The blog of the thirty-something fag- December 2005 Edition
December 30th, 2005

It's Not the CIA, is it?
Bang is snoozing quietly next to me, we're back aboard jet blue flight 382, heading west from Dulles(Washington D.C.) back to Long beach. I was on the east coast on a mixture of business and pleasure. It's top secret, so I can't tell you why I was here or what I was doing. I can tell you, however that it involves a certain agency that is typically known by it's acronym, involving three letters.

 Seriously, I spent four days eating.

Step on it Nubi- we'll miss the early bird special!
I spent the week with the inlaws in VA, getting together for breakfast, lunch and dinner. If it's one thing my inlaws know how to do is eat, and we never saw the same restaurant twice, it was like we were on a running tour of the best Asian food and all-you-can-eat buffets Virginia has to offer. We didn't leave an eatery without planning our next conquest, I left my bib on between meals, stopping just long enough to change clothes, pee and jet to the next table.

In the meantime, I worked on various publishing projects while my partner and his sister took advantage of all the post-Christmas sales the D.C. area had to offer.
I took a break yesterday to get a hair cut and a manicure- Seriously, I had my nails "Done".
I'm a little indifferent to how I feel about it. It was strange typing last night and being aware of the wet-glossy glimmer of my nails. I felt strangley feminine, but not in a bad way. I guess I've said too much, I'll shut up about this now.

This morning's flight left at 7: 20, so if you fly, you can do the math and know we had to rise at 4 a.m. (?) Mostly because there's one shower and four people going to the airport and I'm a neurotic freak about being on time. How long will it be before I get used to getting up before the sun. For the hundreth time in a row this year I caught myself just before saying as stupid as "oooh, it's still dark out!"

Overall we had a great time, I think Bang and I travel well together, and his Familyis so sweet and nice to me. I do miss the babies (Rusty and Mickey) and I'm happy knowing that the highland Park Animal Hospital took good care of them, walked them daily, and will have them all bathed and clean when we pick them up this afternoon.

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December 24ht, 2005

Hold That Hammer!
Not like it's the end of the world or anything, but our deck project is temporarily on hold due to some small issues involving , of all things, the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety. We will resume our coverage of "Deck Project 2006" as well as the ongoing saga of "The Great Wall of Mayo" after the new year, when our contractor returns from the east coast.

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December 21st, 2005

Happy Winter Solstice . . .
Today is supposed to be the shortest day of the year, but it's been a long one for me. I've been working a photo/video shoot in San Diego today and yesterday, and I am just flat-out pooped. The day is over so off I go with my luggage, camera bag full of film and sore feet back to the Amtrak station in Solano Beach. I'm headin' North, back to L.A. and home. Its 7:10 and I'm blogging a train dispatch, somewhere between Oceanside and Fullerton.

About that Job Site . . .
I promised you home-reno updates, so here's the latest: As I mentioned before, I practically had to harasss the contractor daily just to get our deck project on to his "To Do" list, and now we're seeing the fruits of those efforts. It took so much work getting to this point that the actual process of building the deck seems to be going extremely fast and the effect on me is anticathartic.

That Floors me!
Ive been out of town this week on business but Bang tells me the crew installed decking material to the surface today, that means we have something to stand on, and that's good. Up until now I have been dying to stand out on the edgr of those rafters and take in the view, now I'm told I can when I get home. That'll be nice :)
Now were' looking into rail designs.

The Great Wall of Mayo- Revisited
Earlier this week, Luis was putting the finishing touches on the wall with stucco- looking good. I had no idea how much better this wall would look with a stucco surface, and I'm pleasantly surprised. We may not need to bury it in creeping fig and Ivy afterall. Perhaps I can avoid the intermittent waves of embarrassment I have been preparing myself for.

How's it Do that??
The old hot water heater was replaced with a new, tankless system. It heats the water instantly as it passes through, and as one can imagine, it saves a lot of energy. I'm just happy it looks better than the old version, which will now heat water in Daniel's house- Feliz Navidad!
Out goes the old one
New one- shiny!
The new stucco surface

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December 15th, 2005

"But why?" You ask?
We're working dligantly to build a deck on the north side of our house so we can more easily enjoy sunsets reflecting off the foothills as represented in this image

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Stunnning, just stunning!

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December 14th, 2005

They're BA-ACK!
The crew from cornerstone construction is back on the scene, and once again, digging holes in the property to assure a strong and safe foundation for the new addition to our home. As usual I was a little freaked out, it took twice as much effort and time just to get the contractor to fit me into his schedule than is currently scheduled to build the freakin deck. Tell me Allanis, is that not ironic?

Daniel and his crew of Latino-banditos showed up around 9, smiling and waving and I knew immediately that Daniel once again, was the only one on the team I was going to be able to communicate with without overly expressive hand-gestures and on-the-spot dialect-ables (aka pig-latin-o).
It was only about a half hour into their work when I came flying out of the house all a twitter to inform them, that whatever it was they were doing they were doing all wrong.

Daniel was not on site, apparently out shopping, and no one left on the crew had a manual for how to handle me. They stared and scratched their heads as I tried my dangest to get my point accross, but no luck. It's not their fault I'm American mono-lingual, and it never occurred to me to take a class so I could have a better edge when working with the hired help.

Praise Cheeses for Luis, who was there to non-chalantly fill Daniels' compadres(aka Danny's boys) in on what I was micro-managing them about. I had my doubts he was repeating my wishes verbatim when I noticed he rolled his eyes when gesturing toward me. Surprisingly Danny's boys knodded their heads in unison and that thing got done right this time. Hoorah, Cervesa for Everyone!

Today we successfully moved some lumber into the yard and dug five holes before quitting time. Tomorrow we may mix cement, who knows?

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December 9th, 2005

About that small print . . .
Mr. C called and asked me to meet him at Wells FArgo in Pasadena so he could award me with my settlement check. "Why" I asked, "You can just drop a check in the mail. Do you need my address?"(Being the prevvious resident since 1979, I was giving Mr. Coleman freedom to experience this question as a smart assed remark at its fullest possible value) 'No" he went on, missing the high-point of my day,"I want to have your receipt notorized". "fine" I said, and made plans to meet him at 10:00 a.m.

At 10:45 he showed up all frazzled, and we rode the lift to the 7th floor to his notaries office. When he pulled out the reciept he wanted me to sign, he ha cleverly written a fornm, basically stating that by accepting this check, I relinquish all judgements against him. When I asked him to remove that line from the form, he collected the check, scooped up the paprework, and headed for the door, mumbling "That's o.k., I'll apppeal!"
I was as flabbergasted as the notary, who didn't apppreciate having his business time wasted.

I called Mr. C Saturday to see if we could try again, and we agreed to do a repeat on Monday. 'I will sign whatever you like Mr. Coleman" I said, and he liked that.
Of course, signing this meant I could never sue him for non-disclosure again, in case something new with the house comes up, but then again, I'm not the only person who lives here . . .

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December 5th, 2005

Homo-improvement
Bang has been talking about draping the rooms in the house from floor to ceiling ever since he saw it done tastefully in one of the home improvement shows we enjoy so much. I have been talking about ideas for covering up the air conditioner and power cords that are sticking out over the bed in our room. It's unsightly, and if I have to use a phrase, "Very Ghetto!"
One day, chocolate and peanut butter came together in the most unusual way. One trip to Ikea, I hung the harware, Bang sewed the curtains, and Voila! Both our joys are realized! Dontcha just love teamwerk!


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December 4th, 2005

Contractor contracted a contract

On November 3rd I called my contractor and asked him to come over to my house and scope out the plasce for a new deck. He said he'd try to get there the next day.
I called him every day, sometimes twice a day and within 2 weeks I finally got him to come over and scope out the property to give me what I want.
He told me he'd have a contract to me within a week, but that didn't happen. I called every day for three weeks, and it took the first two to get him to commit to sitting down in his own office and writing up the contract. Contract written, I called daily to see if he could squeeze in 15 minutes to bring it over with a payment schedule. "I have Money!" I said "I can write you a check right away!" Apparently that wasn't the issue.
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday- No luck- too busy, not in my part of town. I kept smiling, kept calling and asking. Even when my neighbor asked for the number of a good contractor, I gave this guys card to him. "Good luck nailing him down though" I said, "He's really Busy!"

Thursday morning I called to see if this was my lucky day, and it wasn't, but he promises me he'll come over with the contract around 10 on Friday!
"Great!" I said, "You're certain?"
"Yes" he assured me, "I'm seeing your neighbor across the street tomorrow at 9:30 about a little job, and I'll come see you when I'm done there"


Will someone please tell me what the hell just happened?

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December 3rd, 2005

Kill Tommy, Kill Kill!

Dennis clowning- Oops!
Every time I'm presented with a decision where the outcome might inch me a little closer to obtaining my dream deck, I make it without a second thought.Our grapefruit tree's removal was one such decision, and it is time to drop the AXE. It was scheduled for horizontalization this past weekend, and I was determined to keep the appoinment.

The Mayo street flora-butcher
Dennis (cousin Marni's husband) showed up at 10:05 on Sunday morning with a truck, chainsaw, oil, rope, gloves and the intention of taking down a grapefruit tree. I suppose Marni never saw Dennis do this, and probably thinks he stands at the base and chops at it until it topples, because if she saw how he climbed a ladder and precariously perched himself in this tree, reaching out for branches to saw off with one hand, she'd be freaking out loud, clubbing him over the head and locking him in the shed on weekends. Personally, I'm taking a life insurance policy out on him.

Before you start hating me . . .
This grapefruit tree was a problem in a few ways: Ants loved it, the dropped fruit attracted swarms of fruit flys, the squirrels, rats and Possum feasted, and mostly, it was in my way. The dang thing had to go.
The smell of gasoline, 3-stroke engine fumes, and the whining scream of the saw took me back in time to a small town in NNY where most of the year is snow-covered and wet, and snowmobiles are as necessary as cars.
Yes, the destruction of living, breathing nature makes me all weepy for the nostalgia of my youth.

Dennis cut the fruit tree from the top down, and buy the time he got down to the stump, the back yard looked like a battlezone from the war of emoticons, all these round yellow balls scattered all over the yard. So sad.

He wore out his chainsaw blade getting the stump as flat as he possibly could, then we both loaded up our respective trucks and hauled the remains to the dump in North Hollywood (aka: The smelliest place on earth)

My neighbor Joeseph was not too happy I killed yet another living thing in his life, but he shut-up when I handed him a 20lb bag of fresh grapefruit.

Can we start building our deck now?

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December 1st, 2005

The Marge Event

Margie came over for dinner last week, and we had a great time. Aside from being the first of my Mom's generation to visit the house, she's also the second from the San Diego crowd to make it up. Marni and Dennis made it up in October.
I don't look at Aunt MArge as one of my old-lady aunts (though shes well into her eighties), she more like a fun gal we like to party with, never slows us down, always good for a laugh or a beer, and you can say just about anything in front of her and she doesn't blush. Gotta love that!

Hopefully we'll be having Margie up regularily in the future.

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