tomar

We had a postal vote for years, which is a joke.
They send the forms out 1 week before an election, it often takes up to 10 days for the UK post to get here, so no chance at all of voting.
The only way round it is to let someone have your proxy vote.
It definitely was 15 years, but might have changed.
Caroline going off topic you will sympathise, after yours and my kitchen dramas we are renovating the bathrooms. Sure it will be worth it in the end, but several weeks with only using the downstairs loo with only a small basin, and 1 shower in a totally stripped bathroom I hope the end is in sight. Can't believe how incompetent some suppliers have been with not supplying the right parts.

tomar

PS. Will be thinking about you on the 25th.

carolinephillips

I can believe it, after the kitchen where the window didn't fit, nor the door which was 4cm too narrow, and the cupboards were several cm too short!! My sympathies indeed.

We have decided not to renovate the bathroom for a few years, as we have just had to fork out nearly 6k on pool rectifications so they meet standards. It was a joke there too, as the wall took 4 weeks to do instead of two days and cost an extra $250 for more bricks. (The weather was partly to blame however.) We also have to get a new bed- ours is 26 years old, the headboard broke a year ago, it squeaks all the time and the mattress is nearly 10 years old and carked, so we are getting a queen size one with a headboard for about $3.5k. It's our silver wedding on the 6th so it is our present to ourselves.

Topaz444

Hope all goes well on the 25th Caroline, at least you know the first verse, which is probably more than a lot of people. After years of taking our 2 to school, and attending many events at school I learnt the first verse by accident. As for building renovations, we are in process of our second build, always swore would never do it again after the first time, mind you we had bathroom renovations in our first home, I was 6 months pregnant with our second child, husband away on business and our builder broke a rib, so I was balancing on a bucket, middle of winter and showering at a neighbours for 3 weeks.Congratulations on the Silver Wedding Anniversary, we had ours 3 yrs ago and to celebtrate we had 10 weeks back in UK and Europe.

carolinephillips

Thank you. You did well for your anniversary present!!

Topaz444

LOL not quite a present, I had to pay my half, had a brilliant trip though. Mind you our next trip will be taken care of by my husband as I have just given up work, maybe can convince him 30 years is worth another trip home.
For the first time in 30 years we are having some of my UK family visit in February, they will be here for quite a few weeks but tripping around, had to ask them to change their departure date, as they were thinking of going back on our daughters Wedding day, they had not realised the date, so now they will stay for the wedding and leave 2 days later. By the time all 4 of them arrive, we will have moved out of this big house and moved into our small down size build, typical, all this room in this house and never had one visitor from home.
While I was doing some packing today I found something we were given the day we became Australians, the flags of Australia, hope you get yours and if you don't am happy to let you have ours, lol.

carolinephillips

Thank mate!! Had a lovely ceremony, was given a plant -now I have to find somewhere to put all 3 of them- also a badge which I am wearing in my coat. Had two friends back for supper and drinks afterwards, and DD had her BF too so it was a good evening.

Topaz444

Congrats you are now Dinkie Dye Ozzie, did you proudly and loudly sing Advance Australia Fair, well first verse at least ?. Lol, I sing all 3 anthems with gusto ,God Save The Queen, God defend NZ and Advance Australia Fair, am afraid NZ misses out if they play against Oz and Oz misses out if they play against UK.

carolinephillips

Sang both verses with gusto- also Waltzing Matilda- DD and I were the only two apart from the musicians who knew all the words to the Banjo Patterson version- does that make us sad?? The Mayor said she thought we were the most sincere out of the whole bunch: all 3 of us looked her in the eye as we said the oath, clearly and with projection. The others mumbled. (DD and I have trained voices so it is hard for us not to.)

Topaz444

I remember seeing your mention of joining a choir. When we became Australians, many moons ago we did not have to give the oath individually, I think over 100 people were sworn in with us.

carolinephillips

No, I wanted to join a choir, but I got MS instead. Bugger.

We took the oath in groups of 10.

Famous 5

Congratulations on your citizenship which comes with the added benefit that your daughter will now be eligible for a HECS-HELP loan for her uni tuition fees.

I hope you have better luck with your plants than we had with ours - shortly after our ceremony we went away and returned to find that there had been no rain and our plants (all five of them) were beyond rescue.

carolinephillips

Thanks.The HECS stuff was one reason we wanted citizenship, but not the only one....... Not sure I want all of my plants to survive- one grows to 4.5 metres tall. At least I managed to avoid any gum trees!!