A combination of the threat of visitors and my complete irritation with the state of the house has led to a major housework binge today. The bed has been stripped and re-made with a doona, and the winter quilt. The floor has been vacuumed to within an inch of its life (this was interrupted while I had a long think about why the Dyson was not sucking very well, worked out the problem and addressed it) and the oriental rug which has been gracing the floor of the lounge in its rolled-up and packaged state for some time now is no longer packaged and is unrolled on the newly washed linoleum. This has unfortunately reminded me that the dog, while we lived in NZ, had the misfortune to assume that the Christmas Tree was a thoughtfully provided indoor toilet (a reasonable assumption since both the cats and I had one - so clearly this was meant for him). Since it took some days for me to realise what he was doing, it has resulted in the rug having a permanent odour (easily overlooked when wrapping in packing plastic - not so easily overlooked right now), which is most unpleasant. I am sure there is a powder of some sort that you can rub into a rug to deal with this sort of thing, but I have yet to find it - not that I have actively sought it. No point trying to shampoo it out as the rug is coloured with vegetable dyes, and so not amenable to shampoos or steam cleaners. One day I will be able to afford to take it to a professional oriental rug cleaner (is there such a thing in Tassie?) and deal with the problem on a more permanent basis, but for now, I will let the smell remind me I must do something about it. The quilt that has come off the bed has been washed, as have the various dog and cat beds and they are all merrily drying in front of the fire which has been burning all day due to low temps and high winds. So this winter the house will be positively civilised!! Still with the summer nighties though as I suspect there are one or two more warm nights remaining in this autumn's repertoire.

Well that's a disappointment. A friend posted on Facebook that the Doctor is back on Sunday. Presumably on ABC which I have always assumed was an inalienable right for all good Australians. Apparently not if you live in the country though. I plugged in the telly and did a channel search and woe is me, despite numerous tries in various locations for the antenna, and the signal booster set to maximum, I get a very fuzzy channel I assume to be SBS and another that I think is PAL. So no Doctor for me. I will have to increase my download limit so I can watch it on I-channel I guess... how sad is that!? A lovely sunny day which was mainly spent trying to phone people who had arranged times to call but who were no there to answer their phones. I guess they consider it is fun to mess with peoples' heads like that, but personally, since it was they who called us - I am not cold-calling - I think it is downright rude!! Anyway, life goes on. I managed to pick enough firewood out of the stack to avoid getting the chainsaw out - it will be 14 degrees tomorrow with wind, so probably feeling a lot cooler. So have the fire set to go when I find out whether tomorrow is as bad as they say it will be. A nice walk along the high street between calls garnered various conversations and gossip opportunities, so not all was lost.

From time to time I dabble in a little genealogy. It was quite exciting for the first few generations and then all those ancestors with significant contributions to the global population started to confuse and bewilder me (particularly the men who re-married and started naming their second family with the same names as those of their first family - darn Scottish naming traditions!!). One of those families - this one from Nottinghamshire - turned up about 12 children a couple of generations back and so I didn't bother finding out who had married whom beyond my own direct line. Then the other day I was cruising through Genes Reunited and spotted two people with my mother in their family trees. She had an unusual name, so this was grounds for a possible match. Turns out this family is descended from my great grandmother's eldest brother - so there you go - another 15 or so people in the family tree, and a couple of extra surnames!! I sort of forgot it was Good Friday today so stunned the neighbourhood by starting up the lawn mower at 10am to get back on top of the growth that has eventuated from the recent rain (paltry though the rain itself was). Fortunately I ran out of petrol so was able to withdraw, honour intact, not too long afterward. Hope I didn't offend anyone ... Another genealogical website has recently sent me a reminder that I have not been logging in (they must do wonderfully regular house-cleaning of their inactive membership as this happens fairly often). Ancestry Aid holds the unique position of actually being free. What is more, they have bored genealogists who will devote time to checking out obstacles on the family tree (relatives called John Brown who were born in England, for example) and sieving the data to get you a good match to the family history. They did wonders for my Eliza Taylor who was born in London, and confirmed that the one I had hoped was her, was indeed her, taking her back out of London a couple more generations and into the counties. A pretty chilly morning this morning provided the perfect excuse for a fire to start the day and, though I nearly let it go out around lunchtime, it has been given a new lease of life to get me through the evening. ALso sorted out an excel table so I know who I will be phoning tomorrow when I start hitting the phone once more - I have emailed it to my coach so that we are both singing off the same page (it has notes of previous contacts etc...)

So the sales careers is onward and upward apparently. Five more calls today and four have booked conversations for Saturday. Lucky really as it seems my potential recruit has redirected her mail (presumably back to me) without opening it (I have a tracking number for it). Frankly I am happy with this as it struck me she might not be able to make her own financial decisions so it is a bit of a relief not to have to pursue her. So apart from running around making phone calls (which involve car trips due to the poor reception around here) and piling the odd log on the fire (the air having a distinct nip in between rain showers), I have not achieved all I had hoped to achieve. So it will be good to have tomorrow off as an obligatory holiday (not even sales people are crass enough to pursue leads on Good Friday!). Tonight's dinner is a serving of that luscious trout I cooked a few weeks back - so trout and olives for dinner, with perhaps some rice to pick up the juices. Not enough rain to be excited about, BTW.

Another new customer this morning!! WOo hoo - so happy to finally crack the point where money comes in, rather than goes out (not quite there actually as this is a trial offer so costs her less than me, but she seems a likely long-term prospect if her budget holds out). And another call to make tonight, which will hopefully have similar results. So sewing was a bit abbreviated today what with running out to place orders, send parcels, do phone calls and such like - will be easier to organise this once I am no long shackled to my coach who seems to be holding my hand rather too tightly at present. Still I expect we will get there in the end. The benefit of this is that I will now be able to afford more ads and so hopefully obtain more customers - and so the cycle goes on. Also booked one table for the Campania market (I hope as I had to text her, there being no answer on her home phone) and enquired for the Kempton Market, so fingers crossed on both of these. Now all I have to do it cook dinner for myself and off out into the howling wilderness to make another phone call. No prizes for guessing I may be opting for a landline and computer satellite service once I get a regular income back once more.

Another fun day of chasing leads - the down side of having a coach in WA who works full time, studies part time and fits the job in around these priorities, is that the last two calls will be at 9 tonight (past my bed time!!) as one of them is in WA. The slightly earlier one (8:15) has agreed to that time via a short call this morning. Fingers crossed!! This is much more fun that sitting waiting for a response to an ad...

Much excitement on the home front today - someone has accepted an offer of a Decision Pack which means she has started the journey toward becoming a distributor like me! A total gross income of $9.95 so far, somewhat counter-acted by the cost of sending the package to her (fortunately I had one to hand), but will be phoning her back on Saturday to follow up (if I don't call her before to confirm it arrival). Still, since it is registered post this should be easy enough to ascertain. My free mascara also arrived in the post today! And it works what is more. Happy me!! And today's freebie is a few sachets of coffee (I foolishly failed to scroll down so missed the pasta packs, which is probably a good thing for my waistline at least. Speaking of waistlines - I have lost 3 kg in the seven weeks I have been using this stuff. Not bad considering my tendency to fall of the diet wagon with monotonous regularity. This was confirmed yesterday when I was able to fit into the new corduroy pants i bought at the Op shop for $5.00. So not only a new waistline, but a new wardrobe item as well. I have solved the mystery of the freecycler's decision to throw stuff out - she has switched to a new fad diet - this one is called the paleo diet - I think I will stick to the one I am on - it might let me eat more interesting food. There was also half a bottle of very expensive hair conditioner, so I am not sure what that was all about. Oh, and we have a table to book for the Campania Market - I will have to call tomorrow now I guess, though will try tonight once i unearth the magazine the info is in.

So apart from someone contacting me to say they were fixed up I have had no replies to the emails yet. I have, however, had a mystery phone message from someone in Hawthorn who may be responding to my ad in the Melbourne papers, so fingers crossed on that one. I plan to speak to my trainer first thing and take her advice as to how to respond (supported phone call or whatever). Today was our Successs Training Seminar so I was off to Hobart for further indoctrination. Our trainer today was a 24 year old girl from Cairns who started her business five years ago. I hate to think how many dollars she is now pulling in per week, but clearly her five years were better spent doing this than going to Uni!! So much get up and go!! Her family is from New Guinea (which I think is spelled differently these days, but what can you do), and her goal is to make sufficient money to be able to make real change for her extended family with the money she earns. Nice to see someone that young with a level head on her shoulders, but still able to have great fun along the way. I also collected a box of groceries being given away on Freecycle - clearly someone has stopped their healthy eating phase as it includes things like wheat grass powder, corn meal, muesli (home-made) and other such delights. Some good meals to be extracted from this box!! The weather was less than conducive to easy driving today with strong buffetting winds and scudding rain showers - one of which was downright tropical, for the brief period it lasted. So early to bed tonight I think,so I can be up and about early and call my first potential customer ...!

I have been becoming a little despondent with the complete lack of response to my efforts at advertising the business, but my lovely supervisor has now provided me with 15 of what we call 'call-me' leads. That is, people who have been in contact with the organisation, enquiring, but who have not committed to anything yet. So today I spent a happy hour or so sending out individualised emails to each of these, to see if I can draw a response. A couple have provided dodgy contact details, but I guess you get that. And one has already emailed back to tell me she is already set with some Herbalife from somewhere else - pity. While all these enquiries were logged this month, some of them are from fairly early in the month, so I guess there is a good chance they are already dead in the water - we are an instant gratification society after all. Between this and the weather (scudding rain showers all day) not much else has happened = I spent some time waiting for a phone call and skyping the boss, and so forth as well as emailing, so am now reading Phryne Fisher's latest exploits (or the latest version the local library had available at least). Must read one of the earlier books so I can get some insights into her background ... Last night was not cold, temperature-wise being around 12 degrees, but for some strange reason it was darn cold from where I was lying. So the Royal Stuart tartan picnic rug was whipped out and into service and kept me nice and snug all night.

Lots of work on paperwork today - though some of it was embarrassingly overdue - what with my spat with the English landlords being now several months in the past (how time flies) and still no work done on the house. Fortunately I am now dealing with someone else, so hopefully things will start to chug along in that department at least. I tried to log into ALS today to respond to a couple of posts there, but sadly seem to be unable to do so - does anyone know if the site is down or otherwise unavailable? I tried sending a message to them but so far it has not elicited a response. Anyway - thanks Deb for your 'welcome back' post - apparently it will be a while before I can resume posting though. The day has been fairly rough and ready weather, though with somewhat less rain. All up I seem to have had about 17mm, so still a way to go to fill the tank, but a lot healthier looking than it has been for some time. will have to buy a new ink cassette for the printer soon so I can print out all those tax-related thingies and have a closer look at them ... (the UK tax year differs from ours) Today's freeby is a pack of multivitamins - hope some of the arrive soon so I can start doing the reviews ...

Grey and rainy all day (and thank goodness for the rain) so apart from a brief moment of excitement when I scored yet another free sample (listerine today) I spent a lot of the day dozing by the fire. Smidgen demanded a chance to go outside and he must have really needed to go cos he wandered out into the rain and was not seen for several hours later when he emerged from the small shed down the back yard - dripping wet - so no idea where he had been. Now all dry and comatose in front of the fire with the rest of us.

Claimed a protein bar this morning which is now winging its way over the Strait - wonder what tomorrow will bring? All very exciting. My cousin has been interviewed for Take 5 magazine about her boy who died a couple of years ago. The interview is in this week's magazine and worth a read. Lachie had cerebral palsy and so had a very limiting physical condition - but they made sure he was totally integrated into family life, holidays and fun times as well as ensuring he was able to participate in school and get the support he needed. The article completely misses her 'voice' which has always been upbeat, humorous and so courageous throughout Lachie's short life. quilting - short and sweet today - getting to the end of the counted cross stitch (all the outlying stitches that you assume only a sadist would design into it as they are white on white and other equally difficult to see options, and what is more, highlight the bits where you miscounted and which do not quite match up to where they should be. Oh well, I will just have to fudge it on this one - my eyesight is not quite up to petit point these days. so threw a tantrum and came home early.

Having sorted out the misplaced order, I discovered more money in the account than I had been budgetting for. No I didnt rush out and spend it unwisely - some went to the business account and the rest on paying bills. So now I am solvent and have spare cash for more advertising. Two more ads went into the papers today, and a couple (three) will be going in next weeks papers - this time with a website link (Yay!). Also progressed a bit more business with emails to my coach and to my mentor to organise stuff into the next few weeks. Finally finished stacking the firewood!! That's 8 rows of wood, over a meter high each, and not quite sure how many metres long, but around 3 or more I think. Should hopefully see me through - what do you think?! This cheeky young fellow has been hanging around cheering me on as I labour The diet food is looking good (I had this a few nights ago, courtesy of Jean's son's fish pond... and I have also been having a bit of fun watching the roll-out of Pinchme which is a website that offers free samples of all manner of things (really free) which you can claim, and continue claiming if you provide feedback on the things you have received. So far I have received shampoo (my preferred variety, in a nice sample size ideal for travel) and a mascara (en route as we speak). The launch has had a few teething problems, but has generally gone well, apart from the unbelievable tantrums on line from those who missed out today (like there's not going to be stuff tomorrow, and the day after and so forth into eternity.) Talk about the 'entitled' generation!! Last night was downright chilly and by around 5 I was regretting my decision to opt out on the doona, so tonight I have my standby scottish tartan picnic rug carefully set by 'in case' ...

Spent the day sorting out the chaos that arose as a result of my attempts to buy domain names and use them to be redirected to the websites I wanted them to point at. Almost there, though there are some things I just don't understand, being a bit of a technoblonde when it some to this more complicated stuff. Anyway, the company that removed money from two accounts but failed to provide me with anything resembling a domain name and confirmation of my rights to it for a particular period of time but failed to respond to emails or facebook contacts ... well, it's amazing the results you get when you copy their CEO into the email... Other than that, the fire is lit, the day is cool, the animals are comfily ensconced on chairs in front of said fire ... Have also entertained two visitors (tricky trying to work from home in such a sociable neighbourhood), but since one came bearing food and the other the possibility of some paid work writing up the history of the Parattah Hall, I am feeling pretty happy all round - particularly since the latter visitor originally planned to ask me to do her a favour quite different to this, lol. More wood is now stacked, though still a small mound to go. I expect to clear it finally tomorrow with any luck. We had a rainbow last evening - quite a strong one pointing to the hill behind here. Being St Patrick's Day I should have made the effort to get over there and start digging, but somehow, could not summon the enthusiasm. Oh well.

Another cool day today so took advantage of all that fire wood I had brought inside and lit the fire to keep the house warm all day (and very nice it was too!). The lounge-room is no longer adorned by the table saw!! Finally! I hear you say. Well, yes. The corner where it has been roosting has been scrubbed out and the floor washed down and vacuumed and all such things and now contains some shelving temporarily, pending the construction of bookshelves (and yes, i can hear you saying you won't hold your breaths) I wouldn't be too optimistic about when the bookshelves will arrive, but arrive they will, just as the shed was eventually demolished - these things sometimes take a little longer. The bedroom also got a bit of an overhaul and the sheets are presently drying nicely, as as the cat blankets which usually protect the chairs in the lounge. Sometime in the not too distant future the whole of the lounge-room floor will be given a mop over so I can finally spread the rug out in preparation for winter proper. I had flirted with the idea of introducing the doona back to the bed, but concluded that one chilly night does not a winter make, so the blankets are where they were, and the doona is still in the linen closet waiting for more consistently cooler weather.

I was beginning to think they had lied about today's cold front. There I was out there in full sunshine, breaking a sweat loading stuff on the ute for two trips to the tip, and not a cloud in sight. Come lunchtime I was getting desperate, but came in and made my lunch and settled down and lit the fire (well, it was cool inside the house ...) when woomp! The front arrived, heralded by some pretty strong winds and horizontal rain. Good thing the fire was lit as I have, in my wisdom, apparently created a waterfall when trying to sort out the flue. This hit the top of the hot stove and evaporated immediately, but would have been a bit of a river had the fire not been lit ... Must get up there again and see what I can work out (I hate heights - did i mention that?) It's nine degrees outside and getting cooler, but nice and snug indoors. Some progress has been made ridding the yard of some more of the bits left over from the shed demolition, some of the bricks apparently used for the footing of the shed have been stacked on the lump of concrete down there, and the next step has to be removing the bits of uprights that are still attached loosely to the roof frame, and start stacking the usable timber on top of the roof. At this rate I should have clutter free mowing in the not too distant future, which will be good when things start growing again.

Not quite a four-thirty start today, but almost, and then out to stack some more wood - who would have thought it would take so much effort? Still at least one more row to go I suspect. Then into town for some groceries. The plan was to go into town, drop off rubbish on the way home, and continue through to Jean's place. But it turned out that was unnecessary as I ran into Jean in town and was able to give her the stuff I had planned to drop out to her. She reminded me of the Paddy's Day market (OK, Two days early, but the Catholics were running it and Sunday they have other things to do), and then back to the shop to get the stuff that I as unable to get at the market. Once there it was old home week and I ran into I hate to think how many other people I have not seen for ages (those who were not already met and greeted at the market of course) and so home. Went up on the roof to sort out the chimney, which was a fraught exercise as I have lost confidence in my balance since I had that inner ear thingy (and with good reason too at times), but managed to get the stuff off that was teetering on the edge and move the flue so it was square up with the top of the chimney. I think I will see if i can't get a cap bent which laps the edges of the chimney top and will therefore keep itself in position (with a little help from carefully sited screws into the mortar joins. Then next time i have a man clambering around on the roof I can hopefully con him into fitting it permanently for me.

Another 'wakeup at 4:30, back to bed by 5:30' morning which resolved itself around 8 when I woke once more. We never used to get temperature peaks in the dead of night - it was always a steady plummet to the chilly depths. Worst case scenario was going to bed far too hot and having to haul up some extra bedding before dawn... Moan. I was reminded yesterday that a friend have given me their only copy of a history of their property which I had promised to type up (oops), so I finished that off today, burned a CD and printed off a copy (carefully keeping one for me as well). Then concluded it could wait till tomorrow when I am out and about anyway to save petrol. The ute got a bit of a tidy out and window-washing which was rudely interrupted by the children next door who are firmly of the view that if I am working on that side of the house, I am up for conversation. Sigh. gave up in the end and retreated indoors. It will be better tonight, one hopes, with the temperature already down to 17 and heading south. And tomorrow will be positively temperate thank heaven. The fire has been stacked ready to light tomorrow morning as the morning was quite chilly this morning once it got over its little hot flush.

Any more nights like last night and I would be going postal - far too hot for us mere Tasmanians and once again, an upsurge in temperature in the middle of the night (what's that all about?!). So this morning I was up at 4:30 and back in bed by 5:30 shivering with the cool change - you can't win. So sewing was a pleasant excuse to get out of the house and focus on something other than my need for sleep. Also, the library was open today so I now have restocked. It was a most unpleasant discovery that it was closed on Monday - no-one told me it was a long weekend... The prunes were brought indoors last night, but the act of picking them up dislodged an entire family of large iridescent flies (very pretty, but presumably not too good for the long-term future of the fruit) so that small batch may go to the worm farm (which is thriving, btw). The rest of the still await my memory reminding me to pick up ginger, chillies and capsicums when I am in town. Tomorrow may even be cool enough to resume activities on the former shed. We live in hope.

The nastiest thing about hot weather is hot nights. Here in Tassie we normally escape that sort of thing, as overnight temps are usually in the single or low double digits. But not last night. Last night the coolest we got was 17 degrees, and when I was woken at 1:30 it was because it had gone up to nearly 20 degrees. This is not part of the rules here, weatherwise. Still, it could be worse, I could live in Queensland still... We still seem to be hanging in there for cooler (relatively) weather tomorrow with only 25 forecast, but with strong winds and 16 overnight, so the fan may once again grace the bedroom (wish I had a ceiling fan ...). The wind has picked up, the fire-brigade have washed their truck, so we might be in for an interesting 24 hours. I took advantage of this Indian summer to give the wood-heater another going over - loosening the damper and giving it a good oiling, banging the flue down a few times to loosen up and dislodge anything that might have accumulated and evaded the brush, you know the sort of thing. As the flue was being re-seated on the heater a large giant took a few loud steps down the slope of the roof outside, alerting me to dislodged mortar from around the flue. So once the wind dies down (and it is a dry day) I will be up on the roof sorting that out, apparently. It seems that this might be the source of the raindrops that keep hitting the top of the burner and leaving rust pits on it. I decided to try drying a few of the prune plums. After all, with 35 degrees and a windy day it seemed as good a lot of weather as we are likely to get this side of winter, and so a very few are currently sitting on the grill of the roasting pan outside in the sun and wind. They do seem to be shrivelling a bit, but will clearly need a lot more work once I bring them inside. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that prune plums are free-stone in habit, have a lime green flesh, and don't taste as bitter as I expected. If anything, they don't taste of much at all. Presumably drying them intensifies the flavour. Though the present humidity is more likely to lead to mildew than dried prunes. Anyway, this lot is doomed to become chilli plum sauce, so I am not that concerned. A little more firewood has been stacked and/or brought indoors in preparation for the cool change they keep promising us, the tomatoes remain green and the cabbage whites are having a field day with the remaining savoys, broccoli and cauliflower plants (which will hopefully take off once the weather cools down a bit). Trout for dinner tonight!!

Yesterdays cool temps followed through to about half way through today when it warmed up promptly and became fairly humid. For all the rain falling we received all of 5 mm, so just enough to settle the dust, but not enough to do much good. I spent the morning sorting out the bank in England which had decided all this untoward activity of mine was evidence someone had hacked my account so they stopped all payments, with embarrassing results. All sorted now and hopefully I can get my money back from the company that merrily debited both my accounts, when I had cancelled the order and advised them accordingly. If not, well it was not that much money (I was buying domain names at the time - they are surprisingly cheap and can be bought for periods of one year up to five - I opted for two). So I now have two domain names (from a second website) and have used these to inform my advertisements, and installed a redirection so the people logging onto those addresses (much shorter addresses) will be redirected to the desired destination. Learning curve going berserk here at present. Two names because one is for recruiting, the other is for retail. More learning curve. The dog and cats have had an interesting day of ins and outs due to various visitors and ball games, and I have just finished a rather tasty dish of pea and rice risotto with lightly fried trout over the top. mmmmmmmmmmmmm (no cream, I promise). Tomorrow will be obscenely hot but after that it seems the weather gods will have relented so by the weekend the nights will be quite cool. Great news!! I may get to light the fire again!! This house retains the warmth very effectively now it is insulated - I hate to think how effective it will become once I have the ceiling insulated as well.

A fairly warmish night led to a very early morning so I had breakfast and went back to bed. Today's weather has been overcast and coolish, but with warmish patches and so no idea how to cope with it - clothes on, clothes off, fire stacked, but not lit ... all very confusing. So I bought a couple of domain names, for redirection to the ones provided by the company (which are too long for most newspaper advertisers to accept) and tried to arrange for them to be redirected. One worked, the other, the bank seems to have seized up during the transaction, so will have to contact them tomorrow to find out what is going on (it may be because the company is in Canada and the bank is getting twitchy about my various overseas dealings, or the very nature of the transaction (apparently they don't like payment to internet companies for some reason). Anyway, so once that is sorted out and I have also resolved the difficulties of establishing a merchant account, I will be ready to cope with the (hopefully) rush of prospective clients responding to my three ads in Melbourne-based papers. It's a whole new world this... And stacked a bit more firewood while sorting through the logs for a few that fit so I have a small stockpile in anticipation of the cool change at the end of the week (assuming the weather bureau gets it right for a change). And Oh look - it has gone foggy again and it has now condensed to the point where it might loosely be described as rain... So it's all fun and games here. ETA - It's raining! Bliss

Today was grey and overcast but quite warm nevertheless, and with the occasional splat of water between the eyes giving a closer approximation of yesterday's non-existent showers, discouraged mowing. So I took advantage of this flagrantly transparent excuse to go to the Woodsdale Fair which is an annual event that had snuck up on me all unawares. The had their favourite snake pit there with Reptile Rescue showing off some fine (and dare I say it - huge!!) snakes for the titillation (and education) of the general public, and a plant stall which provided me with a jalapeno chilli (lord knows why since I am not that fond of chilli, but they are an attractive plant and will look nice on the windowsill once I get one - a sill, that is). Home again to pick the fruit which will fall off the trees next week when we climb back up to 30 so may as well be picked, processed and put away during these couple of cooler days. Not that there is much to process, thanks to the rosellas. The plums (prune plums) amount to around 3 kg, and the apples (cider apples) to around 1 kg, so there will not be much in the way of jams, jellies and preserves involved, and since the applies will produce around half a thimble-full of cider I think I will give that a miss this year. Still it is fruit and given the season we have had, and the wet winters that leave the fruit trees waterlogged for months at a time, it is nothing to sneeze at! Hopefully some of that rain they keep talking about will actually fall around here in the next couple of days. At present it is passing both north and south of here, but with a big dry gap in the middle where I am.

Today's forecast is for clearing showers, though it's a bit difficult to see how they are going to achieve that, when they have yet to arrive. Some low cloud (mist) over some of the surrounding hills, but that is about the only evidence of moisture i have seen all day. I did several hours of training and working up an advertisement which I am publishing in the Illawarra Mercury - yes, odd, I realise. But locally there is buckley's chance of recruiting any long-term clients so I thought I would aim at an area where there are a lot of people, where i know my way around (the family comes from there) and that is close enough to speak to folk without blowing the phone budget. And the ad was not expensive, which helped. So if you happen to pick up tomorrow's edition, look for a weight loss ad in the health and wellbeing column, lol. This means i have now finished the training and am ready to rock and roll, so it's a pity my mentors have set off for Bali just when I may need them to help with my early calls. But I think I can probably cope by myself for the first few at least. They have provided an excel spreadsheet for tracking work, but it does not link information between pages, which seems silly to me (too much duplication of effort) so I will have to hunt out my old excel training manual and see if it still applies to the current version I am using, as it will drive me silly otherwise. That clever app that the Bank had for use on the smartphone? It only works on i-phones, I now discover - having invested in an android for compatibility with the laptop. Bother. So now i am stuck having to pay additional monthly fees to get the facility on the computer instead. Darn it!! Oh well, on the up side, I have access to a great phone-call making mechanism which allows me to pre-record all my 'missed number' messages for out-going calls and just hit a button and move onto the next call when doing multiple phone calls, leaving the first call to deal with itself! Amazing stuff, technology.

After the excitement of the power outage yesterday, it was a bit of a comedown to get it back and running nicely before bedtime. Still, it is always better when things are working than when they are not. It was another stinking hot day forecast so I dashed down to Hobart at 7 this morning in the hopes of getting home in the cool, before the real heat began. Cat Prescription diet running out was the only motivating factor. But while down there I decided to pick up another piece of moulding in the hope i can get the front door weatherproofed before the weather turns, and some groceries at Bridgewater as the IGA does not always stock all that is good and cheap. That stop also included a short diversion into Shiploads, which I have to say is a lot easier to find your way around than Chicken Feed ever was. They had some lovely variegated double jonquil bulbs which I felt compelled to leave behind, but I picked up one or two items that had been on the 'must get one of these days' list, then home, in the face of stultifying heat and unrelenting sunshine. This afternoon, of course, it has cooled off nicely - isn't that always the way....

Sewing today so a good time had with the girls in town. Then home via the IGA to collect a pre-cooked chook, which turned out to be an excellent idea as they have turned the electricity off to all parts north of Hobart. There is a bushfire which is under the main cables, so they turned it off for the fire fighters. Meantime, there is no telling when it comes back on. The good news is that the fire is in the Meehan Range, so several fire brigades territories converge on it, and it is also an area which the local louts set fire to with monotonous regularity (I know this as I used to volunteer with the Mt Rumney Brigade). So it is probably about the only place in Tassie that has little if any brash to burn, but it also has some fairly inaccessible bits. I had my heart set on a ceasar salad, so took a jug back into town to get some water from a friend so I could boil some eggs. Strangely, she had about a dozen boiled eggs sitting cooling, so they came home along with sufficient water to wash out my bowl once i am done. While there, she announced the power was back on. I am glad I did not take any notice, as it is still off here... sigh. So, a quiet and an early night tonight by the looks of things...

today started out a nice sunny day - that sort of smear of yellow-saffron along the boundaries of a deep blue sky to herald the dawn. Lovely stuff. By 8 it was such a thick fog I couldn't see the back fence. The tip, unfortunately did not open till 1 this afternoon, so I spent the morning on a training call or two and then returned home to prepare myself for the onslaught of activity. The first trip went fine, as did the next two. But on my way back from the second one, my right arm went into spasm as I reached the intersection and so I was forced to head into town. The Weis bar at the Roxy was just too appealing for words. The temperature around these parts tends to build slowly, with the maximum often only revealing itself at around 6 pm. Today it started to warm up seriously around 1:45, hence the decision to call it quits after three loads. Here's one of the loads - limited for safety reasons as the back tray is down. The thing on the right is a row of nesting boxes that Desi had perched on some drums on the other side of the shed .... You'll note that I managed to find the one spot of shade on the block to park the ute in while loading. The next lot of lumber to go to the tip (which has yet to be loaded) is rather smaller. So perhaps I can justify the delay in getting it there by saying I can add more stuff to it to make the trip worth while ...? And on closer examination it seems that the floor of the shed may, at one stage, have had an attempt at a concrete slab (very thin, unevenly applied) which I will need to break up and add to the rest of the masonry load.For those among us who are neither clear of vision or archaeologically trained, what you are looking at here is as follows. The bare patch in the foreground was where the drums sat which supported the nesting row which was in the back of the ute. To the right of that you will see a patch of shadow which is where a water bucket was embedded in the ground and subsequently removed without back-filling the hole. Above this little lot you will (if you peer closely) spot a double row of bricks and other such stuff and then the concrete floor to which I have referred. After that chaos reigns. But much of that timber is hopefully recoverable (though may not withstand close scrutiny. So pulling the shed down appears to have been the easy bit ... sigh.

The problem with making so much progress in one day is that you are all fired up to get on with the job the next day but are inhibited by the weird pattern of opening hours that the local tip operates to. So I got the ute laden with as much scrap metal as possible so I can launch myself at the tip tomorrow when it opens, and spent a few more hours stablising stuff that might blow away if the wind picks up, and re-locating the half-a-tank that used to lean against the now-demolished shed, so it leans against the smaller chicken shed (now the tool shed until better accommodation is possible. This involved manoeuvrings it into position and then driving some star pickets in either side of it to prevent it bowling off down the paddock the next time the wind picks up. Now that has been done, the rusted out section (which is on the 'ground' side) has been bridged by a section of weldmesh and I have begun winding the longer scraps of fencing wire into narrower tubes so I can store them here until the chicken shed has been built and any other things that will require small-mesh wire in shorter lengths). So tomorrow's plan is to dart off to the tip the instant it opens, dump the scrap metal, come back for consecutive loads of 'tins of kitchen fat', scrap wood, masonry bits of no particular usefulness and anything else I can think of, and get it all done before it gets too hot to move. Today was overcast, which is the Tasmanian weather gods' way of telling you you will fry if you dare to go outside. So once the second layer of sunscreen was past its use-by date I retreated indoors and have read for the afternoon, when not studying my sales technique and other such fun literature or dashing into town to top up the dog's food supply.

Some of you may remember this shed, which originally housed several feet thickness of chicken poo, a rats nest of lumps of wood and a few forty four gallon drums (as well as sundry mice). In the years since I arrived it has slowly disintegrated, aided by the amount of moisture that accumulated around the back wall each winter and the various degrees of vegetation that have engulfed it. The row of drums on the roof has, however, been a major stumbling block to getting rid of it as I have not been able to climb on the roof (too decrepit) or get at them (too much stuff in the way) and have been worried that if they were dislodged they might slide down the roof and destroy the fence (which, given the charms of my neighbour just didn't bear thinking about. I have considered various strategies, including re-building the thing from the inside out, all to no avail and finally conceded defeat and decided to demolish it. Problem was, by now it had reached such a state of apparent fragility that it was clearly not a one-person job. So I put an ad on freecycle and my helpers arrived today and yay, there is no longer a shed (well, actually there is, but it is now in two dimensions, not three. Of course my delightful neighbour supervised the activities from the comforts of a deck chair until we got to the point of pulling what remained over. Then she came down and stood with hands on hips waiting for it to fall on the fence so she could have a go. She was disappointed. And of course any thought of offering assistance with a well-placed 4x2 from her side was out of the question. So now the view from the kitchen window looks like this: The shed collapsed sideways toward the compost heap with the result I now have the entire roof sitting there. I was planning to pull it apart and take stuff away and store stuff etc for future use, but you know ... it strikes me it is the ideal place to store the piles of corrugated iron and spare lumber that litter the yard as it is a raised, defined platform with a surface that will drain freely. So that is probably what I will do. Here is my team of willing slaves who helped with the project. They are KJ - whose advice and anchoring capabilities were invaluable - she stabilised the building for us as we removed the cladding. Lisa, whose efforts were outstanding and who kept me going every time i suggested a break, and Ron who came along for the ride as he is on holidays from Queensland. He was, however, very helpful at removing those dratty drums for us before we started. One trip to the tip was all I had energy for, so the rest will happen in stages methinks.

I didn't get to the tip because i remembered I was supposed to be going to see the doctor to get the results of the blood tests. It seems I am robustly healthy with a good layer of good cholesterol lurking around to fend off any danger of following my cousin to an early grave. Oddly though, my iron levels are low. Hopefully the supplements I am now taking (which contain iron) will do the job to remedy that. A lovely sunny autumn day (precursor to a belated onset of summer according to the forecast) started off sunny here, but foggy in at Oatlands. Glad I did not have to head down the highway as it looked rather murky. The preparations for shed demolition were limited to purchasing lunch ingredients and tidying up the house to resemble a home. And then I off and sprayed vast swathes of the yard with roundup to get the mallow back under control once more. Ferretted out the jemmy bar and a couple of hammers, pliers, screwdrivers and other demolition impedimenta and now I am ready to heat up the lasagne left over from last night for dinner. Surprisingly tasty I have to say, given the unpromising ingredients. Oh, ,and yes, I have the hard hat on standby for immediate use once we get started.

Well, loaded the ute with scrap metal for the tip this morning and unloaded it en route to collect the box of stuff I received from Herbalife today. This has shampoos (for showing to the local hairdresser who may be interested in stocking it in the salon), and two different flavour shakes (since someone is sure to ask me what they taste like and it would be good to know), and some more sample stuff. I figure if I set up a stall at the local market I can give taste tests and such like and take names of interested people (or better still, get them to enter a competition with a view to winning a something - while at the same time agreeing to go on the mailing list), and so home once more. Decided to use the meat mincer which I bought ages ago but have not used due to being missing in action for such a length of time. My recipe called for chicken mince and I only had chicken breast meat, so minced that, then got carried away and minced the celery, mushrooms, leek, garlic and any other recipe ingredient I could lay my hands to. Forgot to mince the onion, so I guess I have to chop that up the usual way. Today was the first day of Autumn, so the weather gods decided to usher it in with a morning temperature of 1.1. Fortunately I had checked the forecast and wrapped the tomatoes in frost cloth. Even more fortunately, no frost arrived, though a very heavy dew was had. The prune plum appears to be laden with fruit, now it has coloured up and I can see it. None ripe just yet (how do you tell if they are ripe if they are suppose to taste sour anyway??), and they are still very hard, but will clearly require close monitoring from now on. The tree has shot up (probably due to all that goose poo where I had planted it) and is twice the size of any of the other fruit trees. It will do with a fairly firm pruning this winter methinks, as will the almond. But the rest of the trees will really only require a bit of trimming and shaping this winter. So excited as my helpers are arriving this Sunday (we gave up on last Sunday due to weather and other commitments) and I will finally get that shed demolished. Most of the clearing up I have been doing has been preparatory to that work, to ensure there are fewer hazards about to cause injury. Having the roof fall on an unsuspecting helper is my main concern (other than sending the shed down over the fence into her-nextdoor's yard). So, tomorrow morning another load to the tip and then let the fun begin. Tonight it is a mushroom and chicken lasagne with zucchini substituting for the pasta.