I'm over halfway through the 1st of the 3 boxes, and the 2nd box really doesn't have that much in it.  The 3rd box, however, would probably take a longer time than the first 2 put together!

 

Anyway, enough about SCANNING.  It is 'boring' (timeconsuming) but the knowledge that I will be finished with it and can go back to reading and stitching and doing other things (with no rush or deadline!) is a great comfort.  It's not as if it's a hobby I've taken up, it's just a task I've set myself.

 

It is now 3pm, 2hrs to go til HOMETIME!  And Monday, I believe, is PAYDAY!!!!

My News

Reminiscent of being in primary school, I am going to write about my news today.

I went to the dentist at 8:00 this morning, to have a filling.  I was under the impression it was just one, but it was in fact 2.  And they were more serious than my dentist had let on - this dentist (my dentist's colleague apparently whose forte it is to do white-fillings) said that he'd had to drill rather deep.  Deep enough to be right near the nerves.  If the nerves have been disturbed, they will give trouble - get inflamed, start to die, etc - and I will have to go for root canal.  OMG please no.

 

Please, just no.

 

It took close on 5 hours for the local anaesthetic to wear off completely.

 

In other news:  the car went for a scheduled service this morning.  We should have a happy car this afternoon, and I'm hoping they even give it a valet.  Kudos to Audi for pointing out that we need new tyres - apparently car service centres do not usually remark on (or even look at) the condition of the tyres as it is not within their 'jurisdiction'.  Basically it's not their responsibility to check stuff like wiperblade and tyre condition as it is your duty to check and maintain those things, not theirs.  But still, a tipped hat to Audi for going the extra 'mile' here.

 

One thing I salvaged out of the mess that is the garage at Mom's is an A4 envelope of letters.  Addressed to Dad, from his Dad, brother and sister.  Dated circa 1960.  Dad was in his late 30s/40s at that stage.  Grandpa was in his 60/70s.  I never met Grandpa+Grandma, and it has evoked such a melancholia in me, reading the letters (and not seeing Dad's reply but knowing his usual manner/writing style), learning about where they lived at that stage (not far at all from where G and I are staying - we'd be able to visit them often if they still lived there), and what their life was like.  They're not DETAILED letters, like 'this is what we eat and this is how we dress' etc, it's more day-to-day.  His sister being glad that they have moved closer to the seaside, yet the traintrip to work would require her getting up early and she'd 'just have to get used to it'.  Watching the fire on the hillside from their back porch.  Things like that.

 

It is also so evident just how catholic they were.  Loads of mentions of Father so and so, as they were evidently like family friends.  Mentions of my uncle, who was living far from them, moving back closer and 'coming back to the ways' of the church.  It makes me wonder, now, well it makes me wonder a lot, but particularly about Dad's religious views when we were small, and how they changed as he got older.  I wonder what made him rethink.  I'm of the impression that he read and learned a lot about science, and it clashed with the catholic (and indeed christian) view that the church and bible are to go unquestioned as fact and that anything found in science that contradicts it must just be ignored/denied.

 

So now I'm having a very thoughtful time, and wish that Dad was around for me to ask him things.  I would love to tell him where we are living now, and would enjoy looking at Google earth and trying to find his and his parents' homes nearby.  I wish I could see more photos of Grandpa+Grandma, to learn more about them.

 

I haven't finished reading (or scanning) all the letters, so maybe I'll learn more as I go through them all.

Freezing cold

Ok not that disastrous, but it's pretty cold here (for this part of the world at least!).  I think it's 12C or something.  Inside this building it's probably more like 3C.

This weekend was a letdown.  Not that I didn't enjoy what we did instead, but for all intents and purposes (those being to junkblitz) it was a no-show.  Mom hasn't dealt with the stuff we blitzed last time.  That was at the end of April.  1.5 months ago.  So we couldn't actually carry on, because we had made no progress and there was no space to unpack things.  I wonder if anything actually was taken away to the charity-organisation, as planned.  A whole stack of childrens' books and toys were packed into Mom's car, to be dropped off the next day, but now I'm wondering whether she didn't just unpack them and stack them somewhere (in the outside loo or shed perhaps?) as well.

It's just so... defeating.  This whole problem is worse than I'd allowed myself to acknowledge (I did know there was a problem but I was HOPING beyond hope that it wouldn't be like this).  My ex-room is now packed full of stuff, not even identifiable stuff.  It's just stuff, clutter.  There are old picture frames, ah shit I don't even want to try LIST all the stuff in there.  It's really hopeless.  It's just dreadful.

I wish that there was a simple solution, like buying her a small house, with no pool/big lawn/other troublesome 'add-ons' (because she claims to be 'busy' all the time, sorting out those things, and can't get around to sorting out the junk), but that would actually not help.  There's so much junk in the house that she wouldn't be able to move, and even if she were to get rid of everything non-vital, she'd just accumulate more.  And if you ask her about individual things, she has an answer (justification) ready.  They are 'valid' reasons, or they make SOME vague sense, but they are just so pointless that you are baffled as to why anyone would waste their energy even THINKING about doing something like that, nevermind actually DOING it.  Example:  collecting 2l ice-cream tub lids, to cut off the rims and keep the lid panel.  I ask her what on earth it's for and she points to ONE plant, in the WHOLE massive garden, that has these lids stuck into the soil around it, and says "they prevent the water from running off the soil away from the plant".  I just... it's just so depressing.

I wonder now, whether there's been 30 years of this 'accumulation' habit... I guess in the 'bigger' items (like the 30+ year old floor polisher, cot and crib), they've just never got rid of them, but now recently (not sure when it started, when Dad was sick?  After he died?), it's other things, like the ice-cream lids.  And not throwing away old things like aerosol-cream tins, which expired LAST YEAR.  Yes, I have said to her each and every time that they are OLD, and they are MOST LIKELY OFF AND GROSS (not to mention dangerous now?), and she just keeps replying 'no, I can still use the leftovers in something'.  Or has it always been like this?

I know this is a publicly viewable blog and anyone reading it can judge her and get a bad impression of her, but there are such complicated issues behind it that I don't even know about.  So reserve your judgement for the celebs and gossip-columns.  I'm blogging to put my thoughts in order and sort of exorcise them.

My sis ended up leaving very soon after we got there, because Mom started going on about how she does nothing to help (how can a person keep helping in conditions like that? but on the flipside I don't belive sis is very generous with her consideration + assistance), and we came home very soon after that too.  We ended up cleaning our own place and enjoying the quiet long weekend.  G worked on Monday, I did not.  I played Diablo 2 last night.  I'm at the end of Act 3, trying to kill Mephisto.

We are still waiting for the ACS result.

Slow

I have 162 working days left.  Yes, I'm staying with this countdown.

 

It's boring, this place is up to sh* but anyway.  I will be a persistent little train-driver (or try to be) and stick it out til the light at the end of the tunnel arrives!

 

ACS is taking their time - it's been 10 weeks since the online application, and just over 4 weeks since they got the paper application documents.  They take 12 weeks to do the assessment.  EERGH I'm so hoping they hurry up and finish it asap :D

 

Soon we should apply for our police clearance certificates, it'll take about a month to do... I've probably blogged about it in detail already but anyway.  It'll be one thing off our list!

 

We went to the dentist yesterday morning, for the usual check-up+clean... the dentist is uber-happy with my teeth except for 1.5 things... he sees on the xrays a potential cavity on one tooth and a potential filling-leak (and potential further degeneration of underlying tooth) on another tooth.  BUMMER!  So I'm going for a filling next Thursday - he says the already-filled tooth isn't as big a worry and is less urgent (not that the potential cavity-tooth is drastically urgent either).  Urgh... and I thought I was over and done with fillings etc, having had a few when I was small.

I'm busy scanning now.  It's rather boring.  I've started clearing out the other mailbox (stuff downloaded to the pc)... it's dull.  I don't feel like it now so I'm blogging.  Work has been DEATHLY boring: filing, folding drawings, more drawings, more filing.  162...it keeps me going to think that.

This weekend (I can't believe it is already upon us!) we're having the 2nd junkblitz.  Not sure what we'll tackle this time, hopefully the garage roof/rafters.  We'll see - it is only 3 days: Tuesday is a public holiday and I have taken Monday off, but G is working, so I can't junkblitz that day.  I guess it's a good thing cos I have to rest ONE day at least (ok more like:  I have to clean the fishtank this weekend so that's when I'll do it).

Ag, anyway, not much else is news.  It's not even very late, yet I want to go to bed.  Dude's all slouched tired too.

Hurl a lurl

Googling that won't bring you up any results in particular, other than hurling a url.

... I've been crying with laughter about it for a few minutes now... man I haven't had such an absurd laugh for a long time. I'm tired, it's late, I have a blogged dose (yay a cold), so I'm probably not thinking right. Anyway I thought it was funny.

It's quite an improvement on my day, really... apparently the assholes are not going to allow us to use earphones (of any sort - linked to the pc or ipod or walkman or radio) at the office. The one boss had a complete shitting-out session with colleagues who are working on a particular set of jobs that he oversees, and apparently the work quality is shit and we're all shit and everything's shit (his wife probably gave him a talking to the previous day or something, to put him in such a shit mood), so we're not allowed to listen to music. And also not allowed to use the work mail for personal stuff, nor check our personal mail during work hours, or abuse the phone (ie make personal calls), etc. So basically the asshole read a few pages of MANAGING FOR DUMMIES. So we should all become drones and die.

So my hopes of a simple countdown, given hope by the light at the end of the tunnel, have been dashed. I don't see myself lasting there WITHOUT MUSIC for another 9 fucking months. Hell, there is no way I'm going to be sitting folding drawings and doing shit filing without music... assholes.

So I've resumed my jobsearch. I dunno if I'll have any luck, I don't really care I'm just (again) ticked off with these pricks.

If they would ever find my blog - maybe they could read it and understand the world from a NOT-ONE-OF-THE-CLUB person's point of view. Why not just bloodywell block the internet? Or block sites like Facebook/youtube/etc? Why not CHECK all the PHONE RECORDS and get everyone to account for each one? Why just shit on everyone generally, and demean them and dispirit them more than they already are?

Whatever, like tossers like that would ever care anyway - it's all about their profit, their faux-'company cars', their comfort and happiness when the rest of us may as well sit in cardboard boxes and just type like monkeys.

ANWAY... enough VENOM (not even a fraction of what I feel)... for tonight. My head feels like crap and joy oh joy I'M RECEPTIONIST TOMORROW FOR THE WHOLE DAY. God I love my job.

Weekend wheeee

Thursday or Friday I started to get a scratchy throat. It behaved
itself until Sunday evening when it developed into a cold, so I'm now
sitting at work with a stuffy lopsided-feeling head. Yay.

Thankfully I wasn't too sick to go see Wayne Brady on Sunday!
Woweeee... it was a great show! That man has serious talent!

Because of my stuffy head, I can't really think of much to type into
this blogpost. I'm bored now, with nothing to do right now.

I have 169 working days left til end of Feb 2010.

Hopefully this evening I will be awake enough to play Diablo at least
a little bit.

Seeing as the visa processing time has been changing so much, we're
going to apply for the police clearance certificates this month. They
are valid for 6 months. If ACS gives the result in July, we will be
able to apply for the visa in July/August, which still leaves the
police clearance cert with 5 or so months' validity. Judging by the
processing times lately, they might assign us a case officer within
the 6 months, and even if they don't, we can apply (and pay the fee
again) for the police to send us another police clearance certificate
from the same application form, as they can do that if you ask within
6 months of first application. So, we would have 1 year's worth of
police clearance certificate! It's hardly expensive (R59), and I
reckon it's worth it having it on hand in case we get a case officer
very soon after applying for the visa. Rather be prepared! That
would just leave us with the medicals to do, which we HAVE to wait to
do because the case officer will tell us when to do them.

All in all, things seem rather straightforward.

Anyway - this is all for now, I have an email to type up and something
else to do now.

Friday AAAAAAHHHHHHHH

I AM SO BORED!!!!!!

I've been folding drawings just about the whole day yesterday and now the whole morning.  It's nearly midday.

I AM SO BORED!!

 

There are 133 days left for me.  It's given me such a burst of energy, this 'light at the end of the tunnel'!  Except now I'm more impatient... I even more badly want to go home and do stuff because work is so boring!!

 

I don't have anything wonderfully inspired to blog about.  bla bla bla bla bla

 

I'M BORED!!!!!

Scanning Sunday!

This weekend was so fun and relaxing!  Saturday, instead of going with G to the mall (it's become a regular Saturday thing due to meeting up with his parents for brunch there), I stayed home, and had a gentle start to my day.  Relaxed, unhurried breakfast, some tea and then I settled in to sort out my stuff.  Basically needed a bit of down-time to sit and figure out where I'm at:  I had a pile of paperwork to sort out, had to go through my to-do lists and prioritise things, etc.  It's given me a lot of peace of mind as there isn't that much that I *have* to do... I have to scan, I know that much!!

Apart from scanning the photos, I haven't got MUCH that I have to do... of course there still remains the mass of junk/junkblitzing to do at Mom's place, but otherwise, all I have to do is read through some Cosmo magazines (a last read before I get rid of them), and some other odds and ends but nothing MAJOR (slow, timeconsuming things like reading a pile of Cosmos or scanning photos).

The photos are still taking forever.  I'm not yet halfway through the 2nd box, and I still have 3 boxes, 1 packet and 3 albums left!!!  At least it's something 'slow' which I can double up on with doing something else which is dull:  clearing out my email box(es)!!  I won't be keeping my ISP-linked mailbox when we move so I may as well clear it out as much as I can before we leave.  And then there are LOADS of those stupid 'friendshippy' emails cluttering another mailbox (which I don't use anymore - it's just used to IM), which I have unbelievably left there for the past few years!  It's taken me ages, but I've whittled them down from 700 to 60.  My gmailbox is another story!! But, as they say in the classics, one step at a time!  I'm nearly done with clearing the friendshippy-mailbox, and then it's onto the ISP-linked one.  Yay!

Saturday evening we went out to Sis's G's birthday party/supper.  Man that was delicious food!  And we seriously overdosed on sugar!!!!!  All round a rather fun time!

That's all news for now that I can think of.

 

137 days left!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Friday

This week has been very boring.  Work-wise, at least.  It hasn't been irritating, like last week... at least, the latter part of this week hasn't been.

I re-counted on my calendar and if I don't find anything else before the end of the year (and provided I LAST that long), I have 138 working days left.  That is, if the visa application runs smoothly and I don't work past the end of this year - it depends entirely on the visa application.  But at least it gives me a milestone to work towards.  It's already May, there are 7 months left, but only 138 WORKING days left.  That's not so bad.  I've counted down for much longer in the past (trip to India, trip to Aus, wedding), so this should go quickly - specially since it is ALREADY May!

I think 138 days... is not such a bad thing.  I cannot properly count down in weeks though as with the leave days I've put in, there are some not-full *working* weeks etc (and even a week off, if I'm lucky), so I'd have to count in calendar weeks, not working weeks.  But if anyone is wanting to know, I have 30 weeks until I'm officially free!  Days make it sound closer because I can subtract one each day - except over weekends.

YAYYYYYYYY!!!!

There have been promising 'discoveries' regarding the visa.  One of the forums I frequent has had a post - someone has put together some 'stats' regarding the application processing times etc, and it seems as if the number of people applying for the visa type we're applying for has dropped.  And they've apparently sped up with processing.  So, if we apply in (touch wood holds thumbs that ACS hurries up and gives a good assessment) say July, we might get assigned a case officer in September or so, which may even mean that we'll have the visa before mid-next year!!  I really don't know what it means for us - if all things work out superbly they might grant the visa before the end of this year but I'm not getting my hopes THAT far up!  But it'd be nice.  So, maybe my sticking it out at this co isn't all that bad, because I'll be able to 'sign off' here and PREPARE TO MOVE!!!!!!

It's just too exciting.  And, it means that I must SHAKE MY ASS and get scanning!  Eeek!  Too exciting.

Nothing much else is news for now... this weekend I want to stay at home as much as we can, and get to grips with stuff we have to do at home.  G will probably have homework to do, but that will enable me to batten down the hatches and get scanning.

Inspired

but nowhere to go.  Or unable to indulge in my inspiration.

We had a wonderful weekend - G's party on Saturday was fun... and Sunday after cleaning up we pretty much chilled: reading, relaxing, nibbling leftovers, basically taking a nice quiet break.

Because of the nice quiet break, I am now super-inspired to tackle things, like scanning those photos (I haven't for a week or 2 now)... because I WANT TO STITCH!!!!!!  Golden Ice is still in my cupboard, sulking.  I REALLY REALLY want to stitch, but at this time I really have to scan photos because we don't know how long the visa will take.

We're still waiting for the skills assessment - the website's status hasn't changed but that doesn't necessarily mean it hasn't been processed.  I'm going to keep looking in the postbox.

Once that's arrived we are SET to apply!  And because (depending on the skills assessment result) G's occupation is on their CSL list, it will hopefully be a prioritised application.  So they *might* take under a year to process it!!

WHICH MAKES SCANNING ALL THE MORE URGENT!! *trying to peptalk myself so that I SCAN and don't stitch*

Once the scanning is finished, I will have all the time in the world to stitch, read, play computer games, etc.

But of course, my IMMEDIATE problem is that I'm stuck at WORK right now, with all the energy in the world, and as usual, by the time this afternoon comes round, my energy and inspiration will have seeped into the ground and disappeared, to be replaced with tiredness by the time I get home.  Super-frustrating!!  But, I can hardly resign to go do stuff like that at home... because we don't know how long the visa processing will take, and I don't think it's wise for me to sit home for 1 year +.  It is still unlikely that I will be able to afford not to work as soon as we're in Aus, and having a gap of a year or more won't do me any favours when looking for a job!

One the 'once-in-Aus' side of things, houses are SO EXPENSIVE THERE!  A nice decent sized house costs at least about AU$400 000, which is in the region of R3m.  That would obviously be if we bought our dreamhome straight-off which isn't going to happen!  But there are some seriously awesome homes there!  I guess though that we will have to look at buying a house and paying it off - which is what everyone does - because we will be settling in Aus, not 'temporarily' residing there, which is what we're doing now while we're in SA.

I guess it'll be a large mind-set change, from everything here being considered against our limited time here, to having 'uncapped' time there to 'invest' in long-term things there.

Work is increasingly quiet here - the whole co is pretty much gearing up for 1 massive job, with all the small ones carrying on and being finished.  Hbbm's not getting anything new for now (it seems), so things are quiet.  Talking of hbbm, he's got (cancerous?) growths/sores on his nose... he says he's having chemo for it and it's from a lifetime of playing cricket in the sun without sunscreen.  Not good.

Anyway, no other news right now.  Crawling down to lunchtime and then hopefully the afternoon will go past quickly.

News

I checked the ACS website again (G and I each seem to check it daily) to see whether there's been any progress with his application.  There has been:  it now says 'in progress', where it used to say 'to be allocated'.  So!  There has been progress!!  Hopefully they RACE through it and send us the letter ASAP so we can apply THIS MONTH for the VISAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!  Yayyyyyy!!!!!!!!!!!!

In other news:  we bought a new fridge yesterday.  We'd decided on an updated one of ours, and the salesman asked whether we'd rather want a silver one because it was going for R500 less than the white!  Colour is no biggie (we only took the white appliances before because they were R500 cheaper than the silver ones!), but I have a feeling it'll look a little unusual - the oven, microwave and washmachine (and even kettle+toaster) are all white, and the built-in cupboards are white too!

It should be delivered on Friday, and we're seriously hopefully they do because we're going to need it well in time to prepare eats for G's birthday!

Other news:  my phone's 3G/3.5G/whatever is faulty - so I can't connect to mig or the internet to check facebook.  Great.  Now my work day is even MORE damn boring!