Kind of a double post today since I've got a lot to cover :)
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POST 1 - pre Stuff arrival
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Melbourne is a fantastic vibrant and creative city. If there is any place you want to go to be some kind of artist, poet, hipster, bug, designer, fashionophile or tram-enthusiest, Melbounre is the place to do it.
One of the things I like most about Melbourne is it's transport network. Taking the car can be quicker sure, but a hell of a lot more stressfull. With their new MyKi system you're able to buy a daily ticket and use it on all busses, trains, trams and elephant rides. With two tram lines just outside the street I was staying at the city was at my 20-30 minute doorstep.
STEP 1: Getting ze pad
We've been wanting to move out for a while. After some poor response from property agencies while we were out of town, Turm and Carnival decided to pack me into a suitcase and send me down to house-hunt.
Finding the place wasn't too hard. I just had to be on the ball. Actually I was on the internet house hunting within half an hour of landing at my Uncle's place (don't worry he was encouraging it I didn't ignore him).
I found the ad for our swanky little flat online, called up to ask about getting the key and was told to hold the line as it was just arriving that day. Cha-ching goes the little light bulb above my head. If they don't have the key yet then no-one else has seen it.
The polite lass on the line informed me that the keys had just come in and if I wanted could pick them up the next day. They opened at 9am. I was there on the dot >:D
Turns out I was the first to see it, and first in line with our application form, so being proactive really helps...that and having an uncle willing to put you up for a week or three while you find a house.
So after signing some papers, organising to meet the agent, preparing bond, getting a form incorrectly filled out in Hobart, making calls to Hobart, finding out neither of them were near the fax machine any more and then having the forms magically turn up anyway despite them sending them to the wrong number...we had a house. A big thank you to our lovely overworked agent Anita, she got a box of chocolates which judging by her figure she probably won't eat, but I hope she enjoys looking at.
STEP 2: Prepping ze pad
Once the water had been turned on my friend TN offered to help me clean the place. Not that much work to do apart form some dusting, wiping etc. But it means we had a basic supply of cleaning doo-dads and a blank canvas to work off.
It had been freshly painted and has a renovated bathroom. Awesome.
It's within 1 km of 3 different shopping streets and 2km of a train station. Also awesome.
Due to the renovations we already had some uh....'tennents'.
WE DO NOT APPROVE OF TINY INSECTS!!!
A new challenger appears. MORETEIN BUG BOMB!!!
It was only a few tiny cockroaches and a few spiders. But I felt a lot better about sweeping and cleaning the cupboards once they had been gassed.
Shame I forgot to open a cupboard and the oven.
DIN DING round 2!
So the house has been cleared of insects. Cleaned and polished. And I even picked up a few bare nessesities AND met the neighbours. (Alex and Maria, nice Italian couple that have been there a few years).
SO.
We've got power, gas and water. A clean pad and I may have even picked up a job.
Along with some sexy furniture that I picked up from a place -just down the road-. BOOYAH
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POST 2 - I have things again!!
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It is with a mixture of joy and befudlement that I started unpacking today. I had the day off work for it and the un-removalists arrived almost smack-bang on the time they said they would. Nice chaps too I gave them a bottle of wine for their troubles.
(I would have had some photos of the house in it's current state, but in the moving of my luggage from Uncle Russel's to the flat I also moved my data cable. Ha durp durp).
The joy came from a christmas time three. I had lots of things to un wrap and find out what they were, even if a lot of them were things I already owned. The befuddlement came from where the heck I was going to PUT it all.
Seriously.
My family and friends went to the ends of the earth to make sure I had everything I needed for my new home. Some of the more notable items were
- Not 1 but 2 medical kits (thanks Mum)
- A full set of high quality dinner glassware (Reds, whites, whisky, pimms, tumblers, brandy, beer, crowne beer). The white wine glasses even SING (joy!)
- A spice rack, spices included
- 2 boxes of linen, spiders included.
- A food dehydrator, processor, blender, sandwich press and cavalry sabre.
- More knives, forks and spoons than I ever remember us owning
- A water filter jug (also Joy!)
- Misc kitchen stuffs like chopsticks, ladels, random stabbey doo-dads and something called a CORER (coming to a kitchen near you this Summer Dun dun DUNN).
- Lots of other things. Big and small. Mostly medium and awkwardly shaped.
- no not that awkwardly shaped, shame on you.
My room is pretty small and I'm suddenly realising how useful a hall linen cupboard is since we -don't have one-. So keeping a lot of my stuff in boxes till we buy cupboards and desks will be fine...since I don't really have a choice.
All in all it's a nice flat. Mayor happies to Logan for the temporary donation of a bar fridge so we can have chilled water\food on the hot days. MAAAJOR happies to Sparky for cleaning off all the labels from my furniture. I think it must be his American charm and he just woo-ed the suckers off the wood because I sure as hell couldn't do it. And lovely Wendy too for all the help and BOX CRUSHING and cleaning, you all rockxorb my proverbial boxorbz.
I got our new sound system up and running and played some Final-Fantasy-X on the ol' PS2, while enjoying some Turkish something from Marc around the corner at 'Meze'. (Btw the Chicken Herb fillets from 'The Kitchen' in the same block are Brillsome). Nothing's blown up yet, so I think we're on a good roll :)
My biggest hurdle at the moment is where I put things. Houses have a funny knack of having things of a type stay where you put the first one. So if I don't spend some time thinking about where and why I'm putting the spare plates in that cupboard then they might stay there and take up space for no applicable reason.
But I'm sure Turm and Carni will think I had a darn-tootin good reason to do so...won't you >:D
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