Self Imposed Exile

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DAY 325


We are excited, it is nearly time for the off, and today is the day we are going to stay in the house and clean it top to bottom so we can give it back to Julie all spick and span.

I was up first and “at it” straight away, cleaning that is, it is something that I don’t mind doing and find it quite therapeutic as long as I can get on with it in my own way

All our stuff for the Kitchen Box that gets packed into the trailer was re-washed and put away, and once the lid was on the box that was it, next stop the trailer.

All the electronic stuff we carry with us, power supplies for the laptop, phone chargers, solar panels, ipod chargers, all had to be looked at packed and ready for transit.

The truck was cleaned of gear that needed to be pack, and as it was going it to have some warranty work carried out tomorrow we would wait until it came back when before loading it, though we would wash it inside and out

Everything had to be done, as you can appreciate that over the 5 weeks all our gear has come out, been used and now has to go back and be put away.

On my list of things to do was the lap top wanted defragmenting and have the files tidied up as for September alone their were about 1800 digital images, when you were uploading the blog you have to trawl through them all to find the latest ones to be inserted in to the blog, so these were going to have to be copied across to the portable hard drive and the hard drive cleared, I know its not a hard job, but it needs doing all the same and it all takes time.

You can tell we have had a lot of Internet usage in Cairns we have used nearly 5Gb, this month alone, yet usually we barely break into that.

The Kitchen was cleaned, Caroline was in control of the washing and ironing department, whilst I carried on, making sure all crockery was clean and put away, and the floors were all done.

I moved the living room sofas and cleaned the floors underneath, dusted the top of all pictures and even moved the TV set and dusted and mopped behind.

Don’t get me wrong its not out of trying to be a saint but, I would hate to move back to our house in Chandlers Ford and find that tenants had left a sh*t tip for us to come back to, its about having a little pride, and by tonight I wanted everything done except our travel bags, cleaning the bath room and toilet which can be left until last.

The job I really wanted “to get my teeth into” was to mop the whole of the decking down outside, which in it self was quite a big prospect, it probably took me a good 4 hours to move all the furniture, plants, ornaments mop it, then put it all back, the second thing that need doing was to wipe down all the metal railings that formed the balcony.

Caroline needed to go into Earlville and order an on going prescription of contact lenses, and I needed a few bits so she left me entrenched in domestic duties.

I think some time in the afternoon I stopped for an Ice-lolly break sitting outside in a comfy chair with a book, obviously pretending to Caroline that I had not stopped all afternoon. she arrived back and found me in my horizontal position, with an Ice-lolly wedge in my gob, much to her disgust.

We had been busy all day, the house was shaping up nicely, but we still had a way to go.

We stopped for our evening meal, and Caroline was at the helm whilst I typed the blog for the day before (Day 324 From a different Perspective) where we had gone to see the train.

Last month our blog’s were read a total of 3349 for August and we are really pleased that it will not be that far off this month, which I think is truly amazing, not withstanding the fact that lately some of our blog’s have not been that exciting.

I don’t know if any of you regular blog readers, remember Andrew and Kirsty from our Blogs way back, the last time we saw them, was blog 220 date 15th June 2009 Grotto You said It, when we were in Kununarra we had done a fair bit of our trip with Andrew and Kirsty as well as the Truman Family, well Kirsty rang us today and we were overjoyed we had worried about them as we were not sure as to what had become of them.

These lovely people are back in Victoria where they started their adventure 7 months from the date of leaving, I know we will catch up again with all the people we have met along the way on this most joyous trip, which will be fantastic, we just have to work out how we can fit everyone in.

After our evening meal, I carried on with some cleaning, I just couldn’t sit down, but when 8.30 arrived I wanted to watch something on TV, so Caroline called me and I came in.

It was 9.30 I had seen what I wanted to so I thought and ½ and hour tidying up outside was what I wanted to do, so again I set to it, the more done today the less to be done tomorrow, and at about 10.30, the evening was lovely and cool so I sat out in the night air and read a few more pages of my book.

The fluorescent light was on and 3 Gecko’s had sneaked in and lay about the tube, I suppose to get the warmth from the lamp, or is it an easy place for them to sit and stalk their prey, the occasional moth attracted by the light, these Geckos make such a big noise for such a little creature.

We wandered off to bed after a very full and bust day, I have to be up fairly early to take the truck in to Nissan, as I have said to have some warranty worked carried out

So it’s off to bed bloggers, we must go and get some sleep so until tomorrow.

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