The ‘farm’ at Dilston will be our home for the foresee-able future. The house itself is tiny, an aluminium building which was fitted out inside to make a home for a young couple while they saved for their dream home. Unfortunately, they made it too comfortable and, without the urge to move on, they stayed in it for 9 years. It is a perfect home for us, having all the comfort we need without the demands of too much housework.
I’ll post some pictures of the outside this time and some photos of the interior in my next episode. I heard on the TV last night that people in Sydney and Melbourne are offering incentives to prospective home buyers: holidays, cars, etc. Graeme and Patsy left us a cat. This moggy entered their lives some time ago when it wandered on to the property looking for a hand-out. They’re kind people with two cats of their own, so offered it the post of Outside Cat with a regular bowl of Whiskas and a warm box to keep out the winter chills. They asked whether we would carry on the arrangement and the cat made it its business to endear herself to us, running to meet us when we visited and rubbing itself against our legs.
When we arrived to take possession of the house, the cat was waiting ready to establish some ground-rules. First, it has promoted itself to Indoor Cat, it wants milk added to its diet, and a bed in the laundry in all seasons of the year. It has demonstrated its knowledge of the existing cat door as it still wants access to the grounds when it feels the urge. It’s quite a noisy cat so Jamie has named it Chatter-box or CB for short. It’s clearly a man’s cat, as it’s all over Jamie and me but treats Marilyn as just the lady who puts down its dinner. In a previous existence, we believe it lived with a man. Marilyn has fantasised about an old bachelor whose cat was the focus of his loveless life, and when he was near to dying, he encouraged it to seek a new home where the people would pander to its demands. Sounds likely, doesn’t it?
Nothing very much has been done to the 2 acres. We certainly have the task ahead of us in levelling and tidying up the area around the house and keeping the tussocks and button grass under control in the rest of the space. There are some areas among the trees which are crying out for development. Jamie talks about a fire pit, for late night sing-songs but I think it will be enough to provide some places where I can drag a soft chair and sit in the shade to read. 
We’re in the process of putting up a shed at the moment. What a rigmarole: choose the shed, get a quote for the concrete slab – easy enough so far. But then, the council gets in on the act: apply for a Building Permit, with plans of the shed (it’s just a rectangle, for goodness sake!), make sure it’s not too close to a boundary else we’ll need a Planning Permit as well, make sure we have a plan to deal with storm water (it’s just a little shed and, if it weren’t there, the rainwater would look after itself), pay the required fee, and wait for several weeks until someone glances at the application and gives it a rubber stamp.
Jamie has also seen a mini-cedar cabin in a Bunnings catalogue but the process of getting approval for that might be beyond us.
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