You still can’t quite believe it.

You’re holding your official statement from the tax department (motto: “What’s yours is ours—eventually.”) But instead of telling you how much you owe and which kidney you’re better off selling, there’s actually a cheque at the bottom.

The tax department is actually giving you a refund.

And unlike the ones you’ve had before, this one has more numbers before the decimal point than after it.

So now you’re thinking about the best way to use the money. Do you put it towards the mortgage, pay off your credit card, or maybe invest it in…

Ha! Just kidding. What you really want to do is buy a new television. A big one you can actually watch from the couch instead of needing to sit a metre in front of it.

And speaking of couches, you want to get a new one of them as well. You’re sick of sinking so far down you need a grappling hook to get out again. You can even reclaim the blanket that’s currently hiding all the rips and tears.

The question is, what do you do with the old ones?

You could do what most people do—haul them out onto your nature strip and hope someone will take them off your hands. But while the TV may find a new home, there’s a good chance the couch may become a permanent fixture. (Even the council has to draw the line somewhere.)

Worse still, you may even find your neighbours sitting on it, complaining they can’t get anything on the TV. (You’re pretty sure they came from the shallow end of the gene pool.)

Or you can forget all the dramas and just call Brizzy Rubbish Removals. They’ll swing by your house, pick them up and take them away for you. You don’t even have to haul them outside. They’ll do all the heavy lifting for you.

And unlike your neighbours they won’t yell out “Geez, what’s that smell?” at the top of their lungs on the way out.

On second thoughts, maybe you should haul them out onto the nature strip first and then call Brizzy Rubbish Removals.

If you’re lucky, they’ll take your neighbours away too.

You still can’t quite believe it.

You’re holding your official statement from the tax department (motto: “What’s yours is ours—eventually.”) But instead of telling you how much you owe and which kidney you’re better off selling, there’s actually a cheque at the bottom.

The tax department is actually giving you a refund.

And unlike the ones you’ve had before, this one more numbers before the decimal point than after it.

So now you’re thinking about the best way to use the money. Do you put it towards the mortgage, pay off your credit, or maybe invest it in…

Ha! Just kidding. What you really want to do is buy a new television. A big one you can actually watch from the couch instead of needing to sit a metre in front of it.

And speaking of couches, you want to get a new one of them as well. You’re sick of sinking so far down you need a grappling hook to get out again. You can even reclaim the blanket that’s currently hiding all the rips and tears.

The question is, what do you do with the old ones?

You could do what most people do—haul them out onto your nature strip and hope someone will take them off your hands. But while the TV may find a new home, there’s a good chance the couch may become a permanent fixture. (Even the council has to draw the line somewhere.)

Worse still, you may even find your neighbours sitting on it, complaining they can’t get anything on the TV. (You’re pretty sure they came from the shallow end of the gene pool.)

Or you can forget all the dramas and just call Brizzy Rubbish Removals. They’ll swing by your house, pick them up and take them away for you. You don’t even have to haul them outside. They’ll do all the heavy lifting for you.

And unlike your neighbours they won’t yell out “Geez, what’s that smell?” at the top of their lungs on the way out.

On second thoughts, maybe you should haul them out onto the nature strip first and then call Brizzy Rubbish Removals.

If you’re lucky, they’ll take your neighbours away too.

You made it through another year. Well done.

And let’s face it: it was tough, particularly towards the end. You had to survive not only the Christmas cavalcade of visitors, gifts and meals, but also New Year’s Eve. But you got through it all, although you’ve vowed once again to give up alcohol. (You now consider it one of your ‘traditions’.) 

Congratulations! You’ve just bought a house.

It wasn’t easy. It took ages to find, and then you had to fight tooth and nail with the owners over the price. (Things were going quite smoothly until you realised they were talking dollars and not yen.)

But after countless bids, counter-bids, counter-counter-bids (and the odd prayer), you finally settled on a price. The paperwork is signed, you’ve been handed the keys, and now you’re about to take your first step into your new home.

Unfortunately, that first step may be the only one you want to take.

You pretty much knew the house wouldn’t be clean when you moved in. After all, there’s no “This place must be spotless before you leave or we’ll take your children” clause in a sale contract. (There was, but it was removed after too many parents took advantage of it.)

But you didn’t expect it to look this bad.

The carpet looks like it hasn’t been vacuumed in years, let alone cleaned. It’s as if the owners rented it out to a fraternity. Cigarette burns and a multitude of stains and spills have come together to create an image Jackson Pollock would be proud of. (At least you hope it’s tomato sauce.)

And there aren’t just indentations where the furniture once sat. There are actual holes, as if it was nailed down to stop poltergeists rearranging it in the middle of the night.

There’s no point even thinking of getting a carpet cleaner in. (Once news of the poltergeists gets around they won’t come near the place.) You’ll have to rip it all up, take it outside, and somehow get rid of it before the police cordon off your yard as a possible murder scene.

The good news is Brizzy Rubbish Removals can help. No, they won’t solve the crime or find the killer (I don’t think they even watch CSI). But they will help you get rid of your old carpet so you can get new flooring installed and finally move in.

And don’t worry about unpacking all those boxes. Just open them up and let the poltergeists arrange everything for you.