Long Days...

Today was hard.

I stayed up till about 3 talking to the Blackwoods (and others), and went to bed (in benji's bed, in case anyone is keeping track) exhausted. I dragged myself downtown at 7 AM to clean the bathrooms. I got back home and decided that I deserved some more sleep before starting on Maria's junk mail. As I was setting the alarm for "9:30 AM", I fell asleep. I woke up at 11, still holding my mobile, and then leapt out of bed in a panic.

I took stock of my situation. After packing a dozen or so bundles of junk mail, I decided that drastic measures must be taken. I rang the Blakstons. After several heart-stopping seconds, Louise picked up the phone. "Can Harry help me with the junk mail route?" I almost pleaded. "Yeh. No problem, Thomas."

Hooray! Glee! Celebration!

I drove over in the van, picked him up, and zoomed back home. We got right to work, chatting while putting the bundles together and rubber banding them. After a few long, boring pauses, though, we decided to listen to an Odyssey.

Harry had arrived at my house at noon. We finished packing the bundles at 2:40. We loaded them up onto the back of the postie bike and took off to deliver as many as we could before I had to take him home and go to my job-confirmation-signing-thing.
At 3:45 we had used up all the bundles in the basket, and decided to go home early so I could shower before the appointment.

We did so.

I took him home, said "bye," and drove off for the hospital in the van, navigating wonderfully (if I do say so myself). Didn't get lost once.
Got to the hospital 10 minutes early. I had the receptionist ring up "Sally" and sat down to wait...

Twenty minutes later, Sally shows up and takes me to an empty office where I spent the next two hours filling out paperwork for the Australian Tax Office.
THE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT IS TAKING AWAY FIFTY PERCENT OF WHAT I MAKE WITH TAXES!!!
Sure, I'll get it back in June (if someone remembers to send me an Australian tax form. geez.)... but HALF of what I make I don't get to see until NEXT JUNE.

HALF.

So I go from making $17 an hour to $8.50. Yippie.

After I got back (It was dark by this time), I had to load up the ol' postie to deliver the last 2/3 of the papers by myself.

It took an hour and a half, give or take.

They designed that post bike well. It worked WONDERFULLY for delivering stuff to mailboxes. I thoroughly approve.

To celebrate my completion of such a momentus task, I visited the Blakstons. The delivery route ends 200m from their house anyway.
We jawed for 15-odd minutes, then Jono left for a last-minute run to the hardware store and I left for my janitorial job downtown.

I returned home VICTORIOUS, and, since I hadn't eaten yet today, I decided to go for "quickly made" instead of "extravagant". After pouring a bowl of cereal (and then remembering that I used the last of the milk this morning) and absolutely frying a few slices of toast in the toaster, I went for month-old fruit-and-chocolate pancakes.
With the edge of my hunger gone, I cooked a few sausages and made cute little sausage pigs-in-a-blanket things. I am eating them as I type (one-handed. How skillful).

Tada! So ends this chapter in the saga of "TOM ALONE IN THE LAND DOWN UNDER!!!"
Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

As I put a bundle into an overgrown mailbox, a medium-sized huntsman fell onto the back of my hand. Without thinking, I calmly held him up to a leaf and poked at him with my other hand until he got off me and onto the plant. Ten meters down the road, my headlight illuminated a pigeon on the road. When I noticed the bird, I was so startled that I screamed like a little girl.
~Thomas