I was wrong. The worst thing about moving (this time anyway) was not the stupid IKEA furniture. There are so many things to choose from that could be considered the worse. Was it the disconnected electricity that prevented us moving in for a full week after signing the lease? Or the filthy new apartment complete with cupboard filled insect droppings and grease from a thousand fry pans. Or maybe its the rats in the attic which wake us up at 5am every morning with their gnawing and scratching. Then there's the leaky taps, etc... And all that is without mentioning the cleaners who I'd been forced to hire (after a mean, mean letting agent threatened to keep our deposit) turned out to be drug addicts. I've also been without internet for the last month. It should only have been a week but the internet provider forgot to ask me for some details, left my application on hold and I only found out after I called up to complain. So I've had to apply to a different, more expensive place to have a hope of getting an internet connection soon. It really would be nice to buy a house next time.

Well we've finally had enough of paying through the nose for our current place and we're moving down the road by about half an hour drive. Much closer to work and much cheaper rent. On the other hand, much much grubbier apartment. The worst part of moving is the disassembling of the bloody IKEA furniture. Patiently unscrewing every bolt with the tiny allen key, trying not to breath in two years worth of dust from crevices that haven't seen daylight since then, knowing that in 24 hours I'll have to do the whole thing in reverse. Coming a close second to that is spending literally hours and hours on hold, during work and on my mobile, to various utilities to tell them I'm moving, only to have them inform me of the $50 moving fee or disconnection and reconnection fee, or of the 10 business days it will take to setup or whatever. We're definitely going to miss living near Crows Nest. So many nice cafes and restaurants open all hours right at your feet. Plenty of amenities, parks, and a really nice trains station equipped with it's own plaza and outdoor dining. The closest thing to scangers we usually saw were the magpies that would try and steal your food.

Last week finally made our move. It has been on the cards for a while but we've finally moved apartment half an hour closer to work and half an hour from the city to Sydney's North Shore. The new neighbourhood is certainly much nicer than before - actual shops and restaurants, all of which stay open past 3pm and none of which have iron bars on the windows. We thought we were hiring just some local guy and his van to help take our stuff from A to B, and spent lots of time packing our meagre possessions into lots of tiny boxes and carrying them all down to the front door before he arrived. Unfortunately it turned out we actually hired a pretty professional group of guys (2 guys and a driver), complete with moving crates and padding, and all wearing uniforms. They charged us through the nose for everything, yet still made us travel separately and take the train there. Also for this first week we've got no telephone, washing machine, internet or television and its taking . Telstra a feckin' shower just as bad as Eircom - even though I signed up for a combined package of telephone, internet and mobile phone as part of one if their deals, I still had to pay $50 to move the phone to the new address, and another $50 to move the feckin' internet as well! Which still isn't bloody connected a week later.