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Well the Health Resort sale went out the window, when the vendor tried to have us pay a whole month of default interest - well over $2,000. You have to wonder whether he really wants to sell them. Meanwhile, we have had all 6 properties re-valued & are able to borrow a substantial amount against the increased equity. Hey, the system works! Probably just as well, because Julie was "asked to resign" from her job yesterday. Silly people, they have a communication problem in the office, that won't go away by shooting the messenger. So she fell apart for the day & is today giving herself the "bootstrap wedgie", which means that she will pick herself up by the bootstraps, give herself a wedgie & get on with finding another job. We're in Melbourne for Valentine's Day. Last night we got a call from Paul that he has proposed to Brooke & that she had said "yes". Today, talking to her, we got the full story. He wanted to go for a walk in the park at lunchtime & she almost ruined the whole thing by not wanting to go. I must admit his planning was meticulous. That morning, he had loaded her phone with a slideshow of stuff arranged on the bed in a heart shape, zooming in to the the case containing the ring & finally to the ring itself. He convinced her that she had missed his text message earlier in the day & started the slideshow playback as he handed her the phone. When she turned around again, there he was on bended knee with the ring. And what a piece of rock it is, too! Huge congratulations to them both. We'll have a celebratory dinner with them tomorrow. Jack is a lot like Duncan - takes him a while to warm up, then he brings out his winning smiles. I played with him in the gardens by the pool at the hotel while the girls talked. Looking forward to seeing Kiana on the weekend too. We also took some time out to get & visit the historic home of Ripponlea. All that time I lived in a suburb just up the road back in the 70's, I never got there to see it. Funny. The loan on the re-valued equity finally came through & we have cleared the credit cards & paid the deposit on the property in Cairns, the one that settles late next year. Meanwhile, our finance broker Mary is about to introduce us to an investor's loan package negotiated by her trading partner in Sydney, underwritten by Macquarie Bank. Apparently, it provides all of the good deals like borrowing up to 100% of the value, shared equity (means we pay a lower interest rate & the remainder of the interest charged is added to the principal. I'm hoping that they will be responsive enough to our changing circumstances that we can feel comfortable with putting all of our business with them, including transaction accounts & credit cards. We'll see. We collected Julie's new scooter today & immediately took the old one & the new one for a ride in the hills. It's a Bug Orion (200 cc) & it's very quiet. Also bright red, & the LED lights at the back are VERY bright. At least she'll be visible. Mine is due back next week - the shop has allocated all of Monday to put it back together again. Just in time for my birthday, which coincidentally is when my new laptop is being delivered. Cool! I've just done some more research on the "weeds" we have growing alongside the barley, oats & corn in the back yard & discovered that we have wheat & rice, as well as what appears to be sorghum or millet. The birds will definitely have a feast this year. And the apple tree in the front yard bore about a dozen apples. We think they are the Pink Lady variety.
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