I’m averaging about 5 hours of very crappy sleep this week, and I’m popping Tums like they’re M&M’s. I now remember why I wasn’t looking forward to buying a new house. Plus, Jen and I sat down and did our post-purchase budgeting to see what we could bank for a wedding, based on her current income and mine. Let’s just say it’s going to be a squeaky nine months until next May. Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-ky.
Date posted: July 17, 2003 | Filed under house, humor | Leave a Comment »
We are still waiting for the word back from the sellers. Stay tuned.
Update: What a miserable, nerve-wracking, screwed-up day this has been.
Two things from yesterday: We did the house inspection; More on that later. The important thing is to say Happy Birthday, Mom!
Friday night Todd and Heather invited us over to dinner to share their wedding wisdom with us; they pulled out books and magazines and told stories and generally freaked the shit out of us. (Thanks guys!) We did not know how much we did not know about all this wedding stuff. It now appears that we will either get married at City Hall, host the reception at McDonald’s and honeymoon at the Motel 6 by the truck stop off 95, or sell all that we have and go into hock for the next three centuries to host a reasonable wedding for our extended families.
Last night I was awake until about 2AM with my stomach in a knot after realizing that I had left the realtor’s commission out of my homebuying calculations—an expensive omission. We should still be able to do this, but our cushion in the bank after the papers are signed will be about one-third less than I was expecting. Ouch.
There’s a really funny link on Boing Boing about a married couple who have bought a 1920’s bungalow and are renovating it; they’ve posted a list of pictures of some of the crap the owners left behind and are asking readers to vote on whether it’s kitsch or crap.
For the past few days, while all the legal, financial, structural, and scheduling issues sort themselves out, I’ve been restless and distracted. There’s plenty to do around the house, and I’ve begun some of it, but I’ve not been able to finish much. I’m ready for change. I guess my current mental state really shows how ready I am to get out of the city, start my life with Jen, and generally get things going. I’ve been searching for shiny things to distract me temporarily from sitting around the house wondering and worrying, and yesterday’s post really reflects that.
It sucks when all the bones in your body are asking you to be creative in some way and you have the debilitating problem of not knowing what to do or where to start. I’m trying to bottle that up for when we move, but it’s hard not to get discouraged.
Hot on the heels of my VoIP post from yesterday, C|Net posted this article, Is VoIP Ready For Prime Time? They don’t seem to have such a rosy outlook for the technology, but for people like me, with two sets of parents outside the local area code and friends scattered about the country, [their estimated quote of] $20/mo. doesn’t sound too bad.
Everybody say Happy Birthday to my sister Renie today!
Jen and I have been doing some work with a friend of ours for the last year and a half, and we started on a new project with him a few months ago. I IM’ed him last night and he told us he’s sending us this cool phone for payment of services so far, which is very cool. This is no ordinary phone; it’s a VoIP (Voice Over IP) phone built by Cisco and made to plug into any broadband network around. You pick up the reciever, and as long as you have a fat pipe, you call out as you would normally, without paying exorbitant long distance fees. Thanks, John.
Proof positive that there are about seventy ways to skin the cat: Todd helped me figure out how to do the thing in 3DSmax that was beyond my ability yesterday. It took all of two minutes to show me, and now it looks great. I need to get past my dependency on looking at this application like I would Adobe Illustrator, and embrace the 3D. The trick is to not get as discouraged as I did yesterday, to the point where I just want to go home.
I’m looking for some kind of Neon how-to guide and source for parts out there; I picked up a trio of neon letters at State Salvage a few weeks back, and I’d love to hook them up to a transformer and get them working. Unfortunately I don’t have any of the electronics and it seems to be impossible to find a local supplier who carries parts. I’ll have to keep looking.
Meanwhile, the fans for the 3Com hub arrived today; besides a little tinkering with the clips inside the case, installation was a snap and this machine is currently networked through the hub with no problems. The fans are rated for 12 volts of power, but considering the originals were rated for 5.5, I think it should be just fine.
Macintouch has a good tip on reviving seemingly dead Powerbook batteries: boot up into Open Firmware (Command+Option+O+F) and type “reset-nvram” and “reset-all”. Then type “mac-boot” to boot normally. Theoretically, this should reset the Power manager and allow you access to the battery (if one day it shows up as dead to your machine.)
Today the Turing Machine has its Rock Pants On.
I, however, do not have My Rock Pants On. I am nowhere near my Rock Pants. They are very far away from me right now. I feel like I’m looking at a computer for the very first time again. I’m realizing just how frickin’ little I know about 3DSmax, or more specifically, how little I know about making quick, easy models.
Today I’m grooving out to some old Bad Brains stuff I ripped years ago. I stopped over at Jen’s this morning to fix her air conditioner and pick up some stuff; then I drove to the house and parked in the driveway for a minute. Timing the drive at 9:30, I was able to make it to work in about 25 minutes, which is about the same amount of time it takes to get out of Canton to work, with less traffic.
I love Baltimore. I love the freaky ice cream truck outside my house at 7pm every night. I love driving three blocks further to find a parking spot at night. I love helicopters hovering over my house. I love the little woman who’s worn a housedress for the entire six years I’ve been on this block. I love thirteen year old boys walking pit bulls. I love twelve year old hoochie girls pushing baby carriages (and not for the reasons you think, you perv.) I love Formstone. I love hot asphalt in August. I love the smell of rain on pavement in the evening. I love my neighbors because they stoop when the sun is low and the air is cool. I love living right up on my neighbors and the fact that they check up on me. I love the kid on the two-stroke scooter that I can’t see in my rearview mirror. I love the rise in my heart rate when I walk home from my car late at night. I love the neighborhood bars and the people that are in them when I’m leaving for work in the morning. I love the good-looking Yuppies that surround me. I love the old-school Cantonites that still live here. I love marble steps, and the fact that I’ve owned a set. I love chicken-wire skylights. I love Highlandtown and Canton and Hampden and Pigtown and Bolton Hill. I love the alterno-kids that make me feel old when I go to bars to shoot pool. I love the bars that don’t exist any more where I used to drink—Tio Loco’s, Wroten’s, Miss Bonnie’s Elvis Shrine, and Lista’s (the top deck only.) I love the Harbor and everything about it. I love to see the old advertising signs fading on the brick throughout the city. I love motorcycles out in front of the Daily Grind. I love cobblestones under the tires of my bike. I love the shiny breasts on the statue outside Johns Hopkins university. I love all the apartments I’ve lived in throughout the city.
There’s a “Sold” sign on the steps outside my house this evening.
I’m filling out the music library this afternoon with a few gems: Ozzy’s Crazy Train, G & R’s It’s so Easy, and ZZ Top’s Cheap Sunglasses. Ahh, bringing back the old days.
I put up some pictures of our trip to my folks’ house this morning: Enjoy.
(Nervously eyeing the latest reports on unemployment and economic news) The house update is that we’re on track for a late August closing date, barring any bizarre finds in the inspections. Hopefully each house will pass muster.
Science project of the week: I’m rebuilding a 3Com SuperStack II, which I found laying in the garbage here at work. Unable to pass up a choice bit of technology, I fished it out and pulled it apart to find two fried cooler fans. A quick stop at a cooling fan site, $10.40 later, and I should have two identical fans by Friday.
. . .
I’m happy to answer the door, even when I don’t know who you are. I’m happy to come outside and move my truck, because it’s in front of your house, and you want to bring in a dumpster to begin gutting it. I’m happy to make small talk with you. I’m happy to tell you that I’ve just gone to contract on my house.
I’m not happy when you ask me how much I sold my house for, when you’ve never once said hello to me in the three years you’ve lived on the block, and you don’t know what my name is, and you don’t bother to ask. It’s none of your business. Read it in the fucking paper.
red, white, and blue, 6.04.03
Yesterday: 85 degrees. Water about 75. Sunny blue skies, Harry Potter and a can of cold beer. Barbecue at the farm, fresh cut grass, twilight, fireflies, breezes cool off the cornfields. Blankets on the side lawn, beer, fireworks drifting over the silo, and laughter. Happy Fourth of July, everyone.