As I mentioned, the 'old piles are gettin' bigger' - not being personal - just talking about the piles for shipping / air freighting / storing / junking ... here is an example or two ...
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| Can you spot a cat amongst it all? |
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| ... well, that's Geoffrey ! |
As Paul mentioned, we went out last Friday night, then (last) Saturday it was his birthday - which he wasn't too worried about this year - his mind being on bigger and better things (and canal boats !). So - Saturday morning we went to get my car cleaned as we had some friends coming over with their daughter to have a look at it, with the view to potentially buying it. Their daughter said it was 'awesome' and really loved it - so, it is all looking good for her to buy it, toward the end of March - which will give her plenty of time to learn to drive a manual car (at the moment, she drives at automatic). So - that was a productive morning !
Saturday afternoon, we cleaned out the garage and loaded up as much rubbish as we could into the Ute and took it up to the tip - the driving force being here that Paul wants me to keep the car in the garage - to keep it happy 'til it is sold ! The nice man at the tip only charged us $10, so that was a good result !
After a bit more clearing when we got back, we treated ourselves to a beer down in Manly, with the dogs (we sit outside a little bar, which is virtually empty at the time we go down there - but later in the night there are queues of young'uns up the road - waiting to get in !). Then we got an Indian take-away and a DVD (The Thing) ... that was what Paul wanted to do for his Birthday night - he said he was in heaven !
On Sunday - after all the frivolities of take-aways and DVDs, we got up and I started on clearing out drawers - as we will be selling all our furniture and so it all has to be emptied! Note to self, never ever put things in drawers again ! Paul took all his tools and tool boxes up to his work to clean and sort them out - which he did for about 6 hours! When he got back we went to the Skiffies to meet some friends - as per his previous blog entry.
On Monday, I had to chase up the animal transport people - when we pick up the animals at Heathrow we will have 5 crates to transport - so we wanted to know the dimensions, so we know how big a truck to hire ! It turns out they are plastic and can be dismantled into two parts, so what we will do is dismantle the dog crates and then fit one of the cat crates into them - that way we will only have to accommodate the size of 3 cat crates, plus our luggage !
When talking to the pet transport people, they mentioned that there were now new regulations on pet travel (as from Jan 2012) - which we knew about - in that, they now only have to wait 3 weeks following their successful rabies blood test. However, what we didn't consider was that part of the wording was that it had to have been done within one year of travel - which seemed a bit nonsensical as our animals rabies vaccinations are all valid for 3 years - even though originally done just over a year ago. Anyway, they wanted to double check with the Quarantine people - just to be safe ! I immediately developed whelts on my neck - and - it's a good job the sun was just over the yard arm - as I had a beer too ... I really didn't want any more hiccups with the animals (ref last years's debacle !).
Anyway - I continued clearing and creating my piles - I have one pile for storage, one pile for shipping, one pile for taking with us on the plane, one pile to send via air freight and one pile for the garage sale. All the stuff in this picture, had been piled up in the garage, while we were selling the house - but which ll got moved to the laundry - which then had to be sorted ..yuk !
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| The laundry full of 'stuff' |
Well -- that was the animals (and our flights) sorted - back to the piles ! The week was full of sorting and culling (in between a busy week of massaging!)
We had decided to have a 'Garage / House moving / Clearance Sale' this weekend, so my focus was getting things ready for that ... this is the result on Saturday morning ...
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| Kitchen jumble sale ! |
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| Lounge room jumble sale ! |
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| Lounge room from deck |
We had soooo many people through from 7.30am to about 11am, then it dropped off - we had stuff all through the lounge, kitchen, dining room, bedroom, backyard and on the deck - so we had people everywhere ! We sold quite a bit of stuff really and met some lovely people too ... it was quite a fun thing to do, but by 1pm we were really, really tired ! My mate, Julia came by with her dog, Neo and bought us some chocolate muffins, so we had those with some cuppas ... very good diet we had yesterday ! By the time 4pm came, we were completely exhausted and the dogs were very peeved at being locked away most of the day (even though I was playing them their 'doggie classical music' to keep them calm!)
So - again - last night we got an Indian take-away - but watched a really bad film (something with Bruce Willis in it) ... I fell asleep, which was great .. thanks, Bruce ! So - we went to bed, thinking that would be the last night on our bed ... as someone said they were going to buy it!
Sunday morning, I got up early as I had so much going on in my head - so started putting our remaining stuff for sale on Gumtree. The lady rang to say she didn't want the bed after all, so we get to sleep on it a few more nights ! Then --- just as we were feeling very fed up with the whole ordeal, Russel (Paul's brother) rang and cheered us up .. he is on board the boat (Caxton) at the moment, with his wife, Tracey - he told us it was so lovely and warm and cozy and peaceful ... so, that spurred us on !!
I put a few items on Gumtree, then we got ready to deliver some of the stuff we had sold (all part of the service !). Paul went under the house to box up all his paints and other bits and bobs, as a guy was coming t 10.30 am to pick them up... which was great - at least they are going to good use ! Another lot of stuff gone .. another tick !
I then had a call from a girl who had seen the ads on Gumtree - who wanted to come and see the coffee table in the afternoon ... ! So - we did 4 lots of deliveries around the place and then came back for the girl to arrive to see the table, but she cancelled and then another guy rang to come and see it ... anyway, he ended up buying it, so all was well ! Now Paul had nothing to stick his feet on while he is watching tele ... terrible habit ! We still have a fair bit to get rid of, but we still have time, before we have to start donating to the charity shops !
Right ... that's my week ... we have just gotten back from a walk and a beer with the dogs and we will settle down soon with some beans on toast ! We know how to live !!! :) Elaine x
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