Road trip sounds good to me at the moment vs plane trip. On our way up the first plane had mechanical issues so a new one had to come in and we missed our connection in Sydney. They had to redo our booking and in the process cancelled our return trip which caused some issues on the way back. Our 2nd return flight (had a Sydney stop over each way) our boarding passes got rejected so they had to do something to our booking again, then we spent an hour sitting on the tarmac while they rebooted the computer. So a trip where we just drove sounds great.

Arte - sounds like you're good with the tubes. Is the appt next week to do it, or just meeting the surgeon? Hope the recovery goes well.

Cass - that blackout does sound a bit full-on. I can't imagine what that's like when you're used to the lights of the city. I know what you mean about perks of the city, I missed them when I moved here (although Canberra perks probably aren't what Melbourne perks are!) but I'm really enjoying life here and get me perks every now and then.