Now I’ll be the first to admit that there’s “very seriously considered” and then there’s “very seriously considered”. As my blogging has become more and more sporadic over the past twenty months and our relationship has inevitably become more distant as a result, there may be a chance you’ve forgotten my natural inclination to understatement. On Tuesday afternoon at 16.20 we decided not to return to England next week. Our house was on the rental market; we had flights booked and confirmed; we had forty minutes of business time left before the packers arrived to start work in our house. It just didn’t feel right.

So quite seriously considered, then. We had decided in the last week of April that it was time to change our employment arrangements. Our gut feel was that we’d be moving back abroad, but we went out to our networks and friends all over the world immediately. Sure enough, we had not a single local lead within our decision timeframe and so made our plans to move: budgets were drawn up, sales lists were (once again) compiled, removal quotes and surveys (and re-surveys to absolutely ensure we’d fit a 20ft container again) were had, tickets were booked, agents of every description were contacted, met and negotiated with. There were periods of immense frustration, times of great excitement and times of intolerable grinding drudgery. Yes, I know, it was just four weeks.

There’s a lot can be accomplished in four weeks, but the real art of critical program management is about the skin in the game. We had backed out every financial commitment (except our dining room table, which we’d shipped up the coast and are missing terribly) by 10am on Wednesday. The emotional turmoil of change is more difficult to quantify, impossible to “back out” and evades easy resolution.

For the past few days, then, we’ve been regrouping, recovering from the inevitable early-winter viruses and beginning to think about what we want next. A change of pace of some description no doubt; a set of changes of pace following hard on each others heels in some almost-random pattern would probably be best.

We’re not quite sure what that looks like yet but have a little time to figure it out, what with work finishing this week.

When I’m at my most stressed I dream of going farming (deluded soul that I am). If anyone out there’s looking for a goat-herd please let me know.
Must include house with grounds.

One of the highlights (of the year, I think) for the Three and me was the rehashing of most of our kitchen in the week preceding Christmas. The most wonderful thing about this kitchen is how well it fits. It fits our character so well it’s almost like an extension of us, it fits the house, it feels good and right and like the centre of the home should. There are things we bought on our honeymoon that were precursors to this feel and so many contributory things that we’ve collected or just admired on the way. It should be obvious that we love the kitchen – and it all came together in a couple of weeks. We found freestanding units at Kims – one of our favourite places – remotely in mid-December and got the appliances we’d had our eye on the next weekend. Against all odds Kim delivered the units two days before Christmas, so we ripped out the old kitchen (and had it taken away by two men with a horse-drawn cart) and put the new one in. After a few protracted kitchen remodellings in previous houses it was refreshing to have one come together in two weeks with a total of about seven hours of work.

We had everyone round for dinner on Christmas Eve in the new kitchen, which was wonderful. The culmination of dinner (which had been spectacular in its own right) was the production of a flaming Christmas pud – the first I’ve made from scratch and delicious btw. Unfortunately I had given no thought to the capacity of the dish I had placed the pudding on before pouring a ladle of burning brandy over all …
Ladle in his left hand, platter in his right he poured. As he did, Grandpa shifted his seat back bumping a plug which tripped the electrics plunging everything into appropriately theatrical darkness as rivulets of flaming brandy began to run off the plate and down me arm. I’m glad I wasn’t wearing my spandex reindeer suit because I would.have.been.toast.

‘Twas a bitter-sweet experience. The pain has outlasted the pudding. The story will outlast the pain.

Now Granny and Grandpa are in Gauteng to celebrate Uncle Ted’s 60th birthday on New Year’s Eve; Ben and Anna returned yesterday from a visit to friends in Mamelodi; Pete and Ros have driven up to East London to visit the house they’ve poured so much heart and soul into and to decide whether to stay for a bit. We’ve enjoyed a weekend on our own recharging and preparing for the year ahead.

Here’s to a wonderful year ahead – may your houses and hearts and lives be full. Happy New Year!

The police said they thought it was a prank. Pretty serious prankster to carry away that many bricks don’t you think?

MGW will probably start making more regular appearances online now.

Meanwhile I was visiting parts of Pretoria I didn’t want to know existed: Acetylene Road, Petroleum Street … reminiscent of the functional thinking that had schools in some areas numbered instead of named.

But what really brings me back, somewhat unwilling, to this old CTS device is to let you know that we’ve moved into our house! At last!

It feels very strange to be responsible for a house again. We hadn’t realised we’d slipped into irresponsibility but on day one following the move both Michelle and I very clearly felt overawed by the responsibility of keeping a house again after four months off. I think it’s also just hard to believe it’s all really ours.

The moving van arrived promptly on Friday morning and was all unloaded by lunchtime. Thanks to tireless efforts from Carolyn (and others), everything was out of boxes by the end of Friday. By the end of Saturday light fittings were up (thanks Paul) and order was beginning to descend slowly on the House Without a Name. I’ll have to work on that.

I still can’t believe the amount of work Michelle got done while I was away. The house is looking stunning. I’d certainly rather be there right now …

plan to have finished the floors completely tomorrow, the coats only need 2 hours to dry:)

just had a hot bath some arnica tabs and some painkillers, hoping to wake up as fresh as a daisy.

THE LOUNGE IS DONE – well at least we have finished scraping paint off at last. still a few more jobs to go:)

we vacuumed and washed down all the floors as well and its all looking lovely. just for fun though the universal undercoat is not towing the line. despite its all powerful name it seems to dislike the floor and does not want to stick to it. seems like i will have to visit victor again ( the local mica paint man where i am on first name terms with a few shop attendants and its already been mentioned that i should be earning shares……..) and see waht he thinks the problem is. i have 20 litres of the stuff so i hope he doesnt say i need something different.

while gerry carol and i scraped and cratched and scrabbled and scrooged away in the house, gill and the girls went to the aquarium and had great fun. and a toasted cheesy and chips in the reataurant. and tea.

james no doubt is doing something groupy and bondingish in an idyllic setting with a room that over looks the sea and all the time wishing he were here too sharing in the fun.

the pool is almost blue.

We’ve had a busy time. I’ve been off work for a full two months now and it’s not been a holiday … well, not in the lying-on-a-beach-without-a-care-in-the-world sense at any rate. Lots of planning and dreaming and arranging and managing – not to mention eating and sleeping – to be done. We’ve had a lot of fun along the way (and seen some beautiful things and eaten some excellent dinners) but most importantly have sorted out the purchase of a beautiful new house (which we’ll move into in February in good time for the Coxes to visit and test our new guest rooms), a couple of very pleasing motorised vehicular transporters, and what currently looks to be a choice of jobs to start in January.

The last six weeks would have been far more straightforward but for the banks to whom, it would seem, 48 hours is as a week, if not quite a thousand years. Banking is the racket to be in here (well, probably everywhere, but extra-especially more so here). Current accounts on the whole pay no interest at all, but charges are levied for every transaction on the account anyway. I had a great conversation with a banker on one of my very frequent visits during which I tried to explain the concept of a branchless, internet-only bank that levies no direct charges for their services. I was attempting to instill a healthy fear of the future in said banker, but she couldn’t get past the absence of transaction charges:
“But Mr Adlard, tell me, does the bank make money in some other way then?”
Which, had I been listening to her advice, would have been exactly when I stopped.

We would love to post pictures of the new house, but it seems a little presumptuous while the current owners are still living in it. We have great plans for it – some new doors and floors and walls as well as an extension at some stage down the track. We’ve been collecting furniture for it, which some of you will know is not unlike us, but this is good stuff and shouldn’t have to live in the garage. So we’re having fun; never a dull moment after 8.30am is what I say. You should understand that Sophie wakes at about 5.30am every day, leaving me with a 3 hour deficit.

We hope to have house plans and final interviews squared away in time to have a full month’s proper lying-on-a-beach-without-a-care-in-the-world holiday, only with a pair of toddlers – even a pair of seafood-loving toddlers – I’m pretty sure it’s impossible to have a lying-on-a-beach-without-a-care-in-the-world holiday. I think we’ll go for the manically-active-no-time-to-give-a-stuff package with the dog-herding option for Sophie and the sofa-climbing option for Jo.

SAA might have no legroom whatsoever (and staff who’re evidently trained not to smile until you’re disembarking) but they do have video-on-demand. This covers a multitude of evils. When you have to time your film watching to coincide with little girls sleeping, being able to start a film anytime and then pause it when you need to is immeasurably valuable. Josie slept well; Sophie slept a little but couldn’t get comfortable squeezed between the seat in front and Michelle; I slept for an hour or so in bits; Michelle slept for about ten minutes in 15-second bursts.

We had rather a lot of luggage with us – the taxi was the biggest MPV we could hire with the rear seats down and was absolutely stuffed full. We changed flights in Jo’burg and had the good sense to use a porter to help get us across to domestic departures. He whisked us through the Premier Club check in – evidently just because the line was shorter – without a hitch despite being 40kg overweight on the weigh bridges they have there. We had breakfast (calamari because it felt like dinner time) and caught the next plane.

We found a house we like yesterday. Will it wait for us? Uh dunno but it’d be nice.

Today we’re going in search of formula that doesn’t give Sophie the screaming runs and having dinner tonight with Jeremy-from-St Albans at the Fat Cactus. It’s a beeoootiful day.

They were terrific. In a couple of hours the place looked almost tidy. MGW has been saying since we moved in that we need storage boxes so that everything has a place. I think she might have been onto something there … . Anyway. They’d been working as a team for some time and the lead chap had been doing it for 6 or 7 years. He must have started when he was fourteen.

I have a certain respect for people who enjoy doing similar things for long periods of time. I have come across many people ranging from strategists to packers (now) who do that. I can’t. Tomorrow is my last day (despite Ben’s rather enthusiastic exclamation last Thursday) with my current employer. I will have been there 34 months, which is the longest I have worked anywhere, let alone on one programme. I’ve stayed because the people are fantastic and I’ve been allowed to pursue opportunities to develop the business in ways that I find challenging and rewarding. I’m leaving because I began with a set of objectives and a timeframe in mind, both of which have run their course. I’ll remember my time there fondly.

I don’t know why, but whenever I write that I have to wonder who it is I’ll be fondling when I do my remembering. What kind of a word is “fondly”, anyway?

We said farewell to the Coxes this weekend just past. They came to stay with us from Friday evening and we had a great time – although we were somewhat distracted by pressures of moving. Mark and I and the two “big” girls ran loads of stuff to the charity shop. Mark suggested I ring them first:
“Hello. I’ve got a couple of car-loads of stuff to bring around.”
“Is it car boot stuff?”
“Ummmm. Well, what’s car boot stuff and what isn’t?”
“Harrummpf. [long pause]Car boot stuff is stuff you’ve tried to sell at a car boot sale and it didn’t sell and now you want to drop it on me.”
“Oh. Then no, it’s not car boot stuff. We’re moving next week.”
“OH! You’re moving. Bring it over; we’ll take the bad with the good if you’re moving …”

Josie and Elspeth played beautifully together. It was very difficult to say goodbye. I’m sure we’ll make other friends on our travels but I don’t think we’ll make any better ones.