No more boring … for a while

We were sailing along, living our normal (boring?) life, here on the dock of the (Port) river  …

There were the usual second-hand purchases: a bigger coffee table $15 (cheaper than the smaller one) and a $4 lamp, IKEA lamp $20 -shade- the hundreds of pot lights here are way too bright  - oh and the HUGE Monet poster to hide the ugly (ugly) wall-mount TV contraption in my bedroom!

The new coffee table - guess you need to see the old to appreciate the difference!!

Can you believe this lamp (without this crazy shade) was $130!!

Then Cassia's driving lessons: not really lessons more practicing I guess. She already has her driver's licence in Canada, Spain and now Australia (no test reqrd.- phew) but driving in Adelaide requires her to sit on the other side of the car, drive on the other side of the road and change gears with the other hand (left) - all this and she doesn't have a clue where she is going -  hence the need to practice!!  We start out in the industrial area on the weekend with no traffic - but we've slowly introduced traffic, intersections, traffic lights and people into the mix and now there are only minor jerks, very few stallings at intersections and few (if any) pedestians in our wake! 

A bit more culture: Billed as a "Night Mural Picnic" - we (50-60 people) sat outside at the end of our group of buildings and watched as murals by local artists were projected onto the walls ( "futuristic urban transformations"!). Sandwiched in between some pretty crazy wintry weather, this night was bearable; cool & breezy but a souvenir blanket and hot chocolate (included in the price) helped. It was pretty gosh-darned amazing!

Our house is three doors to the left.

A bit of babysitting the ever-adorable "J". 

Jasper loves Tia Cassia ...

... especially play cubby in Joseph's wardrobe with the wind-up flashlight!

Cassia spending hours applying for jobs all over the country. Cassia receiving rejection notices from all over the country. A bit of shopping to cheer us up and that was about as exciting as life was until Monday...

Cassia had an interview for a job!  It was a phone interview because the job was in Esperance Western Australia.  Cassia didn't really want a job in Esperance W.A. because Esperance W.A. is on the other side of the country; a 22hr drive from Adelaide across the Nullabor dessert , and an 8 hr drive from Perth. But she needed the practice interviewing so she studied the whole weekend and even though during the interview, she couldn't understand a word the manager said, a call came the next day on our way into town, on the crowded tram (street car), to offer her the job!  

Of course she did what anybody who is offered a job in Esperance W.A. would do - she panicked - asked for a couple of hours to make a decision- then broke into tears! We left the tram and went into one of the nicer hotels in town and sat in their lovely lobby and took a million deep breaths …  Call Pablo he'll help make a decision - well it was 3.00 a.m. in Spain, and Pablo turned off his phone when it rang so that was no help!  So ... she had to decide all by herself!

 She knew her best chance of a job would be in a country town. At least this one is on the coast and she will live one street away from a very nice beach and be able to walk to work and there are lots of great National Parks close by and it does have an airport so Perth isn't quite so far and with the flexible work schedule, she can take a trip to see Erin (Perth), a trip "home" to see me (Adelaide) and after I stay for the first two weeks, I'll make another trip and hopefully Joseph will be back and he can make a trip and by then it will be Christmas and Pablo will be there right after!  So YES!! -  she can do it! A phone call to the very nice HR lady to accept and all of a sudden things are pretty exciting here on the dock!  

Dressing for a job in an Australian rural town, working for the local council, requires precision choices in clothing - so off we go to the shops … again! There is a uniform provided!  Yikes!  (You should know that uniforms are very big in Australia.)  This one is (we think/we hope) just a blue shirt with the council logo discreetly embroidered on the chest -so pants/skirts/cardys (sweaters) will suffice.  Oh and a rather adorable dress to compensate for the tough days ahead (pretty well guarantee there will be some).  I must say I rather enjoy shopping vicariously through my daughter. 

The dress we had to convince ourselves she needed!

... the skirt was a no brainer!

 There may be just one letter different but the joy of looking for XS instead of XL (XXL?) is hard to describe.  The shop assistants look at me strangely as they help me look - sometimes I explain - sometimes I don't!  The funny (sad) part is that in my previous life here, most of my shopping in these stores was for an M or S not XL (you should know that Australian sizes are slightly bigger than N.A.). Sad face...

A fleet of Dutch tall ships arrive this week, docking almost at our front door, so we're having a brunch to celebrate and say goodbye to Cassia and then we're off … to Esperance, Western Australia … on the other side of the country ... flying … not driving!!