I finally came to my senses and told my bosses I have to end this freakin' contract. It was supposed to end May 31st, and now they're talking about October. I know that might seem like a good thing for a contractor, but I have to get my freakin' house done so I can finally move in for real. When my upstairs tenant moves out that's going to be a full-time job in itself. Anyway, I told them I could come back if they still need me after mid-September. So that's the plan, along with some time scheduled for "knowledge transfer" between now and August 18. I really cannot wait to not have to work every day. Although after a month of living in a soon-to-be construction zone, I'll probably be begging to go back, haha.

My upstairs tenant (the one who's actually living there) left me a note saying she lost the check for $500 I gave her with the 30-days notice back in April. She says she's on a student visa and has to stay in film school otherwise she'll be deported, and she doesn't want to borrow money to stay in school. True, she has not cashed the check yet. He cashed his on July 17. I'm supposed to give them each another $500 after they move out, plus the settlement money - which I'm not required by law to give them, but it's one way to make sure they really do move out, otherwise they get nothing more and we have to do it the hard way.

Anyway, it'll cost me $25 to stop payment on the first check, and the stop payment is "only good" for 6 months. What the hell is up with that? Obviously, I'm not going to tell her that part. But I did tell her I could write her another check (as soon as I get back from my LATEST dog-sitting gig, don't ask), but if she "happened" to find the first check, please use that for the second payment, otherwise I would have to deduct the $25 stop payment fee from the next check.

Mostly I'm doing that in case she's trying to pull a fast one. She'll think she won't be able to cash the first check after all, plus she'll be out $25. I think she probably really did lose the thing (you would have to see this apartment to believe it), BUT why the hell should I have to pay for it, and am I willing to bet $500 on it?

I hope the first check does show up. I should probably ask my lawyer whether I should give her a replacement check at this point, but I'm sure she would say "no" and I would end up paying my lawyer $300/hour for that bit of advice which I would probably ignore anyway.

Jesus, who died and made me the Bank of America? I'm no good at this.

Autonomy!

The Buzzcocks song, not the individual empowerment. Ok on second thought, make that both.

Damn! That show rocked!

Whoa, (e:Leetee,204) that was NOT a good introduction to sailing. It might be ok to "bark" orders to your regular crew when you're racing and everyone is there to compete. But it is NOT ok to bark at your guests or guest crew. If she can't handle the boat on her own or with the crew she's brought onboard, you don't want to be on that boat. It's not safe and it's not fun.

Tell her it was too stressful learning what to do and being expected to do it your first time out. You learn by doing, but not under pressure like that. If you would like to sail with her again but strictly as a guest, tell her you're comfortable helping to prep the boat, but not being responsible for anything while under sail. At least not until someone else is there to show you what to do and do it with you a few times until you feel comfortable.

Sounds like her bitchiness started even before you set sail, so it might best to stay away from her in that environment. Maybe she was on a power trip instead of a sailing trip.

In other news, looks like the Adored won't be opening for the Buzzcocks here. Oh well, it would have been fun to hear them since you found them [inlink]leetee,462[/inlink] most excellent. But obviously I am PSYCHED TO SEE THE BUZZCOCKS! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!




Also, I'm thinking of printing this out and putting it in my upstairs tenant's mailbox. Just in time for him to get rid of all his junk!

Wow. I need a tan.

Who could say no to a free sample of unagi?









It'll take me forever to try everything here.

I would love to comment/post in response to the happiness theme. But I'm way too emotionally drained for that right now.

My replacement battery charger arrived today! I should have bought the damn thing 8 months ago when I realized my digital camera battery charger somehow ended up in storage with most of my other stuff. I never thought I'd be a nomad this long, though.

Here's a "candid" shot of my estrip bumper sticker. The only thing that would make it more beautiful here would be two tickets to the Buzzcocks pinned under it! (e:Leetee) - I can't believe you saw them twice!!! My music buddy Larry has our tickets for July 27th at Mezzanine. I can't wait!



p.s. - now that I have my battery charger, I'll have to take my estrip bumper sticker out for another photo shoot. You might think that's extreme, but extreme would be washing my car first. Yeah, I'm not up to that.

p.p.s. - some day I'll keep the bumper sticker on my car. But right now, I'm afraid with my luck - and in my neighborhood - it would get stolen/vandalized. If I ever get to that happiness post, I'll try to explain my relationship with irony. Although I'm already pretty sure you're not going to want to read it.

(The rest of the sailboat story...)

The transport service only let my brother know two days in advance of when they planned to haul the boat. So my brother had to high-tail it down to NC to get it prep'd and give the underside as good of a cleaning as possible. My brother-in-law (who lives in Monroe NC) met him there to help. They did a 45 minute dive to clean the hull and keel the eve before hauling.

My brother's drive home after that was the most harrowing part. Here's the story (in his own words).


They will put her on stands and unstep the mast and get it ready for transporting to Connecticut. They'll come back a week from tomorrow and move it to Connecticut.

My drive from Washington to Newark NJ was definitely an exhilarating one. I have never been in so many electrical storms with so much intensity. It seemed like I caught a western moving front that ran from MD to CT. The lightning was blinding at times. I was at the apex of the Delaware Memorial Bridge and wind and rain was blowing upward over the bridge and an enormous flash and instant crack of thunder seemed like it was directly above me.

I was holding off on getting gas until NJ since they pump it for you (state law), it's considerably cheaper and it had been raining sideways since I was south of Baltimore. I pulled into the first service area off the NJ turnpike, but they had no power. The car computer read 40 miles until an empty tank and the next service area was 36 miles. One traffic jam and I would've been on the side of the road in monsoon rains so I took the first exit off the turnpike and headed for a town 2 miles west, but only to find the same result. No power. Off to the next town, lights out, trees and limbs down. Asked a cop who who was warning people of deep water on the road where to go and he sent me south on I 295 for 5 miles. Finally found a station that had power restored but the pumps would not reset. The guy said to give him 5 minutes. I did and he got them working though had to pay cash as the credit card machine was not working (keep that in mind Dad the next time you drive home from CT with $5 cash in your wallet).

I was finally headed back in the right direction with a full tank of gas. I arrived home at 12:30 this morning -- 10 hours after leaving NC.

Now to the good part -- see pictures below. It was really interesting to see how they have to haul boats at this lake. The trailer they pulled mine out on can handle up to 50' sailboats. They hauled it and put it on stands, then removed (unstepped) the mast with a boom crane. They then hauled a 35' power boat and took it to Myrtle Beach. They'll come back Wednesday and load mine to transport to CT.

Anyway, all went extremely well -- in fact, it could not have gone better. Looking forward to taking everyone out for a sail.









p.s. - wow, I can't believe I never posted any pix from the family sailing trip last year. Guess that was back when I was still trying to make a go of it at alamedalink.com. God, I was so naive back then!

I know you're [inlink]kara,91[/inlink] probably looking for a local boating buddy, and it's not even my boat per se, but my brother just bought a sailboat! He drove 450 miles in one weekend to preview two of the four contenders, then made three round-trips from Connecticut to Lake Kerr, NC for the final winner. A 28' 1990 Beneteau First 285



Now renamed "Carolina Pearl" (after our [inlink]twisted,56[/inlink] grandmother) and safely moored in Norwalk Harbor.



This has been a long time coming for my brother. I remember when my parents announced we'd be getting a new brother or sister. My brother's response: "we could have bought a sailboat instead!" I think in the end he was happier to have our little brother. And now he has both!

We've certainly come a long way since the days Dad rowed us [inlink]twisted,229[/inlink] around Long Island sound, haha.

I love shopping in Japantown. Although it's so hard to decide what to get for lunch. They're all so damn cute!








Ok, maybe that one's not so cute.


And don't forget the sake!

(Apologies to previous commenters. I accidentally deleted this post. I hope this reenactment lives up to the original.)

Mama mia, what a week! I learned a hard lesson today, and I'm going to share it with you all right now. Do NOT suffer in silence, (or in my case, relative silence), until you blow up at the wrong person. ONLY to find out the cure for the pain was within reach all along. Click the heels of your ruby slippers three times! You do NOT have to bother the wizard!

Turns out Firefox was placing the "open file" dialog box out of sight below my dock. D'oh! I should have figured that out!

Safari did crash (consistently) right on cue, and still does after all my AppleCare maintenance. But once I found out my Firefox bug was a non-issue, I didn't care. Sorry I don't have a solution I can share with you (e:Jenks)! Except, use Firefox for estrip!

I can't even begin to describe this week. I think part of my problem is always trying to describe it online. That's never going to work.

Thanks again, (e:theecarey)! I took my estrip bumper sticker for a ride to clear my mind after my AppleCare appointment. Tried to take an incredible picture, but my digital camera battery finally died once and for all. Hopefully I'll get all my crap (including the battery charger) out of storage after August 15. This whole (tenant) thing started in February. I probably should have taken my realtor's advice and given my tenant 30-days notice the day I bought the place in November '05. But I just couldn't see myself standing on the sidewalk waiting to change the locks after the country sheriff forcibly evicts someone on my account. Then again, I could easily see myself with that $14k back. ;-)

The crazy thing is, the guy hasn't even lived here for the past 10 years. He stores his stuff here, and he made it abundantly clear as part of the settlement he won't be removing all of it before moving out, and he doesn't want whatever is left. But he does want his full security deposit of $200 back. (I hope my cost for the dumpster to haul away his stuff is less than $200. Then again, I can probably post "free stuff!" on craigslist and get plenty of takers. Which makes me happier than putting it into the landfill.)

I'm sure the woman who moved in 10 years ago is very grateful for the rent control rate she pays to my tenant, and doesn't mind living with all his stuff for the trouble. Meanwhile, all I want is to finally get my own stuff in my own place, and let the rent control tenant go to a government agency (subsidized by my property taxes) if he does indeed need to be subsidized rather than to me for support. ANYWAY! I'm not getting into that now. Back to my happy, happy place!