Moving House

In the IMMORTAL words of that great poet and philosopher of our time, Ice Cube, "Today was a good day".

I'm often made mention of my distaste for the town in which I live. Almost as frustrating is the state of our house itself.

Part of my wife's work package is that we get a heavily subsidised house as a part of her employment contract. Unfortunately, the house we were supplied is in DESPERATE need of renovation, both inside and out.

Anyway, a few nights ago, the missus and I were sitting back and working out our plans for the future- specifically, the amount of time we would be spending in this town.

After a bit of discussion, we came to the decision that, barring any unforeseen windfalls or lotto wins (pleasepleaseplease) we'd probably be up here for a few more years. The idea being that if we stick it out for a few more years, we could pretty much have enough cash saved to buy our dream property with either a very small mortgage or no mortgage at all.

Of course, by about that time Lauren will be almost ready to start school, so it'll be an opportune time to clear off and set up somewhere else.

I must admit, I was more in favour of getting the f--k out of Dodge a little sooner. But in the spirit of compromise, I assured the wife that I'd acquiesce to a longer stay in town if the wife would pull her finger out and find out how to get her employer (essentially the state government) to pony up for some better digs. The theory being, of course, that if we had a nice place to live, it would be almost like a little sanctuary from the depressing state of the rest of the town, and thus make life up here a LITTLE less painful.

The wife agreed. Of course, the King Brown snake (also known as a Mulga snake, also known as a big, venomous f-er that can kill you f-ing DEAD) that we saw slithering across our front yard the previous day MIGHT have been something of an encouragement for her, too. Trust me on this: NOTHING makes you shit your f-ing trousers QUITE like seeing a venomous snake moseying around your home. Nothing makes you want to get the f--k OUT quite so much, either.

So she started ringing around, and got hold of someone from her work who had the ability to give us the inside scoop on which other properties might be available. After two years of being told that there was no houses available in town (as well as there being no prospect of our house being renovated any time soon), we were suddenly offered no less that FOUR f-ing houses that were either currently vacant, or would be in the next few days.

Two of them were a bit bigger than our current home, but the yards were far too small to house two rambunctious dogs; and one of them was about the same size as ours, but with a similarly unkempt yard- not to mention having known undesirables for neighbours.

No f-ing THANKS.

The fourth, though, suited us down to the ground. Reasonably nice lawns front and back and in a good (relative term, mind you) part of town, and nice enough inside, with an enclosed patio out the back, just perfect for some evening barbecues. Best of all, though, is the fact that it has been earmarked for a complete refurbishment towards the end of this year, so we should have all new appliances and floorcoverings soon enough.

F--k yeah. We put in the request, and it was granted by the powers-that-be. If all goes to plan, we'll be out of this dump next weekend, and into our nice new abode.

And let me f-ing ASSURE you- not a MOMENT too soon.

I'm not really all that precious when it comes to having a flash house. Sure, I want everything to work, but I don't need shiny new kitchens or manicured gardens. All I really want is a nice patch of lawn front and back, maybe a few garden beds with room to plant my veges and herbs, and appliances that are serviceable. Anything more than that is just gravy for mine.

No venomous snakes would be a bonus, too.

But after doing two-and-a-half years in a house with gardens that are unusable bindi-eye minefields and a bathroom that is obviously at the end of its service life, I make NO apologies for being a little picky. We deserve it.

More than anything, we don't want to be forced to keep Lauren housebound when she starts crawling and walking around. I mean, there isn't a public park in this town that isn't constantly covered with broken glass, beer-guzzling mobs and other assorted crap, so a usable back yard is pretty much a necessity.

Hopefully, the move will go without any major problems. The local removalists want to charge almost as much to move us a few streets as we paid to move a thousand miles (f-ing small town price-gouging PRICKS), so we told them to go f-themselves and decided instead to hire a truck and do it ourselves. I've already sounded out the local satellite TV installer about moving our dish over to the new place (and I'm working on sweet-talking Mary into letting me upgrade to the fancy new Foxtel IQ thing while we do it, but I'm not liking my chances), and I've taken a couple of weeks off work so we can get moved and unpacked before we go on holidays in a month.

I've moved house a few times, and it has to be one of the most stressful things you can do. I know better than to expect NOTHING to go wrong, but hopefully whatever DOES go to shit isn't TOO important.

Hopefully.