we have finally left country rural life, and are now back in town for good.

as a stirling example of how difficult it has been to unpack, there is currently an unopened box in the kitchen which is labelled "food, pillows, misc".

????????????????????

"You can't bring that in here."

When I went to the International Motorcycle Show on the weekend, I had a 1" retractable folding knife attached to my keychain. Ever since I had a cog puncture my thumbnail earlier this year, I've been unable to open any plastic packages or packets so it's either I take something with me to help, or I struggle for 20 minutes before eating part of the packaging in a desperate bid to get it open. Put it this way - they'll find my bleached bones on a desert island one day, surrounded by vacuum sealed packets of ready to eat meals. Anyway, when they did the bag check, the lady at the front stated that I couldn't take it in, and would have to put it back in my car. Which I obviously had brought with me, since I had all this bicycle gear and a helmet.

I calmly looked back at the lady without even blinking and stated that there was no law provisioning that I was not allowed to take a knife into the venue. Furthermore, the law stated that a retractable blade must be over 3" long for it to be considered a dangerous weapon under which restrictions apply (technically this is untrue: the blade must be longer than 3.5" for it to be illegal), for both Seattle municipal code and the revised code of Washington.

She looked utterly shocked at the calm, well thought out response I gave and was completely speechless. I thought about it for a second, trying to work out exactly why she even brought it up. "If you would like me to store this out of view inside my bag, I will do that." She quickly agreed to that and I went on my merry way.

Sometimes, quick thinking on your toes and a little knowledge of what's ok and what's not comes in really, really handy. The rest of the IMS was not so good. The only really good thing about it was probably the Husqvarna enduro bikes, which were both hot and functional. Husqvarna make some amazing machines, and I'd love to own one, but the price tag is a little high. I also got my butt kicked on a racing simulator, but did pretty well on a "Dan's commute from hell" driving simulator in which the motorcycle rider assesses the problems they may encounter on the commute in. Even though the guy demonstrating it had seen it all before, I even surprised him when I saw a scooter lane split past a truck and said, "Motorcyclists are like deer, if you see one there's probably more" right before a simulated sportbike popped out and did exactly the same thing. I crashed twice, once trying to work out if you could high side (the answer is yes), and once right at the end because I got to the end of the simulation, turned hard and rode directly into a wall on purpose. They should have more of these simulators, all of them were things that I've encountered on regular commutes, and it would be a good lesson to new riders for all of the hazards they may experience.

to start with, there were a few minor departmental hurdles to overcome which stated that i was allowed to live in mullewa for the entire year that i was on leave (NO), and that i wasn't entitled to have my stuff moved back down to perth because i'd applied to mullewa again.

that, in itself, is a longish sort of story.

anyway, so after many phone calls between different departments, union people and housing people, i ended up being able to have my stuff moved down at department cost.

excellent.

however, i'd only ever heard bad things about the removalists that come out of geraldton. invariably, i was a little concerned. more than a few people had complained about how furniture was damaged or simply went missing (HOW?! between getting it on a truck... and then taking it off a truck...????????!). so a few weeks ago, we started moving easy stuff, and stuff that was valuable ourselves.

finally, i got a call last week confirming the date that the removalists were going to rock up at my house, and what day they would be dropping it off in perth -- 7th dec for uplift, 10th dec for downlift. i assured the receptionist lady that it wouldn't take the guys more than half a day to pack our stuff, since we'd already taken a bunch of stuff home, we don't really have that much anyway, and our house had previously taken the kimberley removalists about 3 hours to pack.

anyway, the 7th. i'd spent all weekend getting everything prepared, chucking stuff out, cleaning up, putting "to keep" stuff aside, i ended up taking monday off, not because of the removalists, but because i had trouble walking around. they eventually turned up ("we've just left gero, we'll be about 20 minutes". gero is 98km away.) 2 hours later than planned, which was to be expected. i went through the house and said "nothing out of the bathroom, and nothing from this wardrobe. i've tied the handles so you remember".

TIED THEM. is there any ambiguity in this??

anyway, the two guys spent until 6pm packing. they got about 1/2 done. every time i walked in to get something or check up on how they were going, one guy was too busy trying to talk to me and drink a choc milk, and the other was busy just... kinda wandering from room to room or going to the toilet. i discovered that they'd taken the speakers from the study, and set them up in the spare room so they could plug their ipod in. dude. you could have packed an entire box in that time.

anyway, so they knocked off at 6pm, with the intention of coming back at 7am the next day. then one guy says "do you mind if we just crash on your living room floor?"

??????????????

yes, yes i do mind. i made up some pleasant lie and told them, sorry but no (why i lied, i have no idea), and they drove off, presumably out bush to camp the night. WHAT??

they came back at 7am, with 2 other guys who'd finished packing another house around the corner. i went around at lunchtime to check up and sign off.

well, sure enough, the wardrobe, WHICH HAD BEEN TIED UP, was open and all the things packed at the back of the truck. as you can imagine, this means i am currently washing clothes every night and borrowing aden's shirts, since all of my clothing for the next week was in the wardrobe. tied up.

that was annoying. i got cross. and annoyed. being the deadshits that they were, they didn't know what to do, so i just said forget it. what day were they going to drop it off?? i needed to confirm in case they were being dumb again. "definitely thursday". right. aden's brother is all prepared to go out and open the house for us, which is awesome.

at 7pm that same day, six hours after this had been confirmed, we get a call saying "uh, yeah, we're almost at your house, we'll be dropping off tomorrow". WHAT?????! they're lucky it was aden who answered the phone, i think i would have started yelling at them, and then possibly started crying. luckily, aden's sister was free to deal with this further demonstration of complete and utter stupidity, and she went and opened the house for them.

i fully expect to open the boxes to find them with like.... a whole bunch of paper and one sock in it. and yes, i will be complaining to the head office.

14,206. Fourteen thousand, two hundred and six. One four two zero six. Over half way around the globe. That's how many miles I've covered from January 1, 2009 to December 7, 2009. By bicycle.

But I'm not done yet. There's still 24 days left in this month, and I've got some juice left in the tank. I'm shooting for a nice 15,000 mi to round out a year of riding. Just over 24,000 km.

There's 794 mi to go. A little over 1,250 km. About the same distance as Perth to Exmouth. Or Perth to Kalgoorlie and back. A good 14 hours of driving, 18 if you have a sheila in the passenger seat with a bladder the size of a pea.

This year has been a nutter of a year. The freezing cold of February drove me on without fail, only to have my 100 day record attempt broken by a division wide skiing/snowboarding event at work. Then again, have it placed under threat after crushing my finger between the chain and gearing on my bicycle and having to go to hospital to get the nail hacked off. Or crashing hard just before Seattle to Portland and getting all cut up just before the ride I'd been preparing and planning for months. Finally completing it and ending the 100 day challenge after 14,511 km. Even then it wasn't finished; getting doored and injured enough that walking away was not an option. This 'ol cat is definitely a few lives down.

It wasn't without its rewards though. There's something zen-like about riding by yourself for 190 mi (306 km) straight. When it's so cold that water has long since frozen and animals dare not venture out. When it's so hot that rides are planned by the ability to stop and drink at water fountains instead of shorter distance or flatter ground. Taking the long way around instead of the short one. The achievement of something that was considered impossible. What is lost by speeding to and from places. What it means to move vast distances without relying on the power of anything else but yourself. The sheer beauty that exists all around if only one's eyes are open to see it. Of adventures had and dreams achieved. Finally understanding why those who are well off enough do all sorts of crazy things for charity, and what life is like at fifteen and not fifty miles per hour.

On that final note, apart from having a great deal of respect for Lance Armstrong and his work at Livestrong, I've decided to take part in next year's Seattle LiveStrong challenge. Considering a recent ride on a fully loaded bike across a much longer distance well within the time limit of LiveStrong, I've decided that just doing the LiveStrong ride isn't enough.

I plan to do it in style. But not only that, if I end up on the fixie doing the 100 mi ride, I'll add one more piece of fixed gear class to the ride as a surprise - spoke cards with the names of everyone who has donated.

-- Kris out.

my pregnancy book and my thighs and lower back region were right -- moving just before you're due is NOT A GOOD IDEA.

when did toner become so important that i have accumilated about 5 half finished bottles all in different brands? similarly hair wax, deoderant and about a gazillion of those nose peel things. and so much SCUNGY MAKEUP!!! it feels good throwing it all in the "to CHUCK" box.

no wonder i could never fit much in the freezer. i found packs of pastry sheets IN the ice.