Part of my job (and a large boring part at the moment) involves keeping up a database of service providers up to date. This is something run by our Federal Government and provides a lot of information (potentially!) for people in our part of Tasmania (and the whole of Australia, variously). Anyhoo, all the information has to be reviewed every 12 months, so it’s an ongoing process of printing reports and sending out letters, and then chasing those up (‘cause at least 50% of people do not fill in forms and return them even when a stamped envelope is provided).

There is a process to go through and at the end of it the record shows when the information was last verified with the name of the person who did it. … Occasionally a random record will pop up from the ether which is very old and has to be completely changed and then it’s all up to date and fine. I am coming across now a lot of records which have been checked by other people over the time I have been here (it’s been a gradual handing over of all responsibility for this to me) and I, of course, have assumed that they’ve been doing their jobs properly. Until today. When I have come across 3 records so far where the informants have told me variously that they have not been at addresses for (in one case) four years …. That that phone number hasn’t been operational for at least 18 months … and that the person on the listing hasn’t been in that job for nearly 2 years.

All I can assume is that the record has been opened, marked verified, and closed, with no actual legwork being done. Which cheeses me off massively ‘cause I’m doing it properly, or as properly as I can, and it’s taking me forever (and is OUTRAGEOUSLY boring!) … and I’d just like to run down the hallway and KICK one of the people who I know is responsible except that I know she’d lie about it. What makes it worse is that this particular person spends a large proportion of her work life moaning about how busy she is …..

If you’re going to do a job do it properly or pass it on to someone who will … and don’t pretend you’ve done it properly if you haven’t.

That’s all I have to say.

Firstly, the mother in law, Mrs Claus … who showed up today around midday, at the house (formerly known as ‘the block’) with the Potato King. Well, she has to come with him as she doesn’t drive . Anyway, showed up with thermos of hot water, cappucino sachets, and savoury toast, just in time to stop Mr Tasmania and I passing out from lack of food – good woman!!!!!!

Secondly – the windows and doors that I saw in the dark last night look even more spectacular in the daylight oddly enough! … It’s so exciting to stand in the house and feel enclosed, windows and external doors in place, half the house blue papered (foil paper), parts of the wall that we can no longer see through, pieces that are firmly in the places they’re supposed to be in – feels like we almost have a home – awesome!

In addition to checking out windows, cleaning up yet more nails (and enormous amounts of cigarette butts left by the roofers – blurg!), we got out the crayons (literally, a red one and a yellow one left by the builders) and drew in the laundry tub, washing machine, and various cabinets, then proceeded to draw in the bathtub and vanity to make sure they fitted where we wanted them! We then proceeded to work out the kitchen, or at least most of it, including finalising (finally!) the shape and size of the island … it may sound simple but when you really start getting into it there’s heaps of variables, and realistically I work more from a standpoint of what i HAVEN’T liked in other kitchens more than what i definitely want in my own … so a fair bit of crossing out before finalising things = but it’s pretty much sorted and we both like it – yay!

So, here is a cross section of windows and doors – I’m especially loving the stable door for the laundry and the big windows in the garage, as well as our beautiful front doors …

From this (on Wednesday)

To this (by Friday night)

Front Door

Back door and living room slider

Laundry door … this door and window are one unit, loving the stable door!

I have no pictures as it was dark when I got there (which was actually good ’cause I finally was able to see what the new solar lights bordering the driveway look like!) but Mr Tasmania and I have been touring our house with most of the windows and external doors now on it and some of the blue paper wrapping done – it actually felt like a house … because we were really INSIDE for the first time .. there were things to go through which had to be opened and closed, and a whole half of the house where the only bits you can see out of are solid as well as see through …. what an amazing feeling, I really can’t tell you how it feels ’cause this is my first house … and even better it’s OUR first house … (and Mr Tasmania’s first house too) … neither of us will ever have this feeling again … it’s really fabulous.

I will be taking a number of pictures tomorrow … as you can imagine … but will actually have to finally give in and subscribe to f1ickr before I can put any up (I’ve got 3 free photos left – cannot believe how many photos some people [Ian!] have on there, amazing!).

Has been absolutely flat strap at work, beyond busy, and we had two out sick today as well, so at one point, in my 9 person office, I was it …only me … for about half an hour, which was actually the nicest half hour of my work day … not that any of it was bad, just full on .. and I’m not whinging really (considering how many people actually are losing jobs at present!), just have tired brain … and I”m tired of having a tired brain from a job which in no way stretches said brain .. thank goodness for an assignment to edit for a mate to give me something to think about .. and quite enjoyable it was too!

Yes, finally, it went on today (bar a couple of ridge caps!)

Have you ever had one of those days when you just want to run away from work? For no good reason, everything is fine and I have no problems, I just haven’t wanted to be here today. Haven’t particularly wanted to be anywhere else either, to be honest, just not here ….

Ah well, I’ve gotten lots done despite that, so I guess it counts as a good day ….

Off to the excitement of grocery shopping shortly and then home for Chinese for dins … ‘cause I just can’t be bothered … actually, I decided I couldn’t be bothered around 2pm this arvo

Anyway … hopefully we will have some roof by tonight so I’ll have something to be excited about …. other than Mr Tasmania of course

‘fl*shing’ is the material that is put behind the guttering and up over the edge of the roof, but under the roofing material, to stop water running down the inside of the walls … in our case the fl*ashing is the same colour as the guttering and roofing – Heritage Red.

‘bagging’ is along the lines of rendering ie a coating put over brickwork … in this case the house is being built with large concrete (grey) bricks, these will then have a light coating of coloured render material ‘bagged’ or swept over them .. this will cover the colour and add the colour we want but allow the shape over the bricks to show through – render is a really thick smooth covering, through which nothing of the materials underneath can be seen.

Friday – discovered that we had flashing and gutters on the house (roof is supposed to start on Monday, weather permitting) … have been working on colours for the external walls (bricked, will be bagged, so colours needed) .. now I can see the gutter colour (which is the same as the flashing and the roofing iron) I have a really good idea of how the roof will look and therefore that our colours for the walls will work … must remember to grab an offcut of the gutters so I can go hunting for the right red for the bright red wall(s) we’re going to put in a couple of places so we get a red that works properly!

Friday – wild winds, rain, and cold … tree took out a transformer .. .not just damaged, obliterated … no power at home from 11am …. Round to friends after work to hover over their wood heater (great time) back home and in bed by 10pm (thank goodness for flannelette sheets!), woke up around 1am to find our power back on, hooray …

Saturday – discovered very few others had power, apparently we are the last house on the sewer pump line and generators were put on those due to the possible environmental hazards … so yay for us, not so yay for anyone else … friend over to use our shower … all others in our area have no loos, no water (electric pumps to their tank water, we’re not on town water), no lights, no heaters (it’s cold!), no fridges, no ovens, everyone camping or just heading out to friends / family for the day …. We went up to the block to work a bit later on … came home to find no power but only because generators were offline so they could test, all power back on at 6pm (so some people had no power from 11am Friday – 6pm Saturday) … out to see Angels and Demons (enjoyed much), home very tired

Sunday – up to block again to shovel dirt, put down concrete slabs for hot water system and reverse cycle air conditioner, clean up vast amounts of nails and ‘stuff’ around the place … home to have lunch (at 2pm!) and read paper for an hour … outside to prune (in a massive way!) two big banksia trees (starting the cleanup/prune process that needs to be done before we move out (hopefully beginning September?)– rather do it gradually than all in one big go whilst moving as well!) … collapse into bed

Monday – meetings at work with government wodgies (both very nice actually), all staff involved, free lunch, now just hoping that Mr Tasmania phones me in an hour or so and tells me they’ve started on the roof! Hopefully will have enough energy to start work on finalising the kitchen designs tonight … they’ve only been out on the dining table for three weeks ……..

we’re back! That’s to the technical wizards … I’ve got nothing to say today but I’m glad of the opportunity to say it!

Well, almost … we have roof trusses, so we finally have a house shaped house, if you know what I mean

As mentioned in a previous post, the roof trusses went up on Friday and yesterday we had the opportunity to walk around the house and really get a feel for each room, windows, ceiling heights, doors etc – it was also really great (as we were up there early) to be able to watch the progress of the sun around the house, so we could see that our solar passive design has worked and we are going to have sun on the main living areas of the house at every part of the day … and even some light on the very back of the house, due to laser light panels (clear) over the back patio.

It’s just so satisfying because we’ve put so much work into it, and everyone who’s seen it (and we had 5 separate lots of visitors yesterday!) has loved it .. Mr Tasmania is even more pleased than me, as he’s put hours and hours and hours into research in so many areas.

And here it is – our house shaped house!

View from the back door (standing in the living room) up the stairs, past the kitchen on the right, and down the hallway to the front door.

View from the back door

Neither of us are in church this morning – we have a visiting pastor, and neither of us want to hear him preach. We won’t be in church next weekend either ’cause he’ll still be here.

He’s a lovely lovely man, and his wife is lovely too (I have met them a few times in Sydney, and know of them as well) but I literally just can’t listen to him preach. I have not one single jot of a problem with his preaching, his ministry (he’s a prophet, and a good sensible one at that), anything he has to say – I just can’t listen to HIM… his style irritates me so immensely I literally can’t sit in the same room. I’ve left a number of meetings when he’s preached over the years, but they’ve been in a much larger venue, with people coming and going, so I’ve been able to make it unobtrusive (I’m not embarrassed to leave, I just don’t think it’s fair to a speaker to have people walking out and not coming back!), however in our current church it would be VERY obvious if we headed on out as soon as he opened his mouth.

ah well, I’m sure he won’t be th e last person I have difficulty listening to.

Mr Tasmania is up at the block routering, sanding, and staining beams to go over our back patio. I’ve been cleaning and washing and walking the dog and starting the pump from the creek (it’s having pressure switch issues) and am thinking it’s almost time to sit down and have a cup of tea!

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