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GILES’ GUIDE TO MOVING 2

GILES’ GUIDE TO MOVING

MOVING IN

When you finally arrive at your new house you have to unpack. This can be quite fun. Deciding where in your room your bed should go. Where you should hide your most secretive stuff and to search the house for little cubby holes that no one else knows about.

Don’t forget to search the back yard for it could be a jungle out there.

Then of course you meet the neighbours. Sometimes they’re good sometimes they’re bad. You find yourself spying on them. There’s something fascinating about neighbours. You get a close up look at someone else life but from a distance. But be careful, they could be aliens and they could be spying on you as well.

EXPLORING TOWN

A new town is great to explore. Finding out where all the shops are and marking out your favourites. But for me Sunset Cove was out of this world. As Grampa said as we drove into town “This place is weird!!”

He couldnn’t have been more right and I wasn’t sure what must have been going through my mother’s mind when she decided to turn our lives upside down and move here!

Mum fitted in right away. She bought us surf boards, changed her clothes and suddenly thought she was a sex symbol and just another “babe” from Sunset Cove.

Mum has always been a little whacky and she was definitely in her element. There were people dancing in the street, kids with huge ears, secret service men sneaking about and lots of people with bright coloured hair and weird ideas. Not to mention that everyone was good looking and had great tans as well!

STARTING SCHOOL

Starting at a new school is totally nerve racking for any kid. You want to fit in, you want to make friends, you want to do well.

You start off being shy and taking everything in. Who are the bad crowd and who are the goody goods? There’s got to be someone in this school that is your type of person. It can take a while…

In Sunset Cove you’re lucky if you find someone that’s even slightly normal. My first day was as whacky as they come. I was introduced to a girl called Sophie. We were just talking and going to our next class when flowerpots started falling and circling me! She later told me she had a poltergeist. Geesh! Anyway we did end up being pretty good friends and she even wanted to marry me!

Beanie was someone else I met on my first day. He didn’t freak me out nearly as much as he should have. He’s quite a harmless guy who’s just a little confused. Which is understandable seeing as he’s an alien and basically has no idea where he comes from.

Some friendly advice – discourage your mother from working at your school! There’s nothing more embarassing than having your parents at school everyday.

SETTLING IN

It can take weeks to settle in to a new town. But after a few weeks you’ll have made some great new friends and be living a whole new life.

Just keep an eye on those neighbours though – you never know who they really are…

GILES’ GUIDE TO MOVING 1

GILES’ GUIDE TO MOVING

“Hi, I’m Giles and recently my family and I moved to a new town called Sunset Cove. It’s been an experience and here’s my guide to moving.

PACKING

Everyone when moving hates packing. But it’s a great chance to throw out all that junk that you’ve accumulated over the years. All the rotten apple cores under your bed, the fluffy pink g-strings you stole off your neighbour, your old love letters and anything else that you might not want seen when it’s unpacked at the other end.

Sometimes I just go wild and chuck away everything – it saves a lot of time.

When packing remember anything that’s old, fragile or breakable should be marked with a “fragile” sticker. We used lots of these on the box we packed my Grampa in. He’s getting old now and we have to take precautions.

He loves getting into his box and being packed in with all the foam balls or scrunched newspapers. He say’s he feels like a present especially when he’s unwrapped at the other end.

TRAVELLING

Some people don’t move very far. We had a neighbour once who bought the house two doors down from her. 10 paces and she was at her new house! That’s hardly moving if you ask me.

But some familes move miles away – even countries away!

When we moved to Sunset Cove it was only about 550 miles from our last town of Townsville. So after we’d packed up all our personal belongings and the moving company had taken all our boxes, we chucked Grampa on the roof and headed out.

I wasn’t looking forward to it. Mum had insisted that Sunset Cove was like Paradise and that it would be good for my complexion to see some sunshine. But a beach is no place for a geek.

To pass the time in the car I read a book I’d picked up at our last stop “100 reasons why not to live in Sunset Cove”. Feeling this was a little pessimistic I decided to play eye spy with Grampa. The problem with playing this game with Grampa is that he’s inside a box and there’s very little in there to “spy” – so after 10 minutes of guessing what might be inside his box I gave up.

JOSH’S GUIDE TO SPENDING MONEY 2

JOSH’S GUIDE TO SPENDING MONEY

My favourite store is my Dad’s store, Montana and Sons. It is the biggest place you can ever begin to imagine. It is 94 storey’s high and takes up 10 and a half blocks. There are 400 elevators, 3300 escalators and 2 zillion gold steps. It stocks everything you could ever want from coffee coated kidney stones to the hat worn by Lord Admiral Nelson at the Battle of Trafalgar.

So, I like to go there a lot and all the staff know me so I have just the best time. My favourite floor at the moment is floor 27, which is crammed full of interactive TV units; remote controlled wireless DVD phones and dehumidified personal oxygen stations.

My Dad and Mom are just as proud of me today as they were the day I was born – a bit prouder than then actually because I have learnt how to use the potty now. They know that I will be a good independent son because they have taught me how to spend like the best of them.

I’ve won awards for my spending and people come to me if I can show them how to spend money. I’m always happy to help but I just wish that they’d remember where they put their own wallets sometimes.

I have to say that spending money is just so easy. It’s only a problem if you have too much cash to fit in your wallet but you can always get someone else to carry some for you – but sometimes they run away and you don’t see them again which I find kinda weird…

Josh’s Top Ten Tips for Spending Money

1. Go out early, the earlier you leave the house the more you’ll come home with.
2. Every time you spend a dollar, spend another one.
3. The best thing that money can buy is more money.
4. Gold is nice but platinum is better.
5. Start at the left of the store and work your way around so you don’t get dizzy.
6. Find out where the washrooms are in case you need to go.
7. Stop for food and drink a lot and think about your purchases, it makes your smile really white which makes you a real chick magnet
8. Get the sales assistant to put your purchases in a bag – it makes things easier to carry that way.
9. If you buy animals make sure that you also buy them some food or they’ll get hungry.
10. Keep looking at your reflection – the weird lightbulbs they use in shops can make you look like you’ve got real bad zits.

JOSH’S GUIDE TO SPENDING MONEY 1

JOSH’S GUIDE TO SPENDING MONEY

“Josh Montana here. You’ve probably heard of me, I’m the richest guy in Sunset Cove and I owe that to my ability to spend money wisely. Let me share it with you.”.

When I was born I was given a silver spoon to put in my mouth. Don’t ask me why but it makes for an interesting conversation piece when people come over and look at my baby pictures.

My family was always rich; Dad says that money is attracted to him. Mom says that she’s attracted to money. So I guess that’s why they’re still together.

When I was five I was given my first pocket money and I spent it. It was the happiest day of my life. I went out with Nanny Bertha and bought two oilfields and a cruise ship. Dad was so proud of me and Mom decided that she would be the first one in the family to try out the new ship.

By the time Mom came home I was 10 years old and during the time that she was away I had learnt how to spend even more money.

I can’t understand why people keep asking me how I spend so much money. I find that it’s really easy. All you have to do is to go out with your wallet and go to a store and buy something. And then something else. And then something else. And you just come home when your feet are tired. If the store is closed then you just have to call your broker and he’ll buy stuff for you.

Anyway, Mom was amazed at all the stuff that I’d collected while she’d been gone. I had built a ranch on the outskirts of town and called it Joshzone. I put up a zoo in the grounds and bought myself a couple of tigers, an elephant and an iguana.

I got a big shed and turned it into a museum that I stuffed full of all the things that Grandpa Josiah had collected on his trips. There was a whole section dedicated to the Rockefellers and a corner for Faberge eggs. It was quite a glittering place to be.

Outside out back I built a replica of the Titanic and my friends used to come over and play on it; it was cool fun.

Mom was proud of me and added to my collection a pure platinum ostrich feather that had belonged to the Queen of Sheba and had been given to my mother by an admirer on the ship.

As well as the ranch I had accumulated quite a few new oil fields and refineries, several planes and vintage cars. Mom was so pleased with my ability to spend that she upped my allowance on the spot and told me that I could take a week off school to go and spend my first week’s money.

So, I filled my wallet with cash and grabbed Nanny Bertha by the hand and went straight to the store and spent my money – and I’ve haven’t really stopped.

DON’S GUIDE TO GROCERY SHOPPING 2

DON’S GUIDE TO GROCERY SHOPPING

The Dairy was an instant hit with the locals. The aisles were freshly stocked with all sorts of amazing products that none of us had ever seen before. This was courtesy of Ralph and his contacts. Soon the whole of the area was full of people eating self-buttering bread and active apples (that would jump around the room to provide exercise as well as nutritional content).

There is always music playing and the breakdancers perform in aisle 7 every second Friday of the month. It can be tricky when you want to get your eggs home in one piece but other than that it’s great entertainment.

My favourite time was when Ralph built a mountain of baked bean cans that were on special and the nuns climbed to the top and sung a medley of Sound of Music tunes. What a way to spend a Thursday night!

Wednesdays are date days where anyone carrying a bunch of carrots in their basket is treated to a bottle of wine and a dinner at the Princess Diner with someone else that is carrying a bunch of bananas in their basket.

One time I had dinner with Anthony and that wasn’t so hot but one time I had dinner with Dolphin and we got on like a house on fire – well, his house was on fire which is why he came out to get groceries in the first place – he couldn’t watch TV while the curtains were burning.

But the best time was when I got to have dinner with Jet Marigold. She was a blast! She had so much monosodium glutamate that she was climbing the curtains. Mrs. Gordon wasn’t too pleased and Jet had to be dragged down but we had a good laugh all the same.

Shopping at the Damascus Dairy is my all-time favourite thing to do when I’m bored. It’s open 23 and a half hours a day and if you’re there on a Sunday you get to sing hymns and are served by Ralph as all the nuns are at church.

The nuns are thinking of expanding and opening another Dairy in Helensview down the highway but I think they should just focus on this store here. I like that we get to have it all to ourselves.

Anyway, got to get a move on, it’s sixties day at the Dairy. That means that I can eat all the donuts I can grab in sixty seconds!

See ya!
Don..