Living in the Suburbs in 2012

I was talking to a good friend this afternoon and she commented that I'd been a bit slack on writing a post here at The Garden Trail so in honour of our friendship, which is almost 10 years strong, I will simply update you with where things are at.  The next door neighbours just got home and their boy is crying and the mother is yelling.  It always disappoints me that they yell at their children but their dog barks almost incessantly all day, every day and I never hear them yell at their yappy little dog.  The dog barks at the moon, the stars, the dark and probably at nothing since he (or she) is always barking.  It's really annoying when I am trying to sleep at night, as you can imagine. 

I am not good at living in the suburbs.  The houses are much too close and I can even hear the neighbour talking on the phone in the house on the other side of mine.  Cars drive past with their loud exhausts, trains blow their peculiar whistles day and night and aeroplanes fly overhead and there is no silence.  Even now, the hum of my laptop, the occasional beeping of a text message to my phone, reminds me that I live in a society run by power, rush and noise!  But I am glad for the modern conveniences, especially my new pink Kenwood Patissiere.  One of my friend's asked me "Do you even cook???!!!"  The problem with cooking is I eat the cakes and biscuits (cookies) if they are there and that does not help if I am trying to keep healthy and fit.  (The Kenwood is a brand of mixer, similar to a Kitchen Aid mixer.) I am also thankful for my laptop although I can't get my SD card out of the slot which I really need to figure out. 

I finally sorted out my phone drama.  After four phone calls last Thursday, being told to wait until Friday afternoon and finding out Friday it still wasn't working, I decided to let the weekend slip by without dealing further with it.  On Monday morning, I called the phone company again and within 5 minutes, Tim had solved the problem for me and I don't have to pay the other phone company's bill.  However, today I went to call interstate and found out that the other phone company had barred me from making any phone calls so my phone company called them and had it removed.  No one knows why I had been barred but at least it's sorted.  I still have to tackle the AT&T bill in the US but that's another story in itself and doesn't bear repeating here.

I called about my crate of stuff from the US and the good news is, it has cleared customs.  However, they still need to unpack the ship, sort out where it all goes, put it on rail and have it shipped to Melbourne, find a truck driver, who will then call me and arrange a delivery date and they will bring it to my home.  The shipping company could not give me any time frame at all and suggested I call again next week.  I asked, "Two weeks? A month?"  but no, they have no idea.  At least it's cleared quarantine.

I had some friends visit yesterday and I took them to the school for a tour which was good.  I really believe that I am going to have a good year teaching there.  The staff seem very friendly, I have my favourite class level and it will be good to focus on my class and teach without the added pressure of being a principal and/or having to encourage more school enrolments.  My class size of 23 sounds wonderful, even if it is mostly boys in my class.  I've been collecting resources together, making up class lists and today I went and had a diet coke and a melting moment (cookie) with another teacher from the school who gave me some more insights into the morale of the school and "What every classroom teacher should know".

I'd like to add something about Dave in this post, to remind you that he is always on my mind but he doesn't seem to fit in to the above paragraphs.  I did receive a cd of photos of our wedding from our sister-in-law and also one of his memorial service and the photos of the wedding looked wonderful.  I have not wanted to view the other cds yet.  It was such a lovely day when we got married and I wish there had been more lovely  days together.