25 Nov 2010: first big letter home

It’s 4 weeks today since I arrived and so little has happened I hardly know where to begin..    I jest not; after the last few months before I left Wellington this feels like living in slow motion.

The first few days were spent getting to know Richard again - he is looking really good having shed some weight, and is fitter from lots of walking..   so good to to be back together after 4 long months apart.

This is in the "big" house!

It was great to have a few days to go out exploring and for Richard to show me around so by the time he went back to work I had a good idea of where I was. His job is based in Perth but we are living in a little place in Fremantle and will probably continue to base ourselves in this area for the time being.

The landlord, Dave, left for Vietnam the night I arrived and kindly let us use his house while he was away.  So my first two weeks were spent in a small and very quirky cottage where most of the doorways are tall enough and wide enough for people from another era, the kitchen isn’t really anywhere near the stove which is in the next room along with the fridge, and the floor in the bedroom is on such a slope that I literally had to hook my foot over the mattress to try to keep on my side of the bed..  

Upstairs in "Hobbiton"

This was all good preparation for when Dave came home and we moved back into "Hobbiton" - the little sleep-out-type-cottagey thing Richard has been living in for the past few months at the back of Dave’s house.  It’s basically like living in an old motel unit with a sleeping platform above the living/kitchen area.   

Once you get out of bed in the morning, it’s best not to go upstairs again for the rest of the day unless you really have to - this eliminates extra opportunities for banging your head on the beams which are several inches lower than my shoulder.  I can stand up between the beams as long as my head is completely bent over...   whatever, it’s built for people way shorter than us.

There is no bathroom - just an outside shower and the proverbial brick “out” house so nocturnal visits require a torch and jandals.  It’s a huge section, very overgrown and with several big trees including a large sycamore outside the front door which provides nice shade on the hot days. 

I am supposed to be finding us somewhere to live which isn’t happening very fast but we’ve needed a bit of time to have a look around and gather information, and in the end I know perfectly well that when we’re ready we’ll find something that makes us both go “yep, this is the one” and we’ll get on with it.

Warren the van rabbit adjusts to
life navigating from a car window

Weekends we hop into Richard’s comfy, air-conditioned company car and go for “little” drives here and there.  So far have been eastwards to York, Northam and Toodyay, and last weekend south to Busselton - a 470km round trip which in this country is a very short drive..

Am coping reasonably well with the higher temperatures here although last week was a challenge - 4 days in a row over 35deg - Friday 39 - but this is not a heat wave as you have to have 5 days in a row for an official heat wave..  I became a shopping centre refugee on Friday which could explain why I now have a cold, having spent the day taking shelter in air conditioned shops..

Life here for me for currently revolves around getting up really early and seeing R off to work - lots of fresh fruit & bircher muesli - and then trying to get things done before it gets too hot.  “Getting things done”  mostly consists of tidying up the little shoe box we inhabit and then playing on this new fangled iMac we bought a week or so ago.  Our old Mac was so old this is like learning to use a computer all over again - fantastic and bloody frustrating in equal measure.  Am also spending time laboriously re-writing my entire contacts list as I had a bit of a disaster with the teeny tiny memory stick I used to put the contents of our old Mac onto before I left NZ..  enough said about that.

Then, having had breakfast so early I have a second breakfast/brunch type snack (well, we are living in Hobbiton!)  Depending on the weather (i.e hot, very hot or stupidly hot) I will don my walking shoes and march into town.  Yesterday I walked down to the hairdresser I had decided to audition to make an appointment.  She took me on the spot, and two hours and a comprehensive scalping later, she appears to have the job..  now all I need to do is lose 3 stone and my head will match my body again..

So, the great news is I am now fully independent in the communications department again with fully functioning computer, access to internet, and even skype-ing now.  


More soon..  
xx