Just a normal day ....

You know me well enough by now that when I go quiet in my blog world, I usually have a bit on. Now there are some bloggers out there who think it's ok to suck  time out of your day by making you read fluff and inane updates on what they've been doing.  But not in my space.  Nope, if I have nothing to say then I won't.  And I  promise I won't ever update you on my weekend.  Because based on the one just been, it would be all about kids sports and cleaning and no one should be subjected to that.

So just to get the ball rolling (think a writers version of flexing or stretching), I'm going to share a little story that actually, truthfully did happen.  And even though I promised no fluff or inaneness (is that a word) only a few lines ago, be warned - this story is nothing but.

So we've had a small (ahem) rodent issue.  This has not been our finest hour, but I'm sure a therapist would tell me it helps to work through this trauma by sharing.  We have not been sitting there waiting for them it to die of old age.  the family have all been very proactive in spotting evidence (some with a little too much excitement - thinking of Young David Attenborough - but even he was tiring)  I think there is enough rat poison under my dishwasher to take a large family down.  And sure enough as promised on the packaging, it started to have effect.  Sidebar; walking through Bunnings with a rat trap and a bumper tub of rat poison in your basket is the equivalent of walking through the supermarket with a 2 litre bottle of nit shampoo - just saying.

So feeling we were "winning the battle" (actual words from the husband - who was overseas for 10 days of The Battle), we started to walk into rooms with confidence that we wouldn't see "evidence" or worse of our visitors.  So one sunny afternoon, I settled myself in for an important phone interview with a corporate client I write for.

You know where this is going don't you.

So I'm sitting at my dining table, when who should appear but a groggy, and clearly unwell RAT. wandering across the kitchen floor (having used his remaining strength to push his way past all the poison blocks under my dishwasher).  It then pauses metres away from me.  I scream and swear lots and ask my client what should I do?

PUT DOWN THE PHONE WOULD HAVE BEEN A GOOD START.

But no, I kept him hanging in awkward silence at the other end, while I talked him through what I was doing.  i.e.
"I'm going to open the sliding door" (squeal)
"Now I'm going to bat it out with this cricket bat" (squealing, swearing OMG's)
"Oh no he's not budging, what do I do now? "(silence)
"Ok I'll try again" (hitting floor loudly with cricket bat)
"Got him, he's gone outside, but he's just sitting there, oh jesus, GROSS" (door slams, silence on the phone),
"Right so lets talk about compliance for the business this month...."

I did manage to get my shiz together to take a photo.  After I'd rung my sister, and the Husband - who unhelpfully wouldn't come back from a work trip to sort it for me.

Ok, that felt good to get that out.  I'm back!

Postscript:  To all my "friends" who commented on this photo on Instagram when I was still clearly traumatised, yes it is "huge" isn't it, and no it's not a possum, and yes it does look like it wants back in.  Thank you

Wildlife No 11

It's been a long, long while since I felt the need to write about my wildlife experiences in Australia.  Maybe it's because I've got used to these encounters  (although I absolutely promise you, I will never, ever get used to this).  But every now and then I have a moment.

Back in my student days I was lucky enough to flat with two of my oldest and dearest friends.  We had a terrace house with an outside loo, and a Hoovermatic washing machine.  The bathroom still brings me out in a cold sweat.  It was a dark enclosed "wardrobe" with no natural light and the grottiest shower you could imagine.
(warning; the next image may cause distress or nausea to readers.  It will to me as I write it).

We were three girls with long hair and questionable cleaning habits.  As our uni exams crept closer, we let ourselves and our flat get run down.  To the point that there was so much freaking hair clugged in the plug hole, it couldn't drain.  So if you wanted a shower, you had to (gulp) step into the COLD, OLD, MURKEY, HAIRY water (in the dark windowless wardrobe/shower).  Taking matters into our own hands we resorted to showering at our boyfriends flats instead.
One of the girls boyfriends, long after we shifted back to the sanctity and cleaniless of our parents homes after exams, actually cleaned it out.  Legend has it he found a hair monster the size of a rat.
I'm sorry, that was unnecessary.
Actually where was I going with this apart from a compulsive, sado-masochistic need to re-hash that story?
Becs, one of my flatmates (and one of my oldest and dearest BFFs), was lucky enough to get the downstairs bedroom with the bright purple carpet (ok, to give some persepctive, our rent was all of $90 total per week, so we're not talking designer digs here (although I'm sure you worked that out from the bathroom imagery I created).  And one of the "special" features of her room was each morning, a crosscross maze of silvery slug trails would adorn the purple carpets.  Poor Becs had slugs.
Some people have spider issues, I have slimey creature issues - slugs, snails, anything squishy and slimey that leaves trails.  That's my albatross I carry with me through life.

So this morning, I came downstairs to find silvery trails on the carpet.  I stopped in my tracks for there in all his grey/black slimey grossness was a massive fat slug.  Inside my house. Mere centimetres away from where I stood.  I blasted it with flyspray and covered it with a plastic container (to stop it's quick getaway, right?), thinking to myself, I'll vacuum it up later once it's dried up (knowing that plastic container on the middle of my floor may be a feature for the next few weeks waiting for that to happen.)  But there is merit in having an insect loving son.
Smith called out to me "I found a slug Mum", to my horror it was no longer under the plastic container.
"What did you do with it buddy?",
"I put in the loo",
"What with?  Your HANDS?",
 "I used loo paper mum" (d'ur!)
I owe my 4 year old big time!

Sorry about the picture folks.  And the shower story.

Wildlife No 10

So I'm sitting writing and can hear the familiar scratching above me that can only be coming from a large nest of extremely large 4 legged, grey creatures with flat pinky tails, and I'm thinking, aha, heres the making for a Wildlife post.  Maybe it's because I'm getting used to the Wildlife in Australia that it no longer grosses me as much, or maybe because I thought you'd all started to tire a bit of my wildlife ramblings, especially after the heated backlash (thanks Sister) from this (actually rereading the one innocuous comment, I remember now the backlash was verbal and was indeed from the Sister).  But then I remembered a doozy that I was sooo traumatised by that I promised myself I would write about it one day when it was a distant memory (or living in a new place which is what has happened).

Picture my old house, bordered with trees on the neighbours property right beside our pool fence.  Possums would wander along the pool fence then jump up into the trees for the evening.  As this usually happened just when it got dark, and as our favourite summertime venue for entertaining was beside our pool, this made for some tense evenings with the Husband and I vigilantly watching the fence, kids water gun (or for the Husband, his golf club) ready while attempting to maintain our composure and continue chitchatting with friends.  One evening, my brother-in-law suffered a serious trauma, when a possum scampered along the fence, hovered for a moment right beside him, whereupon The Husband charged it with his golfclub and I blasted it with the watergun.  My brother-in-law could be forgiven for the Man Scream that followed as the golf club whished past his head and he simultaneously copped an earload of water , which he logically thought was possum blood.  We'll dine out on that story for years.

However....when the neighbours started to build their new house, they cut down all the trees.  leaving the possums no where to dine.  Just after this has happened I was out by the fence, putting my rubbish bins out for the week.  House doors open, windows open, boys inside, me in bare feet.  Just setting the scene...

Suddenly I realised I wasn't alone but a possum was sitting on our fence, only inches from me, and trapping me from getting back in the house.  I screamed.  The possum took off.  Towards our front door. Which was open.
Noooooooooo (said in slow motion!)

"Will, close the front door"  I scream through the windows and behind the pool fence at him.  "Eh?" he says.  "CLOSE THE FRONT DOOR", I scream back.  "I'll do it at the next ad break", he calls back.   "DO IT NOW!!!!!!!", I scream and I think finally hearing the hysteria in my voice, and realising he may be the cause of that hysteria, as well as wondering why his mother is screaming at him through the pool fence, out in the dark, when he thought she was getting his dinner right beside him, he springs to action.  Disaster averted.  We had a bird in the house one and it caused carnage, I can only shudder what a possum would have done.

And every Thursday night until we left that house, one of my boys would be on "torch duty" while I took out the rubbish bins for fear of another possum encounter.
I have pest people coming out next week, so I'm not that used to this country that I think it's fine to live with rats in my roof. Just saying.

Day 45

O....M....G.....

I remember when I was on (ahem) my first honeymoon.  Actually that makes it sound like I have had more than one which I haven't as my second darling Husband took me to live in Sydney for my "honeymoon" - 3 days after we got married, which although I have a lovely happy life over here, doesn't really count as a sitting-in-the-sun-sipping-cocktails-out-of-coconuts kind of holiday. 
I digress. 
So on my first honeymoon, my ex and I went to Rarotonga which had those stereotypical, picture post card beaches and turquoise water....but....the the water was full of fat, slimy, absolutely freakin disgusting sea slugs.  Which were hopefully magnified and not that actual size when seeing them through our mask underwater when snorkelling.  They were grey, the size of my forearm, often mating, or dropping eggs or crap or ....such an unpleasant memory, must erase it now!
So I often bag Australia about it's vast array of wildlife that confronts me (although I must be getting used to it coz I haven't posted about a wildlife experience for yonks, even though I have them regularly), and New Zealand seems to have got off scot free and sits there on my I-am-loud-and-proud-to-be-a-kiwi pedestal ...however......check out this.  Repeat after me...OMG.

I hate to have to do this but...what is a sea slug? (and I'm not sure if I can bring myself to post an image).

Sea slugs are also known as sea cucumbers and are echinoderms (ok, I don't know what that means either). They are marine animals with a leathery skin and an elongated body containing a single, branched gonad (see what I mean - gross) . Sea cucumbers are found on the sea floor worldwide. There are a number of species many of which are targeted for human consumption. The harvested product is variously referred to as trepang, bêche-de-mer or balate.  (ok, I think I may have to stop).  Most sea cucumbers reproduce by releasing sperm and ova into the ocean water (oh shite, I might have accidently swallowed some).

Enough.  My last words....Aussie, aussie, aussie!!!!!
And kiwis, don't forget to click that link - read and weep Peeps, read and weep.

Wildlife No 9

You think you run a tight ship.  You think, "Sure there's room for improvement and perhaps I could mop the floors more often, but on the whole, in the cleanliness stakes, and especially as I do it all myself thanks to the GFC, I give myself an honest 8 out of 10".  You assume 8/10 is good enough.  And then you look behind the big TV unit thingee looking for the lost library books.  And you see the evidence. 

And you know then, in a heartbeat, that 8/10 isn't good enough.

Dogs

I make no apologies, I really am a very nice person but I don't do dogs, never have and probably never will. Fact is I like cats. I am a cat person. I don't do dogs.
So we are looking at shifting (see my earlier post?)and have been looking around at many potential rental properties to shift to. A month or so ago, we looked at a property, it was immaculate in every sense of the word, no shiz anywhere to speak of, no papers, no misplaced socks, no pile of newspapers on the floor, no nothing on the bench AT ALL. It was perfect as only I can dream of. I'm not sure how people can live like that, but apparently these people were. But here's the thing. It had a dog. Evidenced by a spotless dog food bowl, kennel and ....crap all over the back lawn. Piles of the stuff. It was a Off the Leash dog park without the black plastic bags for scooping up fresh poo. What's that about? Spotless inside/dog toilet out.

And another one. The boys and I had just pulled up in the car somewhere when a woman walking her dog stopped on the grass literally right beside us, and her dog had a massive crap right beside our car, which she then proceeded to scoop up (with her hand encased in a black plastic bag, not much protection for my liking, you know how bad dog poo smells). There was stunned silence in our car as the boys had all witnessed this scene. "
And that boys", I concluded, "Is why we will never have a dog"

No more dog poo stories for a bit. Sorry to all my dog loving friends.

Scarred

Some of you have followed my regular "Wildlife"posts, but this one is a doozy, and actually one that caused a "I wanna go back to NZ" plea, that once again fell on death ears.

I was about to be picked up to do a 10km run event and ran out to pop a rubbish bag in the wheely bin. But my rubbish bin was not empty. No sir. Inside the bin was the biggest freaking, most disgusting possum. Asleep. In my rubbish bin. It stirred a little as I screamed and dropped my rubbish bags and ran inside where once again I screamed at the husband ( in frenzied whispering coz if the boys had got wind of the visitor they would have been out like a shot to investigate and coming into any contact with it again would simply have been too much trauma for me for one day). The Husband was very disinterested. Or at least feigned disinterest at my pleading "can you do something about it please". I went to my run, and blame only an ok'ish run on the post stress disorder resulting with my brush with the possum. I came home. "Is the possum gone?" I asked, "Possum, what possum? Oh right, forgot all about it" came his nonchalant reply. Thinking hard about what would inspire him into action, I laid all my cards on the table and promised "pleasures of the flesh" for 7 days in a row. Nope, would need to go higher than that he said. By now my friend Zoe was involved via text, and she said her husband had offered to come and shift our possum for the same deal with her.

Men.

So putting my head back in the sand I went about my day until I saw the rubbish bag I'd discarded beside the rubbish bin, rather than in it, had been ravaged by crows or magpies. Australia, gad! Somehow seeing our rubbish spread around our yard was enough to catapult The Husband into action, and out he came. With his golf club. "I'm going to kill it" he said but I was aghast with the blimmin logistics of the situation I was worrying about mess and gore and ...remnants. He thought we had the perfect solution as the possum WAS ALREADY IN the rubbish bin. Hmm, 6 hot days later you can just imagine all the other wildlife that would be in our bin by rubbish day. He couldn't rouse the sleeping possum, so we agreed a plan when it was dark. And sure enough my brave Husband finally resolved our possum situation and we now have a large rock on top of the wheely bin to prevent any repeat incidents.

And now for my part of the deal....

Only in Australia...

Before I start my Vietnam stories, here's a article from the local newspaper. Now my sincere apologies to anyone who may be offended by my inclusion of this as an "item of interest" on my blog, but really, we're talking about a freaking possum here...

"Fur Flies Over Possum Death"
An Ingleside company has lost its contract with City of Sydney Council after it accidently killed a possum while cutting down a tree last week. The company said the possum's death was the result of poor communication and has apologised for the incident. It said one worker had been stood down and counselling for other staff was being arranged. A council spokesman said "The City of Sydney deeply regrets the incident and shares the anger and disgust of residents..." The Tree Services owner said "Our company deeply regrets the pain caused to any living being and apologises unreservedly for this incident".

This was a serious news item. And it's about a possum.

Wildlife No 8

They're baa--ackkk.......

Wildlife No 7

I'm currently training for the Oxfam 100km walk which covers 2 national parks in North Sydney - apart from a few kms of street walking, the rest is in the bush. And the bush brings with it many, many interesting "wild life" to be contended with. For example, last Saturday we were running through the bush taking it in turns to be the lead runner.

The problem with being the lead runner is that you run into the spiders webs - we normally run in the morning when the webs are new and no one else has usually been on the tracks. So when it was my turn to be in the lead I ran smack into a large web, and while faffing round trying to get the web off me, Mia started going nuts brushing me off. I had a big Golden Orb spider on me (in the photos!), now luckily for me (1) it didn't bite me, althought they're not poisonous and (2) I don't mind spiders. Now if it had been a snail or a slug, well you'd have heard me in NZ and I'd still be running.

Last week The Husband and I left the boys with Nana at a harbour beach and went for a bush walk for a bit. Now this walk is nothing like where we are training for the Oxfam - it's stepped (rather than boulder hopping), groomed (not bush bashing) and very pedestrian, but a gorgeous walk and view. So we were cruising along when A FOOTSTEP away from me, slithered a brown snake (see above), right across the path where I was about to step. We (the snake and me) both got a fright, and it REARED it's head up (remember it's only a footstep away from me - my foot suspended in the air in the microsecond this happened in). I leapt back whispering to The Husband- "snake", and we both stood there while he found a stick and we watched the empty path. "CLOSE CALL", I thought, and damn straight it was, as those blimmin brown snakes are uber poisonous and dangerous.... quote from Wikipedia:

The Eastern Brown Snake (Pseudonaja textilis), often referred to as the Brown Snake, is an elapid snake native to Australia. It is one of the world's deadliest snakes. This, combined with a native habitat which includes the well-populated east coast of Australia, has resulted in fatalities.

Katie, if you are reading this, don't worry. I have NEVER seen a brown snake on the actual track that we'll be walking for Oxfam. So we'll be fine.

Wildlife No 6

Never in Auckland would I have found a baby lizard in my kids beds. Never. Getting Smiths bed ready tonight I noticed a small black toy thingee in his bed, but in my heart of hearts I knew it wasn't one of his many spiders and bugs that he actually does take to bed with him. And as I tapped the bed around the toy, it transformed from a plastic toy into a baby lizard which then took off and ran under the sheets. Knowing this was a two person job, I summonised The Husband who initially annoyed, saw my face, the can of flyspray and knew there was an incident.

We, ok, he, managed to catch it and set it free outside (flyspray doesn't even kill some of the spiders over here let alone small animals - I had it more as a security blanket).
But it got me thinking.
That baby lizard must have a family, it looked too young to be on its own.
Where are they now?

Dog Poo

I thought my blog yonks ago about rissoles was as low as I could scoop (tee hee) on my blog, but give me a small break, I'm just finding my writing boots again after my summer hiatis and I'm still feeling a tad random.
So I freely admit, I'm not a dog lover, but this morning, driving home from school, I saw something that tipped me over the edge. Why do people have dogs? As I was driving, I saw a big "police dog" dog (Ok, I know they have an official dog name but can't find it in the memory banks) being walked by it's owner and as I passed, it squatted and did what can only be described as a big, stinky dog diarrhoea. Totally disgusting. And then the dog owner bent down with her plastic bag. Are you kidding me? Can you imagine what she had to do to sort it out? Why put yourself through this? Ok so dogs may have oodles of personality and are "man's companion" or whatever but really we ALL know how stinky dog poo is and I can't imagine how bad her hand must have smelt if there is only a smidge of cheap black plastic between her hand and the poo. Actually maybe all dog owners can be spotted by raw red poo scooping hands from the constant scalding water and soap routine they have to do.
My neighbour has a dog (who incidentally poo'ed on our front lawn, and I flat out refuse to move it as The Husband is Director of Dog Poo, along with his other directorships of boys teeth extraction and vermin removal) and the other day she stood chatting to me after her walk with Jaffa the dog, and a bulging black plastic bag. She stood chatting for ages. Did she think it was socially ok to hold a bag of poo while having a conversation or has her sense of smell and grossness long left her?

Enough. Next post will be intellectually challenging and informed. No more dog poo stories.

Wildlife #5

Possums. I know I've talked about possums before. You can't take the kiwi out of me, even in Australia, where possums are protected and rescued and classed as a cute cuddley koala like animal, to me they will always be roadkill.
So we have a possum on our roof. I need to make this clear as possum removal people (they trap them and take for a drive over water so they can't return - there is no high powered, extremely toxic poisons involved with possum removal in Australia - AS THERE SHOULD BE) will not remove possums ON a roof, only INSIDE a roof. OK, so our possum lives on top on the roof in an alcove thing and nightly runs along the roof, sounding either like a large rat (during the lean winter months) or a small man (when fat on all the spring growth and with a baby possum in it's belly). getting grossed out?
The alcove thing is above my clothes line, which I spend a lot of time at with 3 small dirty boys and my own cleaning fetish, and I noticed that the possum seemed to be collecting a lot of twigs, brush etc. OMG it ...is...building...a...nest!!!!
Worse yet, one day when hanging out washing and looking at the growing pile of shrub, I noticed a pink ear among the brush, and it was twitching.
Time for action.
For a couple of days I started my own version of Possum Guantanamo Bay. I banged a broom against the wall as close to the twitching ear as I could, I hosed the shrub and alcove in the vain hope of flushing it out and I did this whenever i could remember.
Now I married The Husband for a reason. I mentioned Possum and Nest in the same sentence, and he was up a ladder finally confronting our issue. He told me to "get inside". No need to tell me that twice. And all we could hear was a large man and a very small man scampering around on the roof (pregnant possum being the small man just to make it clear we didn't send one of the boys up to help Dad).
Being ever cautious and slightly paranoid, I had noticed that the ladder The Husband had climbed was precariously and very dangerously balanced. I popped my head out the door and asked "do you want any help getting down", at the same time The Husband yelled "get inside!!!!" just as a small possum can running at me, about to jump to where I was standing. Pink eyes, pink snout, pink twitching ears, fat tail - forever etched into my memory. I screamed, ran, the possum jumped, situation over? Nope, The Husband said there was two up there and the old fat one wouldn't budge even under the assault of a hose in the face.

Hanging out my washing yesterday I noticed a new pile of shrub appearing on the roof. Wildlife #6?

Wildlife #4 - The Moth

There is no reason ever that a moth should be in your pantry. So when one flew out a week or so ago, in denial I made excuses for it - ie it accidently flew into my pantry when trying to find the extremely bright light, even though there is no light inside my pantry at all. I called my friend Caroline and instead of the expected "it will be nothing", having had her own brush with moths in the pantry, she just hmmmed and suggested I keep a close eye for further visitors. Which I had none of. Until tonight. Pouring my pasta into the pot of boiling water I noticed all the black bits floating around. "Just bits of burnt rice pot" I thought - The Husband had almost destroyed one of my 3 pots when boiling rice one night a month or so ago and we've been slowly boiling off the bits of burnt every time we use it. But these bits of black were moving. As if they were dying a slow death-by-boiling water. Which they were. I looked at the packet I had just poured the pasta from.
It was seething.

Bugs #4

Summer in Sydney brings on a whole new challenge. Bugs coming out of hibernation and on the hunt for food. This year I have tried to anticipate the arrival by getting my house sprayed early, earlier that is than the first "viewing" of large black and beige cockrtoaches scampering across my floor in the middle of the night when I've gone for a drink or to sort one of the boys. I know that they are about as you see the occasional cockroach poo in the cupboard and you KID yourself that it is simple a stray spec of black pepper although why you'd have black pepper in the cupboards under your sink with all the dishclothes and cleaners beats me.

So yesterday the Pest Removal man came. I remember in Auckland when you saw a Pest Removal van outside a house you always though ...hmmm, they must have vermin, how totally gross, and if ever god forbid you needed a pest guy yourself, you were always tempted to get him to park a few doors away. Actually, small diversion, but would that have to be the second worse job ever????? Finding and killing rats? The first worse job of course, based on recent experiences HAS to be the poor sod who analyses poo, wee, "scrapings" and sputum samples at those labs - imagine looking forward to going to work on a Monday!

So Pest guy had 2 gigs for us, the first at the cockroach infested new house, second at our home. Now being particularly thorough, I emptied our pantry. Completely.

I have the worlds smallest pantry, yet I still shop like I'm at a Pack n Save and buy 5 boxes of weetbix, a 64 pack of toilet rolls etc etc which proves extremely challenging when it comes to putting it all away. My last shop was with the 3 boys and Will kind of went crazy asking to try different chips and biscuits. And because I was in Survival Mode with The Husband still overseas, my tried and trusted tactic was to say "yes" to almost all requests. So for a good hour on Sunday night, I emptied my cupboard for his 30 second spray. Then came the long, slow process of re-stuffing my shelves. But in my quest for a semi-organised life, I re-stuffed loose stuff into new plastic containers. Impressed?

Now the challenge is to keep it this way. Less incentive to eat though. I don't want to make a mess finding anything!

Wildlife 3

We have a tenant in our property.
Unfortunately it's brown and black, the size of The Husbands hand and runs very fast and erratically.
Yes we have a large cockroach that I think may be heavily laden with a zillion eggs from the same gene pool which creates extremely large cockroaches. I'm too nervous to kill it because (a) I don't want to have to deal with the carcass or the mess (b) I don't want the zillion eggs released on impact (c) w don't have a tool large enough to ensure a swift death (d) I don't want to have to deal with the carcass or the mess.
Even the rental agent is grossed by it and said she had to herd it into a corner when showing a prospective tenant. I'm thinking "honey that's what you're earning the big bucks for".
I'm too grossed to step back inside the property until Ken the exterminator visits on Monday. He told me to leave a cheque on the bench. I'm already trying to work through the logistics and planning the path of least likelihood of a meeting when I run the cheque in. All thoughts of laying new cupboard lining is history.
And it's only the start of the season. I think I'm ready to go home.

Wildlife 2

Our new house is undergoing a 3 day makeover. Not much you can do in 3 days I know, but we can remove the canary yellow and bright orange feature walls. I picked paints in about 2 mins with the painter standing beside me. Seeing my safe beigey colour up on the walls now makes me think maybe I should've taken a couple more. I had The Husband (now known as The Accountant) standing whispering the words "every day without a tenant is costing us "xxxx" much..." in my ear, high stress. Anyhow I was in the house yesterday looking at my paint sample cards I'd strategically placed on the counter for all would-be tenants to see that action was being taken to minimise the bright orange/canary yellow (with large blue square) effect, when I noticed a thready thing peeking out of the folded card I was holding. I slowly realised that it....was...moving..... As I dropped it a large beige and black freaking cockroach randomly scuttled out of the paint cards and sprinted across my floor. With The Accountants words ringing and the thoughts of would-be tenants seeing the wildlife, I had to get it out of the house somehow without the assistance of a vacuum cleaner. This required considerable agility and noise on my behalf, and once safely out of the house and headed towards the pool (the vacuum thing will suck it up in there), only a minute had passed before I heard a "hello" - a would-be tenant had arrived early for an appointment and popped her head in. Close call.

Anyhow she bleeted on about how much she loved the house/area while I forced myself to talk GugiMon with her 8 year old son. Her last words were "I'm going to arrange a time to bring my husband through". Now there's a reason we use a letting agent because not a sight was seen of her since.

I should have left the wildlife.

Wildlife

I can't remember if I ever had a large black and beige cockroach running across my hand when I got mail out of the letterbox in Auckland. Guess it must be a Sydney thing.