I've just finished my last day of work in the UK. I can't express how good it feels. It was such a relief to unburden the workload - passing it on to some other unlucky contractor. We had a 2-day handover period and by the end of it the new contractor looked like he was ready to do a runner. I don't blame him - one of the projects I was working on was an absolute nightmare. Oh well, not my problem anymore!

We've got a busy day ahead tomorrow. We're handing over the keys to the house to the new owners. We've still got a few items to clear out tomorrow morning. We then need to go into our bank branch and close the accounts we no longer need. I also need to sort out things like final invoices, expenses, updating my CV, oh, and the small task of looking for another job! I guess I should have started job hunting already but the move seems to have crept up on us all of a sudden. I can't believe it's only 8 days to go. We'll also be able to pay off our mortgage and other debts, although we are considering leaving a little bit of credit card debt in the UK just so we've got a bit more money to cover us for the first few months in Oz. I'm going to leave some money in a UK account to make the minimum payments with the intention of paying it off when I finally get a job. There are some people on britishexpats.com who admit to leaving the debts with no intention of paying them off. I'm too honest for that, and too practical - what if it all goes wrong in Oz and we have to return?

We also still need to set up an Oz bank account and a money transfer account. I need to square things with the taxman, sort out one of my old private pensions, arrange for my leased car to be picked up, and another million other things.

We're not having a big leaving party but we have arranged to take close family and our closest friends out for dinner on Saturday night (why did I agree to pay, I must have been drunk!). I've also got a night planned out on the lash. Rach has already had her goodbye nights out -I swear she's turning into an alcoholic.