here's to the new year

let us applaud the financial upswing of the new (fiscal/lease/school) year, starting september 1. i just received a small annual raise (my first, ever, haha) and, though nothing like a big promotion or new job, it feels pretty cool.

all of this, of course, is offset by many financial stumbles i've had recently dealing with credit card payments and overdrafts. bah. due to a chinese superstition, i'm unable to get rich because my fingers don't snugly nestle up with each other when i put my hands together, so money will always slip through my fingers.

but to cover that for next year, i've practically given myself a small raise as well by moving into a 2 br with omar. that cuts rent by almost half from what i was paying before. true, i've gone back to roommate living after a quiet year of owning 100% of the personal space of the apartment i lived in, but i think it should be fine. we'll get along great, we'll have more room to decorate/furnish, i'll actually have a kitchen and back yard, and we'll have a KITTEH!!

the housewarming party will be additional fun because of our slanted east cambridge floors.

hunting season

apartment hunting, that is. we've started the mad dash to find a place to call home - and right now, that place could be anywhere. but now, being a current cambridge resident, i am receiving as many calls, if not more, from realtors as i am making calls to realtors. and the hardest part is knowing that the apartment i've loved for the past year is going to become someone else's getaway...and that i might not be able to find anything better.

but it's always important to move on and look toward the future. my motivation is primarily financial - i want to find a cheaper apartment that is as good as my current one. that'll be hard to find, considering the lucky central location to work (shuttle), mit taekwondo, cw taekwondo, and alicia's apartment. and the fortuitous existence of a window pseudo-balcony that allows me to indulge in my container gardening needs. but the lack of a real kitchen, the hope that i can miraculously find a city apartment with a sunny, rich garden, and the hope for hardwood floors without large cracks in it, keeps me searching.

looking back on it, maybe a few unfortunate parking accidents and bike thefts are the only scars that mar my memory of 456 putnam. but i'd like more - more luxury, more convenience, more financial freedom - hopefully without the costs. maybe i will sacrifice a bit of location, but i'm sure to find new things to love about the next apartment. moving on goes hand in hand with moving out...but maybe the next place will be a place where i can finally stop moving.

and look - here is my current place on craigslist!

infestation

any pretense that the world you live in could be clean is an illusion. that nice white apartment wall? look closely and you'll probably see either a swarm of fruit flies or mosquitoes sitting there, wondering just as much as you how they got there.

the damn puddle outside my window is the cause of my latest insect infestation. since it rained a few weeks ago and the roof outside my window was flooded, there have been probably millions of mosquitoes breeding. and each time i've opened my window, or turned on a fan, i guess i'd been sucking in hundreds of mosquitoes. ugh. today i noticed that the spots on my wall were tens of the tiny bugs...and now i've gotten so used to seeing them that each time i see a dark speck, i reach for a newspaper, a shoe, or just a wad of tissue paper.

i must have squished 15 earlier this evening, before i found my pants on the ground, covered in the corpses of the ones that had died of starvation. i hope that they all swarmed and died in the same area...otherwise, my floor is covered in mosquito exoskeletons. then as i got ready for bed, i killed maybe another 15. funny, i guess they were all male, because i don't think i've been bitten yet. (knock on wood)

of course, i had already come up with a great solution to catch the fruit fly swarms that infested my trashcan and my dirty plates. now, all i need is a similar trap...maybe a gatorade bottle with a sack of blood inside?

this monday

this morning i had a near runin with the towing and cambridge parking nazis again. i was looking to park the car near my house when i realized that it was around the 2nd monday of the month, and the spaces that were all untaken were probably due to eventual street cleaning. then i looked at my phone to check the date: 7-19...but that's the third monday, for sure? maybe july 4th didn't count? fortunately some neighbor confirmed it and i spend another 10 minutes finding another spot. i really hope my car is still there when i return.

then i looked at my watch and it was now 7-25. or, rather, 7:25 am. so it was the 2nd monday after all.

on the other hand, my tech + superstition makes it a good day:



ba ba ba - fa fa fa!!

damn cambridge parking

i was too unassuming. july 1 - leave for airport at 4:30 am. park car near alicia's apartment, after using it to pick up a hogu that i left at home. july 2 - no parking sign goes up. i compete at nationals. july 3 - goddamn tow company takes away my car. july 4 - 7: each night i am charged $20 for car storage.

this is the second time my car was towed. sometimes i think it's a sign that having a car in cambridge is more trouble than it's worth. of course, sometimes you really really have to have a car, and that really makes it worth maintaining through the rest of the year. but i wonder why, of all the luck, did i have to park in one of the two spots that ended up becoming no park zones, when i was so careful to find the right place to park my car on street? the only sliver of redemption is that i might have gotten it broken into if it wasn't towed, and if i keep telling myself that, or that my plane could have simply crashed on the way to nationals, then there is a silver lining.

vacation

the vacation starts! after today, there's free access to burgers and milk shakes, food at 3 pm and 11 pm, and beer. tomorrow: the last day i will have some sort of abs, and ability to kick well, then chicago. this best western is the nicest one i've stayed in, with a huge pool and jacuzzi and some quality framed decor on the walls, and fresh warm cookies. i had one yesterday after cutting weight.