Under New Ownership

I moved into my apartment in August of 2008. I love it here and don't want to move unless I absolutely need to or could comfortably afford a two bedroom place so I could have a proper office.

My building was sold to new owners at the end of December. I was a little worried as you never really know what kind of management you are going to get, but they have been awesome. Unfortunately, they are being too awesome and I fear for how much rent is going to sky rocket when my lease is up at the end of July.

The great things they have done to the building so far is give everyone access to free WiFi, re-carpet the stairwell (the old carpets were torn and frankensteined in places, lit up the garage and common areas and put in energy saving washer and dryers. The laundry upgrade is good and bad. On the one hand, it went from $1 wash and $1 dry to $1.75 wash and $1.50 dry. On the other hand, half the building stopped using them so there is no wait and I got the energy saving detergent from Costco so one bottle will last me until after the world ends in 2012.

To my apartment, they came in and asked me all the things I would like fixed. I had no major concerns really. Minor little inconveniences that I just learned to live with. I didn't like rocking the boat with stuff because they hadn't raised my rent in two years.

I had them snake the drains. It's weird. I just got used to showering in ankle deep of water. It kept my feet warm. I have a light switch that was backwards and they flipped it for me. They flattened out the track on my bedroom closet so the doors actually roll on the rollers.

About two weeks after I moved in, my water heater broke and they replaced it with a new one. Unfortunately, they left it on all the factory settings. I had about 6-8 minutes tops of hot water and then about 2-3 minutes of luke warm water until it went ice cold. I mentioned it to the old landlords and they always said it was on their list, but never did anything about it. So, the new maintenance guy looks at it and fixed the settings. WOW. The water actually gets HOT and I can take a long shower in hot water the whole time. AMAZING. However, I find myself keeping it on the mid-warm levels because after over two years of having it that way, I'm still getting over my Stockholm syndrome about it.

I made some suggestions to the new owners for other improvements. I got shot down on having a trash can in the garage, but they are looking into adding a recycle bin near the mailboxes for dumping junk mail. They are also looking into a better place to keep UPS & FedEx packages. We don't have a manager on-site so if the driver gets in the building, they leave the package resting in the basket of the fake tree in our tiny lobby. I suggested losing the tree and getting a table with a cork board so they could leave packages, but also notes to others in the building like garage sales, passive aggressive notes about noise levels and lost mittens. We'll see if anything happens with that.

It is HOT here

As you may have notice, I've been going to the movies a lot. This is mainly because it is HOT here and my apartment doesn't have air conditioning. Seattle only gets hot for a couple of weeks so most homes don't have air conditioning. Every movie I've been going to after work has been packed since everyone is also sucking up as much air conditioning as they can.

I would like to make a recommendation for those going to the theater and wanting snacks. I am all about the kid pack. You get a small drink (a real small not a movie size small), popcorn (about a microwave bag size) and a treat (AMC movie theaters will let you upgrade the candy to $1). It's the perfect amount and its only about $5-6.

Penny Pinching...

In an effort to save some money, I have cut my Netflix down to one at a time. Thankfully, I can watch unlimited movies on Netflix Instant. This is a feature of Netflix where you can watch movies online. It's great, but part of the problem is if you are doing that, you really can't do anything else on the computer.

I like to watch movies as background noise while I'm doing things like going through my photos or paying bills, etc. Since I cut down on my Netflixing, I have been going through my movies. I decided to start alphabetically. Not perfectly, but one letter at a time. Some movies I watch regularly already and some I haven't seen in a while.

So in the last few weeks I have watched:

• 10 Things I Hate About You (Still awesome, but sad to see Heath)
• 27 Dresses (Guilty Pleasure)
• 3:10 to Yuma (Awesome western. Bale and Crowe have great screen chemistry)
• 300 (Still in my top 10)
• Absolute Power (This is just a solid movie all the way around)
  
• The Abyss (Still great and quotable)
  
• The Adams Family (Christini Ricci is so cute and young)
  
• Adams Family Values (This movie is brilliant and better than the first)
  
• Adventures in Babysitting (Still as good as when I first saw it)
  
• Aladdin (I miss Disney musicals)
  
• Alien (Classic)
  
• Aliens (Classic and quotable)
  
• Alien 3 (Better than I remember)
  
• Alien: Resurection (Great quotes and little else)
  
• Almost Famous (I never get tired of watching this)
  
• American Dreamer (Totally 80s, but still holds up)
  
• American President (I never get tired of watching this either)
• The Apartment (Billy Wilder can do no wrong especially with J)
  
• The Aristocrats (Fun documentary on a single joke)
  
• Army of Darkness (This movie is more fun to quote than to actually watch)
  
• Avanti (I'm surprised this hasn't been remade or updated. Solid movie. I mentioned this before, but Billy Wilder is awesome)
  

Moving on to the B's now....

The problem with warm weather...

Seattle doesn't get hot, but it gets warm. Most apartments (including mine) don't have air conditioning so I have to leave my windows and balcony door open. There is only one problem with that. I live next to a fire station. Sometimes when the PA goes off it echoes in and it sounds like the dispatcher is in my apartment. It isn't so bad at night because they are more conscientious and I am a heavy sleeper. It's just annoying. On the plus side, they bbq a lot and my apartment smells great.

However, during the day, one of the fireman likes to practice his bagpipes. So not kidding. I live in a strange, strange place.

Weekend of Productivity

This past weekend I declared it to be a "Weekend of Productivity." I started by getting by at 7a on Saturday morning and drinking 2 cups of my industrial strength coffee on an empty stomach.

I made a to do list. I am big on to do lists and like checking things off as I go. Sometimes, I put things on there just so I can check them off and get some momentum going. I also need to add things like "eat lunch" otherwise, I can forget to stop and do that. Keeping that in mind, here are the things I accomplished this weekend (in no real order):

1. Make to-do list
2. Make list of projects that need to be done
3. Make grocery list
4. Make and drink coffee
5. Eat lunch (sat)
6. Eat lunch (sun)
7. Eat dinner (sat)
8. Eat dinner (sun)
9. Sweep porch
10. Vacuum living room
11. Vacuum bedroom
12. Sweep/wash kitchen floor
    
13. Sweep/wash bathroom floor
14. Dust
15. Take out trash
16. Take out recycling
17. Clean bathroom (scrub tub included)
18. Clean kitchen (cleaning microwave included)
19. Clean refridgarator
20. Mending (socks and shirts)
21. Laundry - Wash, fold, iron & put away
22. Change sheets & make bed
    
23. Pay phone bill
24. Change cell phone to local number
25. Email everyone about the change
26. Calls - 5 of them (1 plus hours each - on avg.)
    
27. Emails - 10 of them (on the long side)
28. Return emails that have been sitting in my inbox
    
29. Sign up to volunteer for Seattle International Film Festival
30. Catch up on blogging (20 entries)
31. Costco
32. Staples
33. QFC (Grocery store)
34. Home Depot
35. Post Office
    
36. Delete MySpace Account
37. Go into work for 2 hours
38. Chop onions, cucumbers and goat cheese so prepped for future salads
39. Fix garage remote
40. Defrag Computer
41. Back up word documents and photos
42. Watch YouTube subscription videos (only 2)
43. Watch Hulu queued items (3 season finales, a week of Daily Show & Colbert report)
44. Watch Caprica (Need to return to a friend whom I borrowed it)
45. Watch Netflix ("Nobel Son" and "Man on Wire")
46. Make May Mix Cds
47. Download/Upload some new music
48. Burn CDs
49. Clean up iTunes by getting rid of duplicate music and stuff that is just sucking up space
50. File bills

In addition, I slept and managed to fit in two naps. I love multi-tasking.

Cherry Blossoms in Seattle

In bloom outside of my apartment building:

Bookcases - Before and After

This is how I had things for a few months.

After a while, I got sick of looking in and out of my boxes for my DVDs so I changed it.

So much better now.

Couch Before and After Photos

From blankets in a couch-like shape to an actual couch in seven months!

It is very comfy. Actually, it is the most comfortable couch I have owned and the boldest in color. I bought it off one of the managers at Amazon who has had it in storage for over 2 years.

My friend Linda's husband, James, and I moved it. The couch is massive and honestly, it should not have fit in my apartment. There were a few moments where I didn't think it was going to fit at all, but it all worked out. It didn't fit in the elevator and the stairwell is partially enclosed. There is only so much of this that you could do: