Saturday, February 25, 2006

One Saturday in February

I'm sitting at the kitchen table, working through all manner of irritations like Powergen (our electricity meter is playing up, but getting them to understand that or fix it is ridiculously difficult, and I don't want to saddle the new owners with a nightmare meter), and I'm trying to make lists.

List 1 is all the direct debits we need to cancel or otherwise tie up before we go. We've been carefully reducing these since the turn of the year, and only the essential ones are left now - the mortgage and so on. The list is looking manageable, although it's going to take quite a few weekday phonecalls to resolve everything. In one way, it's just like moving house normally is, but of course we're not telling people our new UK address - which at least saves me from having to listen to innumerable sales pitches.

List 2 is the 'Dear Friends' list (I'm not getting very far with this, because the boys keep interrupting me to talk about Star Wars). 'Dear Friends' is my embryonic project - the idea is that I will write a weekly letter about our experiences and send it to our friends back home, with the possibility, if I can get them interested, of letting the PG local paper, the 'Citizen' have a look at it as well. If they like it, perhaps I will be sharing my thoughts with their readership as well in a kind of 'see oursel's as ithers see us' kind of way. Trouble is, I can't get emails through to them at all, and talking to someone requires more co-ordination of times and phone calls than I seem to be able to manage at present. Given that I'm in the flow now, perhaps I'll try in a few minutes - I'll let you know.

Meantime, if you'd like to sign up for it, leave me a comment, and I'll add you to the list.

(There. That'll make me do it!)

Update corner:

The house move seems to be going ahead - we've had our offer accepted, and we're just waiting for the paperwork to come through. It still seems slightly sureal, doing this online, but it is working. If timing all comes together, we'll be able to move in after only 2 weeks in Canada, which is beyond our wildest dreams.

The cats continue to be an issue, however. Airfreight company no 1 looked impressive, but have been less than helpful as soon as our move went beyond 'Heathrow to Vancouver Airport' status. Several others have been contacted, and we are hopeful.

More as we go - exciting, this, isn;t it?

Monday, February 20, 2006

It's all happening...

Don't you just hate people who say that? It can't all be happening, you want to say. Well, excuse me, but it pretty much all is happening right now. Posts are much fewer and significantly further between than I had hoped at this stage, and it's all happening...

We've just had the most interesting weekend of the whole project. We started it glumly perusing the latest list of houses for sale in PG, wondering if we were going to end up renting one of the depressing-looking apartments of 15th Avenue (15th Avenue sounds cool, but I don't think it's all that; I don't really remember). This evening we made an offer on a house.

It's faintly alarming, this. But as Zoë just said to me, moving halfway round the world is the scary bit - buying a house you've never seen is nothing.

I need at this point to heap lavish praise and thanks upon our aforementioned friend, Caroline, who has essentially been our proxy this weekend, and actually took time out yesterday to go and view it for us. Then - and this is way above and beyond the call of duty - she took time out of her breakfast routine to call us and give the low-down. Which, naturally, was so positive that we ran upstairs and emailed off an offer.

How did we do this before the internet?

That's all you're getting right now - no more details, not because it'll jinx anything, but because it's still just an offer, and there are plenty of things which could yet stand in our way. But I'll tell you this much - it's so absolutely perfect a fit for our list of objectives that it must be right - it's actually laughably good.

More when I know more.

(And no, I'm not sitting here typing this into one computer while the other one sits behind me on the spare bed, wirelessly connected to Zoë's email account in case of a reply. That would just be silly.)

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Counting Down

It's time to concentrate a few minds, I think. With one thing and another, my time at my current employer is ebbing rapidly, and as of today, I have 29 working days left. So I've set up a countdown in my calendar to try to keep me focused on what needs to be done, and to try to keep everyone else reminded of the fact that I won't be around forever.

Talking of which, since I last posted, we have:

  • Booked our flights: April 3rd from Heathrow with BA turned out to be the best deal. Of course the airline industry being what it is, it is better value for us to book return flights, even though we have no intention of coming back.

  • Made various arrangements for the final week - arranged for removals; organised me to go to Scotland with various bits of computer equipment; arranged to sell my car while I'm there; booked a flight back (using my soon to be redundant AirMiles (long story)); booked a hire car - an estate - for the final few days; booked a hotel for the last night, and many other even less exciting things

  • Opened an offshore bank account (I say again - eek!)

  • Cashed in various policies, making us feel ridiculously wealthy

  • Discovered another snag with those there cats - apparently Air Canada will not fly them to PG from Vancouver, because they do not have heated cargo areas on their internal flights. Another airline, West Jet, can fly them, but it's proving something of a struggle to get this organised. We still love them, though

  • Said (more or less) goodbye to my family, who were all here for the weekend - although I'll be up in Scotland again before we go, the next time my parents and sister see the boys, they'll be Canadian residents. Talking of which:

  • Booked flights for my family to come and visit in July. In spite of us not yet having anywhere to live. It'll work.


So, we've not been idle. It's a lot of work, this. But you know what - it's fun.

Friday, February 03, 2006

Goodbye, part 2

We're saying goodbye to a colleague today - a task which has fallen to me for reasons which need not detain us. A perfect opportunity for a 'dry run' for my own leave-taking, which has suddenly come into sharp focus thanks to the phone call I got this morning.

Around 9.30, my phone rang, and my home number appeared on the screen. I picked it up, expecting some tale of the school run, or - just as likely - a plea for computer support, but instead, I heard: "We've got it!"

"It" being in reality "them", since we are now in possession of all our Work and Study Permits - no problems, just present this piece of paper when you land in Canada, and off you go.

So, approximately 8 weeks from now, I'll be going through the same ritual humiliation in front of all my work colleagues, who'll gather round in the hope of seeing me shed a tear. Might happen, too. We'll see.

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Flying fur

I am prompted to remark upon our feline comapions. Yes, they are coming with us (we hope they like Canadian cat food), and in their own way they are subtly influencing things. For example, the plan at the moment is to rent as soon as we arrive, and look to buy as soon after that as possible. However, this does restrict the choice of rental properties, and it doesn't appear to be all that big in the first place.

They also remind me that they would rather we lived somewhere where bears are a rarity in the garden, but we can't really promise that - we've heard more than one tale of ursine visitors; enough to give the bravest moggy pause for thought.

Pause for my own thought: is 'moggy' a Canadian word? I suspect not.

We have provisionally organised transport for them - there are a lot of companies set up for just this sort of thing - but, of course, until we have a date, we can't really make anything concrete. And the cost? Ah, they're worth it, if only for the sport of seeing them try to kill a moose.