I'm astonished at how sad I feel this morning as I complete last minute chores, including packing. In a couple of hours I'll be on my way back to South Australia for the summer.

Why am I sad? After all, I'm only going for three months. All being well, lots of house-sitting will turn up and I'll be able to stay in Perth for much of next year, as I have this. But I've lived longer in Perth than anywhere else, and it's come to feel like home. I've lived in various parts of Australia, England, Scotland, New Zealand and the USA, but no one city has ever held me for twenty-odd years, as Perth has done. So leaving even for three months is a wrench.

I cannot complain about the quality of goodbyes. I've caught up with several friends this week and yesterday a few visitors dropped in to wish me happy trails. But perhaps the most noteworthy of all was my own personal concert by Andre Rieu and his cast of thousands. This house is opposite the Subiaco Oval, home, as it states proudly on the billboards, of the West Coast Eagles and various other sporting teams. But last night the oval was transformed into an amphitheatre for Rieu's only Perth concert.

The build-up started at about 11.00am with the arrival of the sound people. They fiddled with the volume and quality, on and off, for several hours, giving the neighbourhood a tantalising taste of the program. Snippets of Scotland the Brave blended into Trumpet Voluntary and Bolero with bit of Puccini thrown in for good measure. About 5.00pm they got serious and we actually heard a couple of numbers right through. Then from 7.30pm onwards the musicians were almost in competition with the large and enthusiastic audience. In fact, it was hard to judge which party was making the most noise. And the wee small hours seemed to be devoted to striking the set. They did whatever they were doing reasonably quietly, but still...

Not that the concert was unwelcome noise as far as I'm concerned. I have very plebeian tastes when it comes to music - I love all those hackneyed old tunes, even when they've been transcribed for combinations of instruments and voices far removed from the composers' intentions. So I had great fun singing along while playing Scrabble with Facebook friends. It was just like having my own farewell concert. But anyone who doesn't like classical music or is a purist about its performance would have been running for the earplugs.

I was lucky this time: it was my kind of music. But should local councils be allowed to rent space to events that are almost certain to annoy a considerable number of residents, not just for the duration of a football match, but for the better part of 24 hours? I don't know, but I'm sure glad it wasn't a dance party or death metal or a weird modern opera!

Back to the packing. I'll talk to you again next week, from South Australia!