At long last ! – yaaaay !!

/ MR

I’m back to my bad old ways.  🙂

Moving on Wednesday, 1st October. This I have no doubt will be my last rental, and that’s not being dismal, just sensible. I mean, one not only cannot but has no wish to go through what I have over the past year again – not even one more time !

I’m moving to a Melbourne suburb called Footscray: Chic was born there, but I never knew precisely where (nonetheless, that’s a very nice thing !) I know Footscray well; because when I first returned to Melbourne I spent nearly a year in a being-gentrified suburb called Maribyrnong, and trammed it to the train via Footscray-the-place to Footscray-the-station. It’s really multi-racial – Vietnamese and Chinese, mostly, with Arabic and Indian as well. The food !!! [swoon …] My favourite is Vietnamese, as when I was in Maribyrnong the building’s janitor’s wife – they were both from Vietnam – used to make extra meals for me, bring one up to my flat then come back and take away the plates !!! She it was, the gorgeous Oanh, who got me over my loathing of coriander. Her husband, the adorable Bang Pham, was the sweetest man; and the sole fly in the family ointment was their little girl – outrageously spoiled and commensurately demanding. Cute, but.

I’m longing to start over again with arranging my things. One of the best aspects will be that I have actual walls of which I can choose whichever to put my recliner against, and not have fucking reflections on my laptop screen driving me insane (as they are currently doing). I shall need to have my ground-floor balcony enclosed in bird netting so as to confine The Boodster and stop him from rushing down the yard and out onto the main road.  😦

An only slightly historical screen-grab for you, showing my flat (bike on the balcony) from the street forming the corner with the bigger road upon which block sits my flat-block. You can see the road of my address in the left centre.

I am so thrilled about this move, with my removal from vomit on pristine walkways, shopping trolleys filled with garbage, gardens choked with detritus— shut up, M-R ! Anyway, you get the picture. I am, I say, so thrilled that I shall entertain myself with describing my development of my final home. Here, I mean. You do not need to keep up; just accept that I’m truly happy … happier than I’ve been since my third move in Geelong to St Albans Park, and that was many years ago.

15 thoughts on “At long last ! – yaaaay !!”

  1. I’m very happy for you MR … looks like a lovely ground floor unit. Greatly look forward to hearing all about it. Reflections on screens is one of the things I thought about in our downsizing move. So many modern apartments have so much glass – that means fewer walls for pictures and shelves and more reflection. I like light but there’s a limit! Anyhow, well done.

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  2. Oh my, another move? You sound absolutely delighted so I’m very happy for you. And that certainly looks like a nice place. But I consider moving one of life’s most unpleasant, exhausting experiences, and my next move will be only at gunpoint.

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    • Come now, Colorado – this is my first move in the time you’ve ‘known’ me. I arrived in this social housing complex in February 2024, and have been bewailing being here since approx. July 2024, which was when the other tenants were moved in. 😦

      If it were not for them, I would have stayed on here – probably … except that the organization that administers us got rid of the wonderful woman who worked her arse off and who had become a real friend. They didn’t like her telling it how it is – where they’re wasting money and not utilising their funding – even though she was the Operations Manager. FFS !!! – they retrenched her and did away with the position.

      So there’s absolutely zero attractions remaining here, and a whole big shitload of ’em in Footscray.

      I am genuinely thrilled about my ‘new’ place, and absolutely happy !

      XO

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      • Nope, I remember when you moved into this place and all the noise and commotion with repairs on a sewer or something on the street outside/below your window. But anyway, if you’ve got the strength for one more move, it looks like a great place!

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        • Struth !!!! – you and I were communicating when I lived in Carlton ?!

          I didn’t realize that: goes to show how my brain has turned to mush, don’t it ? [grin]

          I do have that one last effort left in me, Colorado, deo gratias ! I feel as if I shall be re-born there, me old china !

          Chic and I spent all our money on travelling to and from Europe in Business Class; and I don’t regret one living second. It gave him a reason to hang on, and that gave me indescribable joy. Five trips we made, starting with our first in 1989-90, and ending with our last at the end of 2005. Five times we were transported into wonder …

          And so I became an age pensioner with memories. I’m more than content.

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  3. Gosh, this is a surprise. I thought you had finally found your ‘forever’ home when you moved here, I vaguely remember them finding you a flat that suited you. Obviously I must have missed all the shenanigans since. I do hope you can settle finally and enjoy your new surroundings.

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  4. You’re quite correct, Jude me love: I thought I was in heaven when I moved here. I was the first tenant in my building – and possibly even the first in the whole complex ! Shortly, there was another on my floor, and he and I lived in wonderful peace and enjoyment.

    But then the administration got their act together on the residents matter, and slowly but surely the whole place was filled. By which time it had been brought home to me that living in a complex of six or so buildings, no matter how new and shiny, with 400-odd tenants, many of whom had been so in the old-fashioned Housing Commission buildings that once stood on this block … it wasn’t exactly ideal.

    In fact, it was hell. The place did its best to remain new and shiny, but the residents had no interest in that – as you will have seen from my earlier comments.

    So it became a matter of endless searching – like, from July 2024, five months after I came here. And, FINALLY, everything has come together for me !!!

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  5. Congratulations on your upcoming move! It sounds like you will be much happier there, as long as you can keep Boods in bounds.

    Bisquee wandered out onto the porch this afternoon when I was talking to someone. I didn’t know she had it in her! I scooped her up and tossed her back inside. So no more talking with the door open!

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    • You should be ashamed, my clever little mate – standing there in the doorway with the neighbours peering at you from behind their venetian blinds !! [grin] How about Calvin ?

      I became concerned about you (again !) with all that rubbish stirred up by rumpT about the ICE thugs being attacked !!! But Mayor Wilson didn’t cave – goodonim. 🙂 I do declare, Michele – Portland seems often to be in political cross-hairs !

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  7. Thanks so much. 🙂

    I’m absolutely loving it, old flat that it is. I feel as if I finally understand that THIS is the environment that’s me – not high-rise residential buildings with everything inbuilt. I was meant to be in little old-ish places with scrapes on the paintwork and rubbish-bins that I go to (rather than chutes that others misuse and infuriate me). And these 8 flats have 4 big bins with yellow lids and 4 with red lids, and they’re CLEAN. Someone puts the right ones out on different nights – probably flat 1 who gets some benefit off rent for doing so. Thank one of the gods (dunno which) it doesn’t have to be all of us ! 🙂

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