A night in a day with Mr Bundy

Bundy, or Mr Bundy to most of his Asian internet friends, was named after Stray’s beloved Bundaberg Rum. Stray was sort of tricked into naming him (sorry Stray), because I‘d already chosen ‘Bundy’ before arriving home with him, but it was Stray’s turn to name our next pet. You see our cats have generally been named after drinks, Kahlua, Milk, Ouzo etc. (hmmm, our drinking might be more of a problem than I thought), so after I suggested a few lame names like, Mars, Apollo and Achilles, Stray thought of Bundy...all on his own.

I picked Bundy, formally known as Kat, or should I say, he picked me at an animal shelter. He was petite and ladylike, and now at 2 ½, still is. We adorned him with a belled collar almost immediately, not wanting the blood of any wildlife on our hands. The cat who preceded him and who disappeared mysteriously at a sprightly 16 years old was like a deadly Ninja, but with fur. My home made elasticised collar works well, except for the fact that SNAKES ARE DEAF!!!

The truth is out there!

A typical day at the office.

6.45 am, I wake up. I've been able to add an extra 15 minutes of slumber since quitting the coffin nails. Bundy and I go through our normal routine, although he often opts to go outside for his morning business instead of joining me in applying the lippy and mascara. Since the arrival of the Rotty, he prefers to exit the house via a more inconspicuous route. Up the internal staircase, through the spare bedroom, jumping up to and out of an upstairs window, onto a lower roof, then scaling down some lattice work like a hairy ginger spider cat.

I get dressed. Watch the news. Stray's sometimes still in bed. 7.50 am, I depart.

Looking towards the front of our yard including morning winter fog and possible chimney smoke.

My street as I leave in the morning...

So we came all the way back, just to go back - Cambodia

We've been back in Oz for just over one month now. Happy to say Mr Bundy's ears are still intact, minus the points (Solar Dermatis, fancy name for my cat can't tolerate the sun. So he's doomed to a life of zinc cream coated ears). And, I've given into the fact that I WILL have to move more than two chairs and a bed back into the house and have started to do so. Can see a big garage sale coming up soon...more culling.

Stray's undone the termite damage, bar the aesthetic touches. But, I'm still pretending that the upstairs doesn't exist, even though I can safely walk up the steps. Less cleaning that way.

OK, getting to the point! Cambodia, especially Angkor Wat just outside of Siem Reap, was one of the places we intended on visiting while being so close, in Thailand. But, one thing lead to another and we never got there. So, we're heading off early next year to see that, Phnom Phen and Sihanoukville. All via Malaysia where we'll stop off in Georgetown (Penang), Langkawi and Melaka
.

Batu Caves outside of Kuala Lumpur

Sabah (Kota Kinabalu, Borneo) fishing boats

Kuching (Sarawak, Borneo) riverfront

We've visited Kuala Lumpur a couple of times, and Borneo, and our plans are fairly well set in jelly ...but if you've been to any of these places and can recommend 'what to see's' and 'what to do's' (or not) apart from what's on the usual tourist spiels, please do!

Snap's other blog Chiang Mai Thai

Day 5 Hanoi

Last night after dinner we walked along the lakeside, very pretty at night.

No morning walk around the lake this morning, we slept in after one of us having quite a big night. Amazingly we slept through the first major ringing of the cathedral bells at 5 am and were collected later by Phuong, Anh, Daisy, Tung and Quang for a visit to the botanical gardens, which are beautiful. We played an entertaining game on top of the 'mountain' (a man made hill in the centre of the garden) then our lovely hosts took us to lunch by West Lake.

Stray made some new friends last night just outside of our hotel. The alley way turns into an outdoor cafe after dark. He shared some Bundy Rum with them and they, some vodka with him. One of them, Bao (Fat), and his girlfriend (Win, not sure of the spelling) also caught up with us for lunch.

I would especially like to thank Anh, who doubled me on the back of her scooter and delivered me back to our hotel, safe and sound.

Now we have a couple of hours to unwind and get ready for our overnight trip to Hue on the train.

Again Snap hás said it all which of course ís fine with me :) i would just like to add my own thank you to our friends in hanoi for making our trip here so memorable 'cam on' and ola to kyle - Stray

Tag, you're it for 'My 7 Links' - when bloggers get tagged.

Recently I became aware that Cooee had been nominated to do 'My 7 Links', by Megan's Bangkok Reality Smackdown. It's a project that was started by Tripbase, and along with Lani at Tell Thai Heart and three other bloggers, Cooee has been passed the baton.

I'm also surprised that Megan named our blog, because there are so, so many out there with much more worthy content. Cooee was started solely to keep family and friends up to date (even if they rarely comment) with our whereabouts and goings on. I really don't care if anyone reads it (lie, lie), but have definitely been enjoying writing it for its therapeutic benefits.

Oh yeah, part of the game requires nominating 5 blogs (not on the list to date although it doesn't look like they're staying on top of things) to keep the relay running, which you'll find at the end of this post.

And, as the Rules state, I'm not going to over think it, so here goes. Cooee's post that was the...

The To Do-ne list (the fence, the Rotty and the donga)

1. The manly fencing has been completed, so Conan the Rottweiler, our granddog, has moved in. This is fine and dandy, except for one, small, minor loophole...THERE’S NO GATE YET!

Part of the manly fence

One Rotty

To Do-ne List (the cattery, laptop security and life in general)

So, how’s it all going? Well, good, but a bit stressful ...thanks for asking!

The To Do-ne list is getting smaller, but is still quite large and scary. About 80% of the house contents now resides in the donga in boxes labelled A-Z or 1 - ∞ and their innards methodically logged in an Excel spreadsheet for easy (ha) relocation. The walls are pretty bare and cupboards look a little like those from the set of Ghost Town.

Some of our clothes and linen have been vacuum packed into those plastic sucky bags and now look like compacted road kill.

The gate, the essential loophole closer in the Rotty proof fence, has been wire brushed (by me) and is awaiting a coat of black glossy paint (by me).

*Note – the Rotty hasn’t chased next door’s sheep for a couple of weeks, but he has taken liberty with the open gate and was caught out on the road twice today. He is truly a beautiful dog and we have no doubt that we will have him, nearly, trained and adjusted before we go...but Bundy still glares at him with a ‘WHEN!!!! are you leaving????’ look.

The side veranda, AKA cattery for the daughter's three indoor nutty cats, has now had its slab (floor) laid. Our wonderful friends came to help and due to rain, the ordeal/partying lasted two days, not one. The event was not without its hilarity and tragedies.

Before

Still before, but from another angle...

I've buried the cat, Chiang Mai, here we come!

Stray and I are taking the scenic route to Chiang Mai this time, from the Gold Coast, to Kuala Lumur, to Bangkok, to Chiang Mai. Three flights and two airlines in one day, a tad painful, but very economical. AU$369.00 one way. Let me tell you, we were absolutely buggered by the time we boarded the plane (I can say that even two days prior to leaving, while I'm writing this post). We didn't achieve all we set out to do, but at some stage you have to say 'that's enough, it'll be waiting for us when we get back'.

Emotions - for me, running somewhere between, hysteria, relief, excitement, melancholy...you name it, I've got it.

Last week I had my head in the oven (noooo, I was cleaning it, although it was such a chore, turning the gas on did cross my mind) and I thought back to our return flight from Kuala  Lumpur earlier this year (To get anywhere with Air Asia, we have to go via KL). I was sandwiched between Stray (happy about that) and some older, short, vocal, stumpy Aussie guy.

Me and my big mouth. If I'd shut up and not asked to sit next to Stray, who was across the aisle, we would have ended up with three seats to share.


This ain't us!