family dramas: mother

Ah, the joys of family. Let’s face it, if you don’t have family issues, then you’re not human. I’ve been out of contact with my mother for a while now, probably about three or four months.  This was precipitated by a nasty email she sent me, telling me what a horrible selfish daughter I am.  I decided that it wouldn’t hurt me to take a little break for a bit from her unique brand of crazy, so I did so.  And to be honest, it’s been great. Sad, isn’t it.

I love my mother. However, she can be incredibly hurtful. I received an email from her last night, which had attached a string of communication between her and my aunt, my mother’s sister. They’ve always had a rocky relationship. I suspect it’s because they had a difficult childhood (my grandfather was a nasty alcoholic). It probably wasn’t helped by my aunt’s long-undiagnosed bipolar II. She’s on meds for it now which work well, but she had a few tough decades, where she suffered at the mercy of the mental health system. I’m talking everything from being advised to take LSD (yes, by a qualified doctor – hey, it was the 70s!) to being addicted to various prescription drugs.

She did come back from the brink, and is now a nurse, with a specialisation in mental health. She pays her bills, takes her meds, and is generally an upstanding member of society (with a slight alcohol problem, but no one’s perfect). My mother, however, continues to view her as somewhat Looney Toons.

Anyhow, they’d been arguing about my grandmother’s health care.  In an email to my aunt, Mother says, ‘Now grow up for goodness’ sakes – you are becoming rather pathetic!’ Not designed to engender good relations, one might think.  Amazingly, my aunt replied politely (gritting her teeth, no doubt) and didn’t take the bait.  Aunty did however point out an inaccuracy of Mum’s, which Mother obviously didn’t like, and so responded as follows: ‘I don’t know how you hold down a nursing job <Aunt’s Name> you are a complete nutcase!’

And she wonders why she doesn’t get along with her sister.

What do you do with an immediate family member who thinks it’s okay to treat people like this? This is one example of behaviour which has happened over and over again throughout my lifetime – to me, to her siblings, to Dad’s siblings.  She doesn’t pull it with her friends – she’s not that stupid.  The thought of continuing to deal with this crap until she (or I) dies is not fun.  And yet – and yet.  I do love her. Even though she is distinctly unlovable at times.

Sigh. I think this is one of those unsolvable situations.

tagged

This is what happens with me – I tend to wander around oblivious to what’s happening.  I glanced at incoming links on my dashboard today, and realised that Dark Sarcasm has tagged me to complete the following mission, should I choose to accept it:

Pass it on to five other bloggers, and tell them to open the nearest book to page 56. Write out the fifth sentence on that page, and also the next two to five sentences. The CLOSEST BOOK, NOT YOUR FAVORITE, OR MOST INTELLECTUAL!

Luckily for you, dear readers, the closest book to me is The Lady and the Unicorn, by Tracy Chevalier, who’s also the author of Girl with a Pearl Earring.  (The second closest book is actually a tax guide to depreciating assets for the 2007-2008 financial year.)  So, to my task:

I repeated the words I had used the other morning, staring at the scratched pew in front of us. ‘It is my one desire to join the convent at Chelles,’ I said. ‘Mon seul desir. My grandmother joined before she died, and my mother is sure to as well.’

I can recommend it – it’s a great book, with cleverly interweaving plots, and characters which are three-dimensional in the traits they possess.  Definitely worth a read.

Okay, so now I’m tagging Catatonic Kid, Freedomgirl, and TitaniumRose. I’m not playing properly, I know, by only tagging three people, but all the others who I’d normally nominate have already been tagged.  Sorry folks.

cleaning

What a day.  Tenants moved out of one of our units at 12 noon, and the new ones moved it at 5pm.  In that time, I cleaned the oven, cleaned the fridge, cleaned the microwave, the kitchen sink, the glass-topped dining table, the toilet, the bathroom basin, the trough…… need I go on? I made up a new inventory which includes details and numbers of every single item in the unit. (Six forks, one potato peeler, etc etc etc.) I also made up the two beds, moved in all the linen, you name it, I did it.  I dusted skirting boards.  I washed windows.

I’m exhausted.

And where was SO during all of this activity? Well, he was off, buying stuff like a mop and bucket, drinking glasses, a cutlery drawer, that kind of thing.  You know, the stuff I’d rather be doing.  Somehow we ended up doing the wrong tasks.  This won’t happen again.

Still, it was all worth it.  Our new tenants are delighted with the unit, and I have to say, after working on it all day and setting it up, it does look pretty special.  It was a bit sad when we came home, and I looked around our dirty kitchen, then went into my messy en suite, then came out and looked at our unmade bed….. still, it doesn’t matter – that’s what I can spend tomorrow doing – cleaning up our own place.  Yay! <roll eyes>

I think I’m still sick.  My throat is scratchy, and I’m coughing lots still.  Ah well, eventually it’ll go away.  Or I’ll die from it.  (Okay, that last bit was a joke. I’m not planning on dying any time soon.) It made me very cantankerous today though, while I was working away and coughing my lungs up.  I’m not good when I’m sick, as SO will attest to.

Aaaah. It’s a relief knowing we can pay all our mortgages for the next three months.  Financial stability is not overrated.

is it the weekend yet?

Hooo. So glad it’s Thursday night.  This week has gone so quickly, it seems incredible that it’s nearly the weekend again.

After having all of last week off work, I came back to an absolute avalanche.  And as well, just to keep me away from clearing the paperwork from my desk, I had training to deliver all of yesterday and half of today. This was previously booked in, and it needed to be done, but it doesn’t get paperwork finished off.

I guess the good news out of this is that a) I’ve done some extra time, which I can put towards taking some time off; and b) I’ve slept really well this week, due to being knackered.  I’ve come home every day this week and just crashed.

I’m lucky in that I get a lot of enjoyment from the different parts of my job.  I really do enjoy training, and I connect well with people.  When you’re trying to see equal opportunity to a male-dominated workforce, this is critical.  I feel like I’m slowly building trust with employees, one person at a time.  It’s a slow but effective way of being able to help the people who come to me with issues that need resolution – if they don’t trust you, they don’t come to you for help.

In other news, we’ve got our new tenants for our fully furnished unit sorted out.  We signed the lease today, and got the bond and first two weeks’ rent money.  Yay!  It’s a relief.  Three more months until we need to worry about sourcing new tenants.  They’re a couple of young backpackers, and they seem like nice girls – I can’t imagine we’ll have any issues with them. And the best part is, our current tenants move out Saturday morning, and the girls move in that evening.  We don’t even lose a day’s rent.

So even though we’ll spend the majority of Saturday cleaning up and preparing the unit for the new tenants, we’ll be able to kick back and relax on Sunday, knowing we’ll be able to pay our mortgage for the next three months.  This is great news, obviously. I’m looking forward to being financially stable again.  SO mentioned the other day that the ‘buffer’ in our main account in getting bigger, so I’m not the only one who’s happy about things going well financially. It’s a relief.

not quite sure about this

I went to bed last night at 11:30pm. Yes, I know, too late, naughty me. Anyhow, I woke up at 7pm and had some breakfast.  Sat around for a bit and thought…. I think I’m still tired.  So I hit the sack again, expecting to wake up a couple of hours later.

Well, I surfaced at a quarter to one.  Then, I was sleepy this afternoon, so I slept for two hours…. and now I’m tired again.  Or still.

I’m just beginning to wonder if maybe choosing to pass on the antibiotics wasn’t the best idea.  I mean sure, I feel okay.  I’m still coughing up muck <hack> but otherwise I’m good.  But I don’t know if the excessive sleeping thing is a concern.

Oh well, I’ll find out tomorrow.  Back to work, plus our normal Monday lunchtime session in the gym. That should be interesting.

mundane saturday

Despite a fairly laid-back day, a lot got done around the house.  I went food shopping, did some laundry, and we even managed a cooked breakfast, something that normally only happens on a Sunday. Also changed the bed, and cooked a roast dinner. Oh, and I finally finished our tax!! <choir of angels sing in background> When I say ‘finished’, I don’t mean, ‘only a few more receipts to enter’ or ‘just have to look up some costings from the purchase of our IPs’ – I mean, ’sent to accountant’.  What a relief.  It also means I could finally put away all the crap paperwork associated with it – five files and a whole heap of loose stuff I haven’t bothered filing away yet.  Yay!

I also took pity on our tomato plants.  I weeded that garden bed, mulched and put down some slow-release fertiliser, then gave it all a really good watering.  There are more tomatoes that I’d originally thought, too – most of them the cherry tomato type, with one decent-sized ‘proper’ tomato.  The only thing is, I suspect they’re meant to be staked.  I should probably look that up and do something about it.  Whether I do or not is another matter. 

I had a good look at them, and I couldn’t see anything like black spot, or any bugs that are eating them, so I think the plants themselves are pretty hardy.  It’s more whether they’ve had enough water to taste decent.  I guess there’s only one way we’ll find out.

Today we have a home open for one of our units. It’s at 2pm. I just hope people show up – it’s amazing how many people say that they’ll come and have a look, then don’t show.  At least it doesn’t surprise me any more.  I’ll be glad to have it sorted out though. The bit I don’t like about investment properties is when a lease comes to an end, it always worries me even though the rental market in Perth is tight.

gardening

A while back, I planted out some cuttings, and it just occurred to me that I didn’t follow up on how they did.  The trailing geranium cuttings are doing well; I planted three of them in a hanging basket by the back door, assuming that there’d be a loss or two along the way.  Well, they’ve all survived.  They’re not thriving like maniacs or anything, but all of them are shooting new leaves and starting to look a bit happier.

The rosemary, on the other hand, has been a great disappointment.  I made up some lovely free-draining soil, too, and dipped the ends in Vegemite (yeast extract) which apparently helps root formation.  Well, all but one are rooted, in the terminal sense.  The only one that appears to be surviving, so far, is a tiny little softwood cutting.  It’s surrounded by four of its dead friends, which I’m too scared to pull up in case I disturb its fragile hold on life.  The way it’s going, I’ll be able to actually plant it out by about 2012.

I decided to try some more cuttings today.  My plumbago plants are looking really happy and healthy, so I thought I’d try getting soft tip cuttings from both.  I have both Plumbago auriculata and P auriculata var. alba (ie. the blue and the white ones).  They’re pretty, easy to look after, and tough as old boots. And it has an attractive way of sprawling about, which appeals to me:

Currently my plants are in our backyard, next to the fence, and in a hidden away spot.  I thought I’d try to get some cuttings and if they work, I’ll put them in the front yard where they can enjoy the sun.

I also made a discovery when I was getting the plumbago cuttings.  We dig all our kitchen scraps (barring meat and dairy) into the ground, add water, then cover back over with soil.  It’s one way of reducing landfill, and it turns waste into compost.  Well, it turns out that some tomatoes have sprouted.  I have a number of tiny tomatoes as well as full-sized ones that are happily growing without the benefit of watering, fertiliser, or slug pellets.  Amazing but true.  I don’t know what they’ll taste like, but at least I know they’re organic – untouched by any chemical additives whatsoever.

update and rambling

Still unwell here, but slowly getting better. The quack gave me a script for antibiotics, but I didn’t get it filled.  He did say that if I could, I should hold off.  He’s been my doctor for over a decade, so he knows how many times I’ve been on antibiotics before, and that I have developed a fairly decent immunity to them.  So yeah, ixnay on the drugs.  This time.  I’d rather hold off until I get something really serious, like blood poisoning (which I’ve had before, incidentally, when an impacted wisdom tooth went horribly wrong).

I have managed to get a couple of things done today.  I dragged myself to the shops, and bought some food.  Stuff like salad, meat, you know, standard foodstuffs.  I even made a salad for dinner tonight, and SO cooked the meat on the BBQ.  It tastes so much better when barbequed.

I also put some more things on eBay.  Slowly but surely, I hope we’ll be getting rid of our excess clothes.  I can’t wait to have my wardrobe space back! Then I can fill it back up, with stuff that fits.   Heh heh heh…. I haven’t mentioned that part to SO yet.  I may wait a while before I do.

I got spoiled tonight After dinner, SO made me a real coffee (ie. with our coffee machine, not instant) and also gave me a glass of port.  Yum.  It’s a funny thing, both my brother and I are really happy drinkers.  We drink, we’re happy, we drink more, then we fall asleep.  SO and my friends all love it when I have a couple of drinks, because I’m an amusing lush.  It’s easy to see how I have alcoholics on both sides of my family.  That said, all the alcoholics, on both sides, tend to be nasty SOBs when drinking….. It’s an interesting conundrum.  Maybe if all alcoholics were happy drunks, my family would get along better. In fact, I can guarantee it.  I still have flashbacks to the first time SO met my mother’s side of the family.  It was Granny’s 90th birthday, and all my aunts and uncles and cousins went out to dinner at a posh restaurant in West Perth.  My uncle (mum’s brother) started a speech at the appropriate time of the evening, and my aunt (mum’s sister) stood up and abused him.  He argued back.  Fortunately, it didn’t end up with food being thrown.  But yes, not the best family occasion ever.  SO was amazed, and fascinated.  Luckily it didn’t scare him off.  A lesser man would have run.  SO chose to view it as free entertainment.

random grumblings: DIY is not impossible

I get around on the intermenets.  Particularly when it comes to one area of interest – residential property.  Whether it’s about buying it, renovating it, renting it out, managing it, I’ve probably read it.  Hey, I’m obsessive without the compulsive.  At least, most of the time.  And there’s nothing wrong with research.

Anyhow, we’re not here to psychoanalyse my OCD tendencies.  Rather, I want to grumble. <stands on soapbox and clears throat> Why is it, almost everywhere I turn, there are individuals claiming that getting a professional property manager is the way to go? This boggles what little there is of my mind.  In fact, let’s look at some of the common arguments for professional property management, and why they don’t hold water.

1.  ‘They can do it properly.’ Well, that’s lovely – if it’s true.  I have heard some absolute horror stories about poor property managers.  I won’t go into the details, but they include things like drastically under-pricing rents, not bothering about inspections, not removing non-paying ‘guests’ – trust me, the list goes on.

And don’t complain to me about your local equivalent of the Tenancies’ Act.  Seriously, it’s not that hard to understand.  There are always very good plain English guides available, if you don’t want to read the actual legislation.  And if you’re prepared to sign your left kidney away on the ridiculous documentation required for an investment loan, then you should be able to read the Tenancies’ Act.  If not, your problem.  Buyer beware.

2. ‘It’s a tax deduction.’ True.  But honestly, nobody should be going into investment of any description trying to make a loss.  Because you only get tax deductions on losses (ie. outgoings>incomings).  I can sell you any number of pine plantations or second hand cars if you want to make a loss. But if you want to make a profit, then logic dictates that your income should be greater than your expenses.  Financial Accounting 101, not that I ever did it.

3. ‘It saves time.’ Unless you have more than five properties (which in Australia, puts you in the top 0.1% of property investors), then it doesn’t take that much time.  Trust me, I have three, and I do it myself.  There’s a little bit of work at the start, setting up home opens and fielding calls, then installing the tenant; then the regular inspections; then the tenant leaves, so the bond paperwork needs to be done.  In the meantime, the occasional call about maintenance.  But honestly, that’s it.

Of course, this is based on the assumption that you’ve picked decent tenants.  We landlords all want quiet-living people who lawfully abide in our premises.  So far, SO and I have only had one near-disaster, with a non-rent-paying single mum of 19, and her on-again, off-again babydaddy boyfriend, who liked kicking in the front door when he lost his temper.  Since then we’ve been extremely careful.

That said, you have to be on the ball.  I came across this article yesterday which perfectly outlines the rental dilemma. It’s worth a read.

Anyway, to come back to the main issue at hand: don’t whinge about DIY property management.  Give it a go.  It’s a great way to learn about the dark recesses of the human character.

still sick

Ugh.  I’ve been crook all weekend with this head cold, and I’m still feeling very wrong.  I think I may end up missing work again tomorrow, which means going back and getting another med cert, and shelling out another $55 for the privilege.  Oh well.  Thank God for sick leave.

One of our units is coming up for renting again.  The lovely couple currently in it are going back to Scotland, so we’re going to have to look for new tenants.  As the current ones are moving back home, they’ve offered us the majority of their stuff, so we can rent it out fully furnished.  We’ve taken a deep breath, and decided we’re going to give it a shot. Pros of renting fully furnished: better return.  Much better return. Cons: higher vacancy rates, and more stuff to have to replace (eg. broken plates, that kind of thing).  Anyway, we’re going to give it a go, and see how it turns out.

I advertised it yesterday as f/furn and equipped, and have already had two potential applicants get in touch, so that’s got to be a good sign.  On the strength of this, I even managed to pick some stuff up on sale.  I got some great bargains – two doona covers for $20 each, two sheet sets for $16 each, six towels for $5.50 each.  So that’s all very exciting.  I love a bargain. 

All the excitement of bargain hunting really wore me out, though.  After an hour of shopping, I came home and faceplanted on the couch.  Yep, back to bed for me.