~ Curious Charlie ~

All the Moves - Hawthorne (Part 2) @ Sunday, October 22, 2017

December 2016

Life was still busy, full steam ahead. I've never been one to put life on hold for moving (4th move in 4 months by this point), I move in between events, and this one was no different. Advantage of taking forever to move is that you can keep all the windows open (after prying them open, painters painted over everything) for weeks, essential when the entire house smells like paint. This was before they removed the safety screens - turns out they were more concerned about fires than people getting in.

The blinds are scary... we never got around to cleaning then and decided not to use them. Instead we had curtains put up (from ikea). Don't buy that blind cleaner from daiso, it's a waste of money. We don't know how to clean them.

Can't believe I never took a picture of that fireplace... turns out I somehow moved the draws in front of it, and totally missed taking that picture. I'm pretty sure it's boarded up though. But I've got a picture from a house down the street, rent is 900pw for 3 bdrms in case you're wondering, and that doesn't include bills.

Check out that fireplace details. The floorboards in both rooms are the same, hidden under the carpet which they ripped up. Not sure about the mantel, but the grate is the same style at work 1850s+ though jas says he thinks it was built in the 1880s.

I'm surprised the girl before me didn't line all the draws. And there were a lot of draws. We used scented tissue paper and then kraft paper when we remembered everything is temporary.

This is the wardrobe, we added more under shelf bits to keep it in. All these pictures were also so if they say I broke stuff, no it was like that when I got here. Love that I was prepared for an exit. :P

This is the built in cupboard in the corner in the first picture. Didn't have a lot of shelves, which I had custom made and put in. There was mold floating on water in the fridge... and a scary as mug *shudders*. Is that fan mine? O.o I think I forgot it...

Other angles of the room and experimenting where to put what.

Check out that ceiling detail. This room doesn't have the huge central feature (ceiling rose), but the others do. *failed to get a picture* The house had been modified a few times, and so I'm not sure which of the two front doors is the original (both super modernized), but this rooms is huge and I don't think is the parlour. The right entry is more likely to be the original because the first room on the right also has a mudroom connected to it. - But I have never seen or heard of them here in Australia. Everyone has them back home.

Moving in, check out that great lighting. You won't see the room like that again.

I was here for three months before something really bad happened, alliances were formed, the game was set up to be played... and I quit. I don't really recall a time before the bad, all the good memories I once had have been overshadowed by the bad...

Anyway my experience of living at the house were vastly different to Camberwell. We had no cleaner! How were we going to survive?! I personally went through bin hell, god I swear somehow I ended up doing the bins a lot. And had a hazmat suit because I can smell EVERYTHING. Jack fruit has been ruined for me. In the process I nearly killed a neighbour (yes taking out the bins), something touched me and I screamed and ran, knocking him into the garden box. A tangle of dead overgrown weeds, nets and... wait for it... bricks. Getting a concussion around me is not hard. Yes I had put the bricks there, but the accident wasn't planned.

We had weekly chores. It was awful, but we survived. It was meant to make us responsible and stuff, also learn how to clean. Apparently sloshing a bucket over the floor is not the way to do it. I've also wiped the polish right off the table, and no I don't know which product I used. There were 8 of us and the chores were a rotation to be checked by the house mother who I can still feel judging me. There was a time before we hated each other, but it's a very distant memory, more like something out of a dream. We also cleaned our rooms monthly.

In the mornings we had classes, like at Camberwell, but this time they were actually helpful life skill classes. Though I was never a fan of the Steiner style, which isn't for everyone (or just not for me in this case). There were also month excursions, usually involving something I was allergic to, or couldn't do. The resentment is strong. We did do archery once though.

The neighbours were different, they were less offensive in the beginning and kept to themselves. The house didn't smoke like a chimney (at C, most people smoked, there were like 3/17-ish that didn't). Where did it all go wrong? Well neighbours come and go all the time, the house mother's niece was one real special snowflake that one. A vegan. And that's when it all started. The house mother is one of them and they (yes there's more than one, the snowflake bought out the snowflake in another girl) were protected. They could get away with anything, and did. Of course I got her back, but only she knows how. No one personally offends me and gets away with it.