After spending our Saturday looking at apartments in our area, we saw one place that we were all quite happy with. It's very close to Gus' school, still close to the beach, a wee bit bigger than our current place, and plenty of storage space for camping equipment, my bike and other assorted things we've picked up over the past year.
We're moving in over the weekend, and I can't wait. I've been feeling completely overwhelmed over the past week trying to get everything ready for the move (disconnecting/connecting utilities, changing addresses, packing, dealing with old and new property managers). I haven't spent nearly enough time on thesis work, and have been spending way too much time watching episodes of Gossip Girl (what?!? as if I could focus on anything more serious than GG over the past week) and eating ramen noodles (sadly, my comfort food of choice these days).
One worthy (non-rental-related) thing I did get around to this past week, is a tour of a supervised injection centre in King's Cross (the Cross used to be one of the seedier suburbs of Sydney, but is quickly being gentrified). MSIC (or the Medically Supervised Injecting Centre) has been around since 2001 and during that time they've dealt with about 3,000 overdoses that occurred on site. It's sad to think about what would have happenned to those people if they hadn't had access to MSIC. The tour was fascinating and I found the community's support for the service very inspiring. If you're in the area and you're interested, they run tours for the general public once a month. I highly recommend it.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Awww, come on
Remember in my last post, how I was all boasting about being recharged and refreshed and ready to get back into my research. Well, I think I jinxed myself. My first week back post-holidays went like this:
Day 1:
Unpacking, laundry, groceries. Asleep by 7:30pm, exhausted by the flight.
Day 2: Awake at 5am (because crossing the international date line will do that to you)
I was looking forward to my first bike ride in three weeks. I packed up my basket full of the books and papers I had barely cracked open during holidays, dropped Gus off at school, and started off to Uni. It was hard going, and I attributed this to my previous three weeks of sloth and gluttony. On my way up the first hill though, another cyclist passed me (one of those hard-core, lycra-wearing ones, typical in Sydney) and yelled at me "Your back tire is flat". I looked back and sure enough, it was really low. So, I stopped at the nearest gas station to put some air in the tire, except that when I unscrewed the cap, any remaining air came out and the little air thingy retreated into the tire. Aaaargh! I tried to get it back out, but it was beyond my abilities. Also, since this was my third flat in my back tire over the past couple of months, I figured it was time to bring it into the bike shop to get looked at (my bike skills being limited to pumping air into the tires).
I ended up walking the remaining 5km to the nearest bike shop and left it with the bike guy, who - between the aussie accent, aussie terminology and bike terminology - was totally incomprehensible, but I did manage to figure out that I could pick it up after lunch. Afterwards, I walked to the nearest bank machine to pick up some cash, only to type in my pin wrong enough times that the machine wouldn't let me try anymore. I then walked to the bank to sort out my pin and get some money. By that time, the day was pretty much a write-off.
Day 3: Awake at 5:00am
This started out as a good day. My bike was back in working order (something was wrong with the rims, maybe? ...again, I couldn't really understand what the guy was on about). I met with my thesis advisors, and got some feedback for some upcoming ethics review boards I have to submit an application to. All was good. I was back on track.
When I got home, I picked up our mail from our neighbour and found a letter from the property manager indicating that the owner of our apartment was planning to move back into our apartment and that we had 4 weeks to vacate. The letter had been sent two weeks before, meaning we now had two weeks to find a new place to live. Yikes!
Day 4: Awake at 4:30am (because stress and crossing the international date line will do that to you)
Instead of working on ethics submissions, as I had planned, I spent the day begging our property manager for an extra two weeks to vacate (which we got, thank god!), and looking for a new place to live. In order to stay on budget, it seems we may need to make a choice between picking another small apartment within a few blocks of the beach (as we are now), or getting a slightly bigger and better apartment a little farther away - 1-1.5 km from the beach. It will be a tough decision, because I want both: a bigger place that is close to the beach.
Day 5: Awake at 6:30am...yay, I'm finally back to a normal sleeping pattern.
We looked at four places this morning, one of which we all quite liked, then off to a bbq, cause that's what you do in Sydney. Things are looking up. Fingers are crossed!
Day 1:
Unpacking, laundry, groceries. Asleep by 7:30pm, exhausted by the flight.
Day 2: Awake at 5am (because crossing the international date line will do that to you)
I was looking forward to my first bike ride in three weeks. I packed up my basket full of the books and papers I had barely cracked open during holidays, dropped Gus off at school, and started off to Uni. It was hard going, and I attributed this to my previous three weeks of sloth and gluttony. On my way up the first hill though, another cyclist passed me (one of those hard-core, lycra-wearing ones, typical in Sydney) and yelled at me "Your back tire is flat". I looked back and sure enough, it was really low. So, I stopped at the nearest gas station to put some air in the tire, except that when I unscrewed the cap, any remaining air came out and the little air thingy retreated into the tire. Aaaargh! I tried to get it back out, but it was beyond my abilities. Also, since this was my third flat in my back tire over the past couple of months, I figured it was time to bring it into the bike shop to get looked at (my bike skills being limited to pumping air into the tires).
I ended up walking the remaining 5km to the nearest bike shop and left it with the bike guy, who - between the aussie accent, aussie terminology and bike terminology - was totally incomprehensible, but I did manage to figure out that I could pick it up after lunch. Afterwards, I walked to the nearest bank machine to pick up some cash, only to type in my pin wrong enough times that the machine wouldn't let me try anymore. I then walked to the bank to sort out my pin and get some money. By that time, the day was pretty much a write-off.
Day 3: Awake at 5:00am
This started out as a good day. My bike was back in working order (something was wrong with the rims, maybe? ...again, I couldn't really understand what the guy was on about). I met with my thesis advisors, and got some feedback for some upcoming ethics review boards I have to submit an application to. All was good. I was back on track.
When I got home, I picked up our mail from our neighbour and found a letter from the property manager indicating that the owner of our apartment was planning to move back into our apartment and that we had 4 weeks to vacate. The letter had been sent two weeks before, meaning we now had two weeks to find a new place to live. Yikes!
Day 4: Awake at 4:30am (because stress and crossing the international date line will do that to you)
Instead of working on ethics submissions, as I had planned, I spent the day begging our property manager for an extra two weeks to vacate (which we got, thank god!), and looking for a new place to live. In order to stay on budget, it seems we may need to make a choice between picking another small apartment within a few blocks of the beach (as we are now), or getting a slightly bigger and better apartment a little farther away - 1-1.5 km from the beach. It will be a tough decision, because I want both: a bigger place that is close to the beach.
Day 5: Awake at 6:30am...yay, I'm finally back to a normal sleeping pattern.
We looked at four places this morning, one of which we all quite liked, then off to a bbq, cause that's what you do in Sydney. Things are looking up. Fingers are crossed!
Monday, August 17, 2009
Back to reality
I just had three of the best holiday weeks ever. It was so nice to see everyone again and it was great to be able slip back into old conversations with friends just as if it hadn't been one whole long year since we last saw each other. We started our trip in Montreal and made our way across Ontario, ending up in Niagara Falls. We got to see so many people (although we still managed to miss some of our favourites because of our/their schedules). I had lofty ideas when I packed and I brought my yoga mat, some thesis work and picked up a new pair of running shoes, but barely managed to get in much time on any of those three tasks (yoga, studies or running). Instead, I ate a lot, drank too much and slept in every day. It was the perfect way to end our first year in Australia and start my second year of my PhD refreshed and ready to get on with it.
So, after a long, long flight (thank god for those Qantas personal entertainment systems, on which I managed to watch every chick flick that's been released in the past year...don't ever rent He's just not that into you, but do rent Confessions of a shopaholic), we got back to Sydney this morning. We made Vic walk in the door first to make sure the huntsmen spiders hadn't taken over our apartment during our absence, and once he gave the all-clear we were relieved to drag in our luggage and start unpacking.
It's nice to be home.
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