18th January, 2010

Ian's first day of work today! All seems to have gone pretty well, he went out in the morning and came back pretty smiley saying he'd got a lot of admin stuff done and happily tucked into the G&T, so I take that as a good sign. Seems to have got the keys to his office (a bare room with nothing but a table to it), gone through a lot of inductions for new employees, and has been using Pete's office for any correspondence or proper work. Also picked up a load of redirected mail from the UK which of course means more paperwork for me to follow through on - in numerous ways. Joy joy joy.

Meanwhile the Non and I were at home - pretty straightforward day - beach in the morning until 12, then home doing Non work and paperwork and housework till 5, then out again to the beach for another hour and a half or so and we got back home just after Daddymonster had pulled into the garage - just rather sandier than he was. Achievements on the beach included the Non building a very magnificent Seagull Trap (a shallow scrape in the sand surrounded by pointing bits of sticks, seaweed and seashells), and the viewing of the Ocean Baths entirely empty of water, being cleaned ready for fresh use in the morning. You get the jist.

I've started the trawl-around for the Non's school - everything depends on this, really. We can't rent the next house, decide on anything at all until we know where she needs to be going. A couple of places have already responded - Newcastle Grammar School and Merewether Heights (one fee-paying and one public). However I still haven't been able to locate any real independent comparison table of local schools and am pretty much fishing in the dark, so I've also written to a Newcastle relocation service agent to see if they can shed some light on the matter. I could just visit every school in the region but as there are 38 in the Newcastle area alone this could take more time than one would strictly be entirely willing to spend. Still, as a first day's trawl, it's OK.

We're also eyeing up another property that's apparently EVEN smaller than the current one but is a couple of hundred dollars cheaper than this, and in the same area, so for February we might have a new address (doesn't make much difference really, all same old same old). We'll see.

This is a pretty lacklustre blog today, getting into the humdrums now - so as a consolation prize for reading this far here's a slightly out-of-season 12 Days of Christmas Auzzie Style (comes from one of the Non's library books:

On the 12th day of Christmas.. etc..
12 parrots prattling
11 numbats nagging
10 lizards leaping
9 wombats working
8 possums playing
7 koalas climbing
6 platypuses
5 kangaroos
4 kookaburras
3 jabirus
2 pink galahs
and an emu up a gum tree.

I write this slightly also because we've seen a few remnants of Christmas decorations here and there, including some of heavily garbed Santas, fake (obviously) snow and sleighbells.... Argh SO lame!!! Sorry, it's just utterly inappropriate. We were standing in front of one and gawping with disbelief, with the unanimous comment - why? I think it's safe to say that Christmasses here will NOT be 'traditionally' decorated in the Monster household. Definitely going down the Barbie route - and I'm not talking plastic dolls here. Bring on the emus.

Oh, and thank you all for your very kind comments - lovely to hear from you all! Much as it's very gratifying and all that, please don't feel obliged to comment - I know everyone's short of time. The blog's here for you to read or ignore as the fancy takes you, no-one will be offended if there are no replies ... but I DO of course want to hear what everyone else is up to so that's ALWAYS very welcome! And yes, Pie - we're on Skype, and it seems to work just fine, no probs. Mind you I often forget to turn it on, perhaps we should have an 'up time' for whenever is appropriate... I think you guys are damn near 24 hours behind us, so we shouldn't really be too far apart - other than the date line. Might be quite convenient.

Lots of love to all,
V xxxxxx
p.s. Have you seen my yabby pic? Again, out of one of the Non's library books. Common crayfish type thing here, apparently. LOVE the bright blue!!
p.p.s. That dastardly Magpie juvenile was back again this morning, and he and his mum REALLY went bananas when we chucked down some worm-sliver-cut strips of lamb leg.... Oh yes. Magpies like lamb. I have a feeling we'll be seeing more of those birds after all.