16th February 2010 (Tuesday)

Can I just say, thank you Ainsley Harriot because we've all just had a very nice meal thanks to (partially) him and (practically) the Mr for having chosen the recipe, bought the ingredients and cooked it all. Very delicious and quite different. Squid, fried veeery lightly and quickly with a sauce of red onion, fish sauce and soy, served on a bed of lettuce and ripe mango. May I heartily recommend the flavour combination of squid and mango, an absolute peach (if one may employ such a confusingly fruity an idiom). And may I say, it was on this occasion quite the very best-cooked, most soft and succulent, moistest, most delicious fired squid I have ever had, and was truly, entirely memorable and the whole household voted the recipe to be put into the 'keepers' tray. As it has been.

Just prior to this, we were ever-so-slightly frantic. Today was the signing-of-the-lease day for the new place, so we went along at the appointed 4 p.m., dutifully, bearing cheques in hand and all ripe and ready. The lease was fine apart from that we noticed it curiously started from TODAY - we half-assumed (and hoped) that this was a misprint. On the advert, the flat in question was meant to be available from the 21st, and we hadn't specified any move-in date as yet. But no, not a misprint - apparently this is standard practice here, you sign and turn the key in the door - typical Auzzie directness. This was not entirely convenient for us as we've currently got the place we're in until the 27th, and besides, we haven't got fridge or washing machine, which we need to purchase (the new place does not have these). So we said, no no, how about the 21st, at which the agent looked most put out and said well if it has to it has to - we said well hang on we'll try and get in touch with our agents and see what we can do with transitioning.... anyway, it all gets so confusing that I can't even keep track but in short, we're officially renting the new place from the 21st but as it happens we've got the keys to it right now (we asked if we could go in and measure up for the fridge space - it's a defined space in the wall - and the agent just went out and came back with the keys and told us in a whisper not to tell the boss, wouldn't matter if we just went in and measured for ourselves.). Also we're bound for the rent for this place until the 27th but the agent is going to put it on the market for the remainder date that we won't be occupying, and claims that the market is very tight at the moment and that she thinks we ought to get a refund for that week so fingers crossed. 'Just' a week's rent might seem like niggarding but in fact as it's 650 dollars and we've pretty much kitted ourselves out for considerably less than that (more on this anon), it's a bit of a deal, I guess. Still, we'll get what we can, do what we can, see how it goes.

Now, we came home from this in a slightly shell-shocked state - Oh and I forgot to mention, I called up the shipping company for the update on the state of our goods from the UK (they should have been here two days ago from the last update) and got the answer that they 're now due in the country at the end of February and it'll be another two weeks before they're released. So we're probably looking at the middle of March before the stuff arrives, which leaves a month's deficit in time of when we'd have NO stuff at all. If we're moving in five day's time. So I made up a quick list of things we need to provide, and found that the vast majority of the cost is what we'd need to purchase anyway (mostly in white goods), and quite a bit of things would be 'good to have' - such as a better blow-up double bed. The remainder amount of cash that would be actively wasted only came down to about$300, which taking into account the difference in rent (assuming that we could foist off the rental on someone else - which of course is not certain) is a net 'profit' of about $100. So not so bad. Anyway, with the rather strange feeling one has when things are suddenly going a little faster than you anticipated, we came home from the estate agents, had a glass of juice, grabbed the shopping list and headed off the Kmart at 5p.m.. two hours and $425 later we were back home with almost all the 'small' mostly kitchen paraphernalia that we would need to survive - including everything from knives, fish-slices, set of pots and pans, cutleryand crockery, oven mitts, a blow-up bed of luxurious proportions, three pillows, a set of bedding for us and a lightweight quilt, glasses, towels, bathmat, mixing bowls, sieve, toaster, chopping boards, the whole blinkin' lot - it's frightening how little some of these things cost. One really wonders, but prefers not to ask. I was also quite stunned by the accuracy of some of my guesses at price - I estimated for example $8 for a chopping board - we actually spent $8.99 on a set of five chopping mats. Anyway, very swift, reasonably comprehensive, and really quite easy. We plan to do a trip to an electrical store tomorrow and hopefully get the large goods out of the way, and arrange a delivery time. Fingers crossed. It's also quite astonishing how easily one can lay hands on 'sets' of things - a 'set' of essential cookware including can opener, peeler, whisk, slotted spoons, fish slice, sealer clips, 'wooden' (i.e. silicone) spoons, and so on already in a cutlery tray for $24, and a cutlery set (perfectly usable) for 4 for $5. I mean, $5??? One really dreads to think - but it's convenient. A 4-person crockery set - a princely $22. This includes plates, bowls, side plates, and mugs. I was going to get tough plastic items but actually we decided that this was cheaper. Anyway, so much for the first haul (we stopped when two shopping trolleys were full and went home for a glass of wine), no doubt there'll be more. Oh, and we also need to choose our barbecue. Hurrah!

So that's about it for today - we need to get a move on tomorrow with more purchasing but essentially as of Monday next we should be resident at 5/172 Scenic Drive Merewether Heights 2291 NSW Australia. All quite done and dusted. Littles's school might be delayed for another week because we couldn't actually sign the agreement today, but she should be in quite soon. I'll see if I can get things jammed in tomorrow bit might just be a push too far. I'm sure she'll survive another week - though I have to say, she's looking forward to it, quite a bit. Still have to go and get her uniform and bits and pieces.

Anyway, I'm sure you've heard enough of the tedious little bits of our lives for the moment, lots of love from all of us, Nancy xxxxx