Tuesday, October 09, 2007
handymen
Handymen
by Cornelius Eady
I admit to getting a warm fuzzy feeling when I read this poem n the New Yorker... for the time being, I do not have this problem.
by Cornelius Eady
The furnace wheezes like a drenched lung.
You can’t fix it.
The toilet babbles like a speed freak.
You can’t fix it.
The fuse box is a nest of rattlers.
You can’t fix it.
The screens yawn the bees through.
Your fingers are dumb against the hammer.
Your eyes can’t tell plumb from plums.
The frost heaves against the doorjambs,
The ice turns the power lines to brittle candy.
No one told you about how things pop and fizzle,
No one schooled you in spare parts.
That’s what the guy says but doesn’t say
As he tosses his lingo at your apartment-dweller ears,
A bit bemused, a touch impatient,
After the spring melt has wrecked something, stopped something,
After the hard wind has lifted something away,
After the mystery has plugged the pipes,
That rattle coughs up something sinister.
An easy fix, but not for you.
It’s different when you own it,
When it’s yours, he says as the meter runs,
Then smiles like an adult.
I admit to getting a warm fuzzy feeling when I read this poem n the New Yorker... for the time being, I do not have this problem.
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
house
Finally, after all of my moaning and complaining, it looks like someone is going to buy our dang house after all! We reached mututal acceptance on a price today, just $5,000 under our asking price. The deal is still contingent on inspection, but we don't anticipate any problems cropping up with that... hopefully we will be able to close in two weeks! Then the eating of bon-bons can begin. No, wait, I mean then I can afford to pay my tuition for fall quarter.
Labels: house
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
unpacked
I finished unpacking the last of the boxes yesterday. We are quite crammed into this apartment, but we are making it work. I have 5 plastic totes under the bed that are making it all possible. Without a linen closet, all the blankets/sheets/towels/bedspreads/etc. are under the bed. Also my sweaters, hats & gloves, and so forth.
Now that the kitchen is all cleaned up, it is pretty inviting. I actually have more counter space here than I did at the house. And there is plenty of cabinet space for everything I brought here instead of putting in storage. I am not in love with the old crappy electric stove, but oh well. And I am really not in love with the apartment size fridge, especially after having the privilege of picking out my own fridge at the house, which was a thing of beauty and efficiency.
But we're here, and our stuff all fits, and our Kismet cat seems happy, and it's all going to be fine.
Now we just need the darn house to sell so we can commence with the rolling around on piles of money, er, I mean the responsible paying off of debts and banking of profit for a future down payment.
Now that the kitchen is all cleaned up, it is pretty inviting. I actually have more counter space here than I did at the house. And there is plenty of cabinet space for everything I brought here instead of putting in storage. I am not in love with the old crappy electric stove, but oh well. And I am really not in love with the apartment size fridge, especially after having the privilege of picking out my own fridge at the house, which was a thing of beauty and efficiency.
But we're here, and our stuff all fits, and our Kismet cat seems happy, and it's all going to be fine.
Now we just need the darn house to sell so we can commence with the rolling around on piles of money, er, I mean the responsible paying off of debts and banking of profit for a future down payment.
Labels: apartment, house, moving
Friday, July 27, 2007
it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood
I have not fallen off the face of the earth. I have been extremely busy, however. Since I last posted, I have:
1. Moved to the apartment that I described previously.
2. Unpacked some of our stuff, although we still have a lot of boxes.
3. Cleaned our entire old house top to bottom, including painting two rooms.
4. Cleaned out the gardens and patio at the old house ALL IN ONE DAY. I don't recommend this method. Especially when it means toting 10 bags of bark mulch around the yard. I am only 5 feet tall and those bags come up to my waist, so even though I can carry that much weight, it's like wrestling a bear for me to pick up the bag.
5. Worked 4 days/week at the hospital in a team nursing setting - I'm paired with an RN and we take 6 or 7 patients... I provide primary care for half of them, ask the nurse for help with the things I can't do (hang IV meds and give narcotics, mostly), and act as the nurse's aide when s/he needs an extra pair of hands. It's hard work but it's going well. I'm getting mostly positive feedback from my nurses, and the non-positive feedback has all been constructive criticism which I welcome, because it helps me learn.
We moved on Monday and I worked Tuesday-Thursday. Today is my first day off at the apartment and I am unpacking the kitchen (among other things). This morning R* and I went over to a bakery/cafe in the new neighborhood and had a lovely coffee & pastry & fruit salad breakfast before he went to work. I walked back to the apartment and man, this is a nice neighborhoood. Beautiful houses and gardens and so many trees. I even paused and watched a hummingbird in someone's garden for a few minutes. I think once we get settled in the apartment, we're going to really like living here.
1. Moved to the apartment that I described previously.
2. Unpacked some of our stuff, although we still have a lot of boxes.
3. Cleaned our entire old house top to bottom, including painting two rooms.
4. Cleaned out the gardens and patio at the old house ALL IN ONE DAY. I don't recommend this method. Especially when it means toting 10 bags of bark mulch around the yard. I am only 5 feet tall and those bags come up to my waist, so even though I can carry that much weight, it's like wrestling a bear for me to pick up the bag.
5. Worked 4 days/week at the hospital in a team nursing setting - I'm paired with an RN and we take 6 or 7 patients... I provide primary care for half of them, ask the nurse for help with the things I can't do (hang IV meds and give narcotics, mostly), and act as the nurse's aide when s/he needs an extra pair of hands. It's hard work but it's going well. I'm getting mostly positive feedback from my nurses, and the non-positive feedback has all been constructive criticism which I welcome, because it helps me learn.
We moved on Monday and I worked Tuesday-Thursday. Today is my first day off at the apartment and I am unpacking the kitchen (among other things). This morning R* and I went over to a bakery/cafe in the new neighborhood and had a lovely coffee & pastry & fruit salad breakfast before he went to work. I walked back to the apartment and man, this is a nice neighborhoood. Beautiful houses and gardens and so many trees. I even paused and watched a hummingbird in someone's garden for a few minutes. I think once we get settled in the apartment, we're going to really like living here.
Monday, August 07, 2006
home
We live in a 2 bedroom house that we bought shortly after we got married in 2002. It's a great first house and has lots of charming aspects, such as the coved ceilings in the living room and the lovely fireplace and the hexagon-tile bathroom floor. Plus it has lots of useful amenities like the finished basement that R* uses for a music studio and the gas stove and the nearly-new washer and dryer. However. It lacks a lot of things that we have discovered that we would like in a house that we'll live in long-term. For example, we have no coat closet. Or dining room. Or shower in the same vicinity as our bathroom. Or enough bedrooms to have both an office and a child, assuming we have a child someday.
We've been kicking around the idea of either selling this house and buying a bigger/nicer/more conveniently located house, or doing a huge remodel of this house. While the idea of doing a huge remodel is kind of daunting (who wants to live in an apartment for 6 months while strangers tear up their house with jigsaws and sledgehammers?), I kind of loved the idea of getting exactly what we wanted at the end. Not only would we add bedrooms and a full bathroom and all that... we would get to take care of a lot of the little details, like putting linoleum in the kicthen and refinishing the hardwood floors. And we could get a bathtub that is actually comfortable. And I could have a windowseat in my bedroom for reading.
But now R* is saying that it would be more cost-effective in the long run to buy a new house instead. I don't even pretend to understand real-estate investing, but I think he was saying that because we live in a not-as-nice neighborhood, the value of our remodeled house would never go up enough to get our investment back. Whereas starting fresh with a new house would allow us to make incremental improvements and build more equity. Or something like that? Anyway, I feel surprisingly sad about the idea of not remodeling our current house. I thought it was going to be so cool to get to redo things in exactly the way we wanted. And while I LOVE house shopping, I know there's no way that we'll find a perfect house that has everything I want. It's just not possible. I guess that's life, eh? I'm sure we'll eventually find a place that we love, and over time we'll make it into our home. I suspect that our next house will be our long-term home, so we'll have time to do what we want with it. And then when we get old and retire, R* can get his wish of buying a snazzy condo and living downtown. :)
We've been kicking around the idea of either selling this house and buying a bigger/nicer/more conveniently located house, or doing a huge remodel of this house. While the idea of doing a huge remodel is kind of daunting (who wants to live in an apartment for 6 months while strangers tear up their house with jigsaws and sledgehammers?), I kind of loved the idea of getting exactly what we wanted at the end. Not only would we add bedrooms and a full bathroom and all that... we would get to take care of a lot of the little details, like putting linoleum in the kicthen and refinishing the hardwood floors. And we could get a bathtub that is actually comfortable. And I could have a windowseat in my bedroom for reading.
But now R* is saying that it would be more cost-effective in the long run to buy a new house instead. I don't even pretend to understand real-estate investing, but I think he was saying that because we live in a not-as-nice neighborhood, the value of our remodeled house would never go up enough to get our investment back. Whereas starting fresh with a new house would allow us to make incremental improvements and build more equity. Or something like that? Anyway, I feel surprisingly sad about the idea of not remodeling our current house. I thought it was going to be so cool to get to redo things in exactly the way we wanted. And while I LOVE house shopping, I know there's no way that we'll find a perfect house that has everything I want. It's just not possible. I guess that's life, eh? I'm sure we'll eventually find a place that we love, and over time we'll make it into our home. I suspect that our next house will be our long-term home, so we'll have time to do what we want with it. And then when we get old and retire, R* can get his wish of buying a snazzy condo and living downtown. :)
Labels: house
