My October Wrap-up

October started with a visit to the city to meet up with a Brazilian friend who is now living in Paris. She came to attend her daughter's engagement party and managed to steal a bit of time to meet for lunch so we could catch up. Sadly this year we didn't even take a photo of the two of us, we both remembered that on our way home.
On the way to the train station I saw this pretty Spring installation at Forrest Chase - the Bee hive.

The Bee hive - Spring in the city

On Saturday the 12th I again went to the city to meet up with a group of Portuguese women for a first formal meeting to form a new association of which I am the treasurer - WA Portuguese Australian Women's Association, a not for profit organization. The association was based on the Melbourne one, and was created to develop a network of women who band together to support each other and to raise money for causes involving women and their well-being, mainly homelessness and violence against women.
Right now we are trying to get Portuguese women to join the Association via a membership fee, and we will be hosting "sausage sizzles", Portuguese cooking lessons, talks with a Portuguese psychologist and eventually in February we hope to have enough funds to host a fancy dinner party for about 100 people.

The founding members of the WA Portuguese Australian Women's Association

The following day we joined another couple and drove to Mandurah to visit the Boat, Caravan and 4WD and Camping show, which I had mentioned on the Signs meme two weeks ago.

It was a beautiful day out and apart from the fancy caravans, etc they also had a couple of crazy guys doing motorbike stunts.

A revamped old old pink caravan and the ultra-modern caravan with 3 bunk beds and a double bed

The very cute and minute Cool Beans caravans that are made in Perth

The motorcycle stunt duo

                                                               A video of the jump

When we dropped our friends home we were invited in for a coffee and to see the ducklings and cygnets on the Canning River that borders their back yard.

L just calls them "Come here babies" and all the ducks started flying in, then the swans and other birds like the Purple Swanphen and Eurasian coot started arriving to get their food.

So amazing, and my friends are so lucky to have that wildlife on their doorstep.

The cygnets and black swans, the baby ducks and the purple swanphen

Fred the ugly duck that is chased away by the black swans, the swans coming upon being called

Next door to us, the house which was started on the 20th August with the pouring of the cement foundation, has this week got the corrugated polycarbonate roof sheets installed and the plasterers have rendered the front of the house, which is now ready for painting and the internal walls have also been plastered. 
A Portuguese friend of mine who is an architect, had a while back mentioned that the standard of construction here is a lot lower than what she was used to in Portugal. 
We visit the house next door at least once a week to see the progress and even though from the size of the house it must be an expensive build I can attest that I have to agree with my friend. 
We were aghast at seeing some of the electrical wiring not being inside conduits, but just shoved into cuts in the bricks. Also most of the electrical wiring just sits on the rafters, once again not inside conduit...  I suppose they think that once the plaster is on the walls nobody can see what is behind...
There is also no insulation between external and internal walls or on under the roof. Although our Winters are mild, our Summers can be very hot which means they would need a lot of air-conditioners to warm/cool the house.

The lounge area and entertainment area on the side (top left and right), electrical wires hanging from the roof and the wires just stuck on bricks that were cut (without conduit).

Last week before the rendering (top) and 2 days ago (bottom)

 We bought 10sqmt (108sqft) of dark gray non-slippery floor tiles and Jose is busy laying the tiles on our front porch. It's been on the To-Do list for a few years, as the original brown tiles were cracked in one spot as well as being very slippery whenever it rained.

The tiles have been partly laid and what all tiles have been cut to size, but the last couple of days it's been raining a lot, we even had hail on Thursday, so work has stopped until the sun comes back this weekend. Then it will be my job to put the grout between the tiles.

I have also painted the gutter downpipes and electrical box in dark gray exterior paint to make them blend in with the brick. I've always hated the beige colour! Eventually the double garage doors and the rest of the gutters will have to get painted too, but that will be a job for next year I think!

I''ve also never liked the old-fashioned brown/cream external canvas blinds, but were removed after we bought the house, only 3 remain - the lounge, 1 bedroom and kitchen window, which get the the afternoon heat in Summer.  They will stay for now but look even worse now against the dark gutters.

Front porch - The old tiles had to be scored so the tile cement would adhere, and the partly laid new tiles
The gutter downpipes have been painted in dark gray to blend with the brick walls and you can also see the electrical box
by the front door

Work-wise October was  a very busy month for me. A work colleague took 4 weeks leave, returning next Monday, but at the same time another colleague was diagnosed with breast cancer and had to be operated straight away. That meant that instead of the usual 5 front-desk people that work at the Clinic, we were down to 3 people and one is a University student who can only work 2 half-days! That meant two of us had to work 4 days a week from 8am to 6,30pm without a break at all!! As we get paid hourly, in four weeks I worked the amount of hours I would normally work in six weeks, so a good pay-check!  

Luckily my colleague is well, all was caught in time and she will only have to do 6 weeks of radiation.

I would get home exhausted, but luckily Jose would have dinner ready for me. 
So that didn't leave me too much time or disposition for doing stuff around the house.
But November is here and I'm confident I will have more time to do the things I enjoy doing.

Have a great weekend 😉