My (not so endless) numbered days

Every adventure comes to an end eventually. Every Tier 5 visa has an expiration date.

In 60 days I'll definitely* be on a flight home to Australia.

I have no idea whether this move will be temporary or permanent.

For months now, I've been waiting to find out if my work will sponsor me to stay in the UK on a Tier 2 Work Permit visa. And with 60 days to go, I'm no closer to knowing.

In the next 60 days, my job may rise to the top of a list of jobs to be approved to be advertised for application. Right now
it's 141st in a queue of jobs to be approved (by a government organisation that's copped a lot of flack in the UK and international news for its inefficiency, ineptitude, and dire lack of funding for positions more important than mine).

Then I need to pass the Resident Market Labour Test. This means my work has to
1. advertise the job for 28 days
2. interview all the shortlisted applicants
3. prove to the UK Border Agency that I am THE ONLY suitably qualified SLT in the EU who could possibly do the job. If anyone else who interviews could possibly do the job (and doesn't need a visa), they have to be offered the position. Even if I am a better interviewee.
4. If I am the only person in the EU who is suitably qualified to do the job, I need to go home to Australia to get a visa (a get to have a holiday!!!!)
5. If not, I'm home for good.

The job could come up, be advertised, interviewed for, and I could have an answer in 60 days.
Or I could have to go home within that time and wait to find out.

So at the moment, I'm tentatively making plans to start packing, preparing, and farewelling. I'm unsure whether to start shipping things home, to give notice on my flat, etc etc. So for the moment, I'm just going to wait.

And make lists... because making lists makes me feel better. The last time I did this was more than 2 years ago. How time flies.

* 'Now listen, you who say "today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."' James 4:13-14.