Puck’s Blog

Well, we’re nearing the end of the second month living in Burnaby.  So how has it been?  It’s a mixed bag, really.

We’ve been finding problems with the new house here and there.  Nothing too bad, just annoyances that should really be fixed but when you bring them all up with the landlord you seem picky.  That doesn’t stop me though.

We had Jennifer Barclay paint the bedrooms and bathrooms which was sorely needed.  The walls were dirty and in some cases written on by the previous tenant’s children.  Our bedroom has a gorgeous feature wall done in a dark red with a smidge of orange.  Very much like the current background to this blog.  The other three walls are “Russian White” which is sort of a halfway between beige and white.  It’s very nice and warm.

Speaking of warm, the tenants in the suite downstairs are from Brunei and are obviously used to very warm temperatures.  Their heat rises up into our bedrooms (and my computer room) and at times it’s roasting.  I can tell when the husband gets home from work because the heat gets jacked way up.  We’ve managed to block off the air ducts enough so that it’s not too hot.

Mike (Thornley) did an awesome job of wiring the house a few weeks back.  Now I’ve got a network cable running from my computer room’s router all the way to gaming consoles in the living room.  It’s perfectly hidden, going through the wall, into the attic and down again.  He also wired up my surround speakers the same way, so we’re set for movie watching.

Mel is working the 3pm-midnight shift Monday-Friday.  She enjoys those hours but it’s a pain for me.  I typically start work when I get up (11am or so as we’re up late) so we can’t do anything together then, and then she leaves for work, taking the car with her unless I drive and drop her off.  Then she’s gone for the whole time anyone with a regular schedule might be available for socializing and gets back after midnight.  We typically play something together or watch whatever TV I’ve downloaded and then go to sleep and repeat it the next day.  My main clients tend to leave their office (and therefore, stop bugging me for stuff they want done yesterday but didn’t give me until today) at 5pm so for about seven hours every night I’m catching up on a small amount work (usually not much) and then generally doing nothing but playing games by myself.

To top it all off, most of the friends that live near here are either in crunch mode at work or have other plans nearly every night.  It’s also hard to socialize when you’re on Medifast because you can’t go out for a drink or for food without ruining it.  (Medifast update:  It’s been a month and I’m down over 16 lbs)

If the weather was better I’d just drop Mel off and go golfing, but it sucks outside.  When it’s warm out it’s cloudy, grey and raining, and when it’s sunny out it’s cold.  Every year at this time I’m just totally done with winter and want the warmth brought back.

On the positive side it’s nice being close to the city.  I’m about a ten minute drive from Metrotown and it takes me all of twenty minutes to get right downtown Vancouver.  But I’m at the point now where I’d rather shop online and do without the hassle of driving, finding and paying for parking, and seeing if what I want is actually in.  I had to go to the Vancouver Future Shop to get Mirrormask on DVD and ended up paying $2.25 to park, not to mention the gas and time in and back.  If I’d ordered from the Future Shop web site shipping would’ve been free and the only drawback is I’d have to have waited a few days — but I could’ve ordered it whenever I wanted, not just when the car was available and I had time.

So yeah, even the good stuff is tempered with annoyances.