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garage sale
November 2009 
Packing Away
Posted on Jul 21st, 2008
by 
Fearless
Fearless
THERE ARE TWO HOUSEHOLDS I must pack away before I leave on this wonderful epic journey around Australia - one in Melbourne and another in the country.
My lovely little house in the country is on a river and I received a telephone call a couple of days ago to say that it's been raining continuously (a great thing since our country is in drought at the moment), but the river was rising and there was some concern about my house being flooded. (Crap timing since settlement is due in two weeks!) lol
Scoff if you will, but I've taken to lighting a candle at our Second Life island when there is something I am troubled by and I lit a candle to keep my lovely house safe. Today I checked the river level (on a great weather/river level website) and great news - the level has dropped .16 of a metre which brings it that much further below minor flood level.
My main concern in the house is a lovely old 1880's German steel-framed piano, which would completely disintegrate if it got wet.
So, I am packing up this Melbourne house and then heading up to the country for two weeks or so to clear out the house and shed for the new owners, who take possession mid-August. I've been agonising over what to keep; what to sell and what to give away, but I think once I start going through the things, it will all become clear.
The piano is an old treasure - bought for $70 at a garage sale and a bit battered from its years of use at a local Sunday school. I might loan that to a neighbour (and keep my options open until I know where I will be settling eventually). There's an old trunk that someone from Floridia in Italy brought with them to Brunswick (an inner Melbourne suburb) and which I picked up at a market for $20 - another great bargain. I'll hold on to that one.
The shed - full of stuff that "might come in handy one day" is going to be a bit of a treasure trove I think. A 44-gallon drum cut lengthways is a perfect "out in the garden" fire pit; a thick old wooden and glass door from an 1880's miner's cottage I used to live in; a rustic garden setting made from twigs; a huge and heavy barbeque table that takes six men to lift; and assorted other bric a brac.
I'm also organising my financial situation, which will be a meagre one. After I pay off my mortgage, car loan and credit card I will barely have enough to give me a paltry $200 AUS to live on each week. Yep, $200 a week! lol I'm used to poverty, but that is going to be a real challenge - especially while travelling. I will pretty much get one tank of petrol, $50 worth of food and $50 towards camping fees etc out of it.
I might have to set Marlo (my four year Kelpie) to catching her own dinner at night. Still, I'm not daunted. That could be because I'm ridiculously stubborn!
On the whole though, I am really looking forward to the challenges ahead. I'll try and squirrel away as much money as I can by having a garage sale of all my stuff and working from time to time while I'm on the road. I've done a variety of different things - administration, child care, animal welfare, journalism, writing, retail, vineyard worker, fruit picking - so I'm confident of my ability to earn along the way.
The worse it is, the better the story!
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