Tim puts the hammer down - April 09, 2006

Tim came home after almost two weeks in Melbourne to find the house and garden in the same state he left it. No, not just because I was on line gaming...it was the workmen...I swear. The pool and wall are still a mess and most of the jobs inside still need doing. Tim called the real estate agent and said "Fix it all by Easter or we're moving out!" It's not like him to be so stressed, but enough is enough I guess. I don't think he means it really, but he won't buy any more funiture just in case we really do move.

For all the complaints about customer service in the UK, it's not much different here. The main difference is people in Australia are nice to you while they are not doing what you want. Everyone seems very friendly and helpful and asks you how your day is going. After a lovely conversation, you go away and a while later you realize you still didn't get what you wanted. Another thing I've noticed about Australian men (and this may be a wild generalization) is that they love to talk to one another. They don't particularly want to chat with me, but with each other, they never seem to shut up. Just shooting the breeze. It does seem very matey and bloke-ish. This may be Queensland more than Australia, but it still seems pretty sexist. Tim having a tantrum has stirred the pot much more than I ever could.

Lucky for us, IKEA is not only on the way to the beach, but also close by a state park called Daisy Hill. We stopped by IKEA to pick up the rest of our desk and went and saw some Aussie critters in their natural habitat. Saw a koala in the tree and lots of wallabies hanging around trying to mooch some food from a family picnic. There were some very huge spider webs (mayby 3m. across) with golden orb spiders (non-venomous) and some Kokoburas. I'll try and spare you more wallabie pictures, but it was very cool to see them in their natural habitat and not in a zoo. We took some photos of the spiders, but I'll have to look again and see if it'll show up. We need to go back and go on a proper hike there - it was really lovely.

Easter is coming up and we are going away for the weekend. Hope to have more interesting nature tales to post next week.