Narrabeen, Dee Why and Curl Curl

I had shortlisted 6 properties for this week's search. The first one was quite far north in Narrabeen. It was a house on the beach-side of the road, but it had a house in front of it, so the view was very limited. It also was quite run-down. Obvioulsy had been rented out for a while, so a no-go.

Next we had a couple of places in Dee Why, a few km south. We had never been to Dee Why beach, so thought we'd explore. Dee Why was more cosmopolitan than the other places we have been, with lots of bars and restaurants, supermarkets and shops. It also have a nice beach and pool, so seemed ideal. I ended up looking at a 3-bed apartment on my own, as Martin went for a swim. It was actually quite nice and larger than our current one. It was also almost brand new with an outside entertainment deck and small garden. It had no view but was very close to the beach.

After a quick drink we continued off to what looked like a large detached house with a double garage, even closer to the beach. A prime example of you get what you pay for. It was really dated, like it had not been touched since the 1940s or so. Although it was large and a great postion we can not live there. It is something I would consider buying and doing up, but not renting.

Finally, after a quick lunch we went off to Curl Curl, where we have tried to view a house for a few weekends now. It has the most amazing view of the sea. It was quite nice, but a little on the small side. I think we are still considering it, but not 100% sure. Link is here:http://www.realestate.com.au/cgi-bin/rsearch?a=o&id=403459363&f=0&p=10&t=ren&ty=&fmt=&header=&cc=&c=56482154&s=nsw&snf=rbs&tm=1222739735

And picture is the one on top - not sure how to move it...

Dinner was lobster tails on the balcony. This Aussie life is not too bad ;-)

Unfortunately Forty

So, as my friend stated in an e-mail recently, I have joined the club of those who managed to survive to become 40! Who would have thought that...


This year I got an actual present. For those who are not familiar, I usually get a selection of cards, which have a possible present written on each. Then through various elimination processes, not always fair, I end up with one of them.
This year Martin had lost the cards, he claimed he could not remember where he hid them, so he got out to buy me a present instead. I got a Nintendo Wii console and games! We spent the morning playing tennis, skiing, boxing and other interesting things. we did not take into account our tiny over-crowded living room, but it worked out in the end.


Lunch was booked at Peter Doyle's, which is a very nice restaurant overlooking Sydney Harbour, Harbour Bridge and Opera house. We had a table just on the edge of the water and the weather was perfect. I started off with a traditional Prawn Cocktail, and then I had Grilled John Dory with Chips, as one lobster a week is probably enough. I finished off with a small dessert of Mandarin mousse. With this we had a local Hunter Valley Simillion (several bottles). This took most of the day and in the afternoon we just lazed around at home.

Weekend preparations

Earlier this week I received an e-mail from our InternetService Provider informing us that the credit card we were using for payment was due to expire. As I was at home this morning I decided to call them and give them details of the new one. However, they did not want to talk to me. Although I had the account number, my address and all other details, they needed to speak with Martin. But, I did not want to change anything or recive anything, I wanted to pay. Could I not do this, when it was actually my e-mail address they hd sent the reminder to - but no. That is inflexible customer service for you.

Off to the customer for a meeting in the afternoon and saw a couple of what appeared to be fat pigeons from the back, walking around in the bushes. Suddently one turned it's head and turned out to be bright pink on the front, and definetly had the head of a parrot. It was the weirdest combination of parrot/pigeon I have ever seen. I have no idea what it was and if it was an accident or an actual species. I will do some research later. Picture attached will be added when I can get my phone to communicate to the computer.

Tonight I am off to IKEA to deal with their, most likely equally hopeless, customer service. I need to get the broken part for my chest of drawers replaced. Hopefully Sydney rush-hour traffic bvehaves. It is quite practical that Martin works near my customer sometimes so he can pick me up after work.

Wishing everyone a lovely weekend. Weather is forcasted to be 25 degrees and sunny both days here. We are looking at houses on the beach on Saturday and eating a very long lunch at Peter Doyle on Sunday, most likely containig at least one lobster.

A few steps forward

CostCo delivered on their promise and sent the missing part for the bed. It had changed slightly since we bought it, but not more than could be fixed with a screwdriver and some brute force. It was a bit strange sleeping in a bed again, and in the bedroom. The bedroom is quieter, but brighter. Need to sort out the blinds for tonight.

I also finally found my sandals. I now know what size they are so I can order a few more pairs on-line for the next 10 years. Nowadays, if I come across anything I like I always by at least 2, so that I have one for the future when the first one is worn out. Does that make sense?

The importance of doing unpacking properly

In the search of my lost favorite sandals, I came across a half unpacked box on the balcony that appeared to have an assortment of shoes in it. I went through all of them, but no sandals, just a large box at the bottom. That box contained an electric fan for Little Car, that needed to be fitted, so after work today we went off into Suburbia to deliver it.
The new SatNav system was not to be trusted though. This morning it routed Martin 10km the wrong way and two tolls along the motorway. This evening the sensitive touch screen directed us to Cooper Road instead of Cowper Street, so we were a bit late. However the mechanic was still there and will fit it over the next few days.

Today I am eating Spaghetti with a Bolognese sauce made with Minced Kangaroo, Red wine, Carrots, Onion and Celery (no beef and no tomatoes), but I am sure it will be nice. With that we are drinking a 2005 Brokenwood wine from Hunter Valley, called "Cricket pitch" made of a mixture of Cabernet sauvignon, Merlot & Shiraz.

Marathon & David Jones

Woke up early as it was too hot to sleep. we have started using the A/C in the evenings, but turn it off before we go to bed, so early mornings get very hot. I got up and decided to have a few minutes out on the balcony before going back to bed cooled down, and found out the Sydney Marathon had just started (7.20) and they were running past my building. I felt a bit sorry for them running that early as there were not many people out on the streets, so I clapped at them from the balcony, but it really gets to hot later in the day.

We went out on town to buy some stuff (a new SatNav for Australia - so that we get all the speed camera warnings), new sandals (but did not find any - Michelle, you have to come and visit soon and bring some I can order from the US), the new Wiggles DVD (I am sending Lars & Mia's daughter Julia one I got for free in the Sunday paper the other week, and they advertised a new one being released so I thought I'd buy that as well, and then we had lunch at David Jones.
David Jones is the closest to Selfridges or Harrods or possibly a combination of NK & Ostermalmshallen that you get here. They have a great food hall with a lot of nice food counters with small eating bars in between. We wanted to eat at the grill bar a few weeks ago, but it was too full, but today we got a space and it was very pleasant. Then we went shopping and found "Wagyu" beef fillets at AUD $170 / kg (around GBP 75/kg or SEK 930 I guess....). We did not buy any of that this time - maybe next week :-) but a few other nice pieces of things to eat on the balcony this afternoon, and some lobster tails we might get for next week as well.

More of the Northern Beaches

As we quite liked it last week, we decided to explore more of the Northern Beaches. Yes, I know, it is expensive and far from work, but what ios the point of moving here for a better lifestyle, if you are in the city?
We started off going to Manly. We have been there before and there is not much to rent at the moment as summer is looming and whatever is not let, is being advertised for holiday lets, but we wanted to drive north along the coast all the way, and get another look at the place on the way. manly is still nice, but it does not seem to have much mooring space for Martin's boat(s).
From Manly we drove through Queenscliff, through tho Curl Curl. There is a house to rent there overlooking the ocean and minutes walk to the beach and rock pool. Unfortunately it was not open until 1.30, but we had a good look at it from the outside and the beach area. It is very nice but a bit isolated. You will have to drive to get to Manly or Harboard for dinners, but there is a bus both to Manly ferry wharf and the city.
From Queenscliff we drove through Dee Why through to Collaroy. Dee Why beach looks nice, but the way they have built around there there are a limited number of properties with ocean views. Collaroy is one of the places we went last weeks. It is a little bit down-market when it comes to
fine dining and evening entertainment, but they have a cinema and a fast bus to the city & Manly. We looked at 2 properties here. Martin quite liked the second one, an art deco duplex with a view of the beach and ocean and minutes walk to the rock pool. However it was AUD $1,000/week and was not entirely my style. It felt a bit dated, but probably spacious enough - we'll see...
Martin went swimming twice, but the sea is still too cold for me. Around 16 degrees.
Late afternoon was spent sitting on the very sunny balcony in 35+ degrees reading a book and drinking Strongbow cider we managed to find somewhere last week.

Better ending to shit week

It's been a pretty shit week workwise, with a customer playing games and being overall difficult. After a final meeting Thursday evening and a few conversations this morning, we have calmed things down and hope to move forward without too much trouble.
Today I went out for lunch with Rianna from work and met her husband and son, who has just moved over here, having the usual beers and thai curry in the nice place up the road. The weather is more or less perfect (28 degrees and no cloud in sight).
Tomorrow we will go back to the Northern beaches and have a look at some more properties. No doubt Martin will go for a swim we'll find some nice places to eat lunch.
So, off early and "working from the balcony" this afternoon.

Exploring the Northern Beaches

We decided to explore the northern beaches area today. That is really north-east of Sydney starting around Manly and going about 30 km (20 miles) north along the east coast. The reason for this was that we need to find a place for Martin to park his boat and somewhere we might like to live when we decide to leave the city. Martin has found some island called Scotland Island that he is interested in living on.

We stopped in a few places on the way, Collaroy, Bayview, Whale Beach etc. There was an open house in Bayview we went to look at. we quite liked it, although the view was not that great. It was up for Auction and the guide price was 2.5M AUD, so maybe not. It was close to the various marinas, but the bus to work would be 1.5h+walking time.

Whale beach was nice as well, but quite expensive and also too far from work. I think Narrabeen, Collaroy or Curl Curl might be suitable compromised (although I am not known for compromising).

I took some pictures:
http://picasaweb.google.com/sissi.se/NorthernBeaches?authkey=bltyP3fOzqM#

(remember to incluse the # at the end otherwise it will not work).

That's CostCo for you

For those of you who are not from the UK or the US, there is a US chain of stores called Costco, which also expanded throughout the UK over the past few years. They sell all sorts of things, including food, furniture, books, clothes etc.
Anyway, we bought our bed there a couple of years ago, and as I mentioned a few days ago, the removal company lost a part, so we can't sleep on it. I wrote to Costco's customer service in the US on Tuesday and explained what the bed looked like and which part was missing. They forwarded my mail to the UK HQ who told me they would look at it. Today they sent me an e-mail and asked for my address so that they could post me the part. I do call that customer service.

On the other hand I contacted IKEA here in Sydney and asked if they might have a spare part for the broken chest of drawers. They told me they may or may not, and they only way I could find out was to go to their store and ask them. They did not keep an inventory of spare parts and the store would not take incomming calls, so I could not call ahead and check. We'll go out there over the weekend, but I don't have high hopes.

advantages and disadvantages

There are quite a few advantages to walking to work:

Walking against driving:

• If there is a road accident, you can probably walk around it and it will not slow you down
• You don't have to worry about speeding tickets
• You don't have to pay for parking - or even try to find a parking space
• You don't have to pay for petrol/diesel

Walking against taking the bus:

• If there is a road accident, you can probably walk around it and it will not slow you down
  
• You can leave whenever you want to - you don't have to hang around the bus stop
• You don't have to sit next to someone who smells of last night's garlic
• You don't have to pay the fare
• It does not get too hot

Walking against cycling:

• You don't end up sweaty at work
• You don't have to wear a helmet (which you have to here and is stupid)
  

Walking advantages against all:

• If there is a traffic accident you can walk around it and won't get delayed
  
• You wake up breathing fresh air
• You can enjoy the views of the water and the sunshine (except for 2 days a year when it rains)
• You get some unexpected exercise without noticing
• You get a nice sun-tan and blond hair
• You can easily stop off at the shop on the way home
  

In addition - I still can't get used to working in an office again.

Advantages to working in an office:

• You save on phone bills - just talk to whoever you want to talk to by visiting their desk
• You can apply your charm better if you are face to face and make people do things for you with a smile
  

Disadvantages to working in an office:

• People can come and bother you when you don't want them to
• Your boss insists you have a desk phone (I have one now that I nicked from another desk - but it is not connected ;-)) - He did not say it had to be connected.
  
• People put things on your desk and expect you to read them . Just found out someone put 2 envelopes on my desk back in July giving me a $2,000 pay-rise... a bit of a surprise as I just found them today
  
• You collect papers (when I worked from home I did not have a printer - well, I had one but it did not have any cartridges in it)
• It is hard to pretend you are in a meeting
• You can't work from your balcony or your bed
• You have to dress in nice clothes every day
• You have to eat whatever yucky lunch you can get hold of - instead of cooking your own

Anyway - just some thoughts for today... what do you think?

Not a totally shit day

After having had a completely shit day at work on Friday (they migrated my mail-box and lost all my e-mails, my team-leader forwarded something to the customer I did not want him to send, it rained more than I have ever seen before on my way home etc.) I actually had a pretty good day today. I refused to work over the weekend and just ignored my work PC, and after leaving at 4.30 pm on Friday I had no idea how much irritating stuff might have arrived until this morning, it was quite a relief to notice it was not too bad. Most of my e-mails (that they had lost) trickled in during the morning and the commercials for phase 2 of my Traffic Intelligence project seem to have been finalised.

At home we still have chaos, but we are making progress. We now have a study area with the monitor and keyboard etc all set up (doubt I will use it, I just sit in the sofa anyway), I have managed to separate my clothes from Martin's to some extent, and we have found the ironing board (but no ironing lady yet ;-( ). I can't see that we will stay in this little flat for too long, but we will take the time needed to find somewhere really nice. Tonight I am off to look at a replacement garage for the one I was not allowed to rent previously. It is not as nice, but at least we have somewhere to park the laser which will arrive on Wednesday. Little car has also been released from customs, but need to be serviced and checked before I can take him out. A nice guy who specialises in British Sports cars will take care of that.