KEEP IT IN THE PHAMLY

When I was a teen, Mum Pham took me to get my ears pierced at a pharmacy. They used one of those guns and my ears got terribly infected so I took out the earrings and let the holes close up. It's a shame - Mum was excited for me to wear these cute gold earrings she had from when she was little. I don't know where they are now. I guess she either pawned them or gave them away because I never saw them after that. When I was in my early 20s in Melbourne, I went to Off Ya Tree in the CBD and got my ears pierced with a needle. I bled for a couple of days but my ear holes eventually healed. It was so long ago, I can't remember whether I took forever to heal like I'm doing now.

15 years later, and those ear holes that used to be in the centre of my ear lobe now sat much further down than they did. I don't know whether ear cartilage keeps growing or if it's gravity playing its part (if anyone knows for sure, please shed some light because Dr. Google says it's both myth and fact that your ears and nose keep growing and I don't know what to believe). Either way, my ear lobes are bigger and longer and I didn't like how much empty lobe there was so I decided to get new ear holes.

I went to Unicorn Piercings at Toombul to get stabbed by an eccentric girl who used to work at Off Ya Tree (in Brisbane, not Melbourne). She distracted me with tales of her frozen dead pets and dreams of taxidermy and bone jewellery so I wasn't thinking about her poking holes in my body. I wish I'd thought to ask her if earlobes keep growing or if it's gravity dragging them down. Instead, I asked her why I bleed so much from my ear lobes because this time, again, I instantly started dripping blood. She theorised I had lots of capillaries in my earlobes because they're so "big and squishy."

It's been 6 weeks now and my ears still haven't completely healed. The bleeding stopped after a few weeks, but every now and then I still see a bit of blood in the puss or crusty mucus I clean off. I'm hoping my ear holes will finish healing in another month or so and I can start wearing the cute earrings I've started hoarding. And I hope they last me another 15 years before I feel the desire to poke two more holes in my lobes because they've gotten even longer. 

Finally! Social plans that didn't get cancelled at the last minute! ...Mainly because they didn't involve interstate visitors or travel. 

Since moving house I’ve been working to walk, and walking to work. Everyone thinks that’s great, but most of my friendship circle live in cooler climates where a 15-minute morning walk is not a stuffy, sweaty, burny form of self-torture. I suppose I could drive the 2 minutes to work, but because a colleague remarked that I probably wouldn’t keep up the walks during peak summer heat, I am of course going to keep walking all summer long to spite them.

I’ve been trying to find ways to make it work and a $32 UPF 50 umbrella is the best investment I’ve made towards proving my work colleague wrong. It not only blocks 98% of ultraviolet rays, it also provides shade with its blackout fabric and stops my skin from feeling like it’s burning under my SPF50+ sunscreens. Also, it looks bloody awesome with its silver top, black underside and rose gold frame. I love it.

I still arrive at work a sweaty mess because of the humidity, but I leave a folding fan on my desk to help evaporate the sweat. And I haven’t resorted to this yet, because peak summer heat hasn't hit, but a neighbour and colleague who also walks to work recommends getting an iced coffee to make it better. I will take him up on the icy drink, though mine will likely be iced water in my trusty insulated Contigo travel mug.

Wish me luck with keeping up the walks to work despite my colleague of little faith.

I spent the first day of 2021 visiting some of Boyfriend Pham's family. They moved just a couple hours outside Brisbane at the end of last year, so we went for an overnight stay on New Year's Day. It was Day 8 of my 11-day holiday, but felt like the first day I fully relaxed and enjoyed myself. Ecommerce life, hey?

We spent the day making and eating woodfired pizza, then got walked by their dog, before a night of playing board games all with lots of fun conversation. Seeing friends and hearing stories from outside my little Brisbane bubble is what I missed most from 2020. That, plus the amazing food at the now permanently closed Maria's Caribbean kitchen in Toowong - devastating. 

Being out of my house/Brisbane/regular surrounds let me properly chill out after being in high functioning mode for a lot of last year. It made me nostalgic for travel that we all took for granted, and planted the seed that I need to get out of my regular routine this year. Of course, it's easier said than done. As I write, a friend in Tassie and I were waiting for today's announcement as to whether Brisbane has been removed from Tasmania's naughty list so our Gold Coast getaway can go ahead as planned. And the update was that there'll be another update in 48-hours. But then the convention she was coming up for got canned so we cancelled our catch up. I still kept my annual leave days though, because I need the break.

Making travel plans is a bigger gamble than it used to be, but I'm going to jump at any opportunities that arise year. That, plus we have a $400 flight voucher that expires in October so we should probably use it. Unfortunately, everyone we're close with is a city-dweller and either their city is a hotspot, or their city thinks we're a hotspot. 

I’ve gone over what 2020 wasn’t. Now on New Years Eve, I’ve finally had a week of staycation to unwind and look back on the year that was. 

Boyfriend Pham and I started house hunting with 5 months left on our rental lease because all but one friend we know has had a horrible time finding a house. We thought we’d be looking for over a year like everyone else. Instead, it took us 2.5 months.

We didn’t know where to start at first. I had resigned to single life, and my single income could afford an apartment at best (or at worst, Dad’s granny flat once he passed). Boyfriend Pham had never even considered home ownership because he used to be part of Australia’s growing casual workforce and the income insecurities that come with some casual roles. Neither of us had considered buying a house. To make it trickier, we worked on opposite sides of Brisbane so any suburb would leave at least one of us with a bad commute. Neither of us grew up in Brisbane so didn't have a sentimental home suburb/area/region either.

So where did we start? With our budget to see what we could comfortably yet uncomfortably afford (we’re risk averse people who steer clear of any sort of debt). With our powers combined, we could (uncomfortably) afford:

• A house with some land very far north or south, and a horrible commute for one or both of us (this was before he changed jobs to a place near my work).
• A really old, run down house inner-city(ish) that would eat all our money in renovations.
• A decent sized townhouse with modest garage ‘cause most affordable townhouses near the city have a garage to house a city car, not a car and workshop.
• A large apartment with no garage space ‘cause modern apartments have car spaces, not lock-up garages.

Realestate.com.au price filters are handy, though their algorithm does sneak in options that are listed as ‘For sale’ without a price but will be $50K-$150K above your price range so watch out for that. If it looks too good to be true, then it is.

We tried to write a list of must-haves but we’re both very relaxed people so were flexible on nearly everything. Our mandatory items were quickly whittled down to:

1. Double garage Large single lock up garage ‘cause Boyfriend Pham is a car guy with lots of garage-filling crap that I call hoarding but he says 'will be useful one day.'
2. Three bedrooms so I could have a study that wasn’t the guest room.
3. Open plan kitchen/living with enough room for Boyfriend Pham’s desk so we could ‘hang out’ while doing our own thing. Very important.
4. Quiet(er) street - we lived on main roads the past 3 years and we wanted to be able to open our windows/doors.
5. No shared walls - added once we realised we didn’t want a house in the ‘burbs and started looking at townhouses.

Fortunately, picking a suburb became easier when Boyfriend Pham changed roles, and his new office is 7 whole minutes from my office. Eventually, we realised we didn’t want a house with land if it meant living in the ‘burbs. We opted for an inner-city townhouse instead.

My advice if you’re starting the house hunting journey is go to look at as many options and suburbs as possible. You’ll quickly find what you like and don’t like, and also decide what you’re willing or not willing to pay extra for. If you are buying in an area you've never been before then rent if you can. 6 month lease is plenty of time to get to know the area. 

B and V are my childhood besties. The kind of friends who you grew up with and even though you live in different parts of the country or world at times, when you come together it’s like you’ve never been apart? These two are my long distance, close friends.

Well, both of them are living their best COVID-19 impacted lives. While I was buying my first home and am now settling down during COVID-times, both B and V had fled their homes and haven’t been back since March.

B went on a holiday to Tasmania and when the first wave of Melbourne lockdowns began, decided it was safest to stay in Tassie for the sake of her elderly parents. So while the majority of my Melbourne friends have suffered through a second, long lockdown period, B has spent endless days hiking, biking and adventuring in nature, and eating amazing looking food. Lucky me gets to stalk her private Google Photos feed - she’s one of those peeps who doesn’t mobile phone let alone social media.

V has had nature adventures of a different kind. She’s been living on a boat the past 6 months. It sounds like a dream but she’s working remotely so spends her days ignoring the gorgeous sites outside, tapping away on her laptop in a tiny corner of an already small table on a boat. Still, I imagine finishing work and stepping outside to a sea breeze ain’t all that bad.

I caught up with V in Brisbane as soon as the QLD-NSW borders opened. It was fun to hear about her COVID-19 life, and what’s waiting for her back home. Mainly, a car with a flat battery and perhaps some neighbours who may think she’s dead because she didn’t tell anyone she was going and wasn’t expecting to be away for at least the rest of this year.

2020 has been a write-off in many ways, but it’s awesome to hear the silver lining people have found. If you have any positive outcomes from this wreck of a year, please do share - I’d love to hear it. Email blog@thephamly.com.au