Happy Lass

I used Britannia in 2010. Local delivery was handled by a combination of King & Wilson and a local removal firm whose name I can't recall now but they were also good. Mine also took about 12 weeks door-to-door.

The shopping - especially when it comes to furniture. And I do miss being able to shop in John Lewis. There are some lovely British varieties of cheese that I miss but otherwise I've been able to find equivalents (or better) for most of my favourite foods over here.

I wouldn't touch a Windows 8 machine but 8.1 is great. I use it for work as well as home. I looked at the Chromebook earlier this year and decided against it because I want to be able to install anything I want and save it to the machine itself. If all you want is Google docs, Gmail, Web browsing and other Google services then I think it's a really good option but if you want to be able to use Microsoft Office and install things that you wouldn't typically find in the Cloud, you'd be better off with a laptop and these days, 8.1 is the best option as far as Windows goes if ​you get one with a touch-screen.

Once you've got the place insulated and double-glazed, under-floor heating + the ceiling fan may be all you need to get through the winter. Mine is fairly well insulated in that half of it is very well insulated and the other half is like you described. The well insulated half has under-floor heating and it's lovely and warm but I can't say yet whether it is economical to run because this is my first winter in the house.

I never thought I'd say this but I love my Windows 8 laptop. Once you update it to Windows 8.1 and combine it with a touch screen, it's really pretty good and I don't miss Windows 7 at all. I've been using mine for months and wouldn't go back to 7 now that I have it set up the way I like it. You could always look at the laptop/tablet hybrids like the Surface Pro to get you over the line. They're easy to dock and connect up to a full-sized monitor and as portable as an iPad.

Fly screens are also great for keeping the moths out of the house on those hot summer evenings we have here.

That's lovely, Bob. The sky was beautiful here this morning and almost caused me to be late for work.

I found Bellerive to be a really nice area to live (the views are terrific) but I found the light from the Oval overwhelming during the evening especially if you enjoy the night sky. I would recommend renting there for a while just to see how you get on with it.

Congratulations! :hug:

I stopped using foundation since moving here but I used to use Chanel which used to be okay in 30c heat. Now-a-days I just use Ultraceuticals ultra moisturiser together their SPF30 daily moisturiser and a powder blusher (I love Chantecaille).

Stick with the same one. I think. Ring them up; they're pretty good over the phone.

It took me a long time to find work too in good part because I specialise in something that wasn't in much demand where I live when I first moved over here but also because of the visa challenge. The first job offer I had was reneged as soon as it was offered when the person I spoke to found out that I wasn't a permanent resident at that time (I am now). I can laugh at it now because they were prepared to hire me without an interview but I felt frustrated and a little bit defeated at the time. I signed up with lots of different agencies and found a really, really good one that understood my skill-set and career background and I was soon picking up short and fixed term contract work. One of those contracts turned into an offer of permanent work and I am still there now. This is what worked for me: 1. As others have said, take your time over your application. If no selection criteria was requested, I wrote one anyway using my best guess at what they might require. 2. If you're open to trying contracting or temp work and plan to try an agency, ring round until you find someone you think you click with. 3. Check your C.V. and write out any acronyms and initialisms in full even if you worked for somewhere that would be obvious to a fellow Brit such as the NHS, HMRC or HBOS. Remove any reference to your residential status to increase the odds of being asked for an interview. Not that you won't be asked to prove that you are eligible to work in Australia but that you don't always have to provide it in the initial letter of application. 4. Talk about what you do to as many interested people as you can. Chances are that someone is bound to know something about the industry you want to get into or at least have some useful working knowledge of the job market in your area. It took a long time to land the kind of work I love, working for the kind of business and people I like to work for but I did manage to get there in the end and I sincerely hope that you do too. Best of luck.

...and a chocolate shop.

I still enjoy PIO; I don't have as much time to hop on and read the form or post as much as I used to now that I'm working full-time but still love to visit when I can.

That is so funny. Love that she is keeping a good sense of humour about it. Made me think of this sketch by Steve Hughes: