Throw Another Log on the Fire

Brrrrrrr!!!!

Its freezing here!!  I arrived 'down south' 10 days ago.  Perth was rainy, windy and cold for the 24 hours I was there.  And the road trip Thursday to Kalgoorlie was the same.  We left Perth around 11.30am 9 days ago and it took us pretty much 6 hours exactly so by the time we got to 'Kal' my friend had finished work and I went back to her place for the night.  She has just installed a 'donga' (transportable quarters of 5 small rooms) behind her mums house, that she bought second-hand.

As I am broke, broke, broke - I am on a strict budget.  My friends mum had a heap of orange trees and a mandarin tree in the backyard just full of fruit so if I felt a bit peckish I would have a couple of them.  My friend had left me instructions to help finish off the 'extra' Jenny Craig meals in the freezer that she had left over. Happy to help fix her guilt problem! And with the shopping for the camping trip (which I still had some food left over) I managed to go without another big shop while I was there.  I did pop to the corner shop to get 2 loaves of bread, 1 lt milk and a small jar vaseline for my chapped lips for $19!!!  I nearly fell over!

I then scored another lift with the bloke who I had travelled to Kal with, to my hometown where I have been (exept for 3 nights away on my mates farm) ever since.  My brother has an excellent vegie garden in so I have been making vegie soup every day and am really only shopping for staples every 3 or 4 days - milk, bread etc.  When I went to visit my friends farm I also gathered 2 large bags of pine cones to burn in the fire, 2 bags of lemons (I have made one batch of lemon cordial* already) and we made a heap of soap that is now curing.  More for fun than budgeting.


*Lemon Cordial Recipe

2 cups lemon juice (and then I strained it before use)
2 cups sugar

Heat in a saucepan till all sugar dissolved, cool and pour into bottles for storing in the fridge.

Dilute as per shop bought cordial.

Whats left?

Its been a range of many emotions while I've been packing up my late fathers house.  My mother passed away 2004 so theres also all her 'stuff' to contend with too. They both kept everything!!  I mean everything!! So apart from grief, I mostly feel overwhelmed.  Mum had cancer so I guess when she knew that it had got the best of her, she had time to label stuff and sort, and also write a list of what pieces of belongings whould go to whom - my brother or I.  Dad on the other hand died suddenly of a heart attack, and with his latest passion being research there was stuff just everywhere.  Each room - except his bedroom had papers and old photos and little scraps of paper spread everywhere. He obviously had a system but in our frenzy to clean up in preparation for incoming rellies and funeral arrangements we pretty much just had to throw all of it into a box and stack it away.  And it hasn't been touched for over 15 months. 

So its been a hugely slow process although I started with the easy stuff.  Sheets, blankets, dads clothes and mums (dad hadn't got rid of much of mums stuff either) clothes too.  Hundreds of books, over a hundred ornamants, mums art and craft work (everything from paintings to handpainted fabric made into cushion covers etc).  There were blankets from our childhood and quilts that I have put aside and as I go through all the belongings I find other 'stuff' that is tugging at my heart strings, my pile of stuff is building up and then I have to cull that too.  I have inherited some furniture (most of it made by my late great grand father) so I have to arrange for removalists too.  So can send it all back with that.

But as I go through each room and throw out mostly everything, I also sort of wonder what my parents would have wanted me to keep?  And I know that I can't take heaps back to my house so its very tricky to say the least.  Whats left of their lives after their passing that isn't just a bunch of trinkets? I mean dad published a book (he must of had a reprint before he died as there are about 7 boxes of them) and mum was an artist so there is heaps of her art too.  Out of all of their photo albums (did I mention dad was into photograhy so there are mega amounts of photo albums and packets of negatives) I will only be able to keep a few photos from each otherwise it will just be out of control. But basically it seems their lives has boiled down to what they let behind.  And frustratingly what my brother and I can't keep - there are just so many memories in everything but it would be impossible to hang onto it all.  We both live in smaller dwellings and physically cannot keep everything we would like to, and thats probably a good thing (that we physically can't fit all this stuff into our homes) as I could imagine trying to add all this stuff to my stuff at home - phew!!

May I suggest that everyone go through their stuff and do a major cull?  Luckily I had been reading for a year prior to my father passing, a heap of organising books (and though my BF can't see it) I had been systematically going through each room and trying (its not always easy) to get organised.  Clothing that hadn't been worn for a year - donate or sell! Trinkets - regift, upcycle or donate! Now I am glad I had been doing all that as I have more stuff to come in. 

I miss my dog...

Party Time..

So its only 4 days till I head off down South so today (Sunday) I organised a party for lunch time - my birthday is next week so its sort of for that too.

Usually it seems only a third of people turn up from the invite list but so far I have almost 30 people coming!!  So just having a "Barbie" and easy food to heat up.

I'm quite looking forward to it and decided to invite so many people coz I'm sick of only catching up with people at funerals as seems to be the case this year.

Owl @ Wildlife Park 2012

More on Dentist Run to Bali

I noticed a lot of people interested in the Bali Dentist trip so thought I would add some more detail.

As I mentioned in my previous post a week or so ago we had been told about

Bali 911 Dental Clinic

They take a couple of weeks to reply to email queries but heard you could just turn up and pretty much could get in straight away.  As our trip was spur of the moment we just took a punt and showed up at the Kuta branch of 911Dentist.  They were booked out so we took the taxi straight to Denpasar.  The street outside might look grubby in comparison to Western standards but the front is swept a few times a day and the inside is clean although a bit worn.

For a crown and I believe veneers too - you need to allow at least a 10 day trip - the crown takes 5 days to make after the initial consultation.  The day we went back for the fitting was a very long day.  Our appointment was for 1pm.  After having our new crown fitted to size it then went next door for glazing which took an hour or more.  The clinic does have water, tea, coffee making facilities, and these little sachets of like a rice porridge stuff that you add hot water to. I would recommend maybe just carrying some food with you if you use the Denpasar branch, as there doesn't seem to be much close around (although I didn't think to research that before we went) .  There is a toilet there too. The Kuta one is located in a shopping centre so that is no problem for food, toilet or entertainment while waiting.  There is also a laptop in Denpasar for free wifi access while you wait.  The waiting room is quite small and sometimes full and a few people hang out the front - smokers mainly of course.  There aren't any seats out the front and the parking area is usually filled with cars and drivers waiting for their customers inside the clinic.  I'm sure the clinic would call a taxi for you after your consultation so that shouldn't be a problem.

Like I said previously, there is a 5 year guarantee on crowns and 1 year on veneers. All in all I am happy with the experience and would definitely go again.

See my other Bali Dentist Run post - for other details.

2011

Stunned as a Mullet!!

So I just got the estimate of my refund from the accountant.  I was hoping for 10k.  i got 1k!!! Less $200 I owe the tax Office from 2011 year - less nearly $700 for accountant bill. So bugga all in the end and that unfortunately was my big grand plan of survival for the month ahead plus a chunk towards planned 2013 trip. To say I am feeling numb is an understatement!!  And I don't think it has truly sunk in yet.

As luck would have it  my BF -  as a birthday present and contribution towards my farewell / birthday party expenses, popped $1000 in my bank account for me without me knowing for a few days.  So that was completely awesome of him - I haven't used any yet but had planned to so will just have to budget a bit wiser for the party and when I am away.

Wow.....what to do....

A Few Dollars

I haven't posted for a couple of weeks - my depression got the better of me.  It was 1 year since dad died in May, but then in the last 2 weeks - Dads birthday, Fathers Day, World Suicide Prevention Day and the 1 year anniversary since my cousin hung himself.  Suppose its normal to feel depressed.

Today I have about 4 hours work with one of the clients left over since I closed my business down, and I have advised him that today will be the last visit.  So I should have enough money to scrape by on bills for another week hopefully when he pays me.

Somehow I am just managing to scrape through financially - I withdrew some money from a little investment account I have -only $500 and then my brother and I have money in a joint account for the house down south so we both took some from there. And this week - the work. 

And then I am off next week for about 4-6 weeks to finally pack up dads house down south.  I should find out in the next few days the refund amount (hopefully) from the Tax Office as my accountant is close to finalising 2 years income tax.  Thank goodness.  At least I will know where I stand financially - hoping for $10k but not sure if that is a bit optimistic.

And today I must remember to post away and ask for pretty much the last of the money from my investment account - $500 so that I have some money for on the road for the 5 days before I get to dads house. And after that, not sure - it'll be 3 weeks to a month I'd think before I see my tax refund.

Great Ocean Road, Victoria, Jan 2012

Organisation

When I first quit my last job (end of June 2012) - the one I had for  few months - after closing my business in February 2012, I spent many an hour reading from Down To Earth blog.  A great site on living frugally and simply, saving money and enjoying the simple things in life.  I originally started reading this site as I found myself with a lot more time on my hands from when I was self-employed and also I was learning to live on income at least a third or half of my previous income.  Of course a lot of those expenses actually came from having my own business -subscriptions to industry organisations, Professional Indemnity insurance, seminars to keep up to date with industry changes and so on.  By cancelling all these expenses I was able to reduce my bills quite substantially - saving about $250 a week. The job I had (learning to make picture frames and such) and earning $500 a week, just covered my mortgage payments and and bills, after I canclled all my industry related expenses.  Any extra I made on the side by working for a couple of old clients I used for entertainment or extras I wanted.

It was while reading the afore-mentioned blog that I was first switched onto the idea of setting up a household folder and I had also read about this in a great book on being organised (the name of which has eluded me at the moment) but the author was one of the founding members of Messies Anonymous.  As per the book, I listed Daily tasks to do, Tasks by the day and seasonal checklists.  So even I missed one days checklist, it would be done the following week as per the schedule.  This system worked for probably a couple of weeks or so and then it lapsed as I became distracted / absorbed by other things.  So the last few days I have been working on a bigger and better version of the folder after reading some more tips on the website Organized Home.  They have printable forms online but as I don't have a printer right now I am just using handwritten notes for now and probably that is the way to go until the folder is set up properly and I tweak my checklists and schedules.  And I am using a bigger folder!!  So it is not as easy for me to ignore. 

And I have been working off my Dailies checklist and my Monday checklist this morning in between coffees and blogging.  This way it is not so daunting for me either -looking at a whole house to be cleaned and tidied can seem quite overwhelming, so by breaking it down room by room, or chore by chore it doesn't seem so impossible.  And technically each week will get easier as the standard of tidyness increases day by day according to my weekly checklist.

These following tips are helpful

Finish The Job!!  My biggest problem.  Half finished projects laying around when I get distracted by something new or even tidying up after I make coffee (I'm a messy blighter).  My brother is a nightmare when it comes to this.  He seriously cannot/does not even put lids back on jars or milk back in the fridge after making a coffee!!  Dude...

If a chore will take less time than 30 seconds do it straight away - I am perfectly capable of walking over and around, say a piece of thread or similar on a floor.  Instead I should just pick the sucker up!!  For me one of my main 'problems' is the bedroom - if I get changed a few times a day - each old set of clothes ends up flung on the bed or on the floor and every few days I have to sort the piles into dirty laundry, clothes that have another wear in them and so on.  If I could just deal with it straight away it will save a bigger job later down the track.

Speaking of which - I had better finish off my 'Dailies Checklist' and Monday chores - I have almost finished so I can start the day feeling virtuous and under whelmed - is that a word?

 

Great Ocean Road - Jan 2012 - "Stowaway"

Have a great day!!