The Sikkel Retirement Home

A lot has happened since the last update, nearly all of it according to plan fortunately. Check out the fully updated timeline for upcoming events if you'd like to know more. Now that we are retired (or unemployed, take your pick) and can do our shopping anytime we want, we finally can experience standing in line at the Kruidvat for 15 minutes and not have a care in the world. We are amazed daily to see what other people do while we used to work. Now we just take it slow, sleep longer (Yuum mostly), game (Gil mostly), cook weird new recipes (some good, some...interesting) and find out stuff from all sorts of documentaries that we watch. We'll keep out the boring stuff and to keep it somewhat structured, we'll run you through it by category and fill in most of the details as we go along.

Work
Leaving was about as tough as we expected, especially as everyone had made such a huge effort to make us feel appreciated. At the risk of sounding lame, we've always felt appreciated, but it's nice when people take a lot of time to arrange something special. Yuum got a very nice diner, a memorable picture of her colleagues and a nice financial injection. Gil's colleagues took it one step beyond and delivered a full-on interactive power point presentation with music and a quiz (incl. Chuck Norris), a beautiful speech by Tiago, guest appearances of colleagues on leave, a digereedoo performance (I kid you not), diet coke and rice crackers, a scrap book and a season ticket to the Sydney Opera House that we will put to good use. To all of you: Best.Colleagues.Ever.

Kung Fu
Well, as long as he doesn't breathe, it wasn't all that painful (cracked ribs do heal themselves and bruises are the lightest form of internal bleeding)....It wasn't as bad physically as Gil had thought, but man oh man. leaving those people sure put a few nasty bruises on the heart. Monday was great with a nice training and a not so nice circle fight of 9 vs 1 (Gil) but it all ended with a very nice cake those guys had ordered in his honor and pictures with the team. Tuesday was equally tough and fun, but fortunately Sifu Kruit punched Gil in the face pretty good as a prep for the circle of 12 vs 1 (Gil). Thursday was most impressive with knife training, people bringing gifts, last training with my little big sis and Sifu van Die showing his respect to Gil for his 2 years of dedication (wow). As the Thursday did not include a circle fight (really, mercy is a good thing), the Friday team decided to treat Gil to two rounds of a 29 vs 1 (Gil) circle and yes, that's a lot of punches, but all things considered (including 3 black belts and 7 brown belts) he gave as good as he got and was still standing after what felt like 20 minutes, but was probably no longer than 30 seconds. Nothing says we'll miss you like a good fight and this was a great experience. Gil misses it already. (see Kung Fu section for some pictures)

House and Inventory
The paperwork is done and ready to be signed at the notary on the 31st, we're contacting real estate agents in Canberra as you read and every day our house becomes a little emptier. All the stuff we put in the online store is spoken for and the new owners will also keep some of our stuff. Our plants are gone to Yuum's mom and Gil's sister. Garden furniture and gardening stuff is mostly gone, power tools and assorted items are mostly gone as well. A lot of clothing and even some cupboards have gone. We hope to give more stuff away on the 25th and clear out a lot on the 26th to a friend of Gil's sister who can use a little help in the interior supply section of life. On Monday the 27th at 0830 the movers will move in (move in, get it....) and take most of our stuff. What's left after the dust settles will either be airfreight, carry on board, a cat or make its way to the Albrandswaard dump.

Cats
This is the part of the plan that went slightly different than expected. We got the permit without a hitch and the quarantine team was friendly enough to charge us in advance for the stay to then tell us that they would have a spot available by.....the 3rd March 2014 [insert scratchy record sound here]. Okaaaaaay, after a slight panic attack we were fortunate to arrange that Yuum's parents will care for our furry weapons of mass destruction in the additional month including the final stages of the veterinary process and airport drop off. You'd think that them being cats, with all their superiority, they would have figured out how to get to Schiphol and find Australia by themselves, but no.... The upside of it all is that they will live like royalty for another month, see a new environment, get to fight daily with their cat cousins and allow us the time to set up their kingdom in Canberra as good servants are supposed to do.

Well, back to another day of retirement for us, we'll just have to suck it up...