My days spent waiting on the lecie guy

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Before we left Scotland, I had made a few contacts in the health sector and pretty much decided that if I get a job in health then cool, but if I get the opportunity to work in a different industry then cool - So, I pretty much didn’t had a clue what I wanted to do!

Ricky had a week before starting work and this was spent looking for flats so I was only half looking the first week. The second week I was checking the web, The Age (Melbourne's main newspaper) career supplement on a Sat and I also handed my CV into a couple of agencies (which were hard to find as the CBD is full of tall buildings and little lanes!). We did manage to set up bank accounts, get our Medicare cards and get Tax File Numbers, so it was a busy week, on top of getting the flat.

Ricky did a post about the whole electricity thing - but I think you also need to hear it from my (the girl who had to sit in an empty flat for the best part of two days's) point of view!

Weeeellllll - we got the keys for the flat on Fri and because we knew it was going to Fri night we were moving in, we arranged for the electricity to get switched on at some point that day. I had an interview with an agency at 12.30, but was in the flat from about 2pm where I stayed for the rest of the day - with no food, no heating (it was cold coz it had been lying empty!) and not much credit in my phone! Seriously, where is my Dad when I need him? By about 5pm and after a few stern phone calls from Ricky to the elecie company, we thought they would be rushing out to get our lights on before it got dark at 6pm. Seems not.

By this point, I was bored, really bored, hungry and cold. Ricky arrived at the flat as soon as he could after work and we headed to Ikea for a night out. On the way there, I called the elecie company again and they said they couldn’t get access to the building because the entrance was secure. "Has the elecie guy never seen the buzzer to a flat before" I thought to myself. He must have gone to the same Uni as the taxi drivers. The guy on the phone was quite helpful and was adamant that someone else will be out on first thing on Monday. Good.

The weekend was pretty much spent in Ikea, K-Mart and Target. Then on the Sunday we went to Healesville, which was amazing as Ricky was saying. Anyway I don’t want to talk about the animals too much coz I’m higher up in the food chain (I know what you are thinking Ellie!!).

So Monday came - same thing happened all over again - I’m not kidding!!! This time the phone calls from Ricky were stern and abusive. He was promised repeatedly that it would all be sorted by 7pm. That was good of them! It was dark at 6pm and I was well pissed off, only this time I had NO credit in my phone. Ricky was really busy at work (or so he told me) and I reckon he didn’t want to be on the phone to me all day - fair enough, anyway he was too busy on the phone to the f**kin elecie people, who’s lights are certainly not switched on (and neither were ours). Just after 7pm Ricky called me to release me from my duties as cold house sitter and told me to pack a bag and come to his work. Great.

When I got to Ricky’s work, he was laughing. Laughing?! I just laughed too and we headed to the pub. What had happened during the course of that day was when Ricky made a last and final call of the evening to the elecie company, they said they had no record that anyone had to come out to our flat. We couldn’t believe it.

Well that was Monday. I couldn't stay in the flat for the lecie bloke on Tuesday as I had managed to get a couple of days work in the Department of Education in the City. I was just sorting out their files and other crappy admin stuff that they couldn’t be bothered doing themselves. I realized pretty quickly that the best part of working anywhere in the City is lunch time. Chinese, sushi, Italian, coffee and cake, Indian, burgers, sandwiches, I could go on, but basically anything you would ever want on your doorstep, in abundance. There are cafes and sushi joints everywhere. I’ve taken a liken to the wee cafes that actually put fresh oranges, watermelon, strawberries, apples, spinach, ginger, whatever you want into a juicer and make you a big cup of freshly squeezed juice. Yum yum!! And the best bit - it’s only ever about $5 (₤2) what a bargain for a big cup of goodness.

After my 2 days working in what felt like the head mistress’ office I was straight onto the phone to the agency to ask them to get me something else.

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