Frustrations (J1)

I promised myself this whole house sale, buyer complaining about the roof thing was not going to stress me out. That it is normal Irish stupid procedure. I managed ok during the weekend, but yesterday it was driving me crazy. After us denying their claims, they came up with other claims about how bad the roof is, our real estate agent wants us to spend money on an engineers report, and or drop the price. He is not really working for us at the moment, he just wants to close the deal, so he can collect his fee. Our engineer from 3 years ago confirmed the good condition of the roof, and is willing to put in on paper. We have instructed the estate agent to tell the buyer we will put it back on the market if he keep going with this rubbish. I still have the feeling he will proceed with it, he is just desperately trying to get us to drop the price.

Anyway, it is getting to me, I have been stressing all day yesterday, and woke up with a terrible headache today. I have decided to not even go to work. I usually always go to work, even when I am sick. Today I do not feel so guilty, I have put huge overtime in (unpaid) over the last few weeks. Also, last weekend was the hurling final. Hurling is this stupid Gaelic / Irish nationalistic sport. My office is obsessed about it, talk about it all day. I absolutely hate hearing about it, have no interest in it. The fact that my car has been damaged the last 3 years during the hurling final weekend, by the scum leaving the pubs drunk after an all day session while watching their 'fantastic and skilful sport' probably does not help either. This year it has cost me the passenger side mirror. Today one of my colleagues who was at the final would be coming back to work, and I could not bare the idea having to listen to all their stories, them trying to force me to like their stupid game.

Enough of the negative. On the positive side, it looks like arrangements for our dogs or coming together. Both companies involved are very helpful, and we are on time arranging this. The idea is to fly them around the 15th to 20th December. As late as possible, but apparently airlines have a cut off date before Christmas. They will fly with Lufthansa, with an overnight stay in Frankfurt Germany. Then we will leave them in the kennels in Johannesburg with GlobalPaws until we get there. Once we are in Botswana, Global Paws will transport them to us. To give an idea of cost, approx €2200 for the flight from Ireland to joburg, and approx ZAR5700 (€680) for collection at Joburg, clearing them through customs + transport to Gaborone. The kennel costs will be extra. We will need to buy the kennels for transport ourselves, buI i have found some good ones online already.


The procedure is much easier then when importing pets to Ireland. Requirements for pets entering South Africa are:
- Import permit (Global Paws is arranging this on our behalf)
- Valid Rabies vaccination
- A South African health certificate for dogs, signed by our vet less then 10 days prior to
departure
- Government vet clearance (this needs to be signed and stamped by the state vet in Ireland)
- Microchips
- Blood tests

For Botswana all the above is required as well + an import permit for Botswana, which we have obtained already. I have asked Global Paws when I need to do what, but it is probably time to visit the vet soon.

Besides this (if the sale of the house will go through) there is not that many complicated things left to arrange:
arrangege removal company to take our belongings to Botswana (during the last month)
- give notice at work (only 5 to 6 weeks before we leave)
- sell both cars (they are for sale as soon as we give notice)
- buy a ticket from NL to Johannesburg - there are some really good deals on the internet,
might do this soon
- Find myself a job, this would be a bonus if it happens before we leave, but I am not really
worried about it

I think this is giving a pretty good overview of where we are at the moment, it has actually helpe organizing my own thoughts.....