And then it rains...literally and metaphorically...

Well, as Christmas rapidly approaches, I find myself falling into the usual feelings of complete pointlessness that seem to be so much more present and stark at this especially false time of year.
The shear monumental transparency of the occasion seems to make it so difficult for me to enter into the 'spirit' as we all know it in our consumer society. I know that I'm in a minority in expressing myself like this. Most others that I venture to offer this perspective to call me a 'humbug' or variations of that general concept. That it's considered by people to be bad form not to subscribe heartily to the gluttony, get pissed and shout a lot, perhaps have a damn good scrap, buy presents for people that don't need them, and get stuff you don't need in return, so that the retailers can make up for the fact that no one really wants most of their pointless wares for the rest of the year. It's almost incumbent on us to 'support' the retailers. It's UN Australian, or UN American or Un British to just do without these days, and how many of us would consider that a valid response to Christmas?

It truly bothers me though... and I find the process of shopping is almost repulsive at this time of year. The total absence of the very 'cheer' that we're supposed be revelling in amongst the great majority of shoppers is quite the most depressing thing to behold. I've long felt it difficult to understand why people don't acknowledge the cars that stop to let them cross on a zebra crossing, but the fact that they don't acknowledge that at this time of the year seems to be so much worse. So I go around in my small and insignificant way and try to spread the kind of cheer that I think should be spread. I smile at people. I hold doors open. I stop to let the unconscious cross the zebra crossings, I nod and smile as I hold open my rucksack for the shop employees to examine the contents to see if I've been shop lifting, and then, surprisingly, I snot all over my kids when I get home to find that they've been chucking their cute little messes all over the house... in the spirit of Christmas.

Then I have to come down here to the Garage (aka the cave) to contemplate what it is that's 'wrong' with me. (Thank goodness I have 'the cave' to escape myself to).

Last week, quite a lot happened. We had some very 'Queensland' typa weather for one thing. Our newest (and oldest) car - the Pajero, which is the ripe old age of 15, and which has survived in Queensland all that time without sustaining any hail damage, sustained some hail damage. Those of you who've never seen the hail storms here will not appreciate the nature of one so I'll just describe a little. Last week, there was an obvious storm front travelling across in front of my desk which happens to have a glorious vista (OK not a 'vista' but a panoramic view) of the valley behind the motorway at Loganholme. It was VERY dark and ominous. Then, seemingly unconnected bangs started. I wondered what they were and then the whole office, as one, suddenly realised what the noise was and we all sprinted for the exit, to get our cars out of the storm and under cover. Fortunately there's covered car parking in our area but no one normally uses it because it's around the bask and you have to get a lift up to the office as opposed to just walking in. Anyway, I just made it to cover and about 15 seconds later the hail came down in earnest... and about 10 seconds after that, another car made it to cover, but too late...its bonnet was like a bombed no mans land of craters. The hail is not like the kind we have in Britain, this is like golf balls or even as big as tennis balls! Back at home, the Pajero was in the drive... and Molly, although at home, was totally unprepared for the unfolding storm, having never seen one before... and even if she had, you have no way of knowing until it starts falling, what's about to happen. Once it starts, its pretty dangerous to go out in it, unless you have a very sturdy umbrella or a helmet...or ideally both. You'll imagine I'm sure that being hit be a piece of ice falling from the sky that's the size of a golf ball would be painful at best, and possibly fatal if you were unlucky. So the poor old Pajero sustained about 15 dents to the bonnet...and a handful to the roof, most of which was covered by the roof rack which has a board on it.

Bugger...

On the plus side (we hope) however, is the fact that we've put in a series of offers on a house in the local area that originally was on for about 55k more than we finally got it for. here The fly or the spice in the ointment (depending on how you look at it) is that we are contracting to rent the house before we buy it, subject to the sale of our land. We have 6 months to sell the land.

It's a bit stressful really because the house, although it has a fair bit of potential, has some fundamental flaws in the layout that we will need to fix once we have the ownership of it. The process is fairly onerous here, and to complicate it all, we have recently (a month ago) signed another years contract on the rental house we live in. We can get out of it (hopefully) within a short space of time, but the responsibility for ensuring the landlord gets his rent is ours until another tenant is found. We're being assured that this is likely to be quite quick, as we've picked the right time of year to be 'breaking our contract' but it's still a bit of a worry.

And in typical 'Chris Martin' style, I've booked a ticket to fly to the UK with Molly that means that I'm out of the country at the precise time that we would have been moving house, meaning that our Christmas break will be one of packing and storing and hopefully finding places with mates that we can store stuff, or arranging with the vendors to prevail on their generosity and let us put a shed on their property to store our stuff on until we move proper. AND... if THAT wasn't enough... Daile and the girls will be in Whangarei in NZ for 10 days from the 10th to the 20th of Jan! So we have three days when they get back before Moll and I go...! Woohoo! GOD we're good!