Category: life

Odds And Ends

If you could see the state of the room wherein I am composing this post, you would understand my absence from these parts over the past week or two. Sufficient to say that, yes, I have indeed moved. But that seems to imply that moving is the only step to the process.

It turns out moving is just the first step. Unpacking is the second and, in my case, far lengthier step.

I’m not sure whether it was foresight or foolishness that kept me from documenting the process. A week and a half ago, there was no visible floorspace in this room. The living room was “box canyon,” which is the result when a packrat dragon is forced to move his accumulated hoard into a smaller space. I had a lot of stuff that I’ve collected over the years and I had both a full-sized walk-in closet and an outdoor storage shed to house all that stuff.

While cleaning out the stuff, I found $50 dollars in unused gift cards. I found a $25 check that was, sadly, expired. I cashed in my coin bucket for $80 and that’s just the shit I had rolled; the quarters still need to be accounted for.

I’ve pared down the stuff over the past few weeks. I’ve scythed through it. I’ve cut close to the bone. Everything that’s left is either of tremendous sentimental value, such as my very first manuscript or my favorite childhood teddy bear, or is actively valuable and useful, like my camping gear.

At this point, you can see the majority of the floor in my new space. I’ve taken to calling it my study, because I’ve always wanted a study and it sounds much more dignified than my lair or my man-cave.

There’s still a particularly unsightly shelf that will be hauled out once everything has been organized, but the space is usable. My Xbox is hooked up and I spent much of my leisure time playing Borderlands 2 which I was able to purchase with one of my found giftcards. It was ten years old for a company that went out of business, but the company that bought it evidently transferred all the accounts because the card was still redeemable!

The fact that it’s almost November and thus nearly NaNoWriMo 2014 is a thought that fills me with terror and dread. What will I write about this year?

House Update

It turns out I spoke too soon. The house that I had my eye on has been leased by some lucky individual. My discontent with this turn of events is surpassed only by the rage I feel at the landlord who avoided my calls since I tried to establish an appointment last week. Ah well. Everyone tells me that it’s probably for the best; the fact that I couldn’t schedule an appointment with this particular landlord can only save me from the inevitable headache when I need to call him/her with a real emergency, like flooding or termites or a flood of termites.

So, back to square one in my house search.

On an unrelated note, this is the first time I’ve traveled since I replaced my old Acer with the new HP. I looked back over my old travel entries from last summer and positively shuddered remembering how hard it was to get much of anything done on that little thing. It’s one of those things that you don’t notice until you upgrade and then you marvel at how you ever managed to survive with such a limited machine.

This is the first time in years and years that I’ve traveled with a fully capable laptop and I have to say, it is tremendously comforting to have full and speedy access to all my files, my budget, my digital stuff in general. Hell, I could even play a game if I wanted to do so.

It’s a nice feeling.

My flight to Phoenix will last all of twenty minutes, but then it’s a two hour layover before I’m off to Baltimore. It’s entirely possible that I’ll find the need to write a blog post in that time. I may also drink an overpriced airport beer.

Or maybe I’ll read. I brought several books with me, several of which are quite large. No paperbacks for me!

House Hunting

I think I’m close. I’ve got a house in my sights. All I need to do . . . is pull the trigger.

BLAM. And then the lease agreement will be signed, and it will all be over . . . except for the moving.

It really is quite remarkable how you can make anything sound ominous with the right metaphorical language. I should work for the news media!

Seriously, though, I’ve ridden by so many houses over the past few days. I wonder how many people have looked our their window only to be startled by a helmet-clad man in a black and green jacket, peering into the window of a neighboring house.

Fortunately, no one has asked about me yet. I might end up living in one of these places and one really wants to put the best foot forward when meeting new neighbors.