Small Victories

BBF sometimes gets pretty tired of me saying "Let's fix this today." Most people relax by watching television, I guess.

Here's what I made him do with me today. We fetched Burmese puppets from my garage, went to the DIY store and found some anchors, and put these up in my little JC studio.

I love my Burmese puppets. 

Bike to Work Day

Burbank hosted its annual Bike and Walk to Work Day today. For me, that's just "going to work," but one of the three pit stops was in front of my office building, so I stopped in and browsed the public information tables set up by the police department, fire department, cycle advocacy groups, local hospital, and public transit info center.

I politely took flyers about buses I already know well, entered the drawing for a folding bike, and got some good swag--a little light clip for bike handlebars and a flashing reflector.

Then, at the far end of the gallery of tents, I saw a row of used bicycles.

A local nonprofit called Burbank Bike Angels had set these bikes up, and was accepting donations in exchange for them.

I studied the bikes carefully--a men's Specialized, several Schwinn bikes, lots of one-speeds.

There's a bike parking area in my new building's parking garage, but I'd barely ever ridden the last bike I'd had and was unlikely to ride one here. There aren't many bike lanes and this is car country.

"How much are the bikes?" I asked.

"Whatever you donate," was the response.

I took a flyer and went upstairs, where I spoke to one of the other group editors who had bought a bike six months ago and then never used it.

"That's exactly what would happen to me," I said.

But about five minutes later, I changed my mind, went downstairs, and gave the sixty dollars I had in my pocket over in exchange for a purple Schwinn.

I parked it on the bike rack in the office garage, and it was still there at the end of the day. Only now it had a note admonishing me to buy a lock. Ha. Okay. Thanks, anonymous person.

I rode the bike home at twilight down back streets, balancing on my inappropriately tall clogs while trying to stop my handbag from sliding down onto the handlebars.

Here is Red the purple bike, currently residing in my living room while awaiting a lock. I don't know how long I'll manage to keep this until it is stolen even WITH a lock, but at least I know where to get a new one for cheap.

Don't Ask Unless You Really Want an Answer

I sometimes get carried away with instructions.

In my defense, the electrician did ask where I wanted the lights to go.

Draw, Write, Color, and Edit Like a Girl

I wondered if maybe I was too heartbroken to ever post again after giving up my 1990 Ford Taurus.

But then I picked up Yancey at Burbank Bob Hope Airport yesterday morning, drove him around to signings for Free Comic Book Day, and now I feel a little better.

Farewell Old Friend

My car, Henry the Ford Taurus (1990), was running perfectly on the 15th anniversary of my acquisition of him.

I picked him up from my Jersey City garage late last night, directly from Newark Airport. I cleaned out my stuff this morning. Rocks Turbo dragged up from the bottom of canyons as we drove across the US in 2002. An old Haynes manual. The peace sign air freshener my sister left in the car in...2004? 2005? My E-Z Pass. Half a wooden kookaburra keychain. Fuzzy dice.

My car was waiting on Mr. Recycler to come and take him away to be smashed into steel. People said "Why don't you give him to someone," but it's worrying to hand off a 27-year-old car. Who would trust it? Others said "Why don't you donate it?" But you can only get Blue Book value on the donation, not even enough to worry about. The rear bumper alone could be sold for twice what the car is worth. Whatever...I didn't have time to fuss around, so I sold it outright to a recycling company.

I've had this car since April 23, 2002, and I bought it because it's a Taurus and I'm a Taurus, and buying a used car is such a crapshoot, you may as well use the zodiac.

The Aussie ex and I drove this car from Torrance to the East Village, and I've had it ever since. Henry the Ford stayed in my garage while I was in Kuwait, Egypt, Australia, Uganda, and spending ten months on the bus around the world. He went tent camping all over the US and visited every campground in NJ and VA for two separate books. I'd slept in the backseat a few times when I'd gotten too tired to keep driving.

I almost called the recycling company to cancel about 20 times. My car represents eras of my life. But then I'd remind myself that NJ insurance is $150 a month, and that's money I am spending to garage my car in Jersey City even though I live in California at the moment. I'd thought I'd drive it to LA, but after 23 months of living car-free, I knew I didn't need to spend a week driving 8-10 hours a day to get the car out West.

I felt guilty as hell for recycling him, and I kept reminding myself this is a hunk of steel, not a living being. But I didn't entirely believe it.

New Bamboo

Here are my new floors!

Getting them was crazy expensive, way beyond anything I had to pay back home just for refinishing hundred-year-old heart pine floors. If I had to do it again, I'd just go to Lumber Liquidators, get what's on sale and unlikely to last that long, and buy a table saw. How hard can it be? They can snap together if you buy the right kind.

I hired a professional off Yelp. It took me a few weeks to get there. I got an estimate from him initially and it was far too expensive, so I asked a guy working on a floor in a different unit in my complex. He was way more reasonable as he wasn't a company but rather the guy who did the actual work, but as I dug in and learned I needed to provide documentation including insurance to my HOA, and realized I couldn't take delivery of the floor personally without hiring some guys who stand near Home Depot looking for day labor, I came around to seeing the value of paying someone to run the whole thing. This isn't like when I worked at home. I can't hang around the house all day when managing a group in a deadline industry.

And the professional didn't do the work. His guys did the work. And he kept texting me "We" are doing this or that, and what he meant was "They" but I went along with it, because it seemed important to him that I believe he was somehow doing the actual work. He also asked me for a Yelp review at the end, as does everyone for everything now. I guess money isn't enough anymore.

He was incredibly keen to get paid--I can only imagine he's been stiffed in the past. Anyway, it made me nervous, like "What is he trying to hide about this floor?"

I liked the other guy a lot, but we had a communication issue. He texted me to call S&S Flooring for prices, because he couldn't speak English and I couldn't speak Spanish. That led me to a break-of-day trip to S&S Flooring on the LA side of the mountain, but that wasn't particularly promising, so I called the Valley one. The Valley one had a close-out of solid, real 5/8" bamboo (not the kind where it's on top of plywood or particle board) for $3.19 a square foot, so I jumped on that. Even the floor guy was surprised when the flooring showed up. I did real good.

Of course, I didn't really want bamboo. I'm worried about the fumes and I'd rather have proper hardwood, but a sale's a sale, and I have no plans to stay on this coast any longer than I have to, so bamboo it is.

The slate tile in the kitchen and dining area

Ask Me How I Know

Here's what 22 boxes of solid bamboo flooring looks like.

How Not to Buy a Ceiling Fan

1) Spend a week occasionally browsing online.

2) Spend a few days really digging around online.

3) Friday: make an appointment with an electrician to run the ceiling fan wiring on Wednesday morning. Realize you need a ceiling fan in a hurry. Dig around when you should be working, keep having to work instead, finally give up and decide to do it at home later.

4) Spend about half an hour looking online after getting home from buying a pendant ceiling light from IKEA. (Because I know how to party on Friday nights.)

5) Wake up Saturday morning and realize now that the floors will be bamboo, it would be nice to have bamboo ceiling fan blades. Quickly learn few of these exist, and after deciding it might be worth it to buy an expensive ceiling fan with bamboo blades, learn there is no way to have it by Wednesday morning.

6) Finally leave apartment when the agent trying to rent the place keeps bugging me to get in. Catch the La Brea bus to Lighting Expo. Be disappointed by the selection.

7) Stop at Orchard Hardware. Be disappointed by their selection.

8) Catch the next La Brea bus down to Pico. Walk to Lowe's. Decide maybe some of the Lowe's ceiling fans would be okay. Buy some WD-40 for the stiff mailbox lock.

9) Catch the La Brea bus to another disappointing light store. This one has a no photos policy, probably because they don't want word to get out their ceiling fan selection blows.

10) Stop for lunch.

11) Walk to Lamps Plus. See one you like--it's not in stock. But wait, there's one at the North Hollywood Lamps Plus, where you were last week!

12) Catch the La Brea bus to Sunset. Catch the Sunset bus to Home Depot. Nix all their ceiling fans.

13) Walk up to the Hollywood/Western Red Line. Take Red Line metro to North Hollywood.

14) Use some of the 18% left on your phone to learn the next bus from North Hollywood metro to North Hollywood Lamps Plus is not for 50 minutes.

15) Use some of the 17% left on your phone to get a Lyft to North Hollywood Lamps Plus.

16) Pick a ceiling fan that is not the one from La Brea, but is a completely different one, which is quite simple and you could have bought 40 times already.

17) Use some of the 12% left on your phone to catch a Lyft to Burbank.

18) Carry the ceiling fan from the Lyft to your condo, and then look at your phone, and learn from the 10% that if you leave RIGHT NOW, you can get the 155 bus to the Red Line.

19) Catch the 155 bus to the Universal Red Line.

 20) Catch the Red Line back over the mountain to Hollywood. Stop by Trader Joe's on the way home and glance at your phone--made it with 5% to go.

21) Later, wonder if maybe you should've just delayed the electrician and ordered the ceiling fan you wanted. It matches the new bamboo flooring you're getting delivered on Tuesday. Convinced yourself this is the right approach, and plan to return the one your purchased. Look up the one you wanted, click on options. Realize it's $500.

Maybe this was the right way to buy a ceiling fan after all. 

Closed

Tonight, I went by the hotel around the corner from my new condo and picked up the keys.

From the bartender. Also the seller's real estate agent. 

Of course. And of course the co-publisher knows him. Why not? 

The seller was there at the bar, talking with her neighbors and her brother. She hugged me and asked me to take care of her plant.

"This is my brother. He found the condo nine years ago, when they first went on sale. I got first choice. I said, do I want a condo over an alley? He said...yeah, but it's a Burbank alley."

Everyone laughed. Burbank is so tame compared to its big sibling to the south.

The seller's got ten years on me, so she'd decided to buy a Winnebago and leave her job. She's off to a park in Alaska where she'll be a campground host for the summer, then who knows. 

I know a bit about that sort of life, and it seems both like a distant memory and like something scary and strange. It's funny how I can switch from wandering the back roads of Cameroon and Borneo to trudging to work every day without too much angst.

Well, maybe a little. 

In Contract

I'm sorry I've been neglecting you, but I have news.

I'm in contract to buy a condo in Burbank. I wish I could buy a 1920s vintage place in Hollywood, but those are rentals, not condos, so I was left with choosing between a DTLA loft (bad commute), a tiny bungalow out in Sunland (too far from non-work stuff), and a lot of beige apartments with low ceilings, vertical blinds, and stucco. I chose the best of those on offer and somehow, my ability to pass as a normal human got me past the gatekeepers.

It's too expensive and I will need to pull up carpeting and get a floor installed. I kind of wish I'd held out for a value place by the metro. I'm trying to convince BBF to come out and change all the light fixtures and replace all the hanging things on walls with new hanging things. I'm going to have to pull up the tile and replace it in the half bath.

But this really seems to be happening. And I'll be able to walk to work.

I may be getting carried away with my dedication to my job.