AGEING

It pays to be tenacious !

/ MR / 27 Comments

This-morning, having bitten the bullet savagely, I wrote a polite email of cancellation to Community Housing and Horizon Housing Realty (in truth the one company) regarding their having awarded me a studio to live in.

This I did because I had to admit that the studio was simply too small to spend any amount of time living in: as Paula said, the plan makes it look more like a bedsit than a studio. Besides, I would’ve had to get rid of all my larger belongings; and I reckon I’m pared already down to the minimum.

Just after I’d begun advising various companies about cancelling arrangements I’d made, CHL came back to me with

AN OFFER I COULDN’T POSSIBLY REFUSE AND WOULDN’T IN A MILLION YEARS

which is ..

a 1-bedroom apartment facing east, on probably the 4th level, as a Victorian Housing applicant !!!!

This means paying 25% of any income, plus the rent assistance items of my pension.

They hadn’t known me to be on the Victorian Housing Register: I hadn’t told them as I had no idea it was relevant to anything. I’d just gone on sending many MR-type emails and making myself .. erhmm .. known to them; so that they didn’t have to be reminded of me when the whole VHR aspect was raised.

I’ve been doing some real thinking

/ MR / 13 Comments

It’s vital in this time leading to moving in to my final rental.

I really, really don’t want to live in a studio again. In spite of the fact that I spend most of my life on my own (interspersed with joyful but brief times spent with the beloved ‘new’ friend of whom I wrote https://wp.me/p6zYMn-5n7 a good long while ago – and with the other friend from that time), living with my bed in the living-room just isn’t me. And that’s in spite of any enthusiasm I may’ve produced on the topic. I lied.

I just don’t like it. I mean I HATE it.

I did that over a year ago when I moved in to the flat at 1218 in this building, where I lived for about six months before coming down here to 307 and being here for eight months now. I said it was fine. That was a porky.

Even Boodie didn’t like it: it gave him nowhere to go to be on his own, which all moggies want from time to time. And I can tell you that 1218 had a bigger footprint than does the studio above.

I’m packing death now. My younger sister will be speechless with rage if|when I tell her; and as she and her husband are making it possible for me to make this move, I dunno how it will end.     😦

The wonderful audiobook I’m currently listening to while crocheting a stroller rug for the forthcoming infant of my new and superb Care Manager, Maria – Robert Galbraith (a.k.a. JK Rowling) featuring Cormoran Strike in The Silkworm – has a chapter wherein the protagonist and his offsider are discussing the case and she tells him one of the suspects has a blog: “Why do people DO that ?” he asks; and she says “I just don’t know.”

Fuck me – why am I telling you this ? Because I see you as my friends. But by all the gods you are a group of very long-suffering friends ..

 

Yeah .. there’s been a hitch :/

/ MR / 24 Comments

On the day I went to Prahran to set eyes on the studios, I found out that they’re ALL facing directly west.

No can do. Or, should I say, no will do. Never again.

Fortunately, there are, it now turns out, a few in Building D that face south. Only remaining problem is that Building D isn’t finished yet.

It’s a good thing, to put it mildly, that in my ancient years I’ve lost most of the impatience that characterized my youthful ones.

This you ain’t gonna believe !

/ MR / 17 Comments

I GOT IT !!! – I’m IN !!!

It’s not exactly what I went for, but it’s still bloody good !!!

OK, back to the start ..

I applied to this brand-new development in Prahran for a 1-bedroom apartment. Here’s a nimage – artwork only, but more than merely sufficient for the porpoise:

Pretty neat, huh ?

Having donned shoes correct for viewing, I viewed one of those – somewhat different layout but much the same area – and fell instantly in love. Not only with the apartment, but with the gardens, the area and the team of people doing the showing (who’d be the contacts).

It all took much longer than I’d hoped; but ten minutes ago I was informed that my application has been approved – for a studio !

Whaddya reckon ??? – not your usual studio !

I’m in an NRAS place right now, and the rent is only $260pw; its owner will be able to charge more or less what he wants in June – I’m told it will be $430pw.

The rent on a 2nd floor 1-bedroom is $430, and most definitely worth it in today’s terms: split system, dishwasher, everything brand new .. Oh, you should see the landscaped gardens ..!

But the team was anxious about my move from $260 to $430 – and I will admit that they were being both thoughtful and sensible (one of the reasons I want to be where they all are !). The offer is thusly: I’m approved for a studio and expected to last in it for six months; and if I find that I’ve saved some more and still want a 1-bedroom, then I’ll be offered the first one that becomes available and that I like !

No complaints from this old broad !!

I have TENURE !!! – and for $380pw !!!

I am HAPPY !!!

Is me woe ? Is woe me ?

/ MR / 19 Comments

There must be a correct interrogative version of ‘woe is me’, mustn’t there ? I mean, surely we can turn any statement into a question ..?    😉 (Sometimes I amaze even myself with my wittiness. Heh heh.)

But anyway, the answer is a firm ‘NO !’. I have bronchitis, and have been building up to it for more than a week till this point, when I’m coughing incessantly (and it’s – as they say, somewhat disgustingly – ‘productive’). But really that’s all: just the coughing and the product and the endlessness of it all: my throat isn’t sore and a headache comes and goes, and I’m not feverish. Yet I think it has to be bronchitis rather than a cold or certainly the ‘flu.

So what is my post about ?!

I believe it’s about my late-in-life willingness to admit that really, things are pretty bloody good; that in spite of the decrepitude (and currently the phlegm ..) and the inability to get my hair bleaching right, I don’t have a lot to complain about.

I’m almost sure that I’m on the verge of my final move, and it looks like I’ll know on Tuesday when the staff of Community Housing Ltd come back to work. While they’ve been holidaying riotously the staff of Horizon Housing Realty have had their noses to the grindstone – well, one of ’em has, anyway – and calling me often to follow up various aspects of my application. I am decidedly sanguine about my chances.

I and my younger sister, who were not always on the best of terms (largely to do with political issues, but not solely), have buried every difference and are fast friends. Which is Just As Well, seeing as how we was bofe raised the same and tend to quote from the same sources – Lewis Carroll, A.A. Milne and Norman Lindsay, e.g. – and is also something for which to be heartily grateful ! Not to overlook a recent discovery of cousins, down there in Brighton East; children of a brother of my father’s – the eldest female and the youngest male (and his lady) – who are absolutely lovely. (Note to self: remember your editor’s admonishments regarding adverbs, M-R !!)

I know I am a regular whinger – and I have no comprehension of how anyone tolerates it ! – but try as I might I’m unable to find anything to whinge about at this time.

[pause while she scratches her head ..]

Nup. Even though xmas was spent coughing and it kept waking up Da Boodsta sleeping in his NEW VERSION of cat-tree-with-round-thingy-on-the-top, we both managed to get through it without a cross word. I did several times wonder how insane I would’ve driven Stringer with the coughing, had he been here. I can only think he would’ve been obliged to take to me with a ball pein hammer after several days .. WOT a good thing, then, that he isn’t. See ? – positives abound !!

So, my dears, this is your horribly ancient blogger signing off for 2023 in a sunny mood and with one last fusillade of coughs.

May you not over-celebrate on Sunday night. May your chickens remain their normal size so as to find it impossible to do any kicking down of dunny doors. May you be sensible and not make a single resolution for 2024. May the times become as dull as ditchwater overnight.

I love yous all.

So that’s it until June

/ MR / 21 Comments

I can’t move, after all: I didn’t find a place to move to in the month after which I’d told my Property Manager I would be gone.

Of all the places I found – not sure how many, but probably around a dozen – there were three I really and truly wanted: one was in the CBD, one in Malvern and one in Carlton. The first one I was rejected for without explanation – this is the bit that hurts, when they tell you no but go on advertising the place – the second I was mucked about by an expert mucker-abouter to whom I passed on that he’s una pezza di merda because he has an Italian name; and the third was the very last place I saw.

It was a dear little newish place with everything I must have – a bedroom, dishwasher and split system, and in a simply gorgeous environment of trees and plants. However ! it seems I have finally achieved a degree of common sense, for I didn’t even apply .. It is in the middle of – like, nothing. Other residential buildings, all nice and equally nicely landscaped. Not a shop in sight of any kind at all. Sure, only six or seven minutes’ walk to the tram, but one must actually travel on it to reach the Carlton shops in Lygon Street. Here all I need do to reach my delightful pharmacist is manage the ghastly intersection of Leicester, Victoria and Elizabeth Streets with their array of slow lights and Bob’s yer uncle. And I mention Cheryl’s pharmacy because an old fart of my age is in frequent need of same, just to keep up with her scripts, let alone buy hair bleach, non-soap bodywash and so forth.

And knowing me, the prospect of those unavoidable minutes of walking before being able to go anywhere would render me even more likely to sit in my lovely big recliner chair, crocheting, with Boodie between my shins.

I think these lovely little flats were designed for students who have scooters or bikes, for there is a nice big empty space just inside the front door, absolutely suitable to park one of these. Whilst I would give my back teeth to have someone teach me how to ride an e-scooter, I wouldn’t be able to count on there being one nearby whenever I needed it.

So, I turned my back on it, with great sadness. As my sister Paula and I agreed by phone, I wasn’t meant to move at this time.

What in the name of all the gods I’m going to do come the end of May –  chissà ? Something will turn up. Maybe aged care. Oh jesus  ..

On Life – or, rather, On Cholesterol

/ MR / 24 Comments

I’m immortal, surely ! – I must be.

It isn’t possible that I’m going to kark at any stage: I’m ME, alive, breathing, thinking, eating, writing, crocheting, loving my little mog and a small, select group of humans and [deep breath] planning to move again. (Shut up. More later.)

But.

Friday I saw my GP, who explained to me a report from another doctor who wrote it after seeing what is known as a ‘calcium score’ CT scan. Cecile – my GP, in whom I have a great deal of trust, but it is not unlimited – had about a year ago found signs of atrial fibrillation and sent me to a cardiologist. He could not find any more signs, and in fact none have since been found .. except that the calcium score the other day has – as some kind of next step up, presumably – this time found atherosclerosis. O joy ! – disease that killed my father at 64.   😦

So, having become a dedicated fan of Malcolm Kendrick’s since my younger sister introduced me to his book “The Great Cholesterol Con”, which I followed with his “The Clot Thickens”, I’m suddenly actually involved in it all !

What do I mean by “it” ? – I refer to the facts that prove beyond any doubt to me – as well as to Paula, and now (deo gratias !) to many doctors around the world – that cholesterol, far from being bad, is both good and vitally necessary. And that statins are very likely to be the worst con perpetrated on humans by other humans, ever ! (For which you must blame Big Pharma, who are making billions of bucks out of them.)

I must go visit the cardiologist again, as soon as I can get an appointment. It will be interesting. Cecile simply wrote in her referral to him that “she is not on statins” and has handed me on to him with a big sigh of relief. I suggested as she was typing that she should say “and if you can get her onto them you’ll be succeeding where I have failed absolutely !”, but she demurred .. [grin]

I think my major interest now is in ascertaining what he has in mind. An angiogram ? And if it does indeed prove that artery/arteries is/are atherosclerotic, what then ? Because au fond, as the French say succinctly, any treatment by statins he has in mind is never going to be undertaken by me. Not ever. So is there actually any point in an angiogram ?

The cardio is not going to be tickled pink with me. What can I say in my own defence ? Well, there have been many times when the entire medical fraternity has been proven wrong about something, and the cholesterol “diet/heart hypothesis” is IT, currently. I have read Malcolm Kendrick – sorry, I have listened to two of his books, and I agree with everything he writes: the logic is irrefutable. Imnsho it is not possible to take in what he says and not believe it. And below is the kind of simplified garbage that you find on Google – or presumably any search engine – if you go searching on “cholesterol”:

It’s utter bullshit. There ain’t no sech thing. Eat as much fat, of all kinds (not counting trans fats !) as you like/want.

Read Malcolm Kendrick and become another believer !

 

Very strange .. it’s all new !

/ MR / 14 Comments

I hear stuff I doubt I’ve heard before – the noise that pulling on my jeans makes, to start with. Then the startling loudness of me swearing when I don’t get the hook into the first eye behind my bra – heavens ! Can the whole building hear me too ?? Are they all rolling their eyes and telling their partners “Uh-oh .. she’s getting dressed !”

I think tomorrow I won’t put in these hearing-aids until after I’m dressed.

 

Well, I can’t compete with her

/ MR / 17 Comments

But the question is: do I want to ..?

We all have different goals – those of us who have ’em, that is – and no-one can say whose is the most laudable.

I didn’t consider myself to have a goal at all: I did tell several friends that I’m going to kark at 93, but that was a statement based on .. erhmm .. maths, rather than one constituting a goal.

Check out this pretty amazing woman:

(I use the adjective because I reckon it’s fucking amazing that anybody at all derives enjoyment from running in races.)

The ABC article got me wondering about personal goal/s ..

Do I want to be celebrated for doing stuff people associate with younger women ? – nup. Do I seek to come first at anything ? – nup. Do I harbour secret yearnings to win literary awards ? – nup.

So do I have one single aim ? – yep.

To keep love in my life: that’ll maintain the difference between us. 

Way to go !!!

/ MR / 25 Comments

I’m signed up with a small sadist, right now: her name is Monica and she’s a physiotherapist.

(In fact she’s gorgeous – I took to her immediately !)

This is all about my posture. My younger sister (the cleverest of the once five who comprised John Dunphy’s daughters back there in Perth) mentioned anxiously to me that I wasn’t standing straight; and like most of her advice, it sank in. I noticed to my horror that my forward lean was rapidly increasing and had become habitual. And no, it’s not osteoporosis: it’s BAD POSTURE.

So on the advice of my medical team (which is my GP and her practice Nurse, both of whom I dote on) I saw Monica, who went through a long checklist to see how mobile I am and, I suspect, how determined to adjust. I passed. Whew !! Now I am doing daily exercises – religiously, of course, because I’m such a religious person. [grin] I am to return to Monica at the end of the month so that she can see the degree of ease with which I’m doing them; meaning have I been keeping up the regimen ??!!

So seeing this article in this-morning’s “The Guardian” made me sit up (literally: I was a bit slouched) and I read it avidly.

I would SO like to participate. But £199 ?? Shit, that’s 371.47AUD !!! I think she must be not only amazingly good at walking, but an impressively successful monetizer of the fact. I wonder how many people are signed up ? – my guess is a whole big lot.

This activity would suit me 100%. And it would provide another challenge to bolster what I’m doing with The Small Sadist.

I don’t blame Joanna Hall for making money out of her personally-achieved and carefully thought-out fitness programme. But I do blame her for setting the financial bar so high.

Oh SIGH ! – there I go again. Bloody whingeing Aussie, eh ?    😦