Our asses are moved, but our lives are still in boxes.

But we’re getting there.
Although there were moments there where I never thought we would get here.

Like on Friday night after I’d picked up a four-tonne truck for the move to our new house, and then decided that seeing as I had the truck, I may as well move a load of by myself instead of waiting for help the next day.

We’re on a right-of-way driveway, shared with two other townhouses, which runs from one street then dog-legs around and exits on another.

Our house is last coming in from one entrance, but I tried backing in that way because it would have meant I lined up perfectly with our garage. But I quickly learned that the drive way is actually millimetres too small for a four tonne truck. The flashings on the garages stick out just a little too far.

Gah!

And I was alone, so I had no one to guide me in backing.

Gah!

Not one to give up, I went to the other entrance and drove in frontwards. It was tight, but all went well. Until I cornered the dog-leg and came to our house. The garage stuck out just as far as the neighbours. But because going forward is easier than going backwards, I decided to have a go and after 10 minutes of manoeuvring and getting hard up against a boundary fence and ripping several branches off a neighbour’s tree, I managed to get past. Fuck the trees, they shouldn’t be growing over our side, I figured. Then I realised that I was fucked if I ever wanted to get out. I couldn’t go backwards and going forwards meant I’d have to get past the other two neighbouring houses.

I decided to avoid confronting the problem by emptying the truck (which took aaaages). It probably wouldn’t have taken quite so long had I been able to use the truck’s loading ramp, but there wasn’t quite enough room to pull it out (Gah!).
But once the truck was empty, I had to face the fact that I had to try and get my truck-driving ass out of there. And it was pitch-black. I slowly hugged the fenceline and partially destroyed more trees, but managed to get past. I thought I was going to be home and hosed, but then there was a scraping of metal and Gah! Fucking! Gah! I discovered myself pinned up against the top edge of the neighbour’s garage. The drive way had slumped a bit towards his house and the truck went on a natural lean. I had no choice but to back up, causing more minor damage to their flashings. Then I sat there thinking Gah! a lot.

I hugged the fenceline until I could feel splinters, and somehow made it out of there.

It was not a good start to the move.

Instead of getting a smaller hire truck, we decided to make do and just get as close as we could the next day. And all went pretty good.

(Well except for that bit where my wife was guiding me in and didn’t pay attention to both sides of the truck and I managed to back into our fence…)

We had lots of help. Two of the helpers were paying us back for the previous Saturday spent helping move them.

Returning the truck at the end of the day wasn’t a problem. It was already so dented and scratched that they didn’t notice the new ones.

I love this house. It doesn’t quite feel like mine yet. But I love the fact that it gets so much sun. I love that even though it only has a small front yard, there is plenty of landscaping fun for me ahead.

But the best thing – the best thing is that it has a dishwasher!
The past few months spent house-sitting without one has been hell on me.

The girls have great views from their upstairs bedrooms. So does the reading room upstairs, which also has a balcony.
Our bedroom is downstairs and it has an ensuite and a walk-in-wardrobe, which we’ve never had before. Posh!

We have a small two-car-garage but it is big enough to have set up my computer, so that I can record music without bothering anyone.

I love the fact that there is a coffee shop just across the road.

I love that a hundred Harley Davidson motorcycles drove past as some sort of parade as we were sitting outside on Sunday.

I love the native birds.

But I don’t like the one who starts his day at 5.30am each day with a call that sounds like a Casio wristwatch alarm. He’s just lucky that I couldn’t find my ammo the first morning.

But we have a new house. We are in the new house. And it feels like home.

And I love that our life is no longer on hold. Well, once it finishes getting out of all these bloody cardboard boxes that is…