Tales of Phyllis

I am writing this at 6.30 Friday evening. I don't feel like cooking (heating up) anything tonight. I asked Phyllis if I bought a pizza for dinner, would he eat some, and so I would buy a large. 

He said no! Then he added, do you remember we were talking about HSP? 

Yes. 

And you've never had one? 

No, I haven't. 

Kosov is bringing HSP for our dinner. 

If you don't know, HSP is Halal Snack Pack, and to me they sound delicious. Whatever animal is killed to make is, in Australia at least, killed humanely and butchered in the manner Moslems butcher meat. 

I will add my opinion of HSP to this post once I've eaten one. Delicious and I could only eat half of it. There were chips/fries in it as well. 

When mopping the floors of the bathrooms, toilet and kitchen, as I was mopping the toilet, which Phyllis uses, I noticed the floor was wet at the back of the toilet. A leak, I thought. I donned latex gloves and checked for leaks at the inlet pipe and the outlet seal. All dry. 

Then I spotted this plastic container in the bathroom and I guessed he had been washing himself in the toilet and spilt some water.

I checked earlier today and all was dry, so I think my theory is correct. Or course cleaning in his toilet, bathroom and bedroom is his responsibility, but if I get the mop and bucket out, why not give his areas a mop over.

Kosov wants Phyllis to return with him to where he lives in Epping. I only know Epping because the train line used to he the Epping/Hurstbridge train line. Then Epping became South Morang and then it became Mernda with train line extensions. As Phyllis explained the complications, I said Kosov can stay one night here, as you know, and no $20 charge as he is bringing the HSP.

The week has disappeared and I can't say I did much. I have started on the spare room bookcase, which is a nightmare. In the bookcase I found this and I have no memory of it. I initially thought op shop (charity shop). I needed to guarantee to whoever receives it that it is complete without a missing piece, so I decided to make the puzzle up and it took half an hour. It was fun and quite easy. I think I might give it to some of the kiddies before Christmas. Nah, I can't as that would be favouring one lot over another. I'll work something out.

Friday Funny - Revitalisation

I have published this before, and sorry if annoys you if you remember it and it pains you, but I just rewatched and it still makes me laugh. 

For explanation, the last leg of the train line to Newcastle (upon Hunter) was curtailed to build apartment buildings and to get to the same point you now change from a train to a tram. The tram stops at each stop for 90 seconds to recharge its battery. With proper overhead electric wiring, it might stop for 10 seconds to unload and load passengers. 

This one made me laugh too. 

Metro Park

Melbourne's Metro tunnel will transform the way many of us get about. It will certainly do so for me. The tunnel will open next year and I will have a train station just five minutes walk away. Practically, ten minutes to leave home, walk or tram one stop to the station and descend to a platform. 

Some railway land as part as construction of the the tunnel at South Yarra has been transformed. The Dandenong/Cranbourne trains will dive underground here and a rather nice green space has been created. I will guess this is an electric substation to supply power to trains.

Along Osborne Street.

A new footbridge over the railway line.

Just random photos I took. There were people in the park, some with dogs, some just lounging about in the sunshine. 

A public barbeque might have been nice here.

Sadly, there is no train viewing sight line or anyway to do trainspotting.

 

Eventually I was led to William Street and Lovers Walk. 

It is actually called South Yarra Sidings Park but I can't remember sidings there. To conclude, I think the park is terrific and there is a bit more to be constructed yet. 

Train walking

I was going to travel to Sunbury on a regional VLine train for the most important reason that I could. It was a twenty minute wait at Sunbury before a return VLine train arrived to return me to So Cross Southern Cross Station, enough time to buy a take away cup of coffee. I've been there before and the more astute of you may remember when Ray and I visited and brunched at The Jolly Miller. 

Oh damn, why didn't I check on my phone app. The train is leaving from Platform 2B. I would have left the 58 tram a stop later, had I known. Now I had to walk 300/1000. The train was sitting there but people were standing around outside the short train's doors. I stood with them and they clearly knew something I didn't. I noticed the door open button was illuminated so I pressed it and the door opened. I was quickly told I could not board by staff. 

Staff, then public announcements, then screens said the train is defective and a substitute train would leave from Platform 5A, which meant another 300 metre walk back, plus about 100 metres to the train door at Platform 5A.

It was clear to me that the train would now leave 15 to 20 minutes late, thereby meaning I would miss the planned train back to the city. 

I did not want to walk another half a kilometre and hang around in Sunbury for an hour because of a missed train and said to myself, damn it. This was supposed to be a pleasure trip and it is not turning out to be pleasurable. I am going to Corner and Bench in Bourke Street for one of its delicious warm chicken sliders with coleslaw, along with a nice strong cup of coffee. The more I use Southern Cross Station, the more I am hating it. 

I have so many photos to use for posts, but I just keep writing. I like writing.

Phyllis returned on Monday evening. I told him that it was not acceptable that he had not paid his rent and that I hated having to mention money, and that I don't want to have to mention it again. At 9.30 the external door closed and he was off somewhere. He returned with noodles and the rent money at 10. I will guess he went to the new Woolworths Metro supermarket that has opened near. I have checked it out and it is almost as large as a normal supermarket. Brilliant, but I guess it will mean the closure of one of the two IGA small supermarkets nearby.  I went to bed at 11 and Phyllis was busy cooking away. There is now a huge bowl of cooked noodles in the fridge now but as it is nearly 10pm, he has not returned from work. 

9.45 Phyllis has returned and immediately the gas hot plates went on, and it was pasta not noodles that he cooked last night and he is very busy making some kind of pasta dish. I tasted it and it is very spicy. 

While I'd like you to focus on my writing, we had a fabulous rainbow here a couple of weeks ago, so if you are bored with my writing, this is your consolation prize. 

Tram undulations

I've tried a few times to capture this but either the tram driver was driving slowly or a passenger stood up and blocked the view. 

I got it this time, route 58, in Kingsway to West Coburg via the Zoo.

It is an E class tram, built in Melbourne by local and imported ingredients and built in the suburb Dandenong at the Bombardier factory, formerly COMENG, the government owned Commonwealth Engineering. E class trams are quite long, at over 33 metres/108 feet, have three articulated sections and sit on four swivelling bogies. They are quite a good tram in my opinion, even if the creak and groan. And some of the seats with their fibreglass backs, can pop forward and back depending on acceleration and braking. 

Our next new tram will be shorter and hopefully even better. They will be known as G class. I wonder why F class was skipped?

While I am talking about trams, with Melbourne having the largest tram system in the world, the private operator, not owner, is Yarra Trams, a consortium between the French company Keolis and a large local rail engineering company Downer Rail. In my forty one year career in public transport, my final employer was Keolis Downer. 

Come December a new consortium will take over the operation of Yarra Trams made up of the French company Transdev and the Chinese company, John Holland. Transdev did have a contract to operate part of Melbourne's bus system, and were run out of town by the state government for dreadful performance. That does not bode well. 

I hope the clip doesn't make you sea sick. 

Monday Mural

Sami always has a Monday Mural and others do too.

To save you the bother of neck craning, the words say, "Legacies meld here. Crowns with stolen jewels wash away. Growth remembers loss". Well, that is deep!

Ok, the mural is a bit boring. I found the photo of Kosov that I could not yesterday, as he sat and floor and ground away with a mortar and pestle. 

I had a lovely lunch yesterday with Bone Doctor, Sister's wife, at a plant nursery, and yes, I bought a flowering plant for the balcony. Their daughter was nearby rehearsing for a performance. 

The Personal

I could say it is quiet here without Phyllis but he is often out and about. He is staying with a friend for two nights.

The Swedish Death Cleaning goes on. While it didn't all go in bags, I think I would have taken the equivalent of about twenty of the bags full of stuffs to the local charity shop. Just because you have space, there is no need to fill it. As you well know, I am not a person who exaggerates or is theatrical with detail, but I estimate that one tonne of oven trays and metal baking dishes went into recycling, and another half a tonne of ceramic baking dishes to the charity shop. Phyllis must have found the muller and put it in the bag. In a moment of disingenuousness, I can't remember what we used the muller for. The green thing is a Tupperware celery container. Next to the bags sits a draining board that came with our sink. I was reluctant to throw that out, until I thought about it and acknowledged to myself in nearly ten years since the kitchen was given its makeover, it has never been used. 

Aside from one jumbled bookcase in the spare room and bedding in the linen press, oh, and the filing cabinet, oh and photos, there is not much more cleaning required. 

What is this, asked Phyllis. I don't have a clue, I replied. I just picked it up, gave it glance, never used, get rid of it. It is car phone cradle, Phyllis proclaimed as he examined it. 

Ah, I thought, I will keep that, even though my car and phone connect for calls,  the sat nav is pretty awful to use and the voice controls can never understand what I am saying, usually an address. I still use Google Maps and while I can connect the maps to the car screen, I forget how and I can't be bothered checking, given how rarely I need maps in the car. YouTube helps again, with a short clip about where to place the cradle. At the moment I sit my phone upright in a coffee cup holder in the console, close to where this phone cradle appears to clip.

Swedish Death Cleaning can bring sadness at times.

I had promised R to see one of his sisters 'right' if he died first, and last week I received the balance of Ray's superannuation to my bank account. It wasn't six figures, but close. Today I sent the minimum five figure sum I could via my bank by electronic transfer. I followed every instruction so carefully and triple checked the account details Ray's sister had sent to me via the encrypted Whatsapp. It worked as far as I can see. I tried to check if the amount had left my account to be greeted with a message that I had been locked out of my account. I tried the banking app on my phone and I was locked out of that too.

I called my bank and eventually spoke to someone after twenty minutes in a phone queue, who then transferred me to another department with a short wait. This was the first time I had tried to transfer money overseas and the bank was concerned about the legitimately of the transfer. I was asked umpteen questions, and SNAP, the assumption was made that my late partner was female. Since Ray died I have become fed up with this assumption and I will later lodge a complaint. In spite of all my answers, the questioner kept coming up with more concerns, the killer being, if your sister in law's Whatsapp has been hacked, how do you know they haven't just looked at her style of writing and copied it? I could not argue against that. While I was on the phone I had missed call and a voice message from my bank's fraud department. 

What we need you to do is contact her and just verify the bank account details you have match hers. Please, it is 5am in England. She won't wake until at least 9am. I tried but WhatsApp doesn't allow you to hold a call and call another number using WhatsApp. I tried to call her normal phone number and received a recorded message that I wasn't allowed to do that. After checking later, when I cheapened my phone plan, it doesn't include international calls. Bank person was patient. She gave me the direct number for the banking fraud department and said as soon as you can get through to your sister in law, call us back and we can unlock your bank account and approve the transfer. I have called and called Ray's sister, and no answer. With a moment of exquisite timing, I realised this Saturday she was flying to Spain today for a short holiday. Just call me lucky. 

I do understand the bank's caution as they have come under heavy criticism after some people have been defrauded of hundreds of thousands of dollars by scammers and fraudsters.

Since Ray died, I think I've eaten two takeaway pizzas, and tonight after such stress decided to have my third takeaway hamburger. I ordered online, or tried to. I nearly completed the order and then it occurred to me that my bank account was locked, so I have to pay cash. This is why I do keep cash in my wallet but not much. I will message Phyllis tomorrow to ensure he gives me the rent money. 

Tomorrow Jo has a performance rehearsal in Melbourne and Sister's wife, Bone Doctor will drive her to Melbourne and wait while the rehearsal happens. She suggested we could lunch if I was free and I am. We will lunch at Ray's favourite plant nursery, with its quality plants and I will buy a new potted annual for the balcony, as the cyclamen sent to me by Ray's former workmate and friend when Ray died is on its last legs.

That is all. It would be nice to always be bright and cheerful when writing, but it would be false for me. I no longer have the energy to check this for typos or other errors. Publish and be damned.  

Later edit: Ray's sister called at 1.30am and we compared details and all was well. I quickly returned to sleep and at 7am I called the bank and soon my bank account access was restored.