I finally got a large print made for myself, of the frozen lake from my trip to New Hampshire. You really need to see the original from the entry (on black) to get an idea of what the picture looks like, because the shot I took above doesn’t do it justice as I was exposing for the general area in my living room, losing much of the detail of the picture. At over 48″ wide and 32″ tall, it cost me a pretty penny, but it was oh so worth it.

After some extra tweaking on my end to bring out the contrast, my awesome printer brought out the trunks of the white birch trees in the left forest using Photoshop, adding a touch of contrast and detail. The picture was laminated with a matte finish, so there’s no glass to reflect (and hence distract), from he windows. Then my framer used one of her new framing techniques where she takes textured fabric and stretches it over an inside border (instead of a mat board), then adds a frame that’s smooth but not flat¹. The colours fit right in with the walls, while the border and frame matches the couch.

It’s the first picture I’ve used to decorate the main floor of my house, because I’m really picky about the stuff I put up on my walls. This one was chosen because the sky, the sunset, the ice and the patterns in it, all speak emotion to me, which is what I try to achieve in my pictures, and something I enjoy looking at.

1. This means I sign, stamp, and number the picture on the picture itself, since there’s no mat board to write on. [↑]

The house is finally back to its’ former glory. The exhaust pipes to my water heater and furnace have been replaced, the holes in the ceilings have been patched up, sanded, stippled, and painted.

This means a few things of significance:

• I get to dress based on mood again. I would come home and hang my clothes off the banister, then put the same clothes on in the morning, because my closet doors would be taped shut to prevent dust and errant paint/stipple from getting in there.
• I get to sleep in my bed again. The entire bedroom was a mess, so I had been sleeping on the couch for almost three weeks. It felt weird to go back to a big mattress, like I was sleeping on some sort of unlimited surface area.
• I get to use my photo/Tai Chi studio. Almost all my furniture was moved to the guest room. I haven’t been able to practice my Tai Chi, or take pictures of things against a drop sheet.
• I have the use of my main computer. Playing games on a laptop screen doesn’t cut it when you’re used to three 24″ monitors, and music sounds the way it’s supposed to when you have a decent subwoofer.
• No more time off work. I’m lucky in that I have such a short commute, but being there during construction still meant that I lost two days of pay.

I spent most of the weekend wiping dust of everything downstairs — walls, mirrors, decorations, counter tops. The splatters of paint were taken care of with a bottle of Varsol and a Q-tip. A few paint touch-ups were needed too, but nothing too bad. Then the house got an overall cleaning, to get rid of the evidence of muddy boots, dirt, and random pieces of garbage brought in during the whole process.

My back and feet are still sore from rushing to get everything done, but it was oh so worth it to have the cozy comfort of my house again.

Well, I have water. And hot water too. I’ve been doing loads of laundry and dishes in the dishwasher. Not to mention sweet, sweet BMs on a toilet.

But my bathroom and bedroom ceilings still look like this. Not to mention the coarse dust on everything and the uprooted furniture. I had several entries with pictures to post, but my colour-calibrated monitors are sitting in the spare room. I have no idea when the contractor is going to be back to get everything dirty again. Otherwise, I’d do some cleaning.

Either the construction company is on holiday (which contradicts what the worker said), or they’re dodging me, because I haven’t been able to get a hold of anyone for days now. I’m stuck in limbo here, literally living in the living room (what a fitting name). It’s left me rather sick and unmotivated.

Nightmare. The word almost everyone has been using to describe this hot water situation. From my friends and coworkers, to the plumbing technicians, to the sales reps, to the contractors.

When the contractor came over to make holes in my ceiling, he brushed against a pipe that went to the hot water tank, and since it was almost rusted completely through, it snapped and started leaking. Water shoots out of the hole any time I turn the water on, so I’ve had to shut off the main valve. Now I have no water. I can’t wash my hands, I can’t go to the bathroom.

The exhaust pipe that goes to my furnace isn’t up to code anymore either, so even if I get all this work done on the house, my ceiling would have to be ripped up again when the furnace goes. And since mine is 12-years-old and rated for 15 years, it could die on me as soon as three years (or sooner). So I’ll be getting the furnace pipe replaced too, which essentially doubles my pipe installation costs.

In addition to moving as much furniture out of my room as possible into my guest room (thereby robbing me of my photo studio, Tai Chi practice area, bedroom, and main computer), I’ll have to cover the remaining things in sheets to protect them from the dust. When the piping is all replaced¹, the contractor needs to come in and patch up the holes, scrape all the stipple off my ceiling, respray the stipple on, and repaint it. I don’t even have an estimate of how much that’s going to cost.

The house is my one area of stability. Where I retreat to when everything else is falling apart. The one place I need to be constant. I won’t feel settled until it’s all been resolved.

And to think that I was looking forward to the holidays. I was picturing myself enjoying my well-earned time off, eating bacon and eggs, playing a few games, and starting some new projects.

How far away the image seems now.

1. And with luck, they won’t refuse to do the job because they don’t have enough clearance. [↑]

I have no hot water.

In the middle of the weekend, my hot water tank broke down. I called the energy company and was on hold for almost two hours. When I finally got through to someone to troubleshoot my problem, all he told me to do was unplug the tank and plug it back in again. Then he told me to wait an hour and call back to make an appointment with a technician if it didn’t work. I refused to do this (after being on hold for so long already), so I made an appointment right there.

The technician came today and told me that the pipes were leaking water, and the black area under at the bottom signified a carbon monoxide leak¹. The entire hot water tank has to be replaced.

The good news is that my hot water tank is rented, so any repairs or replacements are covered by the energy company. The bad news is that the ventilation pipe that connects the tank to the outside of the house is no longer up to code, and needs to be replaced before the hot water tank is replaced. The worse news is that my ceiling is finished, so it needs to be ripped open for the new piping to be installed then patched up again when it’s done, by an outside construction company. The cherry on top is that neither the pipe installation or the destruction/construction is covered by my condo or the energy company, so I’ll have to shell out more money at a time I can’t afford it.

Until then, I can’t shower², I can’t shave, I can’t do my dishes, I can’t do my laundry, I can’t rinse my mouth without using painfully cold ice water.

But I won’t after this.

1. Thankfully low enough that the two carbon monoxide detectors didn’t go off [↑]
2. which is one of my favourite ways to unwind at the end of the day [↑]

I happen to have a chance to write now. It’s raining, so naturally the windows are all open.

My life has been somewhat chaotic lately. Weekends spent being social have been turned into introverted exile, a way of charging my batteries once again. The added benefit is that I have more time to tie up loose ends on my projects. I’m even getting back into the still photo medium again.

I installed these dry-erase marker boards next to my front door. I use them to keep track of my tasks, projects, and errands, so I can come home and immediately decide what I feel like doing. The two silver clips are used for hanging notes and letters.

Nothing feels better than putting that thick black line through a task. Writing on frosted glass is pretty tasty too.

I use the other board for quotes, a way to keep myself motivated — or grounded — every time I pass by on the way in or out of the house. It’s also a nice way for me to practice my hand-drawn typography, by trying to balance characters, words, and lines on the board in different variations in an esthetic manner.

There’s something familiar about this. A feeling like I’ve been here before, not in this situation exactly, but in the middle of the chaos.

All I know for sure is that I feel like I can handle it much better than if this was happening a year ago.

Hi there.

I’m already in holiday mode. Sure, I have one day of work left — Monday — but my brain has checked out. I even took the day off yesterday and made it a long weekend because I have extra vacation days left, and they can’t be carried forward.

This is how I spend most of my time nowadays: on my new chaise lounge from EQ3, with a mug of tea by my side, in a generally unkempt manner. Unshaven, with the flourish of a cowlick in my hair.

Last year, in which I declared that Christmas is dead, I stayed home out of spite, not directed at anyone but myself. This year, I’ve decided to go to Shirley’s for Christmas Eve and Christmas, and Pat and Jen’s for New Year’s.

But there’s a stretch of a several days in between in which I have no plans. Even though it’ll be a chance for me to do some extra writing, work on my photo projects, maybe even relax a bit, part of me wishes I was busy like everyone else.

I know I don’t have anything to complain about. I’m lucky enough to be spending the “important” days with friends who are important to me. I’m even lucky enough to have a choice of where to go. But I know that during the stretch, when other people has somewhere to be, somewhere to go, I’ll feel somewhat forlorn. They’ll have a place where they belong.

Maybe I’ll belong here, at home alone, on this wonderful chaise.

On a whim, I went to Zone after work. I’ve been in a decorating mood lately. I spent about an hour in there, just gathering design ideas with what they had.

I picked up a pincushion plate and some potpourri for my coffee table, replacing the glass bowl I had before, and lined it up with the edge of the chaise lounge.

Decorating my house has always been important to me, but I’ve never rushed into it. Part of the reason why it’s so empty right now is because I want to put up my own pictures, and I never had enough with which I was satisfied to fill the walls. I don’t want photos of memories — what I have at work — I want pictures that set a certain mood. Another thing that makes it hard is that I’ve never liked non-functioning decorations; candles you’d never burn, baubles that don’t do anything, knick-knacks that clutter shelves don’t make sense to me.

Part of me wants to go out and buy everything at once and be settled, but another part of me never wants to finish.

Otherwise, I’d lose the thrill of the hunt, and the pleasure of adding another thing that’s just right to the right place.

A few pictures of my house, something that’s become a symbol of my transition into adulthood. My next house project is getting enlarged prints of my photos to hang around the house.

The first thing you see when walking in the front door is the breakfast nook. It’s one of the best features of the house, especially in the morning. Even though it’s on the south side, it’s extremely bright and sunny. The windows face a major road, so I usually have the blinds closed for a little privacy, or open them when I’m feeling social.

There are two pathways that lead into the kitchen: the breakfast nook on one side and the hallway on the other. It’s a rather narrow place, but there’s enough elbow room to do some aggressive cooking. Tons of cupboards and plenty of table space keep everything tidy.

I recently bought this dining set from EQ3. Most things from there are custom-made: I was allowed to chose the material and colour of the seats, as well as the metal finish and diameter of the glass. The first thing I did when I bought the house, before I had things moved in, was to have a dimmer switch installed here, and in the two bedrooms. I had the entire area professionally painted a neutral beige for a café feel.

Trolley took most of the living room with him when he moved out, so I’m still looking for pieces. It’s the one part of the house I’m not satisfied with yet. I’d like to purchase one more couch, and a bookcase to clean up that shelf. In the future I’ll be blowing up a few of my pictures for the walls. The TV is hooked up to the digital cable box, an HD DVD player, an HD Gamecube connection, and a laptop (which unfortunately doesn’t output DVI). The couch was also from EQ3, and the coffee table, probably my favourite piece in the house, is from Zone.

One of the oddities of the house is the fact that the bedrooms are in the basement. It really turns some home buyers off, but I didn’t mind. It’s nice to have some stairs; they act as a general partition between the work and rest areas, and have come to define non-student living for me.

Trolley used to be in this room. I haven’t decided what to do with it yet. I may turn it into a guest room, a photo studio (which is doubtful, because of the red paint and how small it is), or a tai chi studio. Most likely the former, since it’s the only open-space large enough in the house for me to practice.

The bedroom is where I spend most of my time. It’s become a safety zone. The good thing about Ikea is that it’s so easy to match things in a set or series. I had the mirrors installed soon after I bought the house, and they hide an entire wall closet.

These are some of the most technically difficult pictures I’ve taken. A 1.6x field-of-view-crop-factor meant that I lost a lot of the wide end of my lens, and mixed lighting conditions made things especially difficult. I didn’t take pictures of the second bathroom or the laundry room. In the next series, I’ll get shots of the house at night.

The house changes it’s personality when it’s dark and moody.

This is the view out my window on the night of a snowfall. The bedrooms are in the basement, so I get a subterranean look at my miniature lawn with pine tree, although the garden is now buried under 40cm of snow. There are the Moonlights, deprived of their charges from snow covering their solar panels. There’s the A/C that cost me a month and a half salary.

I sleep with the blinds open in the winter because at night I see more this time of year than in the summer. Snow makes the sky glow an ashen orange, a phenomenon I can’t myself explain. On some nights, it’s too bright to sleep and I have to mask my eyes, peeking out every few minutes to make sure my winter paradise is still out the window until I fall asleep. When I feel especially sentimental, I leave the window open a crack to let in the smell of ice and dry air.

The price of this pleasure is at least three dead in weather related incidents across the province of Ontario.

In the last year of high school, I was called into the guidance office for some direction in choosing a post-secondary institution. The councilor, a very, very Caucasian man, went through the features of each university, noting especially the ones with nice campuses. In an effort to save his time, I explained that the esthetics of a university were of no consequence to me, because they wouldn’t affect my life. Apparently this was a different approach from other students, whom he believed decided on the direction of their education through a desire for lush lawns and big dorm rooms.

I’d always believed that I’d feel the same way about a house as a campus. Give me enough room for my computer with walls thick enough to crank my music and I’ll be happy, I used to say. While this may still hold true, I’ve discovered that I’m even happier with a nice place. I finally understood that councilor, four years later, after changing universities for a brief post-graduate stint. The new campus was big, modern, and inspiring; quite a difference from my previous university with its brown buildings and constant construction.

It’s the same when comparing a rented place of residence and an actual house. A house begets security, and in turn, a sense of confidence. There’s a distinct feeling, every day, waking up in one’s own home. Knowing that every paycheque is going towards some equity, a little piece of property I call my own. Having a comfort zone, a place that I don’t have to deal with anyone I don’t want to. A place where I make the rules, not having to answer to landlords or security.

It was the process too, that helped me grow. Aside from the common sense of owning a house as a long-term investment, I was inspired (or should I say “driven”) to move because of a roommate. After one particularly childish conflict, I decided more than four months before I actually had time to look, to buy a house and take Trolley with me. We moved in before the lease was up on the apartment.

I went through the entire process myself, knowing nothing at the start. I had never done anything on this scale before, and while it may seem trivial to those who have been initiators their entire lives, this was a big step for me. It let me know that I could actually accomplish the things I want.

And that cast aside all the doubt that was holding me back.

The Trinary Maturity Series

1. Introduction
2. The Job
3. The Girlfriend
4. The House
5. (In)Conclusion

It turns out I have a garden.

I moved in when there was still snow on the ground, and I only knew that there was a little patch of soil in my backyard from the few dead stems sticking out of the snow canopy. Eventually the snow melted, then spring came and passed, but the soil remained barren and dry. Summer started, and Trolley noticed some sprouting when he would go to smoke outside. He pulled some dead growth and weeds but did nothing more, not even a watering. The garden just started to bloom by itself.

I have no idea what kind of plants they are, but they seem to be doing well.

It’s a new week, and I finally feel like myself again. The only time I have an unstable mind is when I wake up between two and four every night. All the thoughts I push to the back of my mind come flooding back, and I have trouble falling asleep for another hour or two. Other than that, I’m okay, more or less. All it took was a housewarming party and a weekend of no worries.

Trolley and I started preparations on Friday. We were expecting 14 people (with three not drinking) and we got that exactly — Pat, Jen, Jeff, Pita, Mike, Iain, Aaron, Karen, Kat, Sebastien, Eric, Jen, Trolley, and I. In all, we had four bottles of Keith’s (left over from poker night last week), three bottles of wine, a 12 of Corona, and two 5-Liter Kegs of Grolsch. In addition to this, Aaron ended up bringing six more Keith’s, while Mike gave me a mickey of Smirnoff, and Pita supplied a 12 of Blueu (the distinguished Quebec variant of Blue). A few major drinkers powered through the alcohol, and while we initially believed ourselves to be overstocked, we ended up with only a few Blue and the wine.

It was a pretty good mix of people. While I was grilling burgers on the new barbeque, people were mingling, hanging out on the couches, catching up on hockey on TV. Some were even soaking up the sun in my little back yard/patio, which has an accommodating set of stairs and a few lawn chairs. There wasn’t as much segregation, and I think that Aaron, Trolley, and Pat helped blend the two (and a half) groups a bit. For a successful party, I’m always sure to have all three in attendance. To my surprise, we all ended up playing some four-player Gamecube games towards the end of the night, something I wasn’t sure that everyone was interested in.

All-in-all, it was a good party, even if I was too busy running around, making sure everyone was well fed and thoroughly drunk, to hang out with my guests. I even got a few housewarming gifts. Trolley and I built the barbeque Pat gave us in time for the party, and Iain got me a nice set of crystal low balls (which have a nice weight to them, but need to be hand washed). Aaron gave me a set of six solar-charged patio lanterns that really make my yard stand out from the rest. I couldn’t ask for more.

Pita crashed that night, but not before I got him burned for the first time. I think his mind was a little too rigid, and he was analyzing things a little too much to be able to relax and enjoy it. He stayed for the rest of Sunday, and we played the old Gamecube games we used to enjoy back when we were still living together. I had such a good time, that I was able to really forget about everything else that’s going on right now. It was like a little gettaway in my own house.

I needed this weekend.

I thought I knew what to expect financially in owning a home. I was ready for mortgage payments, lawyers fees, gas bills, title insurance, land transfer tax (which is a separate payment from the name change fee), and any other random thing that may cost me money.

What I wasn’t ready for was the rapacious urge to purchase things. Things that cover windows, things that illuminate the corners of rooms. Things that go in houses, things that look nice. Things to play, things that organize other things.

So I spent some money. Got the living/dining room and two bedrooms professionally painted. Bought a 53″ Widescreen HDTV Projection TV. Of course, I needed a progressive scan DVD player to go with it (as well as composite cables for that and the Gamecube, which cost more than the DVD player itself). I even bought four games – Paper Mario, Viewtiful Joe 2, Timesplitters: Future Perfect, and Pikmin 2 — so that I could take advantage of widescreen and progressive scan support. There were also a few costly trips to Ikea, Homesense, Home Depot for things like tables, bowls, king sized pillows, and Egyptian cotton pillowcases.

I’m in debt for the first (and hopefully last) time in my life. I was up to seven grand at one point, but the smaller part of it (all on credit cards) was paid-off with the help of my last paycheque, and the larger half happens to be interest-free. I have to mention, though, that a significant portion of what’s left has been reduced, to the generosity of my parents. $2000 of it was towards a set of custom-sized mirrored closet doors to be installed in my room and in the coat closet, and they decided to pay for them as a housewarming gift. Pat also got me a barbecue that fits perfectly on my back patio, along with cover, cooking utensils, and wire-string brush.

My goal is to pay off the debt as soon as I can, and start putting 10% of my pay into a high-interest savings account. I’d also like to save 2% of my annual salary for house repairs and upkeep, while looking into higher RRSP contributions and possibly an extra mortgage payment by the end of the year.

This’ll be hard, however, because I’m itching for a new computer. I admit that I couldn’t help but take advantage of a great deal on Dell’s 19″ viewable flat panel monitors, so I bought two. Unfortunately, with a laptop, I can only use one for the time being. I’ve been looking at the new P4 Extreme Edition processors, which are dual core with hyper-threading on each that can simulate four processors. I’m trying to wait until the price drops a bit, seeing as how one of these costs as much as an entire new system. Normally I wouldn’t even consider spending so much on a CPU, but I can easily justify it with all the video encoding and photo manipulation I’ve been doing lately. I’ll probably be able to afford one by the time they become reasonably priced.

So this is where I live now: an attached condominium townhouse. My unit is second from the right, and goes underground. The white windows facing out on the main floor are part of the breakfast nook. There are still boxes everywhere though, and it’ll take at least half a month to get everything cleared out.

It feels good to wake up in my own house, and as such, I now have to fulfill all the promises I made to myself on the satisfaction of such a condition.

• I promise to floss every day.
• I promise to vacuum more often than I did before (how non-committal of me).
• I promise to smoke less weed.
• I promise to stop pouring cooking grease down the drain.
• I promise to film Dolly running her fat ass up the stairs (she never experienced stairs until I moved).
• I promise to walk more often than I ride the bus.
• I promise to get my finances in order, which involves entering all my incomes and expenses into Quicken XG then setting up (virtual) savings accounts for retirement/emergency/pleasure spending.
• I promise to keep my room spotless.
• I promise to read more than I watch movies.