2 months

Or 8 weeks 5 days
or 61 days (42 at work)
or 1456 hours (depending when boarding takes place)
or 87360 minutes
or 5241600, 5241599, 5241598... seconds

not that I'm counting of course.

Buyer Collects

Well, according to my booking confirmation my Ship leaves on the 13th December. Friday 13th December. As it is now the 12th October I makes that 2 months 1 day and I'll be floating on the water.

Although I'm hearing stories that of the 2 engines the RMS has, one is not working, and briefly on the recent trip from Cape Town, neither was the other. Friday 13th doesn't sound too promising as a departure date.

However, my stuff has to be packed and in crates to leave on the 29th November, so packing now has a deadline, as does selling stuff as I need to know what I'm shipping by mid-Nov. On that score I've already sold a few things with interest in a few other bits, and I haven't even advertised properly yet. Worryingly of the near 1500 people who've looked at the blog page, over 1000 of them are in America. Perhaps I need to make it absolutely clear:

BUYER COLLECTS

Smiley Moon

Just been diving and there's a Smiley Moon out.

There's something nice about being warm and dry, especially having been cold and wet. There are 2 ways between the 2 states, either cold and dry or warm and wet. I definitely prefer Warm and Wet.

Rejection

Less than 36 hours after the closing date of 11pm on Sunday I've had my first response from a Job Application. Unsurprisingly, hearing that quickly, it was rejected. I can't say I'm surprised I didn't get the job - I wouldn't have taken my application any further as I can't get to a face to face interview. But it is a little disappointing as it did seem right up my street.

Hey ho.

So I'm Selling Stuff

Take a look at:
http://daves-stuff-4-sale.blogspot.com/

Buyer Collects!!!

Packing

Well, I've started thinking about packing. The way it's done here is that everything is packed into big wooden crates 4ft x 4ft x either 4,6 or 8ft.

Looking at how I brought my stuff out here, because I brought a car I had a container. Not taking a car back means I won't have a whole container, hence the wooden crates, I think. But half my stuff was packed into

with heavy stuff spread out, so that each crate weighed 15-25kg. Now I reckon I can get 8 of these plastic crates into a 4ft x 4ft x 4ft wooden crate. At 20kg each that maks 160kg, plus say 20kg for wooden crate =0.18Tonnes. I reckon I've got about 500kg in total (0.5T) which will probably go into 2-3 crates...

Assuming that they do as they say and deliver it to the door in the UK, how am I expected to move it? It's too big to go through the door. It's too heavy to lift.

I'm sure it makes sense for the shipping, it must do, it doesn't make sense any other way.

Get Rich Quick. Urm...

Ok, so the choice of car is taking a backseat while I work out other stuff. Also because I've sort of said I'll buy Robs Grey Mondeo.

When I decided I didn't want to stay on St Helena I had grand ideas about being self employed and living in a Caravan. Now it's becoming a reality I'm applying for jobs and looking at Flats... Doh.

The problem with being self employed is that you have to be good at something that other people will pay you for. Somewhere along the line the need for money has to take over.

• I thought about buying and selling stuff using Ebay or similar, but it seems far too easy to lose money.
• I thought about making stuff to sell. But every idea I have falls foul of mass produced stuff at much lower prices. And I can't sell the idea of Hand Made Craftsmanship, cause I no good at that type of thing.
• I looked into making money online doing various things. But it looks like you actually have to work very hard, or be very good, or be very lucky, or be able to programme.
• I've thought about trying to set up a touristy business with a cafe and campsite and shop and stuff. But it looks like hard work and I tooo lazy.

So the Get Rich Quick plan is out the window and I'm back to Get Rich Slow, which works, but invovles having a Job.

Packing

Well I have officially started packing. My lounge floor has, since about March, been half covered in Lego.

Now it's not. I am allowing myself one model to keep out and not dismantle. So obviously I've chosen a big one.

It's based on

but modified so there's a bigger rear overhang on the trailer so it takes an additional car upstairs and downstairs. I've also modified the cab so it has 5 axels (2 steering), a HIAB and a flat bed section for another car.

To fill it Up I've had to keep out some other cars:

(modified to take bigger wheels so it can drive up the ramp), and the 4x4 from:

and a red crew cab version of the above 4x4.

Introduction

This is a new Blog by me which is more of a 'to do' list than a Blog.

By now you will have realised that Back 2 Blighty is because I'm coming to the end of my time on St Helena and will be returning to the UK in December. I've read that returning to the UK after working abroad is harder than moving abroad for work, mainly because it's expected to be easy and so nobody worries about it and there is no support network for the process.

So I'm going to Chronicle, well I might Chronicle... Hey I don't know what I'm going to do, but there will be words here and they may make some sense and explain what I'm doing, how I'm doing it and so on. If they don't make sense or answer the questions you're expecting to find answers to the please address complaints to: The Man On The Moon, Holiday Lodge, 17 Bracknell Street, London, Ohio, Western Atlantic, World.

So What do I intend to do? I think I have 2 main problems:

1. What Car(s) am I going to buy?
2. What am I going to drive until I buy a Car?

Lesser problems include:

1. Where am I going to park?
2. How am I going to organise Insurance?

Of course there are some other questions...

1. How am I going to get Money?
2. How do I get everything back to the UK?
3. Where am I going to Live?

That's about it, in Priority Order...

Dave

(p.s. don't waste a stamp complaining)