the start of something... good?

I suppose the panic really started on the night before my departure when I couldn't close my overflowing suitcase, despite my dad and brother sitting on top of the suitcase, my sister ready to close the locks while I stood there, wringing my hands, all the while my mum continued to roll up even more clothes to fit inside my other backpack.

So despite the best efforts of me trying to pack lightly (coughs), it was by sheer luck that I managed to get away with not paying an excess baggage fine, only to find that sheer luck whisked away when I discovered that I had mistakenly packed my lucky scissors (circa Grade 5 at school) into my carry-on baggage. These small blunt scissors were let through at Melbourne airport by a kind security officer who heard all my school stories, and were almost let though at Sydney airport by another kind security officer, only for some fat ugly paunchy man without a heart to take them away without bothering to look into my pleading eyes.

My bad, I guess.

But here I am in London town. I've felt reasonably cut off from the world so far without access to the internet (which would explain my complete silence back home to Australia, so apologies), and with the sun rising at 4 bloody AM, i've been surviving on 4 hours of sleep a night. Dossing rules (i.e. rules for sleeping on someone else's floor) means that I go to bed when my flatmate goes to bed when she has finished watching TV, and I get up when the sun gets up due to the lack of curtains in the lounge where I am currently camping out.

Speaking of my camp. I am based in the East near Canary Wharf. For those in the know, Canary Wharf is apparently an up-and-coming business area which is busy during the working day, but dead during the night. But to my disappointment, I was further away from the hip Canary Wharf than I realised, and instead am staying in a place called "Isle of Dogs" which in truth sounds more depressing than it actually is.

Job hunting has been a bit painful, but I'm hoping that the agencies might be able to help me out and I'm only starting to go house-hunting today. I'm hoping that the sooner I find a space of my own that i'll feel more settled, and also, find a place with a shower which the place i'm staying at doesn't have. The "shower" that has been set up is actually a hose connected to the hot/cold taps and you have to kneel in the bath so that it can reach over your head.

I miss my shower at home.