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Choosing My Accomodation

I can feel my old age settling in. It was slow at first, hardly noticeable. But it’s starting to catch up to me, in fact, it’s potentially already caught up to me. I think I may officially be old, despite how hard I’ve tried not to be. 

I’m starting to struggle with things that I used to find easy. That’s really tough and extremely frustrating. I feel like I’m losing myself and I know that my children are worried about me, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I suppose I could look into the specialist disability accommodation providers in my area like my children asked me to.

I’m still very sound of mind, which is both a blessing and a curse, so I am quite capable of choosing my own accommodation providers and signing all the paperwork. I would need help moving, but once I’m living in specialist disability accommodation, I should have access to people who can help me perform everyday tasks like I used to.

I’ve put off looking into specialist disability accommodation for several years now because I didn’t want to admit that I was getting older. Unfortunately these days it’s getting harder and harder to deny and I need to do this for myself and my children before it’s too late. I would like to choose my own disability support worker. In the Adelaide CBD, there are plenty of disability support workers to choose from and I wouldn’t want to burden my children with that sort of decision making. While my mind is still strong and with it, I’m going to do what I can to help make my kids’ lives easier.

Although my body is going and my mind is probably going to go with it, I know for a fact that my love for my children will never waver. They are my proudest accomplishment. I hope they’ll be okay once I’m gone.

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Getting A Shoulder Replacement

It’s always scary when someone you love needs surgery. My mum’s body has been failing her ever since I was born. When pregnant with me she had all of these physical issues, and it has been bad for her ever since. She played a lot of sport when she was younger and had bad eating habits, the negative effects of which were masked by the hours and hours of sport/training she did every week. She was extremely talented and a highly regarded sporting child in her town growing up, but one injury to her ligaments at twenty-one years old changed all that.  

Now as a woman in her late fifties, she needs to have a shoulder replacement because of all the stress she put on her shoulders when she was younger. As her only child, I am worried about the surgery and how long it’s going to take her to recover, but I know she needs to do it. She’s not going to have anywhere near a good enough quality of life if she doesn’t get the surgery done. 

Shoulder replacement surgery has many benefits and even though I’m scared for my mum to get the surgery, I know for a fact that she’s in the best hands possible. In fact, we’ve got her an appointment with the best shoulder surgeon Melbourne has to offer. That’s how badly we all want this to go well. If the shoulder surgery does go well then mum will be in significantly less pain and have a much greater range of movement going forward. It would really improve her quality of life to be able to move her shoulder without pain. She would be able to get back into doing exercises that she used to love and I know she would be a lot happier as a result. I’m happy just thinking about her happiness. I really hope her shoulder replacement surgery goes well. 

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Expert Conveyancing Firm

My call with the conveyancer went fantastically! Talking to the conveyancer on company time is literally so much better than actually working. As I said, I really ease myself into work on a Monday because I’m still recovering from an incredibly busy two days before. My weekends are my happy place and spending time with my friends and family is what’s important to me. I thrive off it and I’m still feeling the positive afterglow from my weekend shenanigans.

Anyway, sorry, I’m just really happy! I’m feeling very certain of my decision after speaking with the reputable conveyancing firm for St. Kilda properties. I’ve always wanted to purchase an investment property in St. Kilda, because it’s so popular for tourists and has great nightlife. I could turn it into one of those properties that gets rented out just for the weekend or a couple of weeks and have that pay off my mortgage in no time. It’s a smart decision and I’m so glad that my conveyancer agrees.

My conveyancer really works for the best conveyancing agency near Caulfield and St. Kilda is near Caulfield! That’s why I trust my conveyancer so much. Pretty much if they say jump, I say “how high?”. It’s a great working relationship that we’ve got going on and their advice is likely to make me very rich one day.

As I said, this is a much better way to spend my Monday than actually working. I’m physically at work today but mentally I am anywhere other than work. I hope my boss doesn’t notice but even if she does, I work so much harder than everyone else Tuesday-Friday so I’m sure it’s fine. If my output over four days is still better than everyone else’s over five days, then really, why would she complain? If I have to do five days of work then I’ll drop down to their level.

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Upcoming Logbook Service

It’s almost time for my yearly logbook service. I have a newish car, it was made in 2017 and it’s now 2022, so I’m still within my manufacturer’s logbook requirements. I think it may last ten years? I’m not sure. I just give the mechanic my logbook and let her do whatever it is she needs to do. After all, she’s the expert mechanic servicing Ringwood cars, not me.

I wonder if my car will need anything out of the ordinary for this service. Last time, I needed to get something extra done to my wheels. I’m not quite sure what was wrong with them, maybe they had become misaligned or something. Whatever it was I’m not sure, but I gave my mechanic a nod and let her do what needed to be done. It cost me a bit extra than I would have liked it to, but my mechanic did a great job and so I can’t complain. My car has run incredibly well this year and it’s all thanks to the incredible work she has done. 

I have a feeling that I might need a break repair. In the Ringwood area, the roads are really hilly and rough. I also have to do a lot of stop-start driving once I hit roads closer to the city, which puts pressure on my brakes. I am also a bit of a nervous driver and so I hover over the brakes a lot as I drive. A lot of the time, I’m driving with my foot against the brake pedal. That’s why I have a feeling that my car will need some sort of brake repair or service, even though it’s pretty much new and is still in its logbook service period. I guess it’s my fault for driving so anxiously once I hit the city traffic.

Whatever the price of the logbook service is, I’m lucky that I’ll be able to afford it. I don’t have a high paying job by any stretch of the imagination, but I am good at budgeting and have money saved for situations such as this. 

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On the Water

Three months after escaping the Conclave of Mechanists, Maphira stood on the edge of her boat, overlooking Port Phillip Bay, the breeze rushing through her long hair.

After all the chaos they’d been through, it was time for a bit of a break. Possibly forever. Maphira thought perhaps she’d had enough adventure for one life.

She turned from the bow, glancing over at Vai and Rylee, relaxing in the warm sun. Maphira paced over to her sister and friend, taking the seat between them. The three women were silent for a time, and Maphira wondered if they were just as contemplative as she was today.

Perhaps working as someone who could complete professional boat catch installations wasn’t the most exciting way to spend the rest of her life, but Maphira was quite done with excitement. She’d settled back into her old job seamlessly, continuing that simple career she’d begun forging when in hiding from the Conclave of Mechanists. Thankfully, there was no Conclave of Mechanists to hide from now.

Without its head scientist, director of solar power and overall leader, the Conclave had fallen apart. Those few who remained as part of that old group were continually fighting each other, allowing the world’s old governments to reassert themselves as the leaders once again. That brought its own issues, for sure, but Maphira was just glad to not have a bunch of crazy mechanics running the planet anymore.

Maphira wasn’t sure if marine stainless fabrication near Melbourne was her true calling – was it something she’d be happy to do for the rest of her life? Maybe, or maybe not. Only time would tell. Perhaps she could have joined the police force again, as Rylee had done, but this would do for now.

Taking in the warmth of the sun, Maphira considered the two people beside her, grateful that they’d managed to achieve victory with her. Rylee seemed to be holding up quite well, given what they were on the water to do, but perhaps she simply wasn’t thinking about it.

She suspected that soon enough her sister would be in tears.

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Delaying The Brief

Talk about leaving things to the last minute. I only have four minutes left to finalise this brief for work to pass on to an established video production company that we’re about to work with. They need the brief by a certain time to be able to hit our tight deadline and I completely get that. The only issue is that I’m not going to be able to hit the deadline for the brief. I’ve been so distracted all day and now I’m only just getting my head in the right frame of mind to do the work. I wish I had been this motivated at the start of the day – it would have saved me the very large headache that I’m experiencing now.

I’m going to have to call Melbourne’s best video animation company and apologise. It’s entirely my fault that the project is now being held up. I don’t want anyone getting in trouble on their end for the delay… but I also don’t want to get in trouble on my end for it. I don’t particularly want my boss to know that I wasted a whole day instead of working and as a result the video we’ve commissioned is going to be delayed. Yeah, I can’t have that hanging over my head. But the corporate video production company shouldn’t have to take any negative feedback from my boss because of a mistake that I’ve made. Okay. I’m going to call the video animation company and explain.

Wow. I am so grateful to be the main contact between my work and the corporate video production company. Melbourne city workers like us have to stick together and they very kindly said that they would do what they can in the meantime while waiting for the official brief, so to try and stick to the project timeline as closely as possible. How nice of them. I’m very relieved because this has been a major mess up on my behalf.

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Car Always Breaks

My car breaks down every other week, I swear. Everyone’s telling me that it’s because I haven’t gotten serviced since I purchased it second hand and that it’s my fault for not making sure it was issued with a roadworthy certificate before purchasing it. Phsst. I only had ten minutes to make the purchase with the guy who previously owned the vehicle. Do you really think that I had time to ask him whether he got a roadworthy certificate? Near me, people don’t do those sorts of things. Especially under time pressure. We had time for a “Hey mate,” each and then that was that. I paid him in cash and as soon as I had done so, he was gone.

I am very sick of my car breaking down though. I can hardly get from A to B anymore without something making a weird noise or falling off or stopping altogether. It’s especially annoying having everyone say that I should’ve done this or I should’ve done that as well, because there’s no going back now and it’s too late to dwell on what I did or didn’t do.

It’s gotten to the point where I do think I’m going to have to book an appointment with a mechanic. Underwood is a good area in terms of variety, but all my friends have said I’m going to need to go to the best of the best if I want to have any chance of being able to drive my car properly again. I’ve never actually been able to drive my car properly, but it’s significantly worse now than it used to be.

I’m really hoping that the mechanic can do something to fix my car. I don’t know exactly what needs to be done – maybe my car suspension needs to be repaired or my car needs to be looked over by an automotive mechanic. Whatever it is, I hope my car can be fixed because I really need to be able to drive.

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Perfectly Redecorated Home

The redecorating is coming along really nicely. My house looks exactly like the beachside, tropical location I stayed at a few weeks ago. Transforming my house into a tropical paradise by simply changing the wallpaper and wall decals I’ve selected for my home has been a great decision. I think it’s playing a big role in the fact that even a month on from my holiday, I’m feeling calm, relaxed and happy. Normally I get so caught up in life and my responsibilities that I forget to step back and smell the roses, but with the walls of my home decorated with flower wall decals and bright coloured wallpaper behind them, I feel good. And my house looks incredible. 

I am pleased to say that my decorating of the office is also going really well. My boss said he was happy for me to redecorate, which I was surprised by. I think it was because of how confident, cool, calm and collected I was when I approached him on the first day of work. It was an absolute breeze to talk him through the benefits of redecorating and showing him all the options available to him and the office.

I wanted to have a really large impact on the way our office is decorated going forward, but seeing as I’m not the boss or the owner of the building, I had to run all my design choices by my boss. To ensure I got what I wanted, I made sure to present him with several decorative options. 

I was rather surprised when he opted for the unicorn wall decal option, but I was pleasantly surprised indeed. I am so excited to have the wall decals elegantly framed and put on the walls. It’s going to be a much-needed element of added colour and it’s going to lift the spirit of my coworkers. It’s going to create a really relaxing, holiday feel among the office and employees.

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Under the Sea

The ocean is busier than ever these days. A couple of hundred years ago, mermaids were being hunted by fishermen so frequently that our population numbers dwindled down to extinction. But the past few decades have seen this trend in reverse as we learned to hide from their ships and deceive their scouts. I am barely twenty, so I never got to experience the secrecy and fear that came with the height of the mermaid hunts, but I have heard the stories.

My grandfather says the worst of the boats had a fishing boat decal sticker of a giant squid on the underside of its hull. It moved so silently that we couldn’t tell it was coming but for the dull thud of its anchor hitting the ocean floor. When we looked up and saw the inky squid peering back at us through the opaque water, we kicked our fins and swam as fast as we could. I’m glad I wasn’t around in those days. Whenever an elder tells the story of swimming away, there is a sliver of fear in their eyes that makes me shiver.

Now that the mermaids are at the height of our power again, we’re holding a celebration in the coral fields to commemorate our history and prepare for our upcoming battle against the humans. The fields are always colourful, but today it’s as though all the rainbows in the world have conspired to appear here for our celebration. Bubbles twirl in the water, fish flicker and dance around the perimeter, and someone even seems to have shorn off a vinyl boat print from a shipwreck and strung it up across two tall pieces of coral. My brother is a musician, so I imagine he’ll be floating around here somewhere, shining his metal tubes and getting ready to perform. As for me, I’m just excited for the food. There’s a stall selling seaweed soup that I’ve been eyeing for the past few hours, and as soon as the ceremony finishes I’m going to make a beeline for it.

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A Familiar Office

When Maphira woke up, she found herself in what appeared to be a conference room. It wasn’t just any conference room,  though. This was a special conference room. It was the conference room from that famous sitcom, The Paper Company Office. She’d loved that show as a kid, watching it with her mum in the lounge room of their small home. Rylee had always wanted to join in, but she’d been too young to understand any of the jokes.

Since The Paper Company Office was just a television show, it didn’t really make sense how she’d found herself in its conference room. Perhaps she was dreaming, or maybe the Conclave of Mechanists had brought her to the set of the show for whatever nefarious purposes they had.

Was it possible that they had this kind of office design near Melbourne, somewhere? She considered it unlikely, but not impossible. Either way, this certainly didn’t seem to be the new Conclave of Mechanists base located in Carnegie.

As Maphira lifted herself off the ground, she wondered where Vai could be. Not at all sure what was going on, Maphira headed out of the conference room, into the main office area. 

It was empty now, but she could picture it well – the myriad of scenes she’d once watched and laughed at. James putting Dirk’s stapler in custard, the boss Mitchel Scarn making a fool of himself, the romance blossoming between Pearl and James.

Perhaps there was a business offering office fitouts close to Melbourne that matched the style of that famous show, Maphira thought. It certainly wasn’t impossible, especially now that all the millennials who loved the show were working in similar offices.

Deciding to explore a little bit, Maphira headed toward the break room, hoping she’d find Vai somewhere. She’d stay on her guard since this was probably some sort of Mechanist plot. They weren’t just going to put her in an office and call it a day. So the question was, what was their game?