Alien Visitation

This was probably not our best idea. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but then so did a lot of things in college..

So basically, we go to the bathroom and brush our teeth these days in a sci-fi version of a radioactive phone booth.



This particular photo is a bit exaggerated - the walls are actually the color of granny smith apples, and the ceiling is the color of cantaloupe. That sounds nice, right? Apples and melon? Also there's some banana yellow in there that you can't see in this shot.

This bathroom is so gross and depressing, we thought we'd paint it a cheerful color. Or two. Or three, really, because apples, bananas and cantaloupe are all good, right? We'll take this nasty depressing space and cheer it right up with a fruity mix!

Er, actually, no.

It turns out, our logic was akin to, "well, I like wine AND beer AND whiskey, so why not throw them all in a glass together? It'll be GREAT!"

We experienced similar nauseous results. We actually really have to repaint the place because we just can't be in there for more than a minute or two without wanting to hurl.

In the grand scheme of things, we could have made much bigger mistakes. But hey, there's still time.

The Only Thing I Care About At All

This is our bed. As of this afternoon, it is located in our new apartment. It has sheets on it and it is ready to receive my exhausted body.

And that is the only thing I care about.










This is a second view of the same room. As you can see, it is full of crap. Crap that will not be put away today. Crap that will remain mutely piled against walls and blocking fire egress until I'm good and ready to get out of the aforementioned bed.



There is one other thing that I care about a little bit, and that is the DVD of Harry Potter and the Order Of the Phoenix, which Katherine and I will rent and watch this evening, accompanied by not a little bit of wine, while we ignore the towering piles of crap to be unpacked. These are the rewards of being an adult and not incarcerated - if I choose to ignore duty and instead watch a dumb movie and get slightly drunk, then goddamn if that's not what I'm going to do. Happy moving day!

Moving! Really!

We are moving in, folks ... tomorrow. (Technically, that is today!) We all thought the day would never come, especially after we found that the plaster of the ceiling (the ceiling immediately above our bed, by the way) was sagging -- but that's another story for another blog post. The day is here (almost). By the time you read this, there will be furniture and boxes and another huge mess in the parlor.

Take a look at what we've finally gotten to. Our parlor is painted, and largely free of debris and heavy equipment.









And the kitchen! We have countertops (we tiled them ourselves, with salvage from the smashed-down wall). We have shelves. We have a functional stove. We have a clean, painted sink area.





We have countertops. (I know I already said that but I haven't had this much counterspace in my kitchen since ... well, ever, if you don't count the house I grew up in.) Compare this, my friends, to what we had just a few days ago. (It looks like there's an alien visitation happening in the bathroom, on the far left, but that's just ... well, that's another blog post for another day. Suffice it to say, it's not actually radioactive.)

And the Walls Come A-Tumblin' Down

We are finally getting to knock stuff down in our own apartment! We're not knocking down as much, because we are preparing to move in and then we'll redo the place. (That may not seem like a logical order in which to do things, but as with so much in this house, logic gives way to necessity.)

I got to tear down this completely weird and unnecessary wall that was bisecting the kitchen.





First I stripped off the tile and sheetrock, whereupon I discovered, to my surprise, that the wall had been constructed with an actual frame, studs and everything. Shocking.

It's actually much easier to take something apart when it's been constructed more or less competently.





When we got the whole thing down, we found that our kitchen is HUGE. Which makes you wonder why anyone would ... No, we've already determined, we cannot ask that question in this house, for that way madness lies.