October 2007 – akaemi.com
 

Month: October 2007

fall

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It’s a gray, rainy day today. But not dreary! It is saved from being dreary by the bright display of foliage, everywhere you look.

I grew up in a place where fall was just another dreary rainy season, if you could even call it a season. The biggest change that occurred was that it was ten degrees cooler than summer. Winter brought a drop of another 10 degrees, then spring brought it back up to fall temps. There is something nice about a moderate climate, the temperature always between 50 and 70 degrees – but there are definitely things you miss out on.

Like fall! I was first introduced to fall (and butt-cold winders, and the wondrous arrival of spring) when I went to college. The leaves on the trees changed colors! No evergreens in Utah. It was a beautiful transformation to watch, and I even found myself going on ‘fall drives’ through Provo Canyon just to take in the trees.

Fall is even more pronounced in Virginia. Today, as I drove through the rain on my way home from work, I marveled at all the vibrant colors. Oranges, yellows, reds, even some purple. All the trees, all different colors, right next to each other, a fluffy rainbow. I was struck by the sudden urge to paint it, and then I realized that I don’t paint. In fact, I’m not even remotely artistic.

My tree is already dropping leaves, which means it will soon be time for weekly rakings. Even then, I hope to continue to enjoy my favorite season.

I have a lego collection. That’s right, I’m a 28-year old woman with a lego collection.

And not just any legos; mostly Star Wars and Batman, but also a Spiderman and a Steven Spielberg set or two. My pride and joy would have to be my Millennium Falcon and my Batmobile.

My favorite thing about legos, though, is the little people. I have a batman, cat woman, two-face, spiderman, mary jane, steven spielberg, yoda, chewie, han solo, princess leia in white robes with buns, princess leia in metal bikini, luke skywalker, darth vader, darth maul, r2d2, anakin, and jabba the hut. I have little lego light sabers. I have little lego flames. I have little lego wheels, and little lego steering wheels.

I first discovered legos when b3 got a pirate lego set for Christmas one year – and yes, I did insist on putting it together for him. There were lego sharks, lego monkeys, a lego parrot, lego cannons, and lego palm trees. Not to mention the castle and pirate ship! It was awesome, and I was hooked.

If you haven’t given legos a try lately, consider it. At the very least, go to a lego store and marvel at the wonder that is lego.

I fought the law …

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And I won! It has been approved! I can now go rebuild a modified version of my original rock garden. It will have more “green”, including one section of moss. Since there will be actual living things in my garden, that means I’ll have to work harder at making sure everything stays alive, but, I suppose I’m up to the challenge. And, if not, I can always just buy more plants …

I think there were 3 factors in getting my HOA to relent:

I showed a willingness to work with them, and let them be involved in the “design” process. Everybody likes to feel like they are part of something; no one likes to feel like something was thrust upon them unexpectedly.

I played the race card. And it wasn’t even that hard! Once I made mention to one HOA member that I built the Japanese rock garden “in celebration of my heritage,” he passed along the sentiment for me. And everybody got the hint that “celebrating my heritage” meant that I didn’t mind calling up the ACLU to see how they felt about my situation.

I joined the HOA Architectural Review Bard. Yup, that’s right, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. Just the threat of me being at the meetings every month, as a peer, was enough to soften their hearts. I had every intention of submitting a new “plan” for consideration at every meeting, until they gave in. And if that didn’t work after a few months, I was gonna start making “motions” at every meeting to repeal the “no rocks in landscaping” rule. Hmm, I actually might still do that. Because, honestly, who even cares? Why make silly rules when you are the people that have to enforce them?

So, I guess fighting the good fight does sometimes work out. And I hope that as a bona fide HOA ARB member, I’ll be able to help others fight the good fight as well.

I almost got invited to a ninja vs. pirates party. And I was absolutely excited about it!

I contemplated dressing like a pirate – I do have knee-high pirate socks. But when it comes down to it, ninjas are just cooler. A touch of the supernatural, finely honed fighting skills – plus awesome clothing. I have two kimonos, one chinese dress, and a vietnamese pantsuit-dress thing – so I had the outfit down. All I needed was a samurai sword, and I woulda been totally ready to get my lucy liu on.

But, alas, the party never happened, and I was never invited. I’m still keeping my eyes out for a samurai sword, though – I want to be ready for my next invite.

istp

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The Myers-Brigg personality test has long intrigued me, and I recently did some more reading about my personality type. It definitely gives insights into why I act the way I act, but it also gives insights into how other people see me. And, well, I really do seem like quite the nut.

To an outside observer, I’m a pretty low energy person. Until I embark on a project – then I am capable of a frenzy of activity that looks like complete madness. And I will work seemingly tirelessly on said project, to the great consternation, of say, my husband, who likes to do things like have dinner together. He often walks away frustrated, when he can’t get me to abandon my work for just 30 minutes …

I also have issues with authority (just ask my parents …) and hate having a set schedule. Plus, with my extreme ‘I’, I internalize all my decision-making. Which means that when I make decisions, I don’t feel the need to consult others. Which means that no one has any prior hints as to what I might decide. Which just makes me seem all the more unpredictable and fickle.

I made my brothers take the test as well, and found that b3 and I get along with all the siblings. b1 and b2, however, don’t really get each other. At all. Which is ironic, as they have been roommates for the last 2 years. And which totally explains why when I ask b1 about b2, he always seems perplexed – and vice versa.

So … take the test! And enjoy reading about yourself. 🙂

my bathroom, revised

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Ok, so I’ve been playing with my bathroom. I have not yet come up with any designs that involve moving the closet wall; those are next. 🙂

I was doing some reading online about bathroom remodels, and it turns out that moving plumbing can be difficult to impossible, depending on your house. So these three designs try to keep the toilet in the same place (the most difficult plumbing to move), and keep some of the other plumbing in place.

option 1 This option keeps the toilet in the exact same place, gives up a sink, and trades the existing tub and shower for “corner” tub and shower units. I believe that all existing plumbing could be easily used with this option.

This option also moves the door from the bedroom to the bathroom a teency bit, and doesn’t require that the closet door be removed. (I removed it in this diagram, but mostly cuz I was moving stuff all over the place before I settled on this.)
(I know that pedestal sinks are the new rage, but I got to have my counter space, as well as under-sink storage.)

option 2 This second option sorta keeps the toilet in the same place, it just rotates it. The extra-long, double sink vanity is maintained, and the tub is moved from one side of the bathroom to the other.
The shower is traded up to a slightly larger corner shower.

This requires moving the closet door to the bedroom wall, and moving the door into the bathroom just a teeny bit.

option 3 This third option rotates the toilet, gives up a sink, and requires moving both doors. The gain is in getting a larger corner shower, as well as getting a corner tub (not any larger, but perhaps fancier looking).

Votes? Comments?

my bathroom

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Apparently, my bathroom was a point of discussion with my husband and his coworkers today – and so it has been requested that I post 3D pics of my bathroom in its current state.

I would like to remodel my bathroom, and am open for any suggestions! Doors can be moved, and we only use one sink in the vanity, so I don’t see a need to keep the double sinks (unless it helps with resale value). I also don’t use the tub (mostly because it’s a whirlpool tub with completely moldy nastiness in the jets), but having no tub in the bathroom reduces the bathroom to a 3/4 state, and I suppose it’s never a good idea to downgrade the status of your house.

master suite Master suite floorplan – I included the whole thing, so you can see where you might be able to move doors to (i.e., the walk-in closet door to the bedroom/closet wall).

The bathroom measurements are about 8′ x 11′.

Here are some 3D views:

bathroom 1

bathroom 2

bathroom3.bmp

bathroom4.bmp

I love spreadsheets. A LOT. Especially google spreadsheets! With google spreadsheets, I can update my spreadsheets whenever I get the hankering – I don’t have to wait till I get home to my computer.

I have a spreadsheet to keep track of my vacation time. There’s a sheet for my husband, a sheet for me, and then a sheet to track all the vacations we’ve taken over the year. In a glance, I can tell how much money and time we’ve spent on trips – as well as how many mental health sick days we’ve taken.

I have a spreadsheet to track all my loans. I can see the monthly payment, the amount left for each loan, as well as the final payoff date. And I update it as necessary, whenever I start ‘paying extra’ toward any loan. I leave the mortgage off that spreadsheet, as I like to feel like I’m making some progress towards less indebtedness …

I have a spreadsheet to track all of the colleges I think my sister should go to. This spreadsheet is shared with my sister, of course, who can update the list as she sees fit. With her college spreadsheet, she can quickly see what different schools cost, as well as how well they are ranked in the US News rankings.

I have a spreadsheet to track all my nerdly topics. As I write about each topic, I check it off. And as I think of new topics, I add it to the list!

Spreadsheets are awesome. They are the perfect way to dump what I’m thinking into something a little more logical – and a little more permanent.

When I canceled my directv service 6 months ago, I was excited at the prospect of not getting a monthly phone call to inform me of new services. Seriously, what kind of model is it where you call up to harass your own paying customers? I always got the conversation to end by asking, “Is this information available on your website? Great, then I’ll check it out there.”

When I first canceled directv, the monthly phone calls continued, but this time to try to win me back. I even answered a 50-question phone survey, supposedly not sponsored by directv, but every question seemed to revolve around “why did you cancel your directv service?”

Then the phone calls started to slowly increase. Last week I got 3. This week I’m up to 4.

When I was an actual directv customer, I hated it when they called. Now that I am no longer a customer, I downright detest it.

Today, I am sad to say, I actually got the directv lady to hang up on me. I wasn’t trying to be mean, or to hurt her feelings. But seeing as, “I’m-sorry-we’re-not-interested-today-thank-you[hangup]” wasn’t getting through to them, I finally blew up. “Is there any way we can get off your calling list, because it doesn’t matter if you call us every day, we aren’t going to re-subscribe to your service?” And then I got a dial tone. Perhaps I should have used a little less ‘tude.

I hope this is the end of it. But if not: directv – please stop calling me!

home designer

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A few weekends back, I was at microcenter helping my husband find the elusive G7 mouse, when I stumbled across some home design software.

I had been using some free demoware, that you could use for 30 program-runnings. And if you liked the product, you could buy it. I had just decided to buy it when I went to the website and discovered it cost $500. For a 2D floorplan maker! It did have some neat libraries full of furniture and fixtures, but, still, not $500 worth.

So when I saw an $80 3D home designer package at microcenter, I was intrigued. The pictures on the box promised some neat results, and so I took the plunge.

It took me several hours to transfer my house from my old demoware to the new product, but when I finished – wow. It’s my house! In 3D! With the right textures and colors for everything! I have a brick front, and siding everywhere else. My house is on a slope. The walls have the right colors, the floors are made of the right materials. My kitchen has gray tile and dark granite countertops, just like in real life. The ceiling even has recessed lighting! It’s – wow. That’s all I can say. It’s a real live model of my house.

Which means – I’ll be able to virtually remodel my house before I do the real deal! And I’ll know what it’s gonna look like. And if I hire someone to do the work, I can show them a 3D picture of what I want – and not just a magazine clipping with a “general idea.”

I love my new 3D house. 🙂 I’ve just finished with the basic floor plan and permanent fixtures. Next up: actual furnishings!

kitchen

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