Condo: The Move is Complete

I want to give a big thanks to Calum, John, and Jeremy for helping me move on Saturday. I couldn't have done it without your help.

I'd also like to thank Ken and Colleen for there help earlier in the week.

And I'd especially like to thank my parents for all the help and support they've given me from the day I expressed interest in the new place to helping me clean out old dump, they've been there.

So lets review the weekend.

I had reached the point of total exhaustion. I've been moving stuff over almost every day for the last two week. By the time Saturday rolled around I just couldn't deal with it any more. I couldn't think what went where or how to pack it or even how to carry it. Fortunately everyone did a great job of just picking up stuff and getting it over to the new place. All I did was babel a few incoherent thoughts and it all happened around me.

We did have a little fun too. Here's John and I ridding the couch down the elevator.


If you'd like to see the sequence of the Great Couch Toss it can be found on Calum's Blog. That was a very cathartic experience. That couch, was passed it's prime years ago. The black had faded to gray on the arms and the seat fabric was gone completely.

The cool thing is it only weighed about 35lb so it wasn't hard to lift into the bin. It's too bad I couldn't do the CityTV Christmas Tree Toss thing, 6 floor window and pyrotechnics, but heaving it over the side of the bin was quite satisfying none the less.

Another thing that was happening is people were joking about what strange things they'd find in the kitchen. It's the one area I hadn't managed to do much packing. I left my Mom to pack things up, but I know Jeremy and Calum helped out at times.

There where the typical things like, 15 year old bags of sugar, Jello in classic packaging, cans of questionably aged soup. And there were a few odd things too. Like a picture a framed picture of Wendy Messly that my friend Aair had given me years ago.

But the one really odd thing, which I had forgotten about was in a black garbage bag sitting above the cupboards. On the outside was a small label that had my name and "tues eve" written on it. In side was a board and two clay breasts sitting on it.

Even with context they're pretty odd.

But no-one Mentioned it specifically. I've got to assume John didn't see them because it's not like him to let a breasts go unmentioned.

Anyway, the explanation is somewhat obvious, they are from one of my sculptures. But I didn't do a sculpture of too disembodied breasts. These where actually part of a much larger sculpture I did last year. It's one I have not yet posted. It's almost a life size female torso, which I molded and cast. When cleaning out the casting the breasts popped out of the mold undamaged. Everyone in the class thought they looked perfect, and that I should keep them. In fact a few people wanted to take them if I wasn't going to keep them.

Well I wasn't really interested in keeping them, but I also wasn't comfortable with others taking them. So I invoked my artistic right to be selfish and I keep them. I took them home in a black garbage bag on a board from the class, put them on top of the kitchen cabinets and forgot about them.

Looking at them now I am amazed how well they dried out. Normally this kind of clay cracks and flakes off as it dries. But they are almost perfect.

I'm still not sure what to do with them. They are too hard to work with, they can't be made workable again, and they are too dusty to use as is. The will probably go back in the bag and back on top of my new kitchen cabinets only to be found and wondered about in another 15 years.

Condo: Elevator to Nowhere

Well I've been doing a lot on the Condo of the last few days. However tonight was not fun. I got stuck in the elevator for about 10 minutes. In fact I got stuck in two elevators.

The first one descended a few floors then stopped. The doors wouldn't open and it didn't feel like it was moving. Eventually doors opened on the next floor. Not wanting to temp fate I got off and called another elevator. I was far to high in the building to walk the rest of the way down. Besides I had my trolley with me.

A different elevator arrived and I rode it down maybe another 5 floors before it stopped. I waited a couple of minutes to see if it would open up on he next floor. It didn't. So I decided to press the Call button. Apparently this calls an Alarm Service company. I had a rather frustrating time talking to the lady on the phone. I couldn't understand her well and I don't think she could her me very well even though I was yelling.

I eventually got through to her what building and what elevator I was in. She said she had to put me on hold briefly. So I was on hold for about 2 minutes, then there was a click from the speaker. I now suspect this was the phone hanging up.

All the time I'm sitting in the elevator it doesn't feel like it's moving at all. However the number changes and the elevator beeps about once a minute. I was about to try the call button again when the number hit ground and the doors opened. This was very surpassing since it didn't feel like it was moving at all.

I got off and went to the concierge to tell him what happened. He was very surprised because he is supposed to be contacted immediately when there is an elevator call, and he had not been called.

He said this had happened over the weekend but technitions had been in to work on them. He said he would check on what was happening and notify people in the morning.

I decided I did not want to risk those elevators again so I went out the doors, and took the parking elevator down as far as it would take me and then walked down the ramps the rest of the way.

So I'm back at the old home and I'm glad I'm not planning on going over there Tomorrow. Give them time to sort things out. I'm still a little freaked out. I'm not good in small places when I don't have control over when I can get out.

Anyway, here is a picture of the pool. It's not finished, but it looks nice.

Condo: Day Two

Well today went much better. The property management had arranged for temporary keys for parking so when I arrived this morning I was able to get to my space. It's not a bad space either, although it's very deep in the building, P4. But it exit into a the out lane and it should be easy to back into. I remember my friend Jeff's parking space was 1km into the basement. I'll have to measure mine, I bet it's close.

I do for see one problem. Leaf games. Leaving or arriving when a game is on could be very slow as I must pass through public parking before getting to resident parking.

Now to the condo, I'm feeling much better to day. I got up there and I got to do work on the place. My parents came down from London to help out. I realize now the fact that the builder hadn't been in to clean up was probably a good thing. I would have had to clean everything in the place anyway, it's best if it's just done by the person who cares about it.

So I assumed all the appliances. The fridge was the most fun, and it's enormous. You could stash a couple of people in there. Given the amount I use my current fridge, I suspect there will be a lot of open space.

I vacuumed then wiped down most of the kitchen cupboards. After a brief laps where I was cleaning the floor first, I quickly remember, it's best to start at the top. The amount of dust and saw dust on things was incredible. But you really didn't notice it until you wiped it off because it was so evenly distributed.

Next I got to plug in the stove. Lots of fun plugging in that giant plug. But those things scare me too, so I threw the breaker before doing it.

The appliances are all black, and they look really nice now that all the dirt is washed off them.

My Dad worked on cleaning the baseboards, the balcony and the windows. You can now see out the windows. There is still a fair bit of paint on them in places. Paint was splattered on everything. Fortunately it came of easily in most cases. My mom worked on the bathroom, and it looks great too. She also brought down some nice towels which match the bathroom quite well. They also had a bamboo moniker on them, which is funny because I'm thinking of getting bamboo hardwood floors in a year or two.

finally, to end the day we went to IKEA to look around and pickup my bed. I was disappointed to learn IKEA didn't to the free dinner with $150 or more purchase, but we had a good dinner there anyway. After doing the wonder through we picked up the bed in the warehouse. It's interesting how a simple queen sized bed comes as 6 separate boxes and bags, spread over two different aisle and 3 different bins. The bed side table was one box in one bin.

Where I was feeling dread last night, now I'm looking forward to getting back there tomorrow to do more.

Pictures: first is the living room through to the balcony, second is bedroom window, third is bathroom, as if that wasn't obvious, and the forth, as I've been lead to understand, is the kitchen.

Condo: The View Part 2

The previous shot of my view was a little more confined. This one gives a full 180 degree panorama. Unfortunately it was raining Friday when I took the picture, but it's still reasonably clear. I'll do another one in good weather, when we get some, which might be today.

Thank you to Calum for building the mosaic. My PC is down at the moment, haven't used it in like 3 months. The software he used, Autostitch, is currently only available for Windows.

Condo: Keys in Hand

I got the keys to my condo today. Left work early to go over and collect them and look over the place. Unfortunately, all did not go well.

All week I've had mixed feelings. I want to be really excited, and everyone else wants me to be really excited, but I know if I let myself get too excited I'll be disappointed. And that's what happened today.

The reasons, well some are not entirely unexpected, and the others are frustrations that will pass. I will be very happy with my place. It's just not in a state where I can feel that way yet.

The first problem was with the keys, or lack of a parking garage key. It's kind of hard to do anything at your residence when you don't have a place to park. I had planned on moving a bunch of stuff over there tonight, but that was quashed by having no place to park. Apparently they ran out of FOBs for the resident parking. There is no way to access my spot without them. While the did make an effort to allow me to park on the ground level until Monday when they will have more FOBs, I'm not comfortable with the ability of the parking attendants and security to grasp this concept, and not tow my car. By Monday this will pass, but it has thrown a wrench in my plans.

Second, almost no work was done on my unit from the time of the inspection a week and a half ago till now. The only exception is they installed the closet doors in the bedroom. Unfortunately they installed three, when the contract calls for two, and they installed mirrored doors when the contract calls for white.

While the mirrors are interesting, I'm not really excited by the idea of having an entire wall mirrored. That's why I had it written into the contract that they be white.

Finally the place is really dirty. The inspector said there would be a cleaning crew come through before I took possession. There is just as much or more dust on every surface as there was during the inspection.

So now I've got to give the place a thorough cleaning, and their off the hook for the work. I can't wait around for them the come in and do it. I need to move stuff in and get setup to live there.

I hope this doesn't sound too negative. It's not all bad. It's going to be a great place once everything is finished.

Pictures to come.