Tuesday Night - Bowling Night

Tuesday night, bowling night. And a good night it was. See for yourself.

Dieter : 209 - 150 - 192 = 551(average 183.6)

Me      : 182 - 174 - 180 = 536 (average 178.6)

I was very pleased.

When we came home the cats got their dinner, we had some dinner, we watched an episode of ‘Castle’ and then ... then the moment we had been dreading came ... giving Gabriel his eye ointment.

Earlier in the day I had tried sneaking up on him while he was sleeping, but the little bugger saw me coming with the tube and legged it where I couldn’t follow him, under my bed.

Tonight we made it a two man job. Dieter held Gabriel and I approached from behind. Gabriel is smart, but I’m smarter.
There was some wiggling and squirming, but I managed to get the ointment in his eye.

His eye already looks a lot better. There is no more redness and the swelling is gone.

A visit to the vet

Have you ever tried given a cat medication? If you have you know what a battle it can be.

Gabriel has an eye infection and even though some type of human eye medication was recommended to me to treat the condition, I rather played it safe and took him to the vet.

In his carrier, in the cab, he cried all the way there. At home he hardly says a ‘word’ but now he recited a whole dictionary.

At the vet Gabriel turned into a little angel. He didn’t mind being examined and he didn’t protest one little bit when the doctor put the ointment in his eye.

I thought administering the ointment myself was going to be a breeze. Yeah right.

When I tried to put the medication in his eye, he wiggled and squirmed, kicked and slapped me and generally turned into a little lion that wouldn’t be tamed.

He’s supposed to get that medication three times a day for the next seven days. Perhaps the vet should have sent a team of nurses along to help me with this task.

I’ll try again when he’s sleeping. Maybe I’ll have better luck then.

Can real estate agents read?

We had some excitement this morning.

While having breakfast I suddenly heard the sound of dripping water on the balcony. Was it raining? No, it was our upstairs neighbor’s balcony leaking water for some reason.

This has happened before, but not as severe as this morning. On previous occasions there was just a bit of dripping of water. At the time I thought our neighbor was watering his plants and our balcony was the recipient of a little excess.

This morning it was quite different. The dripping changed into pouring and what pooled on the balcony floor wasn’t clear, but soapy water. To the best of my knowledge nobody tends to their flowers with soap and water. Within no time my balcony flowers were ‘knee deep’ in the soapy stuff and it was time to do something.

I considered going upstairs and asking my neighbor what was going on, when I remembered going up there to ask him to stop banging on the walls at all hours of the day.
His reply at the time was ‘Shut up’, followed by slamming the door in my face.

So, this time I played it smart ... I called the superintendent of our building and he could take care of the soapy problem.

The super took one look at the flooded balcony and went straight upstairs. Minutes later the downpour stopped.
Problem solved. No idea what caused it though.


As for an update on the real estate problem ... I'm wondering about estate agents' intelligence.

Now that we are in the market for a new place to live, I went on the Remax and Centure 21 websites and completed their little questionnaire regarding what kind of new property we are looking for.

I selected condos, townhouses, lofts and houses as possibilities, with the must have of: A/C, close to public transportation and pets allowed. Within 24 hours a representative of Century 21 sent me a message with two possible condos he found.
Both of them had no A/C, were miles away from public transportation and had a no pets allowed policy.

Makes you kind of wonder, doesn’t it.

Moving time

Well, the shit has hit the fan. The real estate shit that is. We’re gonna have to move soon.

I got a call from our landlord this morning, announcing that he is planning on selling our condo. We’re just having no luck.

Ten years ago we came to the building and moved in in unit 504. A little over a year later the landlord sold the place.

In the same building we moved to unit 402. A little over a year later the landlord sold the place.

From there we moved, still in the same building, to unit 502. A little over a year later the landlord ... you guessed it, sold the place.

That’s when we moved into the unit we are in now. In this unit we’ve been for about 6 years, but now, now it’s selling time again.

Damn it and we just recently fixed the place up. We painted everywhere and modernized the kitchen.

The building is far from ideal, but over the years it’s become home.

It also has a very convenient location. Within walking distance of the subway station, close to stores, close to the bowling alley and everything else we need.

It’s not moving that worries me, it’s the price of rental units. At the price we’re renting now, we’ll never find anything similar.

We’re considering buying the place, that way we’ll never have to move again, but do we really want to do that? Over the years the quality of residents in this building has gone down and the management and Board of Directors are far from ideal.

Along with the downsides, the building does have some good points. The units are large and the balconies are enormous.
We’ve seen other condos in the past and my goodness, in comparison those are shoeboxes.

What will the future bring? The real estate future that is.

My first e.book

Beautiful, isn’t it? And they say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.

This is not the type of book I usually buy, my favorite authors are: Maeve Binchy, Sheila O’Flanagan, Marian Keyes, Penny Vinchenzi, Santa Montefiore, Joy Fielding, Erica James, Maureen Lee, Janet Evanovitch and Dan Brown, but since I am switching to e.books to read on the iPad I wanted to try something.

Plus, I got a promotional email from Kobo today, advertizing books for as little as 99 cents. I have to admit, I love a bargain, so this was an offer I couldn’t pass up.

So far so good, the story is a little old fashioned, but it’s entertaining enough.
Plus I have an interview at 12:00 on Monday and a doctor’s appointment at 2:00, so I need something to read on the train and in the waiting room.

Reading on the iPad is quite nice.
The reader has a choice in displaying the book pages in white, cream or black. I prefer cream, softer on the eyes than white. The reader also has the option of different types of font sizes. Nice as even with bifocals I have trouble seeing small letters.

That’s not all I use the iPad for of course, but that’s a story for another day.

For now I leave you with a story of a time when I was a complete idiot. I mean, you have to read it to believe it ... http://www.helium.com/items/1353582-janet-evanovich

Good bowling

Today being Tuesday we went bowling tonight.

Dieter: 199 – 163 – 134
Me: 213 – 157 – 178

I did pretty good hu.
I was a little ticked off though. In the first game I left the 10th frame open. If I had closed it I could have had a 223 or even a 233.
Still, I was very pleased.

On a different note ... the court case that was to be (re. the A/C in our condo) is not to be. Dieter asked me not to go through with it.

I got notified today that the court date is set for August 20 (small claims court) but Dieter thinks it’s too risky.

The future of our condo hangs in the balance as it is (landlord wants to change management companies) and with this complaint, he might just want to sell.

I agreed because quite frankly I don’t want to be blamed. Suppose the landlord wants to sell, then it will always be a case of ... what if we hadn’t complained?

As Dieter said, it’s not the landlord’s fault or our management’s company’s fault that the A/C malfunctioned, it’s the management of this building’s fault and its Board of Directors.

I can see his point, so I agreed.
But as I said to him ... this is exactly why people put up with all kinds of shit, fear.

A resolution for August

I’m taking a break.

My goal this month is to write three article per day. This may seem easy to you, but judging by past experiences this will be tough for me.
Some days I manage two or three articles per day, most days I only manage one.

Too many things get in the way: sleeping, emails, looking at job sites and applying for positions, commenting on forums, spending time on Facebook, tending to my farm on Farmville, tending to my garage at Car Town ... you know what I mean. Playing is nicer than working.

I also lose a lot of time looking for suitable titles to write to. If I had titles all mapped out for me, that would definitely save time.

Gosh what did I ever do before the computer and especially the Internet came along? I remember those days, I was bored.
I would wander through the house, looking for something to do.

I remember knitting, I knitted one sweater after another. I remember crocheting, needle pointing and even doing some bead work. It’s a good thing I lost interest in that, because my eyes aren’t anymore what they used to be.

And then I got my first computer and everything changed. How long ago? Well, let me put it this way. The boy in the picture is Dieter and he is thirty now.



I was so pleased with my new friend. I even wrote an article about him.

http://www.helium.com/items/1710827-unlikely-friendships